Need help crafting an "Unbeatable Dungeon"

[Korias]

I've been tinkering around with an idea of running a 3.X game where the party may only select Homebrew / Non-Core classes. The plot revolves around a dungeon that no party has ever managed to clear, and as such offers a rather large amount of fame to the group that can clear it.

The only issue is what to put IN the dungeon. See, while I have most books, quite a few are outside my grasp, and as such I can't plan for those. Whats more, is that I need a bit of help in figuring out challenges that would tax a party of core classes to their limit.

As for what I mean by "Core", I mean...

Definitively
These are RIGHT off the list.

Any class from the PHB, PHB2, or Complete X series.

Tentatively
These I'm probably sure won't be allowed.

Any class from the Book of Exalted Deeds / Book of Vile Darkness
Any Class from the Races of Destiny

Possibly
Still debating on these.

The Tome of Battle
Dragonlance series
Dungeonscape
Forgotten Realms
Any class from the Psionics Handbook, Expanded Psionics Handbook.



Can anyone help me figure out some strong challenges that would be able to make quick work of parties? I have The Book of Challenges but that only gives me a few good ones I can use, and I need to fill my dungeon with enough encounters to make it quite the trial. Encounters don't have to be just combat-oriented either, roleplaying scenes or puzzles would also be of great use.

For reference, assume a party of five characters, all between the levels of 8 and 10.

Thanks for any assistance: I want to give my players a run through their skills.

[dextercorvia]

For starters make the dungeon in a high-level wizards locked access personal demiplane. That would go a long way to making it 'unbeatable'.

[Korias]

For starters make the dungeon in a high-level wizards locked access personal demiplane. That would go a long way to making it 'unbeatable'.

Well the "Flavor" behind the dungeon is already made, now it's just populating it with challenges. The players are already IN the dungeon for the purposes of this, it's not like some lost catacomb or anything. I just need some way to show how countless parties of Core characters have failed in beating the dungeon, leaving just these oddities to try their luck.

[Seerow]

Honestly, banning core already gets Wizards, Sorcs, Clerics, and Druids out, so goes a long way towards making it hard to beat without doing anything special.

But if your point is to show something that core characters couldn't beat that non-core could... *shrug*

[Swordguy]

My standard-issue "unbeatable dungeon" is populated entirely by incorporeal creatures (NOT undead) which require magic weapons to hit. The entire dungeon is under the effect of an epic persistent antimagic field which suppresses magic items, spells, weapons and psionics (using psionic/magic transparency, which most groups do). Bam - creatures that can't be affected in any way whilst in the dungeon.

It's totally unfair, granted, but the cool part is that assuming the party makes it back out of the dungeon, they have to go find the McGuffin that either turns off the AM Field or suppresses it somehow (preferrably for a limited amount of time, so they have a time pressure forcing them through the dungeon when they go back). Instant interesting multi-session adventure, and a challenge the party can't just magic their way through like everything ELSE in D&D3.x.

[Tiki Snakes]

Well the "Flavor" behind the dungeon is already made, now it's just populating it with challenges. The players are already IN the dungeon for the purposes of this, it's not like some lost catacomb or anything. I just need some way to show how countless parties of Core characters have failed in beating the dungeon, leaving just these oddities to try their luck.

It's actually a school for Affably Evil Wizards. They're polite, good at working together and absolutely destroy any other challenge that core can present. :smallsmile:
Of course, being a dungeon full of Batman Wizards, it's not like non-core will stand a chance either, but there you go. Them's the breaks.

[Lateral]

Tucker's Kobolds, (http://www.tuckerskobolds.com/) but replace kobolds with Atropals that have 30 wizard class levels. 'Nuff said.

Replace 'atropals' with 'insert epic monster here' to fit flavor, if necessary.

Edit: Okay, in all seriousness now. Since you're not doing core, honestly, I think your quickest option may be to leave Psionics in, make the world not have magic-psionics transparency, and just make the whole dungeon in an AMF. As long as none of your PCs use a noncore magic class, it oughta work. It stops magic items from working but not psionic items, so just populate the place with challenges that are unbeatable in an AMF but are just difficult for normal PCs, and you're golden.

Edit 2: Sheesh, it was a joke. I did, in fact, read the OP, and I was, in fact, attempting to contribute to the thread.

[Korias]

It's actually a school for Affably Evil Wizards. They're polite, good at working together and absolutely destroy any other challenge that core can present. :smallsmile:
Of course, being a dungeon full of Batman Wizards, it's not like non-core will stand a chance either, but there you go. Them's the breaks.

Not that far from the money. The dungeon is an Affably Evil Wizard's pet project to humiliate the Overly Confident Guildmaster who boasts that there is no dungeon his guild cannot vanquish. The party represents the unforseen element: Classes that were not taken into account by the Wiz.


Tucker's Kobolds, (http://www.tuckerskobolds.com/) but replace kobolds with Atropals that have 30 wizard class levels. 'Nuff said.

Replace 'atropals' with 'insert epic monster here' to fit flavor, if necessary.




For reference, assume a party of five characters, all between the levels of 8 and 10.



:smallsigh:

[Seerow]

Tucker's Kobolds, but replace kobolds with Atropals that have 30 wizard class levels. 'Nuff said.

Replace 'atropals' with 'insert epic monster here' to fit flavor, if necessary.

For reference, assume a party of five characters, all between the levels of 8 and 10.

:smallsigh:

To be fair, you asked for unbeatable, not unbeatable by everyone except for a level 8-10 group of non-core characters. You clarified the intent later, but can't blame the guy for giving you advice that makes the dungeon literally unbeatable.

[Incanur]

There's got to be something a spell-to-power erudite could do that even wizards can't.

[Korias]

To be fair, you asked for unbeatable, not unbeatable by everyone except for a level 8-10 group of non-core characters. You clarified the intent later, but can't blame the guy for giving you advice that makes the dungeon literally unbeatable.


Hence the quotations around "Unbeatable Dungeon". I'd mark your response to be you failing to read the entire OP since the only edit I made was to add "3.X" to game. I did ask for a series of challenges and listed the following criteria in the post:


The party will be made of non-core/hombrew characters
There will be 5 party members
They will be between levels 8 and 10
Challenges should be designed to tax Core characters to their limits.


Please, re-read the post again. You'll see that all the information is there, you simply need to read the damn post before saying "Oh, use these guys but make them level 30 wizards." :smallannoyed:

A thread title doesn't state everything about the thread. The opening post is what drives the thread, from there a thread Title can be derived. I needed a dungeon that was, for the purposes of the setting, unbeatable. Not that I need an unbeatable dungeon that nobody can take on. If I wanted that, I'd just put the party up against I.D. 36.

[Endarire]

Are Archivists (http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/ex/20051007a&page=3) alllowed?

Regarding incorporeal creatures in a no magic zone, EThergaunts (Fiend Folio 68) normally carry an item- the Etherblade- that does force damage. Nonmagically. Sure, you only get 50 shots per Etherblade, but it can be done.

[Tiki Snakes]

Wizard Cleric and Druid are Core.

So, really, we're going to need to know exactly what classes the players are going with to even stand a chance of tailoring it so that anything other than the most powerful things in the game can beat it.

If you're lucky, and they are all non-magic-based, you could just stick the whole thing in an anti-magic field.

[Korias]

Are Archivists (http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/ex/20051007a&page=3) alllowed?

Yep. Heroes of Horror is a book that I don't have access to normally, so it rarely ever shows up in games I play in. That stuff is "Homebrew" tier for me.



Regarding incorporeal creatures in a no magic zone, EThergaunts (Fiend Folio 68) normally carry an item- the Etherblade- that does force damage. Nonmagically. Sure, you only get 50 shots per Etherblade, but it can be done.
This is interesting. I'll be sure to note these down for future reference. Thanks!


Wizard Cleric and Druid are Core.

So, really, we're going to need to know exactly what classes the players are going with to even stand a chance of tailoring it so that anything other than the most powerful things in the game can beat it.

If you're lucky, and they are all non-magic-based, you could just stick the whole thing in an anti-magic field.

We don't know what the players are going to be, but there will be at least one or two magic-based PCs.

Here's an example of what I'm trying to get: If the Psionics are banned from the Players, I could drop a Psion-Killer somewhere in the dungeon. That should provide a challenge for a party, and prove devastating to a Psionic party, since they're built specifically for their namesake.

Another example: Since Clerics are banned, large groups of low-HD Undead are a challenge since Turning is unavailable. There are ways to counter it, yes, but turning Undead can clear quite a number of them before having to use more general methods like Alchemist's Fire or such.

[Seerow]

Hence the quotations around "Unbeatable Dungeon". I'd mark your response to be you failing to read the entire OP since the only edit I made was to add "3.X" to game. I did ask for a series of challenges and listed the following criteria in the post:


The party will be made of non-core/hombrew characters
There will be 5 party members
They will be between levels 8 and 10
Challenges should be designed to tax Core characters to their limits.


Please, re-read the post again. You'll see that all the information is there, you simply need to read the damn post before saying "Oh, use these guys but make them level 30 wizards." :smallannoyed:

A thread title doesn't state everything about the thread. The opening post is what drives the thread, from there a thread Title can be derived. I needed a dungeon that was, for the purposes of the setting, unbeatable. Not that I need an unbeatable dungeon that nobody can take on. If I wanted that, I'd just put the party up against I.D. 36.

So, you put pun-pun at the bottom of the dungeon.....




But seriously don't lash out at me. I'm not the one who suggested throwing epic casters at everyone, I was just arguing I can see why they would jump immediately to such a suggestion.



But honestly if you want challenges core characters at that level can't beat in any circumstance, but non-core will, we need more details on group composition and the like. To be able to get around the tricks a core wizard can pull out even at level 10, while still being beatable by something else, requires very precise and targeted encounters.

[Korias]

So, you put pun-pun at the bottom of the dungeon.....


Pun Pun has been preemptively banned by everyone in my gaming group because they know I'd use it.





But seriously don't lash out at me. I'm not the one who suggested throwing epic casters at everyone, I was just arguing I can see why they would jump immediately to such a suggestion.



Sorry about that. My mistake, was more directed at the other guy than you.




But honestly if you want challenges core characters at that level can't beat in any circumstance, but non-core will, we need more details on group composition and the like. To be able to get around the tricks a core wizard can pull out even at level 10, while still being beatable by something else, requires very precise and targeted encounters.

I wish I had a party roster, but I don't. I'm trying to write up the dungeon before getting everyone in on this because it takes less time to write a character than it does to write a dungeon.

[Crow]

This makes no sense. There is not really anything you can put together which a party of wizard, cleric, druid and...I dunno, rogue?...couldn't defeat much easier.

I mean what are you going to do? Make enemies only vulnerable to certain maneuvers? Create traps that only some obscure class ability can bypass? Pray the players figure this out without being told outright? Sounds a bit like a bust to me.

[Korias]

This makes no sense. There is not really anything you can put together which a party of wizard, cleric, druid and...I dunno, rogue?...couldn't defeat much easier.

I mean what are you going to do? Make enemies only vulnerable to certain maneuvers? Create traps that only some obscure class ability can bypass? Pray the players figure this out without being told outright? Sounds a bit like a bust to me.

I'm trying to move our players away from their comfort zones a bit and have them play something more ridiculous, just to try it. In the dungeon, parties have made progress but have always been thwarted by a certain enemy that they didn't prepare for. A Beholder inside of a tilting dome when nobody has good balance, or a group of Rust Monsters taking out the weapons of a group, or even a Dire-Werebear with two levels of Barbarian hiding as a prisoner inside of a goblin camp in the dungeon.

[Incanur]

It could work well with psionic characters if you opted to make pisonics fundamentally different from magic. Fill the dungeon with traps and creatures immune to both arcane and divine magic but vulnerable to mental power.

[Tiki Snakes]

I'm trying to move our players away from their comfort zones a bit and have them play something more ridiculous, just to try it. In the dungeon, parties have made progress but have always been thwarted by a certain enemy that they didn't prepare for. A Beholder inside of a tilting dome when nobody has good balance, or a group of Rust Monsters taking out the weapons of a group, or even a Dire-Werebear with two levels of Barbarian hiding as a prisoner inside of a goblin camp in the dungeon.

It's a good idea, but the central premise is a little broken, really.
Because pretty much any Dungeon that can't be cleared by Wizard / Cleric / Druid / Fourthwheelofchoice will chew up and spit out any of the classes you're likely to get.

Short of Lightningwarrior, perhaps. But they give up a lot of power for flavor, they don't even have a familiar!

[dextercorvia]

Yep. Heroes of Horror is a book that I don't have access to normally, so it rarely ever shows up in games I play in. That stuff is "Homebrew" tier for me.

<snip>
Another example: Since Clerics are banned, large groups of low-HD Undead are a challenge since Turning is unavailable. There are ways to counter it, yes, but turning Undead can clear quite a number of them before having to use more general methods like Alchemist's Fire or such.

HoH has Dread Necromancer, which gets Rebuke, so I don't recommend this. If you give him an instant army, combat will really slow down. Also, "Zombie228, you will check this hallway for traps." [Boom] "Zombie 229, your turn."

[Gorgondantess]

Here's some advice:
Tucker's Kobolds, but make them psionic mindflayers.
You're looking at creatures that are CR 8 a piece- so, for a level 9 party of 5, a tough challenge should be three or four- and have them do murderous things like look through a spyhole, dominate the party beefstick, and run. Use clever illusions. When they're asleep after their 15 minute workday, one will come up and dominate the most powerful member of the group (auto-fail on all saves) and have him as a sleeper agent.
Once your players have prepped for telepaths: give some a different discipline, maybe a blaster and an astral construct specialist, just to throw things off.
"Prisoners" who are voidminds and swear to help out the players then turn on them.
BBEG of the dungeon is a psionic mindflayer with 2 telepath levels and a heroic array, plus psionic meditation, a psionatrix of telepathy, and psionic endowment/greater psionic endowment. Then a +6 headband of intelligence. Oh, and if they were smart enough to get some sort of mindblank, easy enough to grab shatter mindblank.
Or just a psionic ulitharid (LoM) with an elite array. That works too.
It's sortof like Tomb of Horrors in that you're looking at something that, by the books, is for an 8-10 level party, but in the end a 13-15th level party would be better suited for it.

[ShneekeyTheLost]

HoH has Dread Necromancer, which gets Rebuke, so I don't recommend this. If you give him an instant army, combat will really slow down. Also, "Zombie228, you will check this hallway for traps." [Boom] "Zombie 229, your turn."

Yea, the Dread Necromancer will just be coming on-line at level 8, that's when he gets his boost to creating and controlling undead. If he picks up some Corpsecrafter feats, he could get real ugly.

I really would read a few pages from Tucker's Kobolds, though. That's a wonderful way to harass PC's without completely blowing them out of the water.

I will have to make one suggestion, and being serious about it, but hear me out because knee-jerk reaction will be "WTF??"

Someone mentioned AMF fields. I think this can be done, with moderation, to really annoy the party. You see, the people who did this are Wizards. They think the ultimate power is... magic. Most everyone else in D&D do as well. So they're gonna try to counter the most obvious 'break this dungeon' tool by shutting it down.

Also, you've shut down most of the arcane caster type classes by barring Wiz and Sorc, who are the two worst culprits. You've also banned all the Completes and PhB II as well, which means no Beguilers and no Warlocks. No Bards either. So AMF's won't be a completely game-breaking as they would be to a traditional party.

Combining AMF with Incorporeal? That's mean, because it effectively says 'you can't affect them'. However, if you give them a means to shut down, or temporarily disable the AMF's, they will be able to take care of it.

This is going to mean that toys are a whole lot less effective, which will also nerf one of the absolute nastiest Tier 1 classes around: The Artificer. Easily on par with Wizard, possibly moreso.

Perhaps there are items which dampen magic, say make a Caster Level check to activate any items. That'll put a jinx on anyone trying to just blast and cast their way out of a problem, but it won't really hamper things like magic swords which are simply magical in nature, but don't need to be activated. These items are in nearly every room. They can be disabled, as per a Magical Trap of a 6th level spell, but disabling it will only turn it off for a couple of minutes before it automatically resets.

[Grelna the Blue]

I've never played a Binder (from ToM), but the source of their magical abilities is listed as entities outside the boundaries of life, death, and undeath that even the gods can't touch. Further, Binders don't cast spells as such. It seems as if they might fall outside many limitations you might put on magic use in this place.

Same thing for all the practitioners of Shadow Mysteries, from the same book.

You'll probably want to give the PCs some hints about conditions in this place so they can try to tailor their PCs at least a little. For instance, and just as an example, if fire, cold, acid, and lightning damage are impossible or minimized within this place, the PCs could know that it is said that the stronghold has somehow been barred away from the elemental planes that are tied to all normal locations and that the elemental forces are weak or nonexistent there.

At higher levels, I believe a few non-core classes allow PCs to forgo the need to eat, sleep, or even breathe. That could conceivably be useful in dungeon design, if you knew the PCs were going to take those classes.

Ultimately, I think it'll be very difficult to design a dungeon for non-core characters if you have no idea what characters they're bringing. You might want to have the players roll up several characters each. Then you could create an adventure in which all the challenges are completely unsuited to core characters, but after each challenge is faced and the next is known there might be waypoints that allow the entire party or individual members to tag team out to bring other members in.

Sorry, that's all I can think of at the moment.

[Korias]

HoH has Dread Necromancer, which gets Rebuke, so I don't recommend this. If you give him an instant army, combat will really slow down. Also, "Zombie228, you will check this hallway for traps." [Boom] "Zombie 229, your turn."

Interesting. I'll definitely need to think about this a great deal more.


Here's some advice:
Tucker's Kobolds, but make them psionic mindflayers.
You're looking at creatures that are CR 8 a piece- so, for a level 9 party of 5, a tough challenge should be three or four- and have them do murderous things like look through a spyhole, dominate the party beefstick, and run. Use clever illusions. When they're asleep after their 15 minute workday, one will come up and dominate the most powerful member of the group (auto-fail on all saves) and have him as a sleeper agent.
Once your players have prepped for telepaths: give some a different discipline, maybe a blaster and an astral construct specialist, just to throw things off.
"Prisoners" who are voidminds and swear to help out the players then turn on them.
BBEG of the dungeon is a psionic mindflayer with 2 telepath levels and a heroic array, plus psionic meditation, a psionatrix of telepathy, and psionic endowment/greater psionic endowment. Then a +6 headband of intelligence. Oh, and if they were smart enough to get some sort of mindblank, easy enough to grab shatter mindblank.
Or just a psionic ulitharid (LoM) with an elite array. That works too.
It's sortof like Tomb of Horrors in that you're looking at something that, by the books, is for an 8-10 level party, but in the end a 13-15th level party would be better suited for it.

I'll be damned, that's a rather brutal combination. I like the way you think good sir. The real issue with that plan is making the rest of it scale so the party is able to take it on.


Yea, the Dread Necromancer will just be coming on-line at level 8, that's when he gets his boost to creating and controlling undead. If he picks up some Corpsecrafter feats, he could get real ugly.

I really would read a few pages from Tucker's Kobolds, though. That's a wonderful way to harass PC's without completely blowing them out of the water.

I will have to make one suggestion, and being serious about it, but hear me out because knee-jerk reaction will be "WTF??"

Someone mentioned AMF fields. I think this can be done, with moderation, to really annoy the party. You see, the people who did this are Wizards. They think the ultimate power is... magic. Most everyone else in D&D do as well. So they're gonna try to counter the most obvious 'break this dungeon' tool by shutting it down.

Also, you've shut down most of the arcane caster type classes by barring Wiz and Sorc, who are the two worst culprits. You've also banned all the Completes and PhB II as well, which means no Beguilers and no Warlocks. No Bards either. So AMF's won't be a completely game-breaking as they would be to a traditional party.

Combining AMF with Incorporeal? That's mean, because it effectively says 'you can't affect them'. However, if you give them a means to shut down, or temporarily disable the AMF's, they will be able to take care of it.

This is going to mean that toys are a whole lot less effective, which will also nerf one of the absolute nastiest Tier 1 classes around: The Artificer. Easily on par with Wizard, possibly moreso.

Perhaps there are items which dampen magic, say make a Caster Level check to activate any items. That'll put a jinx on anyone trying to just blast and cast their way out of a problem, but it won't really hamper things like magic swords which are simply magical in nature, but don't need to be activated. These items are in nearly every room. They can be disabled, as per a Magical Trap of a 6th level spell, but disabling it will only turn it off for a couple of minutes before it automatically resets.

The real hitch is making it so that a Wizard BBEG would be able to function in such a large number of AMF fields. AMF fields tend to be quite a nice touch though, and they'll definitely feature into the design. However, you say that I've shut down most Arcane casters (Bards, Beguilers, Sorcerers, Wizards, and Warlocks), are there any other Arcane casters I should be on the lookout for?


I've never played a Binder (from ToM), but the source of their magical abilities is listed as entities outside the boundaries of life, death, and undeath that even the gods can't touch. Further, Binders don't cast spells as such. It seems as if they might fall outside many limitations you might put on magic use in this place.

Binders have always been a favorite of mine ever since I saw this. (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=59107) It's a pretty good read in it's own right, but the whole vestige thing is absolutely brilliant.


Same thing for all the practitioners of Shadow Mysteries, from the same book.

This could be interesting then. I'll need a way to counter these guys and make sure my players don't try to make their party Shadow-centric.



You'll probably want to give the PCs some hints about conditions in this place so they can try to tailor their PCs at least a little. For instance, and just as an example, if fire, cold, acid, and lightning damage are impossible or minimized within this place, the PCs could know that it is said that the stronghold has somehow been barred away from the elemental planes that are tied to all normal locations and that the elemental forces are weak or nonexistent there.

The PCs will have access to previous expedition's members to pick them over for knowledge, so this is already taken care of. Thanks for the heads up though!



At higher levels, I believe a few non-core classes allow PCs to forgo the need to eat, sleep, or even breathe. That could conceivably be useful in dungeon design, if you knew the PCs were going to take those classes.

I'll keep that in mind, especially since I know that one player intends to be a Warforged no matter what campaign we do (He's never played one and hasn't had the chance to before now).


Ultimately, I think it'll be very difficult to design a dungeon for non-core characters if you have no idea what characters they're bringing. You might want to have the players roll up several characters each. Then you could create an adventure in which all the challenges are completely unsuited to core characters, but after each challenge is faced and the next is known there might be waypoints that allow the entire party or individual members to tag team out to bring other members in.

Sorry, that's all I can think of at the moment.
This is true, and since it IS a one-shot, a tag team party could work... Hm. I like this idea quite a bit actually.

Thanks for the suggestions everyone!

[dextercorvia]

I'll third the AMF idea, but rather than make the enemies incorporeal, give them DR/Magic.



The real hitch is making it so that a Wizard BBEG would be able to function in such a large number of AMF fields. AMF fields tend to be quite a nice touch though, and they'll definitely feature into the design. However, you say that I've shut down most Arcane casters (Bards, Beguilers, Sorcerers, Wizards, and Warlocks), are there any other Arcane casters I should be on the lookout for?


Initiate of Mystra.

[Morithias]

I would like to point out that in the DMG an "auto-reset" trap takes only 500 gp onto the price tag, and I think there's another add on that makes them turn back on after being disabled.

Throw those two onto the traps and even if they beat the dungeon well...better damn hope you don't roll a 1 on those saving throws on the way back out. The fact you're half dead and carrying a ton of extra weight isn't helping too.

[Sir Swindle89]

Tome of Horrors ,Tome of Horrors, Tome of Horrors
how did this go this long without it being mentioned.

[Morithias]

Tome of Horrors ,Tome of Horrors, Tome of Horrors
how did this go this long without it being mentioned.

To be fair the OP is trying to make an original dungeon, but yes great reference point. Although they REALLY toned it down over the years.

[GoatBoy]

If you can get a copy of Dungeonscape, look up what they term as "encounter traps," that is, traps which serve to engage the entire party and require multiple approaches to disarm. They mix things up for parties who are used to either straight-up monster fights, or traps which only serve to make the Rogue feel useful for two rolls of the dice.

Non-Euclidean space is always fun, too.

The movie "Cube" could serve as an example of the ultimate nightmare dungeon.

[Sipex]

I've got it:

You come to a hall way, it is laden with stone bricks, at the end is a set of double doors.

Traps: Walls, Floor, Ceiling, Air, Doors, Door handles, Lock on the doors, Door hinges.
Trap Effect: Everyone Dies - No Save
Disable Device/Thievery DC: 30
Special: When a player successfully disables a trap with a Disable Device (or Thievery) check they are subjected to a secodary attack: Everyone Dies - No Save

Bam, unbeatable.

[dextercorvia]

I've got it:

You come to a hall way, it is laden with stone bricks, at the end is a set of double doors.

Traps: Walls, Floor, Ceiling, Air, Doors, Door handles, Lock on the doors, Door hinges.
Trap Effect: Everyone Dies - No Save
Disable Device/Thievery DC: 30
Special: When a player successfully disables a trap with a Disable Device (or Thievery) check they are subjected to a secodary attack: Everyone Dies - No Save

Bam, unbeatable.

I'm going to pretend that you meant that seriously... The Necropolitan Dread Necromancer is immune to death effects.

[Sipex]

Oh damn.

Well, now I want to take it seriously except I don't know enough about 3.5 to get around that.

Actually, this is an interesting challenge, making the dungeon as a single hallway.

[Morithias]

Oh damn.

Well, now I want to take it seriously except I don't know enough about 3.5 to get around that.

Actually, this is an interesting challenge, making the dungeon as a single hallway.

If you pass the Disable DC by 10 or more (I think) you study the trap and figure out how to get by without disabling it, therefore not triggering the secondary effect.

[Sipex]

Double damn.

[Morithias]

Double damn.

First way would have worked, the undead are only immune to death effects that have the [death] descriptor. I'm pretty sure a high level cleric's holy word spell would kill them for example.

[Sir Swindle89]

They are called Sphere of Annihilation and you put them every where. Bottom of pit trap, Magically bouncing around rooms, rock fall trap with the rock replaced by one, Indiana Jones style rolling Sphere of Annihilation

http://www.d20srd.org/srd/magicItems/artifacts.htm

[Morithias]

They are called Sphere of Annihilation and you put them every where. Bottom of pit trap, Magically bouncing around rooms, rock fall trap with the rock replaced by one, Indiana Jones style rolling Sphere of Annihilation

http://www.d20srd.org/srd/magicItems/artifacts.htm

Once you start pulling artifacts like that I'd stop calling that "unbeatable dungeon" and more "unbeatable suspension of disbelief".

Not to be a jerk, but there are lines. There's a reason we don't have to find a hidden spring, jump across 3 rooftops and then hit a switch on our roof to unlock our front doors in real life.

Just think of it this way.

Man can fly = Awesome, but unreal.
Bat Credit Card = More likely, but STUPID!!!!

[ShneekeyTheLost]

The real hitch is making it so that a Wizard BBEG would be able to function in such a large number of AMF fields. AMF fields tend to be quite a nice touch though, and they'll definitely feature into the design. However, you say that I've shut down most Arcane casters (Bards, Beguilers, Sorcerers, Wizards, and Warlocks), are there any other Arcane casters I should be on the lookout for?

Artificers. They spell trouble every single time. Automatic effects going off when you use an item? Yea, here's the action economy... *shows an egg* Here's your Action Economy on Artificers *cracks and fries egg*. Any questions?

Archivists. It's like a divine wizard... only even worse, because he can pull from any divine spell. That means domain spells, which gives him most of the Wizard spells anyways, that means divine bard, that means druid, that means paladin, that means any divine prestige class evar that has it's own spell list.

As far as how to have your BBEG function normally, here's an idea:

He realizes that the most powerful threat to him is another caster. So he's put stuff all over the place which represses magic in the area, however it's passworded so that he can act freely (think Forbiddance, and a password to teleport freely within ).

This isn't an AMF, in that magic doesn't actually cease to exist. However, anyone casting any magic must overcome a Spell Resistance (set to a very obnoxious number, depending on what your party could regularly be expected to hit. I'd probably try to aim at needing an actual 15+ on the actual roll) or it is repressed.

These items are considered to be magical traps, and an individual with trapfinding may temporarily disable them, however they automatically reset after five minutes. It also takes about ten minutes to disable the device temporarily. The DC is set at 25 + spell level, so let's set the spell level at 6th level (same as an actual AMF) for a DC of 31. That ought to be obnoxious enough for a low to mid level group.

This repression effect also affects any activated magic items or any spell-like abilities actively used.

This gives your party a chance to buff up before combat, if they've got a skillmonkey and they are quick about it, and also gives your party a chance to heal between combat, but keeps them from using magic in combat.

The BBEG, having set them up, either has a bypass or has a high enough CL that the SR doesn't really bother him.

[nyarlathotep]

Here's an idea have a custom anti-magic field. Instead of simply preventing anything magical from functioning it automatically makes a counterspell attempt at +50 or some similarly arbitrarily high number. Then stick a big nasty incorporeal non-undead at the dungeon's start. Only non-spellcasting magic users could beat, it a group that has no core members.

[Sir Swindle89]

Once you start pulling artifacts like that I'd stop calling that "unbeatable dungeon" and more "unbeatable suspension of disbelief".

Not to be a jerk, but there are lines. There's a reason we don't have to find a hidden spring, jump across 3 rooftops and then hit a switch on our roof to unlock our front doors in real life.

Just think of it this way.

Man can fly = Awesome, but unreal.
Bat Credit Card = More likely, but STUPID!!!!

Unbeatable not mamby pamby, oh no their spell caster scryed on the treasure and teleported to it dungeon. Celestial chimps can't disable a falling Sphere of Ahnialation trap!

I took unbeatable as hard at 20 when Skal'Dor, Immortal Father of Umbral Blots is the villan.

[kestrel404]

A dungeon that is unbeatable by the core classes must:
Have a solution for extreme melee efficiency (not difficult, above average melee monsters played tactically can do this).
Have a solution for full casters (AMF/Anti-psi field with an epic caster level (even IoM forces a caster-level check to overcome))
Have a solution for extraordinary stealth (blindsight, touchsight, tremorsense)

That's it, really.

You NEED the AMF to deal with a full caster reliably. Without it, a well-prepared level 10 wizard can solo most dungeons that will challenge an entire party of level 20 fighters. If you're saying that the wizard (with his party) could not defeat this dungeon under any circumstance, then an AMF they can't get around is the only explanation.

The problem is that this covers most of the existing rules in D&D. Even homebrew will leave you unable to deal with most problems in such an environment. In published D&D material?
With the Ex teleportation maneuvers from Tome of Battle (gotten via Swordsage or feats), combined with the Ex immunities from Bone Knight, on top of the Ex regeneration from the Troll-blooded feat, along with non-magical immunities to fire and acid (fire gnome half-dragon is a good starting point), you've got a character that can SURVIVE such a dungeon long enough to make an impact.

A fly-by-attack dive-bomber build with perfect maneuverability built on a chasis of odd base and prestige classes could make for a melee fighter who's not hampered by most terrain features or traps.

An incorporeal character from the Ghostwalker books would make for a useful scout/trapmonkey who's also capable of bypassing most magical senses - either that or a ghost-templated character who can pierce AMFs.

There are some other highly non-standard, cheese-flavored builds that you could use on a dungeon where standard melee, magic and stealth are all rendered useless.

But your party must know this beforehand (I think you've covered that), and they need to be good optimizers so that they can make useful characters who don't fit any of the usual molds.

Do you want specific examples of traps and encounters that will render meleers useless? I'm good with traps and terrain, but somebody else should choose monsters.

[OracleofWuffing]

Try to reinvent Illusory Air for 3.5. I think someone that reads webcomics knows the comic I'm talking about.

The premise for Illusory Air is, back in the day, you had to make a conscious effort to disbelieve an illusion in order to break the illusion. So, you have the party get sucked into a room where all the air has been sucked out, and replaced with Illusory Air. While in this room, the PCs are unable to speak to each other (because there is no air), and are unaware that they're making fortitude saves for "holding" their breath. Additionally, not being able to speak means that spells with spoken components are a no-go, and no air means nonmagical fire stops working, too. So, your characters just think they're under some silence effect that squelches fire, but when they finally figure it out, they immediately see that they're all turning blue in the face. Panic ensues.

You'd need to reinvent it, though, because the 3.5 rules would give you a save when you interact with the air.

Colossal blocks should... uh... block a hallway, except the hallway is only large enough for Fine and smaller creatures. The hallway alternates between regular and fine sized corridors, with encounters in each.

Create traps or situations that require Overrun attacks.

Bat-like creatures that swarm arcane casters, but don't actually attack them. They cling on to the caster's body and increase ACF.

Invisible creatures that sneak around and swap the players' gear for cursed items.

Every Day/X Hours/X Encounters, parts of the dungeon rotate, so mapping will be arbitrarily difficult.

MINE CART MINIGAME!