World's Largest Dungeon in actual play [Spoilers!]

I noticed in the WLD mega-thread that a few people have already started playing through this monster. That thread has been many things over time, and I thought it might be best to start a new one for people to post their experiences with the WLD in actual play.

Assuming anyone bites, this thread will contain spoilers. Fair warning.

So let's hear it: if you've started playing through the WLD, what do you think?

- What's good so far, and what's not-so-good?
- Have you actually read it cover to cover, or did you just dive in?
- How did your expectations reading it match up with your experiences playing it?
- What did you change?

You get the idea.

I tried it a little at dragon con this weekend. We started at the 5th level area.

I have to say... way way WAY too many traps. There was practically a trap in every room. I don't mind traps, but we were going so slowly through just because it seemed like every 5 ft was another trap

One of the first things I noticed about Region A is that the random monster chart is more a list of suggestions than anything else. Region A also is themed on Fiendish templated creatures, but ony four types are used an I like a variety. So I created a six monster enounter chart that I will duplicate here since they are all monsters that a 1st level party of six characters should be able to handle.

1) Abrain pg. 12 Fiend Folio
2) Albadian Battle Dog, Fiendish Template pg. 7 Creature Collection 1
3) Alley Reaper, pg. 8 Creature Collection 1 (be careful with this one, without a priest it can be tough to defeat, it has an ac of 18 and is insubstantial, I had to modifiy its fear power as well, but it was a very entertaining encounter)
4) Death Dog, Fiendish Template, pg. 63 Tome of Horrors 3.0 (or pg. 41 Fiend Folio)
5) Direcorby, Fiendish Template, pg. 104 Tome of Horrors 3.0
6) Mantari, Fiendish Template, pg. 188 Tome of Horrors 3.0

twofalls said:

Region A also is themed on Fiendish templated creatures, but ony four types are used an I like a variety.

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This really bugged while reading through the Region, and I think your approach is a good one. By the end of A, I was pretty tired of seeing yet another fiendish rat swarm or fiendish darkmantle -- and when I tallied up the other non-random beasties in the Region, I realized how few there really were.

I was actually kind of underwhelmed by Region A, and I think if I opt to run it I'd wind up swapping in some other creatures.

I'm glad this thread didn't just fizzle -- this is exactly the kind of stuff I want to hear about.

Gah, sorry to hear that! I'm not too familiar with Region A, having only really given it a passing look as I sped to deal with my own Regions (I&M). My advice on this is to do a simple percentile chart, since things and people are constantly moving around - Call it, in A, a 40% chance the trap is sprung and hasn't been redone, 60% chance it's active. Keeps the players on their toes.

Earthdawn had something like that in Parlainth. I don't recal their names, but they were these horrid little monkey-things that would scamper about the city resetting traps and stealing shiney things from the PCs.

I remember the look on the player's faces as they get past this nasty trap, head down the hall and hear some creaking noise behind them as the little furry gremlin things started in making sure the trap was nice and ready again. It was priceless! After that they just started bashing the hell out of any trap they came across. Which made noise, which attracted more of the little things and they started setting their own traps here and there.

Maybe you could have one of those. Some impish little NPC that hops about the dungeon resetting some traps, but not others. Springing some traps before the PCs get to them, and sometimes just making noise like a trap just went off. That could well be the flavor behind Jim's idea up there.

haiiro said:

- What's good so far, and what's not-so-good?

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Good -- it's very easy to jump right into. The keyed location text is compact and clearly arranged, so most pertinent facts are at your fingertips.

? -- I'm not sure if this is a huge problem since the book provides plenty of activities for your players, but it seems to me that having every stat block wastes a lot of space. It saves you a little flipping through the MM, though, so depending on how big of a hassle you see that as, it mgiht be an advantage.

Not so good -- Not a whole lot yet. I've just played one night, and so far, it seems decent and accomodating. I'm not especially fond of the summoning guidelines and they don't make a lot of sense to me.

- Have you actually read it cover to cover, or did you just dive in?

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I have a day job, hence have not had a chance to read it from cover to cover.

However, as stated, the layout of the book seems very accomodating to diving right in.

- How did your expectations reading it match up with your experiences playing it?

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As stated, I found it quite a bit easier than the norm to run it without a thorough read before hand.

- What did you change?

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Nothing, so far.

I wonder when the first reports will come in of people who have actually played through this monster!

Bye
Thanee

Psion said:

Not so good -- Not a whole lot yet. I've just played one night, and so far, it seems decent and accomodating. I'm not especially fond of the summoning guidelines and they don't make a lot of sense to me.

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you know you can ignore them, right?

[we even say you can ignore them]

btw...

following two threads is going to cause my head to burst

so if anyone needs me to chime in on this board, please
e-mail me or post on the previous thread.

thanks, twofalls, for making this though... it cuts down
on spoilers.

btw (part 2)....

i understand and respect everyone's need to add a variety
of monsters to this region. in hindsight, i wish there had been
more orcs and kobolds in the region, but there is only a limited
number of low-level monsters in the SRD.

and if you read the entire region (specifically A100 through A104),
you'll see the cause of the problem and you can easily justify
adding just about any monster you like to the Region, so long
as its fiendish.

but since people are complaining that Region B is too hard
because of the traps, i'm at a loss as to how we could have
made this Region more challenging without killing PCs.

its my belief that the DMs main job in a dungeon crawl is to
monitor what the PCs can overcome and what they can't.
if the PCs are ready for it, send the fiendish owlbear after
them. or drop in a fiendish harpy, dire animal (so they have
something to eat), cloaker, or perhaps a creature from Region
I that has somehow snuck passed all the wards and creatures
in Region E (ooooo..... foreshadowing).

i think your games are going to go a lot better once you read
what's on the adjacent maps and start placing important
clues or hints of what's to come.

and if you like, drop a lantern archon in the Region (in an empty)
room that is merely there for the PCs to ask questions of.
decide ahead of time what it knows (probably nothing about
the traps and new monsters) and only answer questions it
can answer.

that's enough advice for one day

jim pinto said:

you know you can ignore them, right?

[we even say you can ignore them]

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Er, yeah. I'm just saying the recommendations don't make sense.

That I can ignore them is pretty obvious.

I'm not saying it's a major flaw. Like I said, there's not much I saw as explicitly wrong.