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Message: <blockquote data-quote="John Morrow" data-source="post: 2095333" data-attributes="member: 27012">In the context of Forgotten Realms and Halaster, the Undermountain may very well make perfect sense.That a GM likes the idea so much that they use it as the default for all of their high-level dungeons.  As a default, I don't think entire dungeons (even high-powered ones) should be teleport-free zones (though portions of them most certainly could be).  In specific instances, where it makes sense in the setting that they are like Undermountain, it's a legitimate design choice but still one that I think should be carefully considered.Well, a great deal depends on what came first -- the in-setting justification for the teleport-free zone or the desire to have a teleport free zone and create a justification for it in the setting.  I'm not Ed and don't know Ed so I can't say for sure.But I will point out that when something happens in a role-playing game or setting, the players generally try to figure out what it is happening and why it is happening just as when an audience reads a story or watches a movie, they try to figure out what is happening and wny.  Because of the nature of all of these mediums, there are explanations that deal with the setting and characters and explanations that deal with the authors and the medium.For example, when a red shirt dies in Star Trek, the setting explanation is that they just happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time.  The author explanation is that the author needed a way to show the audience how dangerous the bad guy was and needed to kill someone off who wasn't a regular.  Kill off one red shirt and the audience will generally accept it within the setting because that sort of thing does happen in the real world.  Kill off a red shirt a week and it becomes a cliche and the audience can't help but recognize why the author is doing it.  It's not happening because a red shirt increases your chance of dying.  It's happening beause the author needs a convenient schmuck to kill off this week.Basically, the stronger the clues are that a particular situation is being driven by the needs of the GM or author rather than the needs of the setting, the more likely it is that the players or audience will start looking for the explanations for what is happening in the GM or author rather than in the characters and situations.  And it really doesn't matter that the situation is realistic or possible. In the real world, coincidences (both good and bad) happen all the time.  But authors can't use good coincidences to neatly tie up a story and resolve all of the problems because the audience won't see the coincidence as natural.  They'll see it as contrived by the author to solve a problem that they couldn't write their way out of.  So even if good coincidences are realistic, authors can't use them or, at least, can't use them often because the audience won't see them as natural or real but as something the author is forcing.Similarly, when an element of a setting becomes too convenient for the GM, it can look like a GM contrivance, even if it isn't.  Yes, it's entirely possible that Ed saw the anti-teleportation aspect of Undermountain as a natural part of his setting first.  It's also possible that he wanted a powerful dungeon with certain features and, concerned that teleportation would ruin the whole thing, just declared the whole place a teleport-free zone and made the creator a paranoid and powerful person.  Without knowing either way, I could only guess.  But because the GM-level utility of making the Undermountain is so obvious (What high-level DM hasn't worried about how teleportation or scrying might short-circuit their adventure?), it's easy to think of it as a convenient author-level contrivance rather than an organic part of the setting, like a beneficial coincidence in a book.  Does Undermountain make sense in Forgotten Realms?  Sure.  Might people still be bothered by it despite that?  Yup.</blockquote>

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