Reverse Dungeon Ideas!

[Forrester]

I was bouncing around something like Level 5 PCs. That way they can take a higher EL creature if they want, or just have a skilled goblin or kobold. The "tribe" will be standard evil humanoids.

If I do this I figure the "Adventurers" will have to be a party of 5 or 6 around level 7 with full magic items and pretty min/maxed? Any thoughts on this ratio?

There's a couple potential problems with this. First of all, a party of 7th level adventurers would almost never go goblin/kobold/orc hunting. Certainly, not "normal" goblin/kobold/orcs. Second of all, one or two fireballs are going to wipe out the entire tribe.

I agree with giving the PCs a challenge, but you're setting it up to be almost impossible if you start the Cheaty Adventurers at 7th level. Pits should at least *slow* the adventurers down, hopefully .

That's my opinion, at least -- I'd run it such that the Cheaty Adventurers aren't really going to be threatened much by the mooks (mook = random goblin or kobold), but they can't just completely ignore them.

On the other hand, if the tribe is made up of bugbears and a few ogres, it might be a little fairer. I still think it'll be more fun starting with 1st/2nd level PCs and a 3rd level party, though. Fewer possibilities to worry about at that level, for one (what happens if the Cheaty Adventurers cast Speak With Dead? Scry? What if they have a Teleport scroll? Dimension Door? Easy access to Fly? And again, a few Fireballs and it's all over.)

 

[MerakSpielman]

a party of 7th level adventurers would almost never go goblin/kobold/orc hunting. Certainly, not "normal" goblin/kobold/orcs. Second of all, one or two fireballs are going to wipe out the entire tribe

They'll only get fireballed if they stand still in a group.

There have been threads on how tribes of kobolds can wipe out high-level adventurers. It can be done. They never enter physical combat, develop traps that are not meant to be escapable, dig loads of tunnels that a kobold can run along - crouching (and plenty of emergency tunnels that kobolds can wiggle through on their bellies). Arrange cave-ins, poison arrows from parallel passages w/ arrow slits, etc... If they have a spellcaster, kobolds can get adventurers to waste good area-effect spells on bands of illusionary kobolds. Prevent the adventurers from escaping/resting with harrying attacks, close off the exits, and put time pressure on the party - the adventurers must stop the ritual before midnight (or some such). Self-sealing pits with flaming oil in the bottom (or green slime, or any ooze). Loads of poison can bring down very mighty adventurers, especially in gaseous form.

Kobolds need not be the wusses they are commonly portrayed to be. It's just that the tactics they'd need to use to survive a 7th to 12th level party are so dirty that the players will have very little fun in the process.

 

[mmadsen]

Two apropos threads:
Adversarial Campaign
How would you defend your subterranean kingdom?

 

[Monte At Home]

I used to run games like this at conventions. Players got the choice of running monsters like a minotaur or a displacer beast, a pair of gargoyles, a trio of bugbears or a whole small tribe (about a dozen) goblins.

They had the layout of a whole level of a dungeon, but there was a level below they knew nothing about, because it was well-guarded with traps and full of undead. The whole first half of the scenario involved going down into this new area to explore while preparing for the inevitable adventurer assault which would come from above in the second half. (There was some very useful treasure in the second level that could help defend their lairs if they did well.)

Of course, the group that did the best were the ones that conceived of an elaborate way to get the PCs to bypass their lairs and head straight into the undead.

It made for some fun gaming. I particularly remember the group who used the goblin tribe as communication (runners) but had to make sure that no goblin was ever alone with the displacer beast or minotaur (chomp!)

 

[Tjaden]

Does anyone remember the module "Reverse Dungeon" for 2e? I hate to rain on your parade buddy, but this already exists, and you might want to check it out.

 

[CobaltGrC]

Yeah I own a copy of that module. An Old dm tried to run it for my group but he failed to keep us hooked. Check on Amazon or something for it, I bet they have it.