Five Spells to Bypass a Dungeon in Dungeons and Dragons 5e
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- Опубліковано 6 лип 2024
- MONSTERS OF DRAKKENHEIM is 300+ pages of eldritch horror inspired monsters for 5e by the Dungeon Dudes! Coming to Kickstarter March 26th, 2024: www.kickstarter.com/projects/... Defy danger in the most dastardly dungeon with these five(ish!) spells in Dungeons and Dragons 5e. We take an in-depth look at the how to use these spells to sneak past encounters and traps, and also discuss how Dungeon Masters can up the ante next time!
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Most of these spells are old school D&D spells (1st edition), arcane eye was called wizard eye.
I won't until you make a character build for a druid who is also the party's steed
How about a video on how to get a party/player to be less conservative with item use or be more creative? Like, I'm the kind of guy who keeps those pithy level 1 spell items until end game in RPGs because I _might_ need them later. I also have difficulty thinking of creative options on the fly, which is making me regret making a fighter (battlemaster even!) because I'm not impulsive, don't want to appear "weird" to other players, or just can't think of anything to do that's not on the character sheet.
Passwall. Leomund's Tiny hut (ritual). Passwall. Rinse, wash, repeat.
Gaseous Form and minor illusions to make the cloud seem less obvious by having a sudden dust could swoop up
Player: “I cast stone shape on this wall and make a new door.”
DM: “That wall was load bearing, roll dexterity save for cave in.”
Proper DM improv 👍
And that folks is why you spring for Passwall.
I had a player use transmute rock on the wall and roof above them and got pissed when they almost drown in mud
I cast stone shape on this wall with stone headers, and stone jacks to support the ceiling.
@@aisuru01 Investigation skill roll for geology so you know the qualities of the rock, plus another check so you know how to design the top to be load bearing. And if you tried it in something like sandstone, good luck designing a header.
As a game master the first thing I do after creating a scenario is figure out how I would screw it up.
That’s actually great advice.
I'm usually thinking about how I would screw up a scenario myself as a player at every stage of creation. And if they figure out something I didn't think of, congrats to the players!
This is a fantastic mindset for a DM to have when preparing adventures.
Its also important to also not put in place measures to crush all of these possibilities, but instead limit their ability to destroy the enjoyment of the challenge
Or, indeed, if the players have any of these possibilities available, make it so that their use is either required to progress, or yields extra rewards if they do. Don't counteract the PCs' abilities, count on them!
tl;dw:
Invisibility (lvl2) combines well with Silence or Pass Without Trace.
Gaseous form (lvl3).
Arcane eye (lvl4) for scouting, alternatively Polymorph or Find Familiar.
Dimension Door (lvl4) for after you've scouted, or for escape. Actually teleportation effects in general.
Stone Shape (lvl4). Actually excavation spells in general.
Conclusion: let these work, but you can't fool a recurring villain twice with the same spell.
Lol, thanks for giving me a ♥ instead of a delete. I love your content but often wish it was summarized.
Thanks, save me time 👍
I do wish silence moved with you
Nice summary.
So that's why the concentration mechanism is what it is.
Dungeons without doors: exists
Arcane eye: *its free real estate*
At the level they have arcane eye, I put in a plane shift portal.
Eye goes through and... POOF!
Arcane eye, mmm let's hope medusa isn't around.
Petrifying Gaze wouldn't affect a player looking through Arcane Eye, since the gaze only affects _creatures_ within range, not spell effects.
An entertaining idea to stone the mage by his arcane eye.
And one thing for DMs to remember: You can reuse anything that gets skipped! If the party skips a room, that just means you can take that day of planning, redress the cave into a castle basement, and use it in a few sessions. They'll never know!
"...players will epically destroy the plans of the DM..." That is a hard truth DM's need to take into account. Prepare 4 possible paths. the party will invariably find a way to wander down the 5th. Set up 3 NPC's to talk with...and curiously they find a 4th to speak with totally bypassing the first 3.
Next, five spells to bypass a dragon.
The Bard casts Seduction.
Shape Wood.
Flesh to Stone.
@@Battleguild Roll a constitution save
and as a conclusion a video about spells to bypass Dungeons & Dragons all together.
@some kinda guy vicious mockery - "lol no, shut up about your nerd game haha"
The party was caught in the middle of a war, and contracted by one side to infiltrate the enemy camp and assassinate their general. I thoroughly expected the rogue to take command of the mission, but it was actually the druid who did the job; after the wizard's arcane eye located the general's tent, she took advantage of the humid, bug-filled evening to Wild Shape herself into a mosquito and just buzz on in. She found the guy standing over the battle map and bit him on the back of the neck; he instinctively swats the bug, her beast form drops to 0 HP and suddenly his head is crushed between the table and a WHOLE lot of unexpected extra weight.
She Wild Shapes back into a mosquito and buzzes off before the troops can respond to the sound, leaving the entire camp wondering what in all the hells happened and terrified that it would happen again. They got no sleep that night, the next day's battle was a complete rout, and the war was ultimately won by the actions of one tiny, innocent bug.
Druids are the best assassins after all.
What the hell kinda damage roll do you even roll for that?
@@if7723 There was no damage roll. The general was given a strength saving throw, with a DC determined by the druid's weight, to attempt to withstand that weight long enough to push her off his shoulders. We weren't told the exact math to calculate the DC, but when the saving throw failed, the DM treated the general's death as if he'd been executed by beheading.
@@wolfskinchanger There is no way a general in a D&D campaign doesn't get a damage range on that save. He had to work his bitch ass up to that rank (unless this is a corrupt army kinda thing) even on a failed save he's taking a damage roll not an insta kill.
I guess it was cool in the campaign, but the death of the general seems extremely unrealistic, assuming the campaign world roughly follows the physics of our world.
There’s always undermining the dungeon with upcasting conjure animals to get a horde of giant cave badgers. Then set up them to work. This is also a good siege warfare tactic for collapsing walls.
And my dm thought me going in with a pickaxe was bizarre.
I love when my players subvert my plans, it keeps me on my toes 😂
Hey look, an actually good mindset! Reward their good play.
@@darienb1127 and then learn from what they do to make the next one harder to bypass
@@jtosety eh. After a while, it just kind of becomes this never ending arms race between the DM and the players. Even if it's unintentional, id rather have an easy dungeon that's fun and interesting than a difficult one that's just frustrating.
Now that’s a good DM! ^
This gives me an idea. After the party enters the dungeon, any time they try to use magic to bypass a trap or challenge, you just tell them, "No, the spell fails." When they get to the end, they encounter a very irate wizard who promptly counterspells the next spell they cast and starts ranting about them "cheating" by using magic to try to bypass his traps. He lets slip that he's out or nearly out of spell slots due to counterspelling all those spells (keep track, and let them start succeeding on their spells if he runs out of spell slots). Cut to a rather easy fight against a wizard with no spell slots.
Using Invisibility like that is a surefire way to get hit by the patented Colville Screw.
Chucking a few meteors at a dungeon will usually open it up a bit if it's on the surface.
This is probably the most important conversation ever for high party-level DMs.
As a player, I've tried some of these strategies with mixed results - some DMs freak out.
As a DM, I learned to roll with it. Although it was aggravating at first, I let my players have a few sessions of totally robbing classic D&D modules. When the players had their fill, I ended the campaign and moved onto more low-magic stuff, as my players felt too tempted to use what they called "dungeon cheat codes".
well in most sinaryos it is the only thing you shuld do
As a DM, you always should reward creative thinking by your players, instead of trying to punish them for using tactics like these ones, but from time to time, you can use some neat tools and tricks here and there to protect your dungeons from cheating tactics
From what I've read "Galder's Speedy Courier" can be a very useful spell, when you try to carry things a great distance instantaneously, to a friend~
It's always funny when a party bypasses a dungeon by deciding the monsters in the right and fighting on their behalf. It has happened more than once.
I have definitely used Find Familiar to foil an ambush my DM set up for us once. The salt was hilarious.
Why would you ever be salty about a perfectly valid and intended use of a spell?
@@kacpersulik4219 I know right? I mostly DM, and I give inspirations for thwarting my murderous ways.
If I see that a group of players has no guile or creativity, and they're just going to take every challenge at face value, then I have to step back and re-tweak the whole campaign so that they have some chance of surviving it. Cuz my campaigns are usually full of things that would be suicidal to just take head-on.
The only thing I recall not allowing, was casting wall of force horizontally at ankle height and choosing to shunt all the foes beneath it squashing them into the floor. Well I allowed it, but I used the rules of damage for meld into stone (6d6) with them popping up prone above the wall of force, instead of letting it cause auto-death by squishing. Then they did it in a crawling passage, and I let it fully murder the foes, cuz it was creative and abiding my prior ruling, but with no room above the WoF either. It became a running joke that they kept trying to plan how to get the BBEG into a crawl space, hehe.
Some context: The DM in question was and is still fairly new, and his bandits had been hanging around in the very next room while the party took a short rest. He has gotten better at adapting to my use of familiars though: a hungry orc standing watch fancies catching that bat as a tasty snack, or those goblins are very suspicious of that hawk that just started flying low and seems to be watching them.
I find that experience is something we all take for granted.
I LOVE the fact that you mention one of your 5 things and then immediately explain where to get the spell from, who can have it and exactly how it works (since many players misunderstand things).
Silence: the bane of all low level spell casting villians... And high level ones. Counterspelling counterspell is fun
I would love a few videos on how to make dungeons in a world where these spells are common - not anti player or anything, just with precautions like any good security system protecting magical treasures
Lead, antimagic field, dead magic zones, wild magic zones, glyphs that activate based on being around a magical effect, true seeing, anti life zones, and intelligent patrols. that's off The top of my head
Trap triggers on the walls and ceiling as well as the floor. Security constructs that are all connected to one network so they're all controlled by one magical AI, some of which are floating eyes, some of which are floating laser drones, some of which are adamantium golems with antimagic fields.
Actually that's a cool idea for a campaign. I should do that.
Agree. The more magical the world is, the more likely NPCs and villains have developped tools to counter these 'clever' ways to use spells. Also, I think a fun adventure to 'punish' the players is to turn the dungeon crawl around on them. If they've just obtained an item from a powerful villain, how do they safeguard that item and 'get away' with it, when that villain (or his boss) comes a looking for his stolen possession using Locate Object and other magical means at his/her disposal. How do the PCs protect their ill gotten loot from other adventurers? What ever they come up with, some of their opponents are probably using as well.
Arcane lock would be a good easy spell for that I feel
I ran a campaign in the Underdark wherein the Faerzress caused interference of scrying, teleportation, and certain divination spells like Arcane Eye. It also can cause Wild Magic surges when magic is used within the “hot spots”. Of course, I tell the players all of this before character creation.
I watch these videos because I want to play D&D but I have no friends. :(
roll20.net + discord, that's how I got into D&D.
Rolegate.com play D&D on your phone!
Join an adventures league!
One of my plyers uses the IDENTIFY spell to bypass magical traps. The spell tells you if an object is under a magical effect; so magical trapped chests and doorways wood be included. It then tells you if any spells are affecting the object and what they are. Once you know what it is, its a simple matter to figure out a way to get by it or trigger it harmlessly.
remember that in order to cast identify you have to touch the object for a full minute, which could be enough to set off that next magic chest!
@@thegugster you can make your familiar cast touch spells
@@jimmyflores9235 I am totally using this idea. I love optimizing familiars.
My favorite ever use of Stone Shape, back in a 2nd edition campaign going through Undermountain. The DM had a stone fresco of a wyven break out of the wall into which it was carved, and started attacking the party. After confirming that yes, it was normal stone, just being animated by magic, my druid ran up to it, grabbed it's face... and reshaped the front half of it into solid 5' by 5' by 5' cube. No more bite attacks, no more sight or hearing, and it's back legs could barely move thanks to the sudden change in how it's 'body' was shaped.
That's RIDICULOUSLY cool.
I totally agree with the idea that you shouldn't, as a DM, try to prevent these spells from working as intended, but to challenge them.
To throw a few ideas in the mix (and avoid giving truesight to all your baddies):
Invisibility: dogs (or anything that can smell really well), trip-wires with alarm bells, snow, water or flour on the ground
Gaseous form: wind (?), a waterfall or underwater passages, basically any intelligent creature (that can understand that it's an intruder)
Arcane eye: illusions, closed doors, non-detection (on an important creature/NPC), any creature that can see invisibility can alert of an incoming intrusion
Dimension door: counterspell (against PCs trying to escape), anything that prevents divination (against PCs trying to jump in)
Stone Shape: just don't put the important stuff near the exterior wall? :)
Why would you do this to everyone? Haha, my poor campaign...
There's plenty of ways around these and even the ones like arcane eye are just giving the players an advantage of knowledge, so just think about what they'll do when they find out about your intellect devourer nest. And dimesion door can only transport two people. Besides, how do illusions interact with arcane eye?
Besides, don't you think any wizard's tower in a world with the fly spell wouldn't have locks and alarms on the windows?
We were very high level, but there was a dungeon prelude to the boss battle that was entirely skipped through a combo of Wish, Plane shift and A Deck of Many Things. Never seen luck like that before
This is some great DM advice I would love more videos like this
I love watching your guys videos. I hope to see more in the future.
Great content as always!
I think it depends on the dungeon's owner/resident how effective some of these will be. If they are going into a 'monster' dungeon as opposed to a 'BBEG' intelligent adversary dungeon the results will be dramatically different.
I find a lot of DM's forget that everything players can do, bad guys can also do and therefore prepare for and counter.
Great resource for me to use for designing my dungeon!
A buddy of mine had an entire underwater adventure planned. My nephew had Water Walk as a ritual. We bypassed the entire adventure and went straight to the boss fight with all our resources available. Everyone went Nova. It was over pretty quickly.
1) Summon a familiar with appropriate movement and senses (e.g. bat) for Dungeon. 🦇
2) Send Familiar into pocket dimension.
3) Recall Familiar within 30 feet, on opposite of impassible obstacle.
4) See through Familiar’s special senses to scout around and make sure it’s safe.
5) Use Misty Step to teleport to location, while still using Familiar’s senses.
6) Continue with adventure! 😊👍🏻
My wizard was trapped in a dungeon and it was looking like a TPK. I look at my spells. Dimension Door! Turns out I overestimated how deep we were and found myself falling 150ft straight down. Happy Halloween everybody.
that's funny. also this would make a good ad for feather fall.
I’ve used my Unseen Servant to scout out suspicious rooms and then report back to me.
How does the unseen servant report back to you?
@@curtismorin6396 drawings?
@@curtismorin6396 Semaphore code.
Unseen Servant is an invisible, mindless, shapeless, Medium force . It doesnt have an intelligence to scout anything.
I think I’m doing it wrong but my DM has allowed this 😅 i guess it is supposed to be mindless but I would argue that just looking at an area and telling someone what you see doesn’t take that much intelligence? I think the PH says something about communicating telepathically to it??
Unseen Servant is also supposed to be shapeless but my DM has allowed him to look like a sexy male elf butler. His name is Bitchcakes 😂
Polymorph is a double edged sword though. Transforming into a rat also gives you the intelligence of a rat. One of my players did exactly that, and I ruled he had to make intelligence checks periodically just to remember he wasn't a rat, but a Dwarf. It was cool because he played his character reciting his personal book of grudges when he made his rolls. Moradin looked kindly on his follower that day.
Jester being Polymorphed into a moth comes to mind.
Floating Disc is a great spell for bypassing treacherous pits or or lava/acid pools. I've also used Mage Hand to set off traps, pick locks, or extend a rope across chasms with great success (Unseen Servant can do similar things). Just a couple of low level/cantrips that have come in amazing uses in my games.
Great video with some really creative ideas/solutions, and this is a really useful topic to cover as well.
I have several ideas for DMs handling some of the spells you discussed, but I'm going to limit myself to one so this doesn't go on excessively. That spell is dimension door. As ya'll noted, it can be an extremely powerful spell both for infiltration and exfiltration and if a DM isn't prepared ahead of time this spell can really throw a loop into the DM preparations. As a DM I've used a few special details to make using this spell a challenge for the players and not simply a get out of jail (or anywhere else) free card by working around the limitations of the spell. The first one is for some areas, particularly in locations that are protecting something really important, the designers of the location will have built the place in such a way that it requires movement of greater than 500ft to get inside to important areas. Which puts those areas beyond the "poofing" reach of a single dimension door spell. Another one, that can be extremely effective if handled fairly is to not allow the characters, without roleplaying solutions, to measure out distances when it comes to teleportation spells. This way, you either force the players to figure out ways to measure the distances or the players have to take risks by guessing if they are in fact within range of what they want to do. Now, I said at the beginning there that you have to be fair about it. Meaning that while you can feel free to create some situations where the lava pit is 510ft across and that without figuring something out ahead of time, a player that just attempts to dimension door across b/c they think it looks like its within their range, will end up in the lava instead - *however* I think this should be the exception, b/c it only takes that happening once to make the players become dramatically far less cavalier about resorting to their teleportation spells without preparation/caution. To figure distances, on option can be to just let the players roll for perception or some other ability and set the success # required to whatever difficultly you feel is appropriate, or they can come up with other roleplaying means such as take a length of rope, measuring it out and then tieing it to an arrow and firing it. In this manner they can, fairly accurately, determine distances up to a certain limit. I think it is fair to say that unless a character really has some special capabilities, they shouldn't be able to magically determine distances simply by an easy observation test - b/c in the real world it can be really difficult to accurately estimate distances without some form of aid or without possessing some special geometry related understanding. Also, this ruling on estimating distances can be applied to any spells with distance limitations if you find that your party is too readily reaching to spells to deal with every single scenario. Make the wizard waste a fireball or two by the target being out of range, or for that matter by a party member being too close - and you'll soon find that the players begin to think through their actions with far more deliberation, instead of just saying to the DM "I'm casting fireball, am I close enough?" I think the the DM's response should be "I don't know, are you?" or "you can try and cast it and find out or figure out a way of determining it yourself ahead of time." This can mean in ambushes or battles that the party has some small prep time, that they measure out areas ahead of time and use landmarks as distance markers (as militaries use to do with artillery in the days before computers). Now, if the party is already more careful in their actions and on average tends to roleplay through things and work creatively, then you don't always have to be strict with these distance rules - this is more for parties or specific characters who don't typically do those things. You want to reward players for roleplaying and being creative within it - not necessarily simply being creative in combing game mechanics. Ultimately it is about having fun, but that still goes for the DM too. That being said, if the players are able to circumvent all the traps and encounters and puzzles the DM has set up for them, then its really the DM's fault and not usually the players. B/c the DM knows ahead of time the capabilities of the players and they can build adventures that are challenging by working around and with the characters abilities - conversely, the players don't know ahead of time what the DM is capable of. So, if the players waltz around everything, it is because the DM built a dungeon or what have you separate from considering the characters. As a DM, you can build anything you want and so there's really no excuse for not trying to be creative and for accounting for character abilities etc when designing your adventures.
One last thing, as you've said - you don't want to constantly shut down their efforts or you're robbing the fun from them getting to use their spells. I think it primarily becomes an issue when its something the party does all the time - the players use the exact same plan and abilities to pass by/through every single dungeon or what have you that the DM creates. If the players are using spells to avoid roleplaying, then you can restrict (creatively) the effectiveness of their spells/abilities - but if they aren't, then try to go with the flow, learn something from the occasion as the DM, and make the next encounter with what took place before in mind.
Potential use for the cartography skill here. It probably ought to cover surveying, so to figure out the distance use trigonometry. :)
Well done. I once had a creative player completely destroy and encounter (and about half the party’s barony) when he used Rock to Mud to make a tunnel into the volcano they were traveling near and caused it to erupt quite violently.
1. Create an underground dungeon.
2. Submerge half the dungeon underwater.
3. Place strategically important anti-magic zones at choke-points.
4. Have those same areas contain a lot of creatures/traps that cause the paralyzed/restrained conditions.
5. Watch PCs with low Con scores drown to death.
awesome discussion, as usual. The heavy armor wearing paladin and cleric wouldn't have advantage on their stealth rolls while invis, though, it would be a straight roll. Disavdantage for the heavy armor, advantage for the invis, cancels each other out.
Actually the roll would be at disadvantage because invisibility does not give advantage on stealth checks.
DM: Behold the intricate dungeon that I have built for you to--
Druid: *casts Earthquake and collapses everything
Druid: WHAT DUNGEON?
Features can trip you up too. Ref (12:15) Warlock Pact of the chain - using an invisible familiar in the Imp is (arguably) the point of the gift!
Or a quasit, since the little demons can go invisible as well.
I once bypassed an entire dungeon with a single cantrip. here's my story. I was a storm sorcerer and we came across an underground dungeon with the major rooms made of brass bells. There was a mechanic where when we missed ranged attacks the projectiles would hit the bells and ring while we were inside them. Fun stuff. but I had the Warforged dig a hole in the hillside till we saw the biggest bell. I then using the Shocking grasp cantrip and burning some SP I managed to cut through the bell taking us straight into the boss room. We then proceeded to go through the dungeon in reverse cuz we thought it would be fun
I once used my invisible familiar(pact of the chain warlock with Voice of the Chain Master)to scout past a long corridor essentially filled with living bombs and then use Dimension Door to skip past the entire corridor. It was very entertaining and since it wasn't the main encounter, even the DM was fully satisfied. To clarify, during this adventure it was only two of us so Dimension Door was all I needed to get both of us past the danger.
Unseen servant is great, it can be actually used to predict or preemtively trigger traps.
In the realm of excavation spells like Stone shape, I think my favorite example is Shatter. It can technically shatter a wall of brick or stone and create a "doorway" to move through those surfaces.
Also, to the point for DMs at the end, I never plan what my players are gonna do. I plan the villains, what will happen if they don't act. They always disrupt what you plan, so go ahead and make that the goal from the top, it saves you a lot of headache
Another great one, Dudes!
Maybe give the players non immediate consequences to these actions to make them stand out. For example they blew a hole in a cave outside a town and yes they avoid a fight but the druids of the town no longer want to trade with them because of their disregard for nature.
The one high level combination that's had me reeling recently is one a cleric player can currently do. Ethereal at 8th level on the three person party, bypass a lot (or potentially all) of the dungeon, ambush the baddie, then word of recall out of there.
It's the first time I'm running high level play, and of course there are many, many other ways a high level party can bypass your plans, but this combination REALLY got me reading up those other high level spells my bad guys can use to foil this.
Surprised you did mention Knock and Mage Hand! Thats a pretty useful way to bypass a lot of traps! :O
I tend to feel like, if a party didn't have good strats for bypassing traps, then they're in the wrong line of work.
@@kathrynck what if they're the warring type and not the treasure type?
@@anthonynorman7545 that works, as long as they have good strats for warring
@@kathrynck so are they in the wrong line of work?
My group (lvl 12) came upon a door rigged with a 9th level necromancy spell. After a lot of consideration, I summoned my familiar on the other side of the door looked at the doom the dimension doored to the other side.
One of my groups is going through a dungeon from a module as part of the regular campaign. We... Bypassed the entrance, and on the first floor, there have been a grand total of 2 or 3 out of 14 rooms that we approached from the module-expected direction.
By way of Misty Step to get into a room through the arrow slits, and then busting open a wall to *make* an entrace for the remaining party members.
And then just NOT going the way we were supposed to go.
One of which including my (Poison immune) Paladin triggering a poison cloud trap. And being the only one in the affected area.
Poor DM.
Maybe next week you can tell us how to bypass dragons
Next wee they teach us to bypass "and". Dragons are the week after.
DM gave me a staff of power on my front line Bladelock. I only really use it when I've been beat up and need that bonus AC to make it through, but the built in Wall of Force spell has absolutely ruined my DMs plans a few times.
Happy Halloween guys !
I think an honorary mention should go to Find Familiar for its ability to blind and deafen the player if their going up against something with eye effects like an umber hulk or Basilisk. It's also a great way to just avoid enchantment/illusion spells because the target needs to either hear or see you but are using their familiars as eyes in battle. This is great for and Eldritch Knight with a crab Familiar fighting a medusa or fighting against a caste who cast darkness on the party.
Monty's face though when Kelly mentioned that wizard. XD
ETA: To add to your coda, maybe when the characters level up, keep an eye on the spells that the casters are choosing? They are thinking of what might be coming and wanting to be ready, or they just think the spell is cool. Knowing ahead of time that your wizard is taking Dimension Door as a spell means you're not caught flat-footed when they bust it out in a dungeon. Forewarned is forearmed?
About invisibility:
Stealth checks have two different uses which aren't explained in detail. You can try to hide from someone, which is determined by sight. You can also try to move silently so as to not alert creatures who cannot see you.
The advantage to Stealth checks that you get from invisibility only applies to checks made to hide, not checks made to move silently.
This means a Fighter wearing Plate Armour will still have disadvantage if he is trying to move silently.
Hey Dungeon Dudes! Could I have some advice (as a DM), how exactly would you go about setting up a shop in a city, and ensuring that the players get a fair but not overpowered assortment of items to potentially buy?
Sound like a simple way to overcome this would be to have necessary or beneficial elements in the pockets or packs of denizens they avoided. Or have a hidden trap whose clues are also hidden in the locations they didn’t go to.
Thanks. I will use these not for power-gaming, but rather when I'm just board of dungons, and want to get them over-with.
Don't Forget about those Ninjas (Monk-Shadow) they can also cast pass without a trace using ki points (2 ki points). And they get these ki points back on a short rest.
Invisible np, use tremor sense or blind sense like spiders or grimlocks. Or grell
Good list
Stone shape has screwed up my plans as DM before.
Prestidigitation is a great utility spell. You can put out small fires, create magical lights, create distractions with noises, and even create ghostly images to fool your enemies. It's also a low level spell slot.
Carry a wand of locking and a wand of unlocking. They're not too expensive, and they'll get you out of many jams. The nice thing about a wand of locking is that it can lock any door, even if there's normally no locking mechanism. And since the door is magically sealed, the key won't work to get it open.
Having a pocket dimension is very useful as a hiding place. You can have a rope ladder entrance, and enemies will never find it while you're inside as long as they can't sense magic. Small races can even use a similar trick- They can fit inside a bag of holding.
Floating Disk. It holds up to 500 pounds and must remain within 20 feet of the caster. It floats in the air with perfect precision. This will get your whole party past most traps, as long as you can detect them. It's only a first level spell. Conjuration.
Stack stuff on top of Tensor’s Floating Disc for portable cover! 😊
One way that I like to sorta counter things like invisibility and other sorta scouting spells is to just have physical contact with enemies be an issue. Since players are moving I like to have enemies be moving as if the party isn't nearby. For example let's say that the party recently went invisible in a noble man's manor. This nobleman is preparing a party or feast for later that night. With the party trying to glean information about said nobleman. But because of the preperations many NPCs will be running around seemingly sporadic directions. If an NPC manages to bump into the party the noise of their armor/the impact will cause any nearby NPCs to freak out and try to raise the alarm.
Players will have ways to circumvent these actions by waiting for people to pass or contest the NPC perception with a Dex save (to dodge the upcoming NPC vs. If the NPC notices the strange noise).
Not sure how useful that is but it's something I like to use now and again to ensure that players can't just run past everything.
Stone shape great way to disarm traps . one solid fool. My group reads 5 feet in any direction as 5 cubic feet . So you can do a lot with that .
Trap a group on stone floors and pick them off one by one . Sink their feet into the ground just to lock them in place .
If you're ballparking dimension door by trying to go up, you better have a contingency for if you are wrong by 100 or so feet.
A great way how to bypass the breathing problem in the bag of holding is to get alchemy jug, fill it with water and cast water breathing on the entire party and just share the jug. Flawless. Foolproof.
Investiture of Stone---> gives you the Tarrasque-like ability to freely move through earth, such as dungeon walls and whatnot, among many other beneficial traits. It's like turning on the walk-through-walls cheat in a pokémon game lol
Yes. My party cheesed their way out of the first dungeon with mold earth (was an underground desert maze)
Next dungeon was all solid stone. Stoneshape did the thing here
3rd dungeon was "magical stone construct" impossible to destroy, damage or modify without the wish spell
Just unlocked teleportation for my wizard at the end of our last game. Very much looking forward to breaking it out sometime.
"We're trapped!"
"Well, you say that...."
Honourable mentions:
1) Find Familiar. First level spell which you can cast as a ritual to save a spell slot which you can see through its eyes and doesn’t expire so long as you don’t get it killed. Send it as a rat and you’ve got a free scout who’s inconspicuous.
2) Shape Water. It’s only a cantrip, but just freeze the water and then walk across to change your direction of approach.
3) Fly. Your castle walls mean nothing to the party now.
4) Scrying. Cast it as a ritual and watch the villain in his lair and see who he talks to and where he goes. You again some awesome intel without being there and get some scouting in the process. Maybe you find his secret passageway that only he knows?
5) Resilient Sphere. If stealth isn’t necessary or you need to find a way down that yawning chasm but can’t see a safe way to do it, just jump in a Resilient Sphere and jump off the edge. You can’t take damage and you take a free shortcut to the bottom. Also a great way to get across that lava field. It’s big enough for a large creature, so you can comfortably fit several people inside.
I feel like the title here is a little misleading - it really should be 5 Tactics To Bypass a Dungeon. And then talk about how to handle stealth, unconventional movement modes, scouting, teleportation, and burrowing.
So, for the first two, here's a couple options. First of all, if you've got a stealthy party, your villains should be using dogs, or other minions with Keen Senses. I would probably give those creatures a straight roll (rather than advantage) to detect Gaseous Form, but they should be able to detect them, even if the humanoids around them can't, and don't listen to them. If nothing else, it reminds your players they don't have a solution to everything. Second, glyphs of warding with dispel magic. If you're a paranoid wizard, there's no reason you can't have these things littering the dungeon. Even if you're a baron or other mundane NPC, as long as you've got some cash, you should have one or two of them prepped. Just don't have a "quantum glyph;" players are quick to call BS if they think you're being unfair. I like to note these things' locations in my prep, just to help keep me honest. Finally, there is a tactic called the Colville Screw. It's where you stealth your way to the bottom of a dungeon, and then trip an alarm, and now all the monsters you could've defeated in detail come gunning for you. Use this liberally against stealth-spamming parties, but avoid TPKs by introducing uncertainty to the monsters. Maybe some of them go to the castle walls, convinced the alarm from the keep is a diversion!
Scouting is a feature, not a bug, but there's no need to give the whole game away. While it allows you to feed information to your party about the dungeon (with effective foreshadowing), NPCs who realize they're being spied on can use this as an opportunity to pass along misinformation. "Oh, shoot, if only we hadn't sent the Blood-Pack off to North Woodstock, Jherkins!" And then the PCs go in, only to find a nasty surprise. Also remember that some NPCs will have illusions set up in the dungeon, which can make it really uncomfortable if you try to dimension door into what you thought was an open space, only to discover that was a rock wall disguised with a major image.
As for teleportation, sometimes known as "scry and fry," you have a couple options. One is use the scrying part to feed them misinformation, as relayed above. Two is to use things to raise the cost of teleportation, like pit traps, random teleport mishaps, etc. Very few people can accurately assess distances to a fine degree, and overshooting by a small amount can make things very difficult. Use Intelligence checks (to estimate the distance, which I roll behind the DM's screen), plus a teleport mishap table to see what happens. Dimension door shouldn't be a cost-free escape hatch. Also, you can resurrect some old lore by having the dungeon constructed with lead and gorgon's blood in the mortar, which blocks teleportation.
As for stone shape, that's a 4th-level spell slot to walk through a wall. Honestly, I think that's an irrational tradeoff. Use a sledgehammer, or bet the monk he can't punch through a wall.
Or tell the barbarian the wall said he was weak
Or say its a heritic and let the paladin and cleric at it
I was in one dungeon that was on it's own plane, and when the mage used the spell passwall he was suck out never to be seen again.
I would of said a portable hole vs bag of holding as the opening is much bigger and has a larger air supply
One way of making a dungeon less skipable is to scatter important items and treasure all across
Confirmed by Jeremy Crawford you can't dimension door on the other side of a wall of force,out and f a cage if force,or into/out of that chromatic barrier spell that does all the different damage types
Once had my players in a swamp, standing in front of a cave, the dungeon entrance. I described the tower they could see beyond the cave in the misty distance. It was meant to be a looming thing, and a hint that most of the fort had sunk into the mud. What did they do? Walk past the cave to the tower, climb it, and low themselves down into the boss room... oops, my bad, but it was fun!
24:26
Don't you laugh Monty! I saw what you did to Seb. Poor, poor Seb.
One thing about getting past an encounter is that you can still do something with it, I will often have a lot of bypassed NPCs give chase if they can be heard and if totally bypassed aid the team of player charters will start acting on the side of the players. If a mercenary is hired to protect an item and it is gone even though he did his job he is not getting paid. So why not take something from the guy who hired you so you can get something.
Gasoues form, dungeon depent but have intelligence creatures follow 10ft movement of gas till spell runs out. Or have a hidden wandering predetor happen to be around about same time it runs out like a cave Fisher
So while some of the dungeon styles described at the end would be interesting, and a fun challenge for a versatile party?
I would always ask yourself when creating such a dungeon whether the in-world entity that sets it all up would have the motivation and means to do so.
I’d love for my party to come anywhere near this level of thought... I play with a murder hobo and his follower who is normally stoned out of his gourd when we play. If either of them said to me I want to try and scout the room instead of “i kick that f*cking door in!” I would be astonished and probably give them the easiest way to get the loot/objective physically possible.
In addition to bows and arrows, the standard equipment for my skeletons includes pickaxes and shovels. A 6th level necromancer wizard can have 15 skeletons under command at all times. That is a lot of excavation manpower that never needs rest.
The important thing is to remember that the NPC's can do this too. A paranoid villain can use arcane eye as part of his security procedures. Likewise, a villain can have a room that requires dimension door and specific knowledge of where the hidden room is to get in. Dimension door can allow the villain to escape an encounter with the PCs if they don't resolve it fast enough. A powerful wizard opponent may literally spend all his time in his room invisible. When the PC's burst into his room...he/she isn't there.
I'll also point out that depending on the prevalence of magic and familiars in your campaign world, the 'innocuous' rat, weasel or spider may be viewed with general suspicion. My villains have a number of pets that hunt rats, mice - familiars and polymorphed PCs beware. A dusty room can foil invisibility.
Reward players for their clever use of their abilities, but don't turn your villains into morons. You nailed that at the end of your video.
If I wanted a smart sentry to find my invisible party, could he throw dust/any sort of light substance into the air and watch for solid forms to disturb the particles? Like magic floating glitter?
Or does the spell prevent that sort of thing from happening?
There exists a reasonable argument that as soon as the particulates touch the person they turn invisible as well, so he will become aware that someone invisible is in the room, but will still be unable to actually find them.
I currently play a heavily armored fighter. Our DM put 3 will-o-wisps in a dungeon with many small chambers and twisting hallways. And what do our 2 main spell casters do, but leave them to the melee crew and go exploring. Paladins be praised, my fighter barely lived.
My party and I are trekking through the underdark at the moment, and oh boy, Wind Walk is accelerating things at a completely broken pace. 8 hours of 100ft/sec movement speed, gaseous form and damage resistance? We've breezed (hah) past a huge number of encounters, I feel so sorry for our DM...
What's the helmet in the background? Pluto getting some new armor? :-)
I've always considered 2nd level far too low for such a dramatic spell as Invisibility. This spell is so powerful in so many scenarios that even at 4th level it can be a huge force multiplier.
As a player, I love it, as a DM I hate it. Heh, such is life. Just gotta come up with creative ways to negate it is all. :)
Inviability vs tremor sense and scent ie hell hounds can still smell that rouge, or simply have a room where dripping or standing water is involved the invis and even silent creature will still cause ripples and disturbance in the water ie only partial concealment. There are other ways to foil invis but I don't want to give away all my DM tricks.
Gas form vs over 10 speed wind, or even better sucking wind that takes the pc in a direction they don't want to go. (insert evil laughter here)
Arcane eye yeah that's a tough one. Other then a null magic zone that dis-spells it.
Polymorph or familiar get rat catchers.
And ofcourse there is always the good old illusion counter.
Psychic monsters detecting minds and undead detecting life signs.
Dimension door is nice and tough to beat.
Bleeding the parties spells is always fun.
I love stone shape and the accompanying rock to mud and mud to rock as a player.
Challenges and counters...the GAME goes on!
All of the problem spells have effortless solutions to counter them ( or at least as far as i'm concerned , as i thought of multiple solutions for each spell the moment they said each spell ) .
hello guys i have question about ready action
heres what confuse me let say rogue say i use ready action and he say when goblin come to me i attack him now goblin move close to rogue and attack what happens first ? goblin move , rogue attack , goblin attack OR goblin move and attack then rogue attack
I have always had an issue with stealthing into dungeons. If you bypass the first patrol out of several patrols, you have successfully managed to flank yourself. That being said, there are plenty of uses for stealth in a dungeon, but it sometimes is better to be seen than not.
You have to think ahead of players. They may scope out a teleportation circle, or even learn how to activate it by watching a minion activate it. What they don’t know, though, is that the minion was wearing Slippers of Spider Climbing and the destination teleportation circle is on the ceiling directly over the abode of a Gelatinous Cube! 🧊
Another key debuff of slow is that it forces the use of those legendary resistances. It is so debilitating that any creature, if it has the chance to get out of it, will do it, no questions asked. And if it can't... Then by by BBEG