Campaign Pitch: Gothic Megadungeon

Instead of prepping for my upcoming game or finishing my articles for Kazamata, I thought about megadungeons and came up with a couple of different - and at this stage, very vague - ideas, that I am going to present. The first one is:

The Sempiternal Citadel of Maleficence

Background

The magnificent gothic castle of the Argent family had been looming over the area for hundreds of years. Its rulers were eccentric people, rarely showing interest in the world beyond the castle walls. The local villagers claimed they were practitioners of magic and witchcraft and that they trafficked with devilish creatures; however, these claims were found unsubstantiated and never investigated further.

Roughly a hundred years ago, blood-curdling screams pierced the silence of the night, and an eldritch storm struck the castle. The infernal tempest raged for hours, and when finally stopped, the castle - along with the island it was built on - was nowhere.

Since that night, no daylight have shone on the walls of the citadel. At night, however, it tears itself from the ground, surrounded by netherworldly lightnings and morbid chanting. Once it is rebuilt, the marvellous keep and its many skyscraping towers stand silently and menacingly, surrounded by sinister trees and dark waters, both of which are said to be haunted or worse.

Features

• A gothic megadungeon campaign using the Lamentations of the Flame Princess rules, full of secrets, curses, and hauntings.
• Explorable areas include the keep, the towers, and the vaults beneath, each having multiple levels with distinct themes, such as Dr Halo's Dream Generator, the Shadow Vestry, the Garden of Roses, the Chamber of Tranquility, the Tower of Demise, the Spire of Iridescence, the Coven of the Seven Sisters, the Boneyard of the Blue Horde, Dr Thorn's Insane Asylum, and the Prison of the Loathsome Solar.
• Among the inhabitants one may find relentless undead, wicked witches, foul demon worshippers, cunning devils, animated guardians, crazy alchemists, transhuman sorcerers, and talking objects.
• Numerous clues may be found in the haunted halls and corridors of the castle, with the help of which players may learn its many secrets.
• Secret doors and hidden levels form an integral part of adventuring in the citadel; clues may be found in many places (messages written on the wall, in old books and scrolls, overhearing a secret meeting, etc.).
• Individual levels would probably not be huge (cf. Rappan Athuk); "mega" would come from the interconnectedness regarding levels, characters, and themes.
• Agents from both outside and inside the dungeon may offer "quests", definite objectives with a reward (money, item, service, discount, knowledge, etc.) in order to facilitate focused exploration (as opposed to aimless wandering).