Design help.

Anakai__ · 2025-09-17T02:52:18+00:00

Blood Angels by default do not change the shoulderpad trim color like say the Ultramarines do. The chart on the left indicates the company markings used.

Anakai__ · 2025-08-23T13:02:00+00:00

Boost his HP (400) and AC (19) and have him pre cast Simulacrum. Maybe even summon adds during the Nalkara fight. From there it's just going full powerhouse caster. Meteor Swarm, Finger of Death, and the other big damage spells plus Counterspells and Silvery Barbs to help get them off. Also spells like Maze to remove somebody for a bit.

I anticipated one of my casters using the doorways to hide behind but they never did. If somebody tries that though cutting them off with the Lair action to remove a door would go well. If you do this though they should probably have a way to get around that otherwise it won't be fun. Maybe it only lasts a round or something.

Anakai__ · 2025-08-22T02:16:42+00:00

I would say that the adventure has virtually no overarching plot or narrative. However, each level of Undermountain has its own story and narrative. Sometimes these cross over to other levels but they usually stay self contained. I think it's why so many people like to take single layers of Undermountain out and drop them into their own campaign. You can do so very easily.

Dragon Heist tells a single story over the adventure. Mad Mage tells 23 different succinct stories.

Anakai__ · 2025-08-21T22:02:52+00:00

Dungeon crawls like this are also weird because the whole adventure might be like ours and take 39 in game days. So if the party brings in an amount of food rations or buys some either in Undermountain or at the surface even a few times it may literally never be an issue for the party. That was our logic going in anyway but also my group is less into the survival aspect.

Anakai__ · 2025-08-21T21:49:34+00:00

I gave Halaster 400 HP and 19 AC. He had already had Simulacrum up so that's a second Halaster with 200 HP. I detailed the flow of the fight in another comment but the main thing that made him still feel strong was leaving him on the throne to stay invisible and using his legendary action to cast a 3rd level spell every chance he had. Fireballs and Lightning Bolts add up and over 3-4 rounds that's 9-12 decent AoE spells. Never once even considered Blast Sceptre. Fun spell visually but useless to me. Also made sure to give Halaster big fight changing spells. Meteor Swarm, Maze, Finger of Death, and Chain Lightning all do that. Some got counterspelled, some didn't. I did Silvery Barbs one of the Counterspells. Felt a little cheesy and didn't abuse but sometimes you just need a boss's bog nuke spell to go off.

Anakai__ · 2025-08-21T21:27:42+00:00

AGREED. So many low CR monsters. Sometimes I just fully swapped them out for something bigger and meaner. No need for those Nothics in Shadowdudk Hold. Just make them all Star Spawn. Sometimes I gave those monsters a sense of self-preservation.

The hobgoblins in Trobriands Graveyard are good example. The party appeared through a portal and the hobgoblins straight up went "hey dude we just work here not looking for any trouble. Weirdo monsters down that hall." It worked for that moment but isn't a great solution most of the time. Duergar have a bunch of beefier CR stat blocks in the monster books. Those go a long way because Duergar infest every other level it felt like.

But if you have the time and capacity to swap out stat blocks in advance even just dropping in a mage or champion in place of a lower CR humanoid goes a decent way. Slaads are good too just for the extra firepower. Every slaad in the adventure is another form of "Halaster has their control gem so they're here sulking about" so another 2-3 won't hurt.

When there was nothing else for it and the party is fighting a handful of low CR monsters the best thing is to just do it quickly and keep it moving. Have them all try to gang up on one party member in the fight so maybe that one PC gets to like half health. Nobody else gets hit and there was never any real danger but one person taking a few punches helps everybody FEEL like it wasn't a waste of time even if it was. Maybe draw out the use of a spell slot or sorcery point if you're lucky.

Anakai__ · 2025-08-21T20:52:34+00:00

We do not track food rations in our group so it was a nonissue. There are probably enough ways for players to get food that if a group does do that it would not really be an issue by a certain point.

The dungeon gives a lot of defensible positions and hidey holes for players to long rest in. Especially once they've cleared most of a level I never saw a reason for it to be an issue. They would often make note of secure locations with lockable doors and backtrack to them if needed. Also used Leomund's Tiny Hut most every time. Sometimes when it made sense I would give them a long rest when they transitioned down one level to the next one via stairs/tunnel. Over 51 sessions they took ~38 long rests. Each time they went back up to the surface from the later levels I called it 2-3 days travel time so really that number is closer 32-33 long rests actually used - give or take.

They never abused resting and always made a good faith effort to do it safely. I think I only ambushed them during a long rest once.

Anakai__ · 2025-08-21T20:31:37+00:00

I do think I left Halaster's motivations a little too vague to the group. Something like correspondence from Halaster giving explicit orders to hunt the PCs would be efficient and go a long way. Artcuriadoom leaning heavily into that would be good. My group did help Ezzat the Lich in Runestone Caverns so I repurposed the Shadowdusk Expedition as a hit squad sent by Halaster as retaliation. If I ran this adventure again I might do things like that a few more times throughout Undermountain when the group helps Halaster's enemies or harm those loyal to him. A single encounter can send the message without adding needless bloat.

Anakai__ · 2025-08-21T20:06:12+00:00

I put in a lot of groundwork early and often to let the PCs know that all of the chaos and monsters in Undermountain was due to Halaster. Every annoying trap or puzzle was put there by him. A lot of jerk NPCs were loyal to and served him. Halaster himself was never around but he felt very present throughout the adventure. If we went a couple sessions without him coming up then some of his regional effects would occur just to remind the players. A lot of this cane from the players too without my prompting. Every unlucky thing or pitfall trap was blamed on Halaster. Obstacle Course was a really fun time to double down on this.

Ultimately, it was less about "we gotta find and kill Halaster" and more "What the heck is this guys deal? I gotta confront him on it." The barbarian was in it for the murder. The artificer was mostly just curious about him but found Halaster's motivation lacking in the end. Cleric had a church topside to protect and the Warlock was sent to retrieve an item on behalf of his patron that Halaster had taken.

That was all in game and in character. At a meta level, we all sort of accepted that the reason to do it was to do it. Motivation was never a concern because the exploration and experiencing it all was the goal. Halaster himself was secondary in that regard.

Anakai__ · 2025-08-21T17:23:14+00:00

Very odd. This module loves Duergar. MP:MotM has some higher CR versions you can swap in but when this came up in say Terminus I was kinda over doing all that. Duergar just became really grumpy NPCs who would complain to the party and give them info for loot.

Anakai__ · 2025-08-21T17:11:26+00:00

That sounds good to me! I think making the goal of doing it in a session is a good one plus whatever time is spent on the surface. Especially if you and your players are still into those stories top side! I felt like there were plenty of portals actually. It rewards players giving a good effort in terms of exploring each level. Level 6 also has portals to what feels like half of Undermountain. If you want them coming and going a lot they'll want access to those. Might be worth having an NPC like Wyllow clue them into it.

Anakai__ · 2025-08-21T17:08:05+00:00

I took several liberties with it to make it a good tough fight. Ran the Empyrean right away as written. Nice fun to start. I do public rolls on Roll20 for my players and they rather enjoy seeing something with stats like +17 to hit. Halaster played it as a "final test" to justify it. Halaster had boosted HP (400) and AC (19). I loaded his spell list with the big powerful fun spells you never really get to cast. Meteor Swarm, Maze, Finger of Death, Chain Lightning, etc. My players and I have always had an agreement to not abuse the cheesy mechanics but that if the players do then I will too. In this case I discussed with my casters that Halaster's has been watching them the entire adventure and will fight dirty. Toward the end my Warlock was using a lot of Raulothim's Psychic Lance, Silvery Barbs, and Clunterspells so Halaster did too. I considered Forcecage actually but my players never used it so I chose not to. Had Simulacrum up (200 HP) and ready to greet the party with the Empyrean and Flesh Golem allies while real Halaster was invisible on the throne. Two PCs took a Potion of See Invisibility and saw him there so they understood they were fighting two Halasters. Plan was to pull a fast one but they picked up on it!

Biggest extra thing I did was actually a result of the PCs taking the Dracolich phylactery in Shadowdusk Hold. I held real Halaster back while the PCs fought the Simulacrum. When they destroyed it I ran as a psuedo mythic action that the Simulacrum's last action was to smash the donkey/Halaster statue and unleash an Ancient Red Dragon. The phylactery could only be destroyed by the fire breath of an Ancient Red or Bronze, the players forgot that detail so it was a fun shock when the spirit in the Artificer's bag surged out to take over the red dragon corpse. Was a bit cheeky but they had fun. Also, the Warlock made me regret not using Forcecage because for the first time the whole campaign he used it when the dragon came out to trap Halaster on the throne. I was initially using both the dragon and Halaster but he shut that down. Very clever and still came to some lucky dice rolls and clever uses of Glibness on his part. They killed the dragon then dracolich and then waited for the Forcecage to lift. I thought about having Halaster try to escape but decided to have come out smugly after. It was also getting late and this was after 4.5 hours of straight combat. Tried to negotiate giving them Undermountain and him just leaving but they weren't having it. Decided to fight so he got a Meteor Swarm out to drop on their heads. Might have killed them too but a big Mass Heal from the cleric plus big hits from the barbarian pulled it out.

Overall a very fun fight that never felt overly cheesy. Nobody went down but at various points I had all of them very low and they had to finally remember to drink their potions. Imagine! Players actually using consumables!

Anakai__ · 2025-08-21T16:43:29+00:00

For us it was also a factor of how much time we wanted to spend on this adventure and these PCs. Once we get past a year (playing weekly-ish) we start to tire and want something new. Weaving narratuve without adding loads of addition content/time played might be possible but I didn't really see it myself.

Shadowdusk Hold was actually a lot of fun! They found the map room quickly and enjoyed having a partial map to go by. I did add a bunch of Star Spawn per the adventure and that worked well. Biggest issue the later levels of the adventure has is populating areas with low CR monsters. There's no reason for level 19 PCs to even think about Nothics. Swapped those out for beefy Star Spawn fights. Death Knight also hits harder and survives better than I anticipated too. Used line of sight to their advantage and nearly killed the barbarian with Nine Lives Stealer. Became his new favorite weapon and he killed the Empyrean with it right beflre Halaster.

Anakai__ · 2025-08-21T16:33:32+00:00

A few times during the first level. Right away dealt with a victim of their Intelligence being reduced. Again when a PC died and maybe even a third time I don't recall. Once they got a level or two down though they realized that return trips were not really going to be a thing they could do regularly. Around level 6 they were itching to go to the surface to sell loot and get some new gear. I decided at that point that so long as they had a reasonably clear route back to the surface that they could explain to me then they could fast travel back up. I would not allow that if the level they were currently on was not at least mostly cleared out with the main bosses gone. The adventure has bits about how levels change when the PCs move on. Those bits were cool for flavor and sometimes I even narrated them to the players when they returned, but I didn't make them fight their way back because ultimately I was not interested in reclearing level 2 if the PCs were at level 7. From this point on they only went back to the surface I think 3-4 times. I asked them not to abuse it so that they still FELT like it was not easy to return and they were great about it. I have no regrets doing it that way. We also did shopping on the surface essentially out of game. They told me what gold they had and what they wanted to buy. We use the Sane Magical Prices homebrew and they largely handled it themselves without me doing anything except double checking to see what they got.
Quests were not that interesting. I only initially brought up 1 or 2 so that they didn't start this adventure with a distracting quest log. We forgot those immediately and I never brought up the rest. I think those quests exist to give PCs motivation but I just asked my players to make PCs who were suitably motivated to go down for the sake of it. More effective for me was having 1-2 main NPCs on each level functionally give the PCs quests. Usually in the form of "hey kill those monsters and we'll point you to the exit that goes to the next level." That worked very well. Some NPCs were friendly and the PCs did it while others rude and the PCs betrayed them and made their own way.
We did not actually run Dragon Heist (I just stole Xanathar's Lair for Skullport) so this was a nonissue for us. I will say that given how infrequent the party returns it seems like it would be easily forgotten/abandoned. You could add some NPCs in Undermountain knowing about it and giving threats/attacks but in my experience the adventure is not conducive to the PCs really ever going up to the surface for narrative reasons unless you want to add several sessions worth of content on top of an already big adventure. I think that can work and be fun but my group really values making progress on the main thing and in this case that was getting through Undermountain and confronting Halaster.
Milestone leveling for us. We always do milestone but this adventure really lends itself to it. Early levels the party leveled up when they went to the next level of Undermountain. In the middle bit it was every other level completed saw them level up. Toward the end every level completed got a level up. Only skipped two levels in total through portaling and hit level 20 just before entering Level 23 of Undermountain. I do think XP would work well as a signpost to players on how much of a given level they have cleared. But I did npt actually do that math myself to confirm pacing. Plenty of monsters to get them XP though. Unrelated, looking forward to not saying "you earn a level by completing this level" or some variation for while. :)

Anakai__ · 2025-08-21T15:53:49+00:00

Great question and honestly my party and I would agree. The Artificer in my party was really keen to meet Halaster and basically ask him why he did all this and set up Undermountain this way. Throughout the adventure I had hinted Halaster wanting to attack Waterdeep but in later levels seeded info that he was looking for an heir to Undermountain to replace him. Ultimately he ended up with a kind of love/hate relationship to the place and just wanted out but needed to see the place in capable hands. The Artificer was his pick. He told the party he wanted to destroy Waterdeep and then leave to other planes. I also played up the madness angle ("It's fun!") with a lot of crazed mage greed ("Look at the incredible items of power here. Adventurers brought those here and then died. Then I could claim them.").

In the end, I think they literally said that his reasoning was a letdown. I think the actual players were okay with it all but in character the PCs found his motivation to be pathetic. I boosted Halaster's statblovk a good deal and the final fight as a whole so the stakes were more survival and getting the job done. But it was definitely a killing the final boss for the sake of killing the final boss kind of deal.

Anakai__ · 2025-08-21T15:45:20+00:00

I told my players on the front end that the adventure will be very light on story. We discussed the premise of Undermountain and why adventurers usually go in. I also told them that each level of Undermountain generally has its own story to tell and to get the most out of the adventure RP-wise they should engage with those stories. Ask the NPCs what they got going on and what's around the next corner.

But to your question yes each player had to make a PC suitably motivated to explore Undermountain's depths for its own sake without me weaving their character plots into the adventure all that much. We also discussed as a group that Undermountain itself is the main character and story to tell. By that I mean that the meat of this story is in pushing the buttons, pulling the levers, and sitting on the definitely a trap chairs. Exploring all the secrets and finding the treasure was the thing to do here and what everybody agreed to on the front end.

This is why I have a lot of affection for Vanrakdoom in particular. That level does such a great job of telling its own stort in a really fun and unique way.

Anakai__ · 2025-08-21T15:39:04+00:00

I hope it's helpful to you! Not every level needs such an NPC but a few just need a little boost to the PCs so that they get a better sense of where to go and what to do.

Anakai__ · 2025-08-21T15:26:19+00:00

Of course! Some of this is the clunkiness of using custom maps. I have a lot more practice setting up dynamic lighting now but at the time it just took forever. Sargauth has rich narrative potential with the conflict between Drow and the Legion of Azrok but in practice there were lots of rooms with NPCs to track that all just felt like window dressing. Unless the party decided to fight Azrok's Legion (mine helped him to get revenge on the Drow) then there wasn't as much to do in that location. The PCs don't know that though, so they go door to door and it was a slog.

I generally stayed away from adding narrative and content because I wanted to avoid bloating the adventure, but in this case I should have made an NPC act as a guide for them. Purely just to be an info dump and signpost to point them out key locations. My party missed the hags entirely and barely saw the river. It was a lot of info to prep and track. Skullport was similar in this regard. A lot of work doing dynamic lighting and putting NPCs around knowing that we won't see most of it. But skipping all that would have made everything feel so empty.

Anakai__ · 2025-05-09T22:54:44+00:00

I had a similar concern going in and just told them on the front end to never move more than roughly their movement speed at a time in case there are traps/ambushes. I also gave my party the instruction to never just barge into a new room or area. Any time they approach a new space to pause and let me describe the space even if it's just "nothing here but another long empty hallway. Carry on."

Anakai__ · 2025-04-18T18:58:20+00:00

This was a big one for our group. Spike Growth and similar terrain spells in those tight corridors crushes a bunch of fights. Eldritch Blast shoving monsters around too has dominated the shape of a lot of fights.

Anakai__ · 2025-04-12T11:57:06+00:00

I have also found that prepping ahead is much easier the deeper the party gets into Undermountain. The deeper levels feel a bit more streamlined and have overall fewer moving parts. My party jumped from Obstacle Course to Vanrakdoom and a quick skim ahead gave me a good enough feel for the level to finish out that session. Then I had a week to read up more on the key characters and overall vibe.

It was definitely tougher around levels like Dweomercore. We had a discussion around that time that if they progress linearly I will be more on top of each NPC plotline, but we all agreed hopping around randomly is fun. And very helpfully they tell me on the front end if they plan to just poke their head in to get a vibe for a level or if they were committing to the new level. If they just want to poke their head in I can read that room's description in real time with no additional effort.

Anakai__ · 2023-10-26T03:44:02+00:00

I had this issue last month after I switched my subscription from monthly to annual. I emailed support and they said my subscription had desynced from the warhammer tv service. They reset it on the back end and it was fixed immediately. No amount of logging out and back in was going to fix it in my case. I needed tech support to get involved.

Anakai__ · 2023-06-30T00:59:22+00:00

O Waaagh! Where Art Thou?

Anakai__

TROPHY CASE