Topic: How to limit spells that bypass dungeons

[Pazuzu]

Howdy,

I'm curious to read what other GMs do to limit spells that would bypass dungeon walls without appearing too arbitrary or implausible.
It can be frustrating to spend a lot of time crafting and drawing out large and well put together dungeons, only to have players/characters just nonchalantly cast spells like portal, stone to earth, or crack's call to shortcut their way to the end.

Putting kregora into the material would be ridiculously expensive, and just handwaving anti-magic zones all over the place seems both too cheesy and punitive.

Do any of y'all have better ways to foil these shortcuts without ruining their use of other spells?

[Ginger McMurray]

Once the party has these options, let them use them. Rather than take away their tools, make the world require different ones. A dungeon is just a way to create a path from one scene to another. You can do that with clues, maps, or npc interactions.

Then, every so often, give them something they can bypass again. Nobody want to spend levels learning Earth Law only to find there's no more normal dirt in the world.

[RandalThor]

Well, there is always the possibility that if they skip to the end they miss something important, but they have those spells because they want to use them. Giving them time to use them seems only right and fair. (As Ginger McMurray ninja'd in there just ahead of me....)

One factor is that they don't know they are going, they don't know the layout of the dungeon. So, opening that wall could just mean a few tons of dirty water come crashing into them, or they come face-to-face with someone/thing they didn't expect. Some of those spells are good at keeping the structural integrity of their surroundings intact, but some... not-so-much. Meaning, they need to be careful.

Also, while it might be impractical to have magic materials that block magical movement, any powerful being will likely be able to have spells that the PCs could accidentally trigger when doing something like that. The most basic/common would just be warnings, spells that let them know that their lair has been breached. Others could be full-on damaging/destructive spells, but the best ones are ones that take over the magical transportation being used by the PCs and places them in a precarious position (like in an ambush/trap, or cells, or something like that).   

[jdale]

Even just tunneling into a cistern full of water is going to be a discouragement.

Those spells are most effective for getting around if you are in tightly ordered constructed spaces. Walls are thin. For an actual underground dungeon, put the chambers further apart. Not separated by a foot of wall, try 20' of earth and stone. Or 50'. That doesn't make it impossible, but it makes it harder to aim the right direction, and it will cost more PP and more castings of the spells to get to the next chamber.

[OLF, i.e. Olf Le Fol]

You may want to use "Perimeter Wardings" (RoCo. V, p50-51 or Alc. C p126) though I'd advise to use them with parsimony. As Ginger said, "once the party has these options, let them use them" as there's nothing more frustrating to players than spending time and effort to develop and acquire a skill, item or spell… to then have the GM make it useless by suddenly turning all creatures, items, etc. immune to it!

[Spectre771]

At the very least, they have limited PPs.  If they want to spend all the PPs on turning walls into doors, let them.  You know what spells they have, so plan events or situations where it would have been helpful IF they had more PPs to cast that higher level spell, or plan situations where they resort to those spells too soon and burn up all their PPs.

Depending on the depth of the dungeon, there could a thick wall of impassable roots, particularly if the forest above is an ancient forest.  The roots run deep and plenty.

All of the above examples are ideas I would throw at the party too; naturally occurring caverns are randomly spaced and at random elevations, water sources can easily flood a chamber, have important clues or items in rooms they've conveniently bypassed, etc.  Imagine opening a wall and finding it reveals top of a 75' chamber with no plausible way down.

While enchanting an entire dungeon against magic may be too costly, as the party approaches the goal, that smaller area could have some type of ward or protection.

[Spectre771]

This came to me while playing Diablo.... You can have ice caves or a glacial cavern system.

In the olden days of mining, there were box shafts.  The length of the shaft was lined with timber for support.  The party would need to remove timbers to access earth for spells and that could lead to plenty of instability.  If lining the entire level is not feasible, then protecting the important areas with timber lining is an option.  Since this is your gaming world, you don't have to follow real world historical mining methods, simply line the level or the rooms with timber because the miners wanted it done that way.

[Pazuzu]

These are all good ideas. Many thanks.