Hey guys,
I'm brand new to this site and these forums, so pardon any bumbling mistakes (I don't even know if I have this in the correct subforum).
I've been brewing a campaign for well over a decade, it started off in 2nd edition and made a transition to 3e about 5 or 6 years ago. My group takes very long breaks - a hiatus can last several months at a time, as we are all adults *cough* now, with grownup lives and responsibilities.
One such break was so long I feared we would never finish my magnum opus that I've been constructing for so long. I packed away alot of my books and also lost several of the files I had written on the grand culmination of the campaign.
The story ends with a daring infiltration of Khin-Oin - the tower of the yugoloths in the Gray Waste of Hades. I know for the most part what I want to do with the encounters within, but I have very little idea of how I should challenge them on getting to the tower itself. They are traveling to Hades via a portal on the Infinite Staircase they discovered waaaay back around level 5 or 6. Not knowing any better, they entered and were soundly thrashed by a small group of mezzoloths tasked with guarding this doorway. I'd like them to fight those very same mezzoloths again (now at level 16) simply to illustrate how far they've progressed over this lengthy odyssey - I don't believe every fight needs to put them on death's door. This one is purely for their enjoyment to feel how strong they are now comparitively.
After that one scripted encounter, I don't have much else. As I said, much of my material is scattered/lost. I know they have to make periodic Will saves vs. the omni-present doom-and-gloom of the realm, but what other challenges can I present them with? A roving warband of devils or demons, strays from a Blood War battle? A depressing encounter with a shade that has almost "given up the ghost" and merged into the hoplessness of the plane? How about those birds that once they draw blood, keep following you around until you are drained dry? Not Simpathetics.... what are the other evil crow-like birds in Hades... crap where are all my PS Monster Manuals?
How about just getting around in Oinos? If anyone's ever read the Dragonlance "Legends" series, I like how they detail moving in Hades (which they mistakenly refer to as the Abyss) as more a matter of willpower than physical locomotion. I might implement something like that, after the PCs trudge around for several hours and then turn to see their portal less than a hundred yards behind them.
Ok, enough rambling. I'm just looking for any ideas/inspirations for a Hades adventure before they get to their final destination.
Something short that they can do on the way? Well, if they encounter one of those near-hopeless souls, they might be moved to get him to the nearest portal -- to anywhere, maybe even Gehenna or Carceri -- before he gives up the ghost entirely. Now, that's a pretty simple task, so to complicate things, there could be a few additions. Maybe this is an evil basher. Maybe it would be better if you let the Waste take this one? Or are you willing to escort the dangerous berk around until you find a portal to Carceri and force him through, thereby using the Red Prison's ability to contain such folk? (This could lead straight out of Khin-Oin if this is a prisoner or other mortal freed or released during whatever the players were there to do.)
A wandering hag offers to trade. Bizarrely, she's honest about her goods: she buys and sells cursed items. Some of them are, after all, useful under carefully-chosen conditions, or to the right buyer.
If you're looking for general conditions, Oinos is infested with all manner of disease and plague (and the Blood War), and undead are free-willed and evil on the layer. The players might cross path with a tomb complex in which a priest of one of the darker Egyptian powers has been experimenting with the plane's properties to produce a new and potent form of mummy rot -- a contagious one! He even has some humans around to serve as experimental subjects and guards: one of the early variants he produced instills the subject with a deep sense of rage or hatred, something suitable for vengeance against tomb robbers and also effective against the emotion-draining of the Waste. For those that are desperate to avoid pale grey depression, hatred's red glow is at least something.
The players could be directed there by chance in their travels, come across a victim who managed to flee and tells them about the place, or be contacted remotely by an off-plane investigator who found out about the priest's activities and performed powerful divinations to find nearby troubleshooters of good character who could put a stop to his researches before he releases carrier mummies into the Planes, along with broadcasting the recipe to pyramid constructors. (He figures a few innocent victims are a small price to pay for people learning that tomb-robbers are to be shunned not only as cursed but as plague-carriers. It's for the best!)