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Printable DM sheet — The Summit Cairn
Every scene, monster, and map for this chapter, on one printable sheet.
The Summit Cairn — DM Sheet
Frostpeak Mountain's summit · Best for 2–5 heroes. The finale — only makes full sense having played Chapters 1-2, since it pays off Kestra and the compass directly. Built at a lighter bar than Chapters 1-2 (fewer beats, cover art only, no per-beat scene illustration) — the stated de-scope flex point for this build, not a silent thinning; see the sparkfield#75 build comment for the full reasoning.
Download the player-facing PDF (cover, hook, NPCs, map, handout) →
Read this to your players to start
Kestra's old compass has stopped wandering — it points straight up, toward the true summit, and a cairn shrine nobody in her lifetime has ever reached.
Scenes (all session lengths — scene’s tag shows the shortest length it appears in)
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Scene 1: The Cairn at the Top of the World from Quick Quest on
Wind screams across bare rock at the summit, and there — impossibly, this high — stands a cairn of stacked stones easily twice your height, hung with old, sun-bleached ribbons that shouldn't have survived a single winter, let alone decades. Kestra's compass goes still and warm in your hand, needle locked dead ahead.
Goal: Reach the cairn shrine and figure out what the compass was leading you to. — Approach the cairn directly to look for an inscription (Clever, Difficulty Number 12). / Call out first, in case something living is here (Kind or Brave, Difficulty Number 12).
If the party never recovered the compass in Chapter 2, replace it with Kestra herself insisting she 'just knows' this is the place — a family instinct rather than a magic pull. The scene plays the same either way.
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Scene 2: Snowmane from One-Sitting Session on
A shape unfolds from behind the cairn that makes even Kestra go still — an elder yeti, fur silver-white with age, easily twice Torvind's size, eyes ancient and unhurried. She looks at the compass in your hand for a long moment. "That belonged to my old friend," she rumbles. "I wondered if anyone would ever bring it home."
Goal: Learn the truth about the compass and Kestra's family before deciding how this ends. — Let Kestra step forward and speak for herself (free roleplay — a great character moment if she was kind to the wolves/Torvind earlier). / Ask Snowmane directly what she means (Clever or Kind, Difficulty Number 13).
If the party was kind through Chapters 1-2 (fed the wolves, freed Torvind's mate), Snowmane already half-expected them — word travels on a mountain, even to elder yetis — and this scene plays warmer, almost without a roll. If they weren't, Snowmane is more guarded but still fundamentally reasonable; nothing here should turn hostile without the party choosing a fight.
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Scene 3: Coming Home from Quick Quest on
Snowmane offers one paw, and for a strange, quiet moment, the whole mountain seems to hold its breath. "Your grandmother helped my family once, when no one else would," she tells Kestra. "Stay as long as the mountain lets you. You've more than earned it."
Goal: Close out the expedition — and Kestra's family story. — A heartfelt goodbye (Kind, easy Difficulty Number 10, mostly for the roleplay) — Snowmane gifts the party a keepsake and Kestra a standing invitation to return. / If the party fought their way up the mountain throughout, this scene still resolves peacefully — Snowmane isn't a boss fight, she's the payoff of the whole campaign's throughline.
Let the ending land warm regardless of how bumpy the road was. This is the campaign's emotional resolution, not a combat encounter — protect that even if your table came in swinging.
Player handout — show this to your table
The Ribbon From the Cairn
A faded ribbon, tied fresh to the compass's worn strap. The handwriting matches the compass's own inscription, but newer: "The mountain remembers kindness longer than it remembers anything else. — S."
Monster stat blocks
| Name | Heart Points | Guard | Attack | Special |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Snowmane, the Elder Yeti | 24 | 15 | Claws +4 (1d8 Heart Points) | Not a fight this campaign is built around — Snowmane is the throughline's payoff. If combat happens anyway, she never presses an advantage against a losing party; she simply steps back once anyone offers a Kind check (Difficulty Number 10, deliberately easy). |
Rewards
- The full story of Kestra's grandmother and Snowmane's family — the campaign's throughline, resolved.
- A faded ribbon from the cairn, tied fresh to the compass (the handout below).
- A standing invitation back to Frostpeak Mountain — a natural seed for a future return visit.
Tips for running this one
- This chapter is intentionally shorter than Chapters 1-2 — say so if a sharp-eyed player asks, per the honesty standard the whole build is held to. It's still a complete, satisfying finale, just a lighter one.
- Kestra should get real spotlight time here — this is her story as much as the party's.
- Snowmane is written to be very hard to accidentally turn into a real fight — lean into that if your table is younger or newer to the table.