A towering spire of gravity-defying frozen blood beckons adventurers to plumb its depths. Lurking within its sanguine walls is the black IOUN stone, protected by vat-birthed monstrosities and the ghost of a long-dead magician. The Sorcerer’s Tower of the Sanguine Slant is a level 2 adventure for DCC’s Dying Earth. It’s a fantastic adventure that can really showcase what a weird DE style wizard tower is like. I know that some folks don’t care for the Vancian verbosity or somewhat higher level of complexity that exists in DCC DE, but the adventures are all so great and flexible enough that you can easily run them in regular DCC. Anyway, let’s get to this review!
The Adventure - An Overview
The adventure starts off with a few possible adventure hooks as to why the PCs would take up this quest. These are all pretty decent and you can tailor them to your group. The backstory section isn’t too long and does a good job at describing the pre-existing conflict between Kolghut and Padavona that the PCs find themselves getting involved in. Essentially, Kolghut is trapped in a ghost form and his wizard tower is on auto-pilot (but is only accessible once every 112 years). His hope is that someone else comes and “feeds” the IOUN stone, thus allowing him a chance at possessing their body forever.
Entering the wizard tower requires the small sacrifice of blood (1 hp or 1 physical ability score damage) to create a “blood door” of sorts. The tower is primary a corridor (connected by a weird magic tube elevator) with lots of side rooms. There’s no interconnectivity on the map, but there is thematic interconnectivity. Exploring the side rooms allows the PCs to gather a lot of information that comes in useful later on, and find valuable items.
The most memorable rooms from my adventure (a 6-hour long con one-shot; this could easily be a couple sessions of adventure) include:
Area 2-1 - The Library
Run by a bound sandestin named Yedwe. He has a whole sidebar dedicated to portraying him! Library rules must be followed and there’s a “no check-out” policy. You can simply roleplay and be clever, but it’s possible for this to turn into a difficult combat.
Area 3-1 - The Vat Chamber
There’s a major puzzle here. Whoever donated blood to enter this palce has been cloned! Plus you can try to figure out how to reconstruct Padavona, or simply use the machines to heal any vat-thing PCs. PCs will have to gather “ingredients” and information from various places in the tower to accomplish the puzzle.
If the PCs reconstruct Padavona before “completing the adventure” by fighting Kolghut, then Padavona can give them lots of useful info. Afterwards, he might even become their patron!
Area 3-3 - The Miniscule Habitarium
There’s a bunch of little dudes who live here. They want a book from another room. Parlay about it or fight about it.
Area 4 is where Kolghut used to live. His bedroom has a bunch of bad lady clones who want the PCs to dance (and you must do it well) or it’s combat. Of course, the PCs can also find a new spell here (and other places that I’ve neglected to mention too). Another room has a blood pool with one of the Eyes of the Overworld. Another room has an puzzle based around a statue of Kolghut. It’s a complex puzzle that requires a lot of cleverness or meaningful roleplay with intelligent creatures found elsewhere here. Then we got another room with a statue puzzle, but this time the puzzle is rather easy to solve. Good thing too, but it leads to the “final encounter”.
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Here the PCs must do battle with Kolghut’s spirit. Despite it just being one opponent in a fairly blank room, the description takes a full spread. This is in part due to Kolghut’s stat block (large due to various abilities), but also his combat strategy, info on if PCs touch the IOUN stone or Kolghut possesses the PCs, various methods that the PCs might use on Kolghut, and a description of the magic items found here. It’s a lot going on.
Summary
This is a great adventure! It’s got a lot going on, so the judge needs to fully read the adventure to grok it but it’s wort it to me. I do wish that the map was somewhat more Jaquays’d but I understand it’s hard within a “tower” unless you start using some non-Euclidian geometry. The actual things found within the adventure offer a variety of challenges: roleplay, puzzle solving, and combat. It’s a little too big for a typical convention game, but definitely run through this one if you’ve got the chance!
Have you playing this one? What’s your favorite adventure from the Dying Earth adventure line?
What else is going on?
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