Hey everyone,
Recently, I came up with an idea to make a really annoying dungeon for some characters (with the intent of it being very fun for the players). But I've hit a snag with filling it with monsters/encounters.
I have a BBEG, some traps and such, but I've having very little luck filling it with beasts. Does anyone have a list of monsters that focus on harassment or irritating tactics? And if you have anything in the way of puzzles or traps that might work, please let me know.
The goal is not to kill them, so no heavy hitters. I'm thinking stuff along the lines of faerie dragons tossing rocks at them.
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Rust monsters.
Disenchanter.
EDIT: Sorry, you said fun for the players. Go ahead and disregard that.
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Trapless triggers, such as pressure plates that don't really do anything. And doodles on the walls that look like they could be Symbol spells. Doors that don't open, because there's no actual room behind them.
Stuff like that can make a party careless...
Have your Big Bad be the ten-year-old child of a trickster god that your PCs have been roped into recovering/babysitting. Use the Home Alone movies for inspiration.
Gelatinous golems re-skinned as candy golems (that do only nonlethal damage), soulbound dolls, and other local children as his playmates would make good encounters.
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Faerie Dragons. They play pranks all the time, and have euphoria enducing breath. What's not to love?
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Animated Objects.
The PCs walk into a room that looks like an ordinary drawing room-- a desk with a candelabra and a crystal ball, a chair, a few books on a shelf, a nice throw rug, a sword hanging on the wall, etc.
Every single one of those objects is an animated object, and they all jump the PCs. If you're worried about a TPK, have them stagger their attacks-- first just the crystal ball and the sword, then the rug, then the candelabra and the chair, and finally the desk as the "boss". Finally, have them get attacked by the doorknob on the way out.
Then, every once in a while have them encounter a lone animated object (a book, a brick, a length of chain) in addition to whatever else is happening. Eventually the paranoia will drive them up the walls.
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Thanks to everyone for their replies. I'll definitely use the animated objects one, I think. Paranoid characters are more fun to torment. (I'm not evil, I swear). And I forgot about the euphoria breath, that'll be fun too. And coupling the trapless triggers with the animated objects...pressure pad in front of the door, disable it to find there was no trap, only to have the door attack them as an animate object.
Oh the ideas. :)
And coupling the trapless triggers with the animated objects...pressure pad in front of the door, disable it to find there was no trap, only to have the door attack them as an animate object.
Oh the ideas. :)
That made me laugh. I'm just imagining the party's rogue bending over to disable the pressure plate and WHAM! Door to the face.
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Don't know how high level your party is but here's some low level classics I've enjoyed:
Danse Macabre - 3pp skeleton variant w/the ability to make people dance uncontrolably.
Spring-loaded Punching Glove - cartoon boxing glove shoots out of wall, deals 2d6 non-lethal. Hilarity ensues.
The classic nothing puzzle - a room w/a lever in the middle, a door at the far end, and the second the whole party's inside the entryway seals. A magic mouth begins counting down from 10 and the far door is locked/held/whatever. The lever does nothing but re-set the countdown. The only way out is to just simply let it get to zero...then the room re-opens.
Fey-anything - fey bloodline gives you a no save Laughing Touch; mites + flash beetles + prestidigitated super-clean glass baubles = 1 round enhanced Dazzle effect; actually, anything to do w/mites + prestidigitation = annoying: a handful of sludge in a bucket over a door, food that appears appetizing but tastes like garbage, the sudden stench of rot just as a wall opens releasing a maggot swarm, a prestidigitated floor tile that shatters underfoot; no damage, DC 10 Acrobatics or trip, but what if there's caltrops underneath?
More fey fun - a quickling with the Steal feat, Grigs (same as Danse Macabre: dancing), gremlins of any kind, a brownie in a Tiny hole in the wall (lesser confusion, then dimension door to another hole, followed by prestidigitation fun).
Any NPC w/ANY annoying spells
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trap that turns it's target invisibile and mute, and replaces him with illusionary double controlled by BBEG.
Also, not much of a "trick" but Sunder attacks. Nothing says "annoyed" quite like a frontliner without their favorite toy.
How about a trap that casts Reduce Person?
Another thread said haunts are pretty annoying
Bards. Nuff said.
Moving walls
floors with arrows pointing one way then when they backtrack pointing another way
a treadmill hallway
a teleport trap that drops them in an ugliet (center of a labyrinth from which there's no way out)
sex change traps
a trap that casts shrink item on their clothes
a door that casts mount every time you open it
magnetic ore
tanglefoot bags and entangle spells
a room full of busts that are cursed to all talk at once (and as GM you HAVE to act out the cacophany of voices while the players are trying to figure out their next move - hire some friends and make a party of it!)
random sounds or clues that mean nothing
cursed magic items
a trap that casts touch of idiocy
glue
grease spells
intellegent animated objects - "be our guest, be our guest..."
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A mimic that follows them around and morphs itself into doors and chests and never actually attacks but constantly begs for food. "FEEEEED MEEE" (I've done this and the players ended up loving that "guy")
He became sort of a group pet/friend.
Dotting. Also grease on a winding down hallway they can't see the end and will assume bad things (spikes, pit, spiked pit) put a mattress to cushion the smack into the wall.
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Here's an encounter that I thought of a while ago but am not currently running a campaign. I'd love some feedback on it, whether you decide to run it or not.
The PC's enter a 50x60 room. Every square in the room is a pressure plate, so every 5 feet a character moves for any reason triggers the trap. The "trap" is that a square is chosen at random (I recommend rolling a d10 and a d12) and bars slide down from the ceiling, trapping whatever's in that square in a cage. If that square's bars were already down, they're raised instead, releasing anything that was caged in that square.
When the PCs first get there, there should already be some Medium-sized monsters caged up, and waiting for the PC's to hopefully let them out. I recommend hobgoblins, since they have no racial HD so you can give them whatever weapons, spells, abilities, or CR you want. I'd say one of these guys alone shouldn't pose much threat to the party but there should be enough of them that they could cause a wipe if they all got uncaged at once.
If a PC gets caged, treat is as being grappled, only they can still make ranged attacks. The cage bars should provide cover to any attack, much as though the cage was made of tower shields. A PC could get out with an Escape Artist check, but doing so would move him into an adjacent square (and randomly cage or uncage another square). Maybe on the far side of the wall, there's a control panel or lever that could, with a Disable Device check, disarm all the cage bars. Doing so would retract all cage bars and prevent any new ones from dropping, releasing any trapped PCs but also all the monsters.
I dig it. There was something like this thrown at me a while back but all the plates just set off a barrage of fireballs and magic missile and all sorts of bad stuff. It was pretty but deadly. Yours is more in line with this type of dungeon.
I would recommend having each plate always be random so that you don't have to keep track of which plate triggered which cage. Also I like large monsters(like ogres) so perhaps some cages would trigger on 4 different rolls.
edit: if the ogre triggered a med cage on himself it would either reset or deal damage perhaps. Also my players would beg for reflex saves which would make it a bit less fun, but also force them to trigger another cage if they make it and jump to the side. I'm thinking reflex 20-25 since they have no clue what they triggered.
Edit again: hmm i guess it would be annoying to keep track of which squares were for large cages. Perhaps it could be a magical trap with Major creation or something. The cage just forms around you instead of dropping from the ceiling. That way there would be no clue to the function by looking up.
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Toilet mimic.
Toilet mimic.
That's one hungry mimic. I've never seen a Pathfinder character use a toilet. Except for one of my npcs.
Ah but it's puerile and that's what counts. ;)
Want to annoy your players? Math problems:
Party gets to a door with a sudoku puzzle (Really hard one) as the keypad.
They need to do long division or figure angles like on a pool table to get out of a room.
Set up a simple algorithm that spawns monsters
They have to solve a real-life formula in order to escape from an evil alchemist
Now if you just want to have fun with them, do what a GM I had back in HS did; make your world dark, REALLY dark. Attack them morning, noon and night on their way to the dungeon. Attack them IN the dungeon and assault their senses with really sick, twisted stuff that churns your gritty guts: boiling babies, talking blood fonts, tentacles...truly gory horror.
When you've got them gnawing at their own brains, let them escape. Just outside, give them a n. good fey paradise...and watch them burn it to the ground, just to be sure.
Seriously, my GM went so far as to have the DEMON PRINCE portal directly into my dreams to pull some Freddy Kreuger stuff, then awakened me by describing me clutched in "a pair of inhumanly large and unnaturally hard hands"; turns out it was a treant taking pity on my poor elf maiden I was playing. I awoke with an arrow I always slept with in my hand, rolled a lucky roll and max damage, and promptly stabbed said treant in the eye blinding it permanently.
Needless to say; I spent the ENTIRE CAMPAIGN annoyed while my GM was giddy.
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That made me laugh. I'm just imagining the party's rogue bending over to disable the pressure plate and WHAM! Door to the face.And coupling the trapless triggers with the animated objects...pressure pad in front of the door, disable it to find there was no trap, only to have the door attack them as an animate object.
Oh the ideas. :)
Excellent. >:)
I would have done the non-trap room, but I told them about it a while ago. Bad choice on my part. And thanks Hoover for the huge lists of options. I will definitely be using some of them.
And for Saturn. That doesn't quite fit what I'm going for right now, but if I have to make an Act II, I will test that out, I love the idea.
And if I didn't know that my players would be overjoyed with the follower, I'd try something with...wait...Pull a Navi with a quickling. "Hey" "hey" over and over. That might work.
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Oozes, lots of oozes.
a sewer/runoff with a grate over it, so the slimes can come up from below.
I used that once on a female Paladin PC, ooze slimed into her Armour, so she had to remove her plate-mail in order to get the little bugger out.
It was harmless in itself, but distracting to feel it move under there!
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Anything that gets the PCs to disrobe in public? +1
A mimic that follows them around and morphs itself into doors and chests and never actually attacks but constantly begs for food. "FEEEEED MEEE" (I've done this and the players ended up loving that "guy")
He became sort of a group pet/friend.
Sounds like the Magic Pot enemy from Final Fantasy. Now THAT'S an interesting encounter.
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I once had a level in a wizard's tower that was a seemingly endless corridor of rooms. Each room was 15ft square, and looked exactly the same. They had a door in the center of each wall, as well as a portal in the south east corner of the room. One of the rooms was the true room, while the rest of the rooms were epic level illusory doubles of the initial room. There were no monsters in this level of the dungeon, and any attempt to mark the room other than the real room, caused the same symbol to propogate to the other rooms. There was a riddle presented to the party a few levels down from that floor.
The real trick was that the entire floor was only 3x3 rooms, with 5 foot corridors, however the at each end of the hallway, it looked like it went on for miles in every direction, while in actuality it was just a portal that transported you back to the other side of the chamber when you went through it. Took the party i was playing with 2 real time hours to finally figure out how to solve the puzzle.
Put a poltergeist in a room with objects that aren't actually dangerous at all, tar and feather, rotten fruits and veggies, origami animals, soft clothing that sort of thing.
@mei, I was thinking of something like that, but not as complicated. My idea was to set it up so if they didn't walk up stairs backwards, it would warp them back to the start of the floor (as if they had walked up the initial stairs).
Oozes seem to be a favorite in this thread. I'll have to look up them to see if they fit.
@mei, I was thinking of something like that, but not as complicated. My idea was to set it up so if they didn't walk up stairs backwards, it would warp them back to the start of the floor (as if they had walked up the initial stairs).
Oozes seem to be a favorite in this thread. I'll have to look up them to see if they fit.
Dude, Oozes are amorphous, of course they'll fit!
Still, I'd chose to nerf them a bit for a 'trickster scenario'.
Oozes are usually a great enemy to throw at your PC's normally, especially with paladin's asking if it was right to kill a kobold for scavenging for food at the granary.
They make a satisfying squelch as you cleave them apart or whack them with a club. They also make glass-smashing noise when you freeze them (raw alchemy reagent perhaps?), and make an impressive 'Woof' when you set them alight. (Actually had a party down to 1 torch, so the alchemist grabbed a bit of the ooze, put it on the end of bones and they used them to light their way.)
For a fellow DM, They are also cheap and easy to make! (link on how is http://www.wargamerau.com/forum/lofiversion/index.php/t51015.html)
I once had a level in a wizard's tower that was a seemingly endless corridor of rooms. Each room was 15ft square, and looked exactly the same. They had a door in the center of each wall, as well as a portal in the south east corner of the room. One of the rooms was the true room, while the rest of the rooms were epic level illusory doubles of the initial room. There were no monsters in this level of the dungeon, and any attempt to mark the room other than the real room, caused the same symbol to propogate to the other rooms. There was a riddle presented to the party a few levels down from that floor.
The real trick was that the entire floor was only 3x3 rooms, with 5 foot corridors, however the at each end of the hallway, it looked like it went on for miles in every direction, while in actuality it was just a portal that transported you back to the other side of the chamber when you went through it. Took the party i was playing with 2 real time hours to finally figure out how to solve the puzzle.
What was the riddle?
I can't remember the riddle anymore, i ran the adventure years ago, and lost the notes on it. but it basically came down to "2 Up, portal, 2 left, portal, 1 up, you are there."
A black tentacles spell w/chairs attached at the ends of the rubbery limbs? Could be a fun carnival ride, could be a TPK; you won't know 'till you pay the mite in the straw hat 2 copper and strap in...
Create an elaborate deathtrap scene: describe a pool of blood at the base of a virtual wall of mechanical arms, massive gears, locks and levers. Even add twitching scythe blades and rotating knives and saws. The real trap is when they attempt to jimmy/bypass it they get a pie in the face.
I actually have a nerfed dungeon; not annoying, just not lethal. It was created to test the characters, sort of a 0-level challenge to earn them admission to a group of rogue scholars and lore preservers (Indiana Jones types).
The entry door involves a test of faith using hydraulic pushes and the detect faith spell (the group they're trying to get into is affiliated with the church of Abadar.)
They're entering a mausoleum. Once inside they encounter summoned monks in the main hall; all the attacks are non-lethal holding the party at bay or grappling/bull rushing them back out the door.
The sarcophagus is opened with a simple puzzle lock involving the lantern hanging over the front door; this of course prompts the defenses to reset.
Once opened the sepulcher reveals a spiral staircase into magical darkness; swallowing their fear gets the party safely almost to the bottom, where a tilting-landing trap obscured in the dark dumps them into a flooded crypt; falling inflicts non-lethal due to the water.
Wet, tired and potentially on the verge of passing out they have to wade up against the current; Fort saves or they're Fatigued.
They come into the main chamber of the crypt where they see, jutting up out of the water line a stepped dais and another sepulcher. Here they've got to battle small water elementals inflicting non-lethal and using a special combined whirlwind effect to move the party back from the dais. They've either got to kill, outrun or outsmart the creatures.
Finally mounting the platform they find the sepulcher is a fake, crafted of wood and basically empty. The only thing of note is the shield of the hero who was supposed to be buried here (the McGuffin they're questing for). Removing it causes the walls of the chamber to bust open and water begins rapidly flooding the place.
The ceiling above them is natural cavern and they can see a pin-prick of moonlight coming down. A stone slab is lowering, sealing the chamber. The PC's can either 1) brave the water again and try to beat the slab (this time WITH the current) or use the fake wood sepulcher and lid to float to the top of the chamber and make their escape that way. This is the ONLY time their lives are actually in danger.
What do you think?
I really like it. There's the appearance of danger and actual consequences without being overtly dangerous (until the end). I can see it being really interesting if you ran an infiltration campaign.
Maybe if you're running a town-based campaign, it could be an initiation. ("To enter our commune, you must complete our tests")
The end might be a bit of a problem. What if they don't see the moonlight (or is that obvious?) or you have a fighter in full plate? I'm always iffy when dealing with water because of this. Although, with a high enough level, they should be prepared for that.
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I dig it. There was something like this thrown at me a while back but all the plates just set off a barrage of fireballs and magic missile and all sorts of bad stuff. It was pretty but deadly. Yours is more in line with this type of dungeon.
I would recommend having each plate always be random so that you don't have to keep track of which plate triggered which cage. Also I like large monsters(like ogres) so perhaps some cages would trigger on 4 different rolls.
edit: if the ogre triggered a med cage on himself it would either reset or deal damage perhaps. Also my players would beg for reflex saves which would make it a bit less fun, but also force them to trigger another cage if they make it and jump to the side. I'm thinking reflex 20-25 since they have no clue what they triggered.
Edit again: hmm i guess it would be annoying to keep track of which squares were for large cages. Perhaps it could be a magical trap with Major creation or something. The cage just forms around you instead of dropping from the ceiling. That way there would be no clue to the function by looking up.
Oh I definitely intended it to be random every time-- that way the PCs can't learn the pattern. I'd say every 5 feet of movement, you roll a d10 and a d12 (in front of the players), count 1d10 north and 1d12 east (from the same corner each time) and cage or uncage that square.
I like large monsters too, but for a room like this it's just too difficult to figure out how it'll work. Using Medium creatures just makes it so much easier.
If you want to be a little more troublesome, put a creature with a fly speed in this room. Or worse, a blink dog. >:-D
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When you describe each room, occasionally mention a detail that isn't "actually there". Then, when they go to examine it, look at them like you don't know what they're talking about and tell them what actually is there. The idea is that the PCs are confused or hallucinating. Granted, this will require you to be an excellent liar. It'll help if you have written descriptions of each room beforehand, so you can show your players the "truth" if they protest.
Have some perfectly standard monsters for them to fight, but give one of them an ability it shouldn't have-- like a wolf that can cast dimension door, or a zombie with a breath weapon. Offer no explanation. If the players ask, have them roll a Knowledge check, and if they pass, tell them that they're right-- this creature shouldn't be able to do that... but it can, somehow.
@ Shin-dig: you're right; it is an initiation. The Guild of Archivists, a local bunch of rogue archaeologists, set up dungeons like this to test their hopefuls. An agent will be on hand monitoring the last room.
Re: the last room
The moonlight will be obvious; a shaft of moonlight illuminating the dais through the hole above will be part of the room's description. Still you make a valid point w/the guy in heavy armor. However, the sarcophgus is made of wood and is both light and bouyant, as is it's lid; one solution is to hang onto the lid treading water, another is to simply get into the sarcophagus. You could also combine those. Yet another would be to flip the coffin, trapping air within, and then ride the current down under the slab and hike out the way you entered. I'm sure the party will surprise me w/others as well.
I like the idea of adding a ghost to the room of cage traps. He died in there so he does not want to leave, and the party can free him by figuring this out and releasing his body. I particularly like "the splatter man"
http://www.d20pfsrd.com/bestiary/unique-monsters/cr-6/the-splatter-man
Sorry i have no link knowledge. His fighting notes are good because it involves a lot of dire rats which means lots of trap triggers.
One of my favourites has always been a gelatinous cube that fits perfectly inside a pit in a corridor. It just looks like a puddle of water on the stones due to the reflection of torchlight. The gelatinous form also distorts the stones beneath it causing a refraction and making it look as though the stones are closer to the surface when they are in fact 10-15 feet below the corridor.
Rust monsters, Oozes and Gelatinous cubes are awesome GM tools to harass players with. I have always been a fan of Kobolds for weak, yet cunning monsters. Kobolds are perfect creatures to pair up with rust monsters, oozes and gelatinous cubes. Depending on how extravagant your campaign is, you could have Kobolds riding rust monsters and throwing ceramic/terracotta jars of ooze at the players. Personally that's a bit far out for me but Kobolds are the perfect little critters to use for cunning traps in any case. Just be careful, Kobolds tend to roll a lot of natural 20's.
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Animated Objects.
The PCs walk into a room that looks like an ordinary drawing room-- a desk with a candelabra and a crystal ball, a chair, a few books on a shelf, a nice throw rug, a sword hanging on the wall, etc.
Every single one of those objects is an animated object, and they all jump the PCs. If you're worried about a TPK, have them stagger their attacks-- first just the crystal ball and the sword, then the rug, then the candelabra and the chair, and finally the desk as the "boss". Finally, have them get attacked by the doorknob on the way out.
Then, every once in a while have them encounter a lone animated object (a book, a brick, a length of chain) in addition to whatever else is happening. Eventually the paranoia will drive them up the walls.
Did this in 3.5 except everything was animated. It was not fun. Your experience may differ but....bad memories.
Similar to Laughing Touch - how about a haunt of Hideous Laughter? No harm at all, but every time the PCs pass this (much used) corridor, they all have to Save vs Laughter.
@ elth: why get that elaborate? The kobolds have a pit filled w/a gelatinous cube. The kobolds, keeping it fed w/rats or the occasional kobold rule-breaker. In turn they dip long wood ladels into it and whip goo at intruders. They also know of a den of rust monsters, so the party encounters a couple kobolds who have the ladels, but with iron ingots dangling from one end; a "carrot on a stick" for the anti-ferrous aberrations.
Here is my objects for the party Im running through a tricksters dungeon. I gave them max hp but I think the rest is on par with the CR chart.
35 x 15 room
Candelabra: HP:10 Hard:5 AC:13 +3(1d4+1+1d6 burn)
Crystal Ball: HP:10 Hard:8 AC:14 +3(1d4+2)
2x Sword on wall: HP:30,30 Hard 10 AC:17 +7(1d8+5)
Desk:Mov:20 HP:70 Hard:5 AC:18 +10x2(3d6+10) Trample DC 22 (3d6+15) or attk opp at -4
Chair: HP:30 Hard:5 AC:15 +5x2(1d8+4)
Rug: HP:70 AC:18 reach 10ft +10x2(1d6+10) Grab +14 Constrict(1d6+10)
Metal renforced Bookshelf: HP:70 Hard:10 AC:20 +10(3d6+12)
6x books:Fly:30 HP:10,10,10,10,10,10 AC:13 +3(1d4) or ranged
Bust Stand: HP:50 Hard:8 AC:16 +6(1d12+5)
Haunted Bust:Fly 30 HP:30 Hard:5 AC:15 +5x2(1d6+6)
Door Knob out: HP:10 Hard:5 AC:13 reach 10ft +3(1d4)
In rest of dungeon
Door with fake trap tile in front: HP:70 Hard:20 AC:24 +10(2d6+14)
Chain in Bell room: HP:30 Hard:10 AC:17 +7(1d6+6)
I also did a layout for the cage room complete with an animated cage to keep with the paranoia.
60 x 50 room each 5x5 triggers a roll d10 and d12 to determine which square gets cage
____LDD
sXXX5XXXXXXX
XX1X9XX8XXXX
XsXXXXsXXXXX
XXX7XXXXXXXX
XsXXXxXXXX3X
XX0XXXXXX2XX
XXXXXoXXXXXX
XXXXXXXXXoXX
XXoXXXX6XXXX
4XXXXXXXXXXX
_____DD
D:door
L:lever 15 ft up
0:the Splatter Man's Body (animated as skeleton) Splater man in here too
1:Vreeg (necromancer controls all undead)
2:Merlokrep, the kobold king
3:Goblin King
4:Deadwatcher Orc
5:Acrietia
6:Rukus Graul
7:Gurtis Vortch
8:Hymmir Urath
9:Halruun
o:orc
s:skeleton
x Animated Cage: HP:50 AC:15 +6x2(1d8+6) Grab +10
It uses unique monsters from the d20pfsrd. I like grabbing things from there as opposed to taking lots of time making everything by hand. The ghost really adds to that room.