Let's cut to the chase - I have some great ideas for a dungeon that will essentially be the lead-up to my campaign's final 20th level BBEG. I want to make sure that it properly challenges a large group of characters who are between lvl 17-20.
Tiny backstory: In my homebrew game, Io, the dragon god that split into Tiamat/Bahamut, left their body behind when they split (somehow/unimportant). This split happened while Io was helping to create the multiverse and planes, and thus their body is suffused with raw planar magic (in other words, McGuffin stuff). There was a great secret sealed magic door that kept the body secret, but the players now need to get through the door and find the body for endgame plot reasons.
I want the inside of this magic sealed chamber to essentially be a "prison" that keeps the body/magic from escaping; and it also has elements that have morphed into completely different planar elements, from the magic still contained. Does anyone have some fun ideas, or suggestions for places to look, for high level dungeons that incorporate "weird" or interplanar travel shenanigans?
In my mind this would be a puzzle dungeon shaped like a wagon wheel with 7 spokes, one for each "key" they've collected throughout the campaign. Each spoke would be a room or two before a section where they need to insert their key - once all are inserted, the middle of the wagon wheel opens up and they can continue to the boss.
I have some ideas: one could be a room that essentially splits the party into smaller groups, feeding off their thoughts/whatever, and turns into a small scale boss rush: have them rotate around a few different battlegrounds with bosses they've fought throughout the campaign, and have to work together across these battlefields to defeat the bosses.
Another area could be a puzzle that involves crossing a sort of "planar vortex", that sucks things through and spits them out in a terrible place (with some convoluted way to get back). That terrible place could be a section of the Shadowfell, falling through the skies of the Plane of Air, or even just a dangerous pocket dimension full of monsters.
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I know what you're thinking: "In that flurry of blows, did he use all his ki points, or save one?" Well, are ya feeling lucky, punk?
Without knowing the details, I’d consider making each spoke thematic to where they found the key. It helps it be a kind of retrospective/greatest hits to remind them of the campaign details before they hit the boss.
There's this old jrpg (Legend of Dragoon, if you've heard of it) where the final dungeon is this god-embryo that reacts to the characters as they travel through it, populating the dungeon with pieces of their past (known and unknown) and forcing them to reckon with their personal demons.
One character has to fight a demon-posessed version of his long lost daughter and come to terms with the fact that treating her as a martial arts pupil first and a daughter second was a bad way to parent.
Another character has to fight a giant plant monster with the face of the birth mother who abandoned her, confronting her deep-seated bitterness she held for her and forcing her to acknowledge that her mother was just a woman escaping a bad situation that she as a child couldn't see.
You see how it goes. Dig into the players' pasts, their relationship with your NPCs, and show them twisted and monstrous versions of them as the dungeon tests those who would get to the center.
Without knowing the details, I’d consider making each spoke thematic to where they found the key. It helps it be a kind of retrospective/greatest hits to remind them of the campaign details before they hit the boss.
This is actually a great idea. The whole campaign was based around a multiverse "Greatest Hits" across DND, with the McGuffin keys being located in famous modules/locations (one in the Tomb of Annihilation, one in Waterdeep, one in Avernus, one in the Feywild, etc). Doing this would help to solidify each theme while also reiterating everything they've done up to this point.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
I know what you're thinking: "In that flurry of blows, did he use all his ki points, or save one?" Well, are ya feeling lucky, punk?
I play WW barbarian and I tried tier 4 capstone dungeon at lvl 60 and got my butt whooped by regular mobs, so I decided to wait. I'm currently lvl 63 now and I went ahead and collected all altar of lilith for stat boost and decided to try the capstone dungeon again. I wasn't struggling with regular mobs this time and I was able to beat the first two trials without any issues. The next trial (final trial before the boss) where I have to collect animus from the cannibal is where I'm stuck at. Idk exactly what attack it is, but he literally one shots me at full HP. The cannibal I was fighting had the fire affix crap, where fire ball is shot out in 3 directions, so I would keep my distance when fire balls are about to be fired off and close on him after the to damage him and repeat. But, he keeps doing some weird 1 KO move that I don't know what I'm supposed to do, even after taking + 900 armor elixir.
Is it normal that I'm struggling this much before the final boss fight? I guess it makes me think that I'm doing something wrong when I see others saying they did this at lvl 60. Idk how I'm even struggling with mobs before Elias.
For barbarian players out there who did this dungeon, did you run into similar issues or nah? If so, should I be playing more safe like only attack the cannibal when my shouts are up? And rest of time just run away? The weird debuff that stacks every 5 secs where I take more dmg pisses me off.
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Let's cut to the chase - I have some great ideas for a dungeon that will essentially be the lead-up to my campaign's final 20th level BBEG. I want to make sure that it properly challenges a large group of characters who are between lvl 17-20.
Tiny backstory: In my homebrew game, Io, the dragon god that split into Tiamat/Bahamut, left their body behind when they split (somehow/unimportant). This split happened while Io was helping to create the multiverse and planes, and thus their body is suffused with raw planar magic (in other words, McGuffin stuff). There was a great secret sealed magic door that kept the body secret, but the players now need to get through the door and find the body for endgame plot reasons.
I want the inside of this magic sealed chamber to essentially be a "prison" that keeps the body/magic from escaping; and it also has elements that have morphed into completely different planar elements, from the magic still contained. Does anyone have some fun ideas, or suggestions for places to look, for high level dungeons that incorporate "weird" or interplanar travel shenanigans?
In my mind this would be a puzzle dungeon shaped like a wagon wheel with 7 spokes, one for each "key" they've collected throughout the campaign. Each spoke would be a room or two before a section where they need to insert their key - once all are inserted, the middle of the wagon wheel opens up and they can continue to the boss.
I have some ideas: one could be a room that essentially splits the party into smaller groups, feeding off their thoughts/whatever, and turns into a small scale boss rush: have them rotate around a few different battlegrounds with bosses they've fought throughout the campaign, and have to work together across these battlefields to defeat the bosses.
Another area could be a puzzle that involves crossing a sort of "planar vortex", that sucks things through and spits them out in a terrible place (with some convoluted way to get back). That terrible place could be a section of the Shadowfell, falling through the skies of the Plane of Air, or even just a dangerous pocket dimension full of monsters.
I know what you're thinking: "In that flurry of blows, did he use all his ki points, or save one?" Well, are ya feeling lucky, punk?
Without knowing the details, I’d consider making each spoke thematic to where they found the key. It helps it be a kind of retrospective/greatest hits to remind them of the campaign details before they hit the boss.
There's this old jrpg (Legend of Dragoon, if you've heard of it) where the final dungeon is this god-embryo that reacts to the characters as they travel through it, populating the dungeon with pieces of their past (known and unknown) and forcing them to reckon with their personal demons.
One character has to fight a demon-posessed version of his long lost daughter and come to terms with the fact that treating her as a martial arts pupil first and a daughter second was a bad way to parent.
Another character has to fight a giant plant monster with the face of the birth mother who abandoned her, confronting her deep-seated bitterness she held for her and forcing her to acknowledge that her mother was just a woman escaping a bad situation that she as a child couldn't see.
You see how it goes. Dig into the players' pasts, their relationship with your NPCs, and show them twisted and monstrous versions of them as the dungeon tests those who would get to the center.
This is actually a great idea. The whole campaign was based around a multiverse "Greatest Hits" across DND, with the McGuffin keys being located in famous modules/locations (one in the Tomb of Annihilation, one in Waterdeep, one in Avernus, one in the Feywild, etc). Doing this would help to solidify each theme while also reiterating everything they've done up to this point.
I know what you're thinking: "In that flurry of blows, did he use all his ki points, or save one?" Well, are ya feeling lucky, punk?
I play WW barbarian and I tried tier 4 capstone dungeon at lvl 60 and got my butt whooped by regular mobs, so I decided to wait. I'm currently lvl 63 now and I went ahead and collected all altar of lilith for stat boost and decided to try the capstone dungeon again. I wasn't struggling with regular mobs this time and I was able to beat the first two trials without any issues. The next trial (final trial before the boss) where I have to collect animus from the cannibal is where I'm stuck at. Idk exactly what attack it is, but he literally one shots me at full HP. The cannibal I was fighting had the fire affix crap, where fire ball is shot out in 3 directions, so I would keep my distance when fire balls are about to be fired off and close on him after the to damage him and repeat. But, he keeps doing some weird 1 KO move that I don't know what I'm supposed to do, even after taking + 900 armor elixir.
Is it normal that I'm struggling this much before the final boss fight? I guess it makes me think that I'm doing something wrong when I see others saying they did this at lvl 60. Idk how I'm even struggling with mobs before Elias.
For barbarian players out there who did this dungeon, did you run into similar issues or nah? If so, should I be playing more safe like only attack the cannibal when my shouts are up? And rest of time just run away? The weird debuff that stacks every 5 secs where I take more dmg pisses me off.