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koldstare
2008-03-30, 09:31 PM
Has anybody else seen this dungeon? 1600 encounters and all of the monsters in the monster manual...
http://cgi.ebay.com/Worlds-Largest-Dungeon-Dungeons-and-Dragons-3-5_W0QQitemZ190210016111QQihZ009QQcategoryZ377QQrdZ 1QQssPageNameZWD4VQQcmdZViewItem?_trksid=p1638.m12 4

whats the largest/longest dungeon you have ever run or played?

Szilard
2008-03-30, 09:33 PM
My friend has that, the book is literally 2 or 3 inches thick!

senrath
2008-03-30, 09:35 PM
That book scares me. And I think the longest I've ever been in was about 20 or so encounters, spread out over, if I remember correctly, about 10 square miles.

Flickerdart
2008-03-30, 09:39 PM
Wow...6 pounds of dungeony goodness. 1000 pages...that's impressive.

Now if the adventure covered the entire level-up from 1 to 20...that'd be neat. Same for letting certain-level players start at different places if the earlier challenges are too easy.

And "all the monsters in the manual" also means no human enemies, then? And I'd like to see how they do the aquatic monsters...

senrath
2008-03-30, 09:42 PM
Wow...6 pounds of dungeony goodness. 1000 pages...that's impressive.

Now if the adventure covered the entire level-up from 1 to 20...that'd be neat. Same for letting certain-level players start at different places if the earlier challenges are too easy.

And "all the monsters in the manual" also means no human enemies, then? And I'd like to see how they do the aquatic monsters...

To quote the sales page:

This colossal epic will take characters from neophyte dungeon crawling all the way to epic levels.
So it'll probably either start at level 1 or really low.

koldstare
2008-03-30, 09:50 PM
it said it started at level 1 and that if played in its entirety takes Two Years of real time to play through. Also that you can not leave until the dungeon is completed due to a 1 way force effect at the entrance

Prometheus
2008-03-30, 09:50 PM
I'd really like to know whether or not that has anything besides combat encounters and whether or not it is any good.

I actually don't tend to use many dungeon encounters, when I do, they are seldom deeper than three floors or wider than five rooms (think Zelda dungeon size as a serious upper bound).

But this gets me thinking. How cool would it be for the boards to collectively make a giant dungeon? Where one person leaves off, the next person picks up. It could be a giant paint file, or series of connected paint files. Whose interested?

koldstare
2008-03-30, 09:58 PM
But this gets me thinking. How cool would it be for the boards to collectively make a giant dungeon? Where one person leaves off, the next person picks up. It could be a giant paint file, or series of connected paint files. Whose interested?

I know I'm new to the boards but i would definitely be in

Corsec1337
2008-03-30, 10:04 PM
I was actully thumbing through it last night. Friend of mine is about to put it up on Ebay with some special maps that came out with it when it was first sold.

It has some interesting encounters in it and also has some roleplaying. The book is very... very long. The biggest flaw is that there isn't an appendix that tells you where what is. Like big imporant named people. There is a Wizard that has a tarrasque as a mount in the dungeon though... That should tell you how difficult it can be.

SamTheCleric
2008-03-30, 10:07 PM
Yeah, and that tarrasque isnt the final encounter. Seriously.

I believe... *dont read if you're gonna play it*
The dungeon is an extradimensional prison for some god-like being... and it's beginning to fracture... Been a while since I thumbed through it.

KillianHawkeye
2008-03-30, 10:12 PM
Woah, a Wizard riding the Tarrasque?! WTF

I guess that solves all the talk about the Tarrasque being weak for a CR 20. Just stick a Wizard on him! :smallwink:

Kizara
2008-03-30, 10:16 PM
Anyone actually run it?

I dunno, but it sounds like fun to me.

Chronos
2008-03-30, 10:31 PM
Myself, I have doubts about it. Including every single monster in the Monster Manual? That sounds uncomfortably like the Library of Borges (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Library_of_Babel), which contains every book possible, and therefore no information at all. A dungeon (or library) is defined as much by what isn't in it as what is, and it takes no creativity at all to just smoosh everything together.

And things like the "One way forcefield that you absolutely can't get back out of, no, not even if you do that" smack of railroading. If I'm going to get railroaded by a DM, I'd prefer to at least have some real storyline to go with it, not just the ultimate hack-and-slash.

Gralamin
2008-03-30, 11:37 PM
Myself, I have doubts about it. Including every single monster in the Monster Manual? That sounds uncomfortably like the Library of Borges (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Library_of_Babel), which contains every book possible, and therefore no information at all. A dungeon (or library) is defined as much by what isn't in it as what is, and it takes no creativity at all to just smoosh everything together.

And things like the "One way forcefield that you absolutely can't get back out of, no, not even if you do that" smack of railroading. If I'm going to get railroaded by a DM, I'd prefer to at least have some real storyline to go with it, not just the ultimate hack-and-slash.

It doesn't have every monster in the manual, due to OGL restrictions.
And there is some storyline, they just don't like people leaving the dungeon.

Hadrian_Emrys
2008-03-30, 11:45 PM
The trick, I imagine, is the problem of longevity combined with entirely random WBL. I'm guessing that there are few shops and no reliable means by which to hold onto a ton of loot. Sounds to me like an ideal setting to use a lot of necropolitans and warforged unless you devote SOME skill or spells towards feeding yourself and keeping your fluid intake up.

Douglas
2008-03-30, 11:56 PM
And things like the "One way forcefield that you absolutely can't get back out of, no, not even if you do that" smack of railroading. If I'm going to get railroaded by a DM, I'd prefer to at least have some real storyline to go with it, not just the ultimate hack-and-slash.
Well, presumably if you managed to get back to that point after gaining 10 levels, you might be able to disintegrate it or something. You're only level 1 when you pass that point originally, though, and I imagine it would be a rather long trek back (if it's even possible) after you've gone through enough of it to gain that much xp.

I've gone through a few encounters in the very beginning on these boards once. The game fell apart due to inactivity and/or a disappearing DM, I don't remember which.

koldstare
2008-03-30, 11:59 PM
Oh, i guess all monsters in the SRD then. If it is going to last a couple of years it should have at least a little story. Otherwise why not just roll random encounters all day and kill everything that way.

Yahzi
2008-03-30, 11:59 PM
That sounds uncomfortably like the Library of Borges (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Library_of_Babel), which contains every book possible, and therefore no information at all.
An excellent observation. I agree that the WLD probably contains an amount of fun inversely proportional to its amount of MM completeness.

:smallbiggrin:

Chronos
2008-03-31, 12:25 AM
Well, presumably if you managed to get back to that point after gaining 10 levels, you might be able to disintegrate it or something. You're only level 1 when you pass that point originally, though, and I imagine it would be a rather long trek back (if it's even possible) after you've gone through enough of it to gain that much xp.No trek at all, if you have teleportation spells. Unless, of course, there's some Macguffin which prevents them from working, too, in which case I stand by my railroading comment.

Chronicled
2008-03-31, 12:47 AM
No trek at all, if you have teleportation spells. Unless, of course, there's some Macguffin which prevents them from working, too, in which case I stand by my railroading comment.

Teleportation and summoning spells don't work in the dungeon since it was made to keep demons/devils/etc inside.

Tsotha-lanti
2008-03-31, 01:02 AM
Myself, I have doubts about it. Including every single monster in the Monster Manual? That sounds uncomfortably like the Library of Borges (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Library_of_Babel), which contains every book possible, and therefore no information at all. A dungeon (or library) is defined as much by what isn't in it as what is, and it takes no creativity at all to just smoosh everything together.

Yeah. At least the Undermountain has themed levels.

Ka'ladun
2008-03-31, 02:28 AM
Was playing in this a few days ago. There were 6 of us, all starting at level 4. It seemed a fairly generic dungeon crawl, although there were a few cool things like the magic item eating altar. Also, I don't know if it's part of the dungeon or if the DMs made it up;there were two epic level casters (a level 27 wizard and level 35 warlock if I recall) that were controlling everything and put us in a room with several petrifying monsters (basilisk, gorgon, etc.) The session ended after about 6 hours with the rogue exploding and the rest getting captured for their experiments :smallfrown:

Bavarian itP
2008-03-31, 02:48 AM
it takes no creativity at all to just smoosh everything together.

Where's the problem? D&D is the world's best-selling RPG exactly because it takes no creativity to make a funny adventure.

Saph
2008-03-31, 08:16 AM
We've been playing through the World's Largest Dungeon for about a year. Gone from level 1 to level 12.

It can be pretty fun, if claustrophobic. There are LOTS of traps and some sections of the dungeon are best navigated by the principle "don't touch anything, not even the floor".

Encounters tend to be a bit of a crapshoot. We often run into encounters that are incredibly easy, and often run into encounters that are incredibly hard. Partly this is because the monsters have a tendency to cooperate - you alert the goblin guards on one level, they ring the alarm, and 200+ goblin warriors along with commanders and spellcaster support come looking for you.

Equipment is incredibly hard to come by. It's normally completely random what magic items you get. Warriors are reasonably well-served, since there are plenty of weapons, but don't expect anything unusual or that isn't in the DMG.

The dungeon tends towards heavy combat, with occasional negotiations. There aren't any normal people to interact with and most of your time will probably be taken up with exploration or huge battles. That said, some of the huge battles can be really fun. In the final battle in our current level that we've just completed, we ended up fighting:

• 2 gelatinous cubes
• 1 ochre jelly
• 4 flesh golems
• 4 more flesh golems
• 4 enhanced flesh golems, along with a drider and a mage
• An infinite horde of construct zombies, with four driders providing spellcasting support
• 2 more flesh golems
• A spellcaster capable of using 7th-level spells
• The infinite horde of construct zombies, again
• A drider warlord with seven attacks per round
• A group of eight flesh golems, another group of six flesh golems, a high-level drider spellcaster, a medium-level drider spellcaster, two Gargantuan-sized spider constructs, and the infinite horde of construct zombies one more time. Luckily we had some backup for the last one.

. . . all within the space of a couple of hours. The whole thing took two months to play out, and I went from being 10th-level to 12th-level just from the one day's fighting.

It's probably a good choice if you like Gygaxian-style dungeons, and if your DM doesn't have time to homebrew a full campaign but you want something that'll last - the book cost our DM as much as a couple of normal sourcebooks, and it's kept us occupied for a year. Good value for money. :)

- Saph

Glawackus
2008-03-31, 08:56 AM
Maybe not quite on-topic for this forum, but does anyone know if there are currently any online games of this being run? I'm kind of curious to see just what this whole thing is like.

senrath
2008-03-31, 09:02 AM
Maybe not quite on-topic for this forum, but does anyone know if there are currently any online games of this being run? I'm kind of curious to see just what this whole thing is like.

Ye gods, that would be scary. Considering how long it takes to run this dungeon, and how much longer online games usually take...*twitch*

Glawackus
2008-03-31, 09:04 AM
Ye gods, that would be scary. Considering how long it takes to run this dungeon, and how much longer online games usually take...*twitch*

But why climb Everest? Because it is there. :smallbiggrin:

senrath
2008-03-31, 09:06 AM
But why climb Everest? Because it is there. :smallbiggrin:

Well, I'd play it, if I could be guaranteed a group of people who wouldn't quit after the first couple of months.

Adumbration
2008-03-31, 09:30 AM
Although I haven't yet played a PBP game, I probably would join that game. Sounds like fun.

Sampi
2008-03-31, 09:37 AM
I have been playing it with my group for two and a half years now. We play biweekly, and we've gotten about halfway. The average character level is 15 now, and we take turns GM'ing.

It can be fun.

It is not written very well.

It is edited very poorly.

But we will get ourselves through it.

The best bit? Immortal Fiendish Half-Dragon Gibbering Mouther. Don't ask.

Irreverent Fool
2008-03-31, 11:34 AM
The trick, I imagine, is the problem of longevity combined with entirely random WBL. I'm guessing that there are few shops and no reliable means by which to hold onto a ton of loot. Sounds to me like an ideal setting to use a lot of necropolitans and warforged unless you devote SOME skill or spells towards feeding yourself and keeping your fluid intake up.

I'm replying to this before I finish reading the thread so this may already be mentioned.

I have played in the world's largest dungeon and it can be a chore. The major problem, of course, is with the mapping. As for the 'feeding yourself' issue, a summoner can take care of that. You see, the dungeon is an extradimensional prison and things summoned into it cannot leave. When your spell expires, you no longer control the creature and it is usually unhappy that it can't go home.

It is also delicious.

(There's also a room with eternal fountains of fresh water a short distance in... near the room with the shades (shudder))

Armoury99
2008-03-31, 12:26 PM
Isn't there a similar campaig setting where the entire world is one huge dungeon? Kind of like the Deathgate cycle, without err, the outside bit. Adventurous DMs could combine the two for an occasional change of pace...

PS: if I dreamt that 'the world is one giant dungeon' thing, then I call dibbs on it. :smallsmile:

Crowheart
2008-03-31, 07:40 PM
I have the World's Largest Dungeon and have run it a few times, so I can give my experience on some things:

1. The Dungeon is extremely repetitive. The maps for the dungeon are HUGE and very complicated. There are 16 sections of the dungeon in all, each with some kind of theme. The whole thing is fairly Gygaxian without the insta-kill traps (at least until later on).

2. Every KIND of monster in the SRD is in it, not every monster specifically. There are three dragons in the dungeon, not every single kind of dragon. There might be various demons or devils, but not ALL of them are featured.

3. The book itself in not very well written or edited, but it is still doable.

4. There is almost no RP except for what the DM makes up. Theres a few parts where the PC's might use diplomacy on a monster that isn't immediately hostile but such instances are rare. There is only one exception: One of the larger areas is home to a bunch of elves or some such and can become allies/ home base for the PCs. The area is fairly deep into the dungeon though.

All in all, the dungeon is a giant hackfest and exploration routine. Traps, monsters, mazes galore. It could possibly be fun if your not looking for so much interaction. In the end, my group decided to play something else with a little more RP to it, so we abandoned the game.

Here's a very crappy and small picture of the entire dungeon:
http://www.worldslargestdungeon.com/images/dungeon_map_small.jpg

Have fun if you can.

Hadrian_Emrys
2008-03-31, 07:51 PM
I'm replying to this before I finish reading the thread so this may already be mentioned.

I have played in the world's largest dungeon and it can be a chore. The major problem, of course, is with the mapping. As for the 'feeding yourself' issue, a summoner can take care of that. You see, the dungeon is an extradimensional prison and things summoned into it cannot leave. When your spell expires, you no longer control the creature and it is usually unhappy that it can't go home.

It is also delicious.

(There's also a room with eternal fountains of fresh water a short distance in... near the room with the shades (shudder))

I see. Having never played before, I simply assumed the worst I'd put players through if I were to run it. The dungeon is merciful and yet spiteful to have summons work that way. Good eats (exotic food indeed) yet having to fight your own post battle battle... I like it.

Aquillion
2008-03-31, 11:28 PM
Sounds like a pity. I was hoping it'd be something like Ultima Underworld 1's Great Stygian Abyss.

black dragoon
2008-04-01, 10:26 AM
Dear god! something that beat out undermountain....

Paul H
2008-04-02, 08:08 AM
Hi

Currently playing this at our local club on alternate months. GM reckons way we're going it'll take about 2 years to finish, and that's without doing every room. Should be Epic level time we finish (GM says 30 or so if we do whole lot).

So far the mix is about 1:3 (RP to straight thuggery). We're currently 3rd lvl, only one fatality. Paladin was called to a room by party rogue, straight into a firebal trap. The rogue knew the trap had reset,(having just been blasted himself) just not that the paladin still wasn't healed. Most of party CN)! :smallbiggrin:

If anyone's interested party makeup is:

Human Cleric Llir 2/Favoured Soul 1 - Me (Extra Turning, Augment Healing, Divine Vigor - taking Sacred Healing at 6th)
Elf Sorceror
2x Halfling twins. Both Rogue/Warlock (Played by father & son)
Human Monk
1/2 Orc Fighter

The twins are always getting into trouble, both are also trying to chat up the female elf. Their players use about 3 different accents to show which language they're speaking. (Common, Halfling or Orc). Does mean that we sometimes get bit behind with all the RP & laughter.:smalltongue:

Cheers
Paul H

kingpain
2008-04-02, 09:12 PM
My parties have enjoyed it. There are some typos, and yes it has both combat and role-playing conflict. The CR's in the first area are not well gauged. But...It is immensely fun and my groups routinely ask when I'm going to throw them back down there. Be ready with back-up characters.