3. Stahlmast’s Lair

Once the players are ready to explore Stahlmast’s lair, read or paraphrase the following:

Gathering your weapons and your grit, you prepare for another hike up the Silberquel Ridge. Your goal is to gain access to the lair of this Stahlmast beyond the steel door—and to uncover the full scope of his mysterious plans.

You might use the Random Mountain Encounters table (from earlier in this adventure) during the characters’ ascent, or you can decide that their familiarity with the mountain trails makes it easier to avoid trouble. Either way, having made the journey already, it takes only three hours to reach the Silver Falls.

Steel Door

If the characters recovered an undamaged lead key from any of the kobold minions or Sken, they can easily unlock the door. Otherwise, it can be opened with a successful DC 20 Dexterity check using thieves’ tools. Savvy players might also think to try blowing the lock open with blasting powder. Doing so requires one pouch of blasting powder, tinker’s tools, and a successful DC 12 Intelligence check, but alerts Stahlmast and his minions to the characters’ approach.

Entering the Lair

When the characters move beyond the steel door, read:

The shadowed tunnel stretches onward for fifty feet before the orange glow of lantern light sets an ominous glow across its rough stone walls. The smell of burned coal, wet earth, and refuse hangs heavy here. From a distance comes the intermittent echo of rough, conversational kobold barking. The tunnel splits ahead, with one branch running south and the other continuing on to a cavern that is the source of the light.

Stahlmast’s Minions

Even kobolds as well trained as the ones that serve Stahlmast's prize self-preservation over all else. In each encounter with Stahlmast's kobold minions, if half or more of the kobolds are defeated or killed, any remaining kobolds flee the battle. Fleeing kobolds retreat deeper into the lair in hopes of warning Stahlmast and seeking reinforcements. If any kobolds are captured and questioned, they reveal what they know of Stahlmast’s operation with a successful DC 13 Charisma (Intimidation or Persuasion) check. You can have individual kobolds know only bits of the overall plan so that the characters learn all the information only over time:

The Master is planning to make many tiny metal crabs (Vox Seekers.)
The Gray Dwarf is obsessed with his ugly statue.
The scary elf visits every few weeks to train the kobolds, and then vanishes into the Master’s fire room.

Making a Scene

Though the winding passages of the compound help mute the sounds of footsteps, loud noises (including combat or shouting) alert the lair’s inhabitants of intruders at your determination.

Voice of Stahlmast

Each area of the lair is outfitted with a metal speaking tube that protrudes from the ceiling, and which Stahlmast uses to issue orders wherever he happens to be. If a character speaks into a tube, their words are heard in all areas of the lair. If Stahlmast is aware of the characters’ intrusion, he occasionally taunts them through these tubes. His remarks alternate between threatening and mocking, boasting about his plans while goading the characters into finding him—and trying to lead them into traps and ambushes. As characters approach the clockwork forge in area L19, he might start describing the benefits of joining him.

ALL IS NOT LOST
If the characters lose the fight in the Silver Falls cavern or in any part of Stahlmast’s lair, it doesn’t necessarily mean the adventure is at an end. Whenever Stahlmast’s minions get the upper hand, you can have them start knocking characters out rather than killing them. Unconscious survivors of a fight wake up in a holding cell in area L7 of Stahlmast’s lair, stripped of their equipment. Any new characters replacing fallen characters can join them there as previously captured prisoners. The characters’ confiscated equipment is in a chest in the armory (area L2), and a confident kobold underling guards their cells. You can then set up a scenario in which the characters find a way to escape and recover their equipment.

Parent Plot

Dangerous Designs

Subplots