Here’s a write-up of the greatest magic item of all time: Atalante’s Portable Megadungeon.
Knights check in, but they don’t check out!
And yes, it’s based on the Knight Hotel from Orlando Furioso.
If you want all this in a PDF version, you can find one free here on my itch page.
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Atalante’s Portable Megadungeon is a large, roughly rectangular carved stone.
The Stone: The stone is portable, but heavy, as large as a thick tome. It is a bulky item. When placed on the ground outdoors and the command word is spoken, the stone’s spirit instantly creates an illusory megadungeon.
Megadungeon Appearance: The megadungeon’s exterior appears as an ancient imposing fortress. The gate is open and unguarded. The megadungeon’s interior is an endless array of rooms, corridors, halls, towers, and courtyards that unfold before its unwitting prisoners.
Illusion of Heart’s Desire: The stone’s spirit can discern the heart’s desire of anyone within the dungeon or within sight of the gatehouse. The spirit can generate the illusion of a humanoid foe carrying whatever this desire may be deeper into the dungeon.
Entering the Dungeon: Anyone who passes beneath the gate falls under the spirit’s spell and will not be able to find the gate again without a guide unaffected by the illusions.
Heroes check in, but they don’t check out: At any given time there will be 2D12 prisoners already trapped within the megadungeon.
The Megadungeon is inhabited: The spirit creates illusory foes. The creatures are unaware that they are illusions and behave as if they were real. They will have factions and regularly intrigue against each other.
Cruel, but not Evil: The spirit has no desire to kill its prisoners or see them killed. Its job is to keep its prisoners trapped inside for as long as possible. Prisoners of the dungeon can take damage but can not be slain by an illusion while in the dungeon. The spirit will also use illusions to keep prisoners from killing each other. Food and drink can be found by those trapped inside.
Immunity: The stone’s owner is immune to its illusions and can locate and move to any individual trapped inside in a single round. Individuals immune to illusions can recognize that the megadungeon and its inhabitants are not real. However the illusions behave as if they were real when encountered.
Escaping the Dungeon: It is impossible to escape while under the spirit’s spell. However if one is unaffected by its illusions and can find the stone in the gatehouse and expose its arcane mark to sunlight, the spirit will take material form. If defeated in combat, duel of wits, or any sort of contest the spirit will dispell the illusion and the megadungeon vanish. All prisoners will be freed instantly with full health. The spirit can not be summoned again for a month and a day.
Two months ago I bought that sheet of pink foam. This week I finished making it into a castle.
I have very little experience terrain building. Bad shoebox buildings used in WH40K as a teen and some recent Frostgrave ruins. I do watch Wyloch, Black magic Craft, and others on Youtube. Even still, this was by far the biggest project I’d ever attempted.
Stuff learned from making the castle:
Procrastination is only a problem if it stops you or keeps you from starting/finishing, otherwise it’s part of the process. The castle spent a few weeks as carboard boxes on the balcony. But it didn’t stay that way.
More of the process is the mechanical making the bits than the creative act of piecing the bits together. Much more of the process than you’d expect, like 60-70%. The real joy comes 75% percent into the project when all the various bits come together because you’ve slapped a mono-chromatic base coat all over everything. Also, if you make more bits than you need than the next project might actually be easier.
When you’ve nearly finished making the thing you will figure out the better way to make that thing, but like hell are you going to start over. Save that wisdom for the next project. In this case the two big take-aways are: 1) cardboard makes a better substructure for buildings than styrofoam, and 2) stuffing the cracks with dry toilet paper, then squirting the wad with 50/50 glue-water is a lot easier than trying to get a 50/50 soaked wad stuffed in the crack. (I feel like I must apologize for these sentences. I’m sorry. Wads. Squirt. Crack. We’re all mature adults here.)
Yeah, it would’ve been cool if you made a thing like this with your dad when you were a kid, but having made it… well, you can understand why your dad didn’t make a thing like this with you. That 60% mechanical bit-making is not a kid friendly or exciting time.
That’s all for now. Maybe some of this is applicable to other creative projects. Time to box it up because it’s meant to be a kid’s birthday present.
Yesterweird 