Pyramid of Shadows – JADE Conversion

Pyramid of Shadows – JADE Conversion
The 4th edition Dungeons & Dragons
adventure titled Pyramid of Shadows
takes player characters (PCs) from 7th
to 10th levels. A player or Dungeon
Master (DM) need not own the
Player’s Handbook, Dungeon Master’s
Guide, or Monster Manual to use the
Pyramid of Shadows adventure. The
adventure provides all the necessary
rules to play, and it is designed to fit
into most campaign settings. The
material that follows is a guide to
placing the adventure into the JADE
setting. The article includes additional
encounters, adaptations to the
adventure’s people and places, and
expanded interactions with nonplayer
characters (NPCs). With this guide, a
DM can jumpstart his JADE campaign.
How to Use This Article
Pyramid of Shadows intentionally
leaves gaps in geography and history,
enabling a DM to place the adventure
anywhere within his or her campaign.
To place Pyramid of Shadows into
JADE requires this article to provide—
and in some cases override—many
names, backgrounds, and histories
presented in the original adventure. As
DM, you must be prepared to adapt the
adventure’s original text to the
information presented here. Read the
adventure text in conjunction with this
article before running the adventure.
You might want to place sticky notes
within the adventure’s text to help
remind yourself of changes as the
players run through the adventure.
The Setting
In the JADE setting, the Pyramid of
Shadows lies in Jade's Underdark, far
beneath the Darkling Peaks.
It has long been known that the
Underdark includes the Citadels of the
Drow and of the Illithids.
The Underdark itself is rarely
mentioned. Fortunately the powerful
creatures in the world below have little
interest in the surface lands.
It is generally known that there is a
trickle of trade between the surface and
the Underdark, particularly with the
Duergar (Gray Dwarves).
Orcs, Goblins, Gnolls and
unscrupulous bandits, often trade
captives for gems. Some human
merchants trade Food for gems, gold or
arcane knowledge.
If the players have already played H2:
Thunderspire Labyrinth, they will
already know about its Seven Pillared
Hall.
Otherwise, Arcana or Religion DC 20
reveals that a trading post exists
beneath Thunderspire Mountain.
and Arcana or Religion DC 25 reveals
that the trading post is permitted by the
Kingdom (and by the Churches) as
they need some way to keep an eye on
what's going on down there.
Characters who have played
Thunderspire Mountain should already
know quite a bit about the Underdark.
The Hook for this adventure will most
likely come from the Mages of Saruun
in the Seven Pillared Hall. Foolhardy
duergar explorers have recently
discovered the Pyramid and
inadvertently broken its outer seal.
Somebody will have to go inside and
re-activate the seal before the evils
within, become without!

The Background
For the JADE version of this
adventure, there are many changes to
the nature and history of the Pyramid
and to the nature of the main
protagonists – Karavakos and Vyrellis.
The Pyramid was built by the Dark
Gods, Morlock, Hista and Arachne
8,500 years ago to hold their enemies.
Enemies too powerful (or too
potentially useful) to destroy
completely were cast into the Pyramid.
Each of the infernal trio had a Pyramid
Key to let them come and go freely but
they needed to use all three to release a
prisoner.
The first prisoner was Karavakos an
Exarch of Morlock – one of Morlock's
most powerful servants. Millenia ago,
Karavakos sought to overthrow his
master by gaining worshippers from
three different religions. He assumed
the guises of two other "gods" as well
as his own natural form.
Karavakos – The Eater of Dreams
(worshipped by warlocks of many
races but particularly shadar-kai and
arboreans, he could grant Infernal, Star
or Fey Pact powers)
Sokkavara – The Mind Spider
(worshipped by Drow as a supposed
avatar of Arachne)
Vaskoraak – The Dragon of Despair
(worshipped by dragons, kobolds and
lizardfolk as a supposed avatar of
Hista)
In these forms he attracted worshippers
from all three of the Dark Gods by
nurturing secret cults inside the three
main religions. So successful was he
that it would have done serious
damage to all three of the Dark Gods if
he was killed, so another solution had
to be found.
They created the Pyramid of Shadows,
split Karavakos into his three avatars
to weaken him and locked him away.
Over the millennia the loose alliance of
these three Dark Gods crumbled.
• Arachne became insane and
retreated into her Demonweb, only
interested in her Drow
worshippers.
• Hista was imprisoned by his own
children and has only recently
regained his freedom.
• Morlock eventually lost interest in
the Pyramid as he was unable to
use it without the agreement of the
other two.
For more than a thousand years, the
entrance portal to the Pyramid was
known to many of the most evil races
in the Underdark who have thrown
their own criminals into it too.
Gaining entrance to the Pyramid has
always been easy, anyone passing
through the triangular portal is
transported within. Once inside,
however, there is no return for anyone
unless they have one of the three keys.
Somehow, a duergar theurge gained
one of the three Pyramid Keys
(probably the one belonging to Hista)
and decided to explore the Pyramid to
see what treasures he could take from
the inhabitants. He hired Gharash Vren
(a dragonborn mercenary) and his band
of human outlaws to accompany him.
Somehow the duergar (and his
Pyramid Key) fell into the hands of
Karavakos. Although Karavakos
cannot himself leave the Pyramid,
because he is bound to the other
splinters of himself, the key is allowing
him to reach out into the dreams of
others. He is attempting to lure
adventurers to the Pyramid with vague
promises of plunder and wants them to

destroy the other splinters of himself
so he is free to escape.
Karavakos was imprisoned with his
"girlfriend" Vyrellis, a Drow Priestess
who came to worship him as
Sokkavara but later learned his true
nature and became his lover. She
blames him for her own death and
imprisonment. Like Karavakos, she
was split into three but being only a
mortal, she could not form three living
bodies and was instead split into three
orbs.

Adventure Hooks
Somehow the adventurers need to be
brought inside the Pyramid.
Hook One: The Mages of Saruun
The mages have learned that the
Pyramid of Shadows has been
breached and that one of its occupants
is even now reaching out to weak and
greedy minds, tempting them to enter
the Pyramid. They are concerned that
if the Pyramid opens, terrible evil
creatures will be released. Normally,
entering the Pyramid would be a oneway
trip but the duergar explorers who
have caused this breach had a Pyramid
Key that would have let them leave.
They want the adventurers to enter the
Pyramid, find the lost Pyramid Key
and bring it out.
Other Hooks
Any of the other hooks are ok too,
even just falling into the Portal would
do. Once they are inside they can learn
of the Pyramid Key and the way out
from either a duergar survivor of the
original expedition or from one of the
Orbs of Vyrellis.
Getting to the Pyramid
The Portal to the Pyramid is deep in
the Underdark. If you want to use the
first encounter "A1: The clearing in the
forest" it would make more sense to
have the encounter in the Underdark
and switch the dwarf hammerers and
human ambushers for duergar shock
troopers and duergar scouts looking for
their lost theurge (or waiting to
ambush the theurge's bodyguards when
they emerge in order to avoid having to
pay them).
There is no need to use "The
Invitation"
The portal to the Pyramid is a runecarved
stone triangle about 20 feet on
each side and about 5 feet thick.
Religion DC25 - The runes reveal a
mix of three different dark religions –
Morlock, Arachne & Hista.
Arcana DC25 – It is a teleporting
portal leading to somewhere in the
Shadowfell.

Pyramid Level 1
The Charnel Pit
Encounter P1 – Entrance Pit
Pretty much as written but change the
description of the pile of bodies to
include many drow, kobolds, lizardfolk
and shadar-kai, as these were the races
who worshipped Karavakos' three
avatars the most.
The Orb of Vyrellis
The image in the orb is misty and
sepia. It should not be possible to tell
that Vyrellis is a drow – she looks like
an eladrin.
I'm also going to make the Orbs be
treasure (+1 Orb with the special
ability to let the wielder use their Orb
Mastery ability one extra time per
encounter). If the party has an Orbspecialist
wizard this is a pretty
powerful item but the power will be
withheld if the party don't do as
Vyrellis asks "seek the other orbs and
touch them together in order to release
me".
When the second orb is touched to the
first they merge into one and the
enhancement bonus increases to +2.
When the third orb is touched to the
combined orb, they merge into one and
the enhancement bonus increases to
+3. Vyrellis is now free to emerge at
will but she will probably wait until the
party has escaped from the Pyramid.
The rest of the P1 to P5 encounters
can be run as written.
The Verdant Ruin
All these areas are pretty much as
written but change the background a
little so the Arboreans were originally
worshippers of Karavakos. Their
whole community was imprisoned
here.
Gharash Vren's Gang
All these areas are pretty much as
written but again the background
changes a little. The gang were hired
by a duergar theurge who promised
them vast treasures but then seemed to
go mad and wandered off after being
affected by bad dreams. Unfortunately
the duergar was carrying the Pyramid
Key.
G3 - Inner Chambers
The succubus imprisoned here was a
servant of Karavakos. She knows the
history of the place and has recently
been getting dreams sent by her old
master.
H1 – Library of Whispers
The Eaters of Knowledge are servants
of Karavakos.
H2 – The Hermitage
This Karavakos is the one sending the
dreams. He will vanish when killed in
order to re-appear in the Sanctuary of
Light.
S4 – Chamber of the
Monoliths
This chamber will be as described but
without the headless body. The
encounter itself will be moved until
after the three Orbs of Vyrellis are
joined.
More to Follow…