Let's Brainstorm Dungeon Ideas (Also, Movie inside!)

[Miles-McStyles]

Hey guys, so I loved this game so much I decided to make a movie showing off the final boss and ending on hard. I make sure to show the boss and monsters thoroughly in the encounter so other people who haven't played it might see this fight and think better of the game. Don't get me wrong, I loved watching some other youtube movies where 4 Minotaur Monks can down the Cube in 45 seconds, but as a viewer I don't see much of the struggle or chaos that envelopes that final, hectic boss fight.

My movie: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=58v9bIWNNx8

Anyway, assuming we do eventually get the toolset that was used to make the game, I definitely will be making some high quality content. What are your plans/ideas for a good dungeon? I think 3 important area types for any dungeon include:

Combat Room
Puzzle Room
Visual Room

I've envisioned a lot of crazy ideas of what to do with this game's mechanics and assuming I'm not wrong in how some of them work, I think I can design some great areas.

My first idea for a combat room was simply an Ogre in the middle of a square room. This room would lock you in once you've entered and then put portals along the outer walls(either every square or every other). The trick I wanted was simple: Dodging on Ogre is easy, but if an Ogre can go through a portal and keep his momentum, I'd place the exit portal with the Ogre facing where I would think the most obvious player would be standing. Player dodges, Ogre goes through the Portal, keeps his momentum going and slams into the side of that player.

Below is the idea. The x's mark the portals.

Code: Select all

 ____________
|x   x   x   |
|           x| 
|x           |
|   x   x   x|
 ¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯ ^¯¯
          |
      Entrance
          

The next idea I had was sort of a visual. I'd envision it as an inaccessible area with the only vision to it would be some 1-2 tiles of iron bars. What the player would see is a never ending march of countless undead soldiers. You could write it off as a necromancer's army marching to wipe out the continent. How it would work again, would be 2-3 rows of soldiers going into the same portals and walking in a straight path without end. These portals wouldn't be seen by the player, the room would be long enough to not allow them to be seen. It would simply look like this(x's mark the portals)

Code: Select all

 __________________________________
|x                                x|
|x                                x|
|x                                x|
 ¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯   ^   ¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯
               "Window"

Puzzle rooms could be anything. From riddles to timed events to even crazier puzzles like bringing a dead party member to a certain tile to unlock a secret door(I'm so doing that if I can), the only limits are what the mechanics of the game allows. I know the mechanics might not work out the way I want them too. Monsters might not be able to walk through portals, and maybe somewhere in the script, a door won't be able to open cause there isn't the "check for dead party member" function. I don't know. I have faith there will be. I have so many ideas for good dungeon rooms. I know you guys do too.

So what are some of your ideas for a dungeon? What mechanics will you employ to give your players an enjoyable experience. Also, what kind of plots/storylines have you all been thinking about using?

[dufake]

I like the illusion you have created in the second room.

Personally I prefer to fight in an alley, maze or tight quarters.
Once the player could run in a circle, then they will keep doing it to slay any monsters to death.

[Puck]

Doom remake.

[Curunir]

I dunno about Doom but I'd surely be tempted to remake a Wolfenstein 3D map, just for fun

[Puck]

@ Miles-McStyles

Not sure #2 that would work as you still 'aggro' monsters with bars between you. The current skeleton in line would I think turn to face you and block the procession. Might require a distance with a large enough gap that the player couldn't cross.

[Keefy]

A few ideas (long read I know):

Dice room
There are 9 pressure plates in a square and 6 closed doors placed around the room numbered 1 through 6, with each door leading to a separate area. To open a particular numbered door, you would hold down the pressure plates that match the dots you would see on a dice for that number. examples - for 1 you would simply hold down the center plate, for 3 you would hold down three pressure plates across the top-left to bottom-right diagonal etc.

Pit maze
A fairly simple maze, but a pit opens up behind you after every step you take. There are clues to enable you to make your way successfully through the maze the first time, if you are clever. The clues would be cryptic hints as to which route to take. Falling down a pit would lead to a large room with monsters, and a stairway back up. There would also be a scroll here hinting that the player can solve the maze without resorting to trial and error. There is a reset pit lever at the start of the maze.

Trap an ogre
Longish corridors with an ogre and a closed door with no obvious way of getting it open. There's a hidden switch on one of the walls that causes a teleport field to appear nearby for a few seconds. Stepping into the teleport field teleports you to a 1x1 room (panic!), where you can hear the door opening. A few moments later you are teleported back to the corridor and the door closes, but there would be no way that you could enter before it shuts. To solve the puzzle, you need to bait the ogre to charge towards you and then hit the button to activate the teleporter at the right moment so that the ogre is teleported and becomes temporarily trapped (which opens the door). You then have to rush to get in the door before it closes behind you. If killed, another ogre will spawn in time.

Deliver the blob!
There's a hole at one end of a corridor that needs a white blob to enter it in order for a nearby door to be opened. In the previous room there's a white blob dispenser (!?!) that fires out the aforementioned white blobs but it just shoots them into a blank wall, which is no good! Hidden around this room are a number of secret buttons that temporarily activate teleporter fields. You need to press the right buttons at the right time to deliver the white blob across the room by ensuring it hits the teleporter fields, as these will teleport it to a different tile and keep it in flight. The final teleporter will send it to its destination and open the door. This puzzle would need good timing, pace and require you to navigate the room in a way that means you don't come into contact with the blob during flight (this could be made quite fiendish). It's possible that there could be several rooms like this, with each one becoming more difficult - perhaps with 2 blobs in flight at once.

Cursed level
A cursed level where the health of your party slowly depletes over time, and you can't rest or drink potions. Also, the entrance shuts behind you and there are no pits to fall down. You need to find and destroy the source of the curse before the curse drains all your health. This could be a nasty maze with spinners, teleporters, areas that look the same, dead ends etc. all designed to make you get frustrated, panic and waste time. There could be a few monsters, but not too many and they would appear at moments to make you jump. There would also appear to be no obvious exit. A calm, focused mind will be needed to find the hidden switches that reveal the path to the source of the curse. The source of the curse is a monster, meaning that there will be a desperate final fight as the players' health will probably be quite low by this point. Once killed, the curse is lifted and the health/energy of the team is fully restored.

Automaton
There's a guardian monster on this level that cannot be killed by the players (there are warnings to this affect on the walls), but he holds the key to the exit, so he must die. The guardian wanders the level and will attack the players on sight, he is fairly slow and can be outrun (if not encumbered) but he will be in constant, slow pursuit. There are several dead ends on this level, so don't get trapped! The player needs to find 5 pieces of an automaton hidden on the level - feet, legs, chest, head and hands, and place these in designated alcoves near the entrance to the level. They then need to sacrifice one of their team to give life to the automaton, who then arises and seeks out the guardian. An epic scrap ensues and both the guardian and automaton are destroyed, so the key can finally be collected. Only one problem remains, after using the key in the door a large number of creatures are released and you are at least one man down with no crystal in sight...but perhaps the destroyed automaton left behind some useful equipment?

[Miles-McStyles]

The dice room, cursed level and automaton ideas are great. The concept of an unkillable monster is something that exerts fear and hopelessness and gives all the cocky arrogant players like myself some humility as the only option available is to flee for their lives. The cursed level sounds like players will be pulling their hair out while playing. Which is a good thing. They'll definitely remember a level like that.

[HaunterV]

A few ideas (long read I know):

SpoilerShow

Dice room
There are 9 pressure plates in a square and 6 closed doors placed around the room numbered 1 through 6, with each door leading to a separate area. To open a particular numbered door, you would hold down the pressure plates that match the dots you would see on a dice for that number. examples - for 1 you would simply hold down the center plate, for 3 you would hold down three pressure plates across the top-left to bottom-right diagonal etc.

Pit maze
A fairly simple maze, but a pit opens up behind you after every step you take. There are clues to enable you to make your way successfully through the maze the first time, if you are clever. The clues would be cryptic hints as to which route to take. Falling down a pit would lead to a large room with monsters, and a stairway back up. There would also be a scroll here hinting that the player can solve the maze without resorting to trial and error. There is a reset pit lever at the start of the maze.

Trap an ogre
Longish corridors with an ogre and a closed door with no obvious way of getting it open. There's a hidden switch on one of the walls that causes a teleport field to appear nearby for a few seconds. Stepping into the teleport field teleports you to a 1x1 room (panic!), where you can hear the door opening. A few moments later you are teleported back to the corridor and the door closes, but there would be no way that you could enter before it shuts. To solve the puzzle, you need to bait the ogre to charge towards you and then hit the button to activate the teleporter at the right moment so that the ogre is teleported and becomes temporarily trapped (which opens the door). You then have to rush to get in the door before it closes behind you. If killed, another ogre will spawn in time.

Deliver the blob!
There's a hole at one end of a corridor that needs a white blob to enter it in order for a nearby door to be opened. In the previous room there's a white blob dispenser (!?!) that fires out the aforementioned white blobs but it just shoots them into a blank wall, which is no good! Hidden around this room are a number of secret buttons that temporarily activate teleporter fields. You need to press the right buttons at the right time to deliver the white blob across the room by ensuring it hits the teleporter fields, as these will teleport it to a different tile and keep it in flight. The final teleporter will send it to its destination and open the door. This puzzle would need good timing, pace and require you to navigate the room in a way that means you don't come into contact with the blob during flight (this could be made quite fiendish). It's possible that there could be several rooms like this, with each one becoming more difficult - perhaps with 2 blobs in flight at once.

Cursed level
A cursed level where the health of your party slowly depletes over time, and you can't rest or drink potions. Also, the entrance shuts behind you and there are no pits to fall down. You need to find and destroy the source of the curse before the curse drains all your health. This could be a nasty maze with spinners, teleporters, areas that look the same, dead ends etc. all designed to make you get frustrated, panic and waste time. There could be a few monsters, but not too many and they would appear at moments to make you jump. There would also appear to be no obvious exit. A calm, focused mind will be needed to find the hidden switches that reveal the path to the source of the curse. The source of the curse is a monster, meaning that there will be a desperate final fight as the players' health will probably be quite low by this point. Once killed, the curse is lifted and the health/energy of the team is fully restored.

Automaton
There's a guardian monster on this level that cannot be killed by the players (there are warnings to this affect on the walls), but he holds the key to the exit, so he must die. The guardian wanders the level and will attack the players on sight, he is fairly slow and can be outrun (if not encumbered) but he will be in constant, slow pursuit. There are several dead ends on this level, so don't get trapped! The player needs to find 5 pieces of an automaton hidden on the level - feet, legs, chest, head and hands, and place these in designated alcoves near the entrance to the level. They then need to sacrifice one of their team to give life to the automaton, who then arises and seeks out the guardian. An epic scrap ensues and both the guardian and automaton are destroyed, so the key can finally be collected. Only one problem remains, after using the key in the door a large number of creatures are released and you are at least one man down with no crystal in sight...but perhaps the destroyed automaton left behind some useful equipment?

Someone's been a DM at least once.


If you had an abundance of torches and garbage gear you could navigate the cursed level easy enough.

[Patch]

A few ideas (long read I know):

removed in quote to save space

Someone's been a DM at least once.


If you had an abundance of torches and garbage gear you could navigate the cursed level easy enough.

I carry around extra shields just for that purpose...

[Pajamas]

I was thinking of making a, almost free-roam centric town where you enter different buildings that hold different secrets. The street would probably be like this:
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
I I I I
I I Dungeon I I
I I I I
I ---- - -- -- --I I- - - - - - - - - - I___________
I Start I
I---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Of course thats a quick mock-up but your essentially supposed to explore these multistory rooms for keys and such.

Gold keys are given for completing puzzles. There will be a room that is all dedicated to giving you things for golden keys. The way that would work is that its a progression of items, so inserting the first key will get the wall to lift up behind it leading into another room with a golden key, and just keeps going until you get all of that set. For the best items you have to unlock a full set for that class, so getting the thiefs ninja set will unlock you the best dagger, and getting the best warrior set[s] will give you the best sword. It just goes on and on, and will require plenty of keys to get, I think it will be fine, while there are also other places to get these items, the keys offer the easiest way to get the best shiz.

Your objective is to level up until you can go into the last area which isn't open roamish which is the dungeon. There you fight what you would normally fight in the end of grimrock. The map will be spread up into different sections and completing the multi-story rooms gives you enough round keys to get into the next subarea, the last one being the dungeon, where you begin to assemble the last boss.

While it will mostly be difficult to figure out how to get characters to level properly and feed them in case they explore, I think it will be interesting to say the least.