I'm not one for huge dungeon crawls and I wrote about it today on my blog.Anyone else out there not like the big, huge crawls? Anyone who does, how do you design your dungeons to keep them interesting and engaging? I'm not looking to start a fight, I'd just love to hear people's opinions on the matter since so many published adventures for lots of systems are huge crawls and I'm wondering who out there loves them.
Anyone else not a fan of HUGE dungeon crawls?
- Thread starter Jimbro
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iserith
Magic Wordsmith
I don't like dungeon crawls - I like dungeon runs. That requires good table management, scene-building, and pacing. In a way, any adventure is a dungeon in that it's just a structure to create an environment in which to play. So whether it's a mega-complex or a slice of untamed wilderness, it's all good to me as long as it's designed and executed well.
The best series of articles I have ever read on the subject of dungeon design comes from Deeper in the Game (not my blog). I'll post the series below. It's a must-read in my view before any DM designs a dungeon:
1) Dungeons Part One: Theory and Design
2) Dungeons Part Two: What Players Want
3) Dungeons Part Three: Running the Dungeon
4) Dungeons Part Four: Threat Structure
5) Dungeons Part Five: Information Management
6) Dungeons Part Six: Monsters, Hazards, and Stunting
7) Dungeons Part Seven: Flow and Area Encounter Design
Ravenheart87
Explorer
Huge crawls? Where? Seriously, I barely see any, although we might have a different opinion about what's huge.
As for smaller crawls I can wholeheartedly recommend the DCC RPG adventures. They are usually smaller locations and can be finished in 4-6 hours. They are also very different and are full of interesting ideas, brilliant challenges, new monsters, weird places.
When I'm out of ideas about how to make my dungeon interesting, I put down the Dungeon Alphabet from my shelf, which is probably the best goddamn sourcebook written about dungeons. Another thing I usually do to make dungeons more interesting is taking examples from the genial Paul/Jennel Jaquays and include a lot of loops and forks in my dungeons. I hate linear dungeons, they are boring to explore.
As for smaller crawls I can wholeheartedly recommend the DCC RPG adventures. They are usually smaller locations and can be finished in 4-6 hours. They are also very different and are full of interesting ideas, brilliant challenges, new monsters, weird places.
When I'm out of ideas about how to make my dungeon interesting, I put down the Dungeon Alphabet from my shelf, which is probably the best goddamn sourcebook written about dungeons. Another thing I usually do to make dungeons more interesting is taking examples from the genial Paul/Jennel Jaquays and include a lot of loops and forks in my dungeons. I hate linear dungeons, they are boring to explore.
neobolts
Explorer
I am including one big crawl dungeon as part of a larger campaign. We have newer players who want to see various play styles.
Overview:
The dungeon is a castle that was abandoned after being sacked during a great war 25 years prior. To try to keep it fresh, the party is picking up scraps of information about the various factions who occupy different parts of the castle. They've even gotten bounties or other motivation from townspeople who have knowledge of various "bosses" of the dungeon. Additionally, each floor of the castle has a theme to keep each floor fresh.
The Party's Progress so far:
They entered at the first floor, and the party had done their homework and learned that going down, not up, was better as no one who headed up has lived to tell the tale. They'll clear the upper floors last. They just finished clearing floor -2, the baths.
The Castle: (Floor # - Theme of Floor: Faction)
Floor 3 - Throne Room, Royal Chambers, Library: ???
Floor 2 - Barracks, Great Hall: Evil Wizard
Floor 1 - Kitchens, Chapel, Castle Grounds (outer walls, barn, icehouse, dovecote, etc): Slavers, Duegar
Floor -1 - Workshops (Armorsmith, Barding smith, Weaponsmith, Bowyer/Fletcher, Potter): Classic D&D monsters (rust monster, basilisk, lycanthrope)
Floor -2 - Baths (now flooded), Natural Cave : Kuo-Toa, Sea Hags
Floor -3 - Undercroft: Undead/Necromancer
Floor -4 - Stockades: Orcs/Fiends
Floor -5 - Catacombs, Entrance to the Underdark: Cultists
Overview:
The dungeon is a castle that was abandoned after being sacked during a great war 25 years prior. To try to keep it fresh, the party is picking up scraps of information about the various factions who occupy different parts of the castle. They've even gotten bounties or other motivation from townspeople who have knowledge of various "bosses" of the dungeon. Additionally, each floor of the castle has a theme to keep each floor fresh.
The Party's Progress so far:
They entered at the first floor, and the party had done their homework and learned that going down, not up, was better as no one who headed up has lived to tell the tale. They'll clear the upper floors last. They just finished clearing floor -2, the baths.
The Castle: (Floor # - Theme of Floor: Faction)
Floor 3 - Throne Room, Royal Chambers, Library: ???
Floor 2 - Barracks, Great Hall: Evil Wizard
Floor 1 - Kitchens, Chapel, Castle Grounds (outer walls, barn, icehouse, dovecote, etc): Slavers, Duegar
Floor -1 - Workshops (Armorsmith, Barding smith, Weaponsmith, Bowyer/Fletcher, Potter): Classic D&D monsters (rust monster, basilisk, lycanthrope)
Floor -2 - Baths (now flooded), Natural Cave : Kuo-Toa, Sea Hags
Floor -3 - Undercroft: Undead/Necromancer
Floor -4 - Stockades: Orcs/Fiends
Floor -5 - Catacombs, Entrance to the Underdark: Cultists
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Salamandyr
Adventurer
I too don't particular care for the "Huge" dungeon crawl-huge in quotes to denote that I mean a site based adventure that takes several play sessions to complete that can't be done without either leaving the dungeon or holing up in a room to rest.
I think the last one of these I did was maybe Keep on the Shadowfell. After that I played a lot of the RPGA Living Forgotten Realms games and got to like setting up each session with a discrete story and a number of encounters that can be gotten through in 2 to 4 hours (with one short rest). So when I design dungeons, I try for that same concept-3 to 5 encounters of varying difficulties, and a couple decision points/roleplaying opportunities to allow players to influence the course of the adventure.
I think the last one of these I did was maybe Keep on the Shadowfell. After that I played a lot of the RPGA Living Forgotten Realms games and got to like setting up each session with a discrete story and a number of encounters that can be gotten through in 2 to 4 hours (with one short rest). So when I design dungeons, I try for that same concept-3 to 5 encounters of varying difficulties, and a couple decision points/roleplaying opportunities to allow players to influence the course of the adventure.
iserith
Magic Wordsmith
Also, since you discuss D&D 4e's Dungeon Delve book, I have some thoughts on that as well. When I was only playing D&D 4e (2008 to 2010), I'd run my campaign on Saturday and inevitably after we were done some people would hang out afterward jonesing for more D&D. So oftentimes we'd pull out Dungeon Delve and just do a scenario. We called this "The Graveyard Shift" game because it was usually late as heck.
While it was something to do and we had fun, I never liked the scenarios. First, they were based on pre-MM3 math, so they weren't much of a challenge as written. As well, they were very linear. I also didn't like that they used dungeon tiles to create the maps for those scenarios - dungeon tiles look chintzy to me. (But, whatever, I was redrawing it on the battlemat at the time anyway.)
When I started running a lot of pickup groups on Roll20 starting in 2012 or so, I wanted to create a format for adventures that could be done with 5 players in four hours. I also wanted them to be very replayable - if you played it today, you could play it tomorrow, still be challenged, and see a different story created as a result of play. I ended up creating something pretty cool that was very popular on Roll20, an adventure format I called The Delve.
The Delve consisted of three scenes on 18 x 18 square maps. These scenes could be played in any order as the players liked which dealt to some extent with the linearity of Dungeon Delve. These challenges generally had specific objectives that didn't require a fight to the death. Before each scene there would be a short skill challenge which connected the scenes and could net the party some advantages to use in the upcoming scene or would cost them something (usually healing surges) if they failed it. After we did character bonds before action began, each character would declare a magical item they're interested in finding. In two of the scenes and in one of the skill challenges, there would be a chance to win or find an item. (Players would roll a d20 and the highest would know their item was in play for that scene.) After all three skill challenges and scenes were done, we'd do a collaborative montage for the denouement, describing the aftermath.
I'd run these delves in a very tight fashion, great pacing, with the drama turned up to 11. Scenarios included seeking soul fragments of an archmage in a dungeon overrun by an orcish army, survival in the wastes of Dark Sun, saving a town from three hags on the night of the blood moon, and dealing with a horde of zombies in a swamp full of hillbillies. (Plus a bunch more.) These were very fun, created some excellent stories, and as expected were quite replayable. This format could easily be used in D&D 5e as well, so hopefully this long-winded post is useful to someone!
Iosue
Legend
Basically, to me a huge dungeon is little different than, say, a wilderness with a couple different cities/town/villages and various terrain (and accompanying monsters). It's a big deep pond, and the PCs are a stone (or four!) that gets thrown in, creating ripples throughout. The dungeon is not in a state of stasis waiting for the adventurers to arrive; once the PCs penetrate the earliest levels, that has an effect on the levels below (or above) them. Even though the contents may be for the large part randomly generated, the inhabitants remain a society of sorts, reacting to each other as well as the adventurers.
I try to avoid a situation where the PCs are going door-to-door, killing all inhabitants therein. There's combat, but also negotiations, trickery, alliances, advances, retreats, and just plain exploration of interesting areas. The only real difference is that instead of being spread over different areas of a wilderness map, everything's stacked together in one place.
I try to avoid a situation where the PCs are going door-to-door, killing all inhabitants therein. There's combat, but also negotiations, trickery, alliances, advances, retreats, and just plain exploration of interesting areas. The only real difference is that instead of being spread over different areas of a wilderness map, everything's stacked together in one place.
Queer Venger
Dungeon Master is my Daddy
As a DM I tolerate them. I may have a session or two take place in a dungeon, but not an entire campaign, unless the party frequently returns to the surface to deal with other threats, heal, recover and then return to the dungeon. I like to break it up.
Rod Staffwand
aka Ermlaspur Flormbator
I'm not a fan of the classic dungeon of any size. It just seems like such an artificial environment to me with its seemingly randomly sprinkled traps, treasures and monsters. I certainly not interested in writing, mapping and stocking a 100 room complex as a DM or the dungeon-crawling routine as a player. Luckily, D&D does very well without the D. I suppose you could run it without the other D as well, but I don't know why you'd want to.
When I use complex environments (say the PCs are sneaking into an enemy fortress) I will outline general areas, points of interest, obstacles and dangers rather than doing a full map. Points of interest (the wizard's laboratory, the dragon's den) get more in-depth write-ups while the areas that surround them (corridors, generic storerooms) will be improvised during play. Each point of interest will usually have 2-3 access routes that the party can investigate and choice from. Some might be trapped or guarded, others might be secret or require special movement to use.
Unused points of interest often get repurposed for other adventures. I'll usually do this with traps, obstacles and complications since I'll often need to interject these with the party goes "off script" and I have to quickly come up with content.
This all works because I never run dungeon exploration games wherein the party's primary goal is to literally explore a dungeon. We all find it a rather dull motivation. If the PCs go to an adventuring environment its always to retrieve a relic, stop a villain, seal a portal, find information, save the world, etc. So in that sense, what's important is their goal and the obstacles between them and it.
When I use complex environments (say the PCs are sneaking into an enemy fortress) I will outline general areas, points of interest, obstacles and dangers rather than doing a full map. Points of interest (the wizard's laboratory, the dragon's den) get more in-depth write-ups while the areas that surround them (corridors, generic storerooms) will be improvised during play. Each point of interest will usually have 2-3 access routes that the party can investigate and choice from. Some might be trapped or guarded, others might be secret or require special movement to use.
Unused points of interest often get repurposed for other adventures. I'll usually do this with traps, obstacles and complications since I'll often need to interject these with the party goes "off script" and I have to quickly come up with content.
This all works because I never run dungeon exploration games wherein the party's primary goal is to literally explore a dungeon. We all find it a rather dull motivation. If the PCs go to an adventuring environment its always to retrieve a relic, stop a villain, seal a portal, find information, save the world, etc. So in that sense, what's important is their goal and the obstacles between them and it.
Ravenheart87
Explorer
That sounds like a badly designed dungeon. I don't like those either. A good dungeon has some (often crazed) logic to it, and usually several factions that can be used as enemies or allies. A good example for the latter is be R. E. Howard's Red Nails - which is IMO a far better example for a functional dungeon in fantasy literature, than Moria.
Interestingly those things can happen in dungeons too.
It's just a different kind of environment.Similar Threads
