D&D 5E If you're playing a dungeon campaign, what is a good level to end off at?

[Slit518]

If you're playing a campaign, where the premise of it revolves around being trapped in a dungeon and escaping, what level should it end off at? The beginning of the campaign starts you off at level 1.

 

[The Crimson Binome]

The option I would have chosen is not listed.

Where are you going to find two weeks and an instructor with which to train, inside of a dungeon?

 

[Slit518]

The option I would have chosen is not listed.

Where are you going to find two weeks and an instructor with which to train, inside of a dungeon?

Obviously a campaign like that would omit those rules.

Plus, none of what you said is a requirement for leveling up. It's all up to DM discretion. Most choose a Short Rest or Long Rest rule as a requirement.

 

[The Crimson Binome]

Obviously a campaign like that would omit those rules.

Even if you don't need formalized instruction and down-time, you still wouldn't be able to gain a level within a dungeon, unless that dungeon was large enough to be its own city. Where does a wizard go, to practice new spells, if you don't have a relatively safe spaces in which to make camp? The fundamental assumption that allows you to gain levels by killing monsters is that you're also doing all that other stuff, but that part is off-screen. If you're trapped in a dungeon, then the assumption no longer holds.

Not every campaign requires level advancement.

 

[Jer]

I think this really depends on the kind of dungeon we're talking about here. Is this "the PCs have been kidnapped by Baron von Hendricks and have been placed in the bowels of his personal 'Murderworld' dungeon and have to fight their way out for his amusement?" Having run that game once in the depths of history it got old after about level 4 under the old Basic/Expert D&D rules so I'd probably plan for about the same under 5e.

OTOH - if you're talking about a High Weirdness sort of dungeon where the PCs have been kidnapped from a variety of parallel universes and have to escape from something that starts as a "Cube"-like murdertrap but they slowly discover that they're actually trapped in some kind of extraplanar Hell dimension? From experience that kind of thing can be good for at least 10 levels if you do it right. (Again - Basic/Expert but probably roughly equivalent under 5e rules).

 

[Shiroiken]

Baring DM Fiat, the game should probably end when Teleportation Circle becomes available, which would be Level 9. This is assuming a non-magical dungeon, with a gritty survival aspect.

If you want to have it be extra-dimensional, planar, or possibly even a dream sequence, you can easily force the game to go to whatever level you want. In such a case, I'd suggest finding out how interested the players are in such a campaign, and how long they may want to play. You might want to design out your levels (possibly correlating to the PC levels), but only have 1-2 levels in advance. That way you can end the campaign when the players (or you) start to get bored of it.

 

[Slit518]

Even if you don't need formalized instruction and down-time, you still wouldn't be able to gain a level within a dungeon, unless that dungeon was large enough to be its own city. Where does a wizard go, to practice new spells, if you don't have a relatively safe spaces in which to make camp? The fundamental assumption that allows you to gain levels by killing monsters is that you're also doing all that other stuff, but that part is off-screen. If you're trapped in a dungeon, then the assumption no longer holds.

Not every campaign requires level advancement.

If the campaign were to take place in a dungeon, I am sure there would be "safe places" to level-up/train. I don't see why it wouldn't have those. Leveling up would be idea as the players could tackle harder challenges, without some being too easy, while others being too hard. The deeper they go, the more experienced they would become, the harder the threat thrown at them.

If I recall correctly, in one of the original first games of D&D Gary Gygax and either his friend Dave Anderson or perhaps it was Gygax' son were playing a campaign designed by Gygax. The character had to navigate through a dungeon and all of it's obstacles, leveling up as they went. Albeit, that was probably in the late 70's or early 80's.

I think this really depends on the kind of dungeon we're talking about here. Is this "the PCs have been kidnapped by Baron von Hendricks and have been placed in the bowels of his personal 'Murderworld' dungeon and have to fight their way out for his amusement?" Having run that game once in the depths of history it got old after about level 4 under the old Basic/Expert D&D rules so I'd probably plan for about the same under 5e.

OTOH - if you're talking about a High Weirdness sort of dungeon where the PCs have been kidnapped from a variety of parallel universes and have to escape from something that starts as a "Cube"-like murdertrap but they slowly discover that they're actually trapped in some kind of extraplanar Hell dimension? From experience that kind of thing can be good for at least 10 levels if you do it right. (Again - Basic/Expert but probably roughly equivalent under 5e rules).

Those sound interesting, what are the names of both of those modules?

 

[Jer]

Those sound interesting, what are the names of both of those modules?

No modules - homebrew. The first was based on an idea from the supplement GAZ1 and was a lot of fun for a while but eventually there came a point where they had to reach the top of the dungeon, confront their captor, and move on to other things. The second was a campaign that was very loosely based on a series of novels called "The Dungeon" that had Philip Jose Farmer's name on it but was actually by a bunch of other authors. They never actually escaped and we never finished that campaign, but it was enjoyable as a setting for quite a while. I think now I could probably run it and finish it, but my current group is less into that kind of thing and more into high heroics.

 

[Slit518]

No modules - homebrew. The first was based on an idea from the supplement GAZ1 and was a lot of fun for a while but eventually there came a point where they had to reach the top of the dungeon, confront their captor, and move on to other things. The second was a campaign that was very loosely based on a series of novels called "The Dungeon" that had Philip Jose Farmer's name on it but was actually by a bunch of other authors. They never actually escaped and we never finished that campaign, but it was enjoyable as a setting for quite a while. I think now I could probably run it and finish it, but my current group is less into that kind of thing and more into high heroics.

Ah, I myself have a homebrew dungeon from a couple years back that is similar to the first one. I'm currently converting it to 5th edition.

 

[ccs]

I voted 20. But that's really just a place holder. The actual answer is;
A) When it stops being interesting. At that point you need to have some way to wrap it up/escape.
Or
B) When the players come up with some creative enough way to escape.