Wednesday, September 30, 2015

Steal This: The Hall of Seven Dooms

Got some nice feedback on my last two dungeon rooms.  So, here's another, ready to drop into your next game: The Hall of Seven Dooms.

 
I put this one together for the Neverwinter Nights D&D 5e cloud game I'm currently running.  It's a reworking of some of the design elements I had used in the Deathgate Puzzle Room - another "riddle" dungeon room designed to test the player's cleverness - not their characters' badassery.

The basic idea is fairly simple:  A stone hallway with eight stone doors - four to the left, three to the right, and one on the far end.  Each "door" is really just an archway with a stone wall beyond - no handle, hinges, or other obvious means of opening it.


"You see a hallway, something like this..."

Immediately to the right are a series of glowing runes, with a lever underneath each...

"Aha!  Levers!  They must open the doors.  I wonder what those glowing symbols mean..."

To the left is a glowing riddle - because crazy-ass wizards just love to guard their treasure with a clever riddle, right?  Who doesn't love a riddle?

"Great. Another $@&!ing Riddle..."

Solving the Riddle

Solving the riddle and exiting the hallway is relatively simple.  The riddle tells you to "come ahead," but warns that you cannot "proceed forward."  The answer is:  you must walk backwards (as in, butt-first) down the hallway toward the door on the far side. 

As soon as any PC walks backward for 20', the door on the far side of the hallway grinds open, and the PCs may proceed to whatever waits beyond.  In this way, the owner of the dungeon can easily traverse the hallway without triggering any traps.

Don't Mess with the Levers!

The levers serve absolutely no purpose - other than as a trap to slay intruders Pulling a lever "up" begins opening one of the side doorways.... either releasing a monster or springing a trap!  Pulling a lever "down" slowly closes the same doorway.

Clever PCs will notice that there are eight doors but only seven levers - a sure sign that something fishy is going on.  Of course, what adventurer can resist pulling on a lever in a dungeon?

Here's a quick guide to what I used for the levers in my game, going from left to right along the levers below...


Trident - Door #1 grinds open, revealing a metal wall full of holes - a spear trap that pincushions anyone standing in front of it when the door is fully open.

Cloud - Door #2 grinds open, revealing a metal wall full of holes - this time, they spray a thick, green poison gas into the hallway.

Gear - Door #3 grinds open, releasing a Slaughterstone Eviscerator (or some other clockwork monster of your choosing) from a small room.  It immediately tries to slay anyone in the hallway.
"Yeah, that looks friendly..."

Spider - Door #4 grinds open, releasing a giant spider from a small room full of webbing and cocooned bodies.

Circle with Tentacles - Door #5 grinds open, releasing a hungry Chaos Beast, Roper, or other nasty tentacle monster.

 "My only regret is that I have but one life to give to the monsters of this dungeon..."

Bull Horns - Door #6 grinds open, releasing an undead minotaur eager to kill you all...

"Well, hello there!"
(Cool Art by Karl Kopinski)

Freaky Mouth - Door #7 grinds open, releasing a gibbering mouther!

"Eye see you...get it?  It's a pun!"
(More cool art by:  Marcus Coltrin Awesome Artist!)

Epilogue:  The Hall of Seven Dooms in Play

In my Neverwinter Nights game, the PCs took a job for the local wizards guild to retrieve a package from one of its members, a necromancer.  Our heroes arrived at the  tower to find a full-blown wizard-war raging (the necromancer was a jerk, and his numerous apprentices had decided it was time to murder him and divvy up his stuff).  Of course, faced with a complex situation, the PCs pretty much decided to slaughter everyone and loot the tower...but that's a story for another day.

To my horror, upon entering the Hall of Seven Dooms, one of my players almost immediately (and out loud) guessed and blurted out the riddle's solution!  Fortunately, his comrades scoffed that the answer could be so simple, and proceeded to start pulling various levers.  Only after being stabbed, poisoned, and almost eaten, did they solve the puzzle and proceed to the necromancer's treasure room...

Like this?  Make sure you check out The Cloning Machine Room and The Deathgate Puzzle Room.  And you can be sure I'll write up at least a few more silly little dungeon rooms in the coming weeks.

Enjoy! 

- Balthazar 

Friday, September 25, 2015

Steal This: The Cloning Machine Room

Here's another dungeon room, ready for you to plunk down in your favorite dungeon:  I call it The Cloning Machine.


Basically, it's my personal, dungeon-room homage to the movie Prestige (2006)

"Who could have ever anticipated that messing with a cloning machine in a dungeon would lead to tragedy?"

Like the Deathgate Puzzle Room, I posted earlier, the Cloning Machine was designed for use in my Skull Mountain megadungeon campaign I ran a few years back.  And like a lot of my favorite dungeon setups, it is absolutely safe - so long as the PCs don't mess with things that are obviously dangerous.  Of course, adventurers never seem to be able to resist such temptation... 

The basic setup is simple:  Two rooms separated a bit in the dungeon.  The first room houses the cloning machine itself, an ancient and dangerous device manufactured by some mad wizard centuries ago.  The second room, the cloning vats, are where anything cloned or created by the machine appear.
Room #1 - The Cloning Machine

A large domed chamber.  Iron pillars, 30' tall, arrayed around the wall, carved with a thousand strange symbols, and topped with metal balls.  At the center, an altar of some sort.  It is carved from a solid stone block, and stands about waist high... 

The altar looks something like this.

Above the altar, mounted high on the ceiling, is a strange crystal, pointing down, directly at the altar below...


The great crystal hanging from the ceiling...

On the front of the altar, is a bronze dial with six symbols carved in the stone around it. The dial can be turned about to six different "settings," one for each symbol.   


The symbols around the dial - yeah, what the heck do those mean, anyway?

When discovered, the dial is set to the stylized "O", which is the "off" setting.  After each use of the machine, the dial returns to this setting, until the PCs tamper with it again.

Room #2 - The Cloning Vats

The second room is simply a large chamber full of glass tanks, each 12 feet tall, all filled with some kind of strange, purplish liquid.  Each tank is connected to the ceiling by a series of strange, rubbery tubes, and each has a metal "door" that can be opened by turning a small wheel.  Opening a tank causes the liquid within to come pouring out, but each tank, unless damaged, refills whenever the cloning machine is activated.


 Kind of like this, but in a dungeon, not high tech...


Activate the Cloning Machine at Your Peril! 

Activating the machine is simple - you just turn the bronze dial away from the "O" setting to one of the five other symbols.  As soon as the dial stops on a symbol for a few seconds, the crystal above will begin to glow, hum ominously, and bathe the altar below in a ruddy light.  The walls and ceiling seem to fall away, revealing a strange, starry sky, whirling and bursting with planets, large eyes, silently floating shapes of hideous proportions, and other horrors.

What happens next depends on which of the six "settings" you set the machine to. Here's what they do, working around the dial clockwise...
 

(1) Stylized "O" – the "off" setting.

(2) Weird Thing that Looks Like an Hourglass – If any living thing is lying upon, or touching, the altar when the machine is turned on and the altar is bathed in red light, the machine summons one exact copy of that being from the future. The duplicate appears, with crackling energy and fanfare, in a random cloning tank. The future self of the character is only from a few hours in the future, and played by the GM as an NPC. The future self likely has some additional knowledge of the dungeon, but is cagey. An hour or so after the duplication, the "past" or "original" character simply vanishes...and the player takes over the "future" version.

(3) Symbol that Looks Like Three Guys Conferring – Summons 2d4+4 doppelgangers from alternate time-streams that look and act like the person on the altar – except for the fact that they are naked when they appear, act sly and strange, and - oh yeah - hunger for human flesh. They have only limited knowledge about the person they look like, and so pretend they have amnesia.

(4) Symbol that Looks Like Heads on Stakes – This is a fail-safe created by the maker of the machine, in case things got out of hand. This setting summons nothing to the cloning tanks. Instead, as the machine is activated, it summons 1d4+2 Bodaks, Dimensional Shamblers, Invisible Stalkers, or your preferred inter-dimensional monster, which appear around the altar, attempt to slay all life within sight, and then vanish – carrying away the remains back to their home plane. 


(5) Dudes Gathering Around a Crystal – This summons 2d4+4 copies of the character touching or lying upon the altar, which appear in the cloning tanks. These are actually copies of the "cloned" character pulled from other, quite similar parallel dimensions. However, astute observers will notice small, subtle differences, such as the way the person styles her hair, key details of her background, etc. All of the "clones" are self aware, played by the GM, and want very badly to return to their home dimensions. They are quite willing to try and force the PCs to tinker further with the cloning machine, in the hopes they can find a way home.

(6) Two Guys Looking Down on a Dead Guy – This is true cloning, and summons 1d4+8 exact copies of the target's body into the cloning tanks. Unfortunately, these clones are simply empty vessels, without minds, and do nothing but lie there, drool, and soil themselves. Eventually, unless cared for, they will die of starvation, thirst, or exposure. But, if the "original" dies while any of these clones are still alive, there is a 75% chance that the original's soul will drift into one of the clones, and avoid death. (In my own game, this was one of the few ways a character might cheat death - no Raise Dead spells here).


Epilogue: The Cloning Machine In Play

In my Skull Mountain campaign, the PCs only encountered this room once - and thereafter avoided the entire area at all cost! 


Uncertain as to the machine's purpose, the PCs decided to begin with a little "animal testing."  So, they grabbed a sheep one of the characters had dragged into the dungeon (to help check for traps), strapped it to the altar, and flipped the dial to result #3 above. Soon, they had 9 identical sheep. Except that the 8 new "sheep" seemed awfully clever and, ultimately, turned out to be carnivorous doppelgangers....

 "Did we just make a bunch of man-eating, interdimensional doppelganger sheep?"

- Balthazar

Tuesday, September 22, 2015

Steal This: Deathgate Puzzle Room

One of the things I'm trying to do with this blog is to share fun "bits" and "tricks" from my own games.  Along those lines, here's a "puzzle room" from my Skull Mountaing mega-dungeon campaign that worked particularly well...much to the horror of my players.  Please, steal it, and see how your intrepid players fare.

The Deathgate Puzzle Room


Like many of my favorite dungeon "bits," the Deathgate Puzzle Room is completely harmless - as long as the PCs leave it alone.  And, really, they should.  I mean, come on, it's so obviously a trap.  It basically screams "don't mess with me, I'm f**king dangerous!"  And yet, it is irresistible to players.  And once it is messed with, the clock starts ticking, and soon it will be too late...

You Will Need:

To run this encounter right, you will need (1) a copy of the handouts, below, to give your players; and (2) an egg-timer, preferably one that ticks loudly and ominously.

Entering the Room

The setup is simple.  The PCs enter a large, stone room.  Inside, arrayed along the far wall, are seven heavy stone doors, with no handles.  And in the center of the room on a dais, is a large metal cube. 

"A giant metal Hellraiser box?  Gee, who would ever mess with that?"

It's freaky looking, about as tall as a man standing, sitting atop a gruesomely stained 3-step dais.  Bones, bits of debris, and several fresh bodies surround it.  Something is obviously wrong with the bodies - they all seem to be missing at least one arm.  Missing as in, "gruesomely sliced off at the shoulder."  No sign of any of the missing arms.

The Letters on the Cube
 
Looking closer at the cube, you can see that the sides are actually covered with metal plates, 16 on each side.  Each plate has a single letter carved into it.  And each plate is affixed to the cube with a hinge.  Obviously, you can swing each metal plate open, to reveal something underneath.


At first glance, the letters on the box appear to be gibberish. Here is how they are arrayed on each side.

South Side
(facing entrance): 

West Side:

North Side
(facing 7 doors):

East Side:
 
However, if one starts reading on the left (west) side of the cube, and continuing all the way around the cube, a classic riddle is revealed:

"It is too much for one,
two it is meant for, but no longer exists
if two become more."

"What's in the Box?  Oh, God, What's in the Box?"

The room is completely safe...until the moment that one of the PCs tries to flip open any of the cube's metal plates. Then, a loud metallic "click" reverberates through the cube, the floor, and the walls. 

Anyone who declares - within 5 seconds real time - that they are fleeing back out the door may make a Dexterity check or saving throw (DC left to the vagaries of the DM's cruelty) to escape the room.  After that, a sheet of solid iron falls and blocks the entrance, sealing everyone in the room.  And the box begins a loud, steady ticking.

Psst - Hey DMs:  This is where you pull the egg timer out from behind your screen, set it to 5 minutes, and plunk it down in front of the players.  Sure, their PCs might not know exactly how long they have, but go ahead and let the players see how much time is left anyway.  It's way more fun to watch them panic as the counter ticks down to zero.

So, what's under that metal plate our heroes flipped open, anyway?  Just a dark, nasty smelling hole.  Big enough, just barely, to put your arm into it.  And down below, at the end, is a metal handle you can (with effort) turn.   

Oh, and there's clearly some sort of sharp blade in that hole - perfectly set up to chop off anything (like an arm) you might be stupid enough to put in. 
 
"A Farewell to Arms"

Solving the puzzle, and deactivating the trap, is relatively simple.  The answer to the riddle is the word "S-E-C-R-E-T."  The PCs must spell out that word by opening any of the panels with the correct letters, reaching into the hole, and turning (with some effort) the handles until they click.  Once they spell out the password, they're safe!  Easy enough, right?

Okay, maybe not.

Make a mistake?  Pull a wrong lever, or the right lever in the wrong order?  Well, then the blade snaps your arm off at the shoulder.  Generous DMs can mete out this damage in terms of hit points, allow a saving throw, or allow the player some other kind of check to avoid losing an arm.  Me, I just snapper-snacked that sucker off.  Depending on your preferred edition of D&D, feel free to require a system shock roll, Fortitude save, etc. to survive losing an arm, or at least remain conscious.

There is no easy way to tell which handles are trapped and which are not.  After all, the puzzle is solved by pulling the right levers IN THE RIGHT ORDER - so even levers marked with correct letters can (and will) snap off an arm if pulled in the wrong order.  The severed arms?  They drop down a chute into the center of the cube, lost forever.

If the players solve the puzzle, the metal cube stops ticking, and the doorway behind them opens.  If you're feeling generous, maybe a secret door leading to some treasure room also opens.
 
Tick...Tick...Tick...

Five minutes after the PCs are sealed in, unless they solve the puzzle, your egg timer goes off.  And the cube, floor, and walls rumble again.  At this point, the first of the seven doors on the far side of the wall slowly grinds open...

My own map of the Deathgate Puzzle, from Skull Mountain.
 
And a monster (probably) comes out.  I say "probably" here because you probably don't want to put a monster behind each door.  Here's the lineup I used in my game...

Door #1 - 13 hungry zombies or ghouls.

Door #2 - The rotten, severed head of a giant, the size of a large boulder.  All shriveled, grey flesh, empty rotting sockets.  It rolls about, crushing and biting foes.  Of course, it cannot attack anyone who climbs on top of the cube.

Door #3 - Used to be skeletons, but smashed apart by other adventurers long ago.

Door #4 - A desiccated, long-dead giant spider, hanging in dusty cobwebs, which starved long ago.

Door #5 - A hungry pudding or jelly of your choice.

Door #6 - 12 clay warriors, life-sized, in styled eastern mail and fluted helms.  When they walk, the sound is like cracking pottery.

Door #7 - A mechanical monstrosity, the Wizard-Head Golem.  Iron clockwork legs, a great glass drum filled with bubbling red liquid and a dozen, silently howling bearded heads.  Its right arm is a set of iron pincers, and its left is a buzzing circular saw.

Reset the Clock - Because the Cube Starts Ticking Again...
 
As soon as a door opens, the cube begins loudly ticking again!  Now, the PCs must continue trying to solve the puzzle while contending with whatever monster (or monsters) they have released. 
 
The process continues with a new monster being released every 5 minutes.  If you are feeling generous, once a monster is released (and you're involved in combat rounds) you can set the clock for 10 minutes instead, to account for all the various rolling and combat that must be handled.  But, most importantly, KEEP THE EGG TIMER ON THE TABLE, AND TICKING DOWN TO THE NEXT DOOR OPENING.

Other Ways to Overcome the Deathgate

Even if the players cannot solve the riddle, they can still get past the Deathgate Puzzle.  A few ways include...
  • Behind each stone door that opens, in addition to the monster (or monster remains), is a small tunnel ending in a heavy wooden door that (with a few minutes of effort and some luck) can be picked or broken down.
  • I also put a few secret doors leading off from the room - mainly to allow monsters to pass through the room without triggering the trap.
  • Once all seven doors open, after about 10 minutes, the trap resets and the entrance opens.
Why Is This Fun?

The Deathgate combines some of my favorite elements to include in dungeon design.  A riddle that tests the player's (not the characters') skill and ingenuity.  An evolving tactical situation that rewards creative thinking.  A problem that is difficult, if not impossible, to resolve through straightforward combat - but still has multiple solutions.  And, of course, a clock ticking down to certain doom.

Epilogue:  The Deathgate Puzzle Room in Play

The Deathgate Puzzle Room was a big hit in my Skull Mountain "cloud" megadungeon campaign.  At least three separate groups of PCs stumbled across it in search for a hidden treasure room ("The Chamber of Antiquities") referenced in various maps and other clues they had found.  None of the groups actually managed to "solve" the puzzle by spelling out the answer ("S-E-C-R-E-T"), but they each managed to overcome it in different ways, either by finding a secret door, or hacking down a door at the end of one of the "monster chutes" while being assailed from behind.  A lot of limbs were lost to the blades in the cube.  And a lot of PCs died screaming, as they were dragged from atop the cube by the horde of monsters they had released.

Skull Mountain Level One - The Deathgate is near the NW corner.
 
I hope you enjoy this nasty little room.  If you have any questions about how it works, put your question in the comments below and I'll do my best to answer.  And stay tuned, because I'll be posting about a dozen more little "trick rooms" you can drop into your own favorite dungeon over the next few weeks.

- Balthazar

Friday, September 11, 2015

D&D 5e Clerics (Part 1: Gond and Myrkul)

So, it looks like WotC is not going to put out a Forgotten Realms setting supplement for D&D 5e anytime soon.  

This leaves me somewhat confused and irritated.  What am I supposed to do with clerics in my ongoing Neverwinter game.  Where is my giant book of new domains and channel divinity powers?

Oh, well.  Guess I have to make my own.  So I did that.


The 2nd Edition era Faiths & Avatars is one of my favorite supplements, and fully details all the rituals, holy days, titles, etc. for the various Forgotten Realms gods.  So I've got that covered.  All I need to do now is try to jam those old "specialty priests" into 5e's new systems.  That means creating (or modifying) a divine domain tailored to fit each god.  And of course, because I monkey with everything, I'll be adding my own special sauce to each as I go along. 

So let's start with two of my favorites:  Gond and Myrkul.

GOND, the Wonderbringer, the Lord of All Smiths.
Portfolio:  Artifice, Craft, Smiths, Construction.
Rules:  Per standard cleric, but with the new Artifice Domain, per below:
  • Bonus Proficiencies – At 1st level, priests of Gond gain five tool proficiencies from among the following list:  Alchemist’s Tools, Carpenter’s Tools, Cobbler’s Tools, Glassblower’s Tools, Leatherworker’s Tools, Mason’s Tools, Smith’s Tools, Tinker’s Tools, Weaver’s Tools, Woodcarver’s Tools, or Thieves’ Tools.
  • Armor & Weapon Proficiencies - All simple weapons, crossbows, firearms, explosives, siege weapons, and other Gondsmen devices (see below), and with all armor and shields.
  •  Smokepowder & Weapon Creation - Beginning at 1st level, Gondsmen begin to learn the secrets of the clergy's greatest inventions, including smokepowder weapons.  Provided a priest has access to tolls and supplies, he or she can create such devices.  Recommended costs and required levels are listed in the table below.


Cleric Level Required

Creation
Creation Cost     (each)
Game Statistics
1st
Smoke Grenades
10 gp
60’ range, one round after lands creates a 20’ radius cloud of smoke that heavily obscures sight.
2nd
Smokepowder Bomb (Formula 1)
25 gp
60’ range, requires lighting wick, 3d6 damage to all within 10’ unless DC 12 Dexterity saving throw.
3rd
Net Crossbow
100 gp
Per heavy crossbow, but instead of damage fires a net up to range of 30/100.
4th
Smokepowder Musket
200 gp
4d6 piercing, ammunition, range (40/120), two-round loading time, two-handed.  Explodes (3d6) on a natural 1.
5th
Dragonslayer Cart (Mark 1)
500 gp
A standard horse-cart loaded with a rapid-loading ballista of your own design.  4d10 damage, range 120/480, requires one action to load, one action to aim, and one action to fire.
6th
Smokepower Bomb (Formula Two)
50 gp
60’ range, requires lighting wick, 6d6 damage to all within 10’ unless DC 12 Dexterity saving throw.
7th
Smokepowder Pistol (Mark I)
250 gp
1d10 piercing, ammunition, range 30/90, single shot, two-round loading time.
8th
Smokepowder Scattergun
300 gp
6d6 piercing damage in 20’ cone, three-round loading time
9th
Dragonslayer Cart (Mark II)
400 gp
A smokepowder cannon mounted on a horse-drawn cart that propels heavy balls of cast iron through the air at destructive speeds.  8d10 bludgeoning damage, suffers from Disadvantage against any target smaller than huge, range 600/2,400, five actions to load, one action to aim, one action to fire.
10th
The Red Dragon Apparatus
400 gp
A backpack tank of alchemist’s fire, connected to a rubber hose, 30’ cone range, as action can fire a jet of flaming oil that deals 5d6 damage to all in 30’ cone, DC 12 Dexterity saving throw at beginning of their turn or continue to burn for 1d6 damage.  Holds 10 shots before must be reloaded.  Explodes into a 8d6 fireball on a natural 1.
11th
Smokepower Bomb (Formula Three)
100 gp
60’ range, requires lighting wick, 6d6 damage to all within 10’ (DC 12 Dexterity saving throw for half).
12th
Smokepowder Pistol (Mark II)
500 gp
3d6 piercing, range 30/90, five shots before reloading (requires short rest).
13th
Smokepowder Bomb (Formula Four)
200 gp
60’ range, requires lighting wick, 8d6 damage to all within 20’ (DC 12 Dexterity saving throw for half).

  • Channel Divinity:  Those Wonderful Toys – Beginning at 2nd level, priests of Gond may expend one use of Channel Divinity to grant advantage on any single attack roll involving a Gond weapon, or to grant a single foe Disadvantage on a saving throw against such a weapon.
  • Channel Divinity:  Clockwork Companion – Beginning at 6th level, a priest of Gond can choose to build a clockwork companion, essentially a mechanical version of another creature or monster.  Building a clockwork companion requires 1,000 gp and one week per CR (minimum 1,000 gp and 1 week), and the total CR of the creature cannot be higher than the cleric's level minus 5.  The clockwork companion gains any abilities of the duplicated creature that can reasonably be simulated by machinery, along with a +2 to AC and Resistance to non-magical piercing and slashing weapons, as well as any other abilities allowed by the DM.
  • I’m Sure I Can Figure This Out – Beginning at 8th level, clerics of Gond may use any magical item or device even if they do not otherwise meet the racial, spellcasting, or other requirements. 
  • Summon Aspect of the Great Machine – Beginning at 17th level, once per long rest a priest of Gond may summon as aspect of the great machine, a large spectral clockwork device that acts in all respects as the spell Bigby’s Hand.

Level
Artifice Domain Spells
1st
Unseen Servant, Grease
3rd
Locate Object, Heat Metal
5th
Counterspell, Glyph of Warding
7th
Fabricate, Stoneskin
9th
Animate Objects, Creation










MYRKUL, the Lord of Bones, the Old Lord Skull, the Reaper, the Lord of the Dead.
Portfolio:  the Dead, Wasting, Decay, Corruption, Old Age, Dusk, Autumn.

Rules:  Per standard cleric, but with the new Death Domain, per below:
  • Bonus Proficiencies – At 1st level, priests of Myrkul ("Grey Ones") gain proficiency in Embalming Tools.
  • Armor & Weapon Proficiencies - All simple weapons, plus sickle, scimitar, and light and medium armor.
  • Secrets of the Dead - Beginning at 1st level, Grey Ones gain Advantage in any Arcana or Religion check involving knowledge of the undead.
  • Body of the Grave - Grey Ones are unaffected by disease or parasites' debilitating effects, suffering no game penalties until the moment such effects become fatal.
  • Channel Divinity:  Command Undead - Grey Ones can, but generally do not, turn undead.  Instead, they excel at commanding undead.  Beginning at 2nd level, as an action, Grey Ones may expend one use of Channel Divinity and force all undead within 30’ to make a Charisma saving throw vs. the cleric's spell save DC or become friendly and obey commands.  Intelligent undead (Intelligence 8 or higher) receive Advantage on this saving throw and, if it has Intelligence 12 or higher, it receives a new save after each hour of control.  If more than one cleric is vying for control over the same undead, a contested Spell Attack roll (Wisdom modifier + Proficiency bonus) determines who maintains or gains control.
  • Channel Divinity:  Touch of Death - Beginning at 6th level, Grey Ones may expend a use of Channel Divinity as a reaction to add 2d8 necrotic damage to a single successful melee attack.
  • Feed on Death - At 8th level, a Grey One may, as an action, touch a single dying humanoid target (a living creature only) and immediately force it to roll a Constitution saving throw or perish.  If the victim dies, the Grey One immediately heals 1d6 hp per level or HD of the victim. 
  • Sealed to Myrkul - At 17th level, when a Grey One uses Touch of Death, and the target dies or is deceased, the victim can never again be resurrected, reincarnated, raised, or animated as undead.


Level
Death Domain Spells
1st
False Life, Ray of Sickness
3rd
Invisibility, Ray of Enfeeblement
5th
Animate Dead, Vampiric Touch
7th
Blight, Death Ward
9th
Antilife Shell, Create Undead