Brainstorm for Dragon Cult final encounter

[KaneDriscol]

Alright I’m looking for some suggestions on a final encounter for my group’s clash with a Dragon Cult. Their adventure has been investigating the cult after they ransacked a town and pillage for gold and treasure to be used as an offering.

My original thought was for the group to stumble upon the final ceremony of Dragon Cult as they were making an offering to the image of Durathrax from MAGICs, in hopes of summoning her from the void. Unfortunately, that sounds way to close to DOOMVAULT from CORE, which they have done (Not part of this adventure. I used DOOMVAULT as my way of introducing my group to ICRPG).

My next thought was maybe make the encounter more along the lines of Temple of Doom, with rivers of lava, heart-wrenching sacrifice, and weird mechanisms.

What do you guys think? I’m not looking for someone to write the encounter for me, I just find a back and forth with creative people will make for a better climax to the end of my group’s adventure.

[Alex]

Maybe as a precursor to summoning Durathrax, the group has attempted to control an Eyebeast, perhaps to harvest one of the stalks. However, they have vastly underestimated the thing, and now it’s destroying them AND everyone else in town, for that matter.

Run the eyebeast from the book and make it especially nasty. Keep a tally on how many innocents are dying as it destroys town. That should be an encounter to remember.

[bleaquehaus]

Sounds like they’re doing the summoning in some sort of cave, yes?

Are the cultists sure they picked a cave big enough to hold a dragon?

Set a timer: every time it goes off, a limb bursts from a portal and crushes everyone on a particular side of the room. Observant players can roll normal INT to calculate the next side, so can thin the cultist numbers by tricking them into being up against that side.

[KaneDriscol]

@Alex Oooh I’d never given much thought to the collection of monster parts to be something the villains might do and an eye beast no less. That’s diabolical!

@bleaquehaus yes they are in a cave. I imagined in my head a giant dragon head coming out of a portal and the players having to stop the ritual before the whole cave collapses but that’s just more DOOMVAULT. Maybe instead of dragon parts, I could have a timer for in fluxes of lava flow that affect the area.

[skippy]

Plot twist: the cultists are doing all they do to quickly acquire the means necessary to properly support the clutch of baby dragons that just hatched from the eggs the cult has been guarding. The cultists aren’t evil, per se, just aggressively focused on the health and safety of the hatchlings.

Other plot twist: the leader of the cult has been playing these mooks, using the story of the dragon to keep them focused on gathering all the pieces she needs to perform a ritual to become an eternal lich.

[KaneDriscol]

Nice! That could tie in nicely. I’d been using a rumor that they had a clutch of dragon eggs as an underlying push for the group. What if they really do have a clutch of eggs and they hatch only to be used for nefarious purposes

[Alex]

Other plot twist: the leader of the cult has been playing these mooks, using the story of the dragon to keep them focused on gathering all the pieces she needs to perform a ritual to become an eternal lich.

Hahahahaha. I love this one.

[Chuck_Lemons]

Y’all are diabolical. I love it. There are some great ideas in this thread.

[KaneDriscol]

Just a few pictures of where we left off in last nights boss encounter. They decimated the main enemy wizard with a barrage of arrows, spears, and marking flares, but the party eventually got split and were fighting the encroaching lava/heat, a pack of kobolds, a couple cultists, and a hillfolk general.