Post/Author/DateTime	Post
Vivaldi 01-23-04, 07:17 AM	hi all. we about to explore the "undermountain", outside of Waterdeep I belive. i am new to the Realms still, and have never heard of it. My character is an ex-purple dragon knight, and one would assume would know of such a place. so can anyone give me a brief heads up?? cheers..
Dargoth 01-23-04, 07:34 AM	The Short version is Undermountain was built by Halaster Blackcloak the mad mage of Undermountain. Halaster came to Waterdeep when was nothing but a fishing village. Halaster has created a series of portals throughout the realms that bring monsters from all over Faerun to Undermountain. The the layout of Undermountian itself have been known to change. The most well known entrance to Undermountain is found in the Yawning Portal Inn where a party of adventurers can be lowered into the first level of the Dungeon Halaster and his remaining apprentices to this day live inside Undermountain. For more info on Undermountain I suggest the following The 2 Undermountain boxsets http://store.yahoo.com/svgames-store/tsr1060esd.html http://store.yahoo.com/svgames-store/tsr1104esd.html and the Forgotten realms novel Escape from Undermountain
Kuje31 01-23-04, 07:35 AM	http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/downloads Has some of the free Undermountain modules from 2e also.
Lashan 01-23-04, 05:45 PM	You shouldn't give a player info about Undermountain! Shame on you! Don't you ever DM? Some thing are famous, and other thing are just ment to be found out.
J. Grenemyer 01-23-04, 05:52 PM	Ack! What are you guys doing!?!? You're going to spoil the surprise! Tsk! Tsk! :mad:
Aris Despana The Drow 01-23-04, 08:36 PM	no tell more!!!!!!!!!!!!
Vivaldi 01-24-04, 04:14 PM	nope.. thats all i was after fellas! just a vague idea of the background...thanks.
Krash 01-24-04, 08:33 PM	The only thing your character is likely to know is that Undermountain is considered to be the largest mass grave for adventurers in all of Faerun. Although I'm sure that Myth Drannor is catching up swiftly. -- George Krashos
Hoondatha 01-25-04, 06:40 AM	If that. Cormyr is a LONG way from Waterdeep (wish I knew exactly how far, but Faerun dwarfs the continental United States, to give you an idea of size). You're much more likely to know of the Stonelands, Myth Drannor, various borderlands between Cormyr and the Dales/Sembia than Undermountain. The only things you would hear (maybe, since there are plenty of horrors closer to home) would be fright tales told around a campfire.
Kilamar 01-25-04, 08:25 AM	Originally posted by Vivaldi so can anyone give me a brief heads up?? cheers.. Yepp, you will be like cattle in a slaughterhouse. Kilamar
tauster 01-25-04, 09:35 AM	Originally posted by Vivaldi My character is an ex-purple dragon knight, and one would assume would know of such a place. so can anyone give me a brief heads up?? cheers.. well, i was about to say "just ask your dm how much youīve heard", but others were faster. by my own experience as dm and player, "out-of-character-knowledge" almost ALWAYS conflicts with good roleplaying: you are 100% sure that your opponent is undead (because youīve read about all those telltale singns in the monstrous compendium), but your character isnīt supposed to know it. so you either toil yourself through the encounter, behaving "wrong" against better knowledge and accepting grudgingly potential harm, or you behave "right" although your character isnīt supposed to do so. both alternatives arenīt much fun, at least not as much fun as finding out things about monsters/famous dungeons at first hand...
Cunning Linguist 01-25-04, 10:07 AM	When I DM, my players often see a monster and say "its a xxx" and I don't think thats wrong. They grew up in a world where monsters are a common problem. They must all have heard stories when they where small children of how Vampires look, I know that children a few hundred years ago learned this, they also learned how to drive one back, and how to kill it. I guess no one ever DID kill a vampire 300+ years ago, but people sure did hang garlic infront of there window so that evil spirits and vampires did not enter while they sleept.
tauster 01-25-04, 11:18 AM	They must all have heard stories when they where small children of how Vampires look, I know that children a few hundred years ago learned this, they also learned how to drive one back, and how to kill it. maybe my post was a bit too harsh. i agree with you! i wonīt deny a pc "common knowledge" about certain monsters (trolls burn like tinder- a fact almost everyone apart from some isolated living communities should know). in fact, i try to further such common knowledge by spreading rumors; most are correct, but some completely wrong, based on misunderstandings and such things. true, some vampires are repelled by garlic, thatīs why a farmer would hang it over hist doors & windows. but then there are a few ancient vampires who couldnīt care less about it. no farmer would suspect that... to remain with vampires: imagine how shocked pcīs and players were when they discover via detect undead an atheltic figure on the rooftop at night and a few rounds later, shortly before the fight) realized the it is the same one they had been monitoring for days and who had been walking jovially through the cities market at noon that day! :smirk: because some of my players have during other campaigns gained a considerable amount of oot- knowledge (and some also dabble in dm-ing), every once in a while i give a monster a major twist. again those nifty suckers: a vampiress who subsists on passion instead of blood, thus evolving into a serial heartbreaker, changing lovers regularly every tenday (leaving broken-hearted men by the dozen in her wake) and living in cities with heavy transit traffic. (admittedly, i am heavily influenced by anne riceīs vampire chronicles.) sometimes itīs hard not to overdo it: having to many correct rumors would take away the mystery, too many wrong rumors and players wouldnīt trust their dm any longer. too many "standard- critter" and a campaing gets bland (thatīs were the advantage of lacking out-of-character-knowledge is!), too many exceptional critters... you get it... :rolleyes: and rare monsters should be totally unknown to them, regardless of rumors. i donīt think there are rumors about baelnorms, except among a very few elven communities.
Lashan 01-25-04, 02:23 PM	Don't forget that Skullport is that infamous pirate town....somewhere in the Sea of Swords. Everyone on the Sword Coast knows about this infamous den of piracy and evil, but no one knows where it is. It's got to be somewhere out there. Player knowledge and character knowledge are different things.
Mutablegenus 03-09-04, 10:58 PM	**kuje31** i've been searching for that for so long....
Kuje31 03-09-04, 11:25 PM	Originally posted by Mutablegenus **kuje31** i've been searching for that for so long.... I didn't do it! :) :angel:
Wooly Rupert 03-10-04, 01:31 AM	Kind of an odd coinky-dink that this thread should pop back up... I recently had an idea that lead to me searching thru my old Undermountain stuff -- including the articles in Dragon. So I hit the Dragon Magazine Archive CD-ROMs, and cut and paste the articles from the pdf to Word, just to make it easier for my own use (the actual magazines are now in storage). Now comes the fun task of cleaning them up so they look presentable... So, here's the articles I found in Dragon: 167 Understanding Undermountain 172 Seeing the Sights in Skullport 176 If You Need Help -- Ask the Drow! 227 The Reports from Undermountain
Silverblade The Enchanter 03-10-04, 09:57 AM	Undermountain is VERY VERY well known, that's why it is the "largest mass grave in Faerun" ;) Hm, IIRC there's a lovley little twist on Undermountians infamy in the Neverwinter Night's Hordes of the Underdark expansion.... Halaster's dungeon is widely sung of/talked of by bards and adventurers. The Yawning Portal does have the cage to let you go down into the dern place and Durnan runs the inn. I get the funny feeling from all the descriptions of the inn over the years that there has to be several parties of adventurers every DAY going into it at least...probably more on festivals that attract folk to Waterdeep. Nobles also have "hunts" down there. And I bet a lot of young, poor folk decide to throw their lot in on a gamble to get wealth. Imagine stable lads, seamstresses, dockworkers etc arming themselves with handaxes and spears, going down there, because they are desperate for a better life, for adventure. Imaigne in real life if Undermountain existed in the middle of NEW YORK or London, and you really could go down there and come back up with hundreds of thousands of pounds/dollars etc. bet you despite the lethality the place would be busy.