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The Shadow in the Flame: A Workshop on Designing Dungeons, Monsters, and a Villain
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<blockquote data-quote="Quickleaf" data-source="post: 7027854" data-attributes="member: 20323"><p><span style="font-size: 15px"><strong><span style="color: #B22222">Step 4: Verisimilitude & Foundational Questions</span></strong></span></p><p></p><p>Unless your group is going for a light beer n' pretzels style game or light-hearted dungeon romp parody, you probably don't want the players to have a moment where they ask with incredulity: "Wait a minute, <em>why</em> is there a giant head with a sphere of annihilation in its mouth right here? This dungeon doesn't make any sense."</p><p></p><p>Not <em>everything</em> needs to make sense, but enough to preserve that illusion which engages the players in the imagined scenario of the adventure/dungeon. It's definitely a balancing act, and one which DMs tailor to the groups they play with (e.g. some players don't really care, and others will relentlessly uncover the slightest scent of phoniness).</p><p></p><p>I was encouraged over at RPG.net to answer 5 common sense questions to help build the verisimilitude of my dungeon:</p><ol> <li data-xf-list-type="ol">How do they breathe?</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ol">Where do they sleep?</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ol">What do they eat?</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ol">What do they drink?</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ol">Where do they enter/exit?</li> </ol><p></p><p>I think this step, for me, also intersects with questions like:</p><ul> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Who are original occupants vs. current occupants, and what state is the dungeon in?</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Does this dungeon fit as a particular type described in the DMG (e.g. tomb, stronghold)?</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">What are the fantasy demographics of the dungeon/adventure setting?</li> </ul><p></p><p><strong>1. How do they breathe? </strong></p><p>Most are resistant to fire damage which helps with breathing excessively hot air in places. Otherwise, there's ventilation thanks to a few shafts/lava tubes leading to the caldera's surface. Overlooks and "screen" doors (mashrabiya / jalis) let in airflow as well.</p><p></p><p><strong>2. Where do they sleep?</strong></p><p>They sleep in areas away from the hazardous fumaroles, in quarters (for mages and priests) or barracks (for mamluks and holy slayers).</p><p></p><p><strong>3. What do they eat? </strong></p><p>Precious little game lives in the Great Anvil, the most inhospitable desert in the land, however the Brotherhood do harvest scorpions and beetles, and hunt fire lizards, giant mason wasps, and dangerous salt worms (desert-adapted remorhaz). Because of this limited diet, they rely on trade with mysterious fierce janni tribes who don't mind charging exorbitant prices to the sinister cultists, or else shipments by their allied merchants usually via teleportation circle and sending stones (made of volcanic rock from the caldera). When food is scarce, they force captive janni to create food and water (a spell forbidden to their priests of Kossuth as it involves water).</p><p></p><p><strong>4. What do they drink? </strong></p><p>There is an aquifer deep below the caldera, but it has become tainted with chlorides & sulfides. The alchemists and priests of the Brotherhood have devised a means of extracting the acids/poisons to yield pure water (as well as useful ingredients for more nefarious purposes). Additionally, the Brotherhood stockpiles water in the event that something happens to their water source, though these stockpiles wouldn't last longer than 1 week if rationed, less if not.</p><p>Additionally, they extract water from the dead (a la Dune) in a macabre sacred ritual.</p><p></p><p><strong>5. Where do they enter/exit?</strong></p><p>There are <s>six</s> seven ways into Krak al-Mazhar, the first six used by the Brotherhood, and the last one unused.</p><ul> <li data-xf-list-type="ul"><strong>Narrow fissures</strong> lead through the steep sloping "hills" around the caldera, that invariably lead to guarded bridges; three of these lead into the upper levels.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">The <strong>Gate of Mysteries</strong> opens into the heart of the caldera, and is guarded by horned devils. This is used by slaves working the sulfur mines, entry and exit for new initiates to the Brotherhood, for military drills, and for the very rare departing/incoming caravan.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">A <strong><em>teleportation circle</em></strong> lies at the edge of the caldera ridge, though only the Brotherhood's upper echelon know its sigil sequence, and there’s a rotating password shared among them which if not spoken triggers a <em>glyph of warding</em>.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">A <strong>two-way portal to the Plane of Fire</strong> is used for welcoming efreet ambassadors/messengers and sending out initiates / exploration parties.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">The Bonfire owns <strong><em>the golden mirror</em></strong> which he can use to open a temporary gate which he can also return through.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">EDIT: Flying creatures can enter Krak al-Mazhar's upper levels through the <strong>shadow wyvern aerie</strong>, which is often occupied by several shadow wyverns and/or flame mages coming and going on overflights of the caldera.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul"><strong>Lava tubes</strong> used by salt worms (remorhaz) and sand worms (purple worms) trace their way under the fortress; they are kept at bay by the narrowness of the passages and by magical brass gongs that create a sound the worms dislike.</li> </ul><p></p><p><strong>6. Who are original occupants vs. current occupants, and what state is the dungeon in?</strong></p><p>The original builders & occupants were the mystics of The Fire Most Pure, who were a more neutral-aligned group revering a mysterious divine flame and had association with an asuras (think: "fire angel"). However, they were corrupted by an internal faction that became the Brotherhood of True Flame which now controls Krak al-Mazhar.</p><p></p><p><strong>7. Does this dungeon fit as a particular type described in the DMG (e.g. tomb, stronghold)?</strong></p><p>Krak al-Mazhar doesn't neatly fall into any one dungeon type. It's a stronghold, a school for flame mages, a wizard's tower, and a dungeon for captives/brainwashed victims rolled into one. It's also built on a planar gate, it has a political/ambassadorial role, and there are sulfur mines on site. This is probably the upper limit of how complex you want to make your own dungeons, but I hope to show how these various "types" can feed into one another.</p><p></p><p><strong>8. What are the fantasy demographics of the dungeon/adventure setting?</strong></p><p>This is something which ties into world-building. While you can put whatever monsters you dang well please into your dungeons/adventure settings, when you start getting into larger dungeons thinking about the demographics (and their implication) can help you conceive of the range of monsters, how they operate, and reinforce the verisimilitude of your dungeon.</p><p></p><p>In my case, I'm dealing with a village-sized population at this dungeon, and most of them are NPCs. This means, I want to think about NPC demographics. For example, placing 60 NPCs there who have the spellcasting ability of 12th level wizards has implications for the campaign; namely, that there <em>are</em> enough 12th level wizards in the land for it to be reasonable to say that 60 of them focus on fire magic, and swear allegiance to the Brotherhood of True Flame, and center their operations at Krak al-Mazhar. That's a lot of wizards!</p><p></p><p>I opted for something a bit more moderate...</p><p></p><p>[SECTION]Krak al-Mazhar houses roughly 600 members of the Brotherhood of True Flame and their slaves. The occupying NPCs, not including any of the monsters allied with them, can be divided accordingly:</p><p></p><p>40% (240) slaves (<strong>commoners</strong>) (0th level) (CR 0)</p><p>12% (72) <strong>cultists</strong> training as fedayeen (1st/2nd level) (CR 1/8)</p><p>12% (72) <strong>guards</strong> training as mamluks (1st/2nd level) (CR 1/8)</p><p>18% (108) <strong>mamluks of the Imperishable*</strong> (3rd level) (CR 2)</p><p>3% (18) <strong>cult fanatics</strong> aiding priesthood (4th level) (CR 2)</p><p>6% (36) <strong>Flamedeath fedayeen*</strong> (7th level) (CR 4)</p><p>6% (36) <strong>shig’harakhi*</strong> (7th level) (CR 6)</p><p>0.85% (5) <strong>priests of Kossuth*</strong> (10th level) (CR 6)</p><p>0.5% (3) <strong>aghas of the Imperishable*</strong> (12th level) (CR 6)</p><p>0.5% (3) black flame zealot <strong>assassins</strong> (12th level) (CR 9)</p><p>0.5% (3) <strong>disciples of the salamander*</strong> (12th level) (CR 5)</p><p>0.5% (3) <strong>khaz’harakhi*</strong> (12th level) (CR 9)</p><p>0.15% (1) <strong>The Bonfire*</strong> (20th level) (CR ?)</p><p>[/SECTION]</p><p></p><p>Another factor in figuring out these numbers is that I want the PCs to be able to encounter a group of flame mages (let's say 7th level <strong>shig'harakhi</strong>, which is a fancy name for "lesser flame mage") and have an interesting challenge. For example, a group of 5 (2d4) <strong>shig'harakhi</strong> would make for a roughly Medium difficulty combat for a group of five PCs of 16th level. Thus, I know I want enough of these lesser flame mages around the dungeon for a chance encounter / clearing out one room not to totally decimate the <strong>shig'harakhi</strong> forces.</p><p></p><p>My gut was telling me the total number of <strong>shig'harakhi</strong> should be at least 5-6 times the size of an "average patrol of shig'harakhi" (so 30-35 lesser flame mages). That ended up being about what I went with.</p><p></p><p>There's also some story implications from my dungeon demographics – there are no low-level wizards (like there are mamluks and cultists). Why? Because The Bonfire considers them beneath him, sending any such supplicants away until they reach about 5th level (i.e. can throw a <em>fireball</em>) before he will take them under his tutelage. And BOOM, now I've got some fun side quests I can incorporate about a disgruntled flame mage who wasn't accepted by The Bonfire and goes to extreme lengths to prove himself. And a hint that The Bonfire might be impressed by PCs demonstrating a mastery of fire magic, which <em>could</em> work toward their favor in an undercover scenario (and could get them into awkward situations).</p><p></p><p>Lastly, I did a quick reality check. Would ~360 fighting men/women be reasonable to be stationed/housed at a castle? I thought so, but I double checked...</p><p></p><p>Krak des Chevaliers, one of the largest castles in the Holy Land, had a garrison of roughly 2,000 men strong.</p><p></p><p>Flint Castle, a rather small castle built in 1284, part of Edward I's Welsh castles, had a garrison 120 men strong at its peak.</p><p></p><p><strong>Resources: Fantasy Demographics</strong></p><p><a href="http://www.autarch.co/blog/demographics-heroism" target="_blank">Autarch's Adventurer Conqueror King</a> Alex has a blog post "The Demographics of Heroism" about assumptions of how rare individuals are leveled from 1st to 14th level.</p><p><a href="http://themagictreerpg.blogspot.com/2008/11/d-society-be-aware-of-demographics.html" target="_blank">The Magic Tree</a> Tanz deconstructs how many hypothetical NPCs would have "the hero stuff" and survive long enough to do something with their class levels.</p><p><a href="http://rpg.stackexchange.com/questions/37395/dd-character-levels-and-population-is-the-fifty-percent-rule-valid" target="_blank">The Fifty Percent Rule</a> MontyWild proposed a 50% rule for determining how many NPCs of a given level appear in a world. Not an unreasonable starting point.</p><p><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/dndnext/comments/597t3i/dd_character_level_demographics/" target="_blank">D&D vs. USA Demographics</a> Fallencoder does an interesting comparison of adventurers to US armed forces personnel, coming up with probabilities of encounter an NPC of #th level in the world, and in a number of combats. Possibly flawed assumptions, but interesting nevertheless.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Quickleaf, post: 7027854, member: 20323"] [SIZE=4][B][COLOR=#B22222]Step 4: Verisimilitude & Foundational Questions[/COLOR][/B][/SIZE] Unless your group is going for a light beer n' pretzels style game or light-hearted dungeon romp parody, you probably don't want the players to have a moment where they ask with incredulity: "Wait a minute, [I]why[/I] is there a giant head with a sphere of annihilation in its mouth right here? This dungeon doesn't make any sense." Not [I]everything[/I] needs to make sense, but enough to preserve that illusion which engages the players in the imagined scenario of the adventure/dungeon. It's definitely a balancing act, and one which DMs tailor to the groups they play with (e.g. some players don't really care, and others will relentlessly uncover the slightest scent of phoniness). I was encouraged over at RPG.net to answer 5 common sense questions to help build the verisimilitude of my dungeon: [LIST=1] [*]How do they breathe? [*]Where do they sleep? [*]What do they eat? [*]What do they drink? [*]Where do they enter/exit? [/LIST] I think this step, for me, also intersects with questions like: [LIST] [*]Who are original occupants vs. current occupants, and what state is the dungeon in? [*]Does this dungeon fit as a particular type described in the DMG (e.g. tomb, stronghold)? [*]What are the fantasy demographics of the dungeon/adventure setting? [/LIST] [B]1. How do they breathe? [/B] Most are resistant to fire damage which helps with breathing excessively hot air in places. Otherwise, there's ventilation thanks to a few shafts/lava tubes leading to the caldera's surface. Overlooks and "screen" doors (mashrabiya / jalis) let in airflow as well. [B]2. Where do they sleep?[/B] They sleep in areas away from the hazardous fumaroles, in quarters (for mages and priests) or barracks (for mamluks and holy slayers). [B]3. What do they eat? [/B] Precious little game lives in the Great Anvil, the most inhospitable desert in the land, however the Brotherhood do harvest scorpions and beetles, and hunt fire lizards, giant mason wasps, and dangerous salt worms (desert-adapted remorhaz). Because of this limited diet, they rely on trade with mysterious fierce janni tribes who don't mind charging exorbitant prices to the sinister cultists, or else shipments by their allied merchants usually via teleportation circle and sending stones (made of volcanic rock from the caldera). When food is scarce, they force captive janni to create food and water (a spell forbidden to their priests of Kossuth as it involves water). [B]4. What do they drink? [/B] There is an aquifer deep below the caldera, but it has become tainted with chlorides & sulfides. The alchemists and priests of the Brotherhood have devised a means of extracting the acids/poisons to yield pure water (as well as useful ingredients for more nefarious purposes). Additionally, the Brotherhood stockpiles water in the event that something happens to their water source, though these stockpiles wouldn't last longer than 1 week if rationed, less if not. Additionally, they extract water from the dead (a la Dune) in a macabre sacred ritual. [B]5. Where do they enter/exit?[/B] There are [S]six[/S] seven ways into Krak al-Mazhar, the first six used by the Brotherhood, and the last one unused. [LIST] [*][B]Narrow fissures[/B] lead through the steep sloping "hills" around the caldera, that invariably lead to guarded bridges; three of these lead into the upper levels. [*]The [B]Gate of Mysteries[/B] opens into the heart of the caldera, and is guarded by horned devils. This is used by slaves working the sulfur mines, entry and exit for new initiates to the Brotherhood, for military drills, and for the very rare departing/incoming caravan. [*]A [B][I]teleportation circle[/I][/B] lies at the edge of the caldera ridge, though only the Brotherhood's upper echelon know its sigil sequence, and there’s a rotating password shared among them which if not spoken triggers a [I]glyph of warding[/I]. [*]A [B]two-way portal to the Plane of Fire[/B] is used for welcoming efreet ambassadors/messengers and sending out initiates / exploration parties. [*]The Bonfire owns [B][I]the golden mirror[/I][/B] which he can use to open a temporary gate which he can also return through. [*]EDIT: Flying creatures can enter Krak al-Mazhar's upper levels through the [B]shadow wyvern aerie[/B], which is often occupied by several shadow wyverns and/or flame mages coming and going on overflights of the caldera. [*][B]Lava tubes[/B] used by salt worms (remorhaz) and sand worms (purple worms) trace their way under the fortress; they are kept at bay by the narrowness of the passages and by magical brass gongs that create a sound the worms dislike. [/LIST] [B]6. Who are original occupants vs. current occupants, and what state is the dungeon in?[/B] The original builders & occupants were the mystics of The Fire Most Pure, who were a more neutral-aligned group revering a mysterious divine flame and had association with an asuras (think: "fire angel"). However, they were corrupted by an internal faction that became the Brotherhood of True Flame which now controls Krak al-Mazhar. [B]7. Does this dungeon fit as a particular type described in the DMG (e.g. tomb, stronghold)?[/B] Krak al-Mazhar doesn't neatly fall into any one dungeon type. It's a stronghold, a school for flame mages, a wizard's tower, and a dungeon for captives/brainwashed victims rolled into one. It's also built on a planar gate, it has a political/ambassadorial role, and there are sulfur mines on site. This is probably the upper limit of how complex you want to make your own dungeons, but I hope to show how these various "types" can feed into one another. [B]8. What are the fantasy demographics of the dungeon/adventure setting?[/B] This is something which ties into world-building. While you can put whatever monsters you dang well please into your dungeons/adventure settings, when you start getting into larger dungeons thinking about the demographics (and their implication) can help you conceive of the range of monsters, how they operate, and reinforce the verisimilitude of your dungeon. In my case, I'm dealing with a village-sized population at this dungeon, and most of them are NPCs. This means, I want to think about NPC demographics. For example, placing 60 NPCs there who have the spellcasting ability of 12th level wizards has implications for the campaign; namely, that there [I]are[/I] enough 12th level wizards in the land for it to be reasonable to say that 60 of them focus on fire magic, and swear allegiance to the Brotherhood of True Flame, and center their operations at Krak al-Mazhar. That's a lot of wizards! I opted for something a bit more moderate... [SECTION]Krak al-Mazhar houses roughly 600 members of the Brotherhood of True Flame and their slaves. The occupying NPCs, not including any of the monsters allied with them, can be divided accordingly: 40% (240) slaves ([B]commoners[/B]) (0th level) (CR 0) 12% (72) [B]cultists[/B] training as fedayeen (1st/2nd level) (CR 1/8) 12% (72) [B]guards[/B] training as mamluks (1st/2nd level) (CR 1/8) 18% (108) [B]mamluks of the Imperishable*[/B] (3rd level) (CR 2) 3% (18) [B]cult fanatics[/B] aiding priesthood (4th level) (CR 2) 6% (36) [B]Flamedeath fedayeen*[/B] (7th level) (CR 4) 6% (36) [B]shig’harakhi*[/B] (7th level) (CR 6) 0.85% (5) [B]priests of Kossuth*[/B] (10th level) (CR 6) 0.5% (3) [B]aghas of the Imperishable*[/B] (12th level) (CR 6) 0.5% (3) black flame zealot [B]assassins[/B] (12th level) (CR 9) 0.5% (3) [B]disciples of the salamander*[/B] (12th level) (CR 5) 0.5% (3) [B]khaz’harakhi*[/B] (12th level) (CR 9) 0.15% (1) [B]The Bonfire*[/B] (20th level) (CR ?) [/SECTION] Another factor in figuring out these numbers is that I want the PCs to be able to encounter a group of flame mages (let's say 7th level [B]shig'harakhi[/B], which is a fancy name for "lesser flame mage") and have an interesting challenge. For example, a group of 5 (2d4) [B]shig'harakhi[/B] would make for a roughly Medium difficulty combat for a group of five PCs of 16th level. Thus, I know I want enough of these lesser flame mages around the dungeon for a chance encounter / clearing out one room not to totally decimate the [B]shig'harakhi[/B] forces. My gut was telling me the total number of [B]shig'harakhi[/B] should be at least 5-6 times the size of an "average patrol of shig'harakhi" (so 30-35 lesser flame mages). That ended up being about what I went with. There's also some story implications from my dungeon demographics – there are no low-level wizards (like there are mamluks and cultists). Why? Because The Bonfire considers them beneath him, sending any such supplicants away until they reach about 5th level (i.e. can throw a [I]fireball[/I]) before he will take them under his tutelage. And BOOM, now I've got some fun side quests I can incorporate about a disgruntled flame mage who wasn't accepted by The Bonfire and goes to extreme lengths to prove himself. And a hint that The Bonfire might be impressed by PCs demonstrating a mastery of fire magic, which [I]could[/I] work toward their favor in an undercover scenario (and could get them into awkward situations). Lastly, I did a quick reality check. Would ~360 fighting men/women be reasonable to be stationed/housed at a castle? I thought so, but I double checked... Krak des Chevaliers, one of the largest castles in the Holy Land, had a garrison of roughly 2,000 men strong. Flint Castle, a rather small castle built in 1284, part of Edward I's Welsh castles, had a garrison 120 men strong at its peak. [B]Resources: Fantasy Demographics[/B] [URL='http://www.autarch.co/blog/demographics-heroism']Autarch's Adventurer Conqueror King[/URL] Alex has a blog post "The Demographics of Heroism" about assumptions of how rare individuals are leveled from 1st to 14th level. [URL='http://themagictreerpg.blogspot.com/2008/11/d-society-be-aware-of-demographics.html']The Magic Tree[/URL] Tanz deconstructs how many hypothetical NPCs would have "the hero stuff" and survive long enough to do something with their class levels. [URL='http://rpg.stackexchange.com/questions/37395/dd-character-levels-and-population-is-the-fifty-percent-rule-valid']The Fifty Percent Rule[/URL] MontyWild proposed a 50% rule for determining how many NPCs of a given level appear in a world. Not an unreasonable starting point. [URL='https://www.reddit.com/r/dndnext/comments/597t3i/dd_character_level_demographics/']D&D vs. USA Demographics[/URL] Fallencoder does an interesting comparison of adventurers to US armed forces personnel, coming up with probabilities of encounter an NPC of #th level in the world, and in a number of combats. Possibly flawed assumptions, but interesting nevertheless. [/QUOTE]
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