Summary: Player (Homebrew Bard lvl 6) has an artifact instrument that is paired to another which, when played together, can close rifts between planes. The player who has one of the paired instruments decided to play the song she'd been using to close rifts backward. I had her roll a performance and she got her 20 for the night, a total of 32 on performance. I had to come up with something on the spot, fortunately I was quick enough on me feet to come up with the start of what could be very interesting...but I'm drawing a bit of a blank now that I have to move forward with it.
She ended up being teleported to the source of what was causing the rifts in this location to open, a Crystalline Demon. The demon was in it's jeweled form and she has subsequently picked up and carried along the demon/gem. She is on the opposite side of the Dwarven mines that they've been exploring from the rest of the party. I already plan on having the demon start to warp her mind, but the creatures that have spilled forth from the rifts can easily destroy her. The rest of the party (lvl 6) can handle the creatures, mephits, basiliks, ankhegs, etc.
So I ask you all, how would you bring the group together, how would you make this infiltration interesting? Feel free to ask questions if you want clarification.
Simply teleporting her back to the party doesn't seem very interesting. But, you have dimensional tearing, and multiple planes of existence overlapping here to make things really interesting!
How well does your party deal with puzzles?
The dimensional instabilities can be opening up tears in fabric of reality. These can be opening and closing around the party, and the party can go through. These might lead to other part of the dungeon, they might go to areas in pocket dimensions, they might go to different plane, they might go to other locations in the Prime Material plane, there may be a mix. Different sets of portals can open and close in the same location.
Think of it as a series of rooms or areas.
Example: Area #1: The party's current location, in the Dwarven mine. Dimensional portals open and close around the party, one per round: Red, Blue, Green. Red leads to Area #2, Green to Area #3, Blue to Area #4.
You just then string the rooms together in a maze like this:
Where you color code edges into sets, and only one set of colored edges exists at a given time. What you could do is have one maze, and break it into unsolvable sections, so there isn't a path through from one side of the maze to the other, unless the portal colors change. They need to hop back and forth between sets of portal colors to make their way across this inter-dimensional maze.
The nodes can be anywhere in the multiverse if you like. You can really play up exotic locations here. But ... I might want to devise some reason to keep the Characters from wandering off to explore these exotic locations.
Make things more interesting? A set of paths only open up when someone in the party does something. The Crystalline Demon has left magical artifacts in these locations trying to engineer some sort of inter-planar confluence, and these artifacts could be used to shift between portal color sets. Since the magic seems to be music based, the Bard can use her instrument. Is there another musical character in the group?
Provide a means of communication between the Bard, and the rest of the Party - having some sort of resonance between the crystal artifacts so that the Bard and the Party can hear one another would work.
Now, that the party and the Bard can work together, make that a requirement. The Bard can only activate certain portal colors from her side, the party can only activate some from theirs, so they need to work together.
Oh, and the rooms available through the red portals ( for example ) are inhabited by nasty creatures :D I would make the red portals have some seriously advantageous shortcuts through the maze, but they're guarded by some seriously nasty creatures. I might even cheat and create two sets of monsters, one that the Bard could handle on her own, and one for the Party; it depends on who gets there as to what monsters are there ( and always were there, honest ). I might also be ready to scale groups down to match subsets of the party, if they split up into more than 2 groups. I don't think that's wise, but ... parties, you know.
So - you have a complex shifting inter-dimensional maze, that they party needs to cooperate to manipulate, so that they can get the party back together, with shortcuts they can take if they're willing to pay the price in blood.
Plus you can salt the maze with puzzles, interesting treasure, fantastic locations across all of time and space, and possible future story hooks.
Plus, maybe the party can discover what the Crystalline Demon was trying to do, and possibly thwart it, if you leave clues in the maze.
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Oh Vedexent, you and I stumble on each other's posts and ideas and seem to be of very similar minds. I've already got this kind of thing in the works, however it's tied to an endgame based on this story arc. My players are actually pretty good about puzzles, most of them seem to enjoy them, I am really luck with my group...smart, resourceful, tactical, enjoy puzzles, only one is really the dungeon crawl type.
The party just, 2 sessions ago, realized that the bard is of a lost line of heirs to the artifact. The other artifact belonging to another bloodline, and her (backstory) childhood friend/love interest. This is the first set of rifts that they've encountered, I'm using it to teach the Bard, and group, how the instrument works, how the rifts work, and introduce this story arc. They have a means of communication already set up, a variant of stone of sending, so they can already manage that (though they've somehow forgotten about them for the moment...) The bard is already aware that there are multiple rifts in the area, having closed 2 so far, there is a pull that she feels in the general direction of a portal that gives her some form of guidance with her task. I've given her mental images, when first trying to earn the instrument's favor, of the City of Brass, and the Kraken from the Plane of Water.
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If you already have a means of communication, then perhaps you can adapt the ides, stripping out all the extra-planar aspects.
If there are enemy patrols, traps, monsters, etc. between them - in such a manner that would require shared information and coordination of effort to bypass - this could still work.
The Bard can't get past a nest of ankhegs on her own, but the party can lure them away ( possibly engaging them in combat ) so she can slip by.
The party - might - trigger a trap and becomes trapped somewhere, but the Bard is in a situation where she can deactivate the mechanism keeping them imprisoned.
etc.
The tricky thing here would be to set up obstacles which:
Can be solved much easier through coordinated effort and communication.
Can be acted on simultaneously by groups physically distant from one another
However creatures can climb cliffs, and water and rocks fall down - so vertical distance might be a good tool here.
I might even preserve the whole aspect of "there are high danger, high risk, high reward" shortcuts through the passages between the Bard and the Party a if they dare. If not, the way is much longer.
This kind of scenario might even act as dramatic foreshadowing if you have some sort of inter-dimensional shifting maze puzzle near the endgame: "OK, this is just like the time we got separated in the mines of Dhirulihr ... expect - you know - with a lot more extra-dimensional planes, and demons .... ".
Disclaimer: This signature is a badge of membership in the Forum Loudmouth Club. We are all friends. We are not attacking each other. We are engaging in spirited, friendly debate with one another. We may get snarky, but these are not attacks. Thank you for not reporting us.
Have the magic phase her back and forth with the main party and the crystal demon’s original location (you could bind this to original location she teleported from or the other instrument player, whatever works). Whenever she phases, it results in a release of some creatures where she's phasing from. It’s time bounded when she phases (random or not). She takes one random person with her who she is physically touching. The crystal demon is using her to consume the party, so the spawned creatures don’t attack her (or always miss her). If she’s made unconcious or shatters the crystal, the whole thing ends. Perhaps give a hint as to what is coming (e.g. visions) so the party can prep before each phasing. Creatures are released on both ends (so she leaves something behind and goes back to face something). You can draw it out or make it a rapid back and forth as fits your campaign.
Summary: Player (Homebrew Bard lvl 6) has an artifact instrument that is paired to another which, when played together, can close rifts between planes. The player who has one of the paired instruments decided to play the song she'd been using to close rifts backward. I had her roll a performance and she got her 20 for the night, a total of 32 on performance. I had to come up with something on the spot, fortunately I was quick enough on me feet to come up with the start of what could be very interesting...but I'm drawing a bit of a blank now that I have to move forward with it.
She ended up being teleported to the source of what was causing the rifts in this location to open, a Crystalline Demon. The demon was in it's jeweled form and she has subsequently picked up and carried along the demon/gem. She is on the opposite side of the Dwarven mines that they've been exploring from the rest of the party. I already plan on having the demon start to warp her mind, but the creatures that have spilled forth from the rifts can easily destroy her. The rest of the party (lvl 6) can handle the creatures, mephits, basiliks, ankhegs, etc.
So I ask you all, how would you bring the group together, how would you make this infiltration interesting? Feel free to ask questions if you want clarification.
Simply teleporting her back to the party doesn't seem very interesting. But, you have dimensional tearing, and multiple planes of existence overlapping here to make things really interesting!
How well does your party deal with puzzles?
The dimensional instabilities can be opening up tears in fabric of reality. These can be opening and closing around the party, and the party can go through. These might lead to other part of the dungeon, they might go to areas in pocket dimensions, they might go to different plane, they might go to other locations in the Prime Material plane, there may be a mix. Different sets of portals can open and close in the same location.
Think of it as a series of rooms or areas.
Example: Area #1: The party's current location, in the Dwarven mine. Dimensional portals open and close around the party, one per round: Red, Blue, Green. Red leads to Area #2, Green to Area #3, Blue to Area #4.
You just then string the rooms together in a maze like this:
Where you color code edges into sets, and only one set of colored edges exists at a given time. What you could do is have one maze, and break it into unsolvable sections, so there isn't a path through from one side of the maze to the other, unless the portal colors change. They need to hop back and forth between sets of portal colors to make their way across this inter-dimensional maze.
The nodes can be anywhere in the multiverse if you like. You can really play up exotic locations here. But ... I might want to devise some reason to keep the Characters from wandering off to explore these exotic locations.
Make things more interesting? A set of paths only open up when someone in the party does something. The Crystalline Demon has left magical artifacts in these locations trying to engineer some sort of inter-planar confluence, and these artifacts could be used to shift between portal color sets. Since the magic seems to be music based, the Bard can use her instrument. Is there another musical character in the group?
Provide a means of communication between the Bard, and the rest of the Party - having some sort of resonance between the crystal artifacts so that the Bard and the Party can hear one another would work.
Now, that the party and the Bard can work together, make that a requirement. The Bard can only activate certain portal colors from her side, the party can only activate some from theirs, so they need to work together.
Oh, and the rooms available through the red portals ( for example ) are inhabited by nasty creatures :D I would make the red portals have some seriously advantageous shortcuts through the maze, but they're guarded by some seriously nasty creatures. I might even cheat and create two sets of monsters, one that the Bard could handle on her own, and one for the Party; it depends on who gets there as to what monsters are there ( and always were there, honest ). I might also be ready to scale groups down to match subsets of the party, if they split up into more than 2 groups. I don't think that's wise, but ... parties, you know.
So - you have a complex shifting inter-dimensional maze, that they party needs to cooperate to manipulate, so that they can get the party back together, with shortcuts they can take if they're willing to pay the price in blood.
Plus you can salt the maze with puzzles, interesting treasure, fantastic locations across all of time and space, and possible future story hooks.
Plus, maybe the party can discover what the Crystalline Demon was trying to do, and possibly thwart it, if you leave clues in the maze.
I may end up using this myself :)
My DM Philosophy, as summed up by other people: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1rN5w4-azTq3Kbn0Yvk9nfqQhwQ1R5by1/view
Disclaimer: This signature is a badge of membership in the Forum Loudmouth Club. We are all friends. We are not attacking each other. We are engaging in spirited, friendly debate with one another. We may get snarky, but these are not attacks. Thank you for not reporting us.
Oh Vedexent, you and I stumble on each other's posts and ideas and seem to be of very similar minds. I've already got this kind of thing in the works, however it's tied to an endgame based on this story arc. My players are actually pretty good about puzzles, most of them seem to enjoy them, I am really luck with my group...smart, resourceful, tactical, enjoy puzzles, only one is really the dungeon crawl type.
The party just, 2 sessions ago, realized that the bard is of a lost line of heirs to the artifact. The other artifact belonging to another bloodline, and her (backstory) childhood friend/love interest. This is the first set of rifts that they've encountered, I'm using it to teach the Bard, and group, how the instrument works, how the rifts work, and introduce this story arc. They have a means of communication already set up, a variant of stone of sending, so they can already manage that (though they've somehow forgotten about them for the moment...) The bard is already aware that there are multiple rifts in the area, having closed 2 so far, there is a pull that she feels in the general direction of a portal that gives her some form of guidance with her task. I've given her mental images, when first trying to earn the instrument's favor, of the City of Brass, and the Kraken from the Plane of Water.
Hope this gives a bit more to work with.
Hmm... OK.
I still think I may use this myself, as my party is about to go Plane hopping for the first time, and this might be their way to get back :)
My DM Philosophy, as summed up by other people: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1rN5w4-azTq3Kbn0Yvk9nfqQhwQ1R5by1/view
Disclaimer: This signature is a badge of membership in the Forum Loudmouth Club. We are all friends. We are not attacking each other. We are engaging in spirited, friendly debate with one another. We may get snarky, but these are not attacks. Thank you for not reporting us.
If you already have a means of communication, then perhaps you can adapt the ides, stripping out all the extra-planar aspects.
If there are enemy patrols, traps, monsters, etc. between them - in such a manner that would require shared information and coordination of effort to bypass - this could still work.
The tricky thing here would be to set up obstacles which:
However creatures can climb cliffs, and water and rocks fall down - so vertical distance might be a good tool here.
I might even preserve the whole aspect of "there are high danger, high risk, high reward" shortcuts through the passages between the Bard and the Party a if they dare. If not, the way is much longer.
This kind of scenario might even act as dramatic foreshadowing if you have some sort of inter-dimensional shifting maze puzzle near the endgame: "OK, this is just like the time we got separated in the mines of Dhirulihr ... expect - you know - with a lot more extra-dimensional planes, and demons .... ".
My DM Philosophy, as summed up by other people: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1rN5w4-azTq3Kbn0Yvk9nfqQhwQ1R5by1/view
Disclaimer: This signature is a badge of membership in the Forum Loudmouth Club. We are all friends. We are not attacking each other. We are engaging in spirited, friendly debate with one another. We may get snarky, but these are not attacks. Thank you for not reporting us.
Have the magic phase her back and forth with the main party and the crystal demon’s original location (you could bind this to original location she teleported from or the other instrument player, whatever works). Whenever she phases, it results in a release of some creatures where she's phasing from. It’s time bounded when she phases (random or not). She takes one random person with her who she is physically touching. The crystal demon is using her to consume the party, so the spawned creatures don’t attack her (or always miss her). If she’s made unconcious or shatters the crystal, the whole thing ends. Perhaps give a hint as to what is coming (e.g. visions) so the party can prep before each phasing. Creatures are released on both ends (so she leaves something behind and goes back to face something). You can draw it out or make it a rapid back and forth as fits your campaign.
I rather like that idea, I will have to adapt it some but, I like the concept.