Save my Game! Ancient Door Puzzle Needed

[SlyFlourish]

I have an Eberron adventure I'm running tomorrow where the PCs will infiltrate an ancient warforge forge of the Quori in Xen'Drik.

The forge will be sealed up by her original masters with a huge iron and adamantite door sealing in their ancient creations.

I need a puzzle that makes sense (designed by the Quori to protect their forge) but can be accessed by the PCs. Outside I'm planning on having the party ambushed by some warforged guard dog things. Inside are the mindless ancient animated beasts of the Quori.

So what is a good door puzzle I can throw at my players?

Thanks in advance!

Mike

 

[Rechan]

This might sound a little silly, but:

Have the door be sentient, and can communicate. The trick to opening the door convincing the door that you should be allowed inside.

 

[Nifft]

The door can only be unlocked from the Plane of Dreams. This means a PC must fall asleep while touching the door and unlock it while lucid dreaming (DC 15 Wisdom check while already asleep); alternately, a PC could make a DC 20 Autohypnosis check to enter a waking dream as a full-round action, and a PC with the Still Mind class feature could attempt a DC 20 Concentration check to do the same.

(Adjust DCs for the level of your PCs. I'm basing these off 6th level or so.)

Sleeping PCs are vulnerable to attack from the plane of dreams, of course.

Cheers, -- N

 

[Nerfwright]

This might sound a little silly, but:

Have the door be sentient, and can communicate. The trick to opening the door convincing the door that you should be allowed inside.

I like the idea of the door being a warforged construct - the clue that the door may be sentient is that it is made out of warforged materials.

 

[sinecure]

Make it a trick door like one that slides up, but has a handle on it.

Or hide the door among a series of other doors. For instance, an octagonal room with 7 doors sealed shut, but the real door to the vault is the slab stone floor.

Or tie it to the Quori and the realm of dreams, like anyone sleeping nearby has their dreams become reality or illusion.

A real puzzle could be something to fool the players instead like a riddle or an anagram or both.

I like the freak out method myself. With just an inscription like "Sealed by the Quori forever more. Do not open. Only nightmares lie within". That's a great lock.

 

[Bagpuss]

Also if the door is sentient, they maybe less inclined to chop it up to sell the adamantine.

 

[blargney the second]

What's your party level and composition?

In terms of adventure design, make sure this door isn't a bottleneck. Think of a couple ways they can overcome or circumvent this obstacle ahead of time to save yourself the hassle of them giving up. The building is literally tens of thousands of years old - there's no way it's going to be in the same condition as when the war was still going on. There'd be some cracks and fissures that should be some sort of navigable if the party locates them.

For the door itself, consider the enemy the quori wanted to keep out: giants with elf servants. A once-potent fear trap could guard it, and you could even yell at the top of your lungs to scare your players.

Follow that up with a door that requires the full attention and skills of one or two of your players (this is where that level/composition I mentioned above comes in handy), while the other ones are occupied by a trap that continually summons monsters to fight them and hem them in. The bones of previous adventure seekers should be strewn about the area to indicate the lethality of the door's protections.

 

[SlyFlourish]

Door

Here's the way it ended up:

The door is a construct that speaks into the minds of those who go near. It speaks in the language of the Quori but a high int DC can decode it to say that only a dreamer may enter. The party was given a key by their contact to get in but the key only works when a dreamer tries to use it.

The door can be battered down but it retaliates with lighting every round.

If someone goes to sleep in the nearby stone circle, they see the door painted violet. They can touch their key to the door and the door unlocks, letting the party in the next morning.