Adventuring in Ancient Ruins
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What's been your favorite event/scene in an adventure campaign traveling through ancient ruins of a city? Be it here in Arabel's ruins, or some other campaign?
What kind of exciting adventure/mysterious objects, strange villainous (or otherwise) race would you want to encounter?
Perhaps even as simple as, what's missing from Arabel's ruins that you'ld like to encounter/discover/get killed by?
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i have really enjoyed investigating the thrivaldi ruins and working to discover the history there (though i didnt solve it all, party because it is not all actually in game).
something similar with as in depth a history that can be found out in game would be excellent, though i dont know the FR well enough to suggest something that is true to the setting.maybe an incan style jungle theme and ruins/pyramids with associated cultists/discoveries?
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The Netherese ruins has a base that I've been told was there since back in V3 or early V4.
It's still there but I've not seen anyone gain access to it during my time here except once when Zool accidentally ported my party in there.
I suggest fixing it up (Move the spawns set up inside the base to the area just outside it) and making it claimable like the other bases. Within the base you could add lore that tells tales of events that occurred in the Netherese ruins in CoA's past or make it a hub in the ruins that lets you access all of the other maps quickly for free, giving the owner some power in their domain.
I can't think of extra types of spawns you could add but all maps (excluding the Southern Netherese Ruins) could do with an increase in spawn frequency. Currently those maps feel empty and this might help.Miyeritar could do with the same. It usually has a few spawns of mephits or weak undead (Zombie Warriors, Skeleton Archers) and very occasionally spawns some ooze up to the end of the path. Then it pits you against creatures that are costly to fight and rewards you poorly.
So, it requires some more loot. In each path there is only loot at the end, which is fine, and it's either 1 chest with a valuable gem/reagent in it or many chests with bad loot (e.g. Dwarven Drinking Belt, low value gems).Finding enough things on your trip to these places makes it easier to pay your companions, which means they'll be more likely to pick exploring this area with you over running a quest.
More important than loot or creatures is the lack of lore in each area. The walls are bare and the points of interest aren't made to sound very interesting in my opinion. Graffiti and carvings telling stories of CoA's past linked to the areas or hints about what/who lived there before it was a ruin should be dotted around the maps.
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For me, I'd love to see a ruined Keep that has history to explore. The keep can have dangerous lands around it, making travel to the keep a reasonable challenge. Keeps have rooms above ground, dungeons below, battlements, estate around, outbuildings and such like.. These all give such a wide variety of areas to explore. The Ruined Keep near Eveningstar might be a target. There seems little in the FR Canon that defines its purpose except that it was a Border Fort.
The ruins of an Evil Temple could also provide much the same environment. Tackling undead minions is always great fun and these should be rife within an evil temple ruin.
With both of these, I'd like to see rumours and evidence of an evil threat whose minions are frequently encountered, who's lesser lieutenants are NPC Monsters who are occasionally encountered and who's greater lieutenants are occasionally possessed by DMs and brought into major DM events. However, the master nemesis in these ruins should remain a character of mystery who is almost never visible in game, but often referred to with fear.
I'd love the lesser levels of these ruins to be accessable by many PCs of a variety of levels, but as you delve into the ruins, the fear of what you might find should become greater and greater. Access to certain levels could be restricted to DM events.
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For me, I'd love to see a ruined Keep that has history to explore. The keep can have dangerous lands around it, making travel to the keep a reasonable challenge. Keeps have rooms above ground, dungeons below, battlements, estate around, outbuildings and such like.. These all give such a wide variety of areas to explore. The Ruined Keep near Eveningstar might be a target.
Have you tried the Castle Crag quest? I think it's 7-12 and It's pretty close to what you describe here, too. Could use some more lore as well, though. Maybe adding to the area around it (outbuildings, estate grounds, explorable ruins) would raise interest in it - you could go there to explore, and then if your party is suitable, tackle the quest.
I agree that the ruins below Arabel, for example, could use more spawns. They seem pretty empty at times.
However, they are also a great place for PC's to do stuff - rituals, secret meetings, etc, so it's nice at times that they are semi-safe for secret stuff to be done, instead of a meatgrinder.Lore would be nice. We just went to the Aegis library yesterday, and it was a bit disapointing how empty it was. A few corpses, and a banner, and a strange room with strange levers, with no hint as to their purpose, and wether or not it's something that can even be solved IG without DM help.
Is it possible that monsters would move more on their own? As in, patrol/hunt or something, as opposed to just standing pretty much still?
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I just want to drop in and say that I love puzzles.
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I found the Ruins the best when the rift was super prominent, though that's a plot that's been and gone.
Some more freaky shit down there would be amazing, hook horrors, gauths and devas are pretty boring. -
Also, effluvial lake is pretty darn dangerous at times, a lot more so than the upper ruins - I think this should be the other way around, with the lake being closer to the surface.
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Also, effluvial lake is pretty darn dangerous at times, a lot more so than the upper ruins - I think this should be the other way around, with the lake being closer to the surface.
Not really from a design standpoint. Less dangerous areas are the more 'generic' like Sewers, Hullack Forest, Arabel Ruins–the more dangerous areas are Sewers: Effluvial Lake, Arabel Ruins, Bhersken Point, Hullack Forest: Realm of Wailing Fog. Those 'thematic' areas are meant to be more dangerous, have more odds of better treasures/loots, rarer monster spawns.
Also, the Effluvial Lake...yuck....its a lake of feces and urine that has built up under Arabel over 2,500 years. Really nasty shit (literally) is down there.
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I think the ruins have been overexplored of late and could use new areas or a revamp personally, maybe a structural collapse reveals new unexplored areas/opportunities and blocks off some of the old ones that've been explored to death and show little fruit?
The main appeal of the ruins is a huge amount of unknown to it, problem is after going around down there enough times you get the feeling that if there are any dmless areas to explore you haven't already found, odds are you never will.
The ruins give off this almost sci-fi thriller feel that's really cool, that's a feeling I think should be captured when exploring the ruins of a civilization that was much much more advanced than your own. And the best way to do that is to emphasize about how much of it is unknown or unexplored.
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I just want to drop in and say that I love puzzles.
Try the Stormhorn vault quest if you can find it.
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I love the stormhorn quest :-)
um, its in the stormhorns, right? -
A twisted garden in the Ruins being preserved and protected by archaic druids who've long since gone nutty would be sweet to explore. Include some lore about the circle of druids and some gardening placeables, maybe a curious passage into the Helmlands.
I'd love to see some mega-catacombs with lore pertaining to Jergal as he was worshiped in Netheril. I also wouldn't mind seeing some ancient undead who are pretty pissed about being disturbed from their slumber, alongside some suspicious necromancer activity. I don't know how viable these would be, but they'd be cool to explore.
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Personally, I like the ruins giving adventurers an actual reason to explore them. As it stands, they are 99% empty. Even the old ruins, Bhresken Point, and the gardens area, have zero plot value. I might miss something, but when they where first introduced, I explored and tried to solve the puzzle there. I must admit I was very disappointed when I realized there wasnt much to learn, or much reason to solve whatever was planted there.
Perhaps they could be redesigned, more like Undermountain in Waterdeep? Each area, having a distinct reason for being there, having a plot that can be solved, a clue, something. Import some old ruined maze from some other server / campaign, and tool it to fit our server.
One area, could involve a plot of mythalite. One could lead to some old library, with coa specific information. Add in a random info giver there, so people can return and find a book detailing plot info, but have to keep coming back, to learn what they actually sought down there.
Another, could be an ancient temple of evil as Lamancha said. Or it could lead to the old EO fortress that had a secret entrance in the sewers.
Add in an actual maze, like the twisted maze, with potential dangerous NPCs you can fight, powerful ones, like a minor shadow dragon, a beholder or mind flayer collective, bandits, whatever, but make it random, so it cannot be spammed by one person.To sum up my likely silly post. Add relevant plot info, new areas with a purpose, that can be explored, and add unique loot, merchants, random stuff.
Perhaps make part of the maze, some place where EVIDENCE of wrong doing, of lore pertaining the Citadel Council, Hardcastle, Dracohorn etc can be found, without needing a dm. Relevant plot info.
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A twisted garden in the Ruins being preserved and protected by archaic druids who've long since gone nutty would be sweet to explore. Include some lore about the circle of druids and some gardening placeables, maybe a curious passage into the Helmlands.
I'd love to see some mega-catacombs with lore pertaining to Jergal as he was worshiped in Netheril. I also wouldn't mind seeing some ancient undead who are pretty pissed about being disturbed from their slumber, alongside some suspicious necromancer activity. I don't know how viable these would be, but they'd be cool to explore.
Ideas like these are things I'm hoping to hear.
Also don't mind just strange mysterious "hooks" like a "an odd flaming statue sitting in Soma's Square its hands raised to heaven an a mysterious inscription upon it in an ancient tongue"–-for those of you familiar with the Hammer Heart storyline.
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@O'louth:
but make it random, so it cannot be spammed by one person.
There are very few ways aside from actual party size minimums to stop one person 'spamming' something. But, people 'spamming' something isn't a problem if the reward isn't crazily high compared to the risk/supplies used.
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More Tarrasque. Just one more really. A catacomb that is the beasts sleeping lair. A society of Kenku inhabiting it with claimable areas that PCs could use as forward camps for prolonged exploration. At least until they discover the beast and are killed by it's mere presence. Make the area randomized, so players would have to build up knowledge of the space to make progress. Perhaps the Kenku (or whatever monsters) are more civilized and offer small shops that are between areas. The idea that a player or team of players could spend a large portion of their career inhabiting, dealing and exploring within an area is appealing to me. Maybe I am setting the bar too high on this one. I do not know how much work would have to go into it.
Maybe something like this exists and I just havent put the effort into finding it yet also.
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Perhaps even as simple as, what's missing from Arabel's ruins that you'ld like to encounter/discover/get killed by?
What's lacking I think is artefacts left by prior inhabitants. Ruins mostly look like a generic dungeon, I'd like them to be more interesting to explore, with more clues to their ancient past.
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a new layout to explore
remove the uber long way to Bhersken Point or at least make it more interesting. Nothing ever spawn on it and its just a very long and boring coridor. No side rooms, no lore, nothing. -
It is a very long "nothing" pretty much yeah.