Skip to content
CharGen Icon
CreatePricing
Play the Count at the Keeper's Seat - AI-generated fantasy Encounter

Play the Count at the Keeper's Seat

Encounters
Exploration and skill challenge · Low · 6 players, level 16

Play the Count at the Keeper's Seat

The party can learn how far the horn's answer has progressed, but a careless descent risks injury and may leave the Count's most important signal misunderstood.

Run the talk

Successes
0/3
Failures
0/3

Starts Neutral

Base DC 18

Success The party reaches and plays the horn safely

Failure Three failures before three successes cause the false seat trap to fire

Party 6 players, level 16

System D&D 2024

Cheat sheet

The party wants

Reach the Keeper's Seat, safely play the count, and understand what the horn reveals without losing anyone to its false echoes or trap.

Success

The party reaches and plays the horn safely.

Failure

Three failures before three successes cause the false seat trap to fire.
Clock
3 / 3
successes / failures
Base DC
18
Starts
Neutral

Read aloud

Say this

Follow the founder's stair down through the horn-field as the stone coils beneath your feet. Rope fibers rasp against the wall, and a still pool below returns your breathing a beat late. At the bottom, a glass horn faces a cut-stone seat while the Unbanked Ember tugs east.

Who says what

They wantThe remembered cadence of Hamar Duskfrost's team pushes the intruders to approach carefully and leave the seat intact. It offers clues through the team's work, not proof of Hamar's presence.

LeverageHamar Duskfrost's ropes, tools, and unfinished wall cut show that another team came this way carefully. Follow their practical clues rather than forcing the stairs.

  • If the party handles the tools gently, the echo settles and the next voice returns at its proper pitch.

  • If someone shouts into the Throat, their words crash back in overlapping fragments; ask another character to guide them.

  • If the group plays the count correctly, resolve the horn's response from the Heard boxes, then have the Ember lean east as the horn-field shakes.

Maneuvers

DC 18Ask one character to lead each stage while another supports with a relevant skill or careful use of the team's rope and tools.
DC 18Let the group describe how they keep one another oriented in the doubling sound; reward a fitting plan with advantage on the lead check.
DC 18At the seat, ask who will play the count and who will listen for the answer.

What the party can use

The Throat: Wisdom (Perception), DC 16 Easy, 18 Moderate, or 21 Hard.
The Basin: Intelligence (Arcana) or Wisdom (Insight), same DC tiers.
The Keeper's Seat: Intelligence (History), same DC tiers.
For six characters, invite different specialists to lead each stage; each success advances the clock, while a failed stage check causes its listed effect and marks a failure.
A character at the seat can tap three short beats and one long beat to play the count through the horn.

What happens

30–45 minutes
  1. ·

    On a failed Basin check.

    The pool repeats the last speaker's words in a stranger's voice. That speaker is frightened until the end of their next turn.

  2. ·

    On a failed Keeper's Seat check.

    The false seat trap releases a concussive pulse: Dexterity save, taking thunder damage on a failure or half as much on a success.

  3. ·

    After the count is played, regardless of Heard boxes.

    The horn-field above shudders; grit rains down the stair as the Unbanked Ember leans east.

The battlefield

Zones

  1. 1

    The Throat25-foot section

    A founder's spiral stair descends through a narrow stone throat. Sound doubles back, and Hamar Duskfrost's team's rope and tools remain wedged along the wall.

  2. 2

    The Basin25-foot landing

    A still pool lies across the stair's landing. Every spoken word returns a beat late.

  3. 3

    The Keeper's Seat25-foot chamber

    A cut-stone seat faces a glass horn. Hamar Duskfrost's half-finished wall cut stops just short of the chamber.

What the party can use

The Throat doubles each sound back; characters who pause and listen can orient the group before anyone moves on.
The Basin repeats a speaker's words in a stranger's voice on a failed check; another character can steady them with a hand or a familiar voice.
At the Keeper's Seat, tap three short beats and one long beat against the stone to play the count through the glass horn.

Treasure

Hamar Duskfrost's abandoned rope and tools may prove useful for the return climb.

Media

0 images

No images yet.

Visual sheet

Turn Play the Count at the Keeper's Seat into a sheet

A high-res, share-ready sheet you can post or print.