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Mined Your Head An Unofficial Prequel Adventure to Rime of the Frost Maiden by Steven Pankotai (@stevenpankotai)
“When miners in Termalaine, one of the towns of Ten-Towns, unknowingly discover a new source of the mysterious and powerful chardalyn, powerful foes from the Underdark take note and begin their own investigation. Strange things begin to happen around Termalaine, and heroes find themselves drawn into a mystery with few obvious answers. Can they discover the truth of the sinister mechanisms at play before Ten-Towns is destroyed—or worse, before the mind flayers learn everything they’re after?”
A brilliant introduction to a number of alien concepts to some players, and just a great adventure with so much scope to play out many ways as the players drive the investigation their way, while the DM has everything they need at their fingertips. This is going to be a lot of fun for everyone and have your players begging you to start a Rime of the Frost Maiden campaign!
Before we go any further, we’ve got to talk about this double entendre of a title! This is a work of art referring to watching your head from those pesky low ceilings in mines…but also the fact mind flayers will straight up mine your head to get to the sweet grey meat inside! Poetry!
Adventure Overview
This is a mystery horror adventure investigating the strange goings on in a small Icewind Dale town in which eldritch horrors lurk beneath the ice.
“Part mystery and part horror, this adventure tests not only heroes’ blades, but their investigative skills as well.”
While the adventure is primarily character-driven investigation and roleplay, the sections are organized for the DMs reference.
Setup: Information on Termalaine and its people for reference throughout the adventure
Inciting Incident: The beginning of the adventure and early investigation
Rising Action: After heroes have begun investigations, their enemies begin to move against them
Denouement: Now aware of the threat, heroes must move to stop it before it’s too late!
Adventure Background
“This adventure is intended to be a challenge for skilled adventurers. Throughout, there are several boxes containing information on scaling encounters to best suit your party.”
Chardalyn, a naturally occurring mineral with the ability to store magic, was recently unknowingly uncovered in the tourmaline mines underneath the town of Termalaine in Ten-Towns (say that fast three times in a row after having your intellect devoured). Unbeknownst to the surface-dwellers, deep below mind flayers, perturbed by the growing strength of the chardalyn-hoarding duregar, have sent an inquisition to learn more of the strange material before moving on the deep dwarves. Now most of the town’s miners have had their brains replaced with intellect devourers and are thralls of the aberrations.
Helpful sidebar on intellect Devourer, those little creepy-cute brain puppers puppetting various members of the town, and the aberrant behaviour.
A lovely map of Termalaine by Saga Mackenzie (@pyxistyxGWJ) is provided, showing all locations in the adventure.
The six named locations are briefly described, as well as ten of the 600 Town population relevant to the story with background and a defining aspect, such as Agnes Croix, a scrimshander, carver of knucklehead trout ivory sculptures, and a devout of Tyr with bonuses to social checks for those with other pious bents, Ailred the Barrel-Chested, burly head guard with an appreciation for other buff folx, and Clyde Bernard (Replaced) one of the few non-miners that has been replaced who keeps up to date with gossip and uses basement is used as a meeting place for the replaced brain squad.
A helpful reminder about skill check difficulties sidebar provides a simple reference tool to keep in mind during the player’s interaction with these NPCs.
Inciting Incident
The adventure is designed to be picked up any time adventurers find themselves around Ten-Towns. In Icewind Dale. The adventure presumes the characters are in Termalaine, though a sidebar notes any of the introductory hooks can “easily be adjusted to fit in any Ten-Towns location so long as they lead to Termalaine itself.”
The inciting incident for this adventure is the murder of Danerian Croix by his wife, Agnes. The hooks for the adventure revolve around the adventurers coming across or hearing about this tragic event.
To this end several hooks are provided for ways the adventure can be introduced on its own or naturally in conjunction with other adventures and exploration. These include witnessing the murder as Agnes yells, “I know you’re not him!” as she stabs him, with the chance of the perceptive getting a glimpse of shadowy shape flee the body, seeing Agnes being apprehended by town guards yelling, “It’s not my husband! Don’t you see, it’s not him!” and hearing rumours of the murder and subsequent arrest.
The facts surrounding the murder and examination of the body are provided in helpful bullet points, including a hard Medicine to notice “Danerian’s head feels lighter than it should be.” With the glorious addition, “If heroes go so far as to open Danerian’s skull (an act that would be extremely frowned upon in a public place), they will clearly see that he has no brain.” Agnes was roundly witnessed loudly decrying “Danerian was not her husband, but something else”, before she is taken for questioning at the town hall. Agnes will beg the adventurers to investigate her claims, offering “a fortune in scrimshaw if they can help her show the town that what she killed wasn’t her husband.” This information can also find its way to the party through rumours as necessary.
With the hook in place, the players are free to investigate their own way. Rather than having a set order, the adventure provides a number of scenarios the adventurers may come across, gaining enough information to trigger the Rising Action.
Agnes, Imprisoned
Agnes is held at Town Hall as a prisoner under the watch of guard captain, Ailred. This man lacks imagination, seeing the murder as an open-and-shut case, since Agnes was quite literally caught red-handed, despite her protestations. Thankfully, for the party he gained be bribed or convinced, with enough information, to speak to her. Agnes can talk to her husband going missing for a couple of days, acting strange, sneaking around and “not a flicker of the man” in his eyes, but she did get a glimpse of the intellect devourer after the murder. Agnes mentions a couple of the replaced, which the party can follow up on.
Rumors
There is a very clever aspect to the way rumours are to be implemented, with the community initially being supportive of Agnes, but the intellect devourers start a smear campaign. This can give the party a lead to follow back to the miners.
Doctor Sweet, I Presume
Dr. Eurydon Sweet is preparing Danerian’s body for funeral and burial not seeing the need for an autopsy on account of the obvious knife wound. Being a better man than Ailred, Dr. Sweet needs to be convinced to allow a random party of adventurers to go poking at a corpse in his care. A variety of checks for sneaking in, performing an autopsy and examining the body, which will have characters and players familiar with mind flayers very excited.
The Scene of the Crime
The street where the murder took place is a great place to start an investigation. Access to the scene is dependent on if the guard have cordoned the area off and/ or if they can be persuaded. Tracks of the intellect devourer can be found that ominously change into humanoid footprints a ways down an alley with the difficulty increasing over time as the tracks get “obfuscated by foot traffic”, which is just a delightful phrase.
Town Hall
Speaker Shaelen Masthew is heartbroken at the news, having known both Agnes and Danerian, and can be persuaded to use her authority if the party are working to clear Agnes’ name, as well as officially hiring them to clear out the mine if they can provide evidence of Underdark dangers.
Rising Action
When the time is right the DM unleashes the mind flayers! Actually, when the illithid become aware of the meddling kids they send an intellect devourer assassin to stalk them. If character’s have prior knowledge of mind flayers (which you know players will insist as their knowledge merges seamlessly with that of their character lol) and start chatting about them in public, they are a likely target for the assassin.
The Assassin
A hunter named Videla is the assassin and enforcer for the illithid. If the party are getting too close, she will try to warn them to get the heck out of Dodge...which is unlikely to be very effective. From there she will try to cause panic with a flimsy attempt to frame them for murder to cover her escape or at least make them look bad and make their investigation more difficult, anything to avoid open confrontation if possible. In a last-ditch effort, the leggy brain boi will scarper, leaving Videla’s corpse at the part’s feet in a far better attempt at framing them.
A unique CR 11 Assassin statblock is provided in the text for Videla (replaced) with the advice for including more assassin allies if necessary, for scaling the adventure to higher level or larger parties.
Heroes v. Termalaine
A great sidebar provides advice on handling the challenge of the party having to deal with the ramifications of being framed and the ire of the town, which has all sorts of potential for fun roleplay, with advice on how to get things moving forward with the use of the major NPCs if necessary.
Eastside
The intellect devourers are using the basement of the inn to meet and exchange information under the guise of organising to unionize the miners...which they kind of are but not in the traditional way. It is likely the party will become suspicious of the comings and goings, as well as the alacrity with which they are targeted if they discuss their plans over an ale among the replaced. Although the players are very unlikely to witness it, I love the inclusion of the information that because of their short-range telepathy they replaceds’ meetings would just be a few of them huddled in a corner silently staring at each other.
The Gem Mine
The party are going to end up investigating the mine sooner or later and it is likely the mind flayers are aware and ready for them.
Aetheline Cherrier, the mine’s overseer has a bad vibe of “wrongness” from the mine and miners but hasn’t actually gone to check it out because of their phobia of going in the mine alone. The do know a big shiny rock (chardalyn) came of the mine recently and hasn’t been seen since. They do have a little nugget they can show the party. Miners (replaced) have been taking explosives and deep-mining equipment to try to obtain more, but nothing has come up and they are concerned the miner are conspiring to rip the mine off. This is somewhat close, but it’s not the mine they want to do the ripping to. They can offer a reward for information and with enough evidence of a threat from below they will seal the mine.
Denouement
The regular trudging footsteps can easily be followed deep into the mine where an intact fragment of a Netherese city was found along with its chardalyn, which became illithid HQ with troglodyte bouncers. During the day the mine is packed with replaced miners working but keeping an eye out for their mind flayer bosses and will defend the mine if necessary. Although, if asked nicely they might just escort them into their master’s trap. It’s also possible to sneak in at night, possibly with help from Aetheline, when the troglodyte roam the tunnels. The Netheril ruins are a wondrous sight to behold, the more intelligent of the party may realise the Netheril were a magical nation of flying cities and spaceships that crashed thousands of years ago with bits like this buried beneath the ice and rock of Icewind Dale!
Statblocks for the troglodytes, intellect devourers and mind flayers are provided in the body of the text for ease of reference.
An unbelievably gorgeous and colorful map from Saga Mackenzie (@pyxistyxGWJ01) depicts the Netheril ruins in all their glory!
In this place of beauty and wonder of ages long past the mind flayers have set up a little workshop for brain harvesting for making snacks or pets, depending on their mood, which is lovely. A central research station holder their collection of chardalyn. There is come lovely, grim descriptions of the illithid equipment and general décor with it being up to the DM how the expedition to the ruin runs and whether the party can get their mitts on any more of that sweet, sweet, chardalyn, as well as the number of mind flayers poised to nom on their heads.
A handy sidebar contains scaling information for the final encounter from APL 10 all the way to APL 20!
Another handy sidebar explains why the chardalyn is so very sweet – each nugget is worth 5,000 gp and they can essentially be used as spell pokeballs, both of which are pretty damn sweet!
The mind flayers are too far away to be relaying everything to their elder brain, so they will make every effort for at least one illithid to survive and make it home with their research and any lumps of chardalyn and brains it can grab on the way...or actually get the Netheril ruin to briefly fly away! The mind flayers aren’t worried though, "any mind flayer would be elated to feast on the brains of heroes.”
Player Death and Intellect Devourers
A side bar addresses the very real danger of losing their character permanently by having their minds munch and replaced with the leggy brain bois. The deadly nature of this adventure should be made clear to players. “However, it can be fun (and tragic) to allow a newly-replaced hero to actively fight against their former friends.”
Countdown to Disaster
There is a very cool description of the Netherese ruin/ ship powering up for the mind flayers escape with the snarky telepathic parting message, “This is a mercy compared to what is coming.” At this point the heroes have one minute to stop the absconding aberrations with a wide variety of checks and challenges on offer to disable the charging stations, which obviously includes hitting them very hard. Creativity is encouraged and it is likely they will be victorious, but the longer the take to stop it the more damage they take as the ruins crash down to earth with scaling damage relating to the rounds taken to stop take off.
This could genuinely be the best and most dramatic time for a TPK. Now, I want to be clear I am not advocating for a TPK, I’m a kitten of a DM and I don’t think DMs should try to go out of their way to kill players, although some creatures might. What I am saying is that it would be epic for this crashing damage to wipe the party...only for them to wake up in the inn having been rescued by Aetheline who overcame her fears to recuse the heroes!
Failure
On the other hand failure is possible and the heroes most likely “die in the cataclysmic aftermath”, after the ruin gets to a 100 feet up out of the mine...crashing down and taking out half of the town with it as it sinks into detritus below. “Heroes may survive this impact if they manage to stay in flight, provide strong magical protection for themselves, or otherwise get a large distance away; if they remain unguarded on the ruins as they fall, they will surely die.”
Coda
Agnes can be freed with evidence of the mind flayer conspiracy, so the heroes can get that oh so sweet scrimshaw worth serious skrilla, plus whatever they agreed with the Speaker and/ or Aetheline
The adventure intentionally ends with “more questions than answers” with many seeds and ideas for further adventures, including fining someone smart enough to study the ruins, the possibility of more sleeper agents and intellect devourers still kicking about making things even more tense in the village and Ten-Towns, there being more Netheril sites and mind flayers out there to discover – what are those scamps up to? The Duregar are mentioned in the background of the adventure, but don’t actually make an appearance – what are those other naughty scamps up to...” this plot is featured in the official Dungeons & Dragons adventure Rime of the Frostmaiden!”
This is one of the most brutal Game Over screens I've ever seen:
“If the heroes failed and Termalaine was partially destroyed, the aftermath of this act will scar Ten-Towns for generations. The town will need serious aid to have any chance to recover”. You. Ruined. Everything!
This is a wonderfully open and free-range adventure that centers around the mystery of the mind flayers and their minions. The DM is given all they need to know to run this however they want, but with the scenarios, NPCs and incredibly helpful advice to guide them.
This is a fantastic introduction to Icewind Dale and Netheril ruins, as well as being a great easy way to warm up a party for the Rime of the Frost Maiden campaign. Whether an introduction to the new campaign, a one shot murder mystery or additional frosty fun for your game, this is a well thought out adventure that really gives the players agency to investigate and roleplay as they wish...I mean, unless they get their brain chomped.
This would definitely be my choice as an opener for Rime of the Frost Maiden
Credits
Writing & Design by Steven Pankotai @stevenpankotai on Twitter
Editing by Ryan Langr @RealmwarpM on Twitter
Layout by Steven Pankotai based on templates created by Nathanaël Roux of Barkalot Designs
Map by Saga Mackenzie @pyxistyxGWJ on Twitter
Playtested by Jack Calderone, Cameron Turner, Alyssa Masters, Becca Whitney
“This game plays best with Player Primer: Icewind Dale. Learn about the frozen north of the Forgotten Realms and create characters that feel grounded there! Available at the Dungeon Masters Guild.” https://www.dmsguild.com/product/318990/Player-Primer-Icewind-Dale?affiliate_id=1507682
My Affiliate Link: https://www.dmsguild.com/product/323690/Mined-Your-Head-An-Unofficial-Prequel-to-Rime-of-the-Frostmaiden?affiliate_id=1507682
Also available in the Icewind Dale Bundle: https://www.dmsguild.com/product/326995/Icewind-Dale-Ultimate-Pack-BUNDLE?affiliate_id=1507682
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