Darkvision Ruins Dungeon-Crawling

[Reynard]

No. Dungeon design doesn’t have to depend on darkness in any way. You can light the whole thing as brightly and get plenty of suspense and horror out of the layout and interior decorating (to put it flippantly). And since we are ourselves a visually oriented species, that means more to show via artwork and description. Unusual angles, use of the third dimension, alcoves and niches, misdirection and perspective tricks, horrible objects and art, and so on - this stuff is all right there.

I would posit that being frightened and being horrified are two different things, and the former (often) relies on darkness while the latter (often) relies on unsightly sights.

 

[Bill Zebub]

No. Dungeon design doesn’t have to depend on darkness in any way. You can light the whole thing as brightly as your living room and get plenty of suspense and horror out of the layout and interior decorating (to put it flippantly). And since we are ourselves a visually oriented species, that means more to show via artwork and description. Unusual angles, use of the third dimension, alcoves and niches, misdirection and perspective tricks, horrible objects and art, and so on - this stuff is all right there.

Nobody said a dungeon MUST be dark, but losing darkness as a design tool is like…what?… no traps? No treasure? No secret doors? You “can” also design dungeons without those things. But their absence would be a loss.

 

[Autumnal]

When I’m not engaged in the sort of technical argument where I distinguish between weird (the unnatural presence of something not normally there) and eerie (the unnatural absence of something normally present) and have citations to Mark Fischer and Michael Cisco, I tend to think these overlap a lot.

Darkness does of course have a ton of value! Though my personal favorite mode is the partial glimpse - the scene in the movie The Changeling with the red ball bouncing down stairs is one of my favoritest (another technical term, of course) ever, where there’s an unseen source for what’s clearly visible at hand. It’s part of what I love about Mike Flanagan’s style of direction, too. And the generally so-so found footage movie Grave Encounters has this one fantastic moment. The characters got themselves voluntarily locked into an old asylum overnight. As things heat up, they want out, but nobody’s coming til morning. They finally batter open the front doors, and face something that can’t be there. It’s another hallway stretching off to the distance, not the front lawn. It can’t be there. But it gains credibility by having the same stark clear visibility as the lobby they want to leave.

This is obviously pretty much all taste. Or at least i sure don’t have a fearometer to call my own. I just get this way whenever people seem to me to be leaning too heavily on only one element in the palette of possibilities.

 

[Autumnal]

Nobody said a dungeon MUST be dark, but losing darkness as a design tool is like…what?… no traps? No treasure? No secret doors? You “can” also design dungeons without those things. But their absence would be a loss.

Oh, sure. I just don’t think it should be as ubiquitous as some people have been saying in recent years. I’d like to see design variety, where every element is sometimes left out.

…um, not all at once. I don’t quite know what you’d do with a featureless plain of a dungeon except maybe have marauding Beckett plays.

 

[R_J_K75]

I would posit that being frightened and being horrified are two different things, and the former (often) relies on darkness while the latter (often) relies on unsightly sights.

To add to this, when I think of a dungeon, I tend to think of them as being long abandoned. So, the majority of it is dark and not lighted. Thats not to say that aren't some occupants using a portion or portions of the dungeon, or that an odd magical remnant lights up a particular area, but for the most part if you dont have darkvision, magical light, or torches and lanterns, you're in the dark.

 

[Thomas Shey]

Crossbows are cool. If I were a wizard without unlimited super-beams I'd definitely carry one.

On practical grounds, it makes plenty of sense. It just doesn't fit most people's image of wizard worth a darn.

 

[Thomas Shey]

Sometimes I do. Depends on the game.

We're well past the days most people are going to, however.

 

[Thomas Shey]

Is that supposed to be a bad thing?

If your image of "magic user" doesn't involve a guy hiding in the back throwing short javelins, well, yes.

 

[TiQuinn]

No. Dungeon design doesn’t have to depend on darkness in any way. You can light the whole thing as brightly as your living room and get plenty of suspense and horror out of the layout and interior decorating (to put it flippantly). And since we are ourselves a visually oriented species, that means more to show via artwork and description. Unusual angles, use of the third dimension, alcoves and niches, misdirection and perspective tricks, horrible objects and art, and so on - this stuff is all right there.

I find that these visual nuances (3d representation, perspective, angles) are really difficult to describe verbally, and unless you are working with artwork provided by an adventure, aren’t particularly effective (particularly since I’m also a crappy artist).

How do you go about these things?

 

[Thomas Shey]

A dungeon is a play environment that can support a whole bunch of playstyles.
One of those playstyles is dungeon crawling, and that requires things like limited resources, light scarcity and choices and consequence for pushing "one more room."

My suggestion is, however, that even at the start of the hobby, those limited resources were a whole lot more about spell slots and hit points than how many torches someone had.