The leavings of many civilisations dot the land. Such places are often a magnet for minions of evil. Bandits, marauding humanoids or other—more terrible and ferocious—monsters can be found lairing in such locales.

Ruins Dressing

Any ruin the characters discover is bound to have an interesting feature to two.

1. The walls glow with a strange luminescence, shedding light in a five-foot radius.

2. Thick, sticky cobwebs and piles of rubble clog the ruins, creating areas of difficult terrain.

3. In a sheltered part of the ruins, the embers still burn from a recent campfire.

4. An unnatural keening moan fills the ruins1.

5. A thick layer of soot, which counts as soft ground for tracking, covers everything.

6. Arcane energy fills the air; spells cast in the ruins function at +2 caster levels.

7. Sickly, yellow ivy covers the ruins.

8. Many small animal bones litter the ruins.

9. Some of the ruin’s features (walls, floor and so on) are warped and bent at unnatural angles.

10. Evil humanoids from a local tribe have daubed crude drawings on the walls.

11. A message, written in days-old blood, warns people to stay away or befall a dire fate.

12. A rotted wooden spear impales a skeleton wearing rusted ceremonial armour.

13. Loose bits of debris occasionally come loose tumble to the ground with a clatter.

14. From the ruins, when the stars are visible, the constellations seem subtly out of place2.

15. Twilight seems to last longer, in the ruins.

16. Bits of ancient, broken armour and weapons lie scattered about.

17. The large cracks in the ruin’s walls form words of magical power. Arcane spells cast within the ruins function at +1 caster level.

18. An unusual number of fireflies flit about the ruins, providing areas of dim light.

19. A crumpled piece of parchment3 wedged under a rock has a rough sketch of the ruins.

20. Thick fog fills the ruins, obscuring sight of anything further than 5 ft. away.

Amazing Art from Matt Morrow

Check out this amazing full-page piece of artwork from Matt Morrow for Wilderness Dressing: Ruins:

This is an extract from Wilderness Dressing: Ruins (Remastered) by John Bennett. This tremendously useful GM’s Resource is available in 5e, OSR and Pathfinder 1 editions.