So I was appointed DM (help!)

[Combat Reflexes]

Hey everyone,

After a couple years of running one-shots and silly campaigns, I have finally gotten the chance to DM something greater.
My new campaign will take place in and around the medieval metropolis of Argopolis, a insanely huge city where all nobles rival for power with all other nobles.

Also, the city was (unknowingly) built upon a huge planar instability region - think Sigil, but uncontrolled portals and completely unpredictable. Random portals appear at random places throughout the city, at random times, although no more than 1-3 portals appear per day.
Some portals are permanent, others last only a couple of rounds.These portals can appear anywhere and lead anywhere - a portal to the Plane of Water could appear in some noble's bathroom, or a gate to hell manifests in Main Street, or some random demiplane is accessible through a shimmering window of light in the city wall.

Due to the whole planar instability thing, the city's residents are quite diverse: common races like humans and halflings share their city with more obscure ones like necropolitans, hobgoblins, salamanders, azers and strix.

But...

what could be effects of random portals and gates on a huge city like this? How would it influence the inhabitants? Would people be scared to death, or fascinated, or eager to explore new worlds?

And last but not least:

At least one of my players will complain about the city being ridiculously dangerous to live in, because some portal to the lowest layer of the abyss or something could open anytime. How do I work around the 'balors should've killed everything' problem without making the city's defenses DM-fiat uberstrong?

I have faith in the Playground :smallbiggrin:

[Flickerdart]

In a city like that...well, the weak and unprepared would have moved away a long time ago. Random balors don't attack because the last thousand times they tried it, they were destroyed by random solars, black ethergaunts, mercanes, and whatever other incredibly powerful creatures would be hardy enough to make such a place their home (or also just fall in).

Weaker citizens of the city would nevertheless have a few levels under their belts, and carry a good assortment of various environmental protection, movement mode, or (if they can afford it) planar travel consumables. People living in the city don't have to all be adventurers, but a huge service industry would pop up anyway, even if it's to disseminate the treasure the adventurers bring back. Your average shopkeeper might be just a level 2 adept, but he has a scroll of plane shift squirreled away in his trouser pocket, and a good relationship with proprietor of the inn next door, who always has adventurers staying there. If there's a problem at the shop, a swarm of XP-hungry murder hobos will eradicate it in short order.

[BowStreetRunner]

Make the city itself a living entity...a deity in fact. What appears as randomness to the inhabitants is in fact carefully orchestrated by the mind of the might god Argopolis. He has his own Herald and allies to keep things from getting out of control, and when necessary he can just close portals that become too troublesome. The residents of the city may know him by a different name (Urbanus perhaps?) but the high priests and city rulers know the truth.

[kreenlover]

Make the city itself a living entity...a deity in fact. What appears as randomness to the inhabitants is in fact carefully orchestrated by the mind of the might god Argopolis.

This would work quite well. this, or having a mighty archmage (or ten) watch over the city. Long ago they built an army of mechanical flying animated golem like creatures.
They are there to keep order, having at will scorching rays (but of any element) and the ability to close portals at will.
Being linked to each other, and to the portal sensors at every single street corner, they immediately know of any extremely dangerous portals, and fly, and shut them down. They then proceed to blast whatever came through it.
If things really get out of hand, BOOM in come the archmages time stop, celerity, forcecage disintegrate wishes flying everywhere until everything is dead.

[Sylthia]

Is the entire city prone to random rifts? There could be certain pockets where it is more likely, and they could be fortified. Otherwise the populace would likely be very paranoid, lest a gate open up in their bedrooms and 3:00 in the morning.

[Maginomicon]

How do I work around the 'balors should've killed everything' problem without making the city's defenses DM-fiat uberstrong?Isn't this basically how the plot of Buffy didn't collapse in on itself? Oh wait...

[Combat Reflexes]

In a city like that...well, the weak and unprepared would have moved away a long time ago. Random balors don't attack because the last thousand times they tried it, they were destroyed by random solars, black ethergaunts, mercanes, and whatever other incredibly powerful creatures would be hardy enough to make such a place their home (or also just fall in).

This would be the most likely situation, but its kinda hard to DM due to all the overpowered things running around and stuff. If only there was a way to make sure none of the portals lead to Baator / R'lyeh / the Abyss...


Make the city itself a living entity...a deity in fact. What appears as randomness to the inhabitants is in fact carefully orchestrated by the mind of the might god Argopolis. He has his own Herald and allies to keep things from getting out of control, and when necessary he can just close portals that become too troublesome.

This. I really like the idea of a sentient city as the ultimate DMPC. It says no to balors, and as a bonus it would make a memorable (CR-inappropiate) encounter if any of the PCs decided to side with the bad guys :smallamused:

It would provide a hook for the characters too: the city (or an avatar) hiring the PCs to explore worlds behind portals which just opened, to see where they lead.

[rot42]

A dreaming deity the gentle pulse of whose thoughts brings the planes sometimes nearer and sometimes farther. Only a few functionaries know the true nature of the city, and how to affect its dreams. Keeping the city focused on happier thoughts brings supplies the populace need or want and enables at least semi-regular trade through the portal-thoughts. A renegade or apostate walking the darker corners of the memory-palace can bring in the balors when they are level appropriate.


Cityscape has a zeitgeist as basically a physical manifestation of a city; it is CR 23 (though I would probably put it a bit lower and earlier non-combative encounters would fit just fine). Ruin Chanters and Ruin Elementals from MM V could also fit the setting.

[nedz]

In a city like that...well, the weak and unprepared would have moved away a long time ago. Random balors don't attack because the last thousand times they tried it, they were destroyed by random solars, black ethergaunts, mercanes, and whatever other incredibly powerful creatures would be hardy enough to make such a place their home (or also just fall in).

Weaker citizens of the city would nevertheless have a few levels under their belts, and carry a good assortment of various environmental protection, movement mode, or (if they can afford it) planar travel consumables. People living in the city don't have to all be adventurers, but a huge service industry would pop up anyway, even if it's to disseminate the treasure the adventurers bring back. Your average shopkeeper might be just a level 2 adept, but he has a scroll of plane shift squirreled away in his trouser pocket, and a good relationship with proprietor of the inn next door, who always has adventurers staying there. If there's a problem at the shop, a swarm of XP-hungry murder hobos will eradicate it in short order.

A counter to this would be to make the city very new: thus over the course of the campaign the inhabitants would be displaced by more powerful outsiders etc.

[GilesTheCleric]

The city must necessarily be new, otherwise the effect of "some portals are permanent" will turn the entire city into nothing but portals. Alternatively, portals are not permanent.

Perhaps it makes sense to place the city itself somewhere other than the material plane? Limbo - the last scrap of consistency as the plane slowly tears itself apart. 7 mounting heavens - at the very edge, where its adjacent parallel existence with Baator scrapes at the fabric of reality. Astral - it is nearing the sundering of the Weave, and all of the planes are beginning to collapse into the one plane that 'contains' them all. Material - because of strange magicks, the ethereal plane is closer than usual, allowing for ethereal beings to sometimes slip semi-permanently between the two. The Outlands - it is pretty much just like Sigil.

The other posters had some pretty cool ideas with things like a city-god. I like that one, personally.

The PlH might be a good read, of course, and the table 7-1: Planar Breaches (pg 152) might be useful.

[Flickerdart]

The city must necessarily be new, otherwise the effect of "some portals are permanent" will turn the entire city into nothing but portals. Alternatively, portals are not permanent.
A city like that would have many spellcasters, who are more than capable of sealing portals. Even without that, "some" could mean one in a trillion.

[Stux]

At least one of my players will complain about the city being ridiculously dangerous to live in, because some portal to the lowest layer of the abyss or something could open anytime. How do I work around the 'balors should've killed everything' problem without making the city's defenses DM-fiat uberstrong?

When a portal closes, everything that came through it to the city is dragged back in to it and returned to where it came from. Anything that leaves the city through a portal is trapped on the other side.

This has two interesting consequences:

1) A Balor might occasionally get through a portal, but with any luck it doesn't manage to do too much damage before the portal closes and sends it back.

2) The PCs can explore another plane through a portal, but are on a time limit before the portal closes and they get trapped. This could add some real tension to any portal expeditions. They might acquire a magical device that gives them a time estimate even. Nothing like a ticking clock to put people on edge!

[BowStreetRunner]

A city like that would have many spellcasters, who are more than capable of sealing portals. Even without that, "some" could mean one in a trillion.

There would also be mundane methods of sealing gates - such as burying them. Then O'Neill, Jackson, Carter, and Teal'c would have to uncover the buried portal before they could use it. :smallwink: