Friday Fantasy: Jewels of the Carnifex

In the weird and otherworldly Bazaar of the Gods in Punjar, the City of a Thousand Gates, stand temples, chapels, and churches to gods, goddesses, and demi-gods of almost an unknown number. Cults and faiths have risen and fallen, been promoted and persecuted, banished and proselytised. One of these is the Cult of the Carnifex, dedicated to death and suffering, whose members were drawn from the city’s lowest castes. The sick, the mad, the crippled were welcome amongst its ranks and from them, the Overlord of Punjar picked his personal executioners. Thus, the chthonic rose in favour, a reminder to the city’s nobility of the transience and suffering of their mortality and perhaps their eventual fate. However, not all were prepared to suffer this, and thus, the priest, Azazel of the Light, led a band of the city’s finest young swordsmen from amongst the nobility, known as the Swords of the Pious, and set to cleanse Punjar of the profane presence of Carnifex and her filthy cultist adherents. They smashed the cult and toppled its chapel, but never returned from beneath the city where the true temple to Carnifex was located. Carnifex and her cult were all but forgotten, only the young noblemen of certain families being sent to guard the broken site where the temple to Carnifex once stood, though they have long forgotten why. There are others though who have not forgotten, the knowledge whispered of and even noted down. Now, a band of adventurers and ne’er-do-wells have come into the possession of a map that shows the location of the forgotten passage which leads to the ruins of the temple. If no one has returned from the temple in hundreds of years, then there is still the chance that its wealth remains. Can they find their way into the underground temple, penetrate its secrets, survive its dangers, and return as wealthy men and women?

This is as much set-up as there is for Dungeon Crawl Classics #70: Jewels of the Carnifex, the fourth scenario to be published by Goodman Games for use with the Dungeon Crawl Classics Roleplaying Game. Designed for a group of six to ten Third Level Player Characters, it is an important scenario for four reasons. One is that it is the fourth scenario to be written for the Dungeon Crawl Classics Roleplaying Game and the third to be written for Player Characters who are not Zero level, and the third is that it is the first scenario for Third Level Player Characters. However, it is also important because in tone and setting, the scenario is clearly inspired by tales of Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser. It even admits this at the end, suggesting that the Judge read ‘The Two Best Thieves in Lankhmar’. Even though this scenario was published five years before the Dungeon Crawl Classics Lankhmar Boxed Set, it feels like it would fit right into a Lankhmar campaign. Being designed for Third Level Player Characters for standard Dungeon Crawl Classics play, it is probably too tough an adventure, given the comparitive lack of healing and magic in Dungeon Crawl Classics Lankhmar, for similar Level Player Characters, but adjust that and the Judge will have a fine addition to her campaign. That aside, whether the Judge decides to set it in the city of Lankhmar or not, Dungeon Crawl Classics #70: Jewels of the Carnifex is still a great Swords & Sorcery-style scenario.

The Player Characters have the opportunity to learn a rumour or two before following the map to the temple’s location and finding their way inside. What the Player Characters find below is a trap- and puzzle-infested complex, much of it overgrown with rotting vegetation—the scenario pointedly notes the smell—and occupied by the Swords of the Pious, twisted by their long existence inside the temple complex and exposure to the power of Azazel of the Light. Even getting to the temple entrance is challenging, across a chasm and through a waterfall of effluence from a broken sewer pipe! There is a lovely sense of decrepitude to temple. Not just the prevalent layers of matted and rotten vegetation hanging from the ceiling and along the walls, but partially collapsed rooms where the Player Characters might be able to dig something out of the rubble, hopefully without setting off a further collapse, and riding an avalanche of collapsed saints’ skulls downstairs to a lower room! What is interesting at this point is that the adventure does not make the finding of the secret door to the next level above, a mechanical roll. Rather, ways are suggested as to how the Player Characters might find it, whether Elf, Dwarf, or another Class, but ultimately lets them find it. This is because the point is not to find the door, but have then open it. This requires the solving of a puzzle, actually a fairly simple puzzle. However, there is another exit and that leads to a room of further exits, but all trapped. So essentially, the Player Characters are punished—though punished with some entertaining little encounters, but punished nonetheless—for taking the obviously easier option, but rewarded where the players have to think a little. It is a feature that occurs again later at the end of the scenario. Obviously, the room with the trapped doors are a diversion for anyone foolish enough to break into the temple, but not experienced in ways in which this tomb-like complex is designed.

If there is a sepulchral feel to the complex and Dungeon Crawl Classics #70: Jewels of the Carnifex in general, but the Swords & Sorcery aspect of the scenario delightfully twists the antagonists here. Whilst her cultists are long dead, Carnifex herself, remains imprisoned, and if the Player Characters manage to free her, she is revealed as icily alluring, yet unsettling, a goddess who will actually reward them before she leaves the temple. The Swords of the Pious are the loyal, but physically twisted servants of Azazel of the Light, who unbeknownst to them, are his victims. Trapped in the temple because of his power, a power that he was unwilling to give up and sacrifice himself to permanently seal Carnifex in the temple. Certainly, Azazel of the Light will fight to prevent this from happening in what likely to be the scenario’s big set-piece battle. There is a handy description of the tactics used by the Swords of the Pious—they are no fools, and Azazel of the Light even has his own Critical Hit Table!

The outcome of the scenario is, of course, down to the action of the Player Characters, but all of the options are covered. Also discussed is the possibility of the Player Characters exiting the temple with a lot of treasure. The advice for handling this is very good, basically using the wealth to drive further stories rather than something that the Player Characters can go on a mad shopping spree with. In addition, there are some terrific treasures and magical items to be found in the scenario, many of them dedicated to Carnifex, so looting them may not necessarily be the wisest option, but it does lend itself to further encounters with both her and worshippers from outside of Punjar.

One issue with the scenario is that there are relatively few opportunities for roleplaying. In fact, beyond a madman whom the Judge will have immense pleasure in portraying, the only NPCs who will talk with the Player Characters are Azazel of the Light and Carnifex. This is a very action and exploration orientated scenario.

Lastly, Dungeon Crawl Classics #70: Jewels of the Carnifex, a separate, smaller adventure unconnected to the first. This is ‘Lost in the Briars’. Again, written for Third Level Player Characters, this takes place in the Briarwood Deep, a forest near the village of Garland’s Fork. A thick bramble wall has surrounded the forest and both villagers and travellers, as well as local animals, have begun to go missing. This is due to Nockmort, a treant poisoned and twisted by the forces of Chaos, wanting to take his revenge on anyone and everyone and complete a ritual which will see him elevated into a god! There are some great scenes here, such as animated trees passing humans and animals from one to another like a line of firemen (who will throw them at the Player Characters if they attack), cowardly bandits wanting to get out of there, and a decidedly unhelpful hermit! There is the hint that the scenario is connected to The Sunless Garden (both are by the same author), but this is not developed. Otherwise, this is a short, little forest crawl that is easy to add to a campaign and a very enjoyable bonus scenario.

Physically, Dungeon Crawl Classics #70: Jewels of the Carnifex is a very nicely done book. The maps are good—for both adventures—and the artwork is excellent. That of Russ Nicholson really stands out, giving the scenario a profane feel whilst the depiction of the Player Characters is slightly grubby and desperate. 

Dungeon Crawl Classics #70: Jewels of the Carnifex is a really enjoyable, really good Swords & Sorcery, Conan the Barbarian or Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser-style tomb (temple)-robbing scenario, nicely detailed with some suitable genre twists. It should challenge any party of Player Characters, but the risk is worth it as the reward will make them wealthy, if only for a while.