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Elvenoutrider
2012-09-18, 02:48 PM
Fellow playgrounders,

I once gain call upon the collective knowledge of the playground to help stave off a crippling case of writers block.

I have hit a roadblock in my campaign. The system is pathfinder but what I am asking for help with is not really system specific. My players have decided that in order to stop an army of illithids from harvesting all sentent life on the planet, they must find something to stop them in the forbidden libraries of: The master of the deep world, holder of all forbidden knowledge.

The creature in question is a monster that combines the worst features of an aboleth and a kraken. The players will have to sail out through monster infested seas, then gain access to the ruined city. In the catacombs beneath the city, they can find the ancient library.

I find myself out of ideas for what the pcs should face in this dungeon. I was wondering if my fellow playgrounders had any ideas for devious traps that fit the theme. I was hoping for a combination of encounters in the water and out of the water. The problem I am running into is that there is a large disparity between the stats for the monster I will be using and the stats of the minions I am trying to give him. This is giving me trouble finding something particularly memorable. My party will be somewhere between levels 13 and 16 when they enter the dungeon.

Can any of you help a playgrounder out?

Lord Tyger
2012-09-18, 02:50 PM
Is it going to have been built to be underwater? It would be fun to have traps designed to take out underwater foes- suddenly the water all drains out of a room, for example.

If it was underwater to start with and isn't anymore, many of the doors might require climbing through, being designed for a setting where moving vertically wasn't that hard.

Darcand
2012-09-20, 06:48 AM
I find the most dangerous underwater trap is a good old fashion AMF.


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Sebastrd
2012-09-20, 12:37 PM
Does it have to be a classic dungeon crawl with a series of monster encounters? Perhaps the "dungeon crawl" could be a series of traps and skill challenges to overcome leading up to a big set piece encounter.

Just some ideas off the top of my head:

- Areas filled with seaweed or jellyfish with paralyzing toxin. Even as jellyfish, it isn't an encounter the PCs can fight their way through.
- Lots of mind-controlled or religious fanatic Kuo-toa and Sahuagin minions.
- Sharks with ray of frost or lightning bolt wands attached to their heads.
- Electricity traps or electric eels.
- It sounds like the climactic battle will take place in the library. Of what is the library comprised? Books? Psychic crystals? Kelp and seaweed scrolls? What do the underwater shelves look like and how are they arranged? Undersea architects would build in three dimensions, so make sure you take advantage.
- Perhaps the "books" are actually pearls that the giant creature has swallowed to absorb their knowledge. In order to get at the the PCs have to slay the creature and sift through his inards.
- In the same vein, perhaps the creature has attached all of the "Shelving" to itself as armor. The challenge becomes fighting off waves of 4E style minions while finding a way to break through the shelving-armor.
- Maybe instead of armor, it's a shelving-cage - kind of like a constantly-revolving hamster ball.

Dazdya
2012-09-20, 09:02 PM
Underwater ecology is dominated by light, temperature and currents.

If the library is deep, it may be very dark there. It could be defended by some sort of defensive current around it, making the place itself hard to reach. The water on the floor of the ocean is always 4 degrees celsius (don't know about fahrenheit). I tend to ignore pressure as a DM, that depends on how scientific you want to get.

How about locating the library under the ice? Submarine movies have plenty of great icy pictures you can get inspiration from.

Alternatively, those underwater volcanoes can be deadly as well. Probably not so good for a library, but who knows.

And since the monster wants to protect the secret knowledge, how about placing it inside the beast, Jonah-style?

Elvenoutrider
2012-09-22, 11:21 AM
Thank you for all the suggestions. In my experience underwater combat tends to slow down and complicate encounters to levels where they lose some of the fun factor, so I was hoping to make underwater encounters and occasional occurence in the dungeon rather than the whole theme of it. I was already thinking of using pearls as the source of knowledge in the library.

I already thought of the creatures minions as being abominations composed of different combinations of sea creatures wielding symbiotic weaponry such as acid guns or rot grub swarm launchers.

Dungeon so far:

1) a few challenges involving the pcs climbing or descending shafts while in combat with various minions.

2) an encounter where the party drops down a shaft into water fueled with negative energy where they will fight an undead squid while minions prevent them from leaving the water

3) An underwater encounter where orca riders fight the pcs while dispelling their water breathing spells.

4) sharks with scorching ray wands

5) The library is a laberinth consisting of underwater and above ground chambers. The librarian is a creature that can melt himself down to slip through the chambers. The players will have to trap him to find the information they seek.

6) In order to activate the pearl of knowledge, the players will have to fight the lord of knowledge to gain access to the power source necessary to activate the pearl. The lord of knowledge is a collosal monster that combines some of the worst aspects of a kraken and an aboleth, mixed with a small helping of beholder