Integrating the sprawling, chaotic, and infamously lethal mega-mansion Tegal Manor into Hyperborea requires shifting it from a traditional funhouse dungeon into a surreal cosmic horror anomaly.
In this adaptation, Tegal Manor is an ancient, shifting megalith built over a localized tear in reality. It doesn't just house ghosts; it drifts across space, time, and the bizarre alien dimensions that fringe Hyperborea's dying world.
The Concept: The Phase-Shifting Megalith
The manor was originally erected by the Tegal dynasty—an eccentric and incestuous lineage of pure-blooded Atlantean sorcerers who sought to escape the Great Cataclysm by "unmooring" their estate from the material plane. They partially succeeded.
Now, the manor is trapped in a permanent, erratic dimensional oscillation. When the party steps through the front gates, they aren't just entering a house; they are stepping inside a massive cosmic engine that cycles through different realities based on the time of day, the actions of the players, or pure, chaotic chance.
The Dimensional Engines (The Shifting States)
The classic 250+ room floor plan of Tegal Manor remains intact, but the nature of the rooms, their environment, and their inhabitants shift depending on which Dimensional Phase the manor is currently occupying.
The Referee can roll a $1\text{d}4$ every time the party takes a Rest, triggers a specific trap, or defeats one of the major Tegal family ghosts to determine the manor's current phase:
1. The Prime Phase (The Decay of Hyperborea)
The Atmosphere: A freezing, damp, mold-choked ruin typical of a Hyperborean coastal cliffside. Frost covers the rotting tapestries; sulfur-tinged sea winds howl through shattered stained-glass windows.
Inhabitants: Standard undead, ravenous ghouls, giant vermin, and crazed human cultists who worship the manor's shifting nature.
Environmental Hazard: Hypothermia. Torches burn down twice as fast due to the damp, choking air.
2. The Barsoomian / Sword & Planet Phase
The Atmosphere: The manor's stone walls turn to a polished, dusty red brick. The windows look out onto a barren, crimson desert under two small, erratic moons. The air becomes thin, dry, and scorching hot.
Inhabitants: Six-armed albino apes nesting in the grand ballroom, synthetic flesh-constructs (weird-science automatons), and ancient, cybernetically preserved Tegal ancestors sporting radium pistols instead of wands.
Environmental Hazard: Suffocation/Exhaustion due to the thin, arid atmosphere if characters exert themselves too heavily without acclimating.
3. The Dream-Lands Phase
The Atmosphere: The interior of the manor expands into impossible, non-Euclidean architecture. Hallways stretch for miles, and the ceilings open up into a surreal, violet sky filled with alien constellations. The air smells of lotus flowers and heavy incense.
Inhabitants: Zoogs scratching behind the wainscoting, Nightgaunts roosting in the rafters of the grand gallery, and the ghosts of the Tegal family, who appear fully alive, beautifully attired, and utterly insane.
Environmental Hazard: The Sleep of Xura. Anyone who falls unconscious or attempts to sleep within the manor during this phase must make a Willpower Test or have their consciousness permanently trapped in the Dream-Lands, leaving their physical body a hollow husk.
4. The Void Phase (The Deep Abyss)
The Atmosphere: Absolute pitch-black darkness. The manor exists in the interstellar void between stars. Gravitational anomalies occur randomly—some rooms feature zero gravity, while others feature crushing double gravity.
Inhabitants: Invisible, amorphous entities, Mi-Go harvesters conducting biological experiments in the kitchens, and Shoggoth-variants seeping through the floorboards.
Environmental Hazard: Sound does not travel between separate rooms. Torches and standard lanterns fail to ignite entirely due to a lack of oxygen within specific corridors (requiring magical light or ancient Atlantean glow-globes found within the estate).
Adapting the Tegal Family Ghosts
The 100+ unique portraits and associated ghosts of Tegal Manor are no longer just generic spirits; they are multidimensional echoes of the Tegal bloodline trapped in various stages of temporal distortion.
The Portrait Gallery Anomaly
When a character examines one of the infamous moving portraits, roll a $1\text{d}6$:
The Portrait Attacks: The painting is a localized window to the Void Phase; a tentacled appendage strikes out ($1\text{d}8$ damage + grab).
The Portrait Deceives: The ancestor offers legitimate historical lore or clues about the manor's current layout, but demands a sacrifice of blood (1 hit point) to speak.
The Portrait Displaces: The viewer must make a Saving Throw vs. Sorcery or immediately swap places with the figure in the painting, trapping the character in canvas while their oil-painted double steps out into the party.
Navigating the House: The Key Rooms
To run Tegal Manor as a cohesive campaign sandbox rather than a random gauntlet, certain anchor rooms control the estate’s erratic positioning:
The Observatory (Room 100): Houses a massive, bronze Atlantean astrolabe. A skilled Magician or Scout can manipulate this machine to "lock" the manor into a specific dimensional phase for $1\text{d}4$ hours, allowing for strategic planning or a safer escape.
The Crypts: Regardless of what phase the upper floors are in, the crypts always look out directly into the black sands of the Underworld. The Tegal family dead are buried here in stasis pods that combine traditional mummification with weird-science cryogenics.
Here is a d20 random stocking and encounter table designed to capture the unpredictable, multidimensional madness of a shifting Tegal Manor. Use this table when the party cracks open a door into an unexplored chamber.
Each entry combines a physical description of the space, its current Dimensional Phase alignment, and a localized threat or discovery tailored to Hyperborea's pulp-horror sensibilities.
Tegal Manor Room-Stocking & Encounter Table
| Roll (1d20) | Current Phase | Room Contents & Encounter Details |
| 1 | Void | Zero-Gravity Armory. Racks of rusted broadswords and fragmented Atlantean armor float alongside frozen droplets of blood. Encounter: $1\text{d}3$ Mi-Go (Fungi from Yuggoth) are quietly dissecting a dead Hyperborean scout. They weaponize the zero-G to drop on the party from the ceiling. |
| 2 | Dream-Lands | The Opium Boudoir. A lavishly upholstered lounge filled with velvet divans and sweet, choking purple smoke. Encounter: $2\text{d}4$ Zoogs are tearing apart a leather-bound journal. If appeased with food, they can reveal the location of the nearest hidden door; otherwise, they attack with toxic, sleep-inducing bites. |
| 3 | Prime | The Flooded Conservatory. The glass dome has shattered, letting in freezing rain from the Hyperborean sea cliffs. Giant, mutated kelp chokes the marble fountains. Encounter: A ravenous Ghoul is gnawing on a frozen corpse. Tucked into the corpse's belt is a Potion of Extra-Healing. |
| 4 | Barsoomian | The Radium Laboratory. The stone walls are replaced by copper plating. Glass tubes thrum with a strange, crackling green energy. Encounter: A malfunctioning Weird-Science Automaton (HD 4, AC 3, iron fists deal $1\text{d}10$ damage) blindly bludgeons anything that enters. Hidden in a console is a half-empty radium power cell. |
| 5 | Dream-Lands | The Impossible Gallery. A hallway where the floor loops upside down. Portraits of the Tegal family line the ceiling, looking down with shifting, weeping eyes. Encounter: The ghost of Sir Charles Tegal. He demands the party recite an ancient Atlantean poem. Failure triggers a Phantasmal Killer effect on the speaker (Save vs. Sorcery or die of fright). |
| 6 | Void | The Silent Library. A massive archive of stone tablets where all sound is completely swallowed by the vacuum of space. Encounter: An Amorphous Death-Ooze clings to the ceiling. Because sound cannot travel, the party cannot speak or cast spells with verbal components while inside this room. |
| 7 | Prime | The Desecrated Chapel. A shrine dedicated to a forgotten Hyperborean sky-god, now defiled with blood-painted runes. Encounter: $2\text{d}6$ Crazed Cultists are in the middle of sacrificing a captured Pictish warrior. Interrupting them causes them to fight to the death with jagged sacrificial daggers ($1\text{d}6$ damage). |
| 8 | Barsoomian | The Crimson Kennel. The floor is covered in fine, red desert sand that has blown in through an open terrace. Encounter: $1\text{d}2$ Six-legged Martian Hounds (treat as Death Dogs, but with crimson fur and chitinous plates). They guard a heavy steel chest containing $400\text{ gp}$ and a laser-sighted crossbow scope. |
| 9 | Prime | The Great Banqueting Hall. A long mahogany table is piled high with rotting, maggot-infested food that smells of sulfur. Encounter: $3\text{d}4$ Giant Rats nest inside the hollowed-out carcass of a roasted boar. Under the table lies a discarded silver chalice worth $75\text{ gp}$. |
| 10 | Dream-Lands | The Whispering Aviary. A room filled with crystalline cages, though the birds inside are made entirely of woven starlight. Encounter: A flock of Nightgaunts is roosting in the rafters. They do not attack with claws; instead, they attempt to grapple characters, drag them out the window, and drop them into the violet abyss of the Dream-Lands. |
| 11 | Void | The Crushing Trophy Room. Stuffed heads of alien beasts line the walls, but gravity is doubled here. All movement rates are halved, and physical attacks are made at a -2 penalty. Encounter: A Shoggoth-Shedding (a small, rubbery mass of eyes and mouths, HD 3) shifts across the floor, immune to the crushing gravity. |
| 12 | Barsoomian | The Solar Foundry. A room blast-furnaced by the heat of a dying red sun. Anyone wearing metal armor must make a Save vs. Avoidance every turn or suffer $1\text{d}4$ fire damage from heat conduction. Encounter: Empty of monsters, but contains a functional Atlantean plasma torch capable of cutting through any mundane door lock. |
| 13 | Prime | The Rotting Scullery. A damp kitchen full of rusted cleavers and shattered crockery. Encounter: $1\text{d}4$ Zombies dressed in tattered servant livery are mindlessly scrubbing the floors with their own decaying bone fragments. They ignore the party unless provoked. |
| 14 | Dream-Lands | The Bazaar of Shadows. The room opens up into a small, midnight market square that shouldn't physically fit inside the manor. Encounter: A cloaked Tcho-Tcho Merchant offers to barter weird magical components or alien lotus powders in exchange for the party's memories (instantly draining $1\text{d}4 \times 100\text{ XP}$ from a character for a rare item). |
| 15 | Void | The Frozen Solarium. Absolute zero temperatures have crystallized everything in this room into brittle glass. Encounter: $1\text{d}3$ Cold Ones (ice-elemental spirits). Any bludgeoning attack made by a character that misses its target has a 25% chance to strike a wall or pillar, causing a structural collapse dealing $2\text{d}6$ damage to everyone in the room. |
| 16 | Barsoomian | The Gladiator's Pit. The floor has been excavated into a sandy arena ringed by iron spikes. Encounter: A feral White Ape (HD 6, four arms, multi-attack) is chained to a central pillar. It lashes out wildly at anything that breaches the threshold. |
| 17 | Prime | The Master Bedchamber. A canopy bed with moth-eaten silk drapes. A skeletal figure sits upright in the bed, staring into a vanity mirror. Encounter: A Wight wearing a tarnished silver tiara ($300\text{ gp}$). Its gaze forces a Save vs. Death; failure inflicts a permanent energy drain (1 level). |
| 18 | Dream-Lands | The Clockwork Nursery. Toy soldiers march in endless, perfect loops across the floor while a music box plays a discordant, maddening lullaby. Encounter: Characters must make a Save vs. Sorcery upon entering; failure causes them to fall into a deep sleep for $1\text{d}6$ turns, during which Wandering Monsters are rolled automatically. |
| 19 | Void | The Temporal Rift. The room is a swirling vortex of chronological energy. Encounter: The party encounters themselves from 10 minutes in the future, bloodied and fleeing from a threat. If they interact or try to alter the timeline, a Tindalos Hound manifests to purge the paradox. |
| 20 | Hyper-Shift | The Nexus Hub. The room is actively violently shifting between all four phases every few seconds. Encounter: Roll twice on this table to combine two different encounters. The room contains a glowing, sapphire-encrusted lever that can permanently lock the entire manor into one phase for the next 24 hours if thrown. |
Running the Table: Referee Advice
The Phase-Key: When a room is rolled, its environmental effects remain tied to that specific room until a manor-wide "Hyper-Shift" occurs (such as rolling a 20 or defeating a major boss). This means the party could step from a freezing Hyperborean hallway (Prime) directly into a scorching, red-desert terrace (Barsoomian).
The Escape Route: If things get too lethal, remind players that closing a door, waiting $1\text{d}6$ turns, and reopening it might cause the room to shift to a different phase entirely—though what's waiting on the other side might be worse.
To anchor this multidimensional sandbox, here are the full Hyperborea RPG statistics and lore for the mad architect of Tegal Manor’s cross-dimensional drift: Arch-Mage Baron Malakor Tegal.
Malakor represents the absolute zenith of the family’s degeneracy and genius. He is an Ascended Magician / Necromancer who has successfully grafted Atlantean weird science directly onto his own rotting, sorcerous form.
Baron Malakor Tegal
"The flesh is a terrible anchor. Why tether oneself to a single, dying world when the multiverse offers infinite playgrounds?"
Lore & Background
Baron Malakor was the last patriarch to rule Tegal Manor before its detachment from reality. Obsessed with the impending Cataclysm that drowned Atlantis, Malakor realized that neither pure sorcery nor raw technology could save his lineage. He merged the two, transforming his family manor into a massive dimensional engine.
He is not entirely dead, nor is he truly alive. Malakor exists simultaneously across all four dimensional phases of the manor. If he is slain in one phase, his consciousness simply re-centers in another until the central Eldritch Core in the manor's deep sub-basement is destroyed. He views adventurers not as threats, but as fascinating biological specimens from the "outside" to be cataloged, vivisected, or converted into cybernetic thralls.
Attributes & Statistics
Class: Magician (Necromancer / Weird-Scientist) 11th Level
Alignment: Chaotic Evil (Purposely aligned with cosmic chaos)
Armor Class (AC): 2 (Atlantean Cyber-Chitin Plates & Displacer Field)
Hit Dice (HD): $11\text{d}4+22$ (Plasmatic Fortification)
Hit Points (HP): 52
Movement: 40 feet (Hovering slightly via anti-grav soles)
Attacks: 1 × Radium Scepter OR 1 × Cybernetic Tendril
Saving Throws: Death 9, Transformation 8, Device 6, Avoidance 10, Sorcery 5
| STR | DEX | CON | INT | WIS | CHA |
| 11 | 14 | 15 | 18 | 13 | 6 |
Special Abilities & Combat Actions
Radium Scepter: A heavy bronze rod tipped with a glowing, pulsing green crystal. It functions as a +2 quarterstaff in melee ($1\text{d}6+2$ damage). Alternatively, it can fire a beam of pure radioactive energy up to 90 feet.
Cybernetic Tendril: Malakor can deploy a hidden, whip-like metallic tendril from his sleeve as a secondary attack ($1\text{d}4$ bludgeoning damage). On a successful hit, the target is grappled and must make a Save vs. Transformation or suffer $1\text{d}6$ electrical damage per round as he siphons their neural energy to regain spent spell levels.
Phase Shift (Recharge on a $5\text{-}6$ on $1\text{d}6$): As a defensive reaction when targeted by an attack, Malakor can violently displace himself across dimensions. The attack automatically misses, and he teleports up to 30 feet away, leaving behind a brief, blinding flash of violet light.
Sorcerous Spell Repertory
Malakor casts spells as an 11th-level Magician. His mind has been permanently warped by the Void, allowing him to cast Necromantic and Transmutation spells interchangeably.
1st Level (4/day): Affect Normal Fires, Command Undead, Detect Magic, Shield
2nd Level (4/day): Ghoulish Touch, Mirror Image, Web, Locate Object
3rd Level (4/day): Animate Dead, Dispel Magic, Lightning Bolt (flavored as a plasma discharge), Hold Person
4th Level (3/day): Dimension Door, Dimension Mirror*, Evard’s Black Tentacles (flavored as void appendages)
5th Level (2/day): Cloudkill, Magic Jar (using an Atlantean stasis crystal)
6th Level (1/day): Death Spell
*Hyperborea specific unique spell
Tactical Behavior in the Manor
Malakor alters his tactics depending on which Dimensional Phase the party encounters him in:
In the Prime Phase: He acts as a traditional, arrogant necromancer. He sits back behind a wall of animated Tegal family skeletons, raining down Lightning Bolts and mocking the party's primitive weapons.
In the Barsoomian Phase: He leans entirely into weird science. He will actively use his Radium Scepter from high ledges, deploying flying technological drones (treat as Stirges, but mechanical) to harass the party.
In the Dream-Lands Phase: He is a shifting illusionist. He uses Mirror Image and Dimension Door constantly, manipulating the impossible architecture of the room to separate party members and attack them individually.
In the Void Phase: He is at his most terrifying. He hovers effortlessly in the zero gravity, completely immune to the vacuum, and uses Evard's Black Tentacles to drag characters into zones of crushing gravity or out into the freezing space outside the windows.
Treasure & Artifacts Carried
If the party manages to permanently put Malakor down, his corpse yields relics that are highly prized—and highly dangerous—to any Hyperborean spellcaster:
The Radium Scepter: (Functions as detailed above; requires a Magician or Scout to handle safely without taking 1 point of radiation damage per week).
The Cyber-Monocle: A brass and glass graft that replaces his left eye. If carefully harvested and used by a Magician or Sage, it grants permanent Detect Magic and the ability to read any ancient, dead language (including High Atlantean).
The Core Access Key: A triangular data-crystal that unlocks the heavy, pneumatically sealed vaults in the Crypts where his most dangerous weird-science blueprints are kept.
To permanently sever Tegal Manor from its dimensional anchors and put an end to Baron Malakor’s cross-planar drifting, the party must descend past the crypts into the Sub-Basement Vaults.
Here lies the Eldritch Core Room, a massive, high-ceilinged subterranean cathedral where ancient Atlantean weird science was violently welded to raw, cosmic sorcery.
The Core Room Architecture
The room is laid out like a massive, circular amphitheater. Instead of stone, the walls are lined with dull copper coils and throbbing, lead-shielded conduits. The air smells heavily of ozone, copper, and rotting sea-carrion.
At the center of the room hangs the Eldritch Core: a 15-foot-wide levitating sphere of shifting obsidian metal, cracked open like an egg. Inside the shell, a miniature, blinding vortex of violet-black plasma spins wildly, humming at a frequency that causes teeth to ache and ears to bleed.
Automated Defenses
Malakor did not leave his life-support engine unguarded. The moment the heavy, pneumatic blast doors are breached, the following defenses activate:
1. The Pylons of Phase-Alignment (The Shield)
Surrounding the central core are four massive, bronze pylons, each corresponding to one of the manor's dimensional phases (Prime, Barsoomian, Dream-Lands, and Void).
The Effect: While these pylons are functional, the Core is completely phased out of sync with the material world. Attacks, spells, and physical objects pass directly through the Core as if it were a hologram.
The Crystals: Each pylon is powered by a large, raw gemstone humming with specific energy. To lower the Core's shield, these four crystals must be shattered or deactivated (see Shutting Down the Core below).
2. Guardian Golems: The Cyber-Ghouls
The Threat: $2\text{d}4$ Cyber-Ghouls untether themselves from charging alcoves along the walls.
Mechanics: These are traditional Hyperborean ghouls whose claws and jaws have been replaced with serrated surgical steel and pneumatic pistons. They have HD 4, AC 4, and their attacks deal $1\text{d}6+2$ slashing damage. A character struck by a Cyber-Ghoul must succeed on a Save vs. Paralyzation or be paralyzed for $1\text{d}4+1$ turns by a localized paralytic neurotoxin discharge.
Environmental Hazards
Fighting in the Core Room is a logistical nightmare due to the leaking dimensional energies:
The Spatial Flux: At the start of every round, the Referee rolls a $1\text{d}6$. On a 1–2, gravity in the room temporarily cuts out for that round (all characters float, melee attacks are made at a -2 penalty unless anchored). On a 3–4, a wave of intense desert heat flashes through (characters in metal armor take 1 point of damage). On a 5–6, the room falls into absolute silence (verbal spellcasting is impossible for that round).
Plasma Arcs: Any character who misses a melee or ranged attack against a pylon or golem by more than 5 points accidentally strikes a conduit. A jagged arc of violet electricity lashes out, dealing $2\text{d}6$ electrical damage to the attacker (Save vs. Avoidance for half damage).
Shutting Down the Core
Destroying the Core is a multi-step tactical operation. Simply hacking at it with swords will result in a quick party wipe.
Step 1: Neutralizing the Pylons
The four pylons must be disabled to bring the Core into physical reality. Each has AC 5 and 20 HP, but they can also be disabled through clever attribute checks:
The Prime Pylon (Emerald): Can be shattered by physical damage or dispelled via Dispel Magic.
The Barsoomian Pylon (Ruby): Requires an Intelligence (Weird Science/Devices) Test at a -2 penalty to safely rip out its coolant lines, causing it to overheat and melt down.
The Dream-Lands Pylon (Amethyst): Cannot be harmed by physical weapons. It must be attacked with mental/magical spells, or a character must succeed on a Willpower Test to "will" the illusionary pylon out of existence.
The Void Pylon (Sapphire): Exists in a vacuum pocket. Ranged weapons cannot pierce it. It must be struck in melee, but doing so inflicts $1\text{d}4$ points of temporary frost damage to the attacker per strike.
Step 2: Hacking the Core
Once all four pylons are disabled, the protective dimensional shield drops with a deafening thunderclap. The central vortex is now vulnerable.
The Core has AC 2 and 40 HP. It is immune to non-magical weapons.
The Retaliation: Every time the Core takes damage, it fires a localized gravity pulse. Everyone in the room must make a Save vs. Transformation or be violently thrown against the outer walls for $1\text{d}8$ bludgeoning damage.
Step 3: The Meltdown Escape
When the Core reaches 0 HP, it does not instantly disappear; it begins a catastrophic implosion. The Referee should start a literal 3-minute real-time timer or count down 3 combat rounds.
The manor begins to tear itself apart as the rooms upstairs fold into one another. The party must flee back up the collapsing stairwells, dodging falling debris and shifting room architecture, before the entire estate vanishes into the interstellar void forever. Any character still inside when the timer hits zero is cast adrift into the deep cosmos.
