dumpster mimics

they feast on hobos

@Carcer That might be a bit much, but disguised gargoyles could work.

I was gauging how far your wackiness tolerance went

Gargoyles or other animated statues/artwork.

And the brewery is going to feature many crates, so a large-sized "packing crate mimic" is also fair game.

I'll never forget my GM having a stained glass golem step down from the back of a church.

A brewery. You need gremlins. They love machinery and making it go boom.

If it's an anything goes world, you might have disgruntled Trolls that normally work the hazardous machinery. Having workers that regenerate is useful, even if they tend to be a bit mean.

For the brewery, I'd like to have large pipes that go in between rooms (i.e. different machines in different rooms) that the players can manipulate...somehow. Maybe use that to hide small enemies, or even let the players use it to scout.

Have little foes come from the pipes, tempt players to use the pipes but also be concerned that there could be more things in the pipes.

Also make sure to disable the machine that pushes steam or high pressure liquids connected to the pipe...

Steam pipe traps, that's good. I'll write that down.

Otyugh in the sewers is a good traditional city encounter, too

The brewery premise is that the spies have a secret lab in the basement, hidden by the machinery sounds, and they use the brewery as a front to bulk import alchemical ingredients. So it's possible the workers aren't all spies. As for the other areas, I don't really know what the premise should be.

Mind Flayer that has taken a particular taste to the brains of drunkards. Though they may be out of scope for level 11.

@Maximillian Maybe, but I definitely want to have a challenge involving a psychic + mesmerist duo. There's been a heavy martial/elemental focus in the challenges so far, and the players have yet to deal with things like Feeblemind or Dominate... :)

Mists of Pandaria has a brewery that's been taken over by alementals.

hey there @Maximillian

and maybe said Mind Flayer is an alcoholic themselves? :P

@Carcer Good one, although the previous dungeon was underground, semi-submerged, and full of aberrations. So no sewer-themed areas this time.

@BESW And monkeys

@MikeQ Otyugh in the brewery, if you want to call the quality/content of the brew into question...

@Carcer Heh okay, maybe I'll stick a few in the basement. What about the art/music/theater area? I think I'll put the occult casters there, but I can't figure out what kind of scene to use, i.e. what kind of building it should be or what rooms it should include.

@MikeQ Fancy soiree before/after a big musical performance?

@GreySage Hm, infiltrating the spies at a fancy party... It's a cool idea but I'm not sure how to pull that off, or make it "dungeon-like". What were you thinking?

@MikeQ shrug Just an idea. Maybe the party has to identify the spy at the party, then go into the backstage area to find/fight something?

hey folks -- anyone available tonight and next Thursday night (US time) for a bit of D&D 5e in The Back Room?

@Shalvenay I'll be available later.

@MikeQ ah, what time would later be? (Sora's leveling up her char to L2 atm)

@Shalvenay At earliest... 30 mins from now?

@MikeQ should be fine :)

@GreySage Possibly. I'm not entirely sure how to make a theater into a (mechanically/strategically) interesting environment. The stage area is just a big open space. The back halls are just narrow corridors, possibly with tiny rooms on the side.

@MikeQ don't you have the catwalks overhead for rigging as well?

...Rolling to facepalm

d20

@Shalvenay Yes that's actually a cool concept. How would the GM implement that without having the 3D aspect become problematic for themselves?

@MikeQ that's an interesting question -- I'd think that it'd only be one or two levels of catwalks, though, not much harder than a multi-story dungeon

(and at least it isn't the Metrodome with its infamous baseball-eating catwalk system :P)

google.com/url?q=https://jaune-arc-505.tumblr.com/post/…

May I recommend: Sparring for Dummies, Magic for Dummies, and The Participation Ribbon

@MikeQ Exaggerate a little. The costume room is usually confusing and labyrinthine, exaggerate that. The catwalk system is interconnected and dangerous, exaggerate that. There are ways to get from the front to back of the house without being seen, exaggerate that.

Take a cue from Gaston Leroux.

@MikeQ The back halls have extravagant costumes blocking view.

Make it an old theater that's been repurposed and partly rebuilt several times, so there's bits that don't fit together and forgotten areas that've been walled off...

The walls suddenly go from wood to stone

@BESW yes, this!

multiple remodelings are a great way to make a building stop making so much sense ;)

Maybe it wasn't a theater at all in the first place, that's not uncommon.

Or maybe it's not just a theater.

it's an active theatre

If you think about it, adapted taverns would be a good theater. Inn on the second floor? Perfect for Romeo and Juliet scenes and the like.

Also, arena theaters are crazy.

The theater I work in is a university theater, so it's part of the Fine Arts classroom building.

In some places/times, theaters are built into mansions or palaces.

Or retrofitted into same.

@BESW Nice

@BESW -- now I have visions of someone setting up a temporary stage in Yankee Stadium

wb @MikeQ

@Shalvenay Historically, large entertainment spaces are often designed to be multipurpose.

@BESW indeed, that's true even today in some cases

your average municipal arena can play host to everything from a rodeo to a basketball, indoor football, or hockey game, or to a concert even

the Colosseum in Rome could do theater, or contests of skill, or animal fighting, or human fighting, or get flooded to recreate historical marine battles.

@BESW That's my favorite part about the Coliseum

And then there's taking into account existing geographic conditions.

The Paris Opera House has massive water-filled sub-basement areas because it's built on an underground lake.

I can easily see a D&D architect doing something similar with, say, a hellmouth.

So, the Create and Destroy water spell...

People are around 70% water...

D&D usually avoids that kind of shenanigans with some caveat about not being able to treat parts of living beings as independent from the whole unless the spell specifically says otherwise.

@BESW I figured.

Most creatures contain water, but only creatures that are water, like a water elemental, would be a valid target.

Well, it's only so many gallons, right?

Well, it goes up by 10 gallons per spell slot. How many gallons of water is a water elemental made of?

An adult person has a volume of about 20 gallons according to the internet. So about that for a medium water elemental, plus or minus some factor for bigger or smaller versions.

A 5' cube holds 37.4026 gallons of water

@A_S00 A water elemental is completely water, right?

Yes, but 20 gallons is the total volume of a person, not the volume of the water in their body. I'm assuming a medium-sized elemental is the same size as a person, since people are medium-sized, but there's room for some fudge factor if you think an elemental fills up more of their space than a person does (some of their art makes them look bigger than a person)

(Wolfram Alpha is giving me 17.5 gallons: wolframalpha.com/input/?i=volume+of+human+body+in+gallons )

@BESW Actually, in 5e they even removed that shenanigan - you can only destroy water in an open container. So unless you can talk the water elemental into climbing into a jar...