Dungeons · Underground · Traps
A simple death curse
People are often buried with The Monarchs. If the right people are, they can protect him even after death.
Thinking about a tombs of monarchs, and others of wealth and power, that have the ugly tendency to get looted, I came up with this:
A relatively cheap 'trap' could be a simple corpse. Not just any corpse, mind you, but one that has died from some highly infective disease. Simply include the body (bodies) in an entry hallway, or some easy to access room where thieves are likely to enter/break in. Optionally equip it with some treasure, to make them search it and contract the disease.
Don't forget the death curse, it looks much better!
While infected corpses in their very own grave may conflict a bit with afterlife or personal preferences, they should mostly work:
- germs can stay active for a long time (though people may not know about it)
- diseases that were overcome (or survived...) centuries or millenia ago may be still dangerous to the people. Even if the hardy adventurers survive, or simply cast that Cure Disease spell (sic!), they may carry the 'Black Pest' with them... talk of a major campaign modifier. And don't forget to pursue madly the culprits that unleashed the curse of Rhudolf the Vengeful...
- maybe all that live now are descendants of those that survived the pest, and are immune. Just think of the minor flu one character develops, and it turns lethal for a people/race that arrived after the plague was overcome!
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A very effective way of getting one's own back on looters, given that in historical times, most looting of tombs happened not centuries later, but within weeks or months.
I do like this idea a lot. Two comments I have are 1) to my knowledge most diseases and germs aren't going to live on a dead body (and not decompose) for a long time... but magic can answer this question (or a special disease) 2) Unless it is very fast acting it won't protect the tomb from being robbed, it will just be a curse upon the thief. Unless of course one can spread rumors about it to prevent someone from robbing the tomb for fear of the disease. In which case, you might not even need to have a real diseased corpse!
1) germs could in theory survive for a long time, but magic or a hardy disease can make it
2) You wouldn't want to have a great treasure without a death curse, would you? :)
Rumours have rarely been an effective protection, someone always makes a try if there are riches untold. But even if the thiefs survive, an epidemy could limit further attempts at robbing. (If there are more such tombs...) This trap has a very Egyptian feeling to me.
Thanks for the comment.
Now I remember what happened not a few times in history: that towns under siege were bombarded by not only fire and stones, but also blankets (or even bodyparts) of plague-victims... with fatal effects sometimes.
So if you use this, be the evil monarch and include the personal items and clothing - it will be all the more effective.
Now that, manfred, is truly evil
As you commented it has a nice Egyptian feel to it - He who disturbs my eternal rest shall bring Death and Corruption upon himself and his kin, even unto the third and fourth generations
Definitely up to your usual standards - 4/5
Just seen a crappy documentary on curses and stuff. Very weak reasoning, and not really worth watching, but they mentioned a case, when a few archeologists died some time after opening a tomb. The reported cause (or at least a contributing factor) were funghi growing in the tomb. And some of them could kill a human - but only in extreme amounts, or - if the person was already sick.
Which means something that we already know - that tombs can be dangerous - but it's a nice reminder. Hence, weak people entering a tomb (or, say, wounded while fighting something) can have health issues afterwards, or even die, without any curse or magic at all.
In a fantasy world, even more dangerous funghi may exist, and magic could make them even more potent. In either case you'll get the death curse.
Very usable idea.
Perhaps an expansion might be to use something like lead dust or mercury covering the corpse.
A straightforward idea but quite refreshing and has real-life logic behind it. Short and sweet.