Some locations—the wizard’s tower, the sunken temple, or the haunted house—have a well-trod presence in stories and adventures. In this series, we’ll explore the potential of these archetypal wizard’s tower, playing with or defying tropes, and presenting rules and ideas to bring them to life.

Diving into Towerology (a thing that definitely exists), this niche study reveals a wizard’s character through the choices they make in defending their magical abodes. The challenges of the tower reflect the wizard. By letting the tower invoke similar themes, you present the wizard as a puzzle to be solved—whether as a villainous experimenter or a potential stern ally—before they’re even officially on-screen.

Case Studies

We’ll examine several distinct wizards whose defenses are tailored to their personas and magical strengths. Beyond that, we’ll also add a little punch to our classic wizard-in-a-tower trope. If the wizard’s tower is taken as an extension of its master, why shouldn’t it reflect that connection in fun (and/or dangerous) ways? Each wizard archetype below also has a unique Tower Effect, used here similarly to the Regional Effects of legendary creatures. Take them as inspirational examples and tweak the difficulty or make up your own!

The Principled Protector

The Protector’s defenses aim to detain without harm, allowing intruders to reconsider their actions. Possible themes and connections include Abjuration and Divination spell schools, Celestial occupants, and Divine magic.

• Uses guards and wards to confine with non-deadly spells and arcane lock for strict security. Divination spells like scrying and clairvoyance enhance the Protector’s monitoring.

• Intruders using aggression to get through the tower by bashing doors, locks, etc., run afoul of resilient sphere or hold traps for a time-out, sometimes accompanied by a lecturing magic mouth.

• Riddles bar entry to personal quarters, taking the form of ethical dilemmas. The respondent is expected to provide moral reasoning aligned with the Protector’s values.

TOWER EFFECT

Imposed Self-Reflection: Mirrors spread throughout the tower are mundane to the truly innocent (or nonintelligent). Others see their guilt, selfish acts, and crimes mirrored in their reflection. This reflection is specific to the viewer and cannot be seen by anyone else. While within 30 feet of a mirror, creatures must succeed a DC 13 CHA save to perform harmful or illicit actions (including continuing to trespass into a new room). Otherwise, shame prohibits the creature from taking the intended action. They can’t attempt the same action again until after a short rest.

The Eccentric Enchanter

The Eccentric Enchanter’s tower is a living gallery, by turns repellent with grotesque displays and alluring with visions of wondrous vistas. Apt to be specialists in Enchantment or Necromancy schools, the Enchanter places defenses to spare their creations while confounding intruders with charm and fear effects—or a symbol of death to quiet any boorish critics.

• Various glyphs of warding are embedded among the tower’s artistic pieces, integrated seamlessly among them. Checks to find the glyphs have disadvantage. Touching or manipulating the art is enough to trigger them, with effects like fear, hypnotic pattern, suggestion (to leave), or blindness.

• Damaging the Enchanter’s masterpieces invokes a vicious geas: Offenders must restore the work, even at the cost of their blood and vigor. The target is compelled to work until they suffer one level of exhaustion.

TOWER EFFECT

Agony and Ecstasy: The Eccentric Enchanter’s work blends lines between art, magic, and madness. Esoteric sigils, bone mosaics, glowing pigments, and bloodstained canvases of otherworldly realms invoke passion, pathos, and eerie vertigo and confusion. Visitors have disadvantage to INT (Investigation) and WIS (Perception) checks to notice anything but the art, adding to the concealment of secret doors, hidden caches, and traps.

The Chaotic Conjurer

Whims dictate the Conjurer’s erratic defenses, indifferent to consistency or collateral damage. Suitable for a whimsically mad Conjuration specialist, Chaos sorcerer, or a particularly capricious Fey creature.

• The tower’s traps are randomly placed and range from harmless pranks to lethal threats, seemingly without concern for logic or property damage.

• A whole floor is dedicated to humor, where the keys to doors closed with arcane lock are pun-laden jokes and finishing limericks.

• A misleadingly festive dining hall feast invites guests to summon more food with a written incantation, but instead it finishes a ritual to summon a Fiend looking for payment.

TOWER EFFECT

Chaos Portals: Chaos infuses the tower’s “portals.” Opening any door, window, or chest may set off a chaotic effect, starting at a 5 percent chance of occurring. This chance increases by a cumulative 5 percent for every short rest taken in the tower. If triggered, roll twice on the Volatile Spell Effect table (see Sorcerer in Chapter 2 of the Player’s Guide) and take the least favorable effect (with choices deferred to the GM).  

The Magisterial Magus

Intended to awe guests and demoralize would-be intruders, this showy wizard (or bard, sorcerer, or even mechanist with a flair for showmanship) relies heavily on Illusion and Transmutation spell schools to dazzle and transform the tower into a demonstration of magical prowess and achievement.

• Defense consists of illusions and environment-altering creations, making use of fabricate and major image to cultivate a grandiose atmosphere, and programmed illusion and talkative project image clones to engage in continuous storytelling about the Magus’s feats.

• Decoys abound, with keys and chests morphing, when used, into vanity mementos and souvenirs.

• Intruders in unauthorized areas spring polymorph traps, transforming them into humiliated but unharmed goats, rabbits, or sheep.

TOWER EFFECT

The Great and Powerful: The tower brims with the Magus’s accomplishments and self-aggrandizement, dwarfing intruders literally and figuratively. Creatures who take a long rest within the tower must succeed on a DC 13 CON save or shrink via reduce person until they leave the tower, a metaphorical shrinking next to the magus’s monumental ego.

The Sinister Slumlord

The Sinister Slumberlord employs a passive-aggressive approach, preferring to tempt intruders or drain their resolve until they succumb to slumber. This wicked wizard uses spells primarily Enchantment or Illusion schools, and may work with other dream-affecting creatures like night hags or corrupt Fey.

• The Slumberlord’s tower is awash with false comfort, hiding dream-husk servants behind a benign seeming and sleep chambers with illusory enticements and bewitching enchantments like sympathy. Once inside, interlopers are plied with symbol of sleep and briar rose rituals all pre-arranged.

• Where soft coercion fails, the Slumberlord’s dream-husks and servitors drain the intruders’ resources, pushing them to have to rest.

TOWER EFFECT

Endless Sleep: The Slumberlord’s magic ensnares sleeping victims in a dream from which they might never wake. Sleeping creatures must succeed on a DC 13 WIS save to awaken, or remain trapped in a dreamworld. Each day, the victim can attempt another save, but otherwise can only be awakened by taking damage. After three failed saves, the sleep is permanent; their minds continue forever trapped in a dream, ripe for the Slumberlord’s research, while their bodies join the ranks of the zombie-like dream-husks.

---