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Talakeal
2015-12-18, 05:23 PM
Does anyone have advice for how to run a large dungeon without a whole lot in it at the table?

Obviously going through it room by room will bore the players to death, but just "skipping to the good parts" seems to kind of cheapen the tension and sense of adventure and exploration.

Anyone have any advice?

(System is homebrew, but thinking e6 D&D is close enough)



The specifics of the dungeon:

Fortress / Tower in the middle of a forest.
It has been abandoned for ~200 years, and partially scavenged already.
It was once the fortress of a powerful evil necromancer. It was cleansed by a crusade, but the crusaders then succumbed to starvation, many killing each other as cannibals.
The fortress is haunted. There will be a few odd events to give it color.
The fortress is heavily overgrown.
Ghosts of the crusaders still walk the halls, appearing as 10' orbs of light or darkness to those without the ability to see into the ethereal.
Random encounters will plant like zombies resembling small shambling mounds.


Points of interest:
A long corridor, one of the walls of which is a living wall. Destroying it reveals the tombs of the crusaders with lootable equipment.
The tomb of the Lich that once commanded this structure, sealed and with warnings not to open it lest he return.
A library, home to a Beholder like creature. Most books are ruined, but those that remain include a few spell books, some exposition, and some valuable.
A room that is the nest of giant spiders, several dead treasure hunters and their pillage are held in the webs.
A cistern below the tower, the Lich's phylactery at the bottom of a pool inhabited by a group of mud men.
The tower above has the crusaders flag, still standing and blowing in a phantom breeze.


These seem like enough dressing / plot points to make a good adventure, but I am not quite sure how to put it all together.


Thanks!

Spore
2015-12-18, 05:53 PM
Obviously going through it room by room will bore the players to death, but just "skipping to the good parts" seems to kind of cheapen the tension and sense of adventure and exploration.

Let them pick their pace. Players usually know if they want to make this slowly and securely or if they just walk at a brisk pace through the corridors. One thing I have always enjoyed from DMs are athmospheric and detailed (but not exhaustive) descriptions of rooms. While people might tend to sidetrack you are at no obligation to stop them if they want to read books in the library.

I am not experienced at all but consider this:

1) Give them a reason for tempo: Have the spirits be aggravated by their disturbance of their last haunting place. Some spirits attack, other guide the heroes towards the important parts. I feel like you can play with the darkness and light spheres here: Darkness harms them, light aids them. Darkness would be undead shadows, light monsters are warrior ghosts.

2) Slightly guide their path: Have the light spirits fly towards important structures. Towards hidden levers, important journals, have them avoid the darkness that lingers in the cistern.

3) If the players have discovered enough rooms of one floor, just give them the outline of the fortress on paper.

4) Sprinkle in interesting things for them to discover about the places' past, not just in the library. Have disfigured human skeletons to tell them about the cannibalism. Place gigantic spiderwebs to warn them from the giant spiders. Describe the area as cold and windy and have them feel a sense of dread throughout the whole area. A sense that strengthens closer to the phylactery (resulting in minor drawbacks, similar to D&D's shaken condition). If you play with undead zombies and ghouls, have the area desecrated.

5) Mix in some unexpected element. This preface looks promising but honestly the haunted castle has been done to death. The beholder is one thing but throw in something that isn't associated with an undead infestation. I propose a shadow dragon or a dracolich. Something that is lured into the tomb by the immense aura and worth of the ancient relic, trying to absorb the power within. Make the monster dangerous, worth their time but optional.

Call it a "bonus boss" if you will. Kill the dragon, get the loot and pay for 1 ressurection or similar.

Knaight
2015-12-18, 06:11 PM
Really emphasize the atmosphere, keeping in mind things other than visuals. Sounds, changes in temperature, smells, all that sort of stuff can really help. It sounds like you've got at least a bit of a horror aesthetic going, so take advantage of those tropes.

As an example, I ran a Halloween one shot this year, in which a bunch of shipwrecked tourists end up driven to an abandoned scientific facility. Describing the events of the shipwreck, and having the characters cast out into the tumultuous seas really emphasized the relative powerlessness of the characters against the forces of nature, which segued into them fleeing the cold as they burned the wood they floated into the island on to stay warm. There was no combat there, not much in the way of encounters, but it absolutely served a purpose and took up a not-insignificant portion of the session (first 20-30 minutes, maybe).

Once in the facility, I really emphasized the inky blackness, the silence, the occasional and abrupt changes in temperature near certain places, so on and so forth. I made it unsettling, and played with the unsettling, emphasizing how things were louder in the silence, describing the characters hearing their own breathing and heart beat, then eventually having noises of things coming toward them, booming feet on metal, that sort of thing. It turned out to be a rat. This general unsettling depended on atmospheric description and it worked, particularly once it started transitioning into the weird. What was being researched was found out vaguely, it just added to the tension. Then when it became clear a sample had gotten out, and something was in the shadows, the way the shadows had been established worked well to make it a threat. Eventually it ended with a character getting to the radio room and signaling for help, then waiting for a passing ship outside, with more fuel for a fire taken from within the facility. Two of the characters died, one right by the exit, escape within their grasp.

In all this time, there were relatively few proper encounters, and it worked because of that. Once the creature actually showed up, it became significantly less scary, and once the players and PCs figured out how to hurt it, it became less scary still, though still a formidable opponent. The same style should work well for you, albeit probably less lethal as this isn't a Halloween one shot.

snacksmoto
2015-12-18, 07:20 PM
Since the dungeon will be mostly empty of monsters doesn't mean it has to be mostly empty of encounters. Definitely focus on atmosphere. Think of things that can tell part of the story or history just by their existence. Since the place will be haunted, definitely think of horror tropes.

Perhaps things such as hearing faint screams for mercy that they can track which lead to a jumbled pile of rusted armour with only a few dried, cracked pieces of bone.
A ghostly figure of a feral, degenerate crusader with armour to match who will charge at the party in obvious hunger, only to fade and disappear. Depending on how you want to frame the scenario, it could disappear before or after it passes through its target, without damage.
In some areas light and shadow could simply be wrong. A person holding a torch on their right could have their shadow cast forward. As soon as they notice it, a flicker from the torch sets the shadow normally.
Scratched messages on a wall asking for forgiveness beside some armoured remains of possibly one of the last crusaders. The rest of the remains could be in the spider's lair.
A momentary breeze of frigid air turns their breath to a cloud but their torches never flicker in the breeze.
Ghostly figures in the corridors that cut across their direction of travel, or pass alongside them, with or without sound, with or without acknowledging the party.
Rooms with walls of stone that are above ground but smell of freshly turned earth, or of corrupted, rotting earth.
Rubble or destroyed furniture that moves to a different location when they aren't looking. Statues could also move around this way, or even change body positions or facial expressions.

Talakeal
2015-12-19, 09:13 PM
Thanks, these are all great ideas.

So should I actually go through the dungeon room by room with the players and draw out a map (either for myself or on the mat) or go more theater of the mind?

The dragon is a good idea, but between the living wall and the beholders the players are going to have their hands full with surprise monsters.

Jay R
2015-12-19, 10:31 PM
I recommend having the map drawn out on butcher paper or tiles on the table, covered with smaller sheets of paper that you lift off when they see them.

It speeds up the game tremendously to have the layout already there.

It also allows an important clue to be visible to the players.

goto124
2015-12-20, 12:18 AM
Get one of those portable whiteboards? (http://l7.alamy.com/zooms/8d04d3e5f3094be2ae2bbd98ad7c16ee/girl-draws-map-with-pictures-on-whiteboard-on-floor-cn0634.jpg)

Could even use tape on the whiteboard to make a grid - doesn't disappear when you wipe off the marker ink!

Spore
2015-12-20, 06:39 AM
The dragon is a good idea, but between the living wall and the beholders the players are going to have their hands full with surprise monsters.

Why is the beholder in there though? Is that the Lich's pet? What forces it to stay there? The wiki entry for beholders speaks something of Beholder "Wizards" that take out their antimagic abilities enabling them to gain levels in the wizard class. Is this some exiled Sentry searching for the eldritch secrets buried in there?

Townopolis
2015-12-20, 05:12 PM
Just off the top of my head, my recommendations would be:

Try to ensure that the party gets 2-3 empty rooms at first, followed by a hard fight, possibly an ambush.
Do go room-by-room with each room following a pattern of entry>description>investigation
Entry: After a few rooms, the party will likely have established an entry SOP. Then just ask them if they do that and roll it all at once when they do.
Description: Ensure that every single room has a clear IC purpose. I.e. "this was once a bedroom," "it looks like you've found the kitchen," etc... all the advice above this post applies here as well.
Investigation: This part is optional. If the party decides to move through a room without inspecting, just move on to the next room (unless there's an ambush, then do that first).
If the party investigates, ask them where (in the room) they're going, then spring any ambushes, then go into more detailed descriptions of what they find in the room.

This way, most rooms will be quick (kick in the door, describe, yell "clear," move on) unless the party decides to pick it apart.

The initial attack is to give them an idea of what to look out for and establish tension that should keep the crawl engaging. The occasional fight can refresh the tension as needed. I would also say that, in general, if the party is able to spot the enemies, they should have the chance to ambush them.

Talakeal
2015-12-20, 07:40 PM
Why is the beholder in there though? Is that the Lich's pet? What forces it to stay there? The wiki entry for beholders speaks something of Beholder "Wizards" that take out their antimagic abilities enabling them to gain levels in the wizard class. Is this some exiled Sentry searching for the eldritch secrets buried in there?

In some ways the beholder is just another treasure hunter raiding the dungeon.

He believes knowledge is power and searches out eldritch lore and memorizes it and then destroys it so it cant be used against hum, He is in the process of reading / burning the liches secret library.

Talakeal
2015-12-20, 07:41 PM
Get one of those portable whiteboards? (http://l7.alamy.com/zooms/8d04d3e5f3094be2ae2bbd98ad7c16ee/girl-draws-map-with-pictures-on-whiteboard-on-floor-cn0634.jpg)

Could even use tape on the whiteboard to make a grid - doesn't disappear when you wipe off the marker ink!

I actually have one already, I am just used to using it in dungeons where there is an encounter in most every room. I am not sure whether or not it is appropriate to actually draw out the whole dungeon when most of the rooms are just there for atmosphere.

AMFV
2015-12-21, 10:21 AM
I actually have one already, I am just used to using it in dungeons where there is an encounter in most every room. I am not sure whether or not it is appropriate to actually draw out the whole dungeon when most of the rooms are just there for atmosphere.

Definitely still do it. ESPECIALLY if you've been doing dungeons with tons of encounters. As the players see the empty rooms start to pile up, if they expect an encounter, they'll expect a really big one. It'll build up a lot of horror and suspense stuff. Remember that according to Mr. Hitchcock, suspense is scarier than shock. So if they're expecting something and it doesn't come and doesn't come, until it does, then you'll have a good buildup. Don't overuse it completely though since if it never comes they'll just relax back down.

ImNotTrevor
2015-12-21, 12:55 PM
Haunted castles are easy...ish.

But this place was owned by a lich. Why not have some magical artifacts that are strange and off-the-wall? Things that make no sense without some kind of bizaare arcane taint. Think of things like these:

A mirror that, when you look in it, shows the viewer being slowly dismembered by an invisible knife. The viewer feels nothing, just watches themselves being slowly carved alive.

A room where the walls are covered in writing that says "IM NOT DEAD YET" over and over. With a low-DC check, they find that the words are still writing themselves. A dead body lays in the middle of the room. If they move the body, whatever room the body is in starts to get graffiti'd instead.

A musicbox that plays a nice tune. If they touch it, it suddenly becomes a disembodied, screaming head until they let go. Only the person who touches it sees this.

The orbs could do (and maybe should do) nonsensical, repetitive actions. Trying to put on a rusty helmet that keeps falling through them. Trying desperately to chew on old bones with no effect.

Nothing is scarier than the unexplainable or the unknown. Have a room that is very dark. When they step inside, all the doors seal and it goes pitch black. They hear an entire scene of a man being eaten alive as just audio, or hear a small child sitting behind them crying/laughing/singing an old nursery rhyme. Always behind them. Always.
When the scene ends or whatever, the doors open and the room is normal except a remnant of what they heard. (A doll if the child, laying in the corner. Or a thoroughly chewed skeleton laying in disarray on the floor surrounded by eerily fresh blood.)

A plate that turns any inanimate object set onto it into human flesh. (Have a candle fall over onto it.)


Go ham, friend, and they will see monsters as blessed relief from the nightmare you've created.

Check out scp-wiki.net for more ideas of just creepy, random crap.

Flickerdart
2015-12-21, 02:26 PM
I would avoid detailing things too much. Players will get distracted by everything and try to dispel it, steal it, break it, or "solve the puzzle" when there isn't one. Always be ready with a cue that makes them decide "okay, we leave the trinket alone and move on."

Ideas:

The thing crumbles to dust due to its advanced age, unable to handle all the prodding.
The thing begins to heat up abruptly.
The thing begins to glow red and emit a high pitched alarm sound.
The thing turns out to be an easily identifiable item - a dagger, shield, helmet, or whatever - just executed in an unfamiliar style or obscured by shadows.

ImNotTrevor
2015-12-21, 02:30 PM
Random aside, but how spooky would it be if in a room that becomes pitch black, the DM uses a remote to shut off the lights and just starts screaming for a solid 30 seconds, then the lights come on and he goes back to normal like nothing happened?

That would be unnerving as hell.

Someone do that in a horror campaign or session and report back to us.

Talakeal
2015-12-28, 05:11 AM
Thanks for all the awesome ideas guys (and gals)!

MrStabby
2015-12-28, 09:47 PM
Surprised no one mentioned this thread:

http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?419451-The-most-paranoia-inducing-dungeon

There are some silly but also some excellent ideas for an unnerving dungeon in there.

Mutazoia
2015-12-29, 04:43 AM
One of the most successful dungeons I have run, was a tomb. There was only a few monsters in the whole thing. The majority of the tomb was all traps and puzzles designed and built to discourage/kill tomb robbers.

These days, traps and puzzles seem to be largely ignored in favor of raw combat.

Lord Torath
2015-12-29, 02:55 PM
Do you know what happened to cause the crusaders to descend to cannibalism? An army generally has supplies and supply lines; what happened to those? When the lines were cut, what prevented the crusaders from re-establishing them? What made staying in the fortress and eating each other preferable to venturing out to forage in the surrounding area (perhaps a commander officer driven to insanity and paranoia, jealous of a lower-ranking-but-well-respected leader of a different "faction" of the crusaders)? Will discovering this have some impact on the PCs? On the ghosts in the tower? Just a few more things to think about.

Talakeal
2015-12-29, 03:18 PM
Do you know what happened to cause the crusaders to descend to cannibalism? An army generally has supplies and supply lines; what happened to those? When the lines were cut, what prevented the crusaders from re-establishing them? What made staying in the fortress and eating each other preferable to venturing out to forage in the surrounding area (perhaps a commander officer driven to insanity and paranoia, jealous of a lower-ranking-but-well-respected leader of a different "faction" of the crusaders)? Will discovering this have some impact on the PCs? On the ghosts in the tower? Just a few more things to think about.

Basically, the PCs of the previous campaign defeated the BBEG of the setting, and he had a realm thousands of miles in diameter which was polluted and corrupted on both a spiritual and physical level, where the land was poisoned and the only living things were horrible mutants.

The crusade was formed several generations after the BBEG's death to cleanse the blight from the world and slay the last remnants of his army. They marched into his realm and successfully defeated their enemies, but lacked the capacity to carry enough supplies for the return journey, and as most of their enemies were undead there were no stores for them to seize upon their victory.

The leader of the crusade knew this, but had a vision that divine providence would take care of them if their faith was strong, and so she marched them to victory long past the point of no return.

Mutazoia
2015-12-30, 02:33 AM
Basically, the PCs of the previous campaign defeated the BBEG of the setting, and he had a realm thousands of miles in diameter which was polluted and corrupted on both a spiritual and physical level, where the land was poisoned and the only living things were horrible mutants.

The crusade was formed several generations after the BBEG's death to cleanse the blight from the world and slay the last remnants of his army. They marched into his realm and successfully defeated their enemies, but lacked the capacity to carry enough supplies for the return journey, and as most of their enemies were undead there were no stores for them to seize upon their victory.

The leader of the crusade knew this, but had a vision that divine providence would take care of them if their faith was strong, and so she marched them to victory long past the point of no return.

You'll need to have a reason that they didn't start to head back home regardless of the level of supplies they may or may not have had...odds are that some of them would have made it otherwise. In a setting where magically created food and water are a thing, marching an army out beyond supply lines is more difficult than it sounds. I would imagine a "Alamo" scenario, where they were surrounded and unable to retreat, only a few people able to cast "create food and water" but not enough to feed everybody (maybe on or two of the officers that kept that ability for their own private use until a mutiny ended that practice, along with their lives). Throw in some natural factors, such as getting snowed in for months (natural or magical) and not being able to do any basic hunting/foraging (not that you would find many animals hanging around a large number of undead to begin with), and you've got a pretty solid reason why they all stayed put rather than cutting and running.

Talakeal
2015-12-30, 03:08 AM
You'll need to have a reason that they didn't start to head back home regardless of the level of supplies they may or may not have had...odds are that some of them would have made it otherwise. In a setting where magically created food and water are a thing, marching an army out beyond supply lines is more difficult than it sounds. I would imagine a "Alamo" scenario, where they were surrounded and unable to retreat, only a few people able to cast "create food and water" but not enough to feed everybody (maybe on or two of the officers that kept that ability for their own private use until a mutiny ended that practice, along with their lives). Throw in some natural factors, such as getting snowed in for months (natural or magical) and not being able to do any basic hunting/foraging (not that you would find many animals hanging around a large number of undead to begin with), and you've got a pretty solid reason why they all stayed put rather than cutting and running.

Its a low magic world, any casters they might have had would have been completely incapable of sustaining an army.

Also, a few did try and return. But they would be crossing hundreds, if not thousands, of miles of poisoned, monster infested wasteland, the odds of any of a small group actually making it back are fairly miniscule.

Aotrs Commander
2015-12-31, 04:38 PM
I recently have just had great success running an almost entirely exporatory game (bits of which could be said to be a dungeon crawl). (There's the write-up on this very forum is you have some hours to kill...!) As the entire point was exploration and the PCs were there to actual explore and learn, I made sure there was plenty of skill checks and the occasional object to investigate. The PCs thus spent their time ascertaining what stuff was made from, what it might have been, how old it was etc and it trying to work out the "story" of the place. (It was a two-day adventure which had only three combats in it.)

So it is entirely possible to do this - provided you have the right sort of players who wont get bored of that - and the trick is to keep the players engaged. Mechanically, skill checks to learn stuff are good as well as use of search and spot to find it. (I was running sci-fi in Rolemaster, with a party specifically set up for exploration operations, but you could do pretty much the same with any party, provided the players don't get bored and one character s not cut completely ut (like a D&D Fighter with no useful skills or something.)

Needs a fair bit of prep work, though, in setting all the descriptions up.

It's okay to go room by room if the non-interesting rooms are confined to a fairly short description. You could argue such things could be omitted, but I feel versimilitude and immersion demand one occasionally find the loo (et al), for example, even if no actual adventuring happens in there. Not every room should be filled with monsters or traps.

goto124
2016-01-04, 12:58 AM
I feel versimilitude and immersion demand one occasionally find the loo (et al), for example, even if no actual adventuring happens in there. Not every room should be filled with monsters or traps.

There's a water snake in the toilet!

Joe the Rat
2016-01-04, 10:07 AM
I am not sure whether or not it is appropriate to actually draw out the whole dungeon when most of the rooms are just there for atmosphere.

A room of nothing but mood is pretty boring. You can have them, but sprinkle them around.
Atmosphere can be an "encounter" - folks have mentioned using ghosts as clue-givers (and wandering monsters), but you can do this with your rooms as well. Each room should have a story to tell. Know what each room was in "life," and think about how the Necromancer and his support staff (living or non) used it. Add a couple centuries of decay, but lay out the story. Is the dining hall a formal and functional space to bring valued guests, or a simple affair for the staff? Was the necromancer a fairly normal in his tastes (chandeliers of gold) slightly eccentric (stuffed alligator holding oil lamps) or big on death (the whole room is an ossuary). Did he have an extensive wine cellar? A music room? A torture chamber? Innovative shelving system for tight-packing skeletons and zombies (or corpses) when not in use?

Where did the crusaders set up "camp?" Here's the signs of habitation, here's where a shrine to a good-aligned deity was built (possibly still consecrated), here's some human bones with distinctive butcher-marks - leaving it to the players (and character's abilities) to identify features such as "human femur" and "signs of butchering." Did someone hole up to avoid the cannibal plague, or did the last survivor lock himself away? A corpse (or very hungry crusader-ghoul) in a room with a journal chronicling their experiences... and possibly some clues to the layout. Or you have the busted-out pantry, with weathered parchment found here and there as the Last Crusader makes his rounds, the loose binding dropping pages from his journal. There is no sign of food - everything eaten, with no signs or rot, and very little of vermin getting into things... or signs of the vermin being eaten.

200 years does quite a number on buildings, particularly if poorly maintained. A minor leak will collapse a roof, an open window will rot out your flooring. Where magical (or "actual") traps are not used, you can still have "hazard" traps. Is the floor safe? How to get past the missing staircase? Is that an ugly carpet, or are those stains yellow mold? You can also add some details that allude to the bonus boss: a broken wall or section of floor, where part of the edge is perfectly smooth and curved, like someone disintegrated part to enlarge the opening. Statues of creatures, or monsters, that are much newer than the rest of the decor, and way too lifelike.

People don't typically hide all their non-monetary wealth. A lot of it goes on display. A lot of the easy-access areas may be picked over, but there is opportunity for treasure if you look around, and possibly do some digging. There may not always be treasure, or a clue, or even something useful, but one good find early on may encourage some extra looking.

Lord Torath
2016-01-04, 02:38 PM
Its a low magic world, any casters they might have had would have been completely incapable of sustaining an army.

Also, a few did try and return. But they would be crossing hundreds, if not thousands, of miles of poisoned, monster infested wasteland, the odds of any of a small group actually making it back are fairly miniscule.How edible are these monsters? What do the monsters eat? Can humans (demi-, semi-, or -oids) live off the same prey animals and water sources? Are there any surviving tribes of Crusaders who abandoned the fortress in favor of braving the wilderness? Or evidence of their hunting camps after they died off? (Probably not, as hunting camps are unlikely to last for 200 years without constant upkeep).

Talakeal
2016-01-04, 03:14 PM
How edible are these monsters? What do the monsters eat? Can humans (demi-, semi-, or -oids) live off the same prey animals and water sources? Are there any surviving tribes of Crusaders who abandoned the fortress in favor of braving the wilderness? Or evidence of their hunting camps after they died off? (Probably not, as hunting camps are unlikely to last for 200 years without constant upkeep).

The land itself is tainted, both on a physical and spiritual level. Almost everything is poisonous. The native creatures have some innate resistance to the poisons and plagues of the area, but they are still twisted and mutated and in constant pain.

There may have been some survivors, but that was 200 years ago and any evidence of them would likely be long lost, I hadnt planned on mentioning it in the game.