For a future campaign im planning a dungeon crawl that will span an entire continent. Backstory is basically this is the BBEGs lair that no one has been able to chart because of how dangerous it is. Only 1 settlement, which at the shore. Im planning it to be a sort of flow chart, so come to a landmark, pick which way to go, and there will be a hazard of some kind. Some will be the correct way, some will lead to dead ends, others will have treasure or bonus dungeons hidden. But these hazards will be extremely dangerous. One that I have is a Winged-Tarrasque mating ground. Another is a (currently) abandoned fortress covered in barbs, with a broken gate that they cant open. So im looking for a BUNCH of ideas for dangerous terrain and landmarks that a party could encounter, stuff that would terrify even a high level party. Im just lacking in ideas. any help would be wonderful, thank you!
There should be a friendly settlement in there, or two or more. Dungeon crawls are great, but you need to give the characters a chance to take a break. Just from a narrative standpoint, you can’t keep going at 100 percent all the time, it gets exhausting. There needs to be moments where they can rest and let their hair down, talk to NPCs, etc, to reset the level of tension. And if this is a continent-spanning dungeon, there will come a point where walking all the way back to that starting town will just be impractical. Think you start in New York and need to walk to LA. You don’t want to get to St. Louis and decide it’s time to go buy some plate mail and restock on arrows and spell components, so you have to walk all the way back to NY. Maybe it was founded by escaped prisoners of the BBEG or other adventurers who just got stuck down there. Maybe there’s a side tunnel with an escape hatch and the town is on the surface.
As a "continent spanning dungeon" ... you're sort of describing the Underdark, right? You might want to check out Out of the Abyss (which is set in the FR's Underdark) for an idea of how to make a subterranean experience of that scope engaging.
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Jander Sunstar is the thinking person's Drizzt, fight me.
As a "continent spanning dungeon" ... you're sort of describing the Underdark, right? You might want to check out Out of the Abyss (which is set in the FR's Underdark) for an idea of how to make a subterranean experience of that scope engaging.
That reminded me Tomb of Annihilation is somewhat continent spanning.
Ill check out Tomb of Annihilation and Out of the Abyss for more inspiration, thank you.
As for having more settlements, there is a lore reason there is only one settlement. Basically, the continent is largely uncharted over the last thousand years. Attempts have been made to chart it, but due to the extreme danger of the place, not much progress has been made. This is going to be a lot about heavy adventure preparation and dealing with/avoiding extreme environment and wildlife dangers.
There's a third party book "The Survivalists Guide to Spelunking" written in part by the writer of AD&D "Dunegeoneer's Survival Guide." You may want to see if you can find it as it gives a lot of options for the technical and survival challenges of extended forays into the Underdark. There may be others for 5e, and you can find the original Dunegeoneer's Survival Guide on DMsGuild (different rules system though).
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Jander Sunstar is the thinking person's Drizzt, fight me.
It sounds like your really planning a multiple TPK adventure for tier 4 characters. If that is not the case you might want to rethink things a bit so that as they go things get harder and harder as they level up and so that civilization can develop and spread across in their ( and other groups) wake so resupply and rest is more readily available. This also sounds like a ranger intensive game, For ideas you might want to read the first 4 Louis l amour sackett novels (Sackett’s Land, To the Far Blue Mountains, The Warrior’s Path, and Jubal Sackett) to get some ideas on adventures at the edge of civilization and beyond with 1600’s tech max.
They definitely wont be starting on this adventure, itll be one part of the campaign, both as an optional dungeon for extra cash and a story dungeon crawl towards the very end of the game, theyll most likely be lvl 16+ by then im thinking, and for the story part they will have a Lvl 20 NPC Paladin with Legendary Gear assisting them (plot character), and possibly some hunters guild mercs. I have been looking at some of the Underdark stuff and im definitely pulling a lot of inspiration from that. The Underdark looks very similar to this particular continent actually, minus the caves. Ill check out these other references as well!
I would try to avoid a higher level plot character being a main part as it tends to become the DM’s lead them by the nose plot device. The mercs as sidekicks/hirelings makes more sense.
So the thing with this plot NPC is he is actually the BBEG who was sealed away a thousand years ago, and recently released. Legends were twisted about how he was actually the hero. Because he was sealed away for so long, many of his powers are currently sealed in his old lair on this continent, and so hes using the PCs as extra help. He largely remembers the way, and will be guiding the PCs across this continent. The thing is, he will betray the party and leave them, and they will end up having to recall the journey back through the continent several sessions later. So the choice of theirs for this continental dungeon crawl is really making their own map and paying attention. If theyre not paying attention to the path that the NPC will be going, they could be in trouble. Theres also some extra stuff hidden, so if they choose to explore more, i obviously wont stop them.
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Hello all,
For a future campaign im planning a dungeon crawl that will span an entire continent. Backstory is basically this is the BBEGs lair that no one has been able to chart because of how dangerous it is. Only 1 settlement, which at the shore. Im planning it to be a sort of flow chart, so come to a landmark, pick which way to go, and there will be a hazard of some kind. Some will be the correct way, some will lead to dead ends, others will have treasure or bonus dungeons hidden. But these hazards will be extremely dangerous. One that I have is a Winged-Tarrasque mating ground. Another is a (currently) abandoned fortress covered in barbs, with a broken gate that they cant open. So im looking for a BUNCH of ideas for dangerous terrain and landmarks that a party could encounter, stuff that would terrify even a high level party. Im just lacking in ideas. any help would be wonderful, thank you!
Any ideas would be helpful.
Ok, not sure how helpful this will be but
Tasha's has an Environmental Hazards section that covers natural and spells hazards.
I did a quick search and found a couple of pages that may ignite some ideas.
https://worldbuilderblog.me/2015/04/14/simple-hazards/
https://www.dandwiki.com/wiki/5e_Hazards
https://www.tribality.com/2016/07/29/a-collection-of-traps-hazards-dd-5e/
Ill take a look, thank you!
There should be a friendly settlement in there, or two or more. Dungeon crawls are great, but you need to give the characters a chance to take a break. Just from a narrative standpoint, you can’t keep going at 100 percent all the time, it gets exhausting. There needs to be moments where they can rest and let their hair down, talk to NPCs, etc, to reset the level of tension. And if this is a continent-spanning dungeon, there will come a point where walking all the way back to that starting town will just be impractical. Think you start in New York and need to walk to LA. You don’t want to get to St. Louis and decide it’s time to go buy some plate mail and restock on arrows and spell components, so you have to walk all the way back to NY.
Maybe it was founded by escaped prisoners of the BBEG or other adventurers who just got stuck down there. Maybe there’s a side tunnel with an escape hatch and the town is on the surface.
As a "continent spanning dungeon" ... you're sort of describing the Underdark, right? You might want to check out Out of the Abyss (which is set in the FR's Underdark) for an idea of how to make a subterranean experience of that scope engaging.
Jander Sunstar is the thinking person's Drizzt, fight me.
That reminded me Tomb of Annihilation is somewhat continent spanning.
Ill check out Tomb of Annihilation and Out of the Abyss for more inspiration, thank you.
As for having more settlements, there is a lore reason there is only one settlement. Basically, the continent is largely uncharted over the last thousand years. Attempts have been made to chart it, but due to the extreme danger of the place, not much progress has been made. This is going to be a lot about heavy adventure preparation and dealing with/avoiding extreme environment and wildlife dangers.
There's a third party book "The Survivalists Guide to Spelunking" written in part by the writer of AD&D "Dunegeoneer's Survival Guide." You may want to see if you can find it as it gives a lot of options for the technical and survival challenges of extended forays into the Underdark. There may be others for 5e, and you can find the original Dunegeoneer's Survival Guide on DMsGuild (different rules system though).
Jander Sunstar is the thinking person's Drizzt, fight me.
It sounds like your really planning a multiple TPK adventure for tier 4 characters. If that is not the case you might want to rethink things a bit so that as they go things get harder and harder as they level up and so that civilization can develop and spread across in their ( and other groups) wake so resupply and rest is more readily available. This also sounds like a ranger intensive game, For ideas you might want to read the first 4 Louis l amour sackett novels (Sackett’s Land, To the Far Blue Mountains, The Warrior’s Path, and Jubal Sackett) to get some ideas on adventures at the edge of civilization and beyond with 1600’s tech max.
Wisea$$ DM and Player since 1979.
They definitely wont be starting on this adventure, itll be one part of the campaign, both as an optional dungeon for extra cash and a story dungeon crawl towards the very end of the game, theyll most likely be lvl 16+ by then im thinking, and for the story part they will have a Lvl 20 NPC Paladin with Legendary Gear assisting them (plot character), and possibly some hunters guild mercs. I have been looking at some of the Underdark stuff and im definitely pulling a lot of inspiration from that. The Underdark looks very similar to this particular continent actually, minus the caves. Ill check out these other references as well!
I would try to avoid a higher level plot character being a main part as it tends to become the DM’s lead them by the nose plot device. The mercs as sidekicks/hirelings makes more sense.
Wisea$$ DM and Player since 1979.
For plot reasons, ill probably keep the plot-related NPC, honestly.
It’s your game but try not to take the story telling and decision making away from the players.
Wisea$$ DM and Player since 1979.
So the thing with this plot NPC is he is actually the BBEG who was sealed away a thousand years ago, and recently released. Legends were twisted about how he was actually the hero. Because he was sealed away for so long, many of his powers are currently sealed in his old lair on this continent, and so hes using the PCs as extra help. He largely remembers the way, and will be guiding the PCs across this continent. The thing is, he will betray the party and leave them, and they will end up having to recall the journey back through the continent several sessions later. So the choice of theirs for this continental dungeon crawl is really making their own map and paying attention. If theyre not paying attention to the path that the NPC will be going, they could be in trouble. Theres also some extra stuff hidden, so if they choose to explore more, i obviously wont stop them.