Chapter 16: Ruin - The Book of Many Things

Chapter 16: Ruin. Traditionally, the Ruin card causes individuals who draw the card to lose their wealth. This chapter, intended for the DM, reinterprets this card as physical ruins to be explored: the ruins of Gardmore Abbey. This adventure location was first described in Madness at Gardmore Abbey, a boxed adventure for D&D's fourth edition. In that adventure, Gardmore Abbey was located in the Nentir Vale, and the site had ties to the minotaur empire below Thunderspire Mountain. You, however, can situate the ruin and the fortified hill it sits atop anywhere in your campaign world. The layout of Gardmore Abbey was inspired by a real fortress atop the French island Mont-Saint-Michel, so you might place the ruins on a similar island accessible only by a narrow path that's underwater at high tide. Regardless of where you place Gardmore Abbey, you can use the site to introduce a Deck of Many Things to your campaign. The deck lies in the hoard of Mekkalath, a powerful dragon, who nests in the ruins. Few heroes are brave enough to face Mekkalath in battle, though resourceful characters can obtain the deck in other ways. But once the deck is in their possession, their troubles have just begun. History of Gardmore Abbey A thousand years ago, minotaurs built a temple to Bahamut and other gods of good under a towering hill. But a cult dedicated to the demon lord Baphomet infiltrated the temple, and its members gradually took over the temple's leadership. When the cultists revealed their worship of Baphomet, the minotaurs dedicated to Bahamut rose up to reclaim the temple. After a bloody conflict, the survivors fled, leaving the temple abandoned. Hundreds of years later, monastic knights chose the hill for their order's home and began building a defensive structure atop the site. A massive wall surrounded much of the hill, leaving only its impassible western face unguarded. The knights built an abbey, a barrack, a memorial hall, and more at the summit of the hill, and dug c...