[BRAINSTORM] Cool Battlefields!

[GlassJaw]

When I work on a campaign or prepare an adventure or whatever, I have a tendency to spend a lot time on things that sometimes end up not being important in-play. Conversely, once the session starts, there are things that I wish I had spent more time on (especially when creating one-shots).

One of those things is designing cool places to fight.

Regardless of your campaign, sometimes you just need a cool place to duke it out. And more often than not, a great location can turn a boring or otherwise forgetful battle into something much more cinematic. As a player, the battles I tend to remember are the ones that were staged in a unique location: on an airship, a glass tower, an ice cave, etc.

So here's the brainstorm:

Write about a sweet (and by sweet I mean totally awesome) place to have a battle. List any special rules for the battlefield and some possible baddies.

Couple of basic rules:

1. Keep it to a fantasy-centric setting (more or less).
2. Preferably the location could be translated to a battlemat but this is optional.

Also, by submitting an idea to this thread, you are permitting me to steal them for future use.

 

[IcyCool]

This reminds me of a friend's method for adventure creation for the Feng Shui RPG.

1. Take 3 pictures, postcards, or places in the world. These are where your fights will take place.

2. String those 3 locations together loosely with plot.

3. Enjoy.

So, just taking that into account and doing a few random google image searches I get the following 3 locations:

1. Inflatable bounce house. (Perhaps in D&D it could be a series of connected chambers where movement could be freely taken in 3 dimensions.)

2. An escalator that climbs three stories inside a mall. (Not sure how you'd duplicate this in a D&D setting)

3. Scaffolding surrounding a large (and tall) construction site. (Pretty much usable as is in a D&D world, the construction site would just have to be a castle, temple, or sufficiently large statue)

 

[Big Finger Games]

I'm not sure I can help you with specific rules on the fly, but in an Exalted game from some years ago, we had a battle inside a giant mechanical structure that was filled with moving gears, chains, and other archaic "clockwork" machinery.

Our opponents were a sect of monks that were familar with the workings and rythmns of the mechanisms and used the enviroment to their advantage.

Another fight took place inside the bad guy's menagerie, where a stray attack or movement could upset the bamboo cages that contained all manner of dangerous and poisonous animals.

 

[IcyCool]

Here's two evironments that I've actually played in.

1. The deck of an airship, listing to one side as it slowly sinks and heads for a destructive collision with the ground.

2. A large room, segmented into 5' squares by a steel wire grid set at about two to two and a half feet off the ground. The wire made movement slow, and certain areas of the ceiling would drop alchemist fire if the wire was tripped/cut. An ogre at one end did it's best to trigger the alchemist fire while various small or low to the ground animals had free reign at our ankles.

 

[Meloncov]

A recent fight I ran took place in several run away mine carts. Lots of jumping from one to another, casting spells to change the courses of the cars, ect.

I'm also planning on having a fight on the face and amongst the workings of a massive clock.

 

[Solarious]

Everyone loves a good brawl in a great big Rube Goldbergian Clocktower. I don't know why, but people love complicated and ridiculous numbers of moving parts, even if it's just to blow it up.

It's probably why every time I play a Castlevania game, I curse whoever dreamed up the damn Clocktower levels in the first place.

How about a fight in a gallery of hostile animated art? Spellcasting statues and angry portaits of fighters glaore! Monsters crash through portaits in ambush, or just your basic animated priceless works of art that you don't want to damage.

Another alternative are workshops of any kind. In my experience, there are tons of things in a workshop you usually don't want to spill, and they're frequently full of destructable objects. For example, a carpenter's workshop is filled with wood, paint, varnishes... things that are very conductive to burning. One good fire spell, and the place will quickly begin to resemble the Elemental Plane of Fire. If you think about it hard enough, taking examples from modern factories, you can make a thousand hazards out of everyday objects. I don't care if you're a living construct with an adamitine alloy structure, two tons of terracotta clay dropping from 2 stories up still hurts.

 

[ValhallaGH]

Fighting while climbing a gigantic (about 100 ft tall) statue. With various effects to limit/negate ranged combat, forcing combatants to cut each other out of the way before moving up.
Lots of bull rushing, falling climb checks and some great uses of Jump in that fight.

 

[GlassJaw]

I think the clocktower idea is very cool. I would try to map out a bunch of gears on various levels and then add timers to them so every few rounds, they move in certain patterns and varying speeds. And as BFG mentioned, the inhabitants would know the patterns and timers.

3. Scaffolding surrounding a large (and tall) construction site. (Pretty much usable as is in a D&D world, the construction site would just have to be a castle, temple, or sufficiently large statue)

This reminds of that scene in Rush Hour 2 when they are fighting and climbing up the bamboo scaffolding. This would be a great setting to spring ninjas on the party. Although really, when is it a bad time to throw ninjas at the players?

How about a fight in a gallery of hostile animated art? Spellcasting statues and angry portaits of fighters glaore! Monsters crash through portaits in ambush, or just your basic animated priceless works of art that you don't want to damage.

Another fight took place inside the bad guy's menagerie, where a stray attack or movement could upset the bamboo cages that contained all manner of dangerous and poisonous animals.

I really like both of these because they give the party something else to worry about other than the baddy at hand. These also involve adding potentially more monsters to the battle. Sweet!

Good stuff so far - keep 'em coming!

 

[IcyCool]

This reminds of that scene in Rush Hour 2 when they are fighting and climbing up the bamboo scaffolding. This would be a great setting to spring ninjas on the party. Although really, when is it a bad time to throw ninjas at the players?

I was more thinking of the Statue of Liberty fight in the old movie "Remo Williams: The Adventure Begins."

BTW, anytime is a good time to throw ninjas at the party.

 

[BullMarkOne]

I was more thinking of the Statue of Liberty fight in the old movie "Remo Williams: The Adventure Begins."

Glad I'm not the only one who was channeling that vibe. The mine cart suggestion was giving me some pretty solid "Indian Jones and the Temple of Doom" flashbacks too. Maybe I watch too many movies.

For my own (cliche) Suggestion: I'm a big fan of bridges over rivers or lakes of lava. I had plans to pit one group of pc's against some azer monks on a wide'ish (say 25 feet) bridge, with the ultimate goal of having the Azer's grapple the pc's and roll them off into the lava.