Help me design the fortress of shadow...

[Waylander the Slayer]

The design of the fortress should be an appropriate challenge for 13th level PCs. The fortress of shadow is rumored to exist where the demiplane of shadow overlaps the negative material plane. The only access to the fortress is through a city that was created by native denizens (no one knows the true nature of these beings) that has been long abandoned.

It is rumored that certain powerful members of a cabal of shadow mages currently use the fortress. Thank you for all the assistance in advance!

 

[Shallown]

Here's A half shadow template I used ina recent game. It might be useful. Makes for nasty sneak and ranged attack foes.



No matter the form, half-shadows are always shrouded in shadows. They radiate an aura of cold and menace that unnerves most animals and common people.
CREATING A HALF-SHADOW
"Half-Shadow" is an inherited template that can be added to any living, corporeal creature with an Intelligence score of 4 or higher and nongood alignment (referred to hereafter as the base creature).
A half-shadow uses all the base creature's statistics and special abilities except as noted here.
Size and Type: The creature's type changes to outsider. Do not recalculate the creature's base attack bonus, or saves. Size is unchanged. Half-shadows are normally native outsiders.
Hit Dice: Increase base creature's racial HD by one die size, to a maximum of d12. Do not increase class HD.
Speed: A half-shadow has shadow bat-like wings and can fly at the base creature's base land speed (perfect maneuverability). If the base creature has a fly speed, use that instead. This ability is Su.
Armor Class: Their deflection bonus improves by +1 (this stacks with any defection bonus the base creature has).
Special Attacks: A half-shadow retains all the special attacks of the base creature and also gains the following special abilities.
Deeper Darkness at will up to 1+ char mod times a day as if caster level equal to HD.

Spell-Like Abilities: A half-Shadow with an Intelligence or Wisdom score of 8 or higher has two or more spell-like abilities, depending on its Hit Dice, as indicated on the table below. The abilities are cumulative
Unless otherwise noted, an ability is usable once per day. Caster level equals the creature's HD, and the save DC is Charisma-based. (Where two spell-like abilities are listed choose one when gaining that level/HD)
1-2 Cause Fear / Sleep
3-4 Blur / Mirror Image
5-6 Displacement / Dark Bolt
7-8 Confusion / Deep Slumber
9-10 Dimension Door / Shadow Conjuration
11-12 Shadow Evocation
13-14 Shadow Walk
15-16 Shadow Conjuration, Greater
17-18 Shadow Evocation, Greater
19-20 Energy Drain / Shades


Special Qualities: A half-shadow has all the special qualities of the base creature, plus the following special qualities.
-- Dark vision 90 feet. Can see in Magical darkness created by half shadow creatures.
-- immunity to poison and disease
-- Resistance to cold, acid and fire at 10
-- Dr 5/magic if less than 11 HD, DR 10/magic if 11 or more HD
-- Natural weapons are treated as magic for purposes of DR.
-- Spell resistance equal to 10 + HD max of 20
-- They are Light vulnerable, If base creature is light vulnerable double the penalties.

Abilities: Increase from the base creature as follows: Str +2, Dex +6, Con +2, Int +2, Wis +4, Cha +4.
Skills: A half-shadow gains skill points as an outsider and has skill points equal to (6 + Int modifier) x (HD +3). Do not include Hit
Dice from class levels in this calculation—the half-shadow gains outsider skill points only for its racial Hit Dice, and gains the
normal amount of skill points for its class levels. Treat skills from the base creature's list as class skills, adding hide, move silent,
intimidate and bluff (always considered class skills) and other skills as cross-class.
Challenge Rating: HD 5 or less, as base creature +1; HD 6 to 10, as base creature +2; HD 11 or more, as base creature +3.
Alignment: Always non-good (any).
Level Adjustment: Same as base creature +4.


Hope it helps. May not be perfectly balanced I modeled it after the 1/2 celestial and fiend.

later

 

[Piratecat]

What a cool idea for a place. There's no reason that the city has to be "normal" for real people. How about this:

When we build structures, our walls are made out of wood and stone: things we can't walk through. What would a shadow not be able to pass through? Pure, bright light! As a result, all the structures in the abandoned city (and maybe even in the tower) have walls made from light that has been channelled from the quasielemental plane of radiance. A solid (non-shadowy) person can walk through them, but doing so is incredibly painful and potentially blinding, like being hit by a sunburst spell.

It makes walking on the second and third floors tricky, too. The PCs better learn to levitate.

 

[Rodrigo Istalindir]

It makes walking on the second and third floors tricky, too. The PCs better learn to levitate.

Mirror-lined gaps between floor and ceiling with an permanently-lighted object (x) between:

____Floor_______
-----mirror-------
x
-----mirror-------
____ceiling______

Would work for jail cells, too!

 

[Piratecat]

Since the light would presumably be solid to shadows, they might not need the mirrors. It's the solid people who would have problems. I just love the image of the PCs getting to leap through a wall to attack a shadowcreature.

There's some logic for having the light block both sight (too bright) and line of effect (dimensional energies), of course. That would prevent a sorcerer from standing outside and blanketing every room in a building with fireballs.

 

[Waylander the Slayer]

Since the light would presumably be solid to shadows, they might not need the mirrors. It's the solid people who would have problems. I just love the image of the PCs getting to leap through a wall to attack a shadowcreature.

There's some logic for having the light block both sight (too bright) and line of effect (dimensional energies), of course. That would prevent a sorcerer from standing outside and blanketing every room in a building with fireballs.

Absolutely brilliant idea!
I have also been thinking of art and art forms - What would a shadow creatures sense of sight/sound/smell touch feel like?(i.e no sense of touch unless made of light hence art might be composed of different spectrums of light.

I also have to acknowledge that the idea for the city of shadow etc. was inspired by reading Sagiro's story hour and the Carach Din? I have been working on making the creatures work on a different level of ideology/ logic than humanoids would.

Also consider the effects of the negative material plane on the denizens (a bit o blurb...the denizens were original inhabitants of the PC prime - but were driven out and forced into the shadow plane when the first humanoids came to the prime).

 

[Wycen]

Sounds cool. You should also have a ghost of a woman who died while waiting for her love to come back to rescue her.

10 points to anyone who remembers that reference.

 

[Kroax]

Sounds cool. You should also have a ghost of a woman who died while waiting for her love to come back to rescue her.

10 points to anyone who remembers that reference.

Planescape: Torment?

As for the main post, what if the windows were made of that "shadowstuff" WOtC talks about all the time. Freezing cold (negative energy, energy drain maybe?) and insubstantial to corporeal creatures, but solid for shadow-creatures. Maybe you could use this for other various moving parts, such as doors, maybe even different art objects, considering that light might harm the shadow creatures. What about mixing light and shadow for art pieces? Or for a terrible monster...

 

[crater]

The shadow plane vaguely resembles areas of the material plane, so the shadow city could be a twisted version of prime city. If the pcs explore the prime city and then move into the shadow realm they will be able to use some of the knowledge and clues they have of the first to help them in the second, except that you change a few important bits to surprise them.

 

[Piratecat]

Good idea, crater. I can see the shadow city being the still-partially-existing copy of the world's "iconic" city that was destroyed in the real world. Imagine going to the shadow plane and finding a shadowy copy of the lost library of Alexandretta....