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riddles
2009-06-24, 02:06 PM
my regular dm is taking a 4 week hiatus and i have foolishly volunteered a dungeon crawl to give him a break.

so, the current plot has had the party clear out a dwarf homestead near mithril hall. I will be taking the party into the tunnels and structures beneath said homestead.

the Party:
level 14 dwarf cleric (it's his homestead)
level 14 human fighter/paladin of kord (the paladin bit is some prestige class)
level 14 gnome illusionist
level 13 half orc barbarian - newbie player
level 13 druid - newbie player
level 13 thief/mage - canny, sneaky little bastard who will cause plenty of problems.

so i'm asking the playground for help. any encounters, traps, tricks and monsters i can throw at the party to really push them would be very grateful.

Dixieboy
2009-06-24, 02:08 PM
You have a wizard and a druid in that party.

Unless you play your monsters smart or do a CR WTF encounter not much will challenge them.

Really all you have to do is take a couple of monsters that makes sense to have there and then play them smart.

For traps you would probably need to tell us something about the place.

riddles
2009-06-24, 02:13 PM
druid is a newb and not overly effective. wizard has a penchant for blasting.

RTGoodman
2009-06-24, 02:20 PM
Hmm... they're slightly higher than the suggested level, but what about THIS ONE (http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/oa/20051031a)?

On a more serious note, what about some of Goodman Game's Dungeon Crawl Classics (http://www.rpgnow.com/index.php?cPath=190)? I believe you can find them pretty cheap on various sites if you get the PDFs. Outside that, take a look at some of WotC's free Original Adventures (http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/oa/20030530b&page=1).

Eurantien
2009-06-24, 02:41 PM
Well, CR is important. I'd go with a bunch of typical Dwarven enemies, like orcs and goblins, who've taken over the homestead, with giants perhaps. Hordes in wide halls, with lots of columns. Maybe an ancestor ghost or 3, fought in a pitch-black hall to call for some blind fighting. That'd lower the effectiveness of those casters too. Maybe a dragon would make for a nice end-of-crawl challenge too.

HamsterOfTheGod
2009-06-24, 03:20 PM
my regular dm is taking a 4 week hiatus and i have foolishly volunteered a dungeon crawl to give him a break.

so, the current plot has had the party clear out a dwarf homestead near mithril hall. I will be taking the party into the tunnels and structures beneath said homestead.

the Party:
level 14 dwarf cleric (it's his homestead)
level 14 human fighter/paladin of kord (the paladin bit is some prestige class)
level 14 gnome illusionist
level 13 half orc barbarian - newbie player
level 13 druid - newbie player
level 13 thief/mage - canny, sneaky little bastard who will cause plenty of problems.

so i'm asking the playground for help. any encounters, traps, tricks and monsters i can throw at the party to really push them would be very grateful.
How about Tucker's Kobolds? It takes a little bit of work on your part but basically you set same sized party of intelligent kobolds/goblins/orcs with classes against the party. Make the kobolds 1 or 2 levels lower than the party but let them use ambush techniques and traps. So for ex a party of 6 11the or 12th level kobolds with a cleric, fighter, sorcerer, ranger, bard and rogue.

If you want a big boss monster a mature blue dragon should give them some fits if played right. Don't be afraid to let the dragon get away with dimension door if the players start beating it.

A nightwalker should slow them down a bit too, especially if they've met some stuff that's weakened them along the way like a swarm of spectres (7-8) beforehand.

Tsotha-lanti
2009-06-24, 03:24 PM
The average party level is 13.5, and there's 6 party members, so you're 50% over. That means you need to crank up encounters a bit, with half again the XP for each encounter - or +1 EL. So...

EL -12: easy
EL 13-15: average.
EL 16-17: hard.
EL 18+: real hard.

Use big bunches of lower-CR monsters rather than big monsters. With that many party members, you have to force them to spread their actions. Don't use a single "boss" with a bunch of mooks, use 2-3 bosses with a bunch of mooks.

You want to avoid orcs and goblins, because your options are hordes of totally underpowered mooks (un-leveled, or leveled but no WBL), or hordes of walking bags of loot (leveled with WBL).

In absence of any ideas on what you've got living in the dwarfhold...

- Psionic mind flayers (Expanded Psionics Handbook) with psion levels. They work fine without WBL; just make sure to give them plenty of self-buffing, and have them observe the PCs, then dimension door (or whatever the psionic equivalent is) in with all their buffs on, fully augmented. They need company, though...
- So give them some dominated frost giants, stone giants gray renders, or the like. Low CR (6-10) but great numbers, high hp.
- A few ropers or purple worms - four or so shouldn't be too hard an encounter (EL 16).

Generally, use a few CR 10-15 enemies (lower CR, more monsters) with very dangerous abilities, and a bunch of CR 6-9 enemies with high HP. Remember to have the enemies fan out but keep the PCs from getting to the squishies if possible (or at least make sure they're in smacking range of a meatshield if they get in melee with a squishy). Make use of ambushes (they know the environment), difficult terrain (chasms and bridges are great), and enemies coming from two or more directions.

If you can't calculate ELs too well, use an encounter level calculator. Google helps.

RTGoodman
2009-06-24, 04:28 PM
Taking up part of Tsotha-lanti idea, you've got a good party level to run a (modified) "Against the Giants." It'd be WAY longer than the number of sessions you have, but you could run the first part ("Steading of the Hill Giant Chief") as one dungeon crawl and then still have "Frost Giant Jarl" and "Fire Giant King" left over for next time.

I don't know if there's a 3.5 update/conversion out there anywhere, though, so it could make for a lot of work if you have to do it yourself.

woodenbandman
2009-06-24, 04:33 PM
Hmm... they're slightly higher than the suggested level, but what about THIS ONE (http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/oa/20051031a)?

On a more serious note, what about some of Goodman Game's Dungeon Crawl Classics (http://www.rpgnow.com/index.php?cPath=190)? I believe you can find them pretty cheap on various sites if you get the PDFs. Outside that, take a look at some of WotC's free Original Adventures (http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/oa/20030530b&page=1).

BAD MAP! VETO!

No really don't do it. I don't want to spoil it if you haven't seen it, but let's just say that there's a sphere of annihilation that is pretty much guaranteed to kill you.