How the Lich Stole Christmas! | New Fifth Edition Adventure for 20th-Level Characters (featuring Tom Cartos and Rick Hershey)

Save Christmas from a mean lich in this holiday adventure!

How the Lich Stole Christmas! is a Fifth Edition adventure for four to six characters of 18th to 20th level, and it is optimized for a party of four characters with an average party level (APL) of 20. Although this is a holiday adventure based on a classic children’s novel, it can easily be inserted into any Fifth Edition campaign setting or run as a stand-alone adventure. Characters of 18th or 19th level who complete this adventure should earn half the necessary experience to reach the next level. 20th-level characters who complete this adventure will earn one of the epic boons detailed at the end of this adventure.

Background

Every adventurer down in Ostenwold liked Christmas a lot.
But the Lich who lived just east of Ostenwold did not!

Dresden the Lich hated Christmas! The whole Christmas season!
Now, please don’t ask why. No one quite knows the reason.

It could be, perhaps, that his phylactery was too old.
It could be that his brown molds weren’t that cold.

But I think that the most likely reason of all
May have been that his heart was two sizes too small.

But, whatever the reason, his phylactery or mold
He stood there on Christmas Eve, hating folks from Ostenwold.

Staring down from his tower with a sour, skeletal frown
At the warm lighted windows below in their town,

For he knew every adventurer down in Ostenwold beneath
Was busy counting all their loot and XP.

"And they're hanging their shields," he snarled with a sneer.
"Tomorrow is Christmas! It's practically here!"

Then he growled, with his bony fingers nervously drumming,
"I must find some way to keep Christmas from coming!

For tomorrow, I know, all the Ostenwold fighters and clerics
Will wake bright and early to their bards’ obnoxious lyrics.

And then! Oh, the noise! Oh, the noise! Noise! Noise! Noise!
There's one thing I hate! All the NOISE! NOISE! NOISE! NOISE!

They'll stand close together, with Christmas bells crashing.
They'll stand side-by-side, and those adventurers will start slashing!"

"And they'll bash! And they'll pierce! And they'll STAB! STAB! STAB! STAB!!"
And the more the lich thought of the rogues’ sneak attacks,
The more the lich thought, "I must stop this whole thing from coming back!”

“Why for five hundred years I've put up with it now!
I must stop Christmas from coming! But how?"

Then he got an idea! An awful idea!
The lich got a wonderful, awful idea!

"I know just what to do!" The lich cackled in his throat.
"I'll make a quick Santy Claus hat and a coat."

That Christmas Eve, Dresden the Lich came down from his dark tower
To steal away Christmas, during the latest hours.

"This is stop number one," the old Lichy Claus hissed,
As he climbed to the roof, empty bags-of-holding in his fist.

Then he slid down the chimney, a rather tight pinch.
But if Santa could do it, then so could the lich.

He got stuck only once, for a minute or two.
Then he cast etherealness and right into the wall he went through.

Where the little adventurers’ magic weapons hung all in a row.
"These magic items," he grinned, "are the first things to go!"

Then he slithered and slunk, with a smile most obscene,
Around the whole room, and he took everything!

It was quarter of dawn. All the adventurers still a-bed,
All the heroes still a-snooze, when he packed up his sled.

Packed it up with their plate mail, and shields, and bows
Their lutes and their axes, their trinkets and ten-foot-poles!

Then a planar portal, Dresden opened up
Into the Astral Plane, all the adventurers’ stuff he would chuck!

"Pooh-pooh to the heroes!" he was evilly humming.
"They're finding out now that no Christmas is coming!”

Get the Roll20 Version Now

No time to convert this full adventure to Roll20 yourself? No worries, we gotcha, fam. You can get the whole thing already set up for you on Roll20 with all the bells and whistles.

https://marketplace.roll20.net/browse/gameaddon/8886/how-the-lich-stole-christmas 

Get the Maps from Tom Cartos

All of the maps plus variants are available FREE from Tom Cartos' Patreon. If you aren't already a patron, then wtf are you doing? It's one of the best deals on Patreon!

https://www.patreon.com/posts/dresdens-tower-28893675 

Get the Monster Art from Fat Goblin Games

Our buddy Rick Hershey of Fat Goblin was the mad man who designed a lot of the monster art we used for this adventure including the image of the eponymous lich. Take a gander at his art... if ye dare!

https://www.patreon.com/fatgoblingames/posts