Haunted playroom puzzle and PC getting immobilised in chair

[seanadams]

Hi all,

I am still working on my campaign involving a abandoned child's hospital/asylum. The asylum is located in a deserted town.

I am trying to come up with puzzles that the PCs will face through out the hospital/asylum. The puzzles will either give clues to the story of the campaign or they will find gruesome things like severed hands, jaws, teeth etc.
The PCs will be able to advance even without solving the puzzles or they can use brute force by smashing some of them, but that will take time and mean using resources.

One puzzle will involve them opening a door and the first person to step through, will suddenly get thrown into a chair and will be immobilised, the door will close and lock preventing anyone else from getting inside. A spirit (a doctor - think House on Haunted Hill) will appear by the PC in the chair and start torturing him, using heat, sharp object, just generally not being nice, the PC should be able to use a saving throw to be able to move again. In the meantime the PCs outside the door will either have to pick the lock, smash the door in or solve a puzzle.

I have 3 questions.
1. Can anyone think of a puzzle that will be suitable for a child's playroom? (I am going to have marionettes come to life and attack the PCs.)
2. Is their a immobilise spell that i could use for the person in the chair that also has a saving throw?
3. Can anyone think of a interesting, testing, quick puzzle for the locked door?

Thanks for the help, also if anyone else has done a campaign in a abandoned town/building any tips would be appreciated.

[HuManBing]

I have 3 questions.
1. Can anyone think of a puzzle that will be suitable for a child's playroom? (I am going to have marionettes come to life and attack the PCs.)

Children's letter blocks could float around, and require quick thinking to spell out a response. (Seventh guest had a pretty tough anagram puzzle to solve, which had no vowels except the letter Y. Something like "Shy gypsy spryly shyly trysts by my crypt".) Every round the PC hesitates, the torture grows more intense, but more letters get eliminated, making it easier to solve the puzzle. For added nastiness, you may want to intentionally screw with them - the final letters could spell more than one valid word, but the ghost's clues only accept one choice. The other choice will result in permanent maiming, like the loss of a finger or a dead eye or something cosmetically permanent.

E.g. all the letters of the alphabet start floating around, and the spirit starts punishing the PC as if they were a spoiled child - first a scolding, then progressing onto pinched cheeks and pulled ears, then yanked hair and slapped cheeks, and then a paddling across the shins or forearms with a switch, and then onto severe lacerations with a cane, and progressively harsher and harsher, like a glowing cigarette ember pressed into the back of the hand, a spoon thrust into the mouth and violently jerked around as it cuts the tongue and gums, fingers jabbing the eyes, candle flame applied to the toes, pinching the nose shut and pouring foul medicine down the mouth as the victim tries to breathe, scalding stove water across the arms, a pillow across the mouth and nose, knotted bedsheets throttling the throat, etc.

Meanwhile the letters start dropping out of the air if the PC can't guess the word. The spirit shouts and rants at the PC, with such messages as:

"You ripped your dress. Nana gave that to you, after she scrimped and saved to buy it for you from market. Don't you love Nana?"

"You think the world owes you happiness? The world doesn't owe you a fig, you spoiled little whelp. I could have wedded a Colonel but for you. And now I'm pricking my fingers on rusty needles and cotton thread sewing up your latest tantrum."

"Fifteen ducats each month. That's how much you cost me in nannies and maids. That's fifteen ducats richer I'd have been if you'd never been born. Oh, and three shillings for needle and thread."

"Feel those? [Slap] Do you feel those? [Slap] Those are the fingers I work [Slap] to the bone and pierce [Slap] to the blood so you can [Slap] lie here in your [Slap] pathetic little cot and [Slap] play with your wretched little toys, you [Slap] motherless little swine."

"All I wanted was a man, a house, and a family - and instead I have you in my sewing room. How like me: to put all my eggs into one bastard."

"Look what mommy brought you. You can put your dress on this from now on and it won't rip or tear. Now we finally have a coat hanger for you. A few days too late to save your coat, and six years too late to save my engagement, but it's the thought that counts."

I trust you get the idea.

Anyhow, during each rant, a load of letters disappears. After a spell of this, the remaining letters form something like "A E G I N R T". They can be rearranged into TEARING (presumably the misbehavior of the child in the unhappy story above) or INGRATE (presumably the mother's view of the child). One of them will be right, the other will cause permanent spiritual damage. This is just a quick idea but maybe you can figure out something more fitting. If the PC doesn't respond at all, the spirit does something else horrifying (perhaps giving the PC a sudden out-of-body experience as a helpless toddler being restrained and disciplined by an uncaring ward matron).

[HuManBing]

2. Is their a immobilise spell that i could use for the person in the chair that also has a saving throw?

Depending on which edition you're using, a saving throw could function as an indirect attribute check (e.g. Reflex tied to Dex, Will tied to Wis, Fortitude to Con) or it could just be a random number based vaguely on class and level. I prefer the former - it's a bit more personal to the PC and gives the player a bit more of a feeling of causality.

I'd be more inclined to make it just a situation-specific mechanic. E.g. Say you make the challenge something like: PC walks down a flight of eight stairs down into the play room. The staircase turns suddenly into a sheer slide. The PC falls down, where a wheelchair dashes up to catch him, and then sturdy leg and wrist straps secure him to the wheelchair - allowing the haunting to begin.

You can set some high DCs to begin with, then give them a final repeating DC check that gets easier each round. So if the steps turn into a slide, that's a Dex/Reflex check with a penalty for surprise. The margin of failure then influences the Dex check to avoid the chair, and the Str check to break free from the straps. You can set the first two Dex checks at some impossibly high DC (say 30) and then apply the margin of error to the straps Str check (say DC 25). But each turn the straps get weaker and weaker as the PC's struggles intensify, so eventually they will escape.

Their attribute scores still have some effect on the outcome, so it's not as arbitrary as a single saving throw.

[HuManBing]

3. Can anyone think of a interesting, testing, quick puzzle for the locked door?

Say the door locks and then PCs on the outside can hear phantom voices chattering about trivial details in the household or sanitarium. Two concentric circles appear - one in the middle, featuring only female members of the household, and one in the outside, featuring only male members of the household. The PCs get a new whispered rumor each round, if they concentrate, and the rumors suggest some sort of illicit romance between a given couple. The PCs have to shift the women and men around the circles so they're are correctly matched to each secret lover's affair.

This would have to be a highly visual puzzle (one guy in a chef's hat, one woman in a nun's wimple, one man in a soldier's uniform, one woman with a socialite's hat and feather in her hair, etc.). To prevent easy guessing by just rotating the circles randomly, the PCs have to "drag and drop" the faces to the relevant places on the wheel. You could even indicate a "time of day" element to clue them in to the correct position on the wheel. ("The cook has a half-hour right before dinner at eight, when the roast is secure on the spit and she can come to the stairwell for a quick knee-trembler. Best leave my jacket in the parlor - if the master sees dust on it again I'll be dismissed.") The best clues could be those that exclude a pairing. "Who was seeing Lady Grey?" "I don't know - it couldn't be the Colonel, I didn't see a uniform." That sort of thing. (Look up truth tables if you need inspiration for this.)

[If you really want to make this EXTREMELY dark and disturbing, you could fix it so the child mentioned above (the one who tore her dress) could feature as one of the female members. Which implies, of course, that one of the males on the outer circle is molesting her. You'd have to make sure that your players are okay with this, but if you handle it well it could be extremely creepy... especially for the player inside the room, who is currently living out the memories of the child!]

[HuManBing]

Thanks for the help, also if anyone else has done a campaign in a abandoned town/building any tips would be appreciated.

There are a series of great computer games set in abandoned structures. In sci-fi games they might be a colony base or a derelict spaceship. In horror games they're more likely ruined churches or sprawling mansions. A few games that might give you inspiration:

Clive Barker's Undying (portions of it take place in sewers, a haunted mansion, and a ruined abbey)
System Shock 2 (you're the last man standing on a spaceship, surrounded by undead and audio logs left by the dying)
Bioshock (a spiritual successor to System Shock 2)
Amnesia (a perfect example of a puzzle game - there is no combat at all and the entire game takes place indoors)
Call of Cthulhu Dark Corners of the Earth (plenty of noncombat challenges in beautifully detailed settings)
Fallout 3 (specifically the Dunwich Building level, which is overrun by ghouls and dominated by a Lovecraftian artifact in the basement)

Hope that helps!

[seanadams]

That is some fantastic ideas HuManBing, i love it, though I do think you may need help my friend. LOL.

Nah only joking they are some brilliant ideas i really appreciate it.

I am running it in 3.5 edition. I am trying to make the game fun, but also quite unsettling. I want the PCs on some occasions to feel like the children from the asylum that were tortured (powerless, frightened etc).

One of the PCs will also find evidence that a family member went to the asylum.

I am also using music from Nox Arcana and Midnight Syndicate, which should go well with the gothic, abandoned feel of the asylum.

Again any more help given will greatly appreciated.

[Gonzoron of the FoS]

Wow... HuManBing, I continue to be amazed and frightened by the "quick ideas" you whip up. Nice job!

This is simple logic puzzle I added to Feast of Goblyns last time. It's not particularly "kid's room" in feel, but might fit the bill for a puzzle to open a door:

There are 4 holes in a wall, aligned vertically, and the following inscription:
Coin and bone hand and stone
Open this forbidden zone
Placed in proper holes in wall
In proper order or I take them all

Bones are buried beneath the earth,
Though the stone be not in the highest hole.
Keep your hand close to your metal worth,
Or perhaps you will find that both be stole
The coin is before the lowest but below the last.
At least two follow, when the bone is in the past.


The solution is first to put a coin in the second hole from the top, then a bone in the bottom hole, then a stone in the third hole from the top and finally a hand in the top hole. Mistakes cost you all items you put in the holes, including the hand.

[Gonzoron of the FoS]

2. Is their a immobilise spell that i could use for the person in the chair that also has a saving throw?

Sounds like "hold Person" to me. If the DC is too low, you can use Hold Monster, or just heighten it as per the heighten spell feat.

If you want a fortitude save instead of will, there's a spell in the Book of Vile Darkness called "Bone Seizure" (I think) that rather than being a mental paralysis that will can shrug off, it's actually a telekinesis-like effect that moves the victim's bones like a puppet. (or could be used to hold the victim in place)

[HuManBing]

If you want a fortitude save instead of will, there's a spell in the Book of Vile Darkness called "Bone Seizure" (I think) that rather than being a mental paralysis that will can shrug off, it's actually a telekinesis-like effect that moves the victim's bones like a puppet. (or could be used to hold the victim in place)

You can find that spell in Gazetteer II, p. 114.

[Gonzoron of the FoS]

You can find that spell in Gazetteer II, p. 114.

Oops! my mistake... I could have sworn it was the BoVD. Maybe there's something similar there? Or I've just been using it so much lately that I assumed it was from there.

[HuManBing]

It may have been in both sources. Material often cross-pollinates products in RPG publications.

I don't have my BoVD anymore so I can't check. :/

[seanadams]

Hey guys,

Just want to say thanks so much for all your ideas, its really helped.

I'll let you know how it develops.

Anymore ideas, please keep them coming.

Sean

[HuManBing]

Just saw this picture (which somebody drew while in therapy) and thought it might fit here. Warning: large and somewhat dark.

[seanadams]

Thanks mate, defiantly dark, but i think i know where i can fit in.

Thanks again.