How to make a competitive dungeon crawl?

[Brendanicus]

Hey y'all.

In my next campaign, the players will be competing against other warriors in a series of dangerous competitions. I want one such competition to contain dungeon-crawling elements. How do I best do that?

I have a few ideas, but few strike the balance between too safe and too dangerous. Are the competitors sent into a huge dungeon and may only return when they have treasure? Do they go full Hunger Games and only have to survive life in the dungeon for X amount of time? Is the "dungeon" really just some sort of obstacle course? Any and all suggestions, questions, etc welcome.

[comk59]

I think part of this depends on who is organizing the competition. Is it put together by the Fae court? Is this a yearly event that the kingdom hosts, and people come from miles around to watch? Are they slaves, and is this some kind of overcomplicated gladiator arena?

[hymer]

I'd be inclined to have it be the same dungeon, several times. It could be a mental construct for minimum fuss, or if there's sufficicent amount of magic you can get more and more real.
The dungeon would be the same for each group who competes, and they compete to achieve an object on time, or how much gold per minute they were able to loot, or some combination.

[Gastronomie]

I think part of this depends on who is organizing the competition. Is it put together by the Fae court? Is this a yearly event that the kingdom hosts, and people come from miles around to watch? Are they slaves, and is this some kind of overcomplicated gladiator arena?This is an extremely important question. All the charasteristics of the game should revolve around "who hosts this, for what reason".

For instance, the Holy Grail War in the novel-game and anime "Fate" series is about seven historical figures (summoned to the modern world as super-powerful familiars called "Servants") who kill each other to gain the Holy Grail. In this battle royale, killing off the other competitors is of course the main point, but it also has the following complications:

-The seven Servants are each assigned a "Class", sorta like in D&D. Saber, Lancer, Archer, Rider, Caster, Berserker, and Assassin. The historical figures (King Arthur, Cu Chulainn, Hercules, etc.) are called not by their original names, but by the names of their Classes, and the contestants do not know the names of the other Servants. This is because if your "true name" is discovered, you will be at a great disdvantage. If a Servant's true name is discovered by an enemy, it becomes easier to understand what sorts of weapons he may carry, and the loss of information advantage is devastating. For instance, the Lancer (Cu Chulainn) carries the Gáe Bulg, which is said in legends to have the ability to kill anyone it hits with a single strike. If the other contestants didn't know the Lancer was Cu Chulainn, they might miss the fact that even one strike is lethal. If they did know, they would try to constantly keep a distance, which makes it considerably hard for Cu Chulainn to utilize the lance's ability. The contestants will constantly try to research out the true names of the other Servants, in order to understand their abilities and weaknesses. Gathering information via various sources is a large part of the Grail War.

-Each class has its strong points and weak points, which means that Servant A might lose against Servant B, but might be able to beat Servant C... and Servant C might be able to beat servant B in return (like rock-paper-scissors). Or, there might be a Servant so strong that the other Servants are no match for it. This makes it a good idea to actually team up with another Servant for a while, until all the other Servants are defeated (after which the two will again become enemies and fight to the death).

-There are certain points in the land which are brimming with mana. The Grail War is always held in a place where there are multiple "high-magic" points, because the Grail will appear only in a place with lots of magical energy. If you gain hold of a certain high-magic point and fortify it, you gain a tactical advantage over the others. This means that the Grail War is not just "kill each other" - it also involves trying to take control over these special points in the city.

-The Servants are controlled by Masters (spellcasters), who each have three Command Seals (badass-looking tatoos on their hands). These Seals can be used up to order the Servants against their will and against physical laws (by using up a Seal, the Master may teleport his Servant, boost the Servant's powers temporaily, or alternatively, even make the Servant kill himself. Once used up, there's almost no way to retrieve the Seal). Thus these Seals are also an important factor during this battle royale. Extremely powerful resources, but use up all three of them, and you aren't the Master of your Servant anymore, so you can normally use this special resource only twice during the Grail War.

...And there's lots more.

See how this seems really interesting? Contests shouldn't be about just "fighting head-on". It should also involve mystery elements, special resources, teaming up, decieving, and all that complication. That way it'll be much more fun to play.

[MrStabby]

So the pcs vs other parties?

Then I would make it a race. Safe enough but the challenge is to be quick which means no resting and pushing your resources to the limit.

Possibly, if you have more than 2 parties there is even an interesting dynamic to encounters - neither party wants to use so many resources (including HP) that other parties gain an advantage so it becomes a more opportunistic type of attritional race.

[Demonslayer666]

I like this idea. :smallsmile:

I'd make it somewhat dangerous, just so there's some risk involved. Completion time would probably be best, but you could also gauge success by remaining hit points (or remaining healing potions).

I'd put in elements to test all kinds of dungeoneering skills: detecting traps, solving a puzzle, strength, endurance, and agility tests, skill at arms, plus teamwork aspects (combined skill rolls), maybe even identifying fungus.

[Foxhound438]

The way I'd handle it is to say "here's your time limit (2 days or so), whoever comes back with the most treasure wins*"

it ends up being a resource war, where if the party is used to one fight a day they could blow all their spells and be gimped for the rest of the day; probably go way above the DMG "recommended encounters per day" guideline, throw in a few deceptively easy fights with small turnout, a decent amount of rooms filled with moderate to hard encounters and reasonable hauls, and one or two super dangerous fights that, if successful, will likely make the party win by a landslide. Think something like a Purple worm or adult dragon vs. level 7 or 8 characters.

*And of course, if you're late to return, you're penalized heavily (something like 1 hour=-10%, 2 hour = -30%, 3 hour = -60%, 4 hour = disqualification)

[Gastronomie]

The way I'd handle it is to say "here's your time limit (2 days or so), whoever comes back with the most treasure wins*"Certain teams will begin killing the others and robbing their treasure. I can see this happening.

The Greed Island arc from the manga HUNTERxHUNTER is similar to this, but it's more like a video game in how the goal is to fully complete a collection of in-game items. The collected items can be used during combat and for various other purposes. Players may exchange items with each other peacefully, or simply rob them by force. Certain items are very rare - like only five of them existing in the world - and since everyone in the game wants that item, there's constant competition over its ownership.

Perhaps something like this will add "extra complications" to the game.