I think this is a fantastic idea and I've always toyed with the idea of placing a dungeon "inside" a larger creature. When I took a botany class in college, I had dreams of putting a group of PCs inside a biological dungeon on the cellular level.
Also, when I played Shadow of the Colossus on the PS2, I thought about placing a dungeon inside a long dormant Colossus... only to have it spring to life with the PCs still inside! Can they shut down the monstrosity before it wades across the ocean and attacks Sharn?!
Also, on a side note, Dragonbait said earlier to remember that blood is blue before it hits oxygen. I have to add a caveat to that. Some species of animals do have blue blood, and a turtle might be one. However, human blood is not blue inside the body until it is exposed to outside air. This is a very common misunderstanding. As an education major in a science class right now, it is my task to correct this urban myth.
The following is not meant at a slight towards Dragonbait, as he may very intelligently be stating the truth that turtle blood is blue! I just have to talk a minute about human blood
Yes, veinous blood is "less" red because it has less oxygen in it, and arterial blood is a brighter red because it is more oxygenated. However, even veinous blood is not "blue". It can be a very dark red, almost to the point of being near violet, but it is not a rich blue color of any sort. On charts of the circulatory system, veinous blood is charted a rich blue to differentiated veins from arteries, and sometimes this creates the impression that the blood is actually that blue color.
Ever seen blood drawn through a plastic tube? The blood at the start of the flow could theoretically be turning red as it hits air inside the tube, but what about blood farther back, right out of the body? It's still red and it hasn't touched a bit of air from the outside body. The air from outside the tube is not instantly traveling through the blood down the tube, like electricity through a circuit, turning it all red.
Veins in our body look blue from the outside due to the absorption and reflectance of light through our tissue, a combination of the facts that deoxygenated veinous blood absorbs more red light (and reflects blue) and blue light in general penetrates less deeply through tissue than red light and is thus reflected back.
Ask a Biologist Q&A / Is blood ever blue and why does it appear blue in veins near the skin?
If science discussion is frowned up in these threads, I do apologize. To use the blue/red circulatory model in a dungeon could be very cool, though. PCs could trace the "blue" lines/rooms/pipes inward to reach the heart of the beast (okay, the lungs), and could follow the red lines/rooms/pipes to find their way out
Also, when I played Shadow of the Colossus on the PS2, I thought about placing a dungeon inside a long dormant Colossus... only to have it spring to life with the PCs still inside! Can they shut down the monstrosity before it wades across the ocean and attacks Sharn?!
Also, on a side note, Dragonbait said earlier to remember that blood is blue before it hits oxygen. I have to add a caveat to that. Some species of animals do have blue blood, and a turtle might be one. However, human blood is not blue inside the body until it is exposed to outside air. This is a very common misunderstanding. As an education major in a science class right now, it is my task to correct this urban myth.
The following is not meant at a slight towards Dragonbait, as he may very intelligently be stating the truth that turtle blood is blue! I just have to talk a minute about human blood
Yes, veinous blood is "less" red because it has less oxygen in it, and arterial blood is a brighter red because it is more oxygenated. However, even veinous blood is not "blue". It can be a very dark red, almost to the point of being near violet, but it is not a rich blue color of any sort. On charts of the circulatory system, veinous blood is charted a rich blue to differentiated veins from arteries, and sometimes this creates the impression that the blood is actually that blue color.
Ever seen blood drawn through a plastic tube? The blood at the start of the flow could theoretically be turning red as it hits air inside the tube, but what about blood farther back, right out of the body? It's still red and it hasn't touched a bit of air from the outside body. The air from outside the tube is not instantly traveling through the blood down the tube, like electricity through a circuit, turning it all red.
Veins in our body look blue from the outside due to the absorption and reflectance of light through our tissue, a combination of the facts that deoxygenated veinous blood absorbs more red light (and reflects blue) and blue light in general penetrates less deeply through tissue than red light and is thus reflected back.
Ask a Biologist Q&A / Is blood ever blue and why does it appear blue in veins near the skin?
If science discussion is frowned up in these threads, I do apologize. To use the blue/red circulatory model in a dungeon could be very cool, though. PCs could trace the "blue" lines/rooms/pipes inward to reach the heart of the beast (okay, the lungs), and could follow the red lines/rooms/pipes to find their way out
