Dungeon of DOOM

[Gold Roger]

Okay, I'm seriously stuck here. Even though I've been DMing for some years now, I've never created a serious dungeon (more than some rooms). Now one big aspect of my current Iron Heroes campaignis archeology and another is that it's player driven. Guess what, the PC's had themselfs hired out to an archeologist and have now reached the site of the dungeon. But I don't have any grasp how this dungeon should be and can't figure out what it should represent. All I determined so far was that the dungeon has to be reached from above through burrowing and it lies in zone that's taboo to the natives roamed by unknown horrors that have killed a member of the expedition.
What has happened in my campaign so far can be read in the "So, what's happenin'?" Thread of this board. They will be split up into groups of three while exploring the Dungeon. Here a small lineup of all persons involved:

Cesus (Thief 2;PC): Described in the "So, what's happenin'?" Thread

Aristo (Weaponmaster 2;PC): "So, what's happenin'?" Thread

Sigin (Expert X;Noncombatant;NPC): Expedition Leader. Arrogant and hated by everyone. Will propably and with a knife in his back, wich could belong to anyone.

Hera (Thief 1;NPC): Sigins daughter. Arrogant and decadent, but not as bad as her father. Hates Kanee and was supposed to be married to Sigins assistant and money giver before he died.

Zepharex(Neogi;NPC): Sigin's "buisness partner". Brought slaves and explosives with him. Also called the adventurous Neogi, for it is rare for a Neogi to travel without others of his kind or a chuul in this world. Adventure is seen as a human thing.

Kanee (Executener 4;NPC): Experienced mercenary. Extremely dirty. Drunk most of the time, but also seems to know what's going on before anyone else. Has a deal with the PC's to betray Sigin. Lesbian and was thrown out of the girls room by Hera for staring.

Zears of the Loth'akkan("Werewolf Berserker 1"): Weak skinny bald guy that has to walk on a stick and looks somewhat sick. Calls himself a warrior and has been witnessed by Aristo to turn into a rune covered Hulk like being. Last of a proud warrior tribe erradicated by a zealous religion. Holy ritual warrior that can turn into a "seeker" and destroyer form using the rules of Werewolfes. Fought among PC's on Pirate vessel.

Bron and Gorn(Warriors 1,;NPC's): Good natured but stupid brothers seeking their fortune. Fought among PC's on Pirate vessel.

Random Dude(Warrior 1;NPC): Nondescript guy the PC's haven't talked to jet. Fought among PC's on Pirate vessel and was badly wounded (brought to 0).

Two other guys(unknown; NPC's/PC's): Two guys the PC's haven't had contact with at all. My become new PC's.

5 Slves(commoners 1;NPC's): The human slaves Zepharex brought with himself. The PC's don't like slvery but feel they can't do anything about it atm.

(I know that having three members in the expedition that are more powerfull than the PC's looks like a bad case of DMPC, but I try to keep them off screen during fights by splitting up. It's just a quite high powered world)

 

[MarkCsigs]

The only advice I can offer is this: My campaign seems very similar to yours, in that it is also player driven and that I rarely find myself havling to build large, complicated dungeons. But, my players threw me a curve when they decided to get out of the wandering do-gooder mode and decided to follow up on a 'throw-away' rumor I'd created about a series of catacombs with great treasure and mystery.

I found the idea of starting from scratch to be too intimidating for me. I kept questioning every decision I made about location of a room, what it was originally for and why it was being used in a certain way, now. So I dumped the idea of creating my own and started looking for a module that would fit, instead.

I ended up stumbling onto the infamous Rappan Athuk series and it seemed to be a good fit on the surface (extensive, multilevel catacombs combined with some natural caverns and an evil cult ruling over the place ...), but it still took a lot of work on my part. I rewrote entire encounters, dropped others and put in some new subplots and machinations. In the end, it was probably just as much effort but for whatever reason I found it much easier to work with a written module as a starting point. In the end, it was very much my own adventure draped over the skeleton of a packaged module ... and the result was probably the best extended dungeon crawl that I've ever run.

 

[Gold Roger]

Well, I didn't think of the possibility of using a published adventure as starting point. But I don't think that will be a solution this time around. I'm flat out broke, I don't think there is anything around the stuff I own (only adventure I own is city of the spiderqueen) or among the stuff that's free on the web. Also I don't even know what exactly I'm searching for and the campaign as been on hiatus for quite some time now, so waiting isn't an option either.
I'll try to start by organizing my thoughts as question. Maybe some of you have suggestions how to answer these:
1. What is the expedition searching for? Anything valuable obviously, but that's not enough for the spinning of intrigue I'm trying to reach. No there has to be more to it, some magic item or such (in IH magic items are extremely rare and allways carry a great risk when used)
2. The dungeon was build by some ancient culture, most likely far from human or even humanoid. Who where the creators and what for? (I'm aiming for an ancient ruins look, more than alien spaceship though)
3. What are the dangers and challenges? Traps have to make sense, riddles should be avoided, they'd be to alien for the PC's, wandering monsters and animals are a nono, because the thing has been enclosed for centuries. Dangers of decayed structure are a good start. It's alo to mention here that this will be the first time they meet monsters apart from Chuul or Neogi. This should make a big impression of awsome.
4. What are the terrors on the outside?
5. Why is the darn thing underground? This is the worst part for me. most ruins in this world aren't underground, but the players already know it's underground and are at the site.
6. What hints does it give? Granted, the PC's are interested only in money, but I'm not so sure about the players I also just prefer if connections can be made.
7. Old ruins are supposed to be extremely dangerous. I want the PC's to wonder how they survived once they get out.

Here some more info on the world: At some point all land mass has been sundered appart into countless islands and i'ts now a world of infinite ocean. Most ruins are from nonhuman civilization from the time before the sundering. The greatest and most amazing ruins are known as the "old wonders" (think 7 world wonders) and there is a uncertain number of these old wonders. Examples for old wonders are a tower that rises from the bottom of the ocean (or deeper) up into the clouds (or higher), piramids that float on the ocean, a pearl as bid as an mountain or a Labirinth made up of countless labirinths all around the world connected through magical portals.
There are no gods or a defined cosmology. Religion doesn't grant magic. All magic has either the form as bloodline given or ritualistic and can allways be traced back to the old races.

 

[Nightcloak]

Due to the holidays, work is going to keeping me busy 24/7. But as turkey day approaches, time will lighten up and I'll post some ideas for you. Just how much creative input are you looking for?

 

[MarkCsigs]

The world is your world, obviously and in the end has to have your hand and flavor. But since you asked ... just some random "first thoughts" that popped into my head based on some of your questions ...

1. What is the expedition searching for? Anything valuable obviously, but that's not enough for the spinning of intrigue I'm trying to reach. No there has to be more to it, some magic item or such (in IH magic items are extremely rare and allways carry a great risk when used

Perhaps what they are searching for is of historical, rather than magical power. Very early in my campaign, the characters obtained an item that ... if it were magic would be considered an artifact due to it's power ... but it wasn't magical. It was the simple journal of a minor warlord/bandit king from over 100 years ago. BUT ... if they had done research into some of the names involved they would have learned that the current line of kings is actually based on an illegitimate lineage.

Or maybe the characters go in looking for magic, but the real treasure is something of historical importance instead. Some clue as to the nature of your ancient race and where they've gone off to ... perhaps humanoids were actually their creation despite what man's myths might say ...

2. The dungeon was build by some ancient culture, most likely far from human or even humanoid. Who where the creators and what for? (I'm aiming for an ancient ruins look, more than alien spaceship though)

Continuing my previous thought ... perhaps they were the originators of mankind. Perhaps men and elves and dwarves were originally their (near) mindless servants ... advanced homonoculii if you will. Perhaps one day (if the ancient society was good) they decided to leave this plane and deeded their world to their creations. If not so good ... perhaps something is holding them at bay and their once obedient minions now have evolved and grown powerful ...

Some suggestions for making your race seem strange and alien ... distort the dimensions of your ruins. Perhaps extremely tall and skinny. Or low and squat. And all the doors need three hands to open. Or tentacles. Be sure to include lots of items (furniture, eating utensils, writing) where they couldn't possibly guess their purpose.

3. What are the dangers and challenges? Traps have to make sense, riddles should be avoided, they'd be to alien for the PC's, wandering monsters and animals are a nono, because the thing has been enclosed for centuries. Dangers of decayed structure are a good start. It's alo to mention here that this will be the first time they meet monsters apart from Chuul or Neogi. This should make a big impression of awsome.

4. What are the terrors on the outside?

I don't have any particular ideas for these questions I'm afraid ... but given your limitations, undead, elementals and constructs are all good encounters. Constructs could obviously be left behind by the previous inhabitants ... and elementals could be leftover creatures that were summoned and bound to a particular use ... but I don't particularly have ideas regarding why undead.

5. Why is the darn thing underground? This is the worst part for me. most ruins in this world aren't underground, but the players already know it's underground and are at the site.

Some ideas that come to mind ... the facility represented something so dangerous it had to be kept away from the general populace ... or perhaps unlike the other ones, this facility had some foul or illegal purpose and had to be hidden ... perhaps it was swallowed up by some catastrophe ... or, you mention others that seem to be cloud based, water based; perhaps there were different subspecies of this race and some were water creatures, some air creatures, some earth creatures, etc.

6. What hints does it give? Granted, the PC's are interested only in money, but I'm not so sure about the players I also just prefer if connections can be made.

Perhaps this is just on my mind because my campaign is going through a phase right now where the players are learning that much of the history of the world that their characters knew and grew up believing is now false ... but some kind of secrets of historical importance could be interesting. And once they realize the importance of what they've found ... perhaps make it so the ruins are a bit unstable and they realize they have to be very careful to keep it preserved (not to mention save themselves from being buried).

Well ... those are just some random thoughts. Hope they help, or at least spark an idea or two of your own.

 

[Gold Roger]

Thanks MarkCsigs. That's really what I need most atm. Random thoughts to kick me of.
Some of the stuff you suggested doesn't exactly work with my setting, for example there is not much the PC's learned about history so far, appart from the fact that about every village has it's own creation myth.
However, I already havesome stuff winding it's way through my brain again.
I think this ruin is the prison of some powerfull monster. I already had the idea that it's basically "go in, grab some minor treasure and do some minor dungeon delving, get some bigger treasure, but then get the hell out of there, because something went really wrong". Unknowingly realeasing the beasty should be a good something goes wrong. The lurking things could be the guardians of the place. They serve a function that is good, but they are half mad of age, alien to humans and not partuculary nice to begin with. Maybe some kind of undying grell? or something with burrowing speed. It can't be incorporeal (to powerfull), but should be able to enter and leave the complex. Also one of the PC's is an orphan gifted with both an unnatural luck and an ability of telikinesis, some hinds at it could be nice. But not in connection with the builders, but the monster.
Oh, my evil part of the brain is working again, this should be a "good" sign.

 

[Blade of Desecration]

Heres an idea what the dungeon might have once been: a kind of "zoo" for magical creatures. The horrors wandering the halls could be the original monsters, the descendants of the monsters, or the undead "zoo keepers". Perhaps the place was brought to ruin when one of the more powerful creatures escaped, went on a killing rampage, and accidentally destroyed the pens for most of the other creatures. This could open up many avenues for exotic creatures to attack the PCs with. It's underground because either: A) The creatures are subterranean, or B) They were easier to contain that way.

If you do this, just make a simple gridding of corridors with cages along the sides. Set up some groups of roaming monsters, an archeological find at the end, and you're set. For some real suspence, have the PCs be helping the slaves dig when the tunnel collapses. They are cut off from their powerful allies (hence solving the problem NPCs more powerful than them), and have to find another way back to the surface, maybe find some artifacts (not Artifacts ) along the way, and duke it out with some exotic creatures. The slaves are all either killed in the cave-in, or the PCs have to try to protect and escort them to the surface. Maybe the PCs get to the surface but they are a long way from the camp. Be creative, it sounds like a good campaign.

 

[Gold Roger]

Hey, BoD, thanks for the idea, though I fear it isn't exactly what I want to do. Still a good idea though.
As in above said, I was thinking of a big bad beasty being imprisoned there, but I just couldn't bring myself to use it. I'm extremely weary of plot holes and serious, putting a big beasty under protections two level two'ers could break? Don't think so.
By the way, the powerfull NPC's won't be much of a problem because the structure will be explored in small groups of three, so the powerfulls won't be around most of the time.

edit: Just had an idea, though it still doesn't solve my problem it adds a twist to the theme. First Sigin dies with a knife in his back, or through uncertain ciscumstances. Honestly that would have happened later on anyway. But with this idea it happens earlier. With the nominal leader dead a conflict arrises in the groups and they splinter into thre opposed camps that try to get as much profit out of the ruins as they can and get out, at best without the other groups.