This is the 23rd encounter in my 4E conversion of The Sunless Citadel, in which I take a stab at creating my first 4E disease.

Encounter 23: The Goblin Workshop
Encounter Level 1 (200 XP)

Overview
The PCs find themselves in an alchemical workshop where Belak the Outcast’s goblin lackeys work to perfect an elixir that will turn living creatures into twig blight abominations. Several goblins are also at work on more mundane tasks. This encounter includes:

  • 8 goblin cutters

Area Description
Read the following to the players when they first enter:

Two rows of columns, smothered in luminescent fungus, march the length of the hall. The cobbled floor is cracked and stained. Many small tables fill the spaces in between the columns, their tops littered with mortars and pestles, bowls filled with crushed leaves, chopped fungus stalks, and other plant specimens. Many doors lead off the hall. Some are partly open, and a variety of sounds are audible from behind them.

The goblin workshop

The features of this area include:

  • Illumination: Dim lighting
  • Goblin liqueur: The two goblins in the southwest room are busy mashing roots into a pulp and straining the juice from them into casks. Ten 2-gallon casks full of the crude alcoholic product line the wall.
  • Dire rat experiment: The two goblins in the central south room are monitoring the health of a dire rat strapped to a wooden bench. Horrible, woody tumors protrude from various places on the rat’s body, and it will die within the week. The rat has been infected by the latest generation of a twig blight elixir that the goblins are working on for Belak. A dose of the elixir is contained in a crystal vial resting on a stand in the corner.
  • Rift passage: A corner of the back wall in the southeastern room has collapsed, revealing a natural passage to the rift node.
  • Smithy and leatherworks: The two goblins in the central north room are repairing armor, swords, and gardening implements. There are five short swords and thirty javelins in the room.
  • Treasure: A total of 22 sp can be taken off the goblins.
  • Worktables: The tables contain mashed leaves, fungus, bark, and roots from a variety of common trees, shrubs, and fungus, although all have a pronounced pallor, as if sun-starved (Nature DC 13). A successful Nature check (DC 20) would allow a knowledgeable PC to concoct a single-use poultice (+2 bonus to next Heal check).
Twig Blight Tumor Level 3 Disease
These woody tumors sap their victim’s health until they die. Attack: +4 vs Fortitude
Endurance: Improve DC 15, maintain DC 11, worsen DC 10 or lower
The target is cured. < Initial Effect: The target loses a healing surge and regains only half their normal healing surges after an extended rest. <>The target loses all healing surges and cannot regain any healing surges until cured. > Final State: The target dies.

Tactics
Any noise louder than a whisper will alert the goblins, who respond by attacking.