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Human Paragon 3
2010-10-31, 12:24 PM
This is copied from another thread that got no responses for some reason. Rather than pathetically bumping it again, I've decided to start a new thread on the topic.

The Premise: I am a DM getting ready to run a dungeon. I want your help testing my security program.

The Details:

I: I am a millenias-old drow civilzation who want my stronghold to be secure.

II: You are a party of PCs (ECL 6) who want to get to the end of the dungeon, grab the priceless maguffin, and get out alive. Freeing my slaves is an added bonus, but not necessary for you.

III: You have one wizard who can also UMD, with a familiar that can do likewise. Everybody else is a simple fighter type, though one paladin can use paladin wands etc.

IV: You have some access to higher than at level magic items, on a case by case basis.

My security:

1- The dungeon is a mine that goes deep into the earth. A high content of lead and cold iron in the mine make it impossible to scry into and impossible to teleport into. The lowest point in the mine is 4,000 feet down.

2- The mine is extremely hot and humid. It's so hot and so humid that even endure elements isn't good enough to completely mitigate the effects of heat exhaustion. The lower down you go into the mine, the stronger this effect becomes.

3- The terrain of the mine is treacherous--much of it is razor-sharp crystals and/or slippery crystaline monolliths. It requires skill checks to move through almost every square.

4- At least one anti-magic field exists in the mine. It is in one of the vertical hallways that decends strait down--a very sheer drop. There may be other anti-magic fields. The PCs do not know about the anti magic field(s).

5- The primary denizens of this mine are specially bred drow sentinals. They have been bred with efriti to be heat resistant. The PCs don't know their stats, but they are 6th level hexblades with optimized feat selection and major bloodlines, most likely.

6- There are also crystaline golems. The PCs know about them, but don't know their stats.

7- If necessary, the drow can flood the entire mine with boiling water. This happens very fast.

8- There are other dangers and denizens of the mine, including a heat-based shadow varient and crystal and steam mephits, primarily there to harass the PCs.

How do you get in? Are there obvious security holes I'm missing? This is supposed to be a very terrible stronghold where the drow keep important treasuers and prisoners, and which has never been breeched.

Greenish
2010-10-31, 12:34 PM
If they can trick the drow into flooding the dungeon, they can get rid of the sentinels.

If your PCs are a patient lot, they may choose to tunnel down by themselves, instead of using the existing tunnels. Getting a burrow speed isn't that hard.

Grynning
2010-10-31, 12:52 PM
How do you get in? Are there obvious security holes I'm missing? This is supposed to be a very terrible stronghold where the drow keep important treasuers and prisoners, and which has never been breeched.

um...if you're wanting to run this as an adventure, shouldn't there BE some security holes so that the PC's can actually get IN?

As it stands, your dungeon sounds like it wouldn't be a whole lot of fun. I certainly wouldn't want to sit there while everyone rolls skill checks for "almost every square." It seems like this place is designed to annoy the players into leaving your game.

Also, why doesn't endure elements work on the heat? Is it really worse than 140 degrees farenheit? And if it is, how do the drow and their slaves survive down there?

Edit: Some questions - Do the PC's have a way to track or locate the MacGuffin?
- No skillmonkey/trapfinder? What exactly do you mean by "simple fighter types?" Does this group even have the skills needed to get into this place, outside of relying on their wizard?
Comment:
- The anti-magic field on the sheer drop will probably kill your party. Flat out. The only solution they seem to have to a lot of problems is the Wizard and magic items, which they will try to use to get down the drop.

Valameer
2010-10-31, 01:14 PM
Are the PCs supposed to realise they can't take this place yet, or do you want them to eventually get the MacGuffin? There's a big diff there.

Is it possible to burrow through metal? I would say no, but perhaps there's no distinction. If they use alter self to burrow, feel free to shut them down with all the cold iron and lead.

Resist energy: fire coupled with endure elements should neutralize most of the environmental hazards, as well as the heat of the water. The PCs should be able to piece together pretty quickly that these spells are required.

Now they have to worry about the water, but water breathing lasts a long time.

Shatter is perhaps the best offense they have against crystalline creatures. It's a no-brainer if you're jumping down into the crystal pits of crystal doom to fight the crystal golems. Check out what the spell can do so you are prepared when they use it.

The bad terrain seems more annoying than harmful. Won't things like the terrain and humidity hamper the drow as much as the PCs? If the drow have means to deal with the dangers, then expect PCs to loot those means off the first sentinel they kill.

I suggest that the caves are immersed in complete darkness. This forces the PCs to carry light (or waste a lot of spells on darkvision) - and you can't exactly sneak into an unlit dungeon holding a bright torch. It gives the drow a lot of opportunity to set an ambush.

Alter self or disguise self used to become drow might be able to foil some of the sentinels. But no one knows drow sign language (usually), so the drow would probably use that to identify threats.

If the drow are smart, which they are, they'll fall back to ambush points to deal with the PCs, instead of attacking them in roving bands. A silent alarm can be raised, and the PCs will be minced... since the sentinels are as high level as the PCs, and probably more numerous.

Traps like "rocks fall" will either kill the PCs, or delay them for hours.

Watch out for web, as with it, the PCs will be able to seriously hamper any drow forces.

Mephits are small enough to fade into very small tunnels, free from PCs retribution. Man, that will be annoying.

WinWin
2010-10-31, 02:38 PM
Flight spells or charged items. A wand of Summon Monster for Thoqqua tunneling. A bag of holding/haversack filled with alchemical gear, in particular acid flasks and dither bombs.

Standard dungeon crawling from there.

Not perfect, but a prepared and moderately optimized group could handle most of the threats on the list. The anti-magic over the shaft is a nice touch...That would kill most invisible, flying mages. A lot of the threats can be avoided or reduced by sculpting the dungeon itself. The no-teleport is a tough one, I assume the dungeon limits planar travel as well. This could be a problem is the PC's need to get out in a hurry.

Sounds like fun. I think stealth would work better than a direct assault though. Assault tactics are a good fallback if the parties infiltration is discovered.

Human Paragon 3
2010-10-31, 03:04 PM
um...if you're wanting to run this as an adventure, shouldn't there BE some security holes so that the PC's can actually get IN?

As it stands, your dungeon sounds like it wouldn't be a whole lot of fun. I certainly wouldn't want to sit there while everyone rolls skill checks for "almost every square." It seems like this place is designed to annoy the players into leaving your game.

Also, why doesn't endure elements work on the heat? Is it really worse than 140 degrees farenheit? And if it is, how do the drow and their slaves survive down there?

Edit: Some questions - Do the PC's have a way to track or locate the MacGuffin?
- No skillmonkey/trapfinder? What exactly do you mean by "simple fighter types?" Does this group even have the skills needed to get into this place, outside of relying on their wizard?
Comment:
- The anti-magic field on the sheer drop will probably kill your party. Flat out. The only solution they seem to have to a lot of problems is the Wizard and magic items, which they will try to use to get down the drop.

Some good questions here.

Answered in order:

I'm not trying to seal every concievable security hole, just obvious ones that the drow would have needed to deal with in the past. It's not a credible stronghold if anyone can just wonder in.

Saying that every square requires a skill check was a bit of an exageration. In certain rooms it might be the case where a DC 10 balance check is needed every 15 feet or so, but most hallways will be safe. Only the rooms (and not all rooms) are that difficult to move through.

The PCs will know how inhospitable the dungeon is before hand, and will have plenty of time to prepare, so what might typically be "annoying" will hopefully just be a challenge they've prepared for.

140 degrees is basically the minimum temp for this dungeon. The lower you go, the hotter it gets. The drow actually don't survive in the dungeon. Only their sentinals can. When normal drow go to the dungeon they only make short trips, and use endure elements and fire resistance. Their slaves have been specially bred to endure the heat (dwarves who have been bred over generations for heat resistence, and even so only the women can survive in the hot rooms, and not for very long periods. They have a temperature-controlled room where they live).

The PCs don't have a way to track the item, but they know from research that it's in "the hottest room of the dungeon," which they know is the lowest room of the dungeon.

They have no rogue or trap finder. The party is Warblade 6, Figher 4/Warblade 1/Dwarven Defender 1, Barbarian 5/Paladin 1, Wizard 5/Wild Mage 1.

Fouredged Sword
2010-10-31, 04:12 PM
The defenders would be prepared to breathe water if needed.

I would think rather than go with all the effort to breed dwarves to work the mines for them they would find some nice humanoid from the plain of fire to enslave. Then the slaves would have the fire subtype. Less effort really.

The guards could have ice weapons just to spice things up, as they would expect everything that could survive in the mine to have the fire subtype.

I would point you twards sandstorm for some nice and effective rules for heat and the effect it has on characters. You are looking at extreme heat or greater in the tunnels. You could call the steam out as makeing the situation worse and raise the heat level one notch over the listed tempeture.

Callista
2010-10-31, 05:42 PM
My first impulse would be to have the wizard cast Fly on themselves, Levitation on everybody else, and pull them through on a rope. Otherwise they'd be too hampered by the terrain to move fast.

Human Paragon 3
2010-10-31, 07:19 PM
The defenders would be prepared to breathe water if needed.

I would think rather than go with all the effort to breed dwarves to work the mines for them they would find some nice humanoid from the plain of fire to enslave. Then the slaves would have the fire subtype. Less effort really.

The guards could have ice weapons just to spice things up, as they would expect everything that could survive in the mine to have the fire subtype.

I would point you twards sandstorm for some nice and effective rules for heat and the effect it has on characters. You are looking at extreme heat or greater in the tunnels. You could call the steam out as makeing the situation worse and raise the heat level one notch over the listed tempeture.

Thanks, great suggestions!

Godskook
2010-10-31, 08:00 PM
That AMF better extend to the bottom of the shaft it protects, otherwise its defeated by a 2.2k ring of feather fall(a good buy when going into a dungeon noted for being incredibly deep) because feather fall works instantly to change your fall speed to 'safe'. So if you have even 2ft between the AMF and the bottom of the shaft, there's no point in having it.

Human Paragon 3
2010-10-31, 09:06 PM
For some reason I don't think my party is going to think of getting a ring of feather fall for everyone. If they did, though, more power to them. That's a good idea, and not what I call obvious.

The most notable effect of the anti magic fields IMO is making them suffer the effects of the heat.

Godskook
2010-10-31, 09:37 PM
For some reason I don't think my party is going to think of getting a ring of feather fall for everyone. If they did, though, more power to them. That's a good idea, and not what I call obvious.

The most notable effect of the anti magic fields IMO is making them suffer the effects of the heat.

Feather fall is a 1st level spell and is from core. Presumably both your party and the drow both know about the spell. The item is roughly 1/6th of a player's WBL, so you're right, not going to be dealing with the "party of feather fall" scenario, but its easier to make the drop end inside an AMF than to make the tunnel and AMF long enough to outlast the 5-10 rounds of feather fall a typical caster would be able to handle casting.

And no, if they're putting an AMF in a vertical shaft, the primary goal is *NOT* to force intruders to suffer heat effects. Its to cancel magical aerial movement buffs, such as fly, feather fall, and levitate.

Myth
2010-11-01, 04:15 AM
Regular adamantine weapons + Silence = making their own doors or tunnels. And since there's cold iron and lead there to block teleporting and scrying it means that 10 to 30% of the surrounding terrain can be hacked trough even if you DM fiat adamantine veins running trough the rock as well. Note: be careful with sprinkling adamantine around, least they haul a ton of it to town and become richer than your Emperor npc.

Counter their mining expedition with things with tremorsense, otherwise they could dig right down to room 0 and then fly upwards with the artifact.

Fouredged Sword
2010-11-01, 05:39 AM
I would take out the shaft with an AMF. It is a party kill trap. There is no warning, no save, and it is lethal. This is a no win situation. If you throw it in at least give the players a sign that it is there before they get to it. Like have an npc throw a torch of eternal flame down the shaft to see ho far it goes, then have the torch go out when it hits the field.

At least warn them about the posibility of an AMF. Those are such high level things that if positioned right will kill your players.

Also the drow need a way to get through or around the field themselves. This way is likely to be able to take at least a moderate amount of trafic.

But really I would nix the whole thing. For the cost of a permenent AMF you could create many powerful golems that are more adaptable and able to engage targets in many locations.

No, I would just have a dispell magic trap.

Myth
2010-11-01, 05:44 AM
AMF is not affected by Permanency. It could be a simple AMF trap though. Same difference since the party has no trapfinding abilities.

Fouredged Sword
2010-11-01, 06:06 AM
The dispell trap has a chance of failure. There is a level check to dispell things. Let the dispell have a low CL. You are still looking at a no warning save vs die. You should avoid these as a DM, but at least it is better than a no warning no save, just die trap.

I would suggest you rather put it into a furnace room that is literaly on fire. The party knows something will go wrong as soon as they enter. What they don't know is that when they do they get hit by dispell magic to remove any anti fire spells they have cooked up to run through the room. Once more any fire subtyped creature is immune to the trap and the locals can simply walk through.

Psyx
2010-11-01, 06:12 AM
Murphy's laws of combat: If the enemy can't get in, you can't get out.

How do the drow escape if they need to?