Starting Worlds Largest Dungeon - general suggestions, and jazzing up Region A

[JiffyPopTart]

Things I did in WLD

1. All PCs get max HP at every level. All monster also get max HP as well.

2. I printed off the PDF maps on a piece of heavy cardstock. As the players explored I had the pieces of the dungeon cut out puzzle-like and I would hand them the piece that had the room or hallway complex they had just entered. I handed the piece to the "mapper" who taped it in with his existing map. After a few sessions I would give them a new cardstock "base map" with all that they had explored as one piece, to ease things up. Eventually about halfway through the level I had them meet A23B, the Lantern Archon in charge of the area. He projected a map for them (I gave the map with all the secret doors and hidden rooms erased).

3. You can d/l several variations of the map that are handy for running here...
http://www.james.neetersoft.com/wld/wld.htm

4. I had the party hunting Longtail as hirelings for a high-level ranger. He conveniently died at the entrance to the cave, and the big-bad monster was waiting outside to eat the rest of the party. They HAD to explore the cave, and got stuck in the one-way entrance to section A.

5. I had the party enter a "pocket dimension" between section A and B. This allowed them to swap out the meager bit of loot they found, allowed the wizards to get a few spells, and basically gave them a chance to level up their loot appropriately. I also ran a small adventure in this pocket dimension, giving a break from WLD before reentering. The only way out of the dimension was into section B.

6. Darkmantles REQUIRE 3.0 darkness to operate properly. In 3.5 the darkness spell is poop on a stick. Cheat and give the darkmantles 3.0 darkness as a special power, not 3.5 darkness.

7. When starting out I told the players "You will only have what is written on your sheet. Be sure to list everything you are starting with". Usually we don't keep track of minutae like rations or arrows or whatnot. When they went through the one-way door and realized they were foodless it forced them into some ethical choices. Them orcs good eatin.

I may post some later, tacos are ready!

DS

 

[JiffyPopTart]

The Orc/Kobold battles are going on, to some degree, so theres loads of opportunity to get cool player hooks, and avoid the "dire rat/darkmantle" boring the region has.

Have the players converse with some captured Kobolds, discover Longtail's plans, and try to stop him from opening the portal his familiar is trying to get him to open. Would this break things? How would you handle it?

The problem with switching the fiendish monsters to orc/kobold wars is that when the players to go section B they are going to be bored because the theme of B is what you are proposing to change A to.

Section A=Adjusting to the dungeons and being freaked out at every turn by wierd monsters from hell. The brief moments to normalcy (orc and kobold camps) provide a break between corridors that I tried to describe as Alienslike (the movie).

Section B=A war between the Empire and the Rebels with the PCs caught in the middle.


I had the players learn about Longtail and his history through the Ogre, who they befriended. He never left his saferoom but guarded their stuff in return for them dropping off some food now and then for him.

DS

 

[hackmastergeneral]

Thanks for the ideas so far, guys. I'm mulling over a lot of things right now.

Keep em coming!

 

[rvalle]

If the players go to E there will not be the redunancy issue.

In my game the Ogre, trogs and suvriving orcs were turned into Shadows from the group in E once the players got the Shadows attention.

Drawing a blank for anything else at the moment.

rv