A Reverse Dungeon-ish Adventure


Advice


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I'm working on an adventure partly in the style of the Reverse Dungeon. The Reverse Dungeon was an old-school adventure where the players played monsters defending a dungeon from adventurers (I've never played the Reverse Dungeon though). There was an adventure in Dungeon magazine in the 3E days where the PCs clear out a dungeon, then have to rebuild the defenses and defend it against a group of adventurers seeking the artifact within for evil purposes. I'm going to split the difference- two routes into the volcano lair of a red dragon guarding an artifact. The PCs are taking one route, while evil adventurers take the other. The players play the monsters on the other route and play their PCs (alternating encounters). The better the players play the monsters, the weaker the opponent adventurers will be for the final battle (after defeating the dragon, the PCs will be low on resources). Any thoughts or suggestions?


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One of the things about reverse dungeons is that, properly done, they start months or years before the adventurers arrive. It's not simply "the adventurers kick in the doors, what do you do?"

Remember that the monsters have been living in this dungeon for months, years, possibly longer. They should know every square inch of the dungeon and also have had an opportunity to build or acquire all sorts of defensive equipment, traps, barricades, and whatnot.

One of the best computer games to come out of the 1990s was the old "Dungeon Keeper" game, which I think is available now at GoG.com. Get it, play it, and see what I mean about planning for the adventurers to come in. Barring that, there's a good reverse dungeon scenario available in the second book of the Way of the Wicked adventure series -- again, it's more about planning than it is about the actual fighting. Reverse dungeon itself was like that, too.

Remember that the monsters tend to lose -- they're both weaker individually and also often outnumbered by the party. Intelligent monsters will therefore take advantage of any opportunity they have to get an edge on the adventuring party -- they have to.


Thanks Orfamay Quest! It's going to be a one-shot for my old gaming group. I moved for a PhD program but am visiting Seattle over winter break, and will get to game with a group I gamed with for about fifteen years. The group alternated GMing, so most of the group should be pretty good at running monsters. But I'll have to give a lot of thought to what preparations the monsters will have made before the players run the encounters.

I usually design modular encounters- two encounters before the dragon is a golem and one encounter before the dragon is a cryohydra or pyrohydra. The golem (or several weaker golems) fight will be loud, alerting the dragon and giving him time to cast buff spells. The hydra will use up resources, the party will be spec'd for fire damage so they will either use up fire protection spells and potions or have to improvise cold protection. So each group will face similar but slightly different encounters, and the players are familiar with my GMing and know how I run encounters. But this is a way to mix things up.


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ParagonDireRaccoon wrote:
Thanks Orfamay Quest! It's going to be a one-shot for my old gaming group. I moved for a PhD program but am visiting Seattle over winter break, and will get to game with a group I gamed with for about fifteen years. The group alternated GMing, so most of the group should be pretty good at running monsters. But I'll have to give a lot of thought to what preparations the monsters will have made before the players run the encounters.

Erm,... you may have missed my point.

The players are the monsters, which means the players are the ones who need to give thought to the preparations.

This also means that mindless creatures like golems aren't necessarily good choices (he says, using the classic rhetorical technique of litotes) for a reverse dungeon. The actual dungeon designer is the golem master/creator who decides what kind of golems to create, where to put them, and what orders to give them. Creatures with animal intelligence aren't usually much better.

The classic Reverse Dungeon module used goblins (or kobolds, I forget which) and the first session would be spent doing things like digging pit traps and trying to figure out where the best ambush locations would be. The traps don't have to be brilliant (and at level 1 couldn't be) but the point is that the players have ownership of the traps. That's what really makes reverse dungeons cool.

(Now I have an urge to go run Reverse Dungeon for my group and watch them lay down new carpeting and put a Keurig coffee machine in to welcome the invaders....)


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ParagonDireRaccoon wrote:
I'm working on an adventure partly in the style of the Reverse Dungeon. The Reverse Dungeon was an old-school adventure where the players played monsters defending a dungeon from adventurers (I've never played the Reverse Dungeon though). There was an adventure in Dungeon magazine in the 3E days where the PCs clear out a dungeon, then have to rebuild the defenses and defend it against a group of adventurers seeking the artifact within for evil purposes. I'm going to split the difference- two routes into the volcano lair of a red dragon guarding an artifact. The PCs are taking one route, while evil adventurers take the other. The players play the monsters on the other route and play their PCs (alternating encounters). The better the players play the monsters, the weaker the opponent adventurers will be for the final battle (after defeating the dragon, the PCs will be low on resources). Any thoughts or suggestions?

Reverse dungeons can be really cool, and my players have played a few of them with one funny version being just taking a place and then having to defend it.

The most recent one we ran was set in the M&B Warband universe with added fantasy elements on the wild borderlands. They took a castle from hobgoblins, but then had to contend with invading hobgoblins, giants, other monsters, dangerous plants, mercenaries and knights and finally quit it to leave for riches or pursue their become a druid spiritual quest after being blessed by nature and turning into part plant (that freaked people out).

It was an entirely different way of looking about things, and it was very fun. Those poor hobgoblin samurai... how much shame they experienced.

One that I always wanted to run, and I am really glad I learned the term reverse dungeon today, was for the players to be bandits. So whether for good or ill, merry men or not, they start ambushing a forest road. They begin with basic equipment and a small range of skills, but unlock more traps, better armaments and damage, more options and would have a variety of "sets" to ambush from, in and around their starting region and once they start moving around. They would also choose when they ambushed if not detected, how they started it (setting off log traps, spiked chains or arrow volleys) and what they let go past.

So picking a weakly protected merchant caravan is an easy choice, but you can't attack a contingent of knights guarding a stagecoach until later. The more important the target you hit, the more ire and attention you gain. Which of course means adventurers seek out your hideout (which you would also upgrade as your fallback point).

There are a lot of cool reverse dungeon ideas. I wish you well if you are sticking with monsters and a dungeon. Be sure to add some really off features in it, like natural deep pits, lava is always good, poisonous animals, maybe bees, and some archaic powerful traps that survive from a previous age.

There is also the Deception/Kagero series if you want to do more work. Reverse dungeon series centred on traps.


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Orfamay Quest wrote:
ParagonDireRaccoon wrote:
Thanks Orfamay Quest! It's going to be a one-shot for my old gaming group. I moved for a PhD program but am visiting Seattle over winter break, and will get to game with a group I gamed with for about fifteen years. The group alternated GMing, so most of the group should be pretty good at running monsters. But I'll have to give a lot of thought to what preparations the monsters will have made before the players run the encounters.

Erm,... you may have missed my point.

The players are the monsters, which means the players are the ones who need to give thought to the preparations.

This also means that mindless creatures like golems aren't necessarily good choices (he says, using the classic rhetorical technique of litotes) for a reverse dungeon. The actual dungeon designer is the golem master/creator who decides what kind of golems to create, where to put them, and what orders to give them. Creatures with animal intelligence aren't usually much better.

The classic Reverse Dungeon module used goblins (or kobolds, I forget which) and the first session would be spent doing things like digging pit traps and trying to figure out where the best ambush locations would be. The traps don't have to be brilliant (and at level 1 couldn't be) but the point is that the players have ownership of the traps. That's what really makes reverse dungeons cool.

(Now I have an urge to go run Reverse Dungeon for my group and watch them lay down new carpeting and put a Keurig coffee machine in to welcome the invaders....)

Ah litotes. As an English tutor it is good to see their use by someone who knows what they are doing.

Now on to goblins and level 1 traps, what can also be granted to help these little fellows (the players) along, is yes some old ancient traps in the dungeon. So yeah the players are weaker than the invaders (level 1 fighter in splint mail with a large shield and bastard sword is a real problem), but it isn't just timing that is on their side - when they attack, they can also try to get the invading adventurers into a position where a very old and potent trap takes them out. E.g. get them into the hallway of mirrors and bolts. The bolts never seem to run out, and the shamans whisper of old magic and raised the players with the rule that they are forbidden to interfere with the contraptions there, play around or break them.

This is also an essential resource:

http://trapaday.wordpress.com/


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DM Under The Bridge wrote:


Now on to goblins and level 1 traps, what can also be granted to help these little fellows (the players) along, is yes some old ancient traps in the dungeon. So yeah the players are weaker than the invaders (level 1 fighter in splint mail with a large shield and bastard sword is a real problem), but it isn't just timing that is on their side - when they attack, they can also try to get the invading adventurers into a position where a very old and potent trap takes them out. E.g. get them into the hallway of mirrors and bolts. The bolts never seem to run out, and the shamans whisper of old magic and raised the players with the rule that they are forbidden to interfere with the contraptions there, play around or break them.

That can be granted, yes, but it isn't; the original Reverse Dungeon module was actually three dungeons stacked atop each other, and the sophisticated traps (and sophisticated trap-makers) were in the lower floors, which helped keep the "feel" of the dungeons separate.

If you're running a low-level reverse dungeon and you want to put in some overpowered traps,... well, I generally consider it to be more fun and better form to provide the players with more autonomy and authority, in the same way that I don't think it's good form to give a traditional party an NPC wizard that will solve all the encounters for them. So I'd suggest instead giving them a stock of trap parts (maybe an encounter with a trap merchant whom they can kill and then loot his wagon) and then they have to figure out what to go with a clockwork spray dispenser.....


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There is no poor form in making a dungeon fun and memorable.

On the matter of autonomy and authority, this is an important decision for the dm to make. Are the defenders stronger 1 vs. 1 than the invaders? Or are they weaker? Are they weaker but more numerous (do all players control two kobolds, instead of one)?

If they are weaker, have lower stats, less class options (e.g. no magus kobolds or monks), lower hp, then powering up the traps and throwing in some "old faithful" traps that the defenders can use is how you balance it out. The weak have to think and use their brains, not just their stats of potent authority.

If the kobolds/defenders are just as strong as the attackers, then they don't have to get inventive. It is also closer and closer to being just a normal game of powerful party stomps other powerful parties. If the players are lazy, it can just be party vs. party - which is cool for a few servings, but there is a lot more interesting and rarely seen traps a dm could throw in for the defenders. If the players are weak, they have to think and plan an execute well, or they die. More tension and bigger stakes makes the win, if it happens, much more rewarding. Would you agree?

I definitely support the looting of the trap wagon, clockwork sprays and the like. The first party to breach the hold could also have a trapper among their number, that really sets up a lot of traps if the others need to rest. Killing him is great, because all his traps can be used on the next party!

What is essential for a dm running this though, is to keep a really accurate tally of what equipment the defenders earn when they kill the invaders. Why? Well, plenty of this can be used for traps, as well as the usual upgrading of equipment. Push the players to be inventive with what they can scrounge, and they will be as cunning as the VC.


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ParagonDireRaccoon wrote:
I'm working on an adventure partly in the style of the Reverse Dungeon. The Reverse Dungeon was an old-school adventure where the players played monsters defending a dungeon from adventurers (I've never played the Reverse Dungeon though). There was an adventure in Dungeon magazine in the 3E days where the PCs clear out a dungeon, then have to rebuild the defenses and defend it against a group of adventurers seeking the artifact within for evil purposes. I'm going to split the difference- two routes into the volcano lair of a red dragon guarding an artifact. The PCs are taking one route, while evil adventurers take the other. The players play the monsters on the other route and play their PCs (alternating encounters). The better the players play the monsters, the weaker the opponent adventurers will be for the final battle (after defeating the dragon, the PCs will be low on resources). Any thoughts or suggestions?

Please, one of the invaders has to be a ruddy-skinned blonde barbarian with a whip.

Then a knight with a shovel.

:D


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I'll probably replace the golems with warforged for the players to run, one of the guys loves warforged. It will be a one-shot set around level 12, with pre-gens available and the players can make characters if they would like/have time. I'll have a pool of pre-gens/potential adversary PCs, and probably use 3x5 cards with monster stats.

Thanks for the advice guys!


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Warforged sentinels. Marvellous!

Maybe a particularly large one?

http://darksoulswiki.wikispaces.com/file/view/D_vs_G.jpg/237789747/460x259/ D_vs_G.jpg


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ParagonDireRaccoon wrote:
Any thoughts or suggestions?

Yes, I have a thought.

This is a brilliant idea. Brilliant.

May I thieve it?


Of course TheBlackPlague. Sorry I didn't reply sooner.


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just have the players be dwarves trying to defend against the goblin incursion, have some ogres and a few giants involved.


I'm setting the reverse dungeon-ish adventure in Dragonlance, all the guys in the group are Dragonlance fans since the late 1980s. And the adventure I use as inspiration is from the World of Krynn module, so it will be set just outside of Palanthus. Verminaard (post War of the Lance, he never stays dead and it's a year or so after the end of the war) is teaming up with a red dragon and is making half-fiend draconians with chromatic dragon eggs and draining the essence of a celestial (the process reverses alignment, so what would be half-celestial good-aligned noble draconians become half-fiend evil draconians).

I will still use warforged (one of the guys loves Eberron and warforged) as monsters played by the players, and half-fiend draconians. I'm looking for advice on a chromatic hydra. Depending on how many players are there (it will be about a week and a half before Christmas) each player will control one or two heads (one each for five or more players, two each if it's four players). I'm thinking character hit with both cold and fire breath weapons in the same round will have a penalty to save against the second, any other considerations I should be aware of?

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