Working on the last dungeon for my mythic campaign. Players are 20th level, 9th tier. I have one last big dungeon crawl for them before we end the whole thing.
Mythic Lich of Doom's secret phylactery stronghold, enemies include high CR myhtic skeletal champions (for mooks)
I'm trying to come up with harsh environments and hazards that present challenges to the players, but most of what I have is laughable to 20th level characters.
I have two thus far.
First, it's on the moon, in a secret cave-like entrance in a large mountain on the far side. No air, gravity is weaker, certain types of attacks will/won't work depending on if they need air. (I don't have too many rules to cite for fighting like this, most likely easiest solution would be to allow spells that allow breathing to also allow attacks and whatever else).
Second (this is the big one) the place is both permanently Desecrated (no altar throughout) and Unhallowed with Life Ward (3.5, exact opposite of death ward) placed on the land. Life ward is there to protect my undead minions/bosses and also prevent magic healing without finding a way to cancel it. I'll probably house rule that Death Ward will cancel Life Ward while the duration is active, resulting in a neutral outcome and I'd allow Death Ward to be used as an offensive spell (Will negates) to target an individual undead creature and temporarily cancel out the life ward.
This is where I come up short. Somewhere I need to include a room with some sort of long biographical series of tomes covering the BBEG's history (something like 3-4 thousand years) and I want traps whose apparent solution actually causes more problems. Something like dispelling/unlocking a lock unleashes a horde of enemies. I'll need more interesting and believable countermeasures in place. Fake Phylactery has to be one of them.
Anyone have any experience? I want this dungeon doable in one session (4-6 hours).
I'm curious as to how much effort it would take a group of 20/9 characters to blow up the moon.
Probably more than you think, it's pretty big.
That depends. Relative to the size of the planet, Earth's moon is extremely large. How big is Golarion's moon?
Custom setting, expect the moon to be more or less analogous with ours.
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The moon is full of mythos monsters. Mi Goo, Primordial ones, and a Shoggoth, among others. Explosions will create more encounters than they solve.
What if the phylactery is embedded in a load bearing pillar? You need a time stop, super strength to yank it out, and then get out before the room collapses. Gravity is reduced but not nonexistent.
May I recommend him having a wall mural of a fake life story that strongly suggests a particular item is his phylactery
Disabling teleportation magic, at least in certain areas, makes things alot more threatening
I did one very fun trap recently that went like....
The party finds a yellow chest. Whoever or whatever opens it receives a permanent +2 charisma bonus. If it is not sentient and lacks a charisma score it simply gets a nice appearance upgrade. If your players are like mine this probably means the party's pole looks better now. The next chest they find is a lovely shade of deep blue. Anyone who opens it receives a permanent +2 int bonus. Anything that lacked an intelligence score previously and is used to open the chest becomes sentient with 1d6+2 int. The party then finds a beautiful purple chest. Whoever opens has something terrible happen to them, no save, but that doesn't kill them. I went with extremely violent removal of important body parts but whatever fits that description works :)
Hellevator, from grimstooth. Acts as an elevator. If used it breaks down for a short period of time. When this happens a magic mouth says "An error has occurred. Please remain situated as help is called". The players will then try to break out. Thing is the elevator shaft is filled with explosive gas
Sovereign glue, 2 part epoxy edition. 1 part on an area they need to go through. Next part in a room with an important combat encounter. Only need to describe the floors as wet unless they stop to investigate the floors
Kidnapped innocents make excellent deterrents to blasting everything or mini objectives for puzzles
Did one game a while back with a giant chessboard that was fun. Basically a regular sized chess board caused the pieces of a massive chessboard to mimic the little pieces. Had 2 villains play a game while the players had to try and cross the board. Speed chess to they each made 3 moves per round. Players that are on a square to get captured must make a reflex save for half damage and avoid being pinned under the weight of the piece.
One session? You probably don't need more than three or four encounters. I like grabbing higher level adventures from where I can and converting them as needed. Dungeon magazine had a ton of great little adventures that could be easily adapted.
^^^There was a Dragon issue that dealt with chess set battles. It was in one of the last Paizo issues, I believe.
I have a teleportation trap which redirects magical teleportation to a trap room with no apparent exit. (two secret doors)
I want to incorporate Greater Magic Aura into some of the magical traps, and have some silly meta traps that aren't really traps but function only if the players try to mess with it. I like Spell Turning on the door to reflect back shots of Disintegrate and/or Greater Dispel.
Since this is a lair, I need to incorporate the things a lich may need. One room will most likely be a library with puzzles that are book themed and have the hidden treasure include the spellbook(s) and other wondrous items related to books/tomes. I was thinking about having a book with invisible letters revealing an important secret/location of a 'key' layered over normal ink letters whose language is a red herring which would lead the players to a trap.
One room is going to be something of a magical laboratory/crafting hole. Here I'll generate random loot to represent the belongings of past adventurers who've been defeated. Magical crafting reagents and expensive spell components will also be here.
I need a morgue, with corpses and skeletons not 'yet' animated.
I have a big final boss battle planned for floor 3, and floor 2 is going to be where the hidden fake phylactery is. Because of the scope and intensity of our fights, a few mini encounters aren't so bad, if a little trivial. Mostly they are there for resource drain.
I really want to play into the moon atmosphere/lack thereof. They have a bard that really likes to ruin my encounters with audible performances and discordant voice, so it'll be nice to force them to find a way around that. I'm thinking about having the entire dungeon be completely silent.
What are some good ideas for the real phylactery? I'll make the fake one look like a standard phylactery and destroying it will allow access to the final boss, but I need inspiration for the real thing.
I'm not sure if life bubble would enable bard like things or spellcasting.
Are there other ways around the no sound thing? Should I include an item/loot/'key' that enables it? How would it work?
I would draw upon the Tomb of Horrors content for some thematic ideas. The actual encounters, including the Pathfinder conversion (which I have used), are not appropriately scaled (waaay too low for your party), but contain some very interesting ideas not unlike what has been mentioned already.
You've got a 20/9 Bard with NO WAY AT ALL around being silenced? I'm sure he'll figure something out.
I'm glad someone else feels this way.
I have a DM item which allows for interpersonal contact, sort of like a phone. It's what facilitates the Mythic Stuff, my Mythic McGuffin if you will. I think using those combined with Life Bubble works.
The Abundant Air Tank. There is a opening to the plane of air in this minor artifact. It's a yard long and a foot wide. With the valve turned to full open it will quickly fill any sealed area with breathable air. You can even roll for an encounter of a random air creature once a day(only creatures that can fit through the opening).
If you make this the fake or real phylactery, you can really test their resolve.:)