There is a place in my homebrew world called the Azure Abyss. My players have heard about it and are thinking about heading there at some point to see what is going on in there. I had an idea to base it off of the Abyss from Made in Abyss, where all is fine and dandy as you descend from the first couple layers, but ascending has dire consequences. The monsters in each layer are of no consequence; I have those figured out.
However, I'm reaching out to you fine folks for ideas on what the Ascending effects might be. I could try and just replicate things from the show, but putting hard numbers to it would help, or completely new ideas would be welcome as well!
I'm thinking there will be about 5 layers, with the bottom layer having a massive dragon, which has grown too large to ascend but has lackeys that bring it food in the form of other creatures or explorers. The creatures here were essentially the primordial god's mistakes, which became too powerful to actually destroy and so they just hid them away, creating those barriers of magic to dissuade them from going back to the surface.
Well going up could always incur levels of exhaustion as just a base effect. Exhaustion comes in six levels, with the final level being death, so you could work it out that each level up you wanted to go might auto-hit you with a level of exhaustion, and maybe that deepest part of the dungeon can hit you with two levels right off the bat, meaning that, unless you do something to mitigate it, a person could never rise up from the bottom without just dying.
On top of that, the various temporary and long-term madness tables in the DMG are full of fun things to do to players that would cause issues as they tried to exit the Abyss.
Also, in keeping with the theme from the show, you'll likely get a good work-out from the Trinket table in the PHB, as your players stumble across all manner of strange, but nearly worthless, "ancient artifacts of a bygone age."
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"The mongoose blew out its candle and was asleep in bed before the room went dark." —Llanowar fable
Such simple ideas that make so much damn sense. Thank you sir.
I do like Exhaustion just as the base level of effects that happen on ascension. And I could have some pre-determined madness bits there. May be useful as there is a cleric in the party who just throws out greater restoration all the time, but that would burn lots of spell slots when the party of 6 is coming down with exhaustion and madness pretty frequently.
And I LOVE the trinket idea. Random items that don't make sense, that are useless but still interesting and tell a contextual story for that layer and who may have come before. I appreciate all your suggestions.
You might make some layers have a "as you rise, your exhaustion level becomes 4 if it was not higher," type of wording. Rather than adding up, this would make rising in lower levels more dangerous than rising in higher levels, similar to the manga/anime.
Definitely think this'll be the way to go, make it so they have to go a bit more slowly but there will still be other explorers and monsters roaming about while they're physically 'exhausted' by the abyss' effects.
There is a place in my homebrew world called the Azure Abyss. My players have heard about it and are thinking about heading there at some point to see what is going on in there. I had an idea to base it off of the Abyss from Made in Abyss, where all is fine and dandy as you descend from the first couple layers, but ascending has dire consequences. The monsters in each layer are of no consequence; I have those figured out.
However, I'm reaching out to you fine folks for ideas on what the Ascending effects might be. I could try and just replicate things from the show, but putting hard numbers to it would help, or completely new ideas would be welcome as well!
I'm thinking there will be about 5 layers, with the bottom layer having a massive dragon, which has grown too large to ascend but has lackeys that bring it food in the form of other creatures or explorers. The creatures here were essentially the primordial god's mistakes, which became too powerful to actually destroy and so they just hid them away, creating those barriers of magic to dissuade them from going back to the surface.
Looking forward to your ideas!
Well going up could always incur levels of exhaustion as just a base effect. Exhaustion comes in six levels, with the final level being death, so you could work it out that each level up you wanted to go might auto-hit you with a level of exhaustion, and maybe that deepest part of the dungeon can hit you with two levels right off the bat, meaning that, unless you do something to mitigate it, a person could never rise up from the bottom without just dying.
On top of that, the various temporary and long-term madness tables in the DMG are full of fun things to do to players that would cause issues as they tried to exit the Abyss.
Also, in keeping with the theme from the show, you'll likely get a good work-out from the Trinket table in the PHB, as your players stumble across all manner of strange, but nearly worthless, "ancient artifacts of a bygone age."
Such simple ideas that make so much damn sense. Thank you sir.
I do like Exhaustion just as the base level of effects that happen on ascension. And I could have some pre-determined madness bits there. May be useful as there is a cleric in the party who just throws out greater restoration all the time, but that would burn lots of spell slots when the party of 6 is coming down with exhaustion and madness pretty frequently.
And I LOVE the trinket idea. Random items that don't make sense, that are useless but still interesting and tell a contextual story for that layer and who may have come before. I appreciate all your suggestions.
You might make some layers have a "as you rise, your exhaustion level becomes 4 if it was not higher," type of wording. Rather than adding up, this would make rising in lower levels more dangerous than rising in higher levels, similar to the manga/anime.
Definitely think this'll be the way to go, make it so they have to go a bit more slowly but there will still be other explorers and monsters roaming about while they're physically 'exhausted' by the abyss' effects.
and i think a infection meater