How would you improve this?
>>43612930
All sorts of nasty flying creatures nesting on the edges of the pit, so no would be adventurers would be able to bypass the kick ass dungeons that easily.
>>43612930
>>43612959
Nah nigga, that's the trick of it. The pit is a shortcut, but once you've sacked the city and packed away all the loot, you realize that you're deep underground with a heavy load and none of the floors above you have been cleared.
You also realize that all those suspiciously convenient shelf-like outcrops along the sided of the pit as smooth as porcelain on the undersides.The real boss lived in the skull the whole time. You just burned down the condos included in the legion of evil's advanced retirement package.
>>43613303
doesn't matter, party is dworfs, they will make their embark in the doomed city
>>43613340
>no dirt
>no clay
>no traders
>no migrants
>I sincerely doubt the hauled seeds, barrels, and an anvil down with them
>starting from a freestanding structure in the middle of a breached (interconnected!) cavern layer full of water
>in an evil biome
!!FUN!! inbound.
>>43612930
A balcony/gallery/corridor from 4B looking over the pit - so guards can fire down into it, at least some of the way, and so they can raise an alarm if they see someone coming down that way.
>>43612930
I don't see a still anywhere....
It's like you want tantrum spirals.
4b leads to 5b, a dead-end treasure vault guarded by a rogue glabrezu.
the 3rd level is a sloped level that connects to both 1st and 2nd by slowly descending passageways.
The domed city has a lift chute that carries sentries and supplies up to the Great Stone Skull's 1st up platform.
>>43612959
>>43613575
>"improving" a jaquay-style dungeon by walling off all the alternate paths
>>43612930
I don't know, but it reminds me of Cragscleft Prison.
Right now, the pit-entrance feels like it's a lot less interesting than the one via the skull. Unless there's something that prevents adventurers from climbing the pit back out, it needs improvements.
>>43614255
>proudlyinfected
Holy shit, I fought that dude once. He was using some themed twink build in londo that spammed CSS while you're tied up fighting the giant sentinels.
>>43612930
Would put a crane above the pit, it is used as the main transportation of goods in and out. Due to the fact it is behind the dungeon is unlikely to be found unless your group scouts the place out properly
>>43612930
Add some ventilation tunnels with some magical wind for circulation, and sink some massive steel beams through the entire structure. Your cave's not up to code.
>>43614430
How about if the pit is the mouth of a dormant volcano that is lined with sharp, jagged blades of obsidian glass that slope downwards, cutting at anyone who tries to climb up them or grip them. When repelling down, they can be used as ledges to step off of. At the top, the rocks are smooth and dull enough to allow ropes to be secured to repel down, but the lower section just past the plateau is sharp and will slowly cut through any rope used to climb down or up.
The pit itself is used as a sacrificial pit by a cult of creatures that worship the beast(s) bellow, so it is full of corpses, blood stains, and partially eaten parts, as well as discarded treasure that the denizens have no use for, but the adventurers may find valuable, and monsters that feed on the refuse, such as rust monsters and carrion crawlers.
The 6th level could hold the guardians or custodians of the true denizens of the city, such as mind controlled thralls, thought eaters, dark mantles, nothics or goblin or kolbold priests and mad cultists.
The city itself could be a fortress holding a slave army or serves as the sanctuary for a small council of illithids that have been using the fortress to manipulate the local land into giving them sustenance for them to replenish their numbers, or perhaps is all a farce, a giant facade to lure people to their doom, with the true threat being the ancient Aboleth waiting in the waters around it.
>>43614255
>walling off
>placing guards
Nah
>>43615002
In addition, the 1st upper level holds a group of cultists that serve their evil lords by using the mountain itself to maintain watch over the land beyond. The cult's priests live within the upper chamber and manipulate mechanisms within the mountain to perpetuate the idea that the mountain itself is alive and demand sacrifices on behalf of the mountain's true inhabitants. This "talking mountain god" will likely be what draws the adventurers in the first place.
The second layer holds a barracks where acolytes of the cult live and work cleaning and maintaining the upper chambers of the mountain fortress. The second level is a storage area used to hold materials to feed the cultists and help assist their efforts to feed their dark masters, which could be taken as offerings from frightened townspeople or scavenged from corpses of sacrifices taken by the honor guard in the 6th level, such as potions, spell scrolls, cloth, sandals, and other such things. The chamber is connected to the third level by a mine cart that runs down a steep rail through the 3rd level and down to 4A. The rail is operated by a rope tied to a pulley system on the 2nd level, and requires an operator on the 2nd level to move upwards. A one-way spring loaded trap door seals the 2nd level off after the cart as passed, and requires the pulling of a dead-man's switch on the 2nd level to open.
The connector between level 4A and 3 is a very steep and polished slope that is difficult to climb, and nearly impossible to haul any hefty weight or large items by foot. The 3rd level itself is a labyrinth housing a number of strange beasts and the mutated and insane individuals who have failed or angered the mountain's lords in some way.
cont.
>>43615555
The connector between 4A and 4B is a secured and locked iron door, which is barred from 4A's side. 4B is a laboratory for the dark arts, holding cauldrons of mysterious fluids and vials of strange mixtures, with shelves of samples and ingredients of all kinds. It is manned by a mad wizard who is alone and lost in his madness. He can be caught by surprise without much effort but will attack if he detects the party. It is possible for the party to convince him the adventurers are only hallucinations, and in such case he will answer questions pertaining to where items are in the lab, but will respond angrily to questions about the denizens bellow. Questioning about the laberynth will cause him to chant the cypher he has used to encrypt a map of the 3rd level. Investigation of his corpse by one versed in the arcane or acult will find he is in the early stages of becoming a Nothic himself, and any search of his person will produce the encrypted map. Those who wish to look through the shelves of items can find a number of potions at random, as well as material components for a number of necromantic spells.
The connector between 4B and the 3rd level is a steep stairway which leads to a heavy, secured hidden door.
The 5th level is not maintained in any fashion, and is in total darkness. A number of stone formations along the ceiling and floor glows with dim light, illuminating 10ft around them. The ceiling is host to dark mantles and piercers, and the ground contains at least one roper with a number of underdark beasts. If the roper attacks, the other resident monsters will hind and avoid the conflict, preferring instead to scavenge along the fringes. They are easily frightened creatures, and will flee into the shadows after receiving only moderate damage, as they are used to wounded and dying prey stumbling in from the levels above and are not used to bloody fights and they will not enter the dim light.
Bumpin' the thread while I read it.
>>43612930
By making it not Dwimmermount.
Magma.
>>43612930
>How would you improve this?
Here's basically what I drew/came up with.
>1st up
Crafting ward for blacksmiths, etc: They built smoke stacks and exhaust out of the stone skull's eye. Safe zone.
>1st Level
Completely cleared. Turned into a dungeon town complete with market, church and all basic necessities for dungeon crawling. Safe zone
>2nd Level
Partially cleared. Dungeon interior destroyed and starting to grow moss/vegetation: threats in the form of animals, monsterous-beasts and undead.
>3rd level
Labrynth. Still standing: plenty of treasure left over, monsters and patrols of Minotaurs and occasional Orcs and kobolds getting lost.
>4A
Red Dragon nest. Sends Red kobolds out to collect treasure and food.
>4B
Minotaur City.
>5th Level
Natural Mushroom Cavern. Home to an Orc Town/Fort. Nothing but weird subterranean/underdark beasts and Orcs/Ogres.
>6th Level
Natural Mushroom Cavern. More of the same, but with some spill over from "The Pit".
>The Pit
Massive natural canyon/chasm filled with nesting Wyverns. Overgrown and untouched.
>7th level
Domed City has become abandoned and Magic Crystal have grown outside causing an entire forest to grow underground. Numerous undead, magical constructs, wild animals, monsters - The lake is also teeming with monsters.
>>43617902
Good stuff
Does anyone have more stuff like the OP? I'm really digging this style of map...
>>43614309
I KNEW it looked familiar. BRB, reinstalling Thief/Thief 2.Best Late-Medival/Early Victorian low-magic fantasy horror setting, or only Best Late-Medival/Early Victorian low-magic fantasy horror setting?
>>43613303
You've just reminded me that I'd love to see some kind of game where you start on the roof of a skyscraper and have to fight your way down, with the final boss fight taking place in the building's lobby, with freedom visible a few yards away through the glass doors.
>>43612930
Wizard tower like a unicorn horn out of the skull.
>>43614309
The zombies in that level scared me away from Thief when it was still new. I finally got it and Thief 2 off of Steam last year.
Still creepy, even now.
The Haunted Cathedral was far worse though.
That game had some amazing level design though, I learned some new tricks from it that I use iny own dungeons.
>>43612930
The Pit should have a big ass dragon/serpent/tower thing coming out of it that's constantly on the assault, and the only way to take it out is by going down to the 6th level.
>>43619054
Oh and if you kill the thing, its dead body becomes a way to be able to climb out of the dungeon from the pit (implying that if they were to just jump in the pit they would die.) Can allow them to heal and stuff after the 6th level, and as a result make the 7th level and the Domed City possibly more expansive and challenging.
>>43612930
needs more lava
and skeletons
and lava
>>43619148
What aboutwheel skeletons near the lava?
>>43617902
>>43618331
I have done a few more doodles on the map to better reflect the encounter content on the levels.
>>43619528
Not OP, but I want you to know that your drawing style is fuckin neato.
>>43613396
>not always having plump helmet seeds with you
No dwarf would do this. With helm plump, some water, and a pick, a dwarf has everything he needs to build an amazing society. Then the next thing to build is a spiral staircase up through the pit, and you've got a new fortress. Build a tower over the pit, find a way to shut it, and just leave whatever lives in the stone skull for any future invaders to deal with.
![tumblr_mouvhb4WEq1swb8m1o1_r1_500[1].gif](https://i.imgur.com/vuxBDVt.gif "tumblr_mouvhb4WEq1swb8m1o1_r1_500[1].gif")
>>43619566
>Not OP, but I want you to know that your drawing style is fuckin neato.
Well that's mighty kind of you to say, Anon.
Thank you!
>>43619619
No worries m80
>>43612930
It's inside a titanic rock golem thing
>>43618681
challenge acceptedidea stolen
>>43618681
HL2 cut chapter Vertigo/Palace.
>>43618643
Search for side view dungeon maps
>>43612930
Motherfucking lasers in the eye sockets. And twin linked flamers in the nostrils.
>>43620194
>>43613249
Underrated post.
>>43618681
that was Wolfenstein 3D.
>>43619528
Your art style is super cute anon.
>>43619528
fucking love it.
>>43618651
Don't forget about its spiritual successor; Dishonored.
