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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Celebrim" data-source="post: 5032124" data-attributes="member: 4937">The fact that the Astral Plane is an endless open space tends to make designing interesting encounters on it difficult, because there is no terrain to speak of and hense, little in the way of tactics and little oppurtunity for drama.And on top of that, the Astral Dreadnaught is a brute monster, and not a finesse monster.The only sort of terrain to speak of on the Astral Plane are Pyschic Storms and Hurricanes, so that's were I'd start - with their skiff being caught in a Pyschic Storm.   I'd work it like a skill challenge (more or less, as I don't approve of the actual official skill challenge mechanics) with a series of skill tests, which carry some consequence of failure - fail the skill check, and everyone in the party must save or have something bad to them.  Repeat for several rounds.After/during the storm, I'd have them 'wash up' on a dream dust beach, where fragments of dreams have collected as a thin glittering sand that floats in a narrow shelf extending some mile in diameter and a few inches thick, and on the beach I'd have the wreckage of other boats blown to this shore by the frequent storms in this region - raw material for repairing their little skiff.  The largest and most intact of these would be a nearby Astral Galleon with a great hole in the side.  This is the lair of the Astral Dreadnaught, which is resting after having devoured the crew of the larger vessel.  You fight the Dreadnaught, make some skill checks to repair your craft (failure means possible wandering encounters or having to endure another storm), and encounter over.Alternately, they can try repairing and outfitting one of the bigger damaged crafts here, but that means more skill checks and hense more challenges to endure.Psychic Storm ChallengesI'm not sure what you use for skills wt. respect to planeswalking or handling boats, but I'm going to assume 4e RAW here:Test #1: Insight, DC character level + 15, recognize storm brewing with sufficient time to prepare +2 bonus on all further skill checks, no penalty on failure.Test #2: Dungeoneering, DC character level + 15, gain control of craft and run before storm, on success go to test #3, on failure characters take 1d6+3 pyschic damage from buffetting and attack vs will - pychic shrieking (dazed, ongoing 5 psychic damage, save ends) and repeat test.Test #3: Arcane, DC character level + 10, avoid psychic thunderbolts, on success go to test #4, on failure all must attacks fort for 5d6 psychic damage and lose healing surge.Test #4: Dungeoneering, DC character level +15 , in the eye of the storm, keep control of craft, on success go to test #4, on failure characters take 1d6+3 pyschic damage from buffetting and attack vs. will - pychic shrieking (dazed, ongoing 5 psychic damage, save ends) and repeat test.  Test #5: Endurance, DC character level + 15, keep control of craft, on success go to test #6, on failure all characters must make reflex save  or be thrown overboard.   Anyone thrown over board loses a healing surge and half of remaining hit points.   They are swept out of sight, but appear on beach in next scene unconscious (save -2 ends).Test #6: As #4, but on success challenges is over.Beach ChallengesTotal the number of failures in the storm challenge.  That's the number of successes required to get out of here.  For every half that number of failures, have some minor encounter and lose an accumulated success.   A long rest automatically encurs an addtional minor encounter and loses an accumulated success.Insight/Dungeoneering/Arcane/Nature, DC character level + 10 (can't use same skill twice in a row): Scrounge materials and repair skiff.</blockquote>

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