Charlaquin
Goblin Queen (She/Her/Hers)
I’m going to be running Tomb of Horrors as a stand-alone New Years Eve one-shot. I pitched it to the players as a lighthearted romp through D&D’s most infamous killer dungeon, with optional drinking game element: the suggested rule is to enjoy a drink of your choice at your own pace while playing, but if your character dies, you can finish your drink to resurrect them (but also I don’t want anyone to feel pressured to drink more than they want to, so it’s really just “infinite resurrections, and drink if you want to.”)
Now, I know to some, the idea of running a dungeon like Tomb of Horrors with the ability to freely resurrect your character may seem blasphemous, and to others the idea of running a dungeon like Tomb of Horrors at all may seem unfun, which is why I included the (+) in the thread title. This is the game I’m running, my players have all enthusiastically agreed, so if your advice is to not run this adventure or to not run it in this way, thank you for your input, but this is how it’s going to go. I am, however, willing to entertain revising the rules of the drinking game. Maybe instead of drinking when you die, you can drink to get a hint on a puzzle? I dunno, just spitballing there.
Now, with that out of the way, I’m seeking advice on how to make the most out of this premise. A big part of that will be hitting the sweet spot of just enough character deaths that people want to keep up the drinking game element, so what would be a good character level to facilitate that (assuming a party of 5)? I was thinking in the 11-16 range, but not sure exactly what level to go with. Also, starting equipment? I was figuring 2 permanent Uncommon magic items with the option to swap one or both for 4 Uncommon consumables each, plus whatever non-magical equipment people want.
Folks who have read more than a few of my posts probably know I’m big on a source of time pressure, and typically use wandering monsters to fill that role in dungeons. But wandering monsters definitely doesn’t seem appropriate for the Tomb of Horrors, so what might be a more fitting source of that pressure?
Something I’m not sure about is entering the dungeon. I don’t think poking around a hill with 10-foot polls to even get into the dungeon is going to start a party like this one off on the right note. But I also don’t want to skip over the possibility of finding one of the false entrances. Any ideas on how to handle that?
And of course, any general advice people might have on running Tomb of Horrors would be appreciated.
Now, I know to some, the idea of running a dungeon like Tomb of Horrors with the ability to freely resurrect your character may seem blasphemous, and to others the idea of running a dungeon like Tomb of Horrors at all may seem unfun, which is why I included the (+) in the thread title. This is the game I’m running, my players have all enthusiastically agreed, so if your advice is to not run this adventure or to not run it in this way, thank you for your input, but this is how it’s going to go. I am, however, willing to entertain revising the rules of the drinking game. Maybe instead of drinking when you die, you can drink to get a hint on a puzzle? I dunno, just spitballing there.
Now, with that out of the way, I’m seeking advice on how to make the most out of this premise. A big part of that will be hitting the sweet spot of just enough character deaths that people want to keep up the drinking game element, so what would be a good character level to facilitate that (assuming a party of 5)? I was thinking in the 11-16 range, but not sure exactly what level to go with. Also, starting equipment? I was figuring 2 permanent Uncommon magic items with the option to swap one or both for 4 Uncommon consumables each, plus whatever non-magical equipment people want.
Folks who have read more than a few of my posts probably know I’m big on a source of time pressure, and typically use wandering monsters to fill that role in dungeons. But wandering monsters definitely doesn’t seem appropriate for the Tomb of Horrors, so what might be a more fitting source of that pressure?
Something I’m not sure about is entering the dungeon. I don’t think poking around a hill with 10-foot polls to even get into the dungeon is going to start a party like this one off on the right note. But I also don’t want to skip over the possibility of finding one of the false entrances. Any ideas on how to handle that?
And of course, any general advice people might have on running Tomb of Horrors would be appreciated.