That ring is super overpowered—two effects, one of which can be invisibility? Definitely unbalanced.
The odds of them finding the kid, knowing what they're holding onto, and it having invisibility, and then managing to keep it a secret is the challenge with that ring. It''s a great plot hook and a pretty decent reward assuming they even manage but that'll be harder then it seems and it'll allow you to have hounds of a far greater power hunt them for it.
I don't believe in game balance. There are limitless ways to counter players and situations you can create that'll push them into acting heroically despite the seemingly impossible odds.
the requirement to have a certain grid of numbered rooms is too rigid. Just assume barrows will have as many rooms as players can explore in a single game night and prepare more rooms for backups if exploration goes faster.
Thank you for the feedback, but I am having a hard time understanding what you mean.
The 3-by-3 grid is a layout mechanic, you don't have to have all 9 rooms and I recommend you only have 8 or even 7.
That's a range of 27 to 21 Rooms for a Major Mound, there are 3 of those and up to 3 red herring minor mounds with 7 to 9 rooms each for anywhere from 61 to 108 Rooms to clear 5 days, a 1/4th of those being empty or treasure rooms and 2 per floor being just for entrances and exits it's actually less.
The whole point is that this places weren't built just so the players could clear it in one night, they're burial mounds occupied by layers and layers of monsters who settled them afterwards, they're also defensive structures used by the villain to protect what he needs for a ritual. Why would he use a place that could be cleared out in the real world time of a game night?
I mean I'm not sure how I'd do it seeing as, groups move at different speeds and spend different amounts of times playing so I wouldn't know who to make it for, I personally do a lot of play by post over discord and haven't really sat at a table since October so this is even more alien to me.
I see where you're coming from but that's not really how I think about level design and I haven't seen anything that reflected what I wanted so I went and made it.Sorry for rambling or if I come off as rude, I'm just free flowing here and a little unsure of what you exactly mean.
But, if you run this or put it in your world and want to use a format I think you'd like more let me suggest The 5 Room Dungeon, then you can make the reward either a treasure at the end or the way down, use the spark tables for ideas.
Also, you know your group, you know how long you play and how many rooms you clear. You can make a net work of rooms working in loops and what not using the spark tables to populate and just keep the similar format going.
Thank you for looking at it and leaving a comment, I hope that I shared ideas that'll work with your style and explain my kind of strange funky style. Sorry if this comes off as rude, I'm really not trying to be, and also I know this is a massive wall of text and again, sorry.
Have a good one, please enjoy, and get back to me if you have any follow ups.