What do you want in your Wizard's Tower?

[Tsyr]

Better idea with statues:

Get a very, very, very good sculpter to create several statues of "adventurer" type people, or theives, better yet. Have them carved in positions of shock and surprise, with possibly a tinge of horror on them.

Then enchant them. First of all, this makes them radiate magic, but second... what you do is, enchant them with a modified version of the "create water" spell... so that there is always a few drops of tears around their eyes. If your really sick, have a minor audible illusion enchanted on them so that if you get up within a foot or so of them, you can hear tortured screams.

Then put them out in front of the gates like gargoyles.

 

[Gargoyle]

As a DM I would have a field-day with the familiar's passages. Bet I could design a 100 different nasty things to take up residence in those twisty passages. #1 on the list, an enemy wizard's familiar.

Be careful who you hire as contractors. They could easily place an enemy's scrying device into the mortar or something. Build as much of it as possible yourself, or use trusted allies.

As for design, I'd keep it simple. You don't need a 100 different rooms, one for each task, except for the really dangerous areas like summoning rooms, alchemy labs, and blast chambers. A larger tower is harder to secure and more expensive. (Though fun I admit). You can always add on later.

Also, I'd keep the location a secret if possible. The best defense is when they can't find you.

 

[Zaruthustran]

Man, I LOVE Tsyr's statue idea. Perfect.

And good idea re: contractors. Mr. Baggins, I'd try to use summoned creatures or Stone Shape whenever possible. Or Polymorph yourself and your buddies into stone giants or something.

When digging out my wiz lair, I polymorphed into an umberhulk. They dig fast. Max ranks in Craft: stonemason and knowledge: engineering, in addition to the dwarven Stonecunning and my Earth Elemental familiar means that my character's pad is pretty swank.

 

[sineater]

What about a servants quarters. You don't want to do all the upkeep yourself do you?

Also a kitchen.

 

[Tsyr]

Servant's Quarters?

Bleh.

Take a pair of silk gloves, tied together with a cord, and enchant then with unseen servant . Your "servant's quarters" then become a box under your bed, or whatever space you happen to have.

 

[Tsyr]

Slight problem with the idea of underground rooms seperated by solid rock.

Air.

Granted, this can be overcome by magic, but be sure to do so... otherwise, DMs have a nice little way to kill you

 

[JoeGKushner]

What about places for guests? A manor or a tower should have a place for an apprentice at least.

What about places for horses? In a couple designs I've seen, the first level is for horses, equipment, weapons, hay, etc...

What about a blast chamber where you can test spells? If your character designs spells, that might be a good thing otherwise not truly useful. This can usually be placed below the first level.

What will you be doing for water? A collection at the top or a well at the bottom?

Of course having an alchemist lab is one thing, but what's in that lab?

Same deal with the library. Standard books or ancient ones? Spellbooks, or histories?


Alchemist's lab
Library
Room intended for summoning - thick walls, underground, one door
Rooftop for flying creature arrival
Telescope on rooftop for A) vouyerism and B) astrology
Private sleeping chambers
Vault for loot/valuable components
Chamber appropriate for my familiar, incl. passages for him throughout complex (Lux Astralis, my minidragon familiar)

 

[hong]

Hello.

Stop with the ing thread reanimation already.

ThaADVANCEnks!

 

[JoeGKushner]

Hello.

Stop with the ing thread reanimation already.

ThaADVANCEnks!

I missed it the first time around.

Mark from Creative Mountain Games was cool enough to keep a listing of useful links and many of them I didn't comment on at the time because I missed 'em due to things like work, playing, going out. Yesterday and today, I've had off, as I will tomorrow and Thursday, so I thought I'd take a look around and see what's new on Mark's thread. As none of these threads are a "Me too!" type of deal, is there an issue with this?

 

[tetsujin28]

Alicia Witt and Julia Stiles as my oh-so-dutiful apprentices