Or 30 Things to find on a Villain’s Corpse.

[See The Dead Adventurer’s Catalogue]

___

Wendell bent over the body of the goblin chieftain they had just slaughtered, his slender hands shifting through the goblin’s filthy goods until he encountered something shiny and hard.

“Look here, Tarquilos my old friend. The goblin chief has a little something extra for us.”

Tarquilos approached the wizard’s hunched frame and peered down at the idol held in his hands. Its gold shone eerily in the torchlight and the idol resembled some sort of nightmarish creature drawn from his worst ale dreams.

“I’m not sure taking that is such a good idea, Wendell. It might be cursed or something.”

“Nonsense, this thing has no enchantment I can discern. It does seem a bit dirty however. Let me rub it up a bit…”

Before Tarquilos could mouth a response, Wendell used his sleeve to polish the idol’s alien geometry. Suddenly, a weird buzzing vibration filled the air and somewhere in the depths below a terrible ululating cry sounded.

Wendell looked sheepishly at the warrior by his side as Tarquilos drew his sword.

“One of these days, wizard. One of these days…”

PCs make a habit of killing a lot of enemies, from wicked warlords and nefarious necromancers through to majestic dragons and terrible beings conjured from other realities. Inevitably, the death of any villain leads to looting any possessions they might have, from weapons and armor to magic items and bits of information.

Often however, a villain’s possessions lack anything of real interest that entices or intrigues a PC, particularly when the villain is a faceless henchman or some other miscreant merely getting in the PCs’ way.

This list of 30 items can make a dead villain’s possessions far more interesting and can be used with The Dead Adventurer’s Catalogue to create a master list of items that GMs can fall back on.

1. A map of the region the PCs have just explored, complete with any secret doors or traps they might have missed.
2. Five sticks of candy made from jellied elf.
3. A burlap sack filled with hundreds of dried walnuts.
4. The broken hilt of a magical greatsword.
5. The blade of a magical greatsword wrapped in oilskin.
6. A guide on how to properly prepare and fillet gnomes. Comes complete with diagrams.
7. A masterwork torturer’s kit with a selection of bloodstained knives and thumb screws.
8. A wooden pipe in the shape of a roaring dragon with the words “smoking wards off dragons” written on the side in small dwarven runes.
9. Several paper envelopes with the words “henchman’s pay” written on each.
10. A horribly scented love potion. Only works on goblins.
11. The finger of a dainty human female wearing a crude iron ring.
12. A greased piglet with the number 7 painted on its side.
13. An unremarkable silver wolf’s head pendant. The body it dangles from is rather hirsute however.
14. A rope made from hardened entrails.
15. A matching cup and bowl set made from the skull and shell of a giant snapping turtle.
16. The petrified bust of a human male blowing a raspberry.
17. A vial of catnip. Attached to the vial is a note with the words “for the hellcats.”
18. A brass cylinder inside a crystal cube inside a pyramidal wooden box.
19. An iron listening horn containing a dead earwig of massive size.
20. A poorly designed wickerwork flask incapable of holding even an ounce of liquid.
21. A guide to catching and breaking in griffons filled with several accurate sketches of wyverns.
22. A pop-up book featuring a dungeon that the PCs have explored or one that they may explore in the future. Moving about the pages of the book are tiny illusory figures.
23. The intact heart of a beast of some kind that functions as a magical potion when consumed.
24. A pair of eyeglasses with tinted emerald lenses.
25. A miniature sundial.
26. A note in draconic that reads, “Remember to feed the Thing in Room B.”
27. A list of commands for some unknown magical device.
28. A tiny orrery depicting the planets as they were 1,000 years ago.
29. Lengths of mummy wrapping covered in cryptic mystical diagrams long enough to wind around an entire corpse.
30. A large white toothless rat wearing a leather collar with the name “Gummy” stamped on it in orcish.

(Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Compatible)