Inspired by the movie of the same title, starring Ben Stiller, you can create your own “Night at the Museum” adventure.
Pick a location. It can be as simple as a single room, it can be a structure like a castle, tomb, temple, dungeon, or town. Really, it can be any of those depending on what fits within your setting and in-progress campaign (or make it a one-shot; this is flexible).
The theme I like is a wealthy yet mad wizard collected specimens of different creatures from around the known world, petrified them, and then placed them in various poses and displays throughout their lair. They can have display plaques that show where each creature was acquired, perhaps even stating who they were in life if they were intelligent, speaking, and named beings.
The cool trick underlying everything is that all the specimens throughout the mad wizard’s personal museum are aware and conscious, they just can’t move.
Imagine within this museum a Hall of the Giants, where all the specimens are members of that group of monsters. You’ve got the small ones like ogres, throw in a pair of ettins, a cyclops, then get into the true giants with some hill giants, a frost giant, a fire giant, a stone giant, and perhaps a painting of a storm giant (because it’s unlikely the wizard would be able to capture and petrify an actual storm giant, but that depends on how powerful the mad wizard truly is/was).
Move into the next exhibit hall and you’ve got a collection of the wizard-created monsters like owl bears, manticores, chimeras, maybe even a gelatinous cube.
The party explores through the museum and none of the exhibited creatures attack, but the party gets the sense that these aren’t mere statues or dead-yet-preserved specimens. They sense there’s still intelligence and consciousness, plus lots and lots of seething rage, lurking behind the staring, unmoving eyes.
As they move around, they find clues that indicate the mechanism for de-petrifying the monsters. Perhaps it’s something as simple as a physical touch. Or maybe it’s uttering out loud the “name” of each monster as printed on the brass plaque at the base of their feet. It should be the party’s choice to release a monster, not a mere accident, but perhaps the release mechanism is determined through chance when a mere kobold is unpetrified. The party says, “Ah, this is how the monsters are released!”
Of course, any creature released will immediately fly into a rage, viciously attacking the nearest party member. But, some might be aware enough to be thankful to the party for releasing them. They speak and implore the party to tell them where the mad wizard is so revenge can be pursued. It’s also possible that rival monsters attack each other, such as the mortal enemies of a hobgoblin and a wood elf held in stasis and placed where they must face each other for eternity. Upon release they ignore the party and attack each other.
There should be a strategy for which monsters to release and in which order, and which ones to be kept in their present state of petrification. Can a petrified monster be destroyed in a single blow? This is up to the DM, but it’s suggested that the wizard’s collection has some kind of protection on each specimen to keep that from happening, perhaps a shield of invulnerability preventing them from harm until released.
There are lots of possibilities with this premise, and the DM can scale it up or make it small (a single room with just a few monsters; a fledgling collection) based on their needs and the relative power of the party.
If this made your session better, buying me a coffee keeps the Vault stocked.
