Please don't get used to the term endless 'dungeon'

[Superdeluxe]

I want a mega dungeon.

[Infinitron]

Well, Dragon's Eye in Icewind Dale had a community living in it. Sort of.

[Regenshire]

This game needs diversity, it shouldn't be all about pure roleplay and meeting NPCs, this should be a dungeon to make hard-core dungeon crawlers want to keep coming back for more. It should contain some of the most challenging combat encounters in the game and some of the best loot.

 

The only communities I would support being in there would be communities of monster type creatures, ala like hook horrors or grell or something like that. You might have some small chance of them not killing you on site if you can prove your worth and aid them in their war against other denizens of the dark halls, but I don't want to see a bunch of surface dwellers living merry lives in the dungeon just because.

Edited October 17, 2012 by Regenshire

[AGX-17]

I'd personally like to see the term dungeon restricted to places of imprisonment and parts of brothels where you can pay for unusual services.

[Kiarean]

I don't want a traditional city in it, but it would be cool to see some deviation on the norm. Maybe a semi-organized settlement of some of the more intelligent things down there. Could be a place to pick up tidbits about the Endless Paths, maybe restock a bit if you've got the right skills, or a challenge to penetrate and loot if you don't. I just don't want it to be a mindless dungeon crawl, that's kinda boring. I want it to be freaky, and horrifying, and mind-blowing, and strange, and awesome.

[Pshaw]

I really got the impression that it will be a dungeon crawl. A varried one, with a bit of puzzles tossed in as well.

 

The only thing I'm curious about is if they'll make it need to be completed in 1 go. If you leave before completing it will everything respawn and need to be recleared? I can't decide if I'd like the challenge or just find the whole thing a bother to reclear.

[Death Machine Miyagi]

I'd rather have 2 or 3 levels full of interesting stuff rather than 14 levels full of same-old-same-old hack 'n slash. I really hope they can do these 14 layers justice and don't just make them 14 layers filled with pointless combat.

 

EDIT: For the record, a dungeon like Watcher's Keep is perfectly acceptable. Plenty of combat, but not completely devoid of context or interest beyond killing things.

Edited October 17, 2012 by Death Machine Miyagi

[Brannart]

NO I want 14 levels of monsters, traps, puzzles, shifty characters, legends, exotic and weird locations, and treasures and the whole thing.

 

I only wish once you go in there is no way out Legend of Grimrock style. But that is probably too much to hope for.

Edited October 18, 2012 by Brannart

[rjwest0004]

Hmmm... reading through all these comments, I was thinking that maybe the dungeon could be a quest to uncover some long lost ancient civilization. At the very bottom would be some new race, which would of course include an NPC ally option, and a small underground city with unique items/treasures. But to get there, you have to fight through "endless" levels of baddies and puzzles.

[Brannart]

The rest of the game has cities, npcs and so forth. A mega-dungeon is to delve into desperate struggles with foes barely matched. It's a slow crawl into depths no living person has stepped out of, making your way through the discarded bones of adventurers great and small, struck dead in a similar fashion to how those spiders you just encountered normally attack their prey. Perhaps at some point you might enter a level where no other man has stepped into for eons, and with good reason.......... wait, what was the topic again? No, mega-dungeon means dungeon crawl. Sure, make a twist on it, but sometimes i just want a challenge i know in the end will reward me richly.

 

This. A thousand times this. I want Dorn's Deep on steroids.

[SunBroSolaire]

Noooooooo there will be plenty of non-dungeon stuff, like the cities, villages, wilderness to explore, etc... A huge, difficult-as-hell dungeon with tons of minibosses and unique loot is a beautiful thing and it doesn't need to be corrupted with NPCs and stuff.

 

I would love if they buried lore around the place in the environment and item descripts Dark Souls style, but I don't want some stupid town in the middle of my dungeon crawl.

[commie]

The whole novelty of it is that it is a dungeon that with all the numbers will be around 15 levels deep, making it almost as big as Diablo. Secondly, it's an optional thing that you can ignore if you just want a pure story. I personaly am more of a storyfag and IWD combat doesn't sustain me easily for a whole game, but I'm excited to tackle this thing as in pure gameplay it is likely to be more like an IWD module in a PS:T/BG game and this difference makes it all the better.

[Hassat Hunter]

I was kinda expecting my PE dungeon to have PE gameplay... not be a diablo clone.

 

How fun is 15 levels of BG/PS:T style fighting and *nothing* else.

I have a feeling a lot of people are going to be dissapointed. Then again, giving money for this game and expecting a hack&slash, you could have expected that...

[Hmm-Hmm.]

Hmm.

 

Personally, I think it should have a story behind it. A specific flavour. Perhaps multiple (considering the size). Where did it come from? Who started it? Do they still live down there somewhere or have they left constructs and relics? And over time a lot of creatures may have left their mark on it. Who are living there now and why? What are their relationships with eachother? Why are they hostile (if they are)?

 

So whether you actually meet npcs you can talk to/interact with or not, it should have its own distinct character, I think. In terms of what the levels look like, what you might find and who you'll meet.

Edited October 18, 2012 by Hmm-Hmm.

[septembervirgin]

Basically I feel that what Obsidian has with the Endless Paths of Od Nua is 13 (14?) layers of interconnected map, a template of sorts. There is no need to limit this template to a hack-and-slash formula. I feel that it would be best if this area had its own underground cities, communities, NPCs side quests, hidden nooks and crannies, lore tidbits, that is to say more or less be an extension of normal PE gameplay that we expect, with all the depth, strangeness and unpredictability (perhaps even more so with this opportunity) that the game will surely contain in its other acts and locations. This would naturally take a greater amount of effort than generating a dungeon crawl so I'm not exactly sure how feasible it would be.

 

Plus, I feel this could provide a certain opportunity for Obsidian. Have 13 (or 14, w/e the final number) layers of proper content for the Endless Paths, going progressively deeper, then, as the story there winds down, introduce an actual, procedurally generated endless dungeon for levels 13+ with no (or an arbitrary) end. The game ends up with a rich, story-filled zone and an actual endless dungeon to match the name of the zone.

 

What do others think about this? Am I being too unrealistic or just stating the obvious?

 

I agree with you whole-heartedly to a certain degree; the idea of an underground complex filled with separate communities is sound and could be appealing but I don't think they should do it, also we should dispense with the infinite dungeon aneath unless it's deemed feasible. I disagree with you only in that: I think the infinite paths should be mostly undead filled. Given its description, the strange and altered dead should scurry, walk, crawl, and wriggle there. I believe the underground should be haunted to the point where most of the bodiless dead cannot be removed by magical means available to the characters: it should be annoying and to a certain degree dangerous. Finally, I hope to see oozes and slimes and molds and sentient gasses.

 

I don't know. I personally want a dungeon. No communities. Just old-good dungeon. With intricate puzzles, traps and monsters.

 

I think there are many examples of dungeons where "monsters" have a community. Ghosts and other haunts might drive away some beings and others might end up going mad or dying. Keep in mind that this dungeon is not unreasonably feared, for travelers have stumbled in there with few survivors, and this has been the situation for centuries. Communities that exist in that dungeon are not going to be wholesome, healthy villages. If it were *just* the dead, I'd believe they could manage to live in tandem with the dead, but these walking dead are the result of or are accompanied by strange experiments and damned sorceries.

[Raithe]

A dungeon with no story is just senseless. It's pretty much a mass cliche of badly written fantasy gaming modules..

 

There needs to be a history and a personality to a dungeon. A reason for why its there, and a natural progression from whatever it was built so long ago for, and what is is now and infested with monsters of all varieties.

 

And just because they're monsters, doesn't mean they aren't intelligent and have formed there own tribes, settlements, alliances and differences with other creatures within the depths of it.

 

Just imagine going on some fantasy archeologist quest into this lost place, and not just killing creatures but also getting involved in dialogue with them. Teaming up with the kobolds in x location to help them face the nasty x-spawn from the other, which provides you with access to another area of dungeon..

 

Havng the history of the place involved in lore and quest decisions as you explore and loot..

[Anorymous]

Personally, after having played Portal 2... I'm thinking that maybe, just maybe, the Endless Dungeon would be the perfect setting for a co-op multiplayer dungeon. Different experiences for single-player and multi-player... that would rock.