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

[rvalle]

Hey folks

I've been flipping through my WLD recently, contemplating a run at it, and I decided I'd really like to get my hands on a chronology of the dungeon - there's lots of references to "two years ago", "ten years ago", "fifty years ago", etc., and it would be useful to pull them together.

I haven't read this whole thread, but I've scanned a lot of it. jim pinto mentioned that someone had made a chronology (in post 1118) but I can't find it.

Any leads, anyone?

I remember it being mentioned but I don't have it. Maybe it was in one of the posts lost when the board crashed?

_____

My game:

My group is still slogging though N. They just met up with Isvistis the Lich Lord last night.

I had already figured that if the party talked to Isvy and said the right things that he would hand over his 2 keys and point them in the direction of the 4th (they have the one from the Ghost already). I mean, he wants the vault opened and so do they right? Why fight a group that is going to do what you want and save yourself the trouble.

Things were going well but then the party decided to attack Isv and just take his keys. This was led off by an 'first strike' lightning bolt from the groups Sorc. The casting of which triggered Istvitchs's Globe of Invulnerability and thus had no effect. One Empowered Chain Lighting in return and a failed save by the Sorc and we had one dead party member and rest of the group going 'oh oh...'.

The parties front liners were able to get up to the Lich Lord and put a hurt on him. All I have to say is Time Stop is an awesome spell! He was able to cast it, move out of harms way, cast a quickened Wall of Force and then leave. The party is still scratching their heads about how he left.


Oh, and the undead Hydra in N180? Stupid nasty. There is a bit of a disconnect in the book where one place says there is 1 there and another says 5. I think I'll stick to the 1.

Its the breath weapons that do it. Each one does a bit of fire and unholy damage which was no big deal but each on also causes 1d4 con damage. And while the Ref save can 1/2 the fire and unholy damage it has no effect on the con damage. Ouch. You get all those heads pointing at one character (which is what happened in my game) and you quickly have a dead character on the ground.

The party has a general idea where Kasteoficiss the Mummy Lord is at and are going to go and take her on before they roll up their sleeves and take on Isvistis again.

rv

 

[erucsbo]

Bl**dy Wall of Force!

The party battled Tyrus last night. 4 hours of planning and the battle lasted about 100 minutes.

As this was going to be the final time they could upgrade gear before hitting Tyrus and the Tomb I allowed some Garrison help in equipping the party.
This included 5 arrows of slaying (dragon). Note that this would only affect Tyrus if it hit him and he rolled a 1 on the Fort save.

The party entered the Ice prison, everyone flying and invisible (greater), and the clerics had true seeing up (so were able to discern the illusion straight away).
They spotted Tyrus in the alcove and the sorcerer just managed to beat Tyrus' initiatuve and used a Wall of Force to seal it off (with a 5' gap at the bottom).
The mystic theurge cast cloudkill - Tyrus made his save but still lost 2 Con points.
His action was to disperse the cloud, but still couldn't get past the Wall of Force.
The party fighters closed to fight, and the former assassin fired an arrow of slaying after True strike.
The mystic theurge cast cloudkill each round that Tyrus dispersed it.
The only thing that Tyrus managed to do was get a Prismatic Spray off (but with Holy Aura from the Astral Devas some were unaffected due to the granted spell resistance).
In the end, with hits from the fighter and paladin critting and smites aplenty they got him down to about 88hp when another arrow of slaying hit and Tyrus rolled a 1 (I rolled on the table).
Much whooping and hollering by the party, but their tactics were sound and would have been able to do Tyrus in even if they hadn't trapped him. The party was barely scratched (though lots of prep/buff spell casting was used).
Now for the tomb...

 

[jim pinto]

Bl**dy Wall of Force!

The party battled Tyrus last night. 4 hours of planning and the battle lasted about 100 minutes.

As this was going to be the final time they could upgrade gear before hitting Tyrus and the Tomb I allowed some Garrison help in equipping the party.
This included 5 arrows of slaying (dragon). Note that this would only affect Tyrus if it hit him and he rolled a 1 on the Fort save.

The party entered the Ice prison, everyone flying and invisible (greater), and the clerics had true seeing up (so were able to discern the illusion straight away).
They spotted Tyrus in the alcove and the sorcerer just managed to beat Tyrus' initiatuve and used a Wall of Force to seal it off (with a 5' gap at the bottom).
The mystic theurge cast cloudkill - Tyrus made his save but still lost 2 Con points.
His action was to disperse the cloud, but still couldn't get past the Wall of Force.
The party fighters closed to fight, and the former assassin fired an arrow of slaying after True strike.
The mystic theurge cast cloudkill each round that Tyrus dispersed it.
The only thing that Tyrus managed to do was get a Prismatic Spray off (but with Holy Aura from the Astral Devas some were unaffected due to the granted spell resistance).
In the end, with hits from the fighter and paladin critting and smites aplenty they got him down to about 88hp when another arrow of slaying hit and Tyrus rolled a 1 (I rolled on the table).
Much whooping and hollering by the party, but their tactics were sound and would have been able to do Tyrus in even if they hadn't trapped him. The party was barely scratched (though lots of prep/buff spell casting was used).
Now for the tomb...

Yeah. Kinda anticlimactic way to handle an otherwise fun battle. There are all kinds of "cheats" you could have used to stall this "fish in a barrel of force" but the end result would have been the same… PCs win.

This is the sort of thing that we tried to avoid in writing the adventure in the first place… This just doesn't sound like a found outing for the DM. You know?

Btw… had any group ever uncovered the crypt that lies UNDEAD region J?

Just curious.

 

[erucsbo]

Yeah. Kinda anticlimactic way to handle an otherwise fun battle. There are all kinds of "cheats" you could have used to stall this "fish in a barrel of force" but the end result would have been the same… PCs win.

This is the sort of thing that we tried to avoid in writing the adventure in the first place… This just doesn't sound like a found outing for the DM. You know?

It's always been my contention that the EL formula breaks down when the number of participants is skewed. The party really struggles when there are low level mooks but lots of them. When they hit the boss monster they tend to have a much easier time of it (imho because of the number of characters). The online encounter calculator said that we'd need that many characters involved to stop it turning in to a TPK, but with forethought, buffs and a tactically sound plan I thought it was always going to turn in the PCs favour. I wanted Tyrus dealt with from a story-line perspective and this is what it took to get the players engaged.
I didn't expect this one to be a fun DM outing, but I did think that Tyrus might have a bit more impact. To be fair, if I had rolled behind the screen I would have played it out a bit more, but I couldn't do much with his size to get out of the box he was in or he would have gotten out of the prison much sooner.
Looking back the battle with Terr'kaal was the same (3 rounds).
Now, maybe I should insert a group of Tucker's Kobolds somewhere instead.

Btw… had any group ever uncovered the crypt that lies UNDEAD region J?

Just curious.

We didn't do all the precursor bits. I played it as a Christmas Special about 12 months ago with the few players that were available. Turned out reasonably well. That was when I decided that the NPC paladin had to go away for a while (163hp to Serratine in 1 round).

 

[jim pinto]

Looking back the battle with Terr'kaal was the same (3 rounds).

That's too bad. Another fun encounter, maybe not enough followers and hit points, though.

That was when I decided that the NPC paladin had to go away for a while (163hp to Serratine in 1 round).

Some people are playing a very different version of D&D than I am.

 

[erucsbo]

That's too bad. Another fun encounter, maybe not enough followers and hit points, though.

it was a divide and conquer again - well placed walls of force cut down the number of Azers able to acts.
The player playing the sorcerer has moved interstate and he was the principle source of WoFs, so tactics might change a bit in the tomb.

Some people are playing a very different version of D&D than I am.

*shrug* The dice love this paladin. I even had others roll for her in the battle against Tyrus and she still did horrendous amounts of damage without receiving a scratch. Haste with Power Attack with Smite Evil with a Bastard Sword (Holy + Axiomatic), and rolling really high (though didn't use PA against Tyrus).

Haven't you encountered fighters doing mega-damage in your games?

 

[jim pinto]

Haven't you encountered fighters doing mega-damage in your games?

There are a hundred ways for me to answer this, but it all boils down to the most under-described role of the GM in any RPG book you'll ever read… administration. The GM's role in a game is to make things appear seamless, whether or not they actually are.

Keeping challenges just out of range of the exploits of people who are better at math than you is one of the "cheats" of being a GM. Watching the PCs develop, means always knowing that the fighter can hit an AC 50 without trying very hard, which means… oops, this dragon has AC 51. All of a sudden, there's a challenge.

At it's best, the WLD over-planned for the worst kind of min-maxing. At it's worst, the WLD failed to ramp up in regions like J, which were re-written by me in two-weeks. The tactics and logic of the region were thought-through (trolls with fire resistance for instance), but the math could not accommodate every 3.x book that would arrive, skewing the data in unpredictable ways.

The advantage of table-top play vs. MMOs is the human-element, at the table, monitoring the action and knowing when you ebb and when to flow. I'm actually posting soon in my blog about this very thing (hit points and game tempo).

So. While I wrote a mammoth book of dungeon-crawl encounters, I really don't play THIS style of game. And if I did, I would mix 50% more story into the various sections of the dungeon that I really want to emphasize.

I sound like I'm defending myself. And I'm not. Sorry about the tone. I've been doing a lot of blogging and advice-writing lately. Hard to break the habit.

Question back at you. When do players get tired of doing 100+ points of damage in a round, game after game, and never being challenged?

 

[erucsbo]

There are a hundred ways for me to answer this, but it all boils down to the most under-described role of the GM in any RPG book you'll ever read… administration. The GM's role in a game is to make things appear seamless, whether or not they actually are.

Keeping challenges just out of range of the exploits of people who are better at math than you is one of the "cheats" of being a GM. Watching the PCs develop, means always knowing that the fighter can hit an AC 50 without trying very hard, which means… oops, this dragon has AC 51. All of a sudden, there's a challenge.

Normally I'm pretty good at this, but if you dangle the carrot too far away or don't let them have enough bites then player frustration takes centre stage.

Single monster battles, especially with a large adventuring party, are harder to "cheat" at without it either being obvious or totally dissing intelligent PC play.

We've been going through the WLD for over 3 years now (with the occassional alternate gaming session to keep some variety in the mix), and (imho) due to the age, personality and circumstances of the players it is starting to take its toll. They really just want to get out and Tyrus and the World Eater are the two large story elements that need to be dealt with.

I sound like I'm defending myself. And I'm not. Sorry about the tone. I've been doing a lot of blogging and advice-writing lately. Hard to break the habit.

Question back at you. When do players get tired of doing 100+ points of damage in a round, game after game, and never being challenged?

No apology necessary. It all comes down to player motivations for gaming. Some like to explore facets of their personality (role-players), some to test themselves (problem solvers), some like building the best character they can (power-gamers / min-maxers / munchkins), some for the creative story-telling experience (story tellers), some just for the socialisation (beer & pretzels) (and there are probably others that I have forgotten). I need to (continue to) provide a gaming experience that fits my players' motivations.

Doesn't happen all that often. Only occurred a few times in my game so far - and they are challenged, though more often by the secondary encounters than the big ones (where they plan a lot more). The times that more than 100hps has been dealt in a round are rare enough that they are still causes for celebration rather than ennui.
Some of the players, too, get bored if they don't have a combat. We avoided the elves because of that - a heavy "role-playing" session is not what the vast majority of my players are after - which means that N is more likely going to be a slog rather than playing the three major undead off against each other.
WLD has definitely been worth it, generating many memorable moments (and those are the things that get recalled years later), and we have pretty much limited ourselves to the SRD (except for a few feats from the PHB2 and a couple of other variants). The players have tailored the characters for the environment though (environment is pretty well defined, no one has taken feats for mounted combat etc) and with the Tomb beckoning there will be heavy prepping for undead and traps.
Once free of the WLD I will still have the frost giants and the Terrasque available as separate adventures (with minor modifications).
As long as the players keep showing up and we can have a good time (we're more beer & pretzels players) then I'll keep doing things pretty much the same.

 

[Carpe DM]

Interesting. I find it hard, but not impossible, to challenge my players consistently, given that any one of them can easily top 200 damage a round.

I find several tools useful in maintaining versimilitude while not taking away their hard-earned powers.

First, there are many immediate actions in the late game that help deal with specific threats. I like how Friendly Fire, for example, works. Probably my favorite recently-written spell. Players get a lot more cautious about handing out the Vile Empowered (Soul-Tick) Orb of Force when they know that there's a chance it's going to hit a buddy.

Swift mirror image is also a boon. And, of course, buff suites prolong fights because the casters have to open with dispels against the opposing sides.

Terrain is another big one. We often stop using terrain once fly comes online in a major sense, but this is a mistake. There are all kinds of terrain-like effects that can make an aerial fight interesting and exciting. I just ran a fight in a foundry, in which glowing-hot adamantine I-beams were swinging back and forth on chains, suspended from wheel-tracks. One PC got bull-rushed out of mid-air by one into a furnace. Mmmm. Tastes like chicken.

 

[erucsbo]

Questions about region N

p677 - Horde Traits - first paragraph says that Hordes cannot grapple opponents, yet just after the next paragraph it says they have a +4 bonus for grappling others.

which is it?

Also - given the conditions of Desecrated 4 and Unhallowed 6 - that's -10 on turning checks and with the Horde providing an additional -4 circumstance penalty that makes -14 penalty for Turn checks yes?
(unless conditions are specified otherwise) - and given the Fearless condition does this make the journey much more of a slog?

Plus - the edict against extra-dimensional spaces. I've allowed Handy Haversacks and bags of holding to be used up to now (as they are non-dimensional rather than extra-dimensional spaces). I know that BoH etc are not supposed to work in the dungeon but it made bookkeeping and encumberance tracking a nightmare without them. Has anyone else found issues either for or against ignoring this rule - specifically in N?

And am I reading it right that the party will need to go through each of the gates (and therefore defeating all of the guardians) before being able to progress further in to the tomb?

Any other gotchas to look out for?