I am writing an adventure set in Undermountain where the players have to move 140 400lb barrels through a treacherous dungeon. Think narrow hallways, hostile factions of enemies and wandering monsters. I want to stay a step ahead of my players so I thought I would throw out a call to come up with as many ways as possible to move the barrels in one trip with teleportation or gates being off the table.
Here's one. Using a back of the envelope calculation my friend figured that 5 portable holes could transport that much in one go. Of course, that would cost tens of thousands of gold even if you could find holes.
Hire a bunch of flunkies to carry the stuff, probably with carts or oxen or something. While the PCs go ahead and clear out the bad guys. Not sure how big the barrels are, but a couple demiplane spells might do it.
Including a railway system through a more difficult section of the dungeon is an option. Include lots of track switchers which can be triggered by enemies at inopportune moments! Gives the players the choice between the obvious "use the tracks and carts to move it" option which is clearly a trap, or to find a different way.
Offering the party a pair of magical clamps which allow them to carry immensely heavy loads (when the load is clamped) would be the slowest way (clamp one barrel at a time...) and would also give them something cool to play with later in the campaign!
The "Pro" option would be to use True Polymorph to transform the ale into a creature that can walk itself out.
Yepp, that's a nice option there. But, the only problem here is, IT ONLY LASTS 1 HOUR !!! The more time you spend in prepare the other stuff, the less time you'll have to travel. So, you have to calculate ( while you are travelling ) the time spent. Then, Stop travelling, cast it again, and move.
So 1 alternative option is, split the whole ammount by parts, so each part means less weight to carry, right ??? Then use Tenser's Floating Disk over that ammount of Barrels, or else use a Flying machine, like a Battle Baloon ( or a similar one ). And then repeat the same strategy as many times as it requires it.
That is one heck of a challenge you're throwing at your players!
The main issues come down to weight and number. Basically any spell still on the table is limited by duration, weight, or number of targets such that moving 140 of those barrels is impossible without extreme DM allowances. Even the Reduce/Tenser's Floating Disk suggestion above (which is probably the most reasonable and smart magic combo for this job) needs some DM help since Reduce can't target more than one object at a time. Assuming you disregard the railway system described above, the solution then has to be magic items in concert with spells - and you're gonna have to diverge from RAW to help your players out by ignoring target limits, ignoring concentration, or ignoring weight.
Portable holes aside, a flying carpet or two could potentially carry the barrels without the party needing to hold onto them, but the barrels will have to be under the effects of a modified Reduce spell. A ring of telekinesis might also help, but again, it only targets one object, so you'd have to make allowances. Finally, if you're getting creative with spells, maybe you give them a special scroll of Animate Objects that allows them to target all objects in a certain radius for one hour.
Logistics - you probably require at least two people/barrel to roll them. If they need lifting then you would need 4/barrel unless you can hire an all Goliath work force. Anyway this is somewhere around 280 to 560 people to move the barrels. Porters would appear to be the only solution since you mentioned that the dungeon is treacherous with narrow hallways so wagons and similar methods won't work. Depending on how far it is from one location to the other you could probably set up a "bucket" brigade rolling the barrels along.
Other than that .. you get the magic options.
I'd suggest planeshift but it moves creatures rather than objects.
Demiplane was suggested above and might be the best option. It creates a 30'x30'x30' room - each barrel in this case is about 2' tall with a 2' diameter if they each weigh 400 lbs - so 140 of them would easily fit in the room. The room is open for an hour so the barrels would have to be fairly quickly moved into the space but then the connection to the demiplane could be opened from the destination location and the barrels would remain secure the entire time. This is likely the best, fastest and most secure option.
Mount the barrels on a wall. Get a large supply of Bards. Inspire whatever effort you opt for with a rousing round of "140 Barrels of Beer on the Wall." Mechanically, make your table sing it as a round. If they make it through it entirely, whatever they opted to do, they did it. If the song breaks, the cask on that iteration broke, and the party must start the song again at the next barrel.
I still think, even in this instance, one barrel needs to be internally consumed for this to really work.
30 is the agility with which the craft ale industry operates.
140 is likely the output of a contact brewery somewhere within the Miller/Coors/imBev networks only made to look like a craft brewery. Such contractors often work integrated into their conglomerates distribution system, so a group of independent operators like the PCs in this seizure are going to have some challenges being outsiders to Big Ale.
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Jander Sunstar is the thinking person's Drizzt, fight me.
If you want real world problem solvers, I would make large wheels and strap a pair on each barrel and roll 'em along as Best I could.
You will need a few "sleds" for some of the irregular terrain. The party should bring loads of extra rope and timbers. They should also have a few sets of block and tackle.
Pulleys and things will help for vertical ascents, and when the situation permits, you can "swing" them a long ways like a pendulum in the right sort of caverns.
Can the players "carry a single barrel"? There are spells like thunderstep that allow you and whatever you can carry. I'm not saying Thunderstep is the right call, but spells that work like that, without using the prohibited Teleport spells.
Good luck.
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Cum catapultae proscriptae erunt tum soli proscript catapultas habebunt
If you want real world problem solvers, I would make large wheels and strap a pair on each barrel and roll 'em along as Best I could.
You will need a few "sleds" for some of the irregular terrain. The party should bring loads of extra rope and timbers. They should also have a few sets of block and tackle.
Pulleys and things will help for vertical ascents, and when the situation permits, you can "swing" them a long ways like a pendulum in the right sort of caverns.
Can the players "carry a single barrel"? There are spells like thunderstep that allow you and whatever you can carry. I'm not saying Thunderstep is the right call, but spells that work like that, without using the prohibited Teleport spells.
Good luck.
A hundred and forty segment barrel caterpillar. Now that would be a sight to see.
If you want real world problem solvers, I would make large wheels and strap a pair on each barrel and roll 'em along as Best I could.
You will need a few "sleds" for some of the irregular terrain. The party should bring loads of extra rope and timbers. They should also have a few sets of block and tackle.
Pulleys and things will help for vertical ascents, and when the situation permits, you can "swing" them a long ways like a pendulum in the right sort of caverns.
Can the players "carry a single barrel"? There are spells like thunderstep that allow you and whatever you can carry. I'm not saying Thunderstep is the right call, but spells that work like that, without using the prohibited Teleport spells.
Good luck.
A hundred and forty segment barrel caterpillar. Now that would be a sight to see.
That's what I was thinking initially.
You can also Broom of Flying 70,000 gs done deal. Or have fewer but shuttle trips.
If you want real world problem solvers, I would make large wheels and strap a pair on each barrel and roll 'em along as Best I could.
You will need a few "sleds" for some of the irregular terrain. The party should bring loads of extra rope and timbers. They should also have a few sets of block and tackle.
Pulleys and things will help for vertical ascents, and when the situation permits, you can "swing" them a long ways like a pendulum in the right sort of caverns.
Can the players "carry a single barrel"? There are spells like thunderstep that allow you and whatever you can carry. I'm not saying Thunderstep is the right call, but spells that work like that, without using the prohibited Teleport spells.
Good luck.
A hundred and forty segment barrel caterpillar. Now that would be a sight to see.
That's what I was thinking initially.
You can also Broom of Flying 70,000 gs done deal. Or have fewer but shuttle trips.
That's pretty funny and I believe it would be an epic quest everyone would remember.
Might you be able to just waltz by those goblins who are rolling on the cave floor holding their bellies and laughing so hard they have tears in the eyes?
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Cum catapultae proscriptae erunt tum soli proscript catapultas habebunt
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I am writing an adventure set in Undermountain where the players have to move 140 400lb barrels through a treacherous dungeon. Think narrow hallways, hostile factions of enemies and wandering monsters. I want to stay a step ahead of my players so I thought I would throw out a call to come up with as many ways as possible to move the barrels in one trip with teleportation or gates being off the table.
Here's one. Using a back of the envelope calculation my friend figured that 5 portable holes could transport that much in one go. Of course, that would cost tens of thousands of gold even if you could find holes.
Looking for suggestions, thanks.
Hire a bunch of flunkies to carry the stuff, probably with carts or oxen or something. While the PCs go ahead and clear out the bad guys.
Not sure how big the barrels are, but a couple demiplane spells might do it.
Enlarged Goliath Bear Totem Barbarians?
I have a weird sense of humor.
I also make maps.(That's a link)
Reduce the size of barrells with Enlarge/Reduce spell. Tenser's floating disc (is that still a thing in 5E?)
Gradually via internal consumption.
Jander Sunstar is the thinking person's Drizzt, fight me.
The "Pro" option would be to use True Polymorph to transform the ale into a creature that can walk itself out.
140 is a lot - could I build barges and flood the dungeon?
Including a railway system through a more difficult section of the dungeon is an option. Include lots of track switchers which can be triggered by enemies at inopportune moments! Gives the players the choice between the obvious "use the tracks and carts to move it" option which is clearly a trap, or to find a different way.
Offering the party a pair of magical clamps which allow them to carry immensely heavy loads (when the load is clamped) would be the slowest way (clamp one barrel at a time...) and would also give them something cool to play with later in the campaign!
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Yepp, that's a nice option there. But, the only problem here is, IT ONLY LASTS 1 HOUR !!! The more time you spend in prepare the other stuff, the less time you'll have to travel.
So, you have to calculate ( while you are travelling ) the time spent. Then, Stop travelling, cast it again, and move.
So 1 alternative option is, split the whole ammount by parts, so each part means less weight to carry, right ??? Then use Tenser's Floating Disk over that ammount of Barrels, or else use a Flying machine, like a Battle Baloon ( or a similar one ). And then repeat the same strategy as many times as it requires it.
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True Polymorph can become 'until dispelled'
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That is one heck of a challenge you're throwing at your players!
The main issues come down to weight and number. Basically any spell still on the table is limited by duration, weight, or number of targets such that moving 140 of those barrels is impossible without extreme DM allowances. Even the Reduce/Tenser's Floating Disk suggestion above (which is probably the most reasonable and smart magic combo for this job) needs some DM help since Reduce can't target more than one object at a time. Assuming you disregard the railway system described above, the solution then has to be magic items in concert with spells - and you're gonna have to diverge from RAW to help your players out by ignoring target limits, ignoring concentration, or ignoring weight.
Portable holes aside, a flying carpet or two could potentially carry the barrels without the party needing to hold onto them, but the barrels will have to be under the effects of a modified Reduce spell. A ring of telekinesis might also help, but again, it only targets one object, so you'd have to make allowances. Finally, if you're getting creative with spells, maybe you give them a special scroll of Animate Objects that allows them to target all objects in a certain radius for one hour.
It's either logistics or magic ...
Logistics - you probably require at least two people/barrel to roll them. If they need lifting then you would need 4/barrel unless you can hire an all Goliath work force. Anyway this is somewhere around 280 to 560 people to move the barrels. Porters would appear to be the only solution since you mentioned that the dungeon is treacherous with narrow hallways so wagons and similar methods won't work. Depending on how far it is from one location to the other you could probably set up a "bucket" brigade rolling the barrels along.
Other than that .. you get the magic options.
I'd suggest planeshift but it moves creatures rather than objects.
Demiplane was suggested above and might be the best option. It creates a 30'x30'x30' room - each barrel in this case is about 2' tall with a 2' diameter if they each weigh 400 lbs - so 140 of them would easily fit in the room. The room is open for an hour so the barrels would have to be fairly quickly moved into the space but then the connection to the demiplane could be opened from the destination location and the barrels would remain secure the entire time. This is likely the best, fastest and most secure option.
I agree with whoever said the simplest way is to just drink it.
Glug... glug...
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Mount the barrels on a wall. Get a large supply of Bards. Inspire whatever effort you opt for with a rousing round of "140 Barrels of Beer on the Wall." Mechanically, make your table sing it as a round. If they make it through it entirely, whatever they opted to do, they did it. If the song breaks, the cask on that iteration broke, and the party must start the song again at the next barrel.
I still think, even in this instance, one barrel needs to be internally consumed for this to really work.
Jander Sunstar is the thinking person's Drizzt, fight me.
Pardon the question, but why 140? Wouldn't 30 barrels be just as challenging and give more options for mobility?
30 is the agility with which the craft ale industry operates.
140 is likely the output of a contact brewery somewhere within the Miller/Coors/imBev networks only made to look like a craft brewery. Such contractors often work integrated into their conglomerates distribution system, so a group of independent operators like the PCs in this seizure are going to have some challenges being outsiders to Big Ale.
Jander Sunstar is the thinking person's Drizzt, fight me.
If you want real world problem solvers, I would make large wheels and strap a pair on each barrel and roll 'em along as Best I could.
You will need a few "sleds" for some of the irregular terrain. The party should bring loads of extra rope and timbers. They should also have a few sets of block and tackle.
Pulleys and things will help for vertical ascents, and when the situation permits, you can "swing" them a long ways like a pendulum in the right sort of caverns.
Can the players "carry a single barrel"? There are spells like thunderstep that allow you and whatever you can carry. I'm not saying Thunderstep is the right call, but spells that work like that, without using the prohibited Teleport spells.
Good luck.
Cum catapultae proscriptae erunt tum soli proscript catapultas habebunt
A hundred and forty segment barrel caterpillar. Now that would be a sight to see.
That's what I was thinking initially.
You can also Broom of Flying 70,000 gs done deal. Or have fewer but shuttle trips.
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"............anybody got any potatoes? We could drop a potato in each hole an' see which ones get viciously mauled by horrible monsters?"
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That's pretty funny and I believe it would be an epic quest everyone would remember.
Might you be able to just waltz by those goblins who are rolling on the cave floor holding their bellies and laughing so hard they have tears in the eyes?
Cum catapultae proscriptae erunt tum soli proscript catapultas habebunt