creating horror feel - Downloaded from the Wizards Community, all coding removed by Solauren

creating horror feel

Post/Author/DateTime Post
#1
saethone
Aug 01, 2010 23:22:48 I'm running a homebrew campaign currently, and I'm introducing a new character to the game the next session. He's a fire genasi duskblade (3.5 ed), who comes from the far east (samurai style). In his backstory, he's been in pursuit of a red oni-mask stolen from his master's dojo - and we've carried it to the point where he's basically chased this Drow vampire across the world who has it - and has been instructed to deliver it to her vampire master (who will deliver it to his). Along the way he's met up with a paladin (whos wife was turned to a vampire in a previous game with the other players - and as such has become something of a vampire hunting specialist), who is accompanying him (since the party knows the paladin it will make it easier to work the new player into the party)

Her (the drow vampire) problem is that she's cocky and loves to toy with her prey - as she's let the two of them chase her all the way back to her lair in the drow homelands (which is currently being invaded by several neighboring nations). The game will basically start with the new player and the paladin chasing her into the entrance to her dungeon-lair, and after a breif time in there alone the rest of the party will be entering the dungeon from another entrance (with their own purpose - it will provide an entrance to where they need to go).

that will be the setup here - what I am looking for help with is ideas to help make this a horrific, gruesom, and suspenseful dungeon. Some things that I've already determined are -

the entire thing is something of a funhouse for her to play with her prey in -

there will be some prisoner cells - some empty, some with corpses, and some with still living slaves that the vampires feed from

there will be spiders (possibly undead?) to hamper the parties movement so that she can hide and move about while the party is otherwise occupied

there will be slaves to prepare meals for the prisoners - they taste better healthy. i plan to have them at the end of a dark hallway, rattling chains as they come out to investigate. of course, their chains will only allow them to venture so far - but my hope is that they startle the party into attacking before they know what they actually are and hopefully killing some innocents

in the cells, one prisoners will be one of the vampires spawn who was awaiting execution - there will be a mound of dirt in the cell that could tip the players off (or of course detect undead / evil) - the others are innocent slaves/prisoners of war

one of the players is also a drow who grew up in this city, a wizard - and she was apprenticed to a wizard with heretical views (worshipped the moon goddess as opposed to lloth in secret) - there will be a statue of her in the library - except that it looks as if the statue is in terror. in fact, its not a statue - its his former master...after stricken by a flesh to stone spell.

the library that resides in will have several books bound in humanoid flesh.

there will be a sacraficial altar with a corpse completely drained of blood on the altar - wooden stake through the heart to prevent ressurection as a spawn

there will be swinging chains on the ceiling - which will creep the party out as they'll never know if its the vampire climbing around or spiders or just the wind from the grand opening at the entrance

the vampire will also be running around scrawling warnings on the stone in chalk - just ominous messages etc

what other ideas do ya'll have for rooms/traps/encounters in here that would fit the bill? the players are all pretty mature so don't worry about content - but this will be a totally silly-free dungeon. also what would be some good messages for her to be scrawling - "turn back now and i'll only kill the paladin..." kind of things
#2
sfurtwangler
Aug 02, 2010 9:28:48 Have the party make perception checks for some of the red herrings (listen, in 3.5, to notice the chains rattleing, spot to see the shadow of something moving in one of the cells, far away). If the party all rolls poorly, and you tell them that no one notices anything unusual, that will already put them on guard. If they roll well, and you tell them something they might legitimately notice, but isn't always a threat will perhaps prompt them to react in haste or focus on something like the ceiling chains - maybe wasting some spells. The trick will be to sprinkle in some legitimate threats (the spawn, some normal traps, an ambush in wait) so that when they spot something that looks like it could be an enemy in hiding, they'll shoot first and ask questions later.

Having one cell holding a vampire spawn who used to be someone the PCs know might mess with them. The PCs may try to save or free their old friend but (perhaps because they didn't know about this person until just now) they might also decide to put it out of its misery, so have the person be freshly turned, and begging for help (and have them act scared and potentially helpful if released). If the party considers letting them go, they'll probably be weary, but you can play up the NPC as someone they could save - but, of course, have it turn on them later.

The vampire could be behind several trapped and locked doors, which it could get by with its shapechanging, or gaseous form abilities - but which the PCs would have to carefully navigate. One could be a locked (and trapped) door (high DC, but not unbeatable if the PCs have a rogue that doesn't mind taking 20) near one of the cells, containing a normal human, with a message scrawled in chalk, or blood, near the door that says that the key is in the human's stomach (blatantly taken from Saw).

The party now has two options, they can get the key out of the human, killing it, but allowing them to bypass the door and trap quickly, or they can spare the human, and bypass the trap/lock on their own (requiring them to take 20 on a couple of skill checks, and giving the NPC that much more of a head start. A third option might be to try to get the human to "pass" the key (either by inducing vomitting, or... you know... the other way - although that would take longer than picking the lock). A successful heal check might clue them in, but vomiting up the key would cause some internal damage (nothing some heals can fix up - but those are heals that the party won't get later). There is a key in the guy's stomach... but its not the key for this door, and trying to use it triggers the trap, anyway. :-)

Basically, the idea would be to delay the PCs (giving the vampire time to set up other rooms for them) and maybe to tempt them to sacrificing an innocent person in the interest of saving time.
#3
sfurtwangler
Aug 02, 2010 9:39:22 Another interesting trap/feature that might help increase the their stress-factor, would be to force the party to split up, or to at least offer that option as one which might save someone, and have sticking together and playing it safe result in anotehr death (plus more time for the NPC).

For example, they get to a room with two large open pits in it. From one, they hear painful screaming, like someone being tortured, from the other, they hear the frightened sobs of children. Scrawled on the ground is another of those messages saying "You only have time to save one of them".

Any sort of dawdling with ropes and pullies and whatnot will result in the prisoners in both rooms meeting gruesome ends. The party has one turn, maybe two, to rush into one pit or the other and deal with whatevr is down there (a trap that needs to be disarmed, an undead monster about to claim another victem, whatever). By the time they get back out of the pit, and into the other one, they are too late - and perhaps have more monsters waiting for them. Of course, if they split up, they might save both - but the trick is that if they hop down the pit (only a 10-foot fall or so), the hit a trigger plate which causes the pit to close above them (either the ceiling comes down to plug the hole, or the floor slides over it, or wahtever. If they left a rogue or someone up top, that person could disarm the mechanism and let everyone out, but otherwise, they have to proceed from the room they are now in on the second floor - and if they split up, that MIGHT mean danger for one party, where the other cannot help them.

I think there is a lot you could do if you made it clear that they were in a race of sorts, to catch this vampire lady. She has the advatnage of knowing the stronghold, and being able to turn into gas to escape ro bypass most of the traps, but if you can make the party think that they can catch her if they don't waste a lot of time, you can probably offer them some pretty hard choices.
#4
saethone
Aug 02, 2010 14:07:41 LOL I love the idea with the wrong key in his stomach, I'm definitely going to use this...great Ideas so far, keep them coming!
#5
sfurtwangler
Aug 02, 2010 15:22:07 You could probably look to any of the 6(?) Saw movies for twisted trap ideas. You could also look into a lot of the old-school "deathtrap" dungeons. IIRC, I used to have some DM handouts for traps in 2nd edition Undermountain that were particularly nasty.

Of course, remember that too many of these kinds of traps will make the PCs balk at every scenario you come up with - since they'll quickly assume that everything is a trap designed to screw with them, with no real way for them to win and overcome it quickly. Even if you get a lot of gruesome ideas, use them sparingly - and try to make sure there is a way that the PCs can move past the area quickly and relatively safely, even if it means making some tough decisions.
#6
saethone
Aug 02, 2010 16:12:08 Yeah - this is a playground so none of the traps are going to be designed to kill the party - only hamper, slow, and weaken them. The vampire wants to do all the killing herself so she wouldn't put them against anything she knows they couldn't handle. And not every room is going to be a trap/whatever - only a select few
#7
frothsof
Aug 02, 2010 22:51:04 you should have a well in the basement with a tentacled creature in it, i dont know if it was free but dungeon 156 had a great lovecraftian adventure 'ashenport' that used that to great effect and it can give an excuse for some aberrant creatures and different terrain if you want to mix some water in.

that adventure also had some somewhat cheesy but fun suggestions for a horror adventure, the best of which was having the players not sit in their regular seats to give a kind of weird feel. there was torrential rain, so it cut visibility and was used where if the pcs wnated to leave the town, the weather and visibility got worse and worse then gave way to blasts of lightning. gave it that 'cant leave' feel, and its good even if it never came up to have something if they tried to leave

use a lot of undead and perhaps 'defiled ground', its where if undead die on defiled unholy ground they roll a save to rise again with 1 hp, it gives a good feel to the undead, like that 'one last time' feel in horror movies

try to mix the traps/hazards into combat, maybe have one of those iron maidens, a standing casket w spikes you could get pushed in, you could use piles of organs and limbs as difficult terrain or have to make acrobatics checks to keep from slipping when they move

overall your idea could be really cool, definitely my kind of campaign

#8
TV_Casualty
Aug 12, 2010 12:36:43 Music, music, music.

Softly playing music from video game/movie soundtracks can really set the mood. Not enough to be distracting... just enough for atmosphere.

Silent Hill soundtracks have good stuff for Far Realm/aberrant settings.

BioShock soundtracks have some pretty good tunes for a haunted castle or a big undead boss fight, believe it or not. All of the songs are only a minute and a half long too, so they won't get old or boring.

Post/Author/DateTime	Post
#1 saethone Aug 01, 2010 23:22:48	I'm running a homebrew campaign currently, and I'm introducing a new character to the game the next session. He's a fire genasi duskblade (3.5 ed), who comes from the far east (samurai style). In his backstory, he's been in pursuit of a red oni-mask stolen from his master's dojo - and we've carried it to the point where he's basically chased this Drow vampire across the world who has it - and has been instructed to deliver it to her vampire master (who will deliver it to his). Along the way he's met up with a paladin (whos wife was turned to a vampire in a previous game with the other players - and as such has become something of a vampire hunting specialist), who is accompanying him (since the party knows the paladin it will make it easier to work the new player into the party) Her (the drow vampire) problem is that she's cocky and loves to toy with her prey - as she's let the two of them chase her all the way back to her lair in the drow homelands (which is currently being invaded by several neighboring nations). The game will basically start with the new player and the paladin chasing her into the entrance to her dungeon-lair, and after a breif time in there alone the rest of the party will be entering the dungeon from another entrance (with their own purpose - it will provide an entrance to where they need to go). that will be the setup here - what I am looking for help with is ideas to help make this a horrific, gruesom, and suspenseful dungeon. Some things that I've already determined are - the entire thing is something of a funhouse for her to play with her prey in - there will be some prisoner cells - some empty, some with corpses, and some with still living slaves that the vampires feed from there will be spiders (possibly undead?) to hamper the parties movement so that she can hide and move about while the party is otherwise occupied there will be slaves to prepare meals for the prisoners - they taste better healthy. i plan to have them at the end of a dark hallway, rattling chains as they come out to investigate. of course, their chains will only allow them to venture so far - but my hope is that they startle the party into attacking before they know what they actually are and hopefully killing some innocents in the cells, one prisoners will be one of the vampires spawn who was awaiting execution - there will be a mound of dirt in the cell that could tip the players off (or of course detect undead / evil) - the others are innocent slaves/prisoners of war one of the players is also a drow who grew up in this city, a wizard - and she was apprenticed to a wizard with heretical views (worshipped the moon goddess as opposed to lloth in secret) - there will be a statue of her in the library - except that it looks as if the statue is in terror. in fact, its not a statue - its his former master...after stricken by a flesh to stone spell. the library that resides in will have several books bound in humanoid flesh. there will be a sacraficial altar with a corpse completely drained of blood on the altar - wooden stake through the heart to prevent ressurection as a spawn there will be swinging chains on the ceiling - which will creep the party out as they'll never know if its the vampire climbing around or spiders or just the wind from the grand opening at the entrance the vampire will also be running around scrawling warnings on the stone in chalk - just ominous messages etc what other ideas do ya'll have for rooms/traps/encounters in here that would fit the bill? the players are all pretty mature so don't worry about content - but this will be a totally silly-free dungeon. also what would be some good messages for her to be scrawling - "turn back now and i'll only kill the paladin..." kind of things
#2 sfurtwangler Aug 02, 2010 9:28:48	Have the party make perception checks for some of the red herrings (listen, in 3.5, to notice the chains rattleing, spot to see the shadow of something moving in one of the cells, far away). If the party all rolls poorly, and you tell them that no one notices anything unusual, that will already put them on guard. If they roll well, and you tell them something they might legitimately notice, but isn't always a threat will perhaps prompt them to react in haste or focus on something like the ceiling chains - maybe wasting some spells. The trick will be to sprinkle in some legitimate threats (the spawn, some normal traps, an ambush in wait) so that when they spot something that looks like it could be an enemy in hiding, they'll shoot first and ask questions later. Having one cell holding a vampire spawn who used to be someone the PCs know might mess with them. The PCs may try to save or free their old friend but (perhaps because they didn't know about this person until just now) they might also decide to put it out of its misery, so have the person be freshly turned, and begging for help (and have them act scared and potentially helpful if released). If the party considers letting them go, they'll probably be weary, but you can play up the NPC as someone they could save - but, of course, have it turn on them later. The vampire could be behind several trapped and locked doors, which it could get by with its shapechanging, or gaseous form abilities - but which the PCs would have to carefully navigate. One could be a locked (and trapped) door (high DC, but not unbeatable if the PCs have a rogue that doesn't mind taking 20) near one of the cells, containing a normal human, with a message scrawled in chalk, or blood, near the door that says that the key is in the human's stomach (blatantly taken from Saw). The party now has two options, they can get the key out of the human, killing it, but allowing them to bypass the door and trap quickly, or they can spare the human, and bypass the trap/lock on their own (requiring them to take 20 on a couple of skill checks, and giving the NPC that much more of a head start. A third option might be to try to get the human to "pass" the key (either by inducing vomitting, or... you know... the other way - although that would take longer than picking the lock). A successful heal check might clue them in, but vomiting up the key would cause some internal damage (nothing some heals can fix up - but those are heals that the party won't get later). There is a key in the guy's stomach... but its not the key for this door, and trying to use it triggers the trap, anyway. :-) Basically, the idea would be to delay the PCs (giving the vampire time to set up other rooms for them) and maybe to tempt them to sacrificing an innocent person in the interest of saving time.
#3 sfurtwangler Aug 02, 2010 9:39:22	Another interesting trap/feature that might help increase the their stress-factor, would be to force the party to split up, or to at least offer that option as one which might save someone, and have sticking together and playing it safe result in anotehr death (plus more time for the NPC). For example, they get to a room with two large open pits in it. From one, they hear painful screaming, like someone being tortured, from the other, they hear the frightened sobs of children. Scrawled on the ground is another of those messages saying "You only have time to save one of them". Any sort of dawdling with ropes and pullies and whatnot will result in the prisoners in both rooms meeting gruesome ends. The party has one turn, maybe two, to rush into one pit or the other and deal with whatevr is down there (a trap that needs to be disarmed, an undead monster about to claim another victem, whatever). By the time they get back out of the pit, and into the other one, they are too late - and perhaps have more monsters waiting for them. Of course, if they split up, they might save both - but the trick is that if they hop down the pit (only a 10-foot fall or so), the hit a trigger plate which causes the pit to close above them (either the ceiling comes down to plug the hole, or the floor slides over it, or wahtever. If they left a rogue or someone up top, that person could disarm the mechanism and let everyone out, but otherwise, they have to proceed from the room they are now in on the second floor - and if they split up, that MIGHT mean danger for one party, where the other cannot help them. I think there is a lot you could do if you made it clear that they were in a race of sorts, to catch this vampire lady. She has the advatnage of knowing the stronghold, and being able to turn into gas to escape ro bypass most of the traps, but if you can make the party think that they can catch her if they don't waste a lot of time, you can probably offer them some pretty hard choices.
#4 saethone Aug 02, 2010 14:07:41	LOL I love the idea with the wrong key in his stomach, I'm definitely going to use this...great Ideas so far, keep them coming!
#5 sfurtwangler Aug 02, 2010 15:22:07	You could probably look to any of the 6(?) Saw movies for twisted trap ideas. You could also look into a lot of the old-school "deathtrap" dungeons. IIRC, I used to have some DM handouts for traps in 2nd edition Undermountain that were particularly nasty. Of course, remember that too many of these kinds of traps will make the PCs balk at every scenario you come up with - since they'll quickly assume that everything is a trap designed to screw with them, with no real way for them to win and overcome it quickly. Even if you get a lot of gruesome ideas, use them sparingly - and try to make sure there is a way that the PCs can move past the area quickly and relatively safely, even if it means making some tough decisions.
#6 saethone Aug 02, 2010 16:12:08	Yeah - this is a playground so none of the traps are going to be designed to kill the party - only hamper, slow, and weaken them. The vampire wants to do all the killing herself so she wouldn't put them against anything she knows they couldn't handle. And not every room is going to be a trap/whatever - only a select few
#7 frothsof Aug 02, 2010 22:51:04	you should have a well in the basement with a tentacled creature in it, i dont know if it was free but dungeon 156 had a great lovecraftian adventure 'ashenport' that used that to great effect and it can give an excuse for some aberrant creatures and different terrain if you want to mix some water in. that adventure also had some somewhat cheesy but fun suggestions for a horror adventure, the best of which was having the players not sit in their regular seats to give a kind of weird feel. there was torrential rain, so it cut visibility and was used where if the pcs wnated to leave the town, the weather and visibility got worse and worse then gave way to blasts of lightning. gave it that 'cant leave' feel, and its good even if it never came up to have something if they tried to leave use a lot of undead and perhaps 'defiled ground', its where if undead die on defiled unholy ground they roll a save to rise again with 1 hp, it gives a good feel to the undead, like that 'one last time' feel in horror movies try to mix the traps/hazards into combat, maybe have one of those iron maidens, a standing casket w spikes you could get pushed in, you could use piles of organs and limbs as difficult terrain or have to make acrobatics checks to keep from slipping when they move overall your idea could be really cool, definitely my kind of campaign
#8 TV_Casualty Aug 12, 2010 12:36:43	Music, music, music. Softly playing music from video game/movie soundtracks can really set the mood. Not enough to be distracting... just enough for atmosphere. Silent Hill soundtracks have good stuff for Far Realm/aberrant settings. BioShock soundtracks have some pretty good tunes for a haunted castle or a big undead boss fight, believe it or not. All of the songs are only a minute and a half long too, so they won't get old or boring.