megadungeon plan

[shaneward]

Hi All! I'm glad I was finally able to get on these forums. I had a heck of a time. I've been slowly working on a interesting premise for a mega dungeon, it's going to start out innocently enough with a wizard looking for alchemical ingredients. As the PC
s and adventure progress they will make there way thru some kobold caves, delve deeper to a dwarfen city (friendly possible home base), there will be rumor tables, a dwarfen mine that needs to be cleaned out of monsters, a possible side quest involving a hated enemy of the dwarfs (dark elves possibly), I'm also hoping to include some ancient ruins deep underground as well. Just a few thoughts at this point.

I tried using mapmaptic and it does work like a charm! however I think I may try and create my own maps, for example i was working on a large cave with a river flowing thru it, there is a bridge that goes to the other side, the map just doesn't work with mapmatic properly (or atleast I know I can draw it better). From the downloads I've read there are some hand drawn maps, so I'm guessing this is fine in a module provided they are in black and white.

I'm doing my best to follow the guidelines for Basic Fantasy, I actually went ahead and downloaded Morgans Fort and am basically editing over top of it.

a few questions...

1 - hand draw maps - yah or nah?

2 - If I use artwork that is already in basic fantasy supplements is this okay? provided I put the artists name on them? (and don't delete there signatures etc).

my plan obviously is to do this as close to a "T" as possible so that the wonderful folks at BF will consider it.

Any suggestions for a newbie module designer?

[shaneward]

Here is the adventure seed for my mega dungeon,

Tacked to a tree outside of town you come across a very interesting sign. It reads…
“In need of alchemical ingredients, foolhardy adventures need only apply! You will be compensated for your services. Inquire at the hut on the edge of the forest
-Zane Valenzafob

You make your way to the ancient hut on the outskirts of the forest. Sitting in the shade of an oak tree is a wizardly looking chap, A human about middle aged with a wildly long moustache, wearing a green overcoat and gently strumming a lute. He looks to you and says.

“Ah I see someone has read my sign perhaps? Or are you here on some inane quest to have a wart removed?” grumbly.

(wait for PCs)

“Well here is my proposition, my stocks of alchemical ingredients have slowly dwindled over the last few years, obviously I use a few here and there making potions, but my confounded apprentice Sailice drops and burns more ingredient’s than she uses! I will gladly pay you for whatever you can find for me. Have you ever heard of the Underworld perhaps?” Most of what I seek is below the surface. I will pay you reasonably for any items you can find, some more rare items the price will obviously go up. So what do you say?

Zane stands up and hands the characters a small sack, and explains “this is a bag of teleportation, I created it, handy little contraption if I do say so myself. It’s extremely helpful when out exploring, you just pop the ingredient into this bag and it magically transports it straight to me! (if the PCs ask about there money) “Ah yes, well I will transfer the funds right back to you, provided of course the samples are of decent quality. Alternatively I can keep a good account of what you’ve sent me and pay you upon your return”.

One of the entrances to the underworld is a cave about a day or so’s journey from here, It may be inhabited with a few goblins, but I’m sure they won’t be too problematic for you chaps eh!” After that, find what you can.

[SmootRK]

Artwork is hit and miss. For simplicity sake, avoid using artwork found in the Core Rules. Some artists have not given permission for re-use. I would instead stick to those shared in our art section of the forum... at least when art is posted there it is explicitly stated that such art may be used within BFRPG related projects/supplements. Otherwise, for using stuff found in the core rules, you will have to get in contact directly with Solomoriah about it.

Over time, with the most excellent contributions of Shonuff, Blisterfoot, and others, we shall have a good array of such art.

[shaneward]

thank you very much for the quick reply SmootRK, I will keep the art forum in mind from now on.

sw

[Blazeguard]

I love the sound of this so far.

[shaneward]

Map 1

Map 1.jpg (302.58 KiB) Viewed 9443 times

Here are 2 examples of the hand drawn maps.

[shaneward]

I hope those files aren't to big. Here is the link to the blog http://3toadstools.blogspot.ca/2013/09/a-few-maps.html

[shaneward]

kobold cave.jpg (504.12 KiB) Viewed 9386 times

Any thoughts on graphics? I have a few other designs that I'm thinking about. One where I use a grid paper and then erase the leftover grid, doing some computer hexing over top.

[konrad13]

I'm liking it so far. Perhaps the first levels are filled with goblins in one area (using crude yet effective weapons) and kobolds in the other area using traps to keep the goblins from overrunning them? Just to mix things up a bit, ya see.
As for the enemy of the dwarves, perhaps something a little less well known than drow. You might want to look up the dire corby, they'd be appropriate for the area, though you may need to convert them for to BFRPG. Drow are usually best for the mid-levels between 9-14, because of how they work.

[shaneward]

Thanks konrad13, I'll look dire corby up and see what I can come up with. The Drow are also old hat as well. I'm thinking what I'd like to see is have some monsters in there that are a bit of a mis match for players, in hopes that the players are smart enough to go "WAHHHH NO! ALRIGHT WE BETTER RUN!" LOL. I'm planning on putting a dragon in there somewhere, as to wether they are able to get to him right away, probably not, I have a plan to have a certain set of crystal keys that are needed to get into deeper levels of the dungeon. Obviously the Dwarf settlement will be a "Home base" for the PC's.

I like the plan of them getting thru a few levels prior to getting to the dwarfs. What I want to setup is, not so much deeper levels as if you go N, S, E, W there would be more levels, eventually leading to a deeper level on each section. So ... Go north, map 1, map 2, deeper map 3. same goes for S, E, W. (south - dwarfen settlement, dwarfen mine, deeper level). So all told there should be 4 x 3 levels of dungeon madness. Probably a bit too much to chew, but I want a challenge for myself.

The name I'm considering is "the deep delve"