D&D General Best dungeons?

[Lazybones]

I mostly run home brew but I agree of what I've ran Forge of Furry is better than it has any right to be.

I'd nominated The Caverns of Thracia but I've never played or ran it but some day...

I ran the original Caverns of Thracia several times back in the AD&D days and as mega-dungeons go, it's quite good. The many levels are interconnected in unexpected ways and it's rare for two runs to go exactly the same way. You can easily run a whole campaign there. I bought the 3e conversion when it came out, and I may do the same when Goodman Games puts out their 5e version.

I'm running Forge of Fury (the 5e version from Tales from the Yawning Portal) right now, in fact my group just began their third visit to the dungeon earlier today. I agree with all of Evaniel's points above. The roper fight was a big surprise that almost killed a PC, and the duergar encounter turned into a roleplaying opportunity that I used to preview the presence of the dragon. I like how each time you think you've found all there is to find, suddenly there's a whole other level with different kinds of threats. Plus as others have noted, it makes sense from a dungeon ecology standpoint.

I haven't actually run it, just used it for inspiration, but I have a fondness for the adventure "Tallow's Deep" in Dungeon magazine #18. Lots of creative traps, and makes your players take goblins seriously as a threat.

 

[the Jester]

My favorite is a homebrew, Bile Mountain, which I have run in multiple incarnations in both 3e and 4e-

Bile Mountain
Return to Bile Mountain
Beyond Bile Mountain
Revenge on Bile Mountain
The Bile Mountain Casino and Resort

It lacks one thing that most great dungeons have, which is a bunch of ways to enter and bypass levels; but it has, or had, a ton of great, interesting monsters, truly horrific villains, a variety of factions that could be set at odds with one another, and an evolving, ongoing story (or stories). It's also deadly enough in some incarnations that it TPKed a 3e epic level party that got cocky and split up inside.

As far as published dungeons go, I'd probably say The Secret of Bone Hill and the Gates of Firestorm Peak are among my favorites. Again, super cool bad guys, interesting factions, cool layouts, etc.

 

[Lakesidefantasy]

The Vivified Labyrinth from Curse of the Crimson Throne was a lot of fun. It's a dungeon set on a series of giant gears that changes configuration as you pull different levers to explorer it. It separated the bard from the rest of the party.

Also, The Clash of the Kingslayers has a dungeon that you explore, then it transforms into a walking juggernaut and you get to explore the dungeon again in order to stop it.

Then there's Sersa Victory's Necropolis of the Mailed First. I have but five words to describe this dungeon: Swarm of Spheres of Annihilation.

 

[Clint_L]

Probably White Plume Mountain. There's no deep underlying narrative and it doesn't necessarily make a ton of sense, but it's basically an old school dungeon crawl that I find incredibly fun.

 

[GuyBoy]

I love Forge of Fury, and have run it at least four times with different groups.
Rappan Athuk is, rightly IMO, something of a legend; it's huge, deadly and fun.
Both Caverns of Thracia and Dark Tower are masterpieces of early dungeon design. I'm looking forward to running the latter in my next campaign.

 

[Mistwell]

I notice there's no mention of Waterdeep: Dungeon of the Mad Mage. And I agree as written it doesn't rank among the best. However we've been adventuring in it for 2 years now in one game, and with the right tweaking (by our excellent DM) it really rocks.

 

[LordEntrails]

My thoughts before I got to @Mistwell post and now emphasizing it, IMO the DM matters much more than the written/drawn dungeon. And then the players can turn a good dungeon into a bad campaign or with a good DM a poor dungeon in a great campaign.

I'd say somewhere around 75% of what makes a great dungeon is the DM and players.

Accounting for the play group, I would say Undermountain, but a version heavily developed from what has ever been published. UM as published has never been more than a rough toolkit (2e) or a mediocre reenvisioning (DotMM/5E).

Ignoring the play group, since we can't really account for that, I actually liked Against the Slave Lords. You know, the part where you are thrown in the dungeon with no supplies etc. Sure, all sort of possible complaints about agency etc. But it had all the elements for me for a lot of fun (exploration, danger, creative challenges, meaningful choices). At least if I remember it correctly!

 

[Upper_Krust]

Stonehell was excellent up until the 10th (and final) level of the dungeon (which was terrible). I played in a group who started at the 1st level, I joined when they just started on Level 5. So I can only comment on levels 5-10 personally (though they made it through the first four levels so it must have been entertaining enough).

Dungeon Levels 5-9 were extremely enjoyable, lots of variety, interesting new monsters and cool variants of existing monsters and fun NPCs.

Dungeon Level 10 had almost no combat, what felt like a hundred dead ends and used the same portal to an Earth tv show/videogame gimmick a few times too many.

But overall, levels 5-9 were so good the disappointing level 10 couldn't ruin it.

 

[Bill Zebub]

I notice there's no mention of Waterdeep: Dungeon of the Mad Mage. And I agree as written it doesn't rank among the best. However we've been adventuring in it for 2 years now in one game, and with the right tweaking (by our excellent DM) it really rocks.

Boy you must have a truly excellent DM. I can't stand that dungeon.

 

[Sacrosanct]

B2, Keep on the Borderlands, and S1: White Plume Mountain

B2 gets a lot of criticism, but the reason I love it is not because it was the "default" first module (it wasn't for me anyway). And it wasn't because of the caves themselves (even though the caves really shine when you impalement alliances between the clans with the final priest in charge of them all and not just individual caves that don't really interact with each other).

The reason I love it is because of what a great sandbox it was. In a small module, there is still so much information about surrounding areas that really drove my imagination to turn it into an entire campaign. The Keep is a great base of operations for turning B2 into a much larger thing. To me, that's what makes D&D great: it lets you as the DM create your own adventures and stories on top of the existing adventure.