Bloodworms

Posted on February 7, 2025 in Steel-Realms

Bloodworms are a disgusting creature that is bred in the Dark Lands by the Orrish trap master all over. It is a key ingredient in Wormblat and creating a Fecund Swarm. Individually they are relatively harmless, though aggressive and will latch on like a lamprey and drain blood slowly.

This creature is part of the Steel Realms Bestiary, but is uniquely associated with the Orrish in the Dark Lands.

The worms are raised in a bed of offal and blood, and rituals are spoken over them by the trap masters as they play a torturous bone whistle or pipe. unholy water is added as well as flesh from the dead. The worms grow to 25cm in length, and have a toothed mouth.

The Blood Vurms were originally created by Gorvyrm, Master of the Blood Vurms. Some of their stock was once stolen from the The Fields of Blood by the Orrish to create their Bloodworm pits.

Orrish Trap Masters

Posted on February 7, 2025 in Steel-Realms

The Orrish are well known for their use of traps. This is a known element when dealing with them, and when exploring their lairs and camps (even outside the Dark Lands), it is prudent to take time and care whenever maneuvering through them. There is a role within their society that amounts to a ‘Orrish Trap Master‘ – proficient in creating all manner of traps and tricks with a crew of attendants learning and assisting as part of the Orrish Fighting Forces. There is no signifier for this that has ever been seen – i.e. one cannot tell a goblin trap master from a normal raider. For a goblin raiding party, much of what they do is improvised. Within a group, each one carries crude trinkets, baubles, and materials that the trap master can use, that accumulates as they raid places and get materials. In addition to the normal damage and inconveniences, the trap master also specialize in the making of Wormblat and using materials in The Underlands.

Poisons: Making Wormblat: The care of and use of Blood Worms in making Wormblat is mostly left to the trap masters. Additionally, there can be Carrion crawler mucous, if crawlers are present.

Common Trap Elements

Razor Web from the Spiders of Go-Zen

Stone Caltrops: These are often in a corridor covered with flat plates of stone than will sustain weights of under 100 lbs and break under more.

Breath Stealer Spore Traps: These are small mushrooms that are cultivated mostly by the goblins of the Orrish. They are covered in a dirt brown cap. Cooking them in Orrish urine is enough to make them edible to goblins. Patches are planted then pulled from a patch and placed so that they are nearly unseen and a fleeing goblin can trigger them behind them as they run past. Any character passing through the 5 ’cube of spore clouds without covering their mouth will have a chance of asphyxiation.

• The character must make a DC 10 Constitution check or their throat will constrict. They will take 4 damage and a measure of Exhaustion right away. Unless they rinse their throat with alcohol (wine, beer) or a specific antidote, they will rake 4 damage per round and not be able to use any measure of Concentration.

Guardians:

• Shrieker Tunnel Guardian
• Piercer tunnel guardian. Ambush from above.

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Ebon Shrikes (agents of the Unholy Trio)

Posted on February 6, 2025 in Steel-Realms

The Ebon Shrike is a spirit from the abyss summoned by a priest of The unholy Trio for 1 year (through a blood offering ritual). It is always in pain, always vicious and angry. It looks like a disheveled crow, and loses feathers whenever it alights, only to grow them back in a moment with blood oozing from the creature. It is silent and deadly. It can detect familiars in 80m radius, or anything acting like one (with a link to a master). It does not communicate except in a low raspy, coughing voice that sounds like its choking on blood and sand.

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Dovender Valley

Posted on February 6, 2025 in Steel-Realms

Dovender Valley in the Hawktail Hills where the Riverdans of Tufflim and Pelmon meet – on the Tufflim side. Although situated technically in Tufflim, the road that leads here winds through some of Pelmons hilly territory. It is long abandoned, and the only thing that people still remember is that the rare visitor (archeological exploration or River Rover) often experiences strange smells and temperature fluctuations.

Encounters: It has the VISION encounters common to all Places on the Maithean Plateau. Animals do not willfully enter the valley.

History: Riverdans (History of Dovender Valley and The Dog Fort)

Encounters in the Locale

Automatic

These are lingering effects of the mass deaths caused by the battle between the forces of light, darkness, and the druid’s destruction. The powerful evil creatures that were killed defending the unholy Standard of the Severed Head left a stain that could never be removed.

Hard Difficulty check on Perception (modified by hearing)

Standing in the valley in a moment of quiet, there is a strange wind that blows. It almost holds echoes of something faint, like voices, though indistinct. The air is warmer when this faint hint is present… like a breath on your skin.

Very Hard Difficulty check on Perception (modified by smell)

As the wind blows mournfully through the valley area, you smell a sharp, acrid smell with a hint of metallic taste in your mouth – blood. The effect is faint, and fleeting…

Average Difficulty Occult or Divine Phenomenology
= There is a faint and foul odor of a dark fiend lingering still, residue from a powerful presence of evil.

The Dog Road

The “Dog Road” is the spur from the The Maithen Plateau to the valley itself. It is long unused and not suitable for pulled cats, wagons, etc. (it would be considered Difficult terrain) Horse travel is fine. The Dog Leg Stretch is a final stretch of the road that does a switch back.

Watchers Bluff

About half way up the Dog Leg Stretch is a small bluff that is defensible, only about 20 down from the Dovender valley edge and on the west side. Some old stone foundations are still here – once a small stable was kept here to send runners if the breaches in the valley were spotted as active. From the top of the stable, you could see a signal fire on Spakaya – The Dog Fort.

Valley View South

THIS IS AS FAR AS MOUNTS AND NATURAL ANIMALS WILL GO.

Looking south from the valley mouth, Dovender Valley runs roughly north-south and rises 35m elevation from its northern mouth a half mile away to the south about 2km distant. A trickle of a stream comes from a high up outcrop, running through what appears to be a rubble strewn field filling the valley floor in many areas. It looks as if a washout occurred from the top and since then most of the debris has settled in silt and topsoil – ruining the valley for any use of agriculture without serious work to clear the debris field. On the west side of the south end of the valley is a strange outcrop that appears to be made of rubble itself. Above it is some sort of gouge that appears to have channeled some debris that ends at a lip. Here, at the far south end of the valley, is what appears to be a collection of rubble mostly covered by moss and soil, but it forms a lip from which the trickling stream seems to come from. Behind it a sheer cliff face rises 175m feet into the air, is broken by a ledge, then rises at least half that amount again to a rocky ridge line. On top of the ledge is the broken walled remains of Spakaya – The Dog Fort.