Mega-Dungeons and Multiple Adventuring Groups

[krichaiushii]

Multiple ways in and out - not necessarily all leading to the surface. Some intentional (ramps), some accidental (sinkholes). This prevents one party camping at the entrance and waylaying all others.

Multiple ways to and from each level. Some ramps/staircases skip a level. Others run to otherwise blocked off areas.

Put some of the stairs behind doors - after all, in a barracks, stairs would have been gaurded.

Be sure to keep track of which adventurers die where and to what. After all, thier gear now becomes useful (or not) to whatever vanquished them.

Lots of scavengers would be around, attracted to the blood and carrion. Ghouls, ghasts, carrion crawlers, and lots of rats.

Evidence of earlier battles and pillaging. Broken furniture, scorch marks, blood stains, craters, collapsed ceilings/walls.

Evidence of natural processes - cave-ins being the most likely culprit. But this allows for natural traps like unstable floors/ceilings.

Some parts should be submerged, either intentionally (barracks cistern/sewer) or accidentally (earthquake changed a river's flow - right into the lower levels).

Multilevel rooms. Arenas, large meeting areas, things of that nature. This way you can work fliers and larger than normal creatures into the mix.

Interesting magical architecture from the Stronghold Builders Guidebook.

Enjoy.

 

[pogre]

How do you suggest keeping such a big dungeon interesting?

I like the overall idea, but I would worry about this issue - I suggest you plant lots of plots in addition to filling the dungeon. This tribe is looking for this object, but is blocked by the roper in area X and so on.

The key for a mega-adventure is having smaller parts the adventurers can complete. Good luck - sounds like fun.

 

[Cecil]

Sounds fairly decent. The following thoughts immediately came to mind:

As additional parties arrived, someone in the town will hear about them--the inn will be the place for rumors as to who has gone into the dungeon and who has yet to return.....

Foodstuffs and other items will become precious. Prices will go up. There is probably not a supply system in place to handle the influx of a hundred people (depends upon the size of the village--but ordinary darts, arrows, etc. will become critical--the smith will be spending more and more time doing repairs).

A few clerics looking for gold may show up and charge to heal people coming out of the dungeon. Set up operations in a hospital tent. After enough people pay them, they also become targets for those less scrupulous (side trek ventures anyone?)

Partial adventuring parties in the dungeon--willing to pay to be escorted out--or willing to share info on being escorted out. Other parties in the town willing to pay for the PCs to recover deceased companions.

Other parties in town can foreshadow what the PCs may run into.

The local lord may start to tax those adventuring parties--including the PCs--after all, they are removing treasures that rightfully belong to him (ie, taking stuff from his land)---this depends upon your campaign government

Hmm, the Parlainth box set may be useful for ideas (an old Earthdawn supplement). It had a wall that adventurers scrawled upon--providing a current map of the explored regions.

 

[Cedric]

Problem with a dungeon like this...is why hasn't it been cleared out by this time? What's kept some high level groups from getting together and just cleansing the whole place?

Then I had a thought...

It could be called the Pillars of the World and basically it's part of that plane, but has artifact like, indestructible pillars that create a veil between them that connects to other Planes. There would be thousands of sets of pillars scattered throughout this whole labyrinthian underground structure.

A few (very, very few) know some of the secrets of moving through the Planes with the veils between the portals. But the most immediate problem is the amount of random crap (monsters, creatures from other planes and the like) that wound up stuck there and set up shop when the portals activate and pull them through.

The constant tide of replenshing monsters would be an outstanding reason to have multiple adventurers in the place and to put in just about anything you wanted. If the players get high enough level and find out some of the secrets to the Pillars, then you could make up why they exist.

My favorite answer was that they are the creation of a race of beings from an ancient age. They were growing old and tired of this world, but feeling the encroachment of the new younger races (like Elves and Dwarves) they created the Pillars to summon up armies to send at these younger races to whittle them down some. This has been soooo long ago, even the Elves have forgotten.

Something a few hundred years ago awoke the Pillars and adventurers have been travelling in there ever since cleaning the place out.

Cedric

 

[The Cardinal]

...another idea for "why isn't this thing already empty?" and "where are all those monsters coming from?":


In the dawn of time some ancient race/civilization/cult/whatever of immense power (most settings have one of these) found/created what would ultimately become the reason for its downfall/rise to power/incredible wealth/whatever: an interdimensional "grand central station" that granted access to dozens of worlds and planes.
This wondrous design was placed inside a great mountain and actually consisted of a sprawling network of tunnels and corridors that connected the various gateways. It also contained hundreds of halls and rooms for inns, shops, temples, several museums and universities, menageries, guards, etc. - then, somehow, somewhen, somewhere, it was lost.

...and now, just a short year ago, it has been found again: in a remote part of the realm, where often enough wild tribes of humanoids threaten the livelihood of farmers and hunters on the frontier, it was found inside a lonely mountain when the miners from the nearby village excavated a titanic ancient door inside their copper mine...

...now hundreds of adventurers and soldiers of fortune have made this mountain their home - and even more their grave. For within the age-old labyrinth the fabric of space and time has weakened, and even without the still working old gates there are strange creatures "gated in" all over the place and all the time, while the work of cartographers may be invalidated at any time just because a whole section of the dungeon just switched levels, re-arranged itself, or warped from east to west side of the mountain...

 

[blackshirt5]

After reading these suggestions, I've now found my next campaign. Damn you all.

 

[Silver Moon]

Several years back I began the concept of adding other adventuring teams to my campaign world, some of which are friends, some enemies, some rivals, and others just ignored. Thus far I've managed to have at least a cameo appearance by one of these other teams in each long module I've run. I eventually plan to run a module which will involve between 8 and 12 of these teams in addition to two teams of Playing Characters.

My recommendation is to not spend too much time developing every character of the other team in depth, as it will probably only be the team leader and maybe one other vocal member of each team that the PC's will be interacting with. You also might want to look for pictures of adventuring teams (Dragon Magazine covers offer several) to use as a quick visual description.

 

[The Cardinal]

I've just decided to include a version of this concept into my new "Rains of Mana" GURPS fantasy pirates campaign (it's 1702, but with magic, fantasy races, and no icecaps [or London, the Netherlands, or Florida...] since this pesky comet came around in 1682...):

The "mega dungeon" with shifting layout, separate "sub-dungeon" areas, and lots of competition will be a cross between the "Devil's Triangle" and the Sargasso Sea: an area of dozens, maybe hundreds of small islands and reefs, of unstable geography and freak weather, where - in the midst of monsters, ship wrecks, undead pirates, and ancient ruins - the greatest treasure of all times is rumored to be hidden...

 

[S'mon]

The "mega dungeon" with shifting layout, separate "sub-dungeon" areas, and lots of competition will be a cross between the "Devil's Triangle" and the Sargasso Sea: an area of dozens, maybe hundreds of small islands and reefs, of unstable geography and freak weather, where - in the midst of monsters, ship wrecks, undead pirates, and ancient ruins - the greatest treasure of all times is rumored to be hidden...

If you haven't read 'The Boats of the Glen Carrig' by William Hope Hodgson, I highly recommend it! 'The Ghost Pirates' would be inspirational also.

 

[Tonguez]

I've just decided to include a version of this concept into my new "Rains of Mana" GURPS fantasy pirates campaign (it's 1702, but with magic, fantasy races, and no icecaps [or London, the Netherlands, or Florida...] since this pesky comet came around in 1682...):

The "mega dungeon" with shifting layout, separate "sub-dungeon" areas, and lots of competition will be a cross between the "Devil's Triangle" and the Sargasso Sea: an area of dozens, maybe hundreds of small islands and reefs, of unstable geography and freak weather, where - in the midst of monsters, ship wrecks, undead pirates, and ancient ruins - the greatest treasure of all times is rumored to be hidden...

I was once working on a setting like this called The NineSeas and based on the PC game Pyrates. Basically the PCs are the crew of a ship who must navigate through various islands/reefs and a series of ocean floating portals which link to different Island realms. Each of the nine realms is different (had planned out Mahulu the Jungle Island voodoo realm with savage cannibals, zombies and a ships graveyard, Tethys - a Greek influenced Mediteranean Island realm with its own clashing rocks and resident dragon and its supply of Ship mounted Lightning Spears and greekfire cannons, Krosus a realm in which Sky pyrates in flying machines and gliders raided the ships from floating platforms and the central Port City of Blackport...