Chapter 28 Networking
I work on securing Rethild next. As much as the other destinations tempt me, the lizardfolk there are just too potentially great a resource to ignore. Not now that I have direct access to them. I've already tested the animated skeleton of the black dragon and the portal works fine for him.
The only real drawback is now that he's dead the portal network can't be modified or expanded further. Not that the network isn't valuable as it is. It'd just be nice to have portals connecting all of my dragons to each other.
To make it easy to remember I name the dragon Kethid. I also move to take over the lizardfolk kingdom. I have a lot of fun allowing my Eldar to rampage throughout the area until it's secure. The other four black dragons makes it much easier. After all if it's one thing lizardfolk respect, it's power.
The takeover goes surprisingly smoothly. Sure I have to kill loads of troops, but once the leaders are dead they all surrender quietly. The Siv and improved lizardfolk I bring over easily accepted.
I also start a few breeding programs to start upgrading the lizardfolk. Along with the myconids I seed for farming there should soon be a population boom. On the other hand I am very thorough in hunting down and burning the bodies of every lizardking and queen. I wanted them organized and efficient, which chaotic evil leaders will not help with.
With such a large and deep swamp I incorporate the aquatic template as well. In many ways Rethild is incredibly secure. Anyone invading would need to swim and slog through mud and fens in order to get anywhere. Disease and predators take their toll. Only flying would let you bypass it, but the thick canopy would make it very hard to find anything. Especially since I started building downwards.
While the lizardfolk technically ruled here, their control was sporadic at best. Teams of hunters roamed around, following trails and killed anything they came across they didn't approve of. They didn't rule so much as establish themselves as the apex predator.
I changed that. Once in control I build a massive city. Not dense, more sprawling to keep it in harmony with nature. Slender towers, rope bridges and raised walkways. The real buildings were underground, small heavily reinforced bunkers.
Guard towers were thickly spread across the swamp, each containing an armory and facilities. Phase Doors made sure only lizardfolk could enter through the thick walls. Each one had a bone naga placed as the Watcher, using divination and permanent Rary's Telepathic Bonds to set up a very good scrying network. Redundancy is always nice and this way I can make the swamp even more secure.
The best part is just how little ecological impact all my changes made. Each Watcher knows five spells. Scry, obviously and four more that let them create the equipment needed. Fabricate, Hardening, Improved Augment Object and Petrify. The last spell was one that made a piece of wood as rigid and unyielding as stone. Permanently. Between those four spells all of my lizardfolk use mostly wood equipment.
In order to make the swamp more secure I make the top portion of some of the towers open to tasloi. The small green cat-like goblins are natural climbers and live in the canopy. They are also largely nocturnal, making nightfall even more hazardous.
Only the towers towards the edges of the swamp allow tasloi in though. While they're simply too independent to be used in any kind of battle, they make superb border guards. Ambushes, traps and just general harassment over miles and miles of swamp.
It's the tasloi that inspires me to place a simulacrum of a howler in each tower as well. Carefully modified when sculpted, the quills from the spiky monster dog can be used as barbed arrows or as small barbed javelins by the tasloi. It's also why I add a simulacrum of an umpleby. Their naturally strong long hair can be woven into rope and cloth even stronger than silk.
In return they also raise baboons for me and pay with their skulls. With a natural ability to speak with all types of monkeys, like the xvarts with rats and bats, it's well within their capabilities. And they can also use them as war beasts.
The interior towers have watchspider nests instead of tasloi. They provide a source for silk, poison and chitin. They also serve as guards, even if they aren't as aggressive or effective as tasloi. However, they can be trained to ignore lizardfolk completely. It was just too bad they weren't effective on the battlefield.
Since the spiders didn't work as a warbeast I added swordslugs. Also called metalmasters, they're essentially enormous slugs, stretching out ten feet long, that possess the ability to manipulate metal. Their abilities will wreak havoc on the battlefield, especially against enemy formations. And it was easy enough to feed them using Walls of Iron and troll meat.
To keep his hold over the kingdom Kethid needed to be powerful enough to meet any challengers head on. Towards that end I worked to make him versatile and powerful. Which is why between them, I tried to make sure the bone nagas grafted to him covered as many spells as possible. I also wanted to focus on his crafting and portal abilities. Which is why, like Echidna, he was going to have several abilities that revolved around minions.
The first thing I did was to add items to summon elementals. A Brazier of Conjuring Fire Elementals, Bowl of Water Elemental Command, Censure of Air Elemental Control and a Stone of Conjuring Earth Elementals. The first three were placed inside along with the items and bags of holding to fuel them. The stone was embedded in the palm of it's hand so it could touch the ground.
Elementals, even huge ones, won't be enough though. So I create Gem Rings, the idea for which was inspired by the Simbul's Blood Ring. Like a Drawmij's Instant Summons, but much more complex. I used it to bind an entire company of lizardfolk dread warriors. And while I had several of them made I decided to restrict it's use to once a day.
The dread warriors came inside a pair of armor plated seismosaurus skeletons. Their great strength, enormous size and ability to just crush anything they step on were all invaluable in turning them into mobile fortresses. A touch of fang dragon blood and dungeon bred meant it's tail dealt a hefty 8d10 damage.
I originally intended for them to be used as war beasts, but transportation and food made it too complicated to be worth it. I didn't want to just discard them though so I kept a small population to raise for their skeletons. After importing the bamboo I had made for Ryloth there was plenty for the to eat. They made for excellent APCs.
Not that I expected any of that to really make a difference. They were more for flavor. But gem rings can be used to summon more than just dread warriors. Which is why Kethid also had three gem rings which can each summon ten death tyrants. Although like the dread warriors I was going to restrict their use to once per day.
The final summons are four huge shield guardians. Decked out in defensive magic items they serve as powerful bodyguards. In addition to the items, they each have a familiar pouch holding a clockwork mender swarm. Unlike the undead I plan on having Kethid use them along with the elementals at the beginning any fight.
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While I was securing Rethild I also had teams of bone nagas busy fortifying the Forest of Wyrms. Naturally by creating more false dragons. After all I did have a number of corpses to work with.
The dragon hoards were mostly just a bit of extra resources. The real treasure was the preserved skeleton of their ancestor. None of the green dragons I killed were more than thirty feet. The skeleton on the other hand was twice that, perfect for creating another false dragon.
The interesting thing was that I didn't even have to customize the bone nagas I grafted inside her. The ones in Dromund Kaas already had spell lists geared towards mist and fog spells. And not only did I enchant the wing claws with a version of Smoking that resembles poisonous fog, I also embedded several modified eversmoking bottles that released clouds of the same.
Paired with having her eyes enchanted with fogsight and she had a terrifying advantage in combat. Especially since nauseating cloud and silence will negate blindsight. Horseshoes of the Zephyr means even tremorsense won't detect her. Making it even better, by using watchghosts made from flying snakes and each carrying a ghost touch eversmoking bottle, she can shroud an entire battlefield.
Unlike Shimmergloom, who I really should figure out a name for, she wouldn't win through attrition. Instead she'll be an assassin. I name her Zabuza. It fits and it isn't like anyone can complain about her being the wrong gender.
I add subtle and deadly grace to all her natural attacks, which combined with the tattoo of Hunter's Eye gives her a sneak attack damage bonus of 9d6. With her attacks also having marrowcrushing, vicious and energy aura it gives her a very good change of killing an enemy in a single round.
I even create a unique tattoo that was based off Bloodstar. The tattoo will drain blood from nearby enemies then it'll store it. The Mighty Fist property will kick in then and allow the stored blood to be spent on a Bloodfeeding property. The tattoo was massive in order to allow it store and preserve large quantities of blood. It was equivalent to three hundred constitution points or fifteen hundred blood points, although the spending cap of fifty at a time still applies. And using a bound troll I can easily make sure her reservoir is kept full.
Compared to the damage increase from just the Enlarge Person or Sharptooth spells the bloodfeeding tattoo isn't actually very efficient. Not worth the time and effort to bother mass producing. Especially since it needs recharging. At least it was entertaining to design and create and it did fit the whole ambush theme.
In order to push the whole mist theme as well as provide disposable flankers I add a pair of Censures of Air Elemental Command. Incense is just made from tree sap. It isn't hard to set up a nice small underground bunker farm to mass produce it. Just for fun and a nice bit of irony I mostly grow the one that creates 'dragon's blood'.
In place of a breath weapon I give one of the bone nagas a Ring of Cloudkill. Rolling clouds of poison gas are close enough. The long duration and mobile nature of the spell makes it easier to use as a distraction too.
In contrast the four green dragons I killed that were only thirty feet long were designed for attrition. They still had similar set ups. Mist focused bone nagas, Fogsight, Enlarge, Sharptooth and Hunter's Eye and even a few watchghosts. It was just less. They only had a pair of bone nagas instead of six and four watchghosts instead of a dozen.
Their natural weapons only hava Wounding, Marrowcrushing and four versions of Cursespewing on them. Besides the normal one, the other three all lowered different ability scores. Their Symbols were similarly focused, having multiple Spell Loss, Pain, Weakening and Fear, but no others. As opposed to Stunning, Death, Discord and Insanity Zabuza used.
Finally instead of any censures, they have a Ring of Mordenkainen's Faithful Hound. The spell was changed to create a large viper instead of dog which hisses at intruders, but is otherwise the same. It's perfect for laying traps and creating distractions. It works well with the Ring of Cloudkill. Also paired with a Silence spell it works for ambushes.
The best part was that they were all joined together with a Rary's Telepathic Bond. It allows them to keep track of each other and call for aid. By dividing the forest into a grid they can use coordinates to arrange more elaborate ambushes.
Not that they need to patrol alone. While there were only six adult green dragons, there were twice that many young. Only one had died before the rest were secured. I fed the oldest to a deepspawn and with plenty of boosts managed to age seven of the rest.
None of them were pushed past adults though. Any further and I was fairly certain it'd be too much. As it was I still lost three of them. Still, eleven huge size green dragons is more than enough to secure the whole forest. And with a deepspawn holding a copy, I can always make more.
Which is good since the portal key for the Forest of Wyrms is a dragon's breath weapon. And since none of my false dragons have real breath weapons or count as dragons, there is no way to get reinforcements. Which is why I ended up adding a new unit to the army.
Nagas, serpentflesh golems and mounted archers. I can't help but notice they seem to be lacking a true tank unit. Something large and tough enough to smash enemy lines. Well, except for dragons, but even they were designed for ambushes.
I think it was the tasloi who gave me the inspiration. Like them and xvarts I knew of another race that had an innate connection to an animal. Well vermin, but close enough. Ettercaps.
Ettercaps can raise and train spiders of all types as easily as everyone else does dogs. It wasn't hard to set up either. I simply moved my sword spider farm over to the volcano. Well duplicate the set up and divide the stock. Then capture, Mindrape and then tattoo an ettercap and I had the template for my trainers.
Thankfully fang dragon blood does not make them any harder to control. And while they're still much slower than most creatures their size, their ability to climb and jump means they're perfect for fighting inside the forest. Outside the forest is another matter.
Which is why, I go through all the current spiders and find the one with the highest strength and dexterity scores. Then I have the bone nagas heavily tattoo it, although the most important ones are Might Fists holding Sharptooth and Speed, a boost to speed and jumping and a combination Enlarge / Reduce Person.
While normal spiders scare people, elephant sized ones should be terrifying. And this way I can enchant each leg, meaning the spiders will prove effective even against a dragon. And if a few die, they were just spawn, easily replacable.
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With two parts of the network secured I sent more scouts to explore the other parts more thoroughly. Including the trapped destinations.
The Raurin desert proves fairly useful. At least for obtaining more dragon corpses. It seems the dragons their know about the portal destination and take turns monitoring it when bored. I nabbed a nice pair of browns and another blue dragon before they stopped letting themselves get ambushed.
It was only the fact that the bone nagas inside them can cast independently that kept me from losing Shimmergloom and Icingdeath. Really glad they can't follow them.
One of them led to Chult and I wasn't going to even try there. Red dragons, fire newts and salamanders were just what my scouts saw before escaping. The few that survived.
Mortik Swamp on the other hand was perfect. Located inside Luiren, it was hundreds of miles from any other base I've set up. And while it's inside a country, they're halflings. The DnD equivalent of hobbits. Cheerful, friendly... peaceful.
Not that they're helpless, but they aren't as nearly aggressive as other races.
Too bad I'm currently out of black dragons.
On the other half of the trap destination, where all the gear is sent, is deep in the Wyrmbones mountain range. Bordering the Shaar savannah they were isolated and likely due to whoever Kethid had been, uninhabited.
Since the mountains were named for their resemblance to a massive petrified dragon skeleton I decided to use that as my theme. I started a terraforming project to sculpt the mountains to enhance that impression. I didn't want people to look and think 'hey, that kind of looks like a dragon's skeleton'. I wanted them to see it and marvel at the enormous fossil being exposed and wonder how something that large ever existed.
Of course I wasn't trying to convince them it was real. Which meant I need a group to live here that can and would go to so much effort. The obvious answer to me was kobolds. Which meant I needed dragons to rule them and I just so happened to have a pair of brown dragons needing a home.
I decided to keep them more in theme than I normally did. While the breath weapon can't be completely replicated, a Ring holding a lightning bolt that was enlarged and substituted to acid is close. Even more so when I add three ring so they can breath out in a fifteen foot wide line.
The bone nagas inside all have Rings holding widened Haboobs, allowing them to duplicate the large sandstorm normal brown dragons can create. And since they can keep casting it, it can grow much larger than normal. I also add an item that allows the casting of Sandstorm once per day. You never know when you might need an instant tornado.
An extremely powerful array of tattoos grant tremorsense out for a hundred and twenty feet and allows the dragons to use Xorn Movment and Earthglide. Fighting them will be much like fighting a clever ghost. The bone nagas just enhance that feeling, concentrating as do on earth and pit spells.
In keeping with the whole desert powers theme brown dragons have I decide to provide them with appropriate minions. Dessicators are created from the remains of water elemental aspected creatures, such as a half-water elemental troll. So I created gem rings that allowed me to summon fifty large dessicators.
They weren't the only creatures I was going to have them use either. Voidwraiths look like clouds of black smoke and are created from creatures of elemental air. Instead of using them as minions though, I add Smoking to one of the dragon's natural attacks and then bind a number of voidwraiths to the dragon. Their ability to create vacuums and suffocate people will fit the choking ash cloud image Smoking gives. It also allows me to play with another type of undead.
Since Halruua is so close I set the majority of the Symbols for Weakness, Death, Insanity and Spell Loss. The first two should kill or cripple mages easily and the last two make them vulnerable. No point making it too easy to negate attacks. They are wizards after all. Preparation is kind of their schtick.
With the dragons pretty much done and firmly in charge I turn to tho kobolds. Much like with the other group I plan to encourage them to become sorcerers and especially necromancers. After all these are called the Wyrmbones. It wouldn't be right to not use skeletons.
Towards that end I place some deepspawn holding their own copies of the young green dragon I had selected to copy. Harvesting it for parts would allow the kobolds access to bone, fangs, hide and scales. Plenty of resources.
As a tribute to the dragon that led me here the next dragon was made half-black dragon instead of green. While the leaders will be able to control and use powerful skeletons, the rest of the kobolds will need something else. And since the brown dragons can't use supernatural acid, why not provide something that does?
I've run across digesters before. They were like a water gun crossed with an ostrich. Of the water gun was full of acid. Like kobolds they were constantly hungry. It made them almost mindless. The increased intelligence from the dragon blood made it much easier to tame them, especially since it was easy to feed them. Melting everything down the way they do, they really aren't picky eaters.
I had to be careful about what kinds of units I placed in the Wyrmbones though. That close to Halruaa I didn't need to place something that would draw too much attention. Rethild didn't matter since everyone avoids the swamp, but Wyrmbones sits right next to three major trade routes. Which meant no dread warrior or heavily tatttooed spawn.
Still I was satisfied creating various half-dragons for the kobolds to work with. Dire weasels were dungeon bred so that they were the equivalent size of to dogs for the kobolds before adding fang dragon blood. And half-blue dragon halruaan behirs were used as alternative mounts and warbeasts.
Still I wanted something that would protect them against mages, which is why I added golems. In particular dragonbone and drakestone golems. They'll defend the mountains and give them a trump card against any mages that show up.
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In the end I decided against using the portals to the other two-way destinations. They were simply too much trouble. They were each located on a mountain range close to a powerful country and inhabited by real dragons. Taking any of them over would draw way too much attention.
So I tore down the entire network. I then built my own. And since Kethid was the source of the portals originally I built the network for his lizardfolk. I built two way portals in Rethild, Dromund Kaas and Dagobah, the only places I have lizardfolk right now.
Hmm. Maybe I should rename Rethild? Something to think about later.
I then add one to Mortik Swamp. By using the lizardfolk I don't need to place a dragon. Kethid can easily fill that role.
Best of all? Halfings raise riding dogs and ponies. Both of which are medium sized. While I don't plan on expanding the swamp, I can probably take over a small section of land next to it to raise animals. Maybe set up slaughterhouses and such.
It would stretch the road out even more, but like in the Mere of Dead Men I can build a toll road. Besides the road already bulges out incredibly far. Even if I don't grab some property I'll likely build a toll road. And with Dambrath so close Luiren might even hire some mercenaries.
The only real difference will be that here I'll raise black wyvern drakes. It's far enough from Halruaa that it shouldn't draw too much attention. It'll also likely make it easier to buy property since I can establish periodic waystations to feed them. And with how many raiders come out of Dambrath it wasn't like the halfings used their southern coastline.
