Fantastic Locations for Encounters/Adventures

[Sudain]

Hello. :)

I'm starting the initial design process of a campaign(what type unknown), and I was wondering what types of fantastic locations you guys have enjoyed, would like to see, or are just darn cool. So I can blatenly include them. :smallbiggrin: I'd like to get several of these fully designed before staring the campaign with players so there is less DM burn-out syndrome.

So far I've got:
A floating island
Inside a creature's stomach
Battle on the top of a creature's back while flying(dragon?)
Dragon's Lair
Beholder's Lair
Central Ritual Chamber for a cult
Extensive cave filled with poisonous gas(methane?)
Magic Item Creator's Tower

[Notreallyhere77]

A dungeon built into the side of a sheer cliff; All rooms and hallways are exposed to the open air. No guardrails - if the prisoners walk off, they die at the end of a 120-foot fall (unless they're spectacularly tough). The only entrance is at the top, and the edge of the cliff is patrolled by archers, constantly peering over the edge for people trying to climb to freedom. At least, that's how things worked before the gargoyles decided to roost here.

Oh, whoops! I just made that up. For one that I've already enjoyed, how about the classic Sewer Quest?

[Sudain]

Oooo... interesting. Reminds me of the Erie in Game of Thrones.

[Doc_Pippin]

How about....

1:A sub plane of exsistance inside the material
I.E a 20 by 20 oasis in a desert day that once you enter the water sucks you down and you resurface in a gigantic forest in a pond at night.

2: The Afterlife, who doesn't want to enter the ethereal plane to get something.

3: A simple garden... After being shrunk to fine size.

4:An island on a giant turtles back that dives every 1D4 days

5: A complete city of intelligent non-evil undead just trying to continue not living... Good Necropolis

6: In a mad man's mind

7: A giant desert ... but its actually an hourglass that they have been transported into

8: A genies Lamp

9: A jungle inside a building... Another extra dimensional space

10: A crashed Alien space ship (yes even in the medieval world, (have the technology be designed for a non-humaniod so the party cant abuse it)

11: The Dream Realm

12: Airships

Well thats a good start a perverbial dirty dozen if you need more just ask!!

:smallbiggrin:

[Grail]

Inside a Bag of Holding, ala the Bag Wars storyline from the Knights of the Dinner Table.

[Notreallyhere77]

The Grand Library of the Arcane University.

A miles-long catacomb maze.

The tavern that's bigger on the inside. Much, much bigger.

The ancient, huge, and empty city in the middle of inhospitable terrain.

I'll come up with more.

[Sudain]

Yes please, these are pretty darn cool. :)

1. Pass with high winds and thin ledges. :)
2. Inside an outsider invasion camp
3. Orphanage
4. Harem
5. Slave Trader Caravan
6. Building out of time(modern office building, or ancient structure fully intact)
7. Court where all the nobles are admited enchanters(new meaning to 'charmed' and 'puppet')
8. Asylum for the crazies
9. Field of an extremely valuable but fragile crop(Coffie beans? :)
10. Descending into a live volcano

[sol_kanar]

A forest which is partially overlapped with the Elemental Plane of Air (I am thinking about the Manifest Zones in Eberron). You will have trees that grow on floating rocks, reduced gravity, lots of animal adapted to the environment (shocker lizards? air elementals? blue dragons?) and...Tesla Trees*.

Since the Elemental Plane of Air is apparently full of electrical charges, furious thunderstorms erupt abruptly in the forest: some of the trees got magically enhanced and/or evolved to store the energy and use it to grow (in fact, they do not rely on photosynthesis anymore). The only problem is that, when they absorb too much energy, they tend to discharge the excess in the environment, through lightning bolts.

* Taken form "Hyperion Cantos", by Dan Simmons. I find the idea fascinating and very spectacular.

[TechnoScrabble]

The first campaign I ever ran had a scene where the players were inside a giant watch that belonged to a smithing god, fighting a small army of shadow manipulating warlocks who planned to kill the gods and take their place.

[Geostationary]

Here are some fun ones, a few of which I've actually been involved in:

1. Free-falling several thousand feet over an active caldera
2. A vast cathedral-city, glorifying a self-proclaimed god
3. A recursive mansion containing a vast Table-Continent in the dining room, populated by men of cloth and paper
4. A sabotaged ship rapidly sinking off the coast of an antarctic continent
5. A crystallized spire of reality, thrust into a realm of madness
6. A delightful coffee-shop in a vaguely European city.
7. A large social event in a grand ballroom, if all the guests took fashion advice from Lady Gaga (i.e., any party in Nobilis)
8. Cordial encounters with any flavor of Elder Evil, while inside said elder evil.
9. Any Age from a Myst game. If you aren't familiar, I recommend looking them up, as they have some excellent worlds to explore.

[Sudain]

Sweet! Thank you guys very much! :)

[Doorhandle]

More ideas:

Inside a song.
A level ripped dioreclty from a video game. No, seriously. Go look at the backrounds/stages for Rayman: Orgins, any 3D game in the super Mario series, Wroms: forts under seige, and countless others. A lot of art for WH40k would also work, as would the last level for Dawn of war 2: retribution. Anything counted as scenery porn, (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/SceneryPorn) really.
Walking alon the underside of the water’s surface.
Inside a bottomless pit, or on an endless staircase.
In an ahcient chinese fortress.
In one of the emponyus castkles form the castle-sereise.
In Nevada. (Madness-verison optional)
In the dreaming.
City ruins.
An entire, normal-sized planet, except the players are effectively Colossal+ due to scaling issues.
Afterlives in general.
Climbing up the cliffs of insanity
Inside an endless mausoleum chronicling the births, deaths and extinctions of very living thing that has ever existed.
On a planet-sized sword.
On the road to hell.
Anything from here. (http://www.hiveworkshop.com/forums/terrain-board-267/legendary-terrains-65435/)

[Sdonourg]

A level ripped directly from a video game.
Did that with a first level of Doom 2 in an underwater campaign.

Inside a creature's stomach
I'm planning to make a whole dungeon (or even a region with a town) inside of a draeden (maybe you remember this beast) frozen on the Paraelemental Plane of Ice.

And my suggestion:
Invisible dungeon can be fun. I threw a party once in a spherical invisible dungeon on the Elemental Plane of Air. The only drawback is drawing the dungeon map.

[Doorhandle]

Another suggestion: W.o.W levels. The raid dungeons are on youtube, and there is a map-veiwer for all the dungeons. ABUSE IT!

Also Brutal Legend because that game must be plugged.

The elemental plane of anything, from water to fire to candy, are as a rule immistakably beutiful.

And, eh, giant mysterious skeletons are a plus.

[Das Platyvark]

This. (http://www.darkroastedblend.com/2008/09/most-alien-looking-place-on-earth.html)

[Radar]

If we are filling tropes here, then it wouldn't be complete without a proper chase through a marketplace.

Crystal castle/tower/cavern.

An encounter (which happened in one of games I were in): the party finds a small, scrawny goblin holding a sign saying X, the Great Dragon of Y demands one third of your posessions as a tribute. He is currently sick, so please give your valuables to his goblin servant. If the party ignores him and simply passes by, the PCs should hear the goblin whispering Boy, are they in trouble now.

[Sudain]

Fantastic! :D That should be enough to get me started. :) You guys rock!

[Doorhandle]

This. (http://www.darkroastedblend.com/2008/09/most-alien-looking-place-on-earth.html)

...Okay, wow, that's basically a setting-in-a-box right there.

[jackattack]

A bottomless(?) abyss with stalagmite tops or the ends of log poles as the only places to stand.

Similarly, the tops of rocky spires in a sea of fog or clouds, some connected by rope/log bridges.

A series of shallow pools connected by short waterfalls, with fast-flowing water that threatens to sweep characters and opponents down to the next level. The end of the falls might be a vast drop, or it might be calm water offering escape.