Excuses for Dungeons Below a City?

[Jürgen Hubert]

All in all, I am fairly happy with how Dartmouth, the most detailed city in Urbis (and the assumed "default home base" for Urbis campaigns) shapes up. But, as a friend of mine who currently runs some Urbis adventures pointed out, there is something missing:

Dungeons. Lots and lots of large and famous dungeons.

This made sense to me - after all, Urbis is intended to be a setting for Dungeons and Dragons.


So, what kinds of excuses can you come up for large dungeons to exist below a large and thriving metropolis? Be creative!

[Biohazard]

Sewers would be the most obvious answer. Wine/storage cellars that are tunneled between and/or closed off at some entrances can be interesting.

My favorite is if the current city was actually built over top of an older city - not in the sense that there's an actual, complete city sitting down below, but a case where the current city's construction in some places used the old one's architecture, and foundations, streets, etc. actually change the structure and layout of the old city. You might have an old tower that stretches quite high that is now used as part of a cathedral, and the cathedral's additions have a foundation that cut off the old street next to the tower underneath the new city as well as cutting some little houses on the other side in half. The new one could dip down in places to use more desirable sections of the old one but with a significant amount of work done to hide the paths into other parts.

[Matt Larkin (author)]

I've used Biohazard's idea several times.

Also catacombs, like in Paris are the ultimate undercity.

Plus, you could have actual underground cities.

Elaborate crypts in cities that make a big deal about taking stuff with you to the afterlife.

Underground temples.

Really most dungeon ideas could be adapted to work below a city, I think.

A dragon's den might be a stretch.

[Llum]

Alright the staples (already mentioned mostly).

Sewers

Catacombs (like in Paris as Phoenix mentions)

City built on a city is interesting.

Abandoned mine not far from town. Maybe it's connected to the cave system under the city and all the zombies have finally managed to reach it and/or the surface, would make a good reason for the adventureres to get involved.

As Dartmouth is a harbor city, some kind of coastal cave system with an underwater entrance could be viable. Small island up/down the coast.

For smaller dungeons a large manor house/mansion/guild house/castle with multiple floors above and below ground can always be interesting.

Towers are always useful.

If you want to bring in a planar/cultist factor maybe maybe there's a planar portal in someone's basement/tower/garden/cave/etc... This would let the players explore the planes a bit. (This is assuming like standard D&D 4e planar travel is possible).

More magical things could be, a gateway through a mirror to the castle of a Giant/powerful extraplanar/dragon lair.

Evil golem smith/alchemist/necromancer/summoner have a lair, wouldn't need to be particularly large, good place for a big battle (if they have a very large room (like the lab/magic room or a big hall or something).

Mad astronomer with some buildings not too far from town (to get away from the light) obssessed with calling down the Achelat on the world.

An Island Turtle passing by could be another good temporary adventure site.

That's all I have for now.

[Loch Belthadd]

There is one city in the real world (which I can't remember the name of. Might be in Italy.) that is literally built on top itself (paradox much?). At one point a something happened (a volcano I think) that left the entire first floor of the whole city underground. What is now known as the first floor is actually the second floor. Imagine this happening multiple times to an ancient city. This would leave you with five or more underground city sized floors to work with. And it has the added bonus of being completely plausible (it happened in the real world, why not yours?)

[Steerpike]

It's intereting that most ideas for dungeons below cities rvolve around the idea of forgotten/ruinous levels; my own setting's metropolises certainly do this, too.  I rather like the idea of cities that were intentionally built with underground components that aren't sewers at all; imagine, for example, a kind of double-city with the surface-dwelling races on top and then an undercity, fully habitable, for a group of civilized troglodytes/drow/whatever underground-dwelling races feature in the campaign world.  The cities wouldn't be at war or anything, they'd be symbiotic halves of a single city, with districts of the undercity achieving a degree of ostentation or wealth comparable to those of the surface city.

Actually, I'm going to have to use this idea, it's too good not to.

I don't know if it could be used for Urbis - as I recall Urbis focses on the core dungeons and dragons races, with hobgobins being the closest to a civilzed race that actually borderline gets along with the others??

[Stargate525]

There is one city in the real world (which I can't remember the name of. Might be in Italy.) that is literally built on top itself (paradox much?). At one point a something happened (a volcano I think) that left the entire first floor of the whole city underground. What is now known as the first floor is actually the second floor. Imagine this happening multiple times to an ancient city. This would leave you with five or more underground city sized floors to work with. And it has the added bonus of being completely plausible (it happened in the real world, why not yours?)

Pretty much any old city not on solid ground has this happen to it. Chicago, I know, has sunk something like 17 to 20 feet over its lifetime.

Ancient hill cities had this happen intentionally. Once a city was taken, it was usually razed. the new city, including walls, would be built on top of the old rubble, thereby making the hill to get up to the walls higher. The more you destroyed the city, the harder it was to do it again.

[Gamer Printshop]

Look at the archaeology of places like Ancient Troy (or what they think is the location of ancient Troy) - there are an estimated 40 different towns and cities located at that location, built one on top of the other. Sometimes the layers between are simply layers of solid construction going from one building style to another. In some cases entire portions of street level is still open, but mostly surrounded by add-on structures above and rubble - so entire cities aren't open to move throughout, just parts of cities below.

Then you have Seattle, Washington, where a fire occurred and the entire city was rebuilt on top of itself, with extensive sections of old city still accessable from above.

Then you have China Town districts in many US Western cities, like San Francisco, where the immigrant Chinese population created underground warrens to do their manufacturing and even market squares that were completely out of the eyes of the authorities, because they dug out their underground warrens after the city above was built and not the other way around.

These are using real world examples, but I'm sure there could be dozens of fantasy ideas to determine why a city or dungeon below a city exists - this is not a new idea.

GP

[Jürgen Hubert]

It's intereting that most ideas for dungeons below cities rvolve around the idea of forgotten/ruinous levels; my own setting's metropolises certainly do this, too.  I rather like the idea of cities that were intentionally built with underground components that aren't sewers at all; imagine, for example, a kind of double-city with the surface-dwelling races on top and then an undercity, fully habitable, for a group of civilized troglodytes/drow/whatever underground-dwelling races feature in the campaign world.  The cities wouldn't be at war or anything, they'd be symbiotic halves of a single city, with districts of the undercity achieving a degree of ostentation or wealth comparable to those of the surface city.

Actually, I'm going to have to use this idea, it's too good not to.

I don't know if it could be used for Urbis - as I recall Urbis focses on the core dungeons and dragons races, with hobgobins being the closest to a civilzed race that actually borderline gets along with the others??

True, hobgoblins are grudgingly accepted "civilized" by most other races, as they have managed to build and hold a fairly large nation of their own.

But this has given me an idea - there are some myths and stories which cast the "Picts" as some diminutive human variant race which lived in the British Isles but were gradually driven underground by invading "normal" people - thus giving rise to tales of faeries and other "little people".

I think it would be very easy to cast goblins in the region into a similar role, especially given that the Dartmouth region has a "British" flavor anyway - perhaps the city is on the site of an earlier goblin settlement, and ancient tunnels and similar signs of their passage can still be found today.

[Acrimone]

There are lizard men living in the deep tunnel systems beneath Los Angeles.

[LD]

Acrimone... Perchance do you have Pictures/Proof?

:)

[Jürgen Hubert]

Acrimone... Perchance do you have Pictures/Proof?

Well, it's a common urban legend, at least.

And in the world of gaming, isn't that the same thing as being "real"?    :p