Surviving the World's Largest Dungeon [3.5]

[Kerikath]

I'd like some help building a character for this adventure because I've heard a few ominous things from the DM about how difficult it is just to survive past the first two segments of the adventure. I'm only aware of the basic premise and that it operates a little differently from normal D&D, in that you only gain levels by finding certain rooms with experience mechanisms. From what I do understand, it'd be good to have a character with high versatility and, of course, "dungeons skills".

So, if you gentlemen and ladies would be willing to assist me, the first step should be to pick a class. All 3.5 supplements are allowed, and no houserules apply. I'm thinking rogue, ninja, scout, factotum, or erudite. Suggestions?

[gkathellar]

Of the classes you listed, Factotum is an obvious choice for equal parts versatility and Font of Inspiration cheese. Erudite is, of course, strictly the best class of the bunch, especially with Spell to Power on hand.

Ninja is awful, and Scout will suffer for its lack of dungeoneering skills, which means if you're looking for something lower-powered than the above two the clear choice is Rogue.

[Duncan_Ruadrik]

yeah... you dont want to be a wizard. There is no way to research new spells, and even if your DM allows you two new ones per level... as a wizard, you still want more, because your strength is versatility. In the Worlds Largest Dungeon, a wizard is a basically a prepared sorcerer with fewer spells per day.

A rogue is basically necessary. In fact, even in the first segment or two, there are traps a rogue with full ranks in Disable Device will have trouble with. I should remember, I was the rogue.

Of course, people will always Factotum is better, but ugh... Rogue is a classic.

[sonofzeal]

yeah... you dont want to be a wizard. There is no way to research new spells, and even if your DM allows you two new ones per level... as a wizard, you still want more, because your strength is versatility. In the Worlds Largest Dungeon, a wizard is a basically a prepared sorcerer with fewer spells per day.

A rogue is basically necessary. In fact, even in the first segment or two, there are traps a rogue with full ranks in Disable Device will have trouble with. I should remember, I was the rogue.

Of course, people will always Factotum is better, but ugh... Rogue is a classic.
Factotum isn't exactly "better", it's just classier. More options, more variety, more tactically interesting. But Rogues definitely outperform them in some areas, and a good Rogue should never be underestimated.

But I can't blame people for recommending Factotum, they're fun to play.

[Kerikath]

A rogue is basically necessary. In fact, even in the first segment or two, there are traps a rogue with full ranks in Disable Device will have trouble with. I should remember, I was the rogue.

Good, someone who's actually played this then. Would I be correct in assuming that it's unwise to play a wizard, cleric, archivist, or artificer due to the unique nature of resources rewards and access to spell components?

[faceroll]

Good, someone who's actually played this then. Would I be correct in assuming that it's unwise to play a wizard, cleric, archivist, or artificer due to the unique nature of resources rewards and access to spell components?

Nab Eschew Materials and you don't have to worry about spell components. You can get your number of spells learned upon level up for a wizard up to 5. That's 10 spells known per spell level. You need racial substitution levels and a feat.

[Kerikath]

Nab Eschew Materials and you don't have to worry about spell components.
Except for those useful spells with expensive components, like stoneskin. I'm not certain how many of those spells actually exist, though, so perhaps it's just a passing concern.


You can get your number of spells learned upon level up for a wizard up to 5. That's 10 spells known per spell level. You need racial substitution levels and a feat.
Something from Unearthed Arcana, I'm guessing? Care to explain how it's done?:smallsmile:

[Duncan_Ruadrik]

Good, someone who's actually played this then. Would I be correct in assuming that it's unwise to play a wizard, cleric, archivist, or artificer due to the unique nature of resources rewards and access to spell components?

Yes, exactly. However, a sorcerer is still fine, as is a Cleric and Druid... though the druid will hurt a bit as that there is only one segment that you could consider "outdoorsy"... and yeah, its still in the Dungeon, segment 3 or 4.

IF I recall correctly, we had... a Sorcerer, a necromancy focused Wizard, a Ranger, a Cleric, and a Favored Soul. Plus me, the Rogue. Frankly, I was the only optimized character there. The Cleric had a habit of NOT waiting for me to check for traps/enemies, so at one point, just opened the door on me while trying to check for traps, and killed me. of course with her beefy cleric-ness, she lived... very unapologetic, I might add.

After that I rolled a Duskblade... stupid idea since IIRC, the sorcerer and the ranger (who was wounded) was killed by a scorching ray trap shortly thereafter. I believe we ended up making the necromancer wizard's skeleton minion carry a tower shield up front and trigger all of the traps ahead of time... Until the wizard had an argument with the cleric and left the party... he ended up dying with his hand crossbow clutched in one hand.

After that, I realized the need to have a rogue around, and once my Duskblade perished like a hero, I rolled up a Ranger 2/Rogue X, which went through the rest of the game, and in fact outlived the rest of the party at the end, and numerous drop in characters. He ended up being THE best scout/trapfinder I have ever played... well, the one that survived the longest, anyway.

This all happened within the first segment, by the way. Oh, and great for a rogue is...
a were-rat sorcerer at the end of the first segment, which if you happen to get bitten by, would increase your effectiveness as a rogue in combat by quite a bit. We had a difficult enough time killing it, without me trying to get bit, and killing it, so.. yeah. just a tip.

[qcbtnsrm]

Ah, WLD... good times... good times.
That was my first 3.x D&D campaign. We ran through with the following party.
(Me) Monk/Favored Soul with Vow of Poverty (can you say MAD?)
Monk/Rogue
Paladin
Bard/Rogue/Shadowdancer/Master of Masks/(dozens of other PrCs)
Wizard/Sorcerer/Ultimate Magus (with about a 6 Con, yeah 1hp per level on average)

We were not exactly optimized. But we did survive. So it is possible. Although to be fair we did have a few reboots, hand waves, and "miraculous spontaneous resurrections" to allow the party to survive the first few levels. After that we were on our own. But those early levels are brutal. Once we had Create Food and Water and had discovered some hidey holes we could fort up in for a night (gotta love extended Rope Trick), things got much better.

Here are some points I wish I knew.
1- There is no loot. No seriously, no loot. The most memorable weapon we found was a +1 dragon bane dagger... and we spent about 5 hours digging in a rubble filled room to even find that. We were thorough and convinced we were missing all the cool toys, but no there just weren't any toys to be had. The Paladin was still wearing his original scale mail at level 14-16. So keep that in mind. Your character had better not be dependent on magic items. VoP turned out to make me really powerful compared to the rest of the group. Two members went into Kensei just so they could get a magic weapon.

2- There was a lot of weird magic. So broad swaths of spell casting were out of bounds (no summoning or battlefield control spells for example). Not a big issue for us. But we were specifically warned against Druid and Summoners.

3- Think about basic survival. There is no food or many water sources. Plan accordingly. Likewise you won't have many safe places to sleep. So try not to need any. You should expect to get ambushed every time you stop to rest, unless you take extreme measures to protect yourself. VoP almost killed me here. My character was literally starving by the time we got Create Food and Water.

4- There is a trap every 10 feet or so in some places. You need someone/something to deal with this.

[Vizzerdrix]

Hello. The group I play with is currently closing in on the end of the first section, and other than a trap or two we have very little trouble. Bring extra rations if you can and a warm sweater. And look into alternative methods of healing and you'll be fine. Good luck, and happy gaming!

First area monster spoiler! You'll get sick of stirges, rat swarms and darkmantles.

One more thing: Loot. Most say that their isn't any and in a way they are correct. You will not find much useful loot, but you'll find tons of mundane stuff. So much so that I'm keeping an ancestral relic topped off.

[Kerikath]

Jesus. I had no idea the dungeon was quite like that. I figured out the racial substitution-feat combo that gets you 5 spells known per level, and with Eschew Materials and a careful avoidance of costly spells, wizard might be a feasible class in this adventure.

So, base classes I'm now looking at for this beastly dungeon: Wizard, cleric, archivist, erudite, binder, beguiler, bard, ranger, or factotum. I haven't played an archivist, erudite, binder, beguiler, or factotum before. Again, I'm looking for a class that has dungeon skillz. Out of all these classes, I have pretty much no idea how to build an erudite.

Which class would y'all most recommend I take out of those? And if you're going to recommend erudite, please tell me some guidelines.

[Vizzerdrix]

If you take cleric, I'd like to propose taking healing devotion. It has made a big impact on our group.

[faceroll]

Erudite can actually be VERY powerful if you can make it to level 7. Psychic Reformation lets you spend xp to retrain feats, powers, spells, and skills, so you can pretty much rebuild your whole party. Pick up lots of toughness and psionic talent, then move that all out for better stuff after you get to higher levels.

The issue with erudite is learning new powers. You won't get to do that in the dungeon. The only way to do it will be to use psychic reformation to give yourself craft power stone (basically psionic craft scroll), then give yourself a power you want, put it in the stone, then psychic reform your known powers to something else, then use the stone to get the power back out. XP expensive, and you have to find materials for those powerstones, by RAW.

HOWEVER, you can get around material component requirements by sacrificing creatures to dark gods, thanks to sacrifice rules in book of vile deeds. Of course, you have to be extremely despicably evil.

If you need down time, you can always seal yourself up in a room if the cleric uses stone shape or the wizard uses wall of stone.

The issue is making it that far.

I think, ultimately, an evil party of factotum, wizard, cleric, erudite would do best.

[Kerikath]

I think, ultimately, an evil party of factotum, wizard, cleric, erudite would do best.
Don't know who the other players are yet, which is not the best thing I know, so I can't rely on being able to use Vile Darkness cheese. In any event, I still haven't gotten any recommendations on what class I should pick.

[JaronK]

From the classes you said... definitely Factotum. The checks to find traps are ludicrous in that dungeon (especially considering the difficulty getting gear) so Factotum really helps, and you might even want the feat that lets you use Dex for Search and Disable Device (Tactile Trapsmith... as a Factotum, you'll get Int + Dex).

Also, the flexibility of spells without a spellbook really helps.

JaronK

[Dusk Eclipse]

I too second the Erutide, it is really strong if you know what you are doing and I am sure your team-mates will love you if you use Psychic Reformation in them too so they can amend mistakes or help them be better suited for the challenge at hand.

Also for extra cheese, pick linked power and use it with Psychic Reformation by RAW it will manifest itself as a no action, thus saving a lot of time and even letting you use it mid-battle. Beware of the flying DMGs they can bypass every defence known to 3.5 players.

[gorfnab]

Something from Unearthed Arcana, I'm guessing? Care to explain how it's done?:smallsmile:
Easy Bake Wizard

Elf, preferably Gray

Elf Wizard Racial Sub - Races of the Wild
Eidetic Spellcaster ACF - Dragon Magazine #357
Spontaneous Divination ACF - Complete Champion - Optional but great at higher levels
Collegiate Wizard feat - Complete Arcane

1st Level - 7+ Int mod 1st level spells known, all cantrips, 1 extra spell per day of highest level
No Familiar, No Scribe Scroll, No Spellbook

For a little cheese look into Domain Wizard from UA since it does stack with the Elf Wizard Racial Sub.

Note: Every level after 1st that advances wizard spellcasting gets you 5 spells known for free instead of the usual 2

Edit: If you're playing in Eberron, the feat Aerenal Arcanist (Player's Guide to Eberron) will net you an additional spell known per level netting you 8+Int spells at 1st level and 6 additional spells known every level after that.

Other Options: If flaws are available you can take Sacred Vow and Vow of Poverty at first level and still have a decent caster.

[Gavinfoxx]

What you have to do is figure out WHICH house rules he is and isn't enforcing... there are some CRAZY heavy handed house rules in that module... this is vital to survival, several things are dramatically different than how you would expect them to work in a standard D&D world. I'll have a list a bit later..




1.) For characters that can invest resources in 'burrowing', 'earthgliding', and 'burrowing through stone', are the use of their abilities nerfed? IE, are inner room walls impervious as *well as* the obviously impervious outer walls? IE, will we sometimes be able to scout or bypass rooms in this way?
2.) For characters who invest in being able to do things with crafting materials, will you be using the standard lack of crafting supplies in this dungeon? Or will supplies be found, or will you be able to convert GP value in items to generic crafting supplies at a particular ratio?
3.) For characters who can replace animal companions or such things via summoning them, either a few times a day or via a 24 hour ritual, will those abilities work as advertised? What if you want to release your existing animal companion and summon a new one? What about the magical paladin pokeball-mounts?
4.) For characters that invest in short range teleports, or becoming etherial, or things like that, do those work as advertised? At least for interior areas?
5.) For characters that expect to be able to Take 10 or Take 20 on skills, do those work as advertised?
6.) For characters that invest in having access to, say, an Extended Rope Trick at level 5, does that work as advertised, to get access to a safe space? What are your rulings on Extradimensional or nondimensional spaces working in the dungeon? What if a Wizard wants to actually scribe scrolls, will you be handwaving the exotic inks necessary to do so? Maybe just subtract a GP worth of value to do this? What if an Easy Bake Wizard (it's a named build using a few combinations of techniques) wants to spend some time scribing scrolls to his brain by burning incenses, will those be placed as treasure?
7.) Will you be making intelligent adjustments to the 'security' of rooms or wandering monster based issues based on intelligent barricading techniques?
8.) Will you be changing the treasure of the module? Most of the treasure of the module is supposedly completely useless -- ie, 'art', or 'not equipment' sorts of things, or things that doesn't actually HELP, or things too large to be taken. Alternately, are you relaxing the restrictions on the feat 'Ancestral Relic', ie, the only real way to appropriately sacrifice the crappy treasure to make useful equipment, maybe give it out as a bonus feat or not make it 'good aligned only'? Is this feat suggested or appropriate for this particular campaign?
9.) The module suggests completely banning the entire category of 'battlefield control' spells from the game, and mentions that they will not be placed in the game. Typically, a few pages later, a Web scroll is given out as treasure. Are there any house rules on battlefield control spells?

[Kerikath]

What you have to do is figure out WHICH house rules he is and isn't enforcing...
It seems that we'll be able to use alternate modes of movement like burrowing as is normal. Crafting characters are just going to be unplayable. Familiar and companion replacement should function normally. Teleportation magic is completely shut down, but ethereality should work most of the time. Taking 10 is fine, and taking 20 can be done at risk of interruption by nasty things. Extradimensional spaces are kosher, and because you can't create openings to the astral plane, IT IS IN FACT COOL TO PUT A BAG OF HOLDING IN A PORTABLE HOLE AND VICE VERSA. Not that we'll get access to either piece of equipment, and it wouldn't reduce the carrying weight further. I'm not sure what you mean when you talk about the security of rooms. Ancestral Relic will not be allowed. Battlefield control spells will fire off normally.


I'll have a list a bit later...
Sounds like that'd be helpful. Please do.

Also, my DM told me something insane today. I asked him, as a joke, if I could play a gestalt character with Vow of Poverty. He said it was cool. :smalleek: I asked him if he was serious, and he said he was. He said I can use literally anything from 3.5. I'm now tempted to take Vow just because it'd eventually nullify so many of the things that screw you in this dungeon. The bonuses it grants would make it as though I'm getting the normal progression of magical equipment for my character. I wouldn't have to eat, drink, or breathe after 11th level. I kind of want to take this feat, but I might feel bad later if I do. :smallfrown:

[RedWarrior0]

Vow of Poverty Warforged all the way, then. Seriously, do it.

Also, get your entire party to do so as well.

[Gavinfoxx]

Well I got the list! see the edited post... but apparently you saw that...

The thing with extradimensional spaces was using rope trick or extended rope trick to you know, rest safely and securely for 9 hours...

Uhm. You know how some modules have wandering monsters every half hour or hour, where it is difficult to rest in places that are not specifically written up possible to make into safe places to rest? Some old modules from back in the day have that 'feature' as a way of punishing parties who don't obviously find the specific out of the way room which was written up as being a room that was safe to rest in? Just a thought to consider that topic in general, you know. Hint Hint.

[Fizban]

I've read the first couple of sections of WLD and am itching to try and run it with my group, so I think I can comment on it. I also posted in Vizzerdrix's thread a couple months ago and will spoiler those at the end of this post (and you should probably go read that thread as well).

in that you only gain levels by finding certain rooms with experience mechanisms.
Say what? No, that would be dumb. In WLD you have to reduce the xp awards because otherwise the party would be something like level 8 before they finished the first section (according to the module intro, but seriously there are a loooooot of monsters). It gives the DM a couple suggestions for how to do so, but nothing hard and fast like that. Unless you have a reason to track it down to the point like item crafting, xp cost spells, or enforcing death penalties (how'd you get resurrected anyway?), I'd suggest just leveling up whenever the DM says so.

even if your DM allows you two new ones per level...
Those spells are yours by default rights and anything else is a targetted houserule. I hear this a lot and it really irks me :smallfrown:

1.) For characters that can invest resources in 'burrowing', 'earthgliding', and 'burrowing through stone', are the use of their abilities nerfed? IE, are inner room walls impervious as *well as* the obviously impervious outer walls? IE, will we sometimes be able to scout or bypass rooms in this way?
That's no houserule. Burrowing never works on stone unless the creature entry specifies it, and Earth Glide only works on natural stone. While there are some natural caverns later, the vast majority of the dungeon is. . . dungeon. Something someone built. Not natural stone. So no Earth Glide.

2.) For characters who invest in being able to do things with crafting materials, will you be using the standard lack of crafting supplies in this dungeon? Or will supplies be found, or will you be able to convert GP value in items to generic crafting supplies at a particular ratio?
While the answer should be obvious for magic items (Aside from Ancestral Relic), this is a good question regarding mundane crafting. Technically mundane crafting requires the same unspecified gp worth of materials, but there are plenty of useful items you could logically craft in the dungeon (see my posts below for examples).

3.) For characters who can replace animal companions or such things via summoning them, either a few times a day or via a 24 hour ritual, will those abilities work as advertised? What if you want to release your existing animal companion and summon a new one? What about the magical paladin pokeball-mounts?
4.) For characters that invest in short range teleports, or becoming etherial, or things like that, do those work as advertised? At least for interior areas?
5.) For characters that expect to be able to Take 10 or Take 20 on skills, do those work as advertised?
6.) For characters that invest in having access to, say, an Extended Rope Trick at level 5, does that work as advertised, to get access to a safe space? What are your rulings on Extradimensional or nondimensional spaces working in the dungeon?
Again, those should be fairly obvious. There is absolutely no extraplanar travel in the dungeon simply because it would not work otherwise. So no summoning monsters or paladin mounts. Similarly, unless your DM drops in an animal that can be made into a companion, those can't be replaced either. Frankly, druids don't need the extra buff anyway, and there are alternate class features to replace most companion abilities. Anyone who does invest in teleportation when they know they can't use it is a fool and deserves what they get for wasting their resources on it, and you can't run a game like WLD without letting the players know beforehand (it's just bad DMing).

7.) Will you be making intelligent adjustments to the 'security' of rooms or wandering monster based issues based on intelligent barricading techniques?
I mention this below but it bears pre-repeating here: there are places to rest in the dungeon. They are specifically called out to the DM and they players shouldn't have trouble finding them. Unless you try "intelligent barricade techniques" in the middle of an enemy stronghold, you shouldn't even be rolling random encounters while resting. Honestly, based on some people's experiences I'm beginning to think some DMs are just jumping straight to the room descriptions without reading any of the massive introduction that is required to run the dungeon properly at all :smallsigh:

9.) The module suggests completely banning the entire category of 'battlefield control' spells from the game, and mentions that they will not be placed in the game. Typically, a few pages later, a Web scroll is given out as treasure. Are there any house rules on battlefield control spells?
I will definitely agree on this one. I actually would recommend some sort of nerfing even if you don't want to ban them, but banning something only for players is ridiculous.

And finally, here are my posts from Vizzerdrix's thread. I go into a lot of detail on basic assumptions and what the module actually says on the topics of food and resting, suggested builds for healing and trapfinding, and how to use Ancestral Relic:

Late to the party as usual. I've read through the first few dungeon sections, so I think I can speak on the topic.

There are definitely a lot of ham-fisted housrules suggested (the web one has been pointed out already, so dumb :smallfurious:), but sleeping and eating aren't as bad as people have said. There are at least two different rooms in each region that are specifically listed as safe for resting, and usually a couple more that are supposed to be safe if you wall them up a bit. There's one trap room in particular that becomes literally impossible to enter from the outside once you're inside, which you can then open from the inside with disable device. As for eating, there's a short section about that lists a number of different ideas, ranging from finding food as you need it to just handwaving it by saying nothing needs to eat in the dungeon. The summary is that food is not supposed to be a problem at all, and resting should in theory be easy enough if you find a good room for it.

Edit: Grr, lost the rest of my post. Reconstruction:

The best way to fight WLD is to use stuff that was printed after it came out, and thus was not targeted by the draconican anti-PC housrules. The all-warforged sublime way party is a good idea, though it could replace the swordsage with an arcanist or psionicist. You really need the nova potential and raw spell quality for some rooms. Also good is the all druid plan, except that you absolutely need a skill monkey. WLD is ridiculously trap heavy, to the point where the traps can often be more dangerous than the foes. Half of one of the sections I've read was nothing but traps (aside from random encounters), if that gives you some perspective. I'd recommend a multi-class build, with sorcerer1 to get Instant Locksmith and Spontaneous Search, and cleric3 to get Divine Insight. The sorcerer spells will let you search for and disable traps quickly under pressure, with the search spell giving you results as if you'd taken 10 even if the houserules say you can't, while Divine Insight gives you a massive bonus on skill checks to make up for not being able to buy proper skill bonus items. Fill it in with the skillmonkey base of your choice, such as rogue, ninja, or factotum, and gauge how many more casting levels you'll need for spell slots from there.

For clerics, I recommend the Divine Restoration variant from Dungeonscape. It hardly costs you anything, and there is a section where you will die unless you can restore ability damage at all times. If you want a little more healing capacity without burning feats, the Healing Pool variant from Divine Champion can give you a good amount that'll never be wasted on overkill, and the Touch of Healing feat almost goes without mentioning even though it does cost a feat. (Note: don't knock a dedicated healer build, they can be serious business. I wouldn't bother with Sacred Healing- take either Augment Healing to vastly improve all your healing spells, or Sacred Boost to maximize a few out-of-combat heals per day. Healing's a rather all or nothing gig though, so unless you really intend to focus on it, I'd just take Touch of Healing and the Healing Pool variant to recover between fights without burning too many spell slots).

And regarding magic items, I'll add to what everyone else has said on how little and poor they are with some general examples. The first couple of regions give you some extremely expensive +2 weapons (if you're lucky enough to find them, that is), and pretty much nothing else because that fills up your WBL for quite a while. The next couple of regions have more +1 weapons, a couple +1 armors, and a couple more hard to find +2 weapons in a room you'll probably run away from to avoid dying. There's a nice +2 armor in one room behind a puzzle that you probably won't even know exists, and has a similar "bind on pickup" effect to MMOs that mean the item might be wasted on someone who can't even use it. The best items are naturally owned by NPC groups which are willing to play nice, so unless you slaughter everyone indiscriminately, you probably won't get those either. And not to be too spoilery, but most of the +2 or +3 weapons also have alignment effects that mean a good party will have issues using them (while the dungeon literally has scripted rooms that will simply kill an evil character for existing). In short, it really is best to assume you'll have no equipment aside from basic starting weapons and armor when you're building your character. Maybe you'll get lucky and find something awesome, but luck is not your friend when the entire dungeon is designed to screw you over.

You've hit the main problem with Ancestral Relic right on the head: the masterwork requirement. Usually that's the kind of thing I'd just say to ask the DM about. While trying to inherit an entire bag of adventuring gear will never fly, a single masterwork item so you can use your feat should be plenty reasonable.

Except that you aren't starting with the feat. Hmmm. . . You could always abuse the church aspect: the feat specifically calls out members of your religous order. So bring a party member who's part of your religous order, then have him craft a masterwork whatever and give it to you (and try to ignore the fact that the mundane crafting rules also require "miscelaneous materials.")

Finally, if you can live with your Relic not being a weapon or armor then it will probably cost a lot less. Masterwork tools are only 50gp, for example. The Noble's Outfit requires jewlery worth 100gp to function properly, which calls out jewlery as a possible tool, so you should be able to buy a Masterwork Amulet for 50gp. Being a warforged cleric wielding a slam attack means your starting gold should be mostly free up and you can buy the spell focii and account for an amulet with sentimental value just fine.

[gkathellar]

Also, my DM told me something insane today. I asked him, as a joke, if I could play a gestalt character with Vow of Poverty. He said it was cool. :smalleek: I asked him if he was serious, and he said he was. He said I can use literally anything from 3.5. I'm now tempted to take Vow just because it'd eventually nullify so many of the things that screw you in this dungeon. The bonuses it grants would make it as though I'm getting the normal progression of magical equipment for my character. I wouldn't have to eat, drink, or breathe after 11th level. I kind of want to take this feat, but I might feel bad later if I do. :smallfrown:

Do it. Do it and play a Druid//Totemist. You can make yourself feel better about being horrible by reminding yourself that you didn't mix in any Planar Shepherd.

EDIT: Remember, Fleshraker Dinosaur wildshape + Fleshraker Dinosaur animal companion + Serpentfire = +CLd6 to every one of the 14 natural attacks you should be using every single round.

[big teej]

forgive my ignorance.... but, uhm.


if this is a dungeon where you won't progress past your starting gear.

why hasn't anybody suggested incarnum?

psht, weapons? we don't need no stinking weapons! I can make my own!

+ VoP Warforged

???

Profit!


.... right? :smallconfused:

EDIT: that's what I get for not clicking refresh before I reply. :smallredface:

[panaikhan]

I've GM'd a group halfway through this. it's tough going both for the players and the GM. Inconsistancies crop up all over the place.

That said, their group consists of:
Half-drow Cleric, deep-dwarf Thief, githzerai Monk (with VoP), half-celestial Sorcerer, gnome Druid (yes, I warned him), and kobold (dragonwrought) Sorcerer.
They have had it hard a couple of times: traps are hard to find, locks are set at the take-20 kind of level - you need a single-classed Thief to realistically stay on top of this.
The party find far more 'stuff' than they can use, with little or no way to trade it away. An Artificer (who can leech unwanted magical items and improve the ones being used) would go down well.

[Vizzerdrix]

If the group can budget it, then grab some shapesand before going in. Mine has been more useful than some of our party members :smallwink:

[Gavinfoxx]

Do it. Do it and play a Druid//Totemist. You can make yourself feel better about being horrible by reminding yourself that you didn't mix in any Planar Shepherd.

EDIT: Remember, Fleshraker Dinosaur wildshape + Fleshraker Dinosaur animal companion + Serpentfire = +CLd6 to every one of the 14 natural attacks you should be using every single round.

How exactly will you use the summoning ritual to get a Fleshraker animal companion, huh? The list of house rules question is *vital* in choosing your character! Many character concepts flat out won't work in the dungeon...

Also, for other things:

There are at least two creatures which can burrow through stone. One is the Bluespawn Ambusher, the other is a Thoqqua.

The Artificer might not be able to find the *gp* worth of crafting materials, regardless on if he can drain XP or not! Again, it is vital to ask the DM about the house rules and options for when you build your character.

[DrDeth]

There’s scads of loot, very powerful loot, so much loot you won’t be able to carry it. The problem is, there’s darn few places to buy & sell, and the good stuff is weird and unusual. Thus, you may build a falchion specialist and only find a cool battleaxe. Thus, do not make a build which depends upon specialized equipment.

I played it all the way thru. Experienced players (two of us) were allowed gestalt, the other two players were allowed a higher point buy. In the early parts we died a lot, little loot.

Later, there’s a undead level and a super-powerful dragon. Also a cage area with blasphemy casting critters and another area with a super-sized black pudding. But after the first level, things really picked up, those were the deadlier areas.

The DM did have a traveling salesman drop by once a level. This helped a lot.

You NEED healing, tanking and trapfinding. And the last MAXed out, MAXed to the point where taking a skill feat isn’t a bad idea. In the early levels, make sure you have a good FORT save, too. Dwarves are nice.

The Dungeon Ranger variant works well.

Ancestral relic or kensai works for magic weapons, etc.

[Kerikath]

Guh, is it just me, or was this module written by lazy people who genuinely detest players? I just read part of the beginning of the module. Reduced experience gain for really no reason; the excuse that's given is pretty damn weak. Darkness, darkness 'errywhere. Sound physics that go wonky specifically so the DM can have a "legitimate" way to cheat and control the outcomes of the party's actions. There's basically no ecosystem and therefore no food for the party to find, yet monsters have been living in this place for a long damn time. Said monsters apparently reproduce via A-sexual division too, since there are no monster children or babies. Magical items that are hard to find, and which don't fit the party's needs anyway. Traps have existed in this dungeon for centuries, but apparently haven't all been triggered by the countless inhabitants moving around. Teleportation, summoning, plane hopping, dimension warping, and wild-shaping are all off limits.

**** the authors of this module. I'm not even sure I want to play this anymore.

[Gavinfoxx]

...And that's why I made that list...

Actually, the module says 'pretend the party doesnt need to eat or drink. the nature of this prison makes it so things dont have to eat or drink' as one of the main options...

[hex0]

4- There is a trap every 10 feet or so in some places. You need someone/something to deal with this.

Trapsmith? Factotum 3/Rogue 2 is a nice entry. (psychic rogue if possible)

Edit: I like playing Dwarf Factotums myself. They are harder to trip and notice stonework, etc.

[hex0]

...And that's why I made that list...

Actually, the module says 'pretend the party doesnt need to eat or drink. the nature of this prison makes it so things dont have to eat or drink' as one of the main options...

Play an Elan. :smalltongue:

[Fizban]

why hasn't anybody suggested incarnum?

psht, weapons? we don't need no stinking weapons! I can make my own!

+ VoP Warforged
Because incarnum doesn't give you magic weapons. It gives you skill bonuses and various immunities and other little abilities. In the hands of a master I'm sure it's as viable as anything else for WLD, but if you want free magic weapons Kensai or Soulbow can actually do that (Incarnate Weapon only gives you a flat enhancement bonus, lame). Vow of poverty is technically doable, and you might even be able to stick to your exalted status as well, but since you can't get out of the dungeon to donate your share of the loot to orphans and whatnot you'll be flying in the face of the fluff of a fluffy book.

Guh, is it just me, or was this module written by lazy people who genuinely detest players?
That's kinda the point. The dungeon is not your friend, and when you can't get out to go home and shop and control the pace of the adventure, it gets nasty.

Reduced experience gain for really no reason; the excuse that's given is pretty damn weak.
So you'd rather have the party extremely overleveled and watch them steamroll the entire rest of the dungeon? That's just tons of fun right there.

Darkness, darkness 'errywhere. Sound physics that go wonky specifically so the DM can have a "legitimate" way to cheat and control the outcomes of the party's actions.
I agree that the table of random spot and listen penalties is stupid, but it's an old broken down dungeon. Why should you expect there to be any light at all? If you're complaining about magical darkness, consider that it's an extremely common spell-like ability, and a lot of the dungeon is designed with the "ten thousand years of residual magic wonkyness" fluff.

There's basically no ecosystem and therefore no food for the party to find, yet monsters have been living in this place for a long damn time. Said monsters apparently reproduce via A-sexual division too, since there are no monster children or babies.
It's giant magical dungeon of fiat, what do you expect? As I've said before, the players are supposed to either raid the food that the monsters are eating (which itself is handwaved, either they brought a lot or it's magic mushrooms or something), or the DM is supposed to handwave eating for everyone in the dungeon via magical stasis timey wimey metabolism something. Alternatively: you just killed how many pounds of meat in combat? The majority of the monsters showed up after it was built and didn't exactly bring mates, the humanoid creatures were all war parties that got trapped inside. Why would any of them have children in that hellhole?

Magical items that are hard to find, and which don't fit the party's needs anyway. Traps have existed in this dungeon for centuries, but apparently haven't all been triggered by the countless inhabitants moving around. Teleportation, summoning, plane hopping, dimension warping, and wild-shaping are all off limits.
It's freaking giant magical prison! Why would the celestials leave tons of magic items laying around for prisoners to find? Of course the traps are all still working, they were designed and built by beings with more power than you can imagine! It was built to house devils that have teleportation at-will, so duh, teleportation can't work or it wouldn't be a prison in the first place! I don't remember anything about wild shape being banned, but I just don't think these are valid complaints. Why would you expect an ancient dungeon that traps the players the moment they step inside to be an easy peasy kid gloved hand holding cakewalk? It's right there in the concept: this dungeon is big and mean and hard and you'd better be prepared to suck it up.

This is not a custom DM made story tailored to your characters where they somehow find the exact items they need when they need them. This is not a sandbox world where you can stop by the magic item mart between combats and buy the exact item you need for the next fight. This is a top down design starting with giant magical prison and ending with giant magical dungeon. It's not struggling to survive against you: You have to survive through It.

[Kerikath]

You're really, really missing the point here, Fizban, and you're being way too vehement.

That's kinda the point. The dungeon is not your friend, and when you can't get out to go home and shop and control the pace of the adventure, it gets nasty.
I'm not saying the developers are lazy jerks for those reasons. Those factors make it a more difficult adventure, but they're not what turn me off. I'll explain below.

So you'd rather have the party extremely overleveled and watch them steamroll the entire rest of the dungeon? That's just tons of fun right there.
I'd rather have the party get rewards proportional to the challenges they overcome. The devs evidently decided to go make an adventure module based on a cool-sounding concept: The World's Largest Dungeon. With loads of monsters of different sorts, lots of traps, puzzle challenges, and a plotline or plotlines. Eventually they realized, however, that including so many monsters and challenges in general would result in the PCs leveling rather quickly. In fact, the PCs would be well past level 20 upon leaving the dungeon. Writing material that would've accommodated and challenged epic level PCs would have been hard, requiring the developers to use the Epic Level Handbook and potentially Deities and Demigods, which were both out two years before the module was published. Rather than stretch their imaginations through the creation of epic tier dungeon sections, and rather than scale back their original concept of this massive dungeon, they took the laziest route possible and told DMs to put an XP cap on the PCs. They screwed the players.

Of course the traps are all still working, they were designed and built by beings with more power than you can imagine!
Going by the material that is in this adventure, plenty of the traps can only be triggered once by any of the PCs, and then they never hurt you again. They are expended. After millenia of people traversing this dungeon, all of those traps should be deactivated.

It's giant magical dungeon of fiat, what do you expect? As I've said before, the players are supposed to either raid the food that the monsters are eating (which itself is handwaved, either they brought a lot or it's magic mushrooms or something), or the DM is supposed to handwave eating for everyone in the dungeon via magical stasis timey wimey metabolism something. Alternatively: you just killed how many pounds of meat in combat? The majority of the monsters showed up after it was built and didn't exactly bring mates, the humanoid creatures were all war parties that got trapped inside. Why would any of them have children in that hellhole?
Some of these tribes of monsters have been in the dungeon for a LONG time, well past their lifespan. There would've had to be reproduction for the tribes to be there. You can justify there not being food with the magical stasis idea, but you can't just handwave away the need for children. If you do, you're a lazy idiot.

I don't remember anything about wild shape being banned
There's a part where the module states that any druids should not be able to wildshape into much of anything, because they haven't had the chance to observe any of the things they'd normally be able to wildshape into. According to the writiers, starting at level 1 inside the dungeon as a druid means that you haven't seen pretty much anything other than rats, so you can't wildshape into anything other than a rat. This is another premise that doesn't make sense. Under the assumption that you can't wildshape into something you haven't seen, it only makes sense to prevent the druid from wildshaping into a bear or wolf under the further assumption that the druid was born inside the freaking dungeon, and therefore has only been witness to rats his whole life.

it's an old broken down dungeon. Why should you expect there to be any light at all?

Why would the celestials leave tons of magic items laying around for prisoners to find? It was built to house devils that have teleportation at-will, so duh, teleportation can't work or it wouldn't be a prison in the first place!
Yes, all of these things make sense within the premise of the dungeon, and could just make it more of a challenge, something to let you later say, "Aha! I have triumphed!" Instead, the module doesn't give you the experience rewards you damn well deserve by surviving in this hellhole. Nor is there a big treasure chest at the end for all your hard work. It's like someone is kicking your shins the entire time you're running a marathon, and then at the end, there's neither sandwich nor PowerAde for you. And these beings with more power than I can imagine were apparently stupid enough to build the dungeon in a tectonically active area near a magma vein and a lake instead of a dimension-locked, sterile demiplane. These awesome beings were certainly dense enough to drop some loot in there for the same inexplicable reason they chose to build where they did.

This is not a custom DM made story tailored to your characters where they somehow find the exact items they need when they need them. This is not a sandbox world where you can stop by the magic item mart between combats and buy the exact item you need for the next fight. This is a top down design starting with giant magical prison and ending with giant magical dungeon. It's not struggling to survive against you: You have to survive through It.
Yeah. And It is a cluster**** that 1) Cheats players out of what, 75% of the XP they deserve? 2) Limits the sight of most races via the default environment 3) Tells DMs to go ahead and toy with the sound so they can railroad the party 4) Has no justification for the lack of children and breeding pairs, despite the tribes having been there a long time 5) Was built by cosmically powerful, phenomenally retarded entities of good in an unstable environment 6) Is devoid of most of its celestial guardians, who, despite being the epitome of good, are apparently doing nothing about the random people getting trapped in the prison and slaughtered by the inmates 7) Does not provide equipment or wealth suiting the party's needs 8) Has traps that either reassembled themselves or stayed intact just so they can blow up YOUR party 9) Does not let you teleport, even inside the individual prison sections 10) Does not let you plane shift, even when remaining inside the individual prison sections' analogous ethereal territory 11) Does not let you make use of bags of holding or portable holes to cart the unfeasibly large and heavy valuables you find 12) Says druids can't wildshape, since they've obviously never seen an animal before coming to the dungeon 13) Tells DMs to fudge rolls with goblins because they're too weak, instead of giving class levels or templates to offset this 14) Tells DMs to ban battlefield control magic 15) Tells DMs to ban taking 10 or 20, despite that being one of the more common sense mechanics in 3.5 16) Does not let you leave to rest, get supplies, or sidequest

The fluff and background material in this module is bogus. It has many environmental conditions that make success more difficult to attain, and rather than rewarding you for accepting the extra challenge, it punishes you for doing so. I'm going to have to let the DM know I'm not going to play this module.

[Fizban]

I'm gonna go ahead and spoiler most of my rebuttal so people can skip by if they want. I'll leave the last paragraph outside though, and after this I'm done with the back and forth. Oh and the xp reduction part cause I liked that paragraph.
On xp and dungeon size: I'm pretty sure it wasn't that they just kept building until it got to big and then decided to take the lazy way out. It went something more like this: they came up with the general idea of the dungeon, made a flowchart of the major areas and branching paths the PCs could make, then laid it onto a map and broke it into regions. They wanted the dungeon to be huge and epic so they told the region mappers to make them huge, then the room designers filled up those huge maps so you wouldn't be bored, then they realized that that was a ton of xp. Note also that they don't actually expect anyone to ever make it through running the whole dungeon from start to finish: you're also supposed to be able to lift a region out and drop it into another game to run as a dungeon of it's own, so the regions have to be big enough to do that. It was already enough to try and make use of every monster in the manual while still making an interesting dungeon, I don't think they needed to bring the Epic Level Handbook into it at the same time, and the dungeon wouldn't somehow make more sense if it was the same but smaller.

The methods for cutting xp actually make plenty of sense and are the kinds of things DMs have been wondering about forever: why is it that after killing 20 identical goblins you're still getting the same amount of knowledge as when you killed the first one? And finally, their example is also an exaggeration: the party really should not be clearing every single room in each region. I would expect them to cut a swath through it and maybe need their xp cut in half in order to stay reasonable (naturally I haven't run the exact numbers yet since we haven't even finished our current campaign).

Traps: ok, that's probably true. But people have suspended the same amount of disbelief before so once again I don't see why it's so heinous this time. And when you consider that these tribes of monsters have staked out their territory and rarely leave it, while monsters looking for food are going to ignore an obviously empty room, it's very easy to suspend.

Monster kids: I haven't reached the later parts so I'm not sure which monsters you're talking about. I can however easy handwave the need for children: in addition to not needing food, the dungeon also slows your aging. Bam, done, see how easy?

Wildshape: okay, my bad for forgetting that then. Like the player only ban on battlefield control, I must have immediately disregarded it so hard that I forgot, because I expect no DM will actually follow that rule. That said, I can still see it being justified depending on what your campaign looks like (and plenty of DnD products have these kind of personal assumptions all over). If you're running a very adventurey world where people level all the way to 20 and you need to be 5th just to count as a proper adventurer, then a 1st level noob probably hasn't left the city limits before. Since having to see the animal in person is a common houserule to limit the ridiculousness of shapechanging magic, and big animals don't show up in cities, then yeah I could easily see a 1st level druid not knowing any animals well enough to wildhshape into them.

Xp and marathons: experience rewards are a tool used by the DM to tell the players when their characters get better at things. If the DM thinks the characters should be learning at a slower rate, such as because they are trapped in a dungeon with absolutely no ability to seek outside advice or resources and have to be on guard at all hours of the day, then the DM is perfectly justified in reducing xp to reflect that. Think of it this way: in a normal game the character are assumed to spend some of their nebulous downtime practicing their skills and reflecting on what they've learned, learning about what higher level adventurers have done and emulating that themselves. If you're stuck in the WLD, you can't do that. You are in a combat zone 24/7 and you have to make up your entire profession as you go, so instead of asking or reading about some common problem and the easy solution, you have to grind it out with trial and error in the middle of combat. It's like needing a higher level of math that a genius discovered hundreds of years ago and is easy to learn with a book or a teacher. Except you didn't know it when you fell into the dungeon because you were only level 1, and now you have to invent it yourself while slavering monsters are surrounding you. You're not going to progress as fast as someone who can just go back to town and crunch the numbers, even if he doesn't have a teacher either.

As for the marathon example, well a person chooses to run a marathon. If your character didn't choose to enter the WLD then yeah he's gonna be very unhappy about it. If he did, then he should probably have a good idea that there's nothing awesome waiting at the end. Entering that kind of dungeon isn't for glory, it's for saving the world or bad luck. Either way, if you as a player agreed to the idea of a massive inescapable prison dungeon, then you shouldn't be surprised when you get an inescapable prison dungeon. As for building location, once again that's necessary for it to even be an adventure. Plate tectonics in DnD might not work the way ours do what with all the magic permeating the setting, and even if they knew it might be a bad location down the road it might have been the only place with enough magic mumbo jumbo to build the thing. If you'd rather they built the dungeon in the perfect place and nothing ever happened to it then go ahead. Now you don't have a dungeon to run.

Limiting sight via default environment: I shouldn't even dignify this with a response. Boo hoo, being a human actually has a downside, make some torches and get over it. Getting rid of taking 10/20 is kinda bogus, but considering how much of the dungeon is supposed to be traps, it would be like letting you take 10 on attack rolls. Previous editions of dnd got along just fine without the option and while I'd allow it myself it makes a lot more sense for this style of game to get rid of them.
Experience rewards are a tool used by the DM to tell the players when their characters get better at things. If the DM thinks the characters should be learning at a slower rate, such as because they are trapped in a dungeon with absolutely no ability to seek outside advice or resources and have to be on guard at all hours of the day, then the DM is perfectly justified in reducing xp to reflect that. Think of it this way: in a normal game the character are assumed to spend some of their nebulous downtime practicing their skills and reflecting on what they've learned, learning about what higher level adventurers have done and emulating that themselves. If you're stuck in the WLD, you can't do that. You are in a combat zone 24/7 and you have to make up your entire profession as you go, so instead of asking or reading about some common problem and the easy solution, you have to grind it out with trial and error in the middle of combat. It's like needing a higher level of math that a genius discovered hundreds of years ago and is easy to learn with a book or a teacher. Except you didn't know it when you fell into the dungeon because you were only level 1, and now you have to invent it yourself while slavering monsters are surrounding you. You're not going to progress as fast as someone who can just go back to town and crunch the numbers, even if he doesn't have a teacher either.

As for the rest, I don't think there's any more point in arguing. The World's Largest Dungeon necessitates a big change in the style of the game and if you can't accept that then you won't have any fun playing it. Shorter modules can be dropped into any gamestyle and setting, but WLD is too big for that. It's not Return to the Temple of Elemental evil where you go from 5th to 13th. It's not even a 1st-20th campaign. It is bigger than 1-20 and is effectively a campaign setting in it's own right. If a campaign setting says it's low magic and you can't buy magic items does that make it bogus and unfair? No, it makes it just what it says on the tin. Same thing here.

[panaikhan]

Just my 2cp on the XP issue. My group is split into three camps.
3 of them are of the mind "We level up when the DM tells us to"
2 of them think "I wonder if we have earned enough for the next level yet"
1 of them thinks "That was 4 CR 5 monsters and we're 6 CL3 characters.. so that's......"

The first 3 are players.
The next 2 are player / GM's.
The last one (and every group has one) is the Rules Lawyer. He is the only one who even thinks to moan that "we're getting hosed XP-wise". And then it's only when it's blatantly obvious.

Loot-wise. Nothing stops the GM from refluffing or outright swapping some of the treasure.

[Kansaschaser]

There's basically no ecosystem and therefore no food for the party to find, yet monsters have been living in this place for a long damn time.

In addition to the "loot" that is found by the party, I'd probably have the monsters that need food to have some rations on them. Though, if they killed a Minoutar, the food they may find on him would be something like rotting flesh or raw intestines.

[faceroll]

Experience rewards are a tool used by the DM to tell the players when their characters get better at things. If the DM thinks the characters should be learning at a slower rate, such as because they are trapped in a dungeon with absolutely no ability to seek outside advice or resources and have to be on guard at all hours of the day, then the DM is perfectly justified in reducing xp to reflect that. Think of it this way: in a normal game the character are assumed to spend some of their nebulous downtime practicing their skills and reflecting on what they've learned, learning about what higher level adventurers have done and emulating that themselves. If you're stuck in the WLD, you can't do that. You are in a combat zone 24/7 and you have to make up your entire profession as you go, so instead of asking or reading about some common problem and the easy solution, you have to grind it out with trial and error in the middle of combat. It's like needing a higher level of math that a genius discovered hundreds of years ago and is easy to learn with a book or a teacher. Except you didn't know it when you fell into the dungeon because you were only level 1, and now you have to invent it yourself while slavering monsters are surrounding you. You're not going to progress as fast as someone who can just go back to town and crunch the numbers, even if he doesn't have a teacher either.

That's unnecessary in-game justification of an out-of-game mechanic. The DMG comes right out and says "adjust the flow of XP as it is appropriate for your game."Insomuch as D&D is a method of story telling, XP flow is controlled for whatever particular story you want to tell. If the story only takes place between levels 4 and 6 (because after level 6, D&D characters get anime powers), but there will be 100 battles, the players should be getting about 1/5 of the XP.