Dungeon design help

[Rubik_the_Cube]

Greetings ENWorlders,

I've been enjoying this forum for a long time and the content has already helped me out a ton, but for the first time I have a request that I don't feel like I can mine other threads to fulfil.

I've been DMing a group since I returned from a deployment last September. It's our first 4e game and we've been having a great time with the system so far. We're at level 13 currently, having leveled quite a bit more quickly than I have in other RPGs I've run because the odds are good that someone will PCS before too long, and we all want to play from 1-30 if possible.

Where we're at in the evolving story is that the is set to help some dwarves take back their clan-hold from gnomes that pushed them out a few years back. This was a heroic tier hook I dropped that they put off for quite a while. My problem now is that I want to transition the game into paragon tier exploits, which in my mind is not crushing gnomes home-invaders. I gave them some second hand knowledge that these gnomes truck with demons to help set the stage for something bigger, but now that the stage has been set, I need to deliver on the premise.

As it stands, they're going to clear out the dwarf clan-hold, going ever deeper under ground, and what I would like from you fine folks is ideas for what each level of decent might hold. I'm would like to run each level as an encounter to help keep up the pace I'm going for. Also, the group does not enjoy exploration on the whole so it is often better if I give them thematic details during combat or skill challenges, when they're paying the most attention, rather than have them explore then fight then explore then fight.

I'm planning on making one of the upper levels a brewery, as these particular dwarves are prolific brewers. I had also thought that towards the bottom things would take on a more demonic bend, but the specifics are completely up in the air.

If you have any ideas, please send them my way, and thanks for all the ideas I've already gleaned from you all.

- RtC

 

[Jan van Leyden]

Hi Rubik (are you from Hungary?) and welcome to ENWorld.

4e's Paragon tier is meant to have the PCs plane hopping. Based on what you have done so far, do you have decided who's behind the gnomes? If not, just take an otherworldly entity as mastermind or power behind the throne and have the characters explore the Feywild or some other plane to confront this entity.

 

[(Psi)SeveredHead]

I've heard the paragon-tier is supposed to have plane-hopping, but Planar Portal is an 18th-level ritual. I think at this point, PCs are expected to enter exotic environments such as the Underdark.

Gnomes trafficking with demons is kind of odd. Why? Also, demons have completely different abilities from gnomes, so they can surprise the PCs.

 

[the Jester]

They don't need a ritual if there is a portal.

How about the dwarves delved too deep and found a portal to the Abyss? The gnomes might have been imprisoned by whatever demon prince or lordling you like, corrupted and now become dark gnomes, the gnomish equivalent of duergar.

 

[Rubik_the_Cube]

Thanks for the quick responses guys. I was thinking of sending them plane hopping at the end of this little dungeon. If I treat each level as a single encounter, I would probably only level them up once during the whole thing, even if it was a dozen levels or so. I put tied the gnomes in with demons because gnomes always seemed tricky to me and trickery seems somewhat chaotic. I figured the gnomes didn't intentionally get in bed with the demons, but somewhere, at some time, a gnome got a favor/power/weapon/whatever from a demon then maybe another, and so on until it was time to pay up.

It's like borrowing money from the mob. Maybe you can't pay it back and have to help an otherworldly evil get a foothold in the mortal world. You didn't mean for it to happen, but now you're in over your head.

So far I've got level 1 drawn up as living quarters, but I don't have anything to really make it that memorable.
Level 2 I was thinking would be the main brewery. I figured the gnomes could have some traps set up there, maybe some exploding kegs or molotov cocktails.

I was thinking that as they go down it would get progressively more "demonic" to make that transition, then maybe slap a portal to another plane at the bottom as was suggested. I don't really know much about the Feywild, I was thinking of having them go to the abyss, but is that more of an Epic thing traditionally?

- RtC

 

[Balesir]

If you want the invader-expulsion to be quick, how about running it as one big battle, with the dwarves involved, too? You can make "swarms" of gnomes (and dwarves) - eight 1st level gnomes make a 13th level swarm (same XP value); give the swarm some appropriate powers (Area attacks for missile troops, close burst weapon strikes for melee units) and all the usual swarm attributes. The dwarven units could count (and be statted) as Companions (DMG2), then just run the whole thing as a big battle, level by level. Maybe include some skill challenges for spotting and countering gnomish tricks and tactical ruses... And a temple of Demogorgon with summoned demons at the end (when the dwarves all flee, leaving the PCs to face the final Boss...)

 

[ajanders]

Dwarves and Gnomes and Demons...oh dear

I had better preface this by saying my suggestions rely on the D&D 4E backstory.
If your campaign has some different cosmology or different history,these ideas may not apply.

First, gnomes are supposed to have been enslaved inhabitants of the Feywild (slaves of the Formorians:: evil fairy giants with lots of magical powers and a pretty brutal attitude towards their slaves). As you say, it is perfectly possible they might have made a deal with a devil to get free.

And we don't suggest the devils idly. Again, in traditional 4E, demons are supposed to be mostly destructive creatures related to the elements: they don't tempt or trick, they just kill you and eat your stuff. So your gnomes might very well be linked to fiends, but they'd be devils, not demons.

Evil diabolist gnomes actually sound kinda fun Lots of combat with gnomes of evil, plus some demons, plus some dwarven defensive constructs repurposed by the gnomes to defend them. A good, straightforward tactical dungeon

But there's another route you could take, and it's a little more subtle.
In traditional 4E D&D, the gnomes are, as we said, slaves of the Formians: big fairy giants with some pretty freaky magical powers: some of them have magic shrunken heads they hit you with, some of them steal your eyes, some of them keep the souls of the dead around them to dance and sing for their amusement...generally nasty folks.
The Formorians have sent their gnome warriors out to invade and capture the dwarf freehold...maybe the dwarves have a fay artifact the formorians want, maybe the formori want that good dwarven beer, maybe they want some enslaved weaponsmiths.
The gnome warriors don't want to take over a dwarven freehold -- but the formori have their spouses(?) children(?) non combat cultural or religious figure (?) hostage. The gnomes fight or the hostages get it in the neck.
If the PC's can rescue the hostages, the gnomes will let the dwarves have their clanhold.
In this scenario, once the PC's figure out the gnomes are unwilling servants, your PC's can stop fighting them. No more "Gnome Invaders". Instead, they can move straight against the gnomes dark masters. And there's no "exploration" needed. If you can get the gnomes on your side, they'll be happy to provide maps, guides, and intelligence reports.
Mind you, the intelligence and maps aren't perfect, and the guides aren't going to be any help in a fight, but there's no wandering around looking for the bad guys.

Now, as for locations and things in a dwarven clan of brewers?

1.Living and working quarters...personal homes. Many small, but if the hold is old and prosperous, there might be the dwarf equivalent of a knightly keep.

2. As you say, the brewery.

3.The dwarves have to be making their beer out of something. There's either a major bit of infrastructure bringing in a lot of grain to the brewery or a big underground mushroom garden with the special mushrooms for dwarf mushroom beer.

4. The beer has to be stored in something. There's a cooper's shop to make barrels, or a pottery shop to make giant clay beer pots...like a Grecian Amphora. The beer might also be stored or shipped in stone jugs (unlikely) or metal kegs (also unlikely, but cool enough you could suspend disbelief).

5. Something to produce the raw materials for the facility in step 4: a mine for beer kegs, a quarry or pit for clay or stone, or a way to get wood for barrel staves if it's going out in barrels, and a lumber mill.

6.How about a dwarven mausoleum, where all the ancestors are buried?

7.We've got dwarves and good beer: how about a sports arena. For dwarf football?

 

[Rubik_the_Cube]

Balesir, I can't get the idea of a swarm of gnomes out of my head now, but are you suggesting a swarm as a creature type at the appropriate level, or actually having a huge number of individual gnomes? I think I'll avoid the mass combat as I've already established that these dwarves aren't up to taking their own home back and they haven't participated in any combats since they recruited the PCs.

ajanders, thanks for all the ideas about the different levels, that's exactly what I was hoping to get out of this thread. As for the demon vs devil, I guess I have been running it against canon so far, so I'll probably keep it that way just to maintain consistency within the game world. I didn't know the official backstory of gnomes, but thankfully none of my players do either. I assumed they were a natural race, at least as natural a the other races.

-RtC

 

[Balesir]

Balesir, I can't get the idea of a swarm of gnomes out of my head now, but are you suggesting a swarm as a creature type at the appropriate level, or actually having a huge number of individual gnomes?

I was suggesting "swarm" monsters that (in the game world) consist of many gnomes or dwarves. It's a way of having "mass combat" in 4E that doesn't involve lots and lots of die rolling; just have, for example, a squad of 8-12 archers be a single "swarm" 12 levels higher than the base creature with area attacks to represent its firepower and a close burst for its melee capability.

If you don't want to use mass combat, though, it's probably not what you need.

 

[Herobizkit]

...for example, a squad of 8-12 archers be a single "swarm" 12 levels higher than the base creature with area attacks to represent its firepower and a close burst for its melee capability.

Did you arbitrarily choose the level of the swarm, or are there guidelines for designing a swarm somewhere that I've missed?

The campaign I'm playing has some mass combat approaching...