Running dungeons with high level PCs (my players don't read - and yes, I'll know!)

I'm running Rappan Athuk right now (halfway through RA2). My group started the dungeon at level 5, and they are now about level 10. I'm very inexperienced when it comes to higher-level play, and wonder how to handle all of the various abilities and spells possessed by characters of such levels.

The problem is that at this level, they have access to teleportation, polymorphs, flight and other useful magics. This pretty much nullifies a lot of what makes Rappan Athuk (or any other dungeon) so deadly - it occurs to me that dungeon-crawls aren't appropriate for a higher level party.

Some examples - RA has maze sections. It attempts to make this harder be making it a shifting maze. Unfortunately, the PCs are able to turn into elementals or umber hulks, thereby pretty much circumventing the mazes. The same goes for cliffs and/or chasms - the climb skill is redundant with teleportation, characters which can dig slanted tunnels through a cliff in minutes, that sort of thing.

Those of you familiar with RA may rememeber the "White Corridor". Pretty nasty to walk through. Not so bad when you turn into an earth elemental or an umber hulk and just go around it.

These types of abilities pretty much nullify the "dungeon-structure" (i.e. walls, rooms, tunnels). Of course, you can come up with convenient things which prevent them from doing this all the time, but it becomes obvious you're doing it, and players feel like your just not allowing them to use their abilities. How would a cleric feel if you said "uh, no you can't heal", or a fighter if you told him "no, hitting things isn't possible"?

So how does one deal with such things? At this level, PCs can create impregnable hideaways within the dungeon, carved out of the very rock. They can rest as long as they want. If you're really mean and keep hitting them with umber hulks, purple worms, and other critters who aren't stopped by such physical barriers, they use extended rope-tricks and the like to hide for as long as they need.

The result is that the dungeon doesn't work like a dungeon. Sure, individual encounters are challenging, but the general exploration/attrition factor of the dungeon isn't there. With decent divinations (an extended arcane eye, for example), PCs are able to map out entire levels before venturing into them. They teleport back to the city after each encounter, then teleport back to where they left.

Essentially, the dungeon feels much more like a computer game with a quick-save feature than a dangerous, mysterious dungeon. That's not the fault of the module, of course - I'm just inexperienced at higher level play.

Any suggestions on how to keep the dungeon feeling dangerous, claustrophobic and exciting? How to keep that sense of "what's around the next corner?" without just arbitrarily nullifying various abilities with convenient plot-devices?

Well I am not familiar with the module, but as for the walls simply make them adamantine or another super hard substance. As for actuall earth and cliffs. Thats a little harder but don't be afraid to nail them if the try to take advantage of there high level abilites. Part of the fun of the higher level dungeon crawls is the fact that the party may run low on rescources something they have not experienced since about 3rd level. Fear

How many characters in your party? What sort of class composition do they have?

Are you playing 3ed or 3.5?

With this information, people will be able to give you some specific information. You'll be able to pick out the genereal trends on your own after a little bit.

Seems like their burning up spells to avoid obstacles. Make 'em pay for that. Hit 'em hard, don't let them rest, chase 'em around. You can do this with a dimensional anchor, for example. Hit the spellcaster with silence. Or you can put them on a time limit to finsih the exploration.


10th level characters should be saving thos teleports to run away! And when they run, they leave something behind...something that waits...
also, have critters run and warn other critters...have dungeon actively on the alert

Stone Angel said:

Well I am not familiar with the module, but as for the walls simply make them adamantine or another super hard substance.

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That, though, is one of those "arbitrary ability nullification" tactics which I hesitate to use. You keep doing that, it gets annoying for players and becomes obvious that it's what you're doing.

Also, having the entirety of a mega-dungeon like RA made of adamantine seems a bit silly. Especially when the dungeon is populated in places by purple worms, umber hulks, gobin miners, natural underground rivers and tunnels, rat tunnels which lead from here to there and so forth.

Well, I've never read or run the RA module. So I have no idea what it might contain. But here's some thoughts based on experiences with other high-level groups in dungeons.

Like you said, the environment is not really an obstacle an longer. So, in some sense, the "classic dungeon crawl" feel isn't going to be replicated. One option is to alter the types of environmental challenges, say by making them more high-magic. A lot of older modules, like "Ghost Tower" or "White Plume Mountain", had odd, magical architectures that required the use of spells to get around. "Ghost Tower", for instance, had a level for every element, and the PCs needed to burn water breathing or fly spells just to be able to function. In doing so, they still get to use their abilities, but in a way that works within the setting's parameters instead of violating them.

High-magic features like this may not work for your campaign, and they may not fit into the RA module. The other main thing would be to shift the focus to creature tactics- make the monsters/villains/whatever more organized, give them communication lines, etc. This sort of emphasizes the environment indirectly, since the dungeon's inhabitants know it better than the PCs. So the enemies tracking them can pick the right spots for ambushes, use hit-and-run tactics, that sort of thing. So now, if someone turns into an umber hulk and just digs straight through a maze, they're going to make a very easy target for small, quick creatures who can snipe them and disappear into well-known tunnels.

A similar idea, some of the party's spells may actually hurt them. I took a higher-level group (16th level or so) through "Demon God's Fane" and scaled it up some, putting a lich at the end as the temple's leader. About halfway through, the party encounters a succubus, who naturally tries to bargain with them for her life. They get the information out of her, then try to kill her, so she teleported to the lich to tell him what was going on. The party immediately followed (homebrew spell that sort of "piggybacks" someone else's teleport), and found themselves in a pitch-black crypt, with no obvious exit, and facing off with a lich who had a lot of his evil minions with him and suspected they were coming. The results were not pretty...

Polydamas said:

How many characters in your party? What sort of class composition do they have?

Are you playing 3ed or 3.5?

With this information, people will be able to give you some specific information. You'll be able to pick out the genereal trends on your own after a little bit.

Seems like their burning up spells to avoid obstacles. Make 'em pay for that. Hit 'em hard, don't let them rest, chase 'em around. 10th level characters should be saving thos teleports to run away! And when they run, they leave something behind...something that waits...

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5 characters, 10th level. Includes 2 wizards, a cleric, a ranger and a fighter, plus one thief cohort. We're playing 3.5.

The "don't let them rest" part is hard to do. I have no desire to spend hours running random encounter after random encounter (that's just boring...), and the characters are able to hide easily, as mentioned earlier. It seems very difficult to use the attrition tactic which most dungeons seem to rely on - avoidance and recuperation seems very easy. Run away, rope-trick/teleport/dig a secret cave/numerous other tactics.

Byrons_Ghost said:

Like you said, the environment is not really an obstacle an longer. So, in some sense, the "classic dungeon crawl" feel isn't going to be replicated.

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That's what I feared, and you've summarised it succinctly better than I could have.

Ack! You replied before I could edit my post to make sense in your specific situation! Qouting the relevant changes:

You can do this with a dimensional anchor, for example. Hit the spellcaster with silence. Or you can put them on a time limit to finish the exploration.

In general, without changing the nature of the dungeon, make it so they don't want to leave. The time limit might work, or you can have the dungeon actively changing everyday...what works one day might be slightly different the next (someone comes in, sets up traps, rearranges furniture to make teleporting more difficult).

Don't make teleporting useless, just make it dangerous. Have the badguys bring in an artifact which redirects teleports d% ft in a random direction. Like up, into the stone ceiling. Or have the badguys set up a thing that lets them detect where a teleport started and ended. That way they can check on the progress of the party. Once the party figures out what is up, teleporting is useable, but has consequences.

Actually, it can be done - I just ran 17th-20th lvl PCs through a dungeon to see if it was possible, and it went quite smoothly. So it's not inherently a bad idea.

In the morning I'll type of some thoughts and lessons from that adventure.