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*TTRPGs General
Classic dungeons: What makes them great?
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<blockquote data-quote="Jhaelen" data-source="post: 3735871" data-attributes="member: 46713"><p>Nice analysis! <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":)" title="Smile :)" data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":)" /></p><p>Those are the most important points, IME. I think it actually boils down to two major criteria:</p><p>1) Believability: A good dungeon must make sense on at least some basic level. If you invest some thoughts about its history that will improve all its other aspects: the atmosphere, level of detail, inhabitants, map layout, etc.</p><p>2) Encounter design: There must be some variance in type, difficulty, required tactics and/or theme. If there are several factions involved that's (almost) always a big plus for a dungeon adventure because it adds roleplaying opportunities.</p><p></p><p>However, I think that the majority of the adventures that are considered classics today are not really that great at all. Many suffer from an odd mix of creatures, unfair death traps, and simply being too big/long and/or not having enough variance in the encounter design.</p><p></p><p>I remember having lots of fun playing several of them, nonetheless. But I doubt the experience would be repeatable. After 25 years of roleplaying my expectations are a lot higher and my idea of what constitutes fun has changed considerably.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Jhaelen, post: 3735871, member: 46713"] Nice analysis! :) Those are the most important points, IME. I think it actually boils down to two major criteria: 1) Believability: A good dungeon must make sense on at least some basic level. If you invest some thoughts about its history that will improve all its other aspects: the atmosphere, level of detail, inhabitants, map layout, etc. 2) Encounter design: There must be some variance in type, difficulty, required tactics and/or theme. If there are several factions involved that's (almost) always a big plus for a dungeon adventure because it adds roleplaying opportunities. However, I think that the majority of the adventures that are considered classics today are not really that great at all. Many suffer from an odd mix of creatures, unfair death traps, and simply being too big/long and/or not having enough variance in the encounter design. I remember having lots of fun playing several of them, nonetheless. But I doubt the experience would be repeatable. After 25 years of roleplaying my expectations are a lot higher and my idea of what constitutes fun has changed considerably. [/QUOTE]
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