What should guard a wizard's lab?

[FalcWP]

In an Eberron game I'm going to be running, the PCs are going to end up in an underground labratory that formerly belonged to a (now-deceased) wizard. I want the wizard to have a few guards in this lab, but I'm not sure what they should be. A few details:

• The PCs will be third level
• The labratory has been abandoned for somewhere between 20 and 50 years.
• The labratory is mostly sealed - if possible, I'd like to avoid the guards being monsters which wandered in
• I have ready access to the Monster Manual, Monster Manual II, Monster Manual IV, and the Eberron Campaign Setting (for books with monsters), and I can borrow most other books

The PCs will have just been fighting undead (skirmish with Karrnath), so I'd rather avoid stocking the labratory with more undead.

I considered having the wizard be a conjurer who had bound a few outsiders as guards. However, two things I can't figure out are:
1) Does an outside bound (as with Planar Binding) remain bound even if the caster dies?
2) Assuming that they stay bound, does an outsider need to eat and drink, or can it just stand guard for 50 years?

I also considered some constructs (possibly using an Artificer, rather than a Wizard, and possibly providing a connection with House Cannith).

What else can make effective guards that don't need to eat or drink, and will remain even after the employer/creator/summoner is dead?

 

[Voadam]

Planar binding works and only binds up to a certain HD of outsider so it makes sense to have a CR appropriate encounter.

Outsiders don't eat or drink. Native subtype outsiders like planetouched do eat and drink.

 

[Voadam]

An imp or quasit might even try to make a deal with the PCs and be an opportunity for NPC interaction.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

I'd give a low level ooze a point or two of intelligence (it's a magical accident that worked out for the wizard) and have it lairing in the cauldron it was originally created in.

 

[icedrake]

In an Eberron game I'm going to be running, the PCs are going to end up in an underground labratory that formerly belonged to a (now-deceased) wizard. I want the wizard to have a few guards in this lab, but I'm not sure what they should be. A few details:

• The PCs will be third level
• The labratory has been abandoned for somewhere between 20 and 50 years.
• The labratory is mostly sealed - if possible, I'd like to avoid the guards being monsters which wandered in
• I have ready access to the Monster Manual, Monster Manual II, Monster Manual IV, and the Eberron Campaign Setting (for books with monsters), and I can borrow most other books

The PCs will have just been fighting undead (skirmish with Karrnath), so I'd rather avoid stocking the labratory with more undead.

I considered having the wizard be a conjurer who had bound a few outsiders as guards. However, two things I can't figure out are:
1) Does an outside bound (as with Planar Binding) remain bound even if the caster dies?
2) Assuming that they stay bound, does an outsider need to eat and drink, or can it just stand guard for 50 years?

I also considered some constructs (possibly using an Artificer, rather than a Wizard, and possibly providing a connection with House Cannith).

What else can make effective guards that don't need to eat or drink, and will remain even after the employer/creator/summoner is dead?

How large is the complex? How long do your sessions go for? Would you want to do this in one or more sittings?

Depending on how much stuff you want there, you've got a lot of options on what you populate the lab with. Many creatures in DnD have significantly long life spans, so its feesable that you'd have a number of magical beasts either guarding the location or wandering its grounds as failed experiments. These creatures would fit well for both a wizard or artificer. Though artificers focus on making objects rather than working with living beings, the guy could have been trying to perfect human life, animating a golomn with a soul could draw into some Frankenstein elements into the game.

I think you'd want to involve constructs some how, wizard labs always scream constructs to me. Since many of them are much too powerful for your characters to face right now, use a dumbed down one in the form of a warforged. I'm thinking some kind of prototype that lacks a con score as well as something that has very low mental scores. It has very simple instructions and it carries them out to the letter. "Protect this location, feed the chickens." kind of a thing.

 

[VirgilCaine]

I considered having the wizard be a conjurer who had bound a few outsiders as guards. However, two things I can't figure out are:
1) Does an outside bound (as with Planar Binding) remain bound even if the caster dies?

Yes. Also, all of his spells (the permanent ones) will still be working.

 

[green slime]

Why would the wizard want anything protecting the inside of the lab? Doesn't that sort strike you as dangerous?

I mean, you want an excellent shell defence, and an intelligent response unit to an intruder alert. But actual physical violence in the holy of holies? Doesn't strike me as making much sense. Alarms, magic mouth imparting information and warnings, teleport wards, and divination devices out the wazoo.

Constructs suffice for an exterior defence, or when under the direct command of an intelligent being, but I'd never trust one to sensibly adjudicate my intentions, even when spelled out in a single sentence containing simple, monosyllabic words.

 

[Nyeshet]

Maybe the door is a mimic?

Perhaps the little gargoyle above the door is actually a (tiny sized) gargoyle?

Perhaps those two statues by the entrance are stone constructs?

Various small and medium sized outsiders come to mind as well.

Don't forget the aberrations. After all, a conjurer may have made a few mistakes now and then and accidentally summoned a far realm creature . . . .

All that magic, just lying about for decades or even centuries . . . certainly a little wild magic might have touched a little of it in all that time, right? So how about that living spell template, perhaps even used upon some of the protective wards - such as Summon Monster II or Teleport?

What about that spell - Guards and Wards, or something like that - couldn't it still be in effect?

Maybe some of the magical traps are actually immobilized warforged units, prototypes, perhaps?

What about his familiar? Perhaps the conjurer died in an odd accident, and as with Psicrystals, some aspect or shard of his personality remained - embedded in his familiar. Treat it as an awakened creature of its type with all the benefits of also being a familiar (despite his master's death, as his master is still 'with' him, in a way). Maybe it has gone partially insane and wanders the lab, occationally checking up on this or that experiment which has long sense ended - or perhaps keeping a few of them going, despite the death of its master.

 

[Anti-Sean]

I also considered some constructs (possibly using an Artificer, rather than a Wizard, and possibly providing a connection with House Cannith).

Iron Defenders (ECS 287) fill my blackened, withered heart with glee; advanced Iron Defenders even moreso.

 

[00Machado]

I'd give a low level ooze a point or two of intelligence (it's a magical accident that worked out for the wizard) and have it lairing in the cauldron it was originally created in.

I like the idea. Along these lines, isn't there a template for creating guardian oozes in Dungeonscape?

Also, regarding the "it's a magical accident", I think this is an example of how any fun idea can be made to work.

My advice is to pick something that would be fun in play, and then figure out a rationale for it even if it's not RAW, or not repeatable by the PCs.

If you want something straight out of a book, don't they also have low CR constructs for just such a purpose?