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shaka gl
2007-12-28, 10:05 PM
A very important NPC was captured by the enemy army in my campaign, so now iŽll need a prison (the party wants to save him). Do you have any prisons or buildings that could be used as one? Or just ideas?

The enemy is a Snow Elf Army, so anything Frostburn-themed is helpful, but not necesary.

Balkash
2007-12-28, 10:13 PM
Well obviously the prison must be made out of ice. If you could, please make the prison on top of a lake. Then, have the NPC's cell be located as far down as possible without breaking into the freezing, rushing river current below. Then give all the guards cold resistance, but instead they have fire weakness. Try to get the PC's to use fire, because if they do, they melt away too much of the prison, the structure collapses, the NPC is swept away to probably drown in the freezing water, and the PC's might be swept away too. If not so drastic, then try keeping the NPC in a dimension locked, telekinetic sphere. Then put it out in the middle of a clearing. when the PC's try to save the NPC, send the sphere hurtling upwards while snow elf archers, who have been hiding in the trees and in the snow drifts, pop up to shower the PC's with arrows.

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if you really want a layout,
simple prison layout (http://wcghost.org/images/Layout.jpg)

seedjar
2007-12-28, 10:13 PM
I like to look up floorplans of real-life things for inspiration. Maybe you could browse around for some bunkers or something? Your local library or city hall might have some appropriate blueprints on hand.
~Joe

EvilElitest
2007-12-28, 10:16 PM
1. A small cardboard box that is lit on fire if they think the prisoner is thinking
2. A prison shaped like a massive wheel with the spooks being cells with see through glass that prevents them from seeing the guard in the middle but allows the guard to see them
3. A southern work force where the workers are forced to dig ditches for a warden who were dark sun glasses
from,
EEE

Yami
2007-12-28, 11:18 PM
The foremost thing you need to ask is would this improsing force ever want to capture a magic-user? Secondly, would they have the resources to have AMFed a part of the jail?

If it is so then a gaurd station right before the cells, with AMF about it can make for a dangerous prison break. Low fort save melee builds for the scary.

You could have a lot of fun with it based on the terrain said prison is in. I've grown fond of the open air prisons in a cliff side. But again, this requires a bit of AMF in the area to ensure it's lethality and that no captives can just fly off. Then you can have some repelling fun and fight vertical battles.

Danzaver
2007-12-29, 01:43 AM
I like the way you think, Belkash. I really do.

I was going to suggest some kind of temporal prison where time passes faster inside the cells, but damn, I like your idea better.

shaka gl
2007-12-29, 04:12 PM
Well obviously the prison must be made out of ice. If you could, please make the prison on top of a lake. Then, have the NPC's cell be located as far down as possible without breaking into the freezing, rushing river current below. Then give all the guards cold resistance, but instead they have fire weakness. Try to get the PC's to use fire, because if they do, they melt away too much of the prison, the structure collapses, the NPC is swept away to probably drown in the freezing water, and the PC's might be swept away too.

I really like this idea. Add some Ice Golems, one or two traps involving falling and stalagmites and a nice Frostmage/Elemental Savant (Cold)/Rimefire Witch-gone-bad as a jailhouse keeper; and I think I have a pretty cool adventure. What do you think?

Voyager_I
2007-12-29, 07:17 PM
It's an amusing dungeon, but any mildly competent players will have predicted most of your surprises within the first minute of laying eyes on the fortress. Also, it does raise the question of how an enemy army managed to build a permanent ice fortress. Magically-sculpted ice castles might be getting just a tad trite by now...

...remember, just because the monster has a preferred element doesn't mean its dungeon has to be a Disney-esque theme ride.


Personally, can I suggest something of a red herring? Make the big bad prison (although I'm recommending against the archetypal ice castle), but don't put the NPC in it. Assuming these people know what they have and aren't complete morons, they probably know someone's going to come looking for him. Instead of putting him in the first place any rescuers would look, stuff the prisoner somewhere rather secret and low-key (magic makes it a bit easier to do this). Then make the prison into an Admiral Ackbar-style trap. If the players lose, they get to make their own jailbreak (although putting them in the same place as the NPC would feel rather contrived), and maybe one of their cellmates saw something. If they win, perhaps one of the higher-ranking ambushers bargains for his life with some useful information?

shaka gl
2007-12-29, 07:40 PM
Personally, can I suggest something of a red herring? Make the big bad prison (although I'm recommending against the archetypal ice castle), but don't put the NPC in it. Assuming these people know what they have and aren't complete morons, they probably know someone's going to come looking for him.

Not necesary. It`s supposed to be a secret facility and the only reason the Pcs know about the place is because they found a rebel in the enemy army. But, then again, the army does know that the rebel is with them. Yeah, i see your point.


Instead of putting him in the first place any rescuers would look, stuff the prisoner somewhere rather secret and low-key (magic makes it a bit easier to do this). Then make the prison into an Admiral Ackbar-style trap.

Something like making the intrusion quite easy (trust me, they wont suspect) and once they get to the place where the prisoner should be (I will use the "underground vertical compound inserted in a frozen lake" idea), he is not and the place starts falling apart or they are attacked?


If the players lose, they get to make their own jailbreak (although putting them in the same place as the NPC would feel rather contrived), and maybe one of their cellmates saw something.

Not really, prisoners of this army usually get entombed, hibernated or turnes into ice statues :smallwink:


If they win, perhaps one of the higher-ranking ambushers bargains for his life with some useful information?
They always do, those bastards :smallbiggrin:

kemmotar
2007-12-29, 09:20 PM
Well you could use the stronghodld builder's guidebook to help with ideas. You can use a castle prison. It will be shaped like a sphere and floating well above the ground in a giant cave. Then use the eye of the storm item, or eye of the hurricane(or whatever they're called) to create a hurricane centered on the prison that reaches both to the ground and the ceiling.

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@=emptiness
||=wind-hurricane
----=floor and ceiling...

Hope this makes the least bit of sense...it did in my mind:smalltongue:
something like this anyway...make it spin continually so that gravity people can walk all around the sphere. The VIP cell would be at the very center of the sphere within a telekinetic sphere. Dimensional lock on the whole prison so no one can teleport in. Lighted walls make it impossible to HiPs...add some nasty dopplegagner mindspies for scouts taken on as mercenaries by the snow elf army and there you go....

Voyager_I
2007-12-31, 02:58 AM
Here's my suggestion:

Make the prison subterranean (cliche, but effective for this purpose). Have the entrance be a long, vertical shaft, concealed by both natural means and illusory magic (if available). Assuming the party finds the entrance, they will have to climb/levitate/feather fall to reach the bottom. Tracking checks should notice a recent increase in foot traffic going into the prison, and an easy spot check will reveal that a staircase has recently been removed. Hopefully this will at least make the players suspicious enough to take some precautions, because the Elves have taken great pains to make the ambush inescapable once triggered. If the party is smart, they'll scout the bottom before they descend personally, although the ambushers will probably be coordinated enough not to fire on obvious summoned creatures.

At any rate, whatever reaches the bottom will find it surrounded by a makeshift barricade (probably made largely from the stairs, and perhaps shored up with a few uprooted cell bars). If the defenders can afford it, they will have set up an Antimagic Field at the bottom of the shaft, just to make sure the party can't escape (This will also suppress any summoned creatures they might have sent to scout). The barricade will, naturally, be chock full of concealed defenders, all firing from thick cover. The elves will presumably know that something big is coming their way, and probably won't bother bringing too many CR 1/2 Mooks. To make things a little easier on the party, have them concentrate on the rebel in the first round. In role-playing terms, they all want him dead personally. The party is just another opponent, albeit a particularly dangerous one. In more practical terms, it gives the party proper a chance to get their bearings/buff before getting hammered. Of course, the rebel will probably point out that something is up as soon as he sees the missing stairs. If they just plop straight down expecting to cut down a couple of Door-Mooks, they get what they deserve.

I don't particularly know how the party would survive the ambush if they trigger it...are these the type smart enough to realize that death is not the only option?



Also, while all this is going on, the prisoner is a statue holding up a flowerpot in the BBEG's office.

kentma57
2007-12-31, 09:44 AM
Use genesis to create a wild magic plane, the plane is also time less(you don't age and you don't have to eat or sleep). Finaly plane shift your prisoner there, if he/she tries to planeshift out some random magic effect happens.

Basicly the odds of the escapeing are low and if you try to rescue them you get caught on that plane.

ps: if you want to make it harder have time go much slower on that plane, after they try three spells one thousand years have passed here.

pps: sorry is I got some of the terms for plane types wrong.

pendell
2007-12-31, 09:53 AM
Just some random thoughts, but you might base it on the Supermax (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Supermax) prisons

Or another example to use is a bank vault, with the 'treasure' being the high-value prisoners.

Let's see ...

... it needs to be a fortification to protect against a forcible liberation of prisoners. Hence, walls, magical shielding, AMF field on the prison section itself.

... it needs an early warning detection system , both to prevent people from infiltrating and to prevent escape. That means wards of various kinds, constant protection from good. If your villains are some variant of evil, some sort of alignment check system (detect good, traps that actuate on non-evil characters) might be useful.

... armed guards capable of stopping prisoners if they break out of the anti-magic cells. So you're going to need some sort of high-level jailer to backstop the mooks.

.. perhaps some kind of self-destruct on the prisoner himself, e.g., the prisoner is forced to drink some sort of highly addictive drug, which is fatal if the dose is not repeated every 24 hours. Rescue the prisoner, have him drop dead 24 hours later.

... the decoy cell, containing a high-level lich or vampire disguised as the prisoner.


... a ready reaction force. Once an alarm is signaled, REALLY heavy cavalry should be ready to roll in really fast, up to and including the BBEG him/herself. Once a security breach is detected, the PCs should have ten minutes or less to make their getaway.

... the vault will need food, water, laundry, and other day-to-day services. Folks coming in to provide these services should be subject to 'screening' with detect magic, detect good, etc.


.. Potential prison self-destruct. If it's really that important to the BBEG not to have these prisoners rescued, have some kind of planeshift ready to trip that will dump the entire prison into level 666 of the abyss, planeshift triggerable at a moment's notice by the prison warden or the BBEG.

..> The Gary Gygax trick. Spread rumors and such in the local town and elsewhere .. and in the prison itself .. false clues stating that the way to detention block AA-23 is down a particular dark passage. That dark passage, of course, contains a Sphere of Annihilation.


Hope some of that helps.

Respectfully,

Brian P.

pendell
2007-12-31, 09:59 AM
Heck, speaking of Gygax, just use this module (http://www.wizards.com/dnd/files/Tomb_of_Horrors.zip) and put your prisoner at the end of it. Or just borrow liberally from it. Cackle insanely as none of your PCs will make it out alive.

Respectfully,

Brian P.

shaka gl
2008-01-01, 12:38 PM
Thanks to all! Im using Voyager_1`s idea for the ambush. Also...


Let's see ...

... it needs to be a fortification to protect against a forcible liberation of prisoners. Hence, walls, magical shielding, AMF field on the prison section itself.

Of course.


... it needs an early warning detection system , both to prevent people from infiltrating and to prevent escape. That means wards of various kinds, constant protection from good. If your villains are some variant of evil, some sort of alignment check system (detect good, traps that actuate on non-evil characters) might be useful.

Soldiers of this army are not all Evil, most of them are just LN following orders.


... armed guards capable of stopping prisoners if they break out of the anti-magic cells. So you're going to need some sort of high-level jailer to backstop the mooks.

Already prepared.


... perhaps some kind of self-destruct on the prisoner himself, e.g., the prisoner is forced to drink some sort of highly addictive drug, which is fatal if the dose is not repeated every 24 hours. Rescue the prisoner, have him drop dead 24 hours later.

That`s just mean. And I like that NPC :smallfrown:


... the decoy cell, containing a high-level lich or vampire disguised as the prisoner.

Nice move. Hadn`t think about this. I`ll search for some Frostburn Undead.


... a ready reaction force. Once an alarm is signaled, REALLY heavy cavalry should be ready to roll in really fast, up to and including the BBEG him/herself. Once a security breach is detected, the PCs should have ten minutes or less to make their getaway.

Great. There`s a 2nd in command, a powerful White Half-dragon that serves nice for this.


... the vault will need food, water, laundry, and other day-to-day services. Folks coming in to provide these services should be subject to 'screening' with detect magic, detect good, etc.

Probably they`ll just wear an ammulet or something that the "system" identifies as safe. The pcs will get hurt before they realize this :smallsmile:


.. Potential prison self-destruct. If it's really that important to the BBEG not to have these prisoners rescued, have some kind of planeshift ready to trip that will dump the entire prison into level 666 of the abyss, planeshift triggerable at a moment's notice by the prison warden or the BBEG.

I think the action force, if not avoided, should be enough, so this wont be needed. Still...


..> The Gary Gygax trick. Spread rumors and such in the local town and elsewhere .. and in the prison itself .. false clues stating that the way to detention block AA-23 is down a particular dark passage. That dark passage, of course, contains a Sphere of Annihilation.

Cliché, but it could work...

And...


Also, while all this is going on, the prisoner is a statue holding up a flowerpot in the BBEG's office.

This one is a MUST!