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George Krashos
Master of Realmslore

Australia
6666 Posts

Posted - 29 Mar 2005 :  07:33:38  Show Profile Send George Krashos a Private Message  Reply with Quote  Delete Topic
I've got a big, invisible sphere - as big as a manor house in fact. Most likely it's a mythal construct. It contains 'stuff' (as in items). I need some suggestions re what the 'inside' of the sphere would comprise of in terms of layout. Would it have 'rooms' (and if so, how would you structure them within a sphere), extra-dimensional spaces accessed by ???, a big mist (like a wardmist), an actual manor house , etc.

I'm after ideas re the insides of this big, invisible to the naked eye sphere. Insides that would be an interesting place to adventure in for a group of high level PCs. Any ideas out there, folks?

-- George Krashos

"Because only we, contrary to the barbarians, never count the enemy in battle." -- Aeschylus

Dargoth
Great Reader

Australia
4607 Posts

Posted - 29 Mar 2005 :  08:03:55  Show Profile  Visit Dargoth's Homepage Send Dargoth a Private Message  Reply with Quote
It could be Elven armoury containing weapons from a realm that no longer exists (Victim of the Crown Wars)

The Mythal could conceal a gate to one of the lower planes perhaps the Elves didnt have the power to destroy the gate or portal but they managed to seal it so nothing could come through. Knowing that in the future some one might try and repoen the gate, the elves created a Mythal over the site rendering it invisable

Guardians for the Gate or Armoury

Baelorns, Golems, Constructs with an Elven background, plenty of Glyths and Wards with an elven flavour

“I am the King of Rome, and above grammar”

Emperor Sigismund

"Its good to be the King!"

Mel Brooks

Edited by - Dargoth on 29 Mar 2005 08:04:59
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Gray Richardson
Master of Realmslore

USA
1291 Posts

Posted - 29 Mar 2005 :  08:03:58  Show Profile  Visit Gray Richardson's Homepage Send Gray Richardson a Private Message  Reply with Quote
My god! It's full of stars!

A mythal construct, eh?

Well, a mythal is built to protect something. So I imagine it would be something wonderful. It could be something valuable or an environment. A garden perhaps?

One interesting thing would be to have gravity on the inside of the sphere follow the surface of the sphere so that "up" would always be the center of the sphere and the inner surface would always be down. You could walk around the entire sphere, even if to the outside world you appeared upside down.
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Gray Richardson
Master of Realmslore

USA
1291 Posts

Posted - 29 Mar 2005 :  08:10:07  Show Profile  Visit Gray Richardson's Homepage Send Gray Richardson a Private Message  Reply with Quote
It could be a maze. Maybe an invisible maze. There is this HP Lovecraft short story about a guy who walks into an invisible maze in a swamp on Venus. He can see exactly where he is the whole time, but he has no ideas where the walls are, he wanders around for days trying to find his way out. Explorers find his body a few days later just a few feet inside the entrance. He had almost made it out before he gave up and died without realizing it.

Okay, that's kind of a bummer, but the concept is interesting.

Maybe it's like a giant habitrail with all these three dimensional tubes twisting around inside like a crazy straw, that lead to neat rooms with puzzles and stuff. You could even have a big running wheel for Wooly
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Gray Richardson
Master of Realmslore

USA
1291 Posts

Posted - 29 Mar 2005 :  08:16:55  Show Profile  Visit Gray Richardson's Homepage Send Gray Richardson a Private Message  Reply with Quote
If it's a special environment, it could be like a terrarium, protecting special and rare plants. Maybe that elven tree of life that was said to have been planted in the icy North somewhere.

You enter from a glacial, snowy environ and find a little slice of summer inside, with butterflies, bright dapples of sunlight, and a beautiful tree in the middle. It might be protected by elves or needlefolk or other plant people.
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Gray Richardson
Master of Realmslore

USA
1291 Posts

Posted - 29 Mar 2005 :  08:24:08  Show Profile  Visit Gray Richardson's Homepage Send Gray Richardson a Private Message  Reply with Quote
If it was created by an epic level spellcaster, it could be a wizard's retreat. Who knows what crazy things he experimented on inside.

Perhaps the Mythal construct is not to keep things out but rather to keep things in. It could contain a powerful fiend lord, an augmented slime that contains the last essence of Moander, an elf-eater egg, or some other horrible monster.

It could be a menagerie, with lots of strange beasts. Perhaps rare and wonderous monsters from all across the Realms. Perhaps they have long since escaped their cages and now wander freely through the interior of the sphere.
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Mumadar Ibn Huzal
Master of Realmslore

1338 Posts

Posted - 29 Mar 2005 :  19:48:16  Show Profile Send Mumadar Ibn Huzal a Private Message  Reply with Quote
Less fancy, but the first thing that came to mind was the 'ball-room' (pun intended) in the Labyrinth movie (the one with David Bowie). Drapes, stairs, balconies, chandeliers and masked lords and ladies dancing...
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Gray Richardson
Master of Realmslore

USA
1291 Posts

Posted - 03 Apr 2005 :  19:37:42  Show Profile  Visit Gray Richardson's Homepage Send Gray Richardson a Private Message  Reply with Quote
Here's another idea: Matryoshka spheres. Successive, nested spheres. You get inside and the ceiling is the outer surface of another sphere contained within the first one. There is an entrance but you have to explore the first "level" to find the opening.

When you get inside the 2nd sphere, there is another sphere inside that one, and you have to explore that "level" (the inner surface of the 2nd sphere) to find the opening into the next sphere above/deeper within.

Each layer might have a guardian or a test or a puzzle, or it could be a whole labyrinth with rooms and inhabitants, however you like it. The very last sphere conatains your MacGuffin.
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Gray Richardson
Master of Realmslore

USA
1291 Posts

Posted - 03 Apr 2005 :  19:40:22  Show Profile  Visit Gray Richardson's Homepage Send Gray Richardson a Private Message  Reply with Quote
Then at the center of the whole shebang, the last of several successively smaller spheres, is a small spherical chamber that contains a spherical relic.

A mythalar maybe?
A sphere of anihilation?
One of Ed Bonny's udoxias? (oooh I like that idea best!)
A powerful crystal ball that can see anywhere on Toril or the planes--even through any barriers errected against divination?
A glass globe containing the soul of a notable NPC or entity imprisoned by magic jar?
A globe of teleportation. It is a large globe of Toril and by pressing on any given spot with a special stylus it allows you to teleport to that location instantly without error?
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Wooly Rupert
Master of Mischief
Moderator

USA
36804 Posts

Posted - 03 Apr 2005 :  19:43:05  Show Profile Send Wooly Rupert a Private Message  Reply with Quote
quote:
Originally posted by Gray Richardson

Here's another idea: Matryoshka spheres. Successive, nested spheres. You get inside and the ceiling is the outer surface of another sphere contained within the first one. There is an entrance but you have to explore the first "level" to find the opening.

When you get inside the 2nd sphere, there is another sphere inside that one, and you have to explore that "level" (the inner surface of the 2nd sphere) to find the opening into the next sphere above/deeper within.

Each layer might have a guardian or a test or a puzzle, or it could be a whole labyrinth with rooms and inhabitants, however you like it. The very last sphere conatains your MacGuffin.



That reminds me of one of the Dyson spheres mentioned in Illegal Aliens...

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