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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Unwise" data-source="post: 5533603" data-attributes="member: 98008">Generally I am not a fan of dream sequences unless they have quite nailed down mechanics. Although a changeable world is thematic, it leads to players not being sure which mechanics are at play.  They might be trying to 'disbelieve' in a dragon that you intend them to fight. They might wonder why they can't just summon a +5 sword, when they could earlier summon a lantern with a thought. Do they have their equipment with them? Why would they bring a grappnel hook into a dream? Do you need to go over every peice of equipment to see if they have it? If you let them wish things into being, it can end up with them feeling it is just shoddily constructed. Adding in wierdness, letting people summon things, change the environment etc is cool in a thematic way, but it disengages the player from the consequences of their choice. When you open up endless possibilities, it really feels like the game is entirely in the GMs hands, if your PC dies it is just because you are being screwed over. After all, why did X bad bizaare unexplained thing happen instead of Y good thing. To get around these issues, when I use a dream sequence, I tend to have it take place in the actual Realm of Dreams. A place as real as the Feywild or Shadowfell. It has real and solid terrain with real and solid consequences. It might be wierd, but gravity is not suddenly going to turn off and your sword is not going to turn into a rabbit mid fight. In my campaign, there are two characters, each is fighting against a different BBEG. They each found the attention of the bad guys, who decided to mess with them. They hired a dream assassin of sorts (some sort of demon probably). When the PCs go to sleep, they each teleport to a place in the dream realm and are forced to fight a minor avatar/projection of the BBEG they want to kill. These are very hard fights. They are fair distance from each other, but can try and run to team up if they want. If they fail, they wake up 2 healing surges down. This happens every night until they run out of surges and their souls are consumed by the dream-assassin (or they win the fight). This is designged as a a 'Luke in the dark-side cave on Dagobar' style moment. Once they defeat the bad guys in the dream, the baddies plot backfires as the PCs are now full of confidence and know a weakness or two of the real BBEG. This allows them to progress to Paragon Tier.(In my campaigns, you have to acheive something very significant and character building to be allowed to progress between tiers)</blockquote>

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