Underdark Encounters

[Painfully]

Myconids come to mind. You know, the mushroom people. They might be especially helpful as guides, or as medicine men. Think of Treebeard and his forest buddies in LotR, only underdark style. Maybe the party only meets and interacts with one myconid, but when they find themselves in trouble later, suddenly all the nearby mushrooms sprout legs and join the fight.

Could there be an underdark version of a dryad? Hmmm.

Don't ignore all the normal creepy crawlies while underground. If nothing else, they might wake up with a nasty surprise when they put on their boots in the morning.

Remember the piercer from 1st edition? It was a creature that stuck to cave ceilings and would drop down onto their prey. I think it might have been put into the Tome of Horrors, but I'm not sure. They resembled stalactites, and were not particularly tough. Just the thing to keep your players on their toes.

 

[Darthjaye]

Asmo is right, try the one from Dungeon 85. We played through this one and it's awesome. Really brings out the best in the Kuo-Tua.

 

[Felon]

If you're looking for adventure seeds, I highly recommend the FR Underdark supplement to you. It has a wealth of information on underdark geography & ecology, and it details dozens of bizarre and vile underdark cultures. Very flavorful stuff. The Prrestige Classes and mosnters are a bit blah, so I wouldn't call it a very "crunchy" book, but the fluff is outstanding.

 

[Delgar]

Thanks for some good ideas!

Anything else would be extremely helpful!

Delgar

 

[Hand of Evil]

Draw out a rough diagram, side view. Also have large carvens.

You may want to hunt up some cave pics for visual aids.

 

[Shallown]

I did an underdark run not to long agao with an ilithid controlled trade town with doppleganger prostitutes and brain salesmen etc.

Also had a drak dragon encounter with a lair guarded by half dragon ogres, hobgoblins, kobolds and some Yaun-ti who worshipped the dragon. I used teh yaunti stats and not the background info. It was an interesting set up switching from fighters and rogues to the spell catsers. tripped players up some. Add nasty traps and they had a rough battle . The half dragons had class levels, hobgoblins with rogue, ogres with fighter and kobolds with rogue , sorceror mixes.

was fun especially having a breath weapon once a day was very effective.

later

 

[Delgar]

Well my players have just escaped the arena and are now wandering through the underdark. Not aimlessly though as they will most likely be headed off to help rescue a kobold tribe from the drow. For more information look here, click on the link in the first post.

What I'm looking for are some interesting things/terrain/people they can meet on their way. The stranger the better. Anyone have any more ideas?

Thanks

Delgar

 

[the Jester]

How about a scholarly xorn, come to study the prime dwellers in stone?

If you have the Tome of Horrors, check out the vilstrak. It's an old 1e monster that can phase through solid stone.

Also, consider the possibilities of weird alliances. How would the pcs react to meeting a group of deep gnomes allies with hobgoblins against a group of drow? Or how about svirfneblin and drow against aboleths??

In my game, certain underdark crystals grow that some dwarves and others smoke (it's the dwarven crack, basically).

 

[Barmy Gith]

I'd have to agree with Felon. I think that the FR Underdark book would be a great resource for you. It even has some nifty encounter tables.

Another thing to possibly try...

What if the PCs ended up having to pass through the decaying corpse of a collosal creature (like a giant, titan, dragon, or long dead God). The tunnels that they travel could have been made by purple worms that are feasting on the corpse. There could be plenty of strange festering oozes, slimes, and icky things (don't forget to consider the slippery nature of such a place, balance checks, charging impairment?) Who knows, perhaps the site has some significance to a bizarre cult (Trying to raise the beast, or find the artifact that slayed the creature, which is rumored to be stilled lodged inside the creature).

One nice thing about this scenario is that just when the PCs get used to dealing with the not too bright worms and slimes of the area they might suddenly find themselves dealing with intelligent opponents capable of strategy.

That's my two cents, Good Gaming.

 

[S'mon]

Cave-ins, cliffs, ravines (w crumbling bridges), narrow ledges, slippery or rubble-strewn slopes, tight squeezes, lava, hot vapour, noxious gas, poisonous gas, gypsum flowers, underground rivers & lakes, waterfalls, magnetic lodestone, etc - been reading my 1e Dungeoneers' Survival Guide.