Dm need help with idea. Inside mind of a god.

[Adamantly d20]

Ok so In our campaign, I DM for a group of between 6-12 players (depending on who can make it that session)

We are in a realm that is a dying world where a comatose elder god rests. Horrible monsters of darkness are born from her nightmares and those who still enhabit the world are being hunted by the creatures of darkness.

The players have come to this realm by means of "plot device portal" and have come across the body of this comatose elder god. One of the players used a key that can "open any barrier/portal/gate/door etc... and wishes to enter the mind of the elder god to try to calm its nightmares.

I'm having some trouble coming up with a session that would be ok for a group of level 10s to not get obliterated...

Something in the line of puzzles/labyrinth of the mind of a god... with creatures manifesting to challenge the players. I had a vague idea of something like the movie "inside out" or something. Idk. Any ideas welcome.

***
The elder goddess was never as powerful as she should have been because she was unable to harness enough energy to fully develop. She was believed to be stillborn when she hatched from her "elder egg" and her 4 siblings (elder gods) left her here on this planet and ventured off to harness and gather primordial magic so they could create new worlds.

(In our setting. The elder gods wander the cosmos in search of primordial energy which they harness. They seek out lesser beings that have come into contact with this primordial energy and have become *gods*. The elder gods make note of the location and allow the *gods* to grow in power. And to help gather more energies. The elder gods will eventually devour the lesser *gods* and when they believe they have enough energy, they attempt to build a suitable world to lay their eggs to create the next iteration of themselves. Often they fail at creating the "perfect world" so they leave it and go on to search for more energy to try again. Once a "perfect world" is created they then burrow into that world and lay "elder eggs" and "die". The new "elder gods" will be reborn again if the previous iterations have gathered a sufficient amount of energy and their eggs are nourished. When they hatch there is a "big bang". Most of the nearby worlds within range are obliterated and the new elder gods suck the energy/life from the world where they were hatched from and go searching the cosmos for more magical energies and *gods* to devour and create suitable worlds again. Then they start the process again. -this happens over a period of time of anywhere from 100,000 to a hundred billion years depending on how easy it is to find sufficient energy and if they are able to make worlds quickly during this iteration of their cycle. Some species/races/ planets survive these cycles, while others are completely destroyed or killed off by the blast from the "bigbang". Each cycle is refered to as a "Revision")

[Adamantly d20]

Party consists of a mixture of experienced vs new players. Characters (off the top of my head)

*half-elf Wizard (new player) mix of damage spells and some utility (CG)

*half-giant Barbarian/fighter (experienced) tanky and uses a towers shield as a weapon (deals damage based on str score) (CG)

*halfling summoner (experienced) 3-headed serpent eidelon, has some healing abilities (CN)-slight evil tendencies

*warforged inquisitor (experienced) uses great axe I think (player re-rolled new character so doesn't have a lot of magic items at the moment) (N?)

*half-elf ranger/dragonrider (new, but "gets the game"), power hungry, has a bow and gets lots of attacks... did I mention lots, LOTS of attacks. Has dragon companion (NG)

*blackscale lizard (new) some sort of monk/fighter mix very strong likes to grapple, doesn't talk. (CN)

*half-orc bard (new) "worships" a god of "darkness" has a scythe/guitar combination weapon/instrument. Does bard things. (CE)

*we have some rogues and fighters that rarely show up and won't be counted*

*DMPC that is NEVER used, I created it to be a healer for the group when party size was small, but I have never used it because they have enough healing and I didn't want to remove the "challenge" from the game. (N)

[flappeercraft]

I would make it a mirror world of the real one. It has all the aspects of the real world but twisted in a way and corrupted. So maybe a possible twist could be that instead of the planes being separate the planes are all one and there are just random chunks of plane everywhere, maybe opposite alignments for every creature, Demons and Angels switch places, that kind of stuff. Finally I would add some aspect of the creation mythos of the campaign setting being shown and show maybe a weakening state of his portfolios around his whole imaginary world. Symbols burnt down, churches in ruins, sanctuaries invaded, worshippers killed, etc.

Edit: Something psychologically affecting him might not be wrong, maybe due to lack of willpower he is not able to affect his dream world and due to not affecting his dream world he lacks willpower or a similar closed loop like that.

[Adamantly d20]

I like the mirror world idea. I used a similar thing last session for a hallway that led to a hidden prison chamber that had a follower of the god that the bard worships. Planes coming togetherand shifting landscapes wit crazy magical effects are also awesome ideas.

[Hackulator]

Have encounters that DO wipe the party, but then since it's a crazy nightmare and not reality, "dying" just throws them into some other crazy situation.

[Adamantly d20]

So far what I'm envisioning, with the help of your suggestions.

Collision of multiple planes with illusion/phantom terrain that changes and has magical effects that may change gravity randomly and have random things burst apart and create effects? Demons/ are good, angels are evil (love this idea). Spawn creatures of great power and play them without mercy. Upon character "death" they can be returned to the prime material where they are alive and In a shaken state. 99.9% of the npcs will not believe them if they try to tell people what happened.

[Mr.Sandman]

A thought on the Demons/Angels thing: Angels, being the servents of good gods, are acting as sort of mental Antibodies, hunting down the Demon Viruses, which the Demons and Angels see you as, because they have been the only actually living things in here before.

[DrKerosene]

I basically combined the effects of the Dream Heart, with an upgraded version of that Dragon Psychosis that causes wandering sleeplessness and manifested illusions, to incapacitate Graughlothor and turn the surrounding landscape into a dungeon.

I periodically just changed the landscape and setting to represent when a dream suddenly shifts to a different focus, kinda like limbo. My Players liked it, but I reduced CR of historical badasses by using Simulcras of them, and such already mentioned ideas.

I believe there is a trilogy called Towing Jehovah, I think the second book deals with some people going into the mind of God (literally physically) and having a Wonderland-esque adventure. It would be a great time for unfathomable knowledge to be provided. You know, cosmoc horror type stuff.

How about using some Ethergaunts too?

[atemu1234]

Aren't obyrith the dreams of dead gods? They may work.

[Garktz]

I would go full tpk on them but not really...
Think about our own nightmares, scary as ****, we feel overwhelmed and we cant do nothing but run or scream...
If the things on our nightmares are stronger than ourselfs and we cant do **** about them... a god has nightmares with stuff beyond their power so make it so

Have them face monsters that vastly overpower the party, make it clear that they should run away, but they wont, the monsters will catch up to them and kill them the most horrible way possible, just to awake again facing a different monster...
again and again and again
Every monser they face, just catches up to them and kills them faster than te last until they embrace the madnees and stop running away or fighting back
Each time they embrace the madness, they take some aspects of the nightmares away until after enoght embraces, they "cure" the god...

Extra points if they face the players real fears

[flappeercraft]

I would go full tpk on them but not really...
Think about our own nightmares, scary as ****, we feel overwhelmed and we cant do nothing but run or scream...
If the things on our nightmares are stronger than ourselfs and we cant do **** about them... a god has nightmares with stuff beyond their power so make it so

Have them face monsters that vastly overpower the party, make it clear that they should run away, but they wont, the monsters will catch up to them and kill them the most horrible way possible, just to awake again facing a different monster...
again and again and again
Every monser they face, just catches up to them and kills them faster than te last until they embrace the madnees and stop running away or fighting back
Each time they embrace the madness, they take some aspects of the nightmares away until after enoght embraces, they "cure" the god...

Extra points if they face the players real fears

What about Dream Larvae from ELH?

[Adamantly d20]

Lots of great ideas. I have about a week to prepare for the session. So I'll be busy making notes and such

[Lvl 2 Expert]

I might make the mind not a part of the physical world. As such nothing in there, including the players, has hitpoints. Players can be incapacitated by all sorts of mental effects, like madness, sleep effects, illusions and the maze spell. Stunts and obstacles work similarly. You can't fall to your death, but you can get trapped in a pit, or get separated from the rest of the group by moving walls. The consciousness of the god needs to be talked out of being mad. It's hidden somewhere in the mind itself. In fact, maybe his consciousness is shattered, and they need to talk to several different parts of it. One way to do it might be Freudian psychology: the ego, the super-ego and the id (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Id,_ego_and_super-ego). The super-ego is full of itself and hardly recognizes anything outside the god exists and the id is barely conscious, so they either need to have a really good go at it or realize they're approaching this the wrong way and talk to the ego first, having one part on their side gives them a bonus to collecting the others. Let them draw analogies so they can use their skills and spells. The id is the animal side of the mind, so handle animal can be used, ideas like that.

It would be a weird session, but that's kind of what you want inside the mind of a god.

[Menzath]

I second the mirror world idea. What comes to mind is a mix of the movies existeZ and the labyrinth.
A surreal mix of the world with odd looking or monstrous versions of NPC's they know, with a landscape that is mis-matched or even shifting.

Also the "shadow" creatures could be all the creatures in the dream temporarily manifesting on the material, including the PC's after they enter the dream.
But the shadows and PC's still view it as the dream, maybe until plot device tells them other wise.

And I would have to assume that even sleeping gods are somewhat aware of their domain on some level.
So maybe that manifests in the dreams as well to aid in either rousing them or at least to stop the nightmare/shadow creatures for a time.

[denthor]

You need to have clues on how to wake the diety.

Have what amounts to a giant aspirin in her hand or hair she missed taking it takes 6 caracters to lift it and put it in her mounth. She swallows the pill and starts to revive.

This makes the heroes they should be. When they return.

[Adamantly d20]

If they revive the elder god who's purpose is to eat divine power and energy so that it can meet up with her siblings and start the Revision...

A lot of gods will die and most mortals on the material plane will die from the revision. Maybe they unwittingly being about the revision... idk