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At what point is a dungeon too much for your players?
I've encountered two in my preparation as a DM; the Golden City of Death, where Players have less than three days to fight their way to the center, retrieve the amulet and escape before, in all likelihood, drowning or overheating; and Armag's Tomb (Kingmaker part 4), where an ingenious use of Guards and Wards makes exploration tedious at best.
In both of these scenarios, the players are chasing down an NPC. My thinking, if I encountered these dungeons as a player, would be to wait outside and see if the NPC survives, rather than deal with the frustration.
Maybe I'm not giving my players enough credit, although I don't know if they're meticulous enough for Armag's Tomb, in particular, so I ask people who have played these modules for their reactions. More broadly, have you ever run your players through a dungeon where they threw up their hands and said "No treasure is worth this?"
More broadly, have you ever run your players through a dungeon where they threw up their hands and said "No treasure is worth this?"
Once I made a dungeon too big...and/or my players did not find it interesting enough...so I cut out two levels to get to the end.
I really don't know anything about the AP so I can't judge it. But...if your players are getting frustrated and/or bored I would probably skip traps or some rooms. Or spice them up if you can do well on the fly.
At what point is a dungeon too much for your players?
I've encountered two in my preparation as a DM; the Golden City of Death, where Players have less than three days to fight their way to the center, retrieve the amulet and escape before, in all likelihood, drowning or overheating; and Armag's Tomb (Kingmaker part 4), where an ingenious use of Guards and Wards makes exploration tedious at best.
In both of these scenarios, the players are chasing down an NPC. My thinking, if I encountered these dungeons as a player, would be to wait outside and see if the NPC survives, rather than deal with the frustration.
Maybe I'm not giving my players enough credit, although I don't know if they're meticulous enough for Armag's Tomb, in particular, so I ask people who have played these modules for their reactions. More broadly, have you ever run your players through a dungeon where they threw up their hands and said "No treasure is worth this?"
My players and myself like challenges. The only dungeon that annoyed me, but only due to its size was the one in Shackled City. It was not bad enough to make me not want to play through it though.
I'll add another vote for Jzadirune being too big (and pointless, since you can choose to skip it completely).
My other negative dungeon experience was a homebrew puzzle dungeon where we weren't allowed to skip to the next room until we solved the room's puzzle (e.g. the walls are made out of magic-proof, teleport-and-divination blocking invulnerable arbitrarium). Boo.
I'll add another vote for Jzadirune being too big (and pointless, since you can choose to skip it completely).
My other negative dungeon experience was a homebrew puzzle dungeon where we weren't allowed to skip to the next room until we solved the room's puzzle (e.g. the walls are made out of magic-proof, teleport-and-divination blocking invulnerable arbitrarium). Boo.
Can't do anything about the "magic proof" part, but shatter is great for doors as well as any spell that does sonic damage.
I've never actually had players get sick of one of my dungeons, although I have gotten sick of a couple of them myself.
As a player, I have gotten sick of a campaign theme ... the GM took us through a 3.5 adaptation of "Against the Giants" and I was sick of giants by the end. To be fair, I was also sick of my PC, who was swimming against the tide as a would be fighter/wizard/EK and just couldn't do anything very well, which probably contributed.
-The Gneech
I've certainly encountered resistance to either a dungeon's size or style. To me, this is caused by a disconnect between the dungeon's stylistic elements and the party's pretext for being there.
Jzadirune is a perfect example, not because it isn't a great dungeon (I think it's one of the best I've ever seen). It's because it's size and complexity doesn't match the pretext of the party given in the rest of the adventure Life's Bazaar. There is a disconnect when you say "Quick, go get the orphans!" and then put a 70-room dungeon (which, by the way, has neither the orphans nor any sign of them) as the first major challenge.
So, the key from a DM's perspective is to try to keep the party's pretext in line with the challenges that they're facing. You can do this by either changing the challenges, or by changing the pretext. Both can be modified at any point. E.g. the party was searching for a bad guy? In one trapped room put a corpse with a note talking about an awesome treasure that should be just 2 rooms away; that's a new pretext for continuing.