7.2 KiB
Finding the Train Station
When the PCs enter the sea of gears, they encounter a monodrone. The monodrone delivers a message:
Audio Recording from Primus: Greetings, agents of Tymora and Rennick. I would like to discuss plans and negotiate the future nature of the universe. Please proceed to the nearest train station, the rail network will bring you to me. Ask the nearest modron for guidance to the train station.
Then, the monodrone resumes walking in the direction it was walking in before. It is not smart enough to figure out that it is supposed to provide guidance to the train station.
To get guidance, the PCs will have to run after the monodrone and say "hey, can you take us to the train station." The monodrone doesn't understand the request, but it understands that something is wanted of it. The monodrone says: "my superior can assist you." The monodrone takes the PCs to its superior, a duodrone.
The PCs must again ask for the train station. The duodrone says, "my superior can assist you," and brings the PCs to a tridrone.
The tridrone is staring at a gear which is wrenching erratically. The tridrone says, "Something is malfunctioning. There is a strong chaotic influence."
The PCs must again ask for the train station. The tridrone says, "my superior can assist you," and brings the PCs to a quadrone. But this time, the tridrone is intelligent enough to at least relay the request: the tridrone says to the quadrone: "these individuals wish to go to a train station." The quadrone says, "I can assist with that."
The quadrone then asks a few questions, and then brings the PCs to the train station.
The Ring of Defenders
The train station is encircled by about 300 monodrones, 50 or so duodrones, a dozen or so tridrones, and three quadrones. They are not allowing anyone inside, interposing their bodies. If anyone tries to push through, a quadrone approaches and explains the situation:
The train station contains a chaotic influence. It is causing a great deal of damage. Several modrons have been corrupted. We are quarantining the site to limit the damage. Please respect the quarantine.
The easiest way to get through the ring of modrons is to say, "We too are corrupted by chaos. We should also be quarantined." The quadrone takes a chaos reading, agrees, and sends the PCs into the train station to be quarantined.
If the PCs force their way through, or teleport around the lines, or the like, then as soon as they get too close to the train station the quadrone says: "they are too close, they are corrupted. Leave them." The modrons back away.
The Moon-Corrupted Quadrone at the front door:
Directly in front of the front door is a quadrone with the moon card over his head. Both of his arms and one of his legs have fallen off. He is using his wings to stay upright on one leg. He explains, "I am corrupted by chaos. I cannot withstand this level of chaos, I am falling apart. When my first arm fell off, I tried reattaching it, but it just fell off again and again."
If the PCs try to enter the train station, the modron says, "I locked the door to enforce the quarantine." If asked to unlock the door, the quadrone says, "I see that you should be quarantined, you are corrupted by chaos. However, I am afraid that without my arms, I am unable to unlock the door."
The best solution to this problem is to point out to the modron that the moon card grants him three wishes. He wishes to no longer be corrupted by chaos. The moon card vanishes. He gets no more wishes, because he wished away the card that was granting him wishes.
Now the PCs have to reattach the modron's arms and leg. This can be accomplished with a simple mending cantrip, or a good skill roll. Once this is done, the quadrone willingly unlocks the front door.
The main hall of the train station:
The main hall is guarded by the following defenders: the Bricklayer-corrupted Decaton, the Beast-Corrupted Quadrone, and the Knight-Corrupted Tridrone. The Decaton will scream, "My territory! This station is my territory!" and will immediately attack. The other two corrupted modrons fight on his side. The fight is unavoidable.
The boarding platform:
After defeating the corrupted modrons, it is possible to go down the stairs to the boarding platform. On the boarding platform is a giant version of the box of the deck of many things. If the lid is removed, it becomes an entrance to the same extradimensional space as was found behind the steel door.
At this point, Rennick can talk to the god of the Deck for the first time. The two of them are very angry and frustrated with each other. Have your PCs roleplay Rennick, and also the God of the Deck. Let them negotiate.
The Train:
The PCs get on board the train. The train doesn't go anywhere. After a while, presumably, the PCs will walk to the front of the train, to see what the holdup is. At the front of the train is a steam engine whose engineer is a Sun-Corrupted Monodrone.
The Sun card grants somebody the divine spark: they have the potential to ascend to divinity. The monodrone has no idea about this.
In front of the train is a length of track that extends about 15 feet out onto the surface of a gear, then it just stops. The engineer is patiently waiting for the track to be repaired. However, the track is not going to be repaired, because the train station was built by the Bricklayer card, and the Bricklayer card can only build one station, not an entire rail network. The modrons will not fix it because this is not where the train station is supposed to be.
The engineer is only a monodrone: not that smart. The answers you get to any questions are mostly monosyllabic and trivial.
If you ask the monodrone about the Sun card, it has no idea about it, or that it is even there.
If you ask the monodrone for its supervisor, it says, "my supervisor can assist you." Then it transforms into a duodrone. The sun card has given this monodrone its first step toward divinity. If you ask it for its superior again, it transforms into a tridrone. It can promote itself all the way up to Primus.
When the modron takes the final step, promoting itself all the way up to Primus, the surroundings change. The PCs are no longer in a train station, they're in Primus's installation.
Primus
The room that the PCs are in is a large room with a dais, and on top of the dais a cylinder that looks kind of like a hot tub, with Primus inside. Inside the hot tub there is no water, only cables and wires connecting the building to primus' body.
Primus has two "arms," but on closer look they aren't really arms: they're very thick cables. There are two small portals, one on either side of primus: one leads to the positive energy plane, the other to the negative energy plane. Primus's cables are tapped into the two planes.
Primus says to the PCs: "Greetings, agents of Tymora, and Rennick #93."
This is probably the first clue the PCs have that the Rennick they're traveling with at this point is not the real Rennick. This may cause some consternation.
Primus says: "It matters not that this is not Rennick #1. I can negotiate with this Rennick. His reasoning is almost identical to the reasoning of Rennick #1. Therefore, any deal struck by Rennick #93 will be accepted by Rennick #1."