More Doors

Having finished running through my 4E conversion of Chris Perkins' adventure Lich-Queen's Beloved, I've learned a few lessons about dungeons and adventure design. One of these is the importance of the architectural environment and the very elements of the dungeon itself. In Lich Queen's Beloved, the environment of the dungeon takes on an interesting role and challenge in and of itself in the adventure, namely in the types of doors that are encountered. Doors, I feel, are an oft overlooked source of hazards, terrain effects, challenges, and provocative dungeon dressing. At the end of this post, I also briefly touch upon a way in which we can all design dungeons with better (ie. more fun) secret doors.

What I'm trying to say is that we simply need more doors.

The Seven Sons of Moradin - actual play log

By reader request, I've linked and opened up the Google Docs continuing log of The Seven Sons of Moradin D&D campaign that I play in on Thurday nights. It's pretty neat to read, as many of the recent innovative posts here at DMG42 were created through its play, such as the popular Death and Reincarnation mechanics.

The notes are written very hastily, during the middle of the game, while we're drinking beers. So, it's a little sloppy at times, but very natural and organic, taking place entirely from the players' perspectives and relaying information that we find important without the shadow of the DM's plot schemes hanging over the descriptions.

Exploring the Lich-Queen's Beloved, Part 3

This post continues to document the journey through The Palace of Whispers, as started here.

This post will actually be recapping two week's worth of play. I always like to have some new, usable content for my readers with every post. Being as I posted the baseline conversion of the whole adveture already, I'm really looking to the additions and alterations I've made. These come mostly in the form of deadlier enemies and added deathtraps, so not every single week is entirely appropriate. This past week has been so; have at thee!

Warning: This is a long-ass post.

[4E Modern] Middle East Adventure

Retired general, Moshe Dyan

My 4E Modern campaign is coming to its natural close, having been planned out to be a short romp of only 3 Levels. To finish, I decided to convert one of my favorite DDi adventures to the Modern system and aesthetic, Rob Schwalb's Bark at the Moon. To get a better understanding of the 4E Modern adventure, please go check out the original D&D adventure here.

Some highlights:
* An NPC Henchmen, whom my group thought looked like (and thus became) Rebecca Black
* Modern era terrain hazards, such as landmines, machine gun nests, and barbed wire
* Two new Modern era afflictions, Radiation Sickness and Roid Rage, mechanically akin to diseases
* Nuclear weaponry
* Magical assault rifles
* Dude with an eye patch
* A threat to plunge the Middle East into war, just before peace has finally been reached

WARNING: This conversion to Bark at the Moon is a farcical and irreverent look at Israeli-Palestinian relations. It is a touchy subject of which I am no expert. If you feel at all strongly about Middle East issues, just go ahead and please, do not read this adventure and get pissed off.

The adventure is formatted in my own 4E Modern style, so you'll see creatures' attacks listed as flat, static values instead of a modifier to a die roll. I also abbreviate some attacks and don't write out completely in full the "Hit:" line etc., on most attacks. If you've been following 4E for any length of time, this should all appear sensible and easy to read, but I wanted to throw a note out there explaining that, while I do know how the official stat blocks are supposed to be constructed, I have chosen not to for brevity on the printout.

This adventure is suitable for 3rd Level Agents.

Download the adventure here!

The Sundering of the Earth - A Fourthcore Adventure

The Sundering
from www.swordofdoom.com

Long ago in a forgotten age, I had entered the PAX East 2011 Dungeon Master's Challenge. My notes for that adventure can be found here. Afterward, I immediately set forth to "upgrade" the adventure to something approaching the Fourthcore moniker, dubbed The Sundering of the Earth. Like most pieces of work, the author was never satisfied with it and it languished in the unknown obscurity of my hard drive awaiting just one more playtest that simply never happened. After much cajoling by my faithful readers whom would enjoy seeing more of the fruits of my labor and some more detail to my PAX adventure, I have acquiesced and hesitantly published what I have. Like everything on DMG 42, I have posted it in the hopes that it helps the Dungeon Masters of the world have a better game at their own table. I dare you to NOT find something within the adventure that does not inspire one of the adventures at your home game!

Fourthcore Team Deathmatch - E1M4

I am proud to present the latest map to be added to the Fourthcore Team Deathmatch roster, to be debuted at the upcoming Baltimore-area FTDM Tournament on October 15th, 2011:

E1M4: ASTRAL AMBUSH

tiles from Brian Rollins (www.dungeoneering.net)

Fourthcore Team Deathmatch – E1M3: Secret

By the time this post goes live, I’ll be at GenCon in Indianapolis preparing to get ready for the showdown of champions known as the Fourthcore Team Deathmatch. It’s a little humbling to think of how long this has all been developing and brewing. The Secret Map, especially, as it was the first map I drafted and had the fewest changes from inception to implementation. Also, it’s the one I’m most proud of, the one I expect to wow the crowds the most. I’m really looking forward to springing this out and seeing the astonished faces of all the Fourthcore Fanatics.

Blade of the Feywild Thunderdome

A player in my home campaign was bringing a new character into the group, his previous character having died in the deadly halls of The Iron Lich. He wanted to play an Elven Avenger, out for vengeance against the wretched defilers who had desecrated the resting place of his ancestors via the Garden of Graves in the 4E Tomb of Horrors. As per our campaign House Rules, the player was allowed to start his character with a powerful magic item, however it had to be carefully crafted by both himself and the Dungeon Master. The item needed to be beneficial, but also have drawbacks or hindrances that must be overcome by its user. The player wanted to emphasize the Avenger theme of a duel to the death, and really enjoyed the mechanics behind Adventurers Vault 2’s arcane immurements, the magic “snow globes” that trap people in them. With this in mind, we crafted the Blade of the Feywild Thunderdome. The magic sword whisks the wielder and his opponent away to a secluded battle arena, where they must fight to the death. This suits the Avenger theme perfectly by completely isolating the Avenger’s target. It is also very dangerous, however, as a few bad rolls or crit’ing a Solo or Elite enemy can quickly spell disaster.

Huzzah, WotC!

Wizards of the Coast just spat out a pretty decent article on terrain powers, here, a topic near and dear to my heart. I particularly like the guidelines set forth equating various conditions (dazed, blinded, etc.) with the action economy, modified by tier. That's definitely an area that I feel a lot of newer DM's are hesitant and inexperienced with. The only thing that comes to mind that I would have done differently would be to increase the suggested damage range. I feel like terrain powers work best when they're on the side of a little too powerful. You need a good carrot to get the typical risk-averse, closed-box-thinking player to use them. And if they're not using them, what's the point?

The author is a relative unknown, Mark Monack. He has a Wizard Community Blog called Unearthed Wrecana.

Terrain Powers for a 1-On-1 Duel

from The Karate Kid (1984)

The duel to the death, the 1-on-1 fight, the showdown. These words describe a powerful scenario where a hero must confront and defeat his enemy. Dungeons & Dragons, however, is at its heart a group game, made with the idea of a tactical team of 5 in mind. Must we abandon this epic imagery? This satisfying closure between two rivals so that we can invite the whole team? No, we will split the goddamn party.

Stained Glass Ceiling



This is more an addendum to my last post than anything else. In it, I described one of the Terrain Powers I added to the final encounter in WotC's 4E Tomb of Horrors. There was an additional power I added in there, one that was put out in plain sight as soon as initiative was rolled, and made available to all. The heroes, unfortunately, heard the clatter of dice and forgot their senses. They thought that I had run out of tricks and traps.

They were wrong, and for their lack of cunning, they were punished as the vine-tentacled beast of the encounter smashed the ceiling above, raining razor sharp shards of multi-hued stained glass upon the soft flesh of the dungeoneers.

The Death of a God

from www.deicide.com

Months ago, my D&D campaign headed in the direction of going through the WotC 4E Tomb of Horrors. They puzzled over the traps and obstacles set before them, started thinking laterally (at least a little) and were having a good time. The culmination of the Garden of Graves, the end encounter, loomed before them. They were ready to tackle this and, in fact, very eager. They had just spent the last few sessions perplexed by the mysteries of the adventure, but at the same time had their eye on the map of the complex provided so early on in the Garden. They knew the end was coming, and they were dying to know just what the hell had been going on. Despite this adventure being a cut above the rest of WotC's stuff, I knew that I needed to crank it up to deliver the kind of awesome experience they were looking for.

I had to kill a god.

Tomb of Horrors Spoilers Below!

PAX East DM's Challenge: The Adventure

from http://www.jengajam.net/2010/03/157-d-and-pax-east-preview.html

UPDATE! I fixed the links.

This past weekend, I attending the mega gaming convention: PAX East. I signed up to run quite a few delves for WotC, and in doing so met a lot of really cool people. One of those events was the PAX East DM's Challenge. I've wrote about it before, which you can see here and here. The game was a ton of fun, I felt like I had a great group, and it was well-received. The following are my thoughts on the whole matter, the adventure itself, as well as what I'm planning for the future.

(A note to my regular players: Do not read this until we’re done with ‘Iron Lich!)

Terrain Power: Chained Beast

Here's another example of progressing a terrain power through the three tiers. From a tiger, to a displacer beast, to a ragng demon; an iconic and dangerous beast is presented where appropriate for the power level of the heroes that face off against it.

This started with my attempt to add some interesting effects to the Chamber of Eyes finale in Thunderspire Labyrinth. In it, the heroes storm the lair of Hobgoblin slavers and end with a climactic duel, which also happens to link some new participants in the battle into the next phase of the plot. In the description of the scene, there are chains pinned to the floor and an angry Dire Wolf pet of the Hobgoblin chief. I felt that these two great tastes would taste together, and so chained down the pet onto the floor, removing it as a standard combatant per se, and creating a dangerous terrain feature that could be exploited by clever thinkers on either side of the DM Screen. I've also included a similar setup for a chained down wild boar, which also appears in Thunderspire Labyrinth.

Picture from http://www.dougsirois.com/FANTASY%20ART.html

Terrain Element: Collapsing Wall/Cairn/Cliff Face

Here's a simple terrain power progression from Heroic to Paragon to Epic tiers. I started with a collapsable stone wall in a dungeon or amidst the ruins of an ancient keep. A keep, mayhaps, on the Shadowfell. Afterwards,  I progressed the power to knocking over the burial cairns of the ancient fey, as seen in the latest Tomb of Horrors. Lastly, I let the PCs and their enemies jack up their power to over-the-top limits in Epic tier, with collapsing an entire side of a cliff in an avalanche like fashion.

One of the keys to good terrain power progression, and good progression in general throughout the game, from tier to tier is to alter not only the basic stats; attack bonus, damage expression, skill DC, etc., but to also mess around with status effects, area of effect, and anything else you can do to kick it up a notch, such as changing the area of effect in this collapsing series of terrain powers to a wall at Epic tier.

Terrain Power: Rope Bridge

Here's a little tweak to the ol' swinging rope bridge. The rope bridge is detailed well in the Dungeon Master's Guide 2, however the original printing fails to add mechanics for when PC's (wisely) cut the ends of the rope to drop the bridge completely.

Terrain Power: Transdimensional Breach

These three terrain powers are good for use when dealing with the fragile barriers between worlds. Use these whenever your group of adventurers are messing around with a wizard's tower, or an area with a connection to elemental energies or the Elemental Chaos itself.

The first two of these terrain powers are good in that they provide an easy way to add teleportation into an encounter. I like teleportation, because it can throw everyone for a loop and keeps the combatants moving around the field. This added action focuses the players at the table as to what's going on, because they must constantly re-evaluate what their character's strategy will be with every combatant getting moved around so much.

The last terrain power is pretty nice, too, because it adds a quick and easy way of throwing in extra damage. I like adding extra damage to an enconter, on both sides of the screen, to help speed things up a bit and add some swinginess to the fight. Especially at those higher levels, you can sometimes use a little bit of extra oomph to get things moving faster.

Terrain Power: Carpetting

Rugs and tapestries are ubiquitous in fantasy themes, D&D in particular. The following two terrain powers can be used in a very wide variety of scenarios and adventures. For heroic tier I think they're fine, but always remember that when you bring your group into the next tier of play, you have to find a way to "up the ante" on things. You might be able to get away with just, I don't know, really big rug, but in general it's not a good idea. Your players will get thrown out of their immersion when they see the same boring challenges and items (terrain powers , monsters, etc.) just with higher numeric values.

For the Paragon tapestry, I would suggest describing it as a silken filament of web from Shelob's Lair that  restrains the target. For Epic, it can be the structure to a Far Realm portal, removing the target from the encounter.


c Pull the Rug Out
Single Use Terrain (Level 4)
You grab the hem of the carpet and yank it up hard.
Single Use
Minor Action ; Melee touch
Check: Strength DC 10
Effect: You pull the carpet up and over anyone standing on it. Each creature standing on the rug is knocked prone.

c Hanging Tapestry
Single Use Terrain (Level 2)
You pull down the ornate tapestry from the wall and cover your enemy.
Single Use
Minor Action ; Close blast 2
Check: Strenth DC 9
Attack: +5 vs. Reflex
Hit: The target is blinded and slowed until escape (Escape DC 9).

c Wall Webbing
Single Use Terrain (Level 12)
You pull down the silken webbing clinging to the walls.
Single Use
Minor Action ; Close blast 3
Check: Strenth DC 14
Attack: +15 vs. Reflex
Hit: The target is restrained until escape (Escape DC 14).

c Far Realm Filament
Single Use Terrain (Level 22)
You pull down the ornate portal archway creating a gate to the realms of madness.
Single Use
Minor Action ; Close blast 5
Check: Strenth DC 20
Attack: +25 vs. Reflex
Hit: The target is removed from play (save ends). When the target saves out of this condition, it reappears in the closest unoccupied space to where it originally disappeared from.

Terrain Power: Dragon Bones

These terrain powers always reminded me of visits to the Natural History Museum when I was a kid. I remember these gigantic displays of dinosaur skeletons that were set up in the main hall. The T-Rex's mouth bound open, ready to snap. It helped spur my imagination as a child, and the memories help today.

Although there are dinosaur analogues in D&D, called behemoths, I felt that dragons were more appropriate. In fact, I'm a firm believer in stuffing as many dragons into your game as you can. The encounter I used these in had the dessicated bones of the Arkhosian Emperor's ancestors hanging on display in the tyrant's throne room, hanging from the ceiling, ready to drop.

a Dragon Skull
Single Use Terrain (Level 9)
The hanging, jagged dragon skull comes crashing down on anyone caught beneath it.
Single Use
Free Action; Area burst 2
Trigger: The chains holding the dragon skull take damage (AC 20; Fortitude 14, Reflex 5)
Target: Each creature in burst.
Attack: +13 vs. Reflex
Hit: 3d6+15 damage, and the target is knocked prone.
Miss: Half damage.

a Dragon Ribcage
Single Use Terrain (Level 9)
The hanging, skeletal torso comes crashing down, trapping anyone caught beneath it.
Single Use
Free Action; Area burst 1
Trigger: The chains holding the dragon ribcage take damage (AC 20; Fortitude 14, Reflex 5)
Target: Each creature in burst.
Attack: +13 vs. Reflex
Hit: 1d10+7 damage, and the target is restrained.
Miss: Half damage.
Effect: If the ribcage takes further damage, all creatures caught in it are no longer restrained.

Terrain Power: Floating Castle, Part 2

Continuing in the redux of Remains of Empire, here are some terrain powers that I've used with great success in the finale encounter with the adventure's villain, Bozidar. In it, the PCs confront the final enemy in the ruined throne room of the shattered, floating castle. The magic spells holding the castle aloft have been greatly weakened, and as such, being of sufficient skill can warp the spells. The Dungeon Master should go out of his way to show off these terrain powers to the players, by having Bozidar use them frequently and by having a lareg font printout of the terrain powers laid out on the gaming table.

This is a tricky encounter to pull off. It requires the participants to all think in three dimensions, and envision this room rotating about. While there are many enterprising ways of representing a three dimensional encounter, those of use without the patience or arts & crafts skills will have to get creative. When I ran this encounter, I used a small marker, a business card with a large arrow printed on it, to indicate which surface of the room was down. I then had extra tiles, the long 2x8's, placed down beside the floors to represent characters on the "walls". Relative to the real world table (and its real world physical constraints), all of the minis moved while the Dungeon Tiles stayed stationary.

Rotating Room
At-will Terrain Power (Level 6)
At-will
Move Action; Personal
Check: Arcana  DC 23 [Hard]
Effect: The room rotates 90 degrees in any single axis. Each creature standing on the current floor of the throne room must make an Athletics DC 15 [Moderate] check to hold onto the a peice of the wall or other stable object and dangle from the new ceiling. While holding onto the wall in this way, the creature grants combat advantage to all attackers. A creature may also make a DC 23 [Hard] Acrobatics check to land safely on the new floor. Otherwise, the creatures are knocked prone and thrown onto the floor, taking falling damage as appropriate.

Features of the Area
Stained Glass Windows: A creature that is knocked into the window when the room is rotated shatters the glass and must make a saving throw. On a failure, the creature falls 90 ft. down to a floating peice of shattered castle outside, taking falling damage as appropriate. On a success, the creature is prone, hanging onto the window edge.