Ye Olde Inn

So my hero party playing quest 1 had two heroes die and the other two run screaming back to the staircase. The board was clear of all monsters, all doors opened, except for Verag, a Chaos/Dread Warrior and an Orc from the center room. So now the party is going to make a return to Fellmarg’s tomb to vanquish Verag. Are there any tips or homebrew rules for a second visit to the same quest? Do I add monsters again? Do I change any of the rooms? Or do I leave it all the same?

Interested in hearing what others have done to make a repeated quest interesting and hopefully the heroes can complete it this time.

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Welcome!

I would definitely change the rooms up for their repeat visit. Pretty easy to do, keep the layout the same but just switch the monsters. I believe there is even an alternative map for this and other quests here at the Inn, for this exact purpose. If you are interested I can try to find it for you?

Just found it;
viewtopic.php?f=37&t=1463&hilit=alternative

Thank you! Exactly what I was looking to for!

If the Heroes end up with a boring empty quest, but are still going strong, you can also force them to flee by (beforehand) hiding an undetectable secret door where a formerly empty room (or two) is loaded with reinforcements. Say, when the alarm sounds a few squads of Orcs start streaming towards the heroes' location.

Now if the heroes insist on standing against them (and the forces are not unlimited), they may be back to square one, but at that point I'd just "give it to them" in terms of the win. Enjoy!

If you leave Verag in the central room or connected to it by a door and a direct path, the party might return there to find him. Getting to Verag earlier makes the Quest easier since the Heroes won't need to fight as many monsters to win the Quest goal.

Beyond that, emphasize that sticking together insures more success if they haven't figured that out yet. Also, encourage them to pool their gold coins for shopping at the Armory before they make a second run (if they found enough.)

I'm used to just completely revamping the Quest if all the heroes died but there is a different situation if some survived and escaped to the stairway (as you are allowed to do).

If it wasn't a total party kill and some survivors are returning with new gear, I would add more stuff to the Quest. Maybe Verag has some reinforcements this time? You'd think he'd be running scared and no longer in the dungeon but he is alerted to your presence. Maybe he has hired a few stronger monsters as his body guards? He could even have stashed a potion for himself as extra insurance (what he chooses is up to you, but the simplest would be a potion of healing). Is there anything important hidden in Felmarg's tomb (if you haven't searched it already)? Maybe he has some kind of deadman switch so that when he's vanquished, the Heroes have to beat a hasty retreat do to crumbling walls or poison gas filling the area or something?

Perhaps there are now just some traps this time (not too many because he hasn't had too much time to prepare). Might there be some new treasures? I would leave undiscovered treasure, but in theory he could have moved it somewhere else (and put a trap on it) for example. Even if you leave the rooms the same, you could block off certain corridors, with the idea that he has barricaded certain areas. Maybe there are new secret passages that weren't there before as well (hastily created). All sorts of possibilities to spice things up next time!