The Black Tower Free 40×30 Multi-Level Battlemap & Adventure

Beta Test

While visiting a local inn for a rest, you are startled when a woman in elaborate robes made of black sable cloth appears in a puff of magical smoke in the middle of the common room! She coughs a little and sweeps the smoke aside with a few waves of her hands, then looks around the room and spots you at a table.

“Ah, you’ll do!” she remarks after a cursory examination. “I am Genevieve, a witch of no small renown in this region. You may have heard of me perhaps? Maybe? Anyway, you appear to be just the sort of person I’m looking for. May I join you for a moment?” If you agree to hear her out, she takes a seat at your table and collects her thoughts.

“It may not look like it, but I recently retired from an adventurous life and bought a nice little tower for myself. I have a great deal of magical treasure from my years of travel, and I’m simply paranoid about my new home being burgled. Aside from the loss of money and magic, the blow to my prestige would be insurmountable! The other wizards would never let me hear the end of it, you know.

“To that end, I have given great thought to security measures in the tower, and I think I’ve come up with a number of devious traps and fearsome creatures to dissuade the most accomplished thieves. But I need to know for sure!

“I propose to hire you to break into my tower, if you can! You know, test the doors, avoid the traps, dispatch the guardians of certain doom, that sort of thing. Just understand, I won’t be pulling any punches, so don’t hold back. To make it worth your while, I will part with a magical item of great pow— I mean, reasonable power. What do you say?”

If you agree to this unnecessarily dangerous mission, Genevieve beams at you, then raises a hand and you are enveloped in a cloud of smoke! You cough and sputter for a moment, but the smoke clears rapidly and you find yourself standing outside a small tower of black stone, somewhere in a forest.

“Up here!” calls Genevieve, drawing your attention to the roof of the tower upon which she stands. “Off you go then, do your worst!” The front door of the tower beckons!

If you’ve the skill, you could attempt to pick the lock, but you might also notice there is a trap above it that will drop heavy rocks on your head if you tamper with it! If you’ve no skill to deal with either of these things, you might be able to bash your way in and take the damage from the rocks.

Beyond the door lies a large chamber with stairs rising on either side, and a few smaller rooms. There are stone statues here that immediately begin to move as soon as you enter, stomping across the floor to intercept you! If you defeat the stone golems, you hear Genevieve’s voice from above.

“Perhaps stone golems weren’t the best choice for the atrium,” she says, thinking out loud. “I might replace them with iron golems covered in spikes! Yes, that sounds deadlier. Anyway, proceed!”

As you take the stairs, you might notice there is a tripwire along one of the steps. If so, you could disarm it, but if not, you are pelted with an assortment of dead fish! Aside from the smell, they are launched with enough force to do significant damage!

Once you make it to the first floor, you notice a swirling pattern of air above the atrium. It coalesces into a number of air elementals, which move to attack! If you defeat them, Genevieve mutters some choice words from her position above.

“I was really conflicted about using those. There’s lots of space for them, but they just don’t hit hard enough. I shall have to reconsider them in the next iteration. Never mind my prattling, onwards and upwards!”

If you make it to the second floor, you find an opulent yet practical area that Genevieve lives and works in. The carpet beneath your feet is plain yet soft, and it is as you’re wandering around the area that the carpet starts to move! It rises from the ground and a fang-filled mouth opens wide as it tries to eat you!

The carpet is huge and tear-resistance, and seems almost impervious to magic, but if you defeat it, Genevieve appears in a puff of smoke and applauds.

“Well done, you defeated the Carpet of Certain Death, my final security measure. I bet you didn’t see that one coming! Still, you did defeat it and now I have a pile of torn carpet scraps to deal with. Maybe I should replace it with a chest of gold that has teeth? I don’t know, it sounds a bit cliché to me.

“Anyway, I took copious notes and I’ll have to put some thought into improvements. Here, take your pick of my low-end magic items before I send you back to the inn. Thanks again!”

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