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<blockquote data-quote="Philotomy Jurament" data-source="post: 4701485" data-attributes="member: 20854">Well, as I mentioned, above, I think the idea of &quot;all crawl all the time&quot; is something of a straw-mannish concept.&nbsp; (Not only because even heavily dungeon-based campaigns have non-dungeon aspects, but also because I think many peoples' concept of a &quot;dungeon crawl&quot; is something of a caricature.) However, since I think that an entire campaign centered around a <a href="http://www.philotomy.com/#dungeon" target="_blank">huge dungeon underworld</a> is a viable (and fun) concept, I'll take a stab at this.A campaign centered around a huge dungeon needn't lack the features of any other campaign, with many of these elements being present in the dungeon, itself.&nbsp; A well-designed campaign dungeon will have plenty of room for player choice and player decisions (where to go, when to go there).&nbsp; It will have factions and politics.&nbsp; It will have friendly and malignant NPCs, with some being recurring characters.&nbsp; It will have lots of role-playing opportunities (especially if the PCs are utilizing hirelings and henchmen).&nbsp; It will certainly have mysteries and puzzles, as well as combat.&nbsp; It will have secrets and sublevels that remain long undiscovered, and uncovering things like this will be a big reward (and bragging rights) -- &quot;you'll never believe what we found on the second level in that big room with the obelisk -- yeah, the one you guys explored a few months ago.&quot;&nbsp; It will have a nearby town or city, and probably a wilderness around it (or nearby).&nbsp; In my experience, you don't even have to pre-arrange all these things -- they'll happen naturally, during play.(Incidentally, I have a <a href="http://www.philotomy.com/#creating_dungeon" target="_blank">new musing on creating an old-school dungeon</a> up on my site.)</blockquote>

[QUOTE="Philotomy Jurament, post: 4701485, member: 20854"] Well, as I mentioned, above, I think the idea of "all crawl all the time" is something of a straw-mannish concept. (Not only because even heavily dungeon-based campaigns have non-dungeon aspects, but also because I think many peoples' concept of a "dungeon crawl" is something of a caricature.) However, since I think that an entire campaign centered around a [url=http://www.philotomy.com/#dungeon]huge dungeon underworld[/url] is a viable (and fun) concept, I'll take a stab at this. A campaign centered around a huge dungeon needn't lack the features of any other campaign, with many of these elements being present in the dungeon, itself. A well-designed campaign dungeon will have plenty of room for player choice and player decisions (where to go, when to go there). It will have factions and politics. It will have friendly and malignant NPCs, with some being recurring characters. It will have lots of role-playing opportunities (especially if the PCs are utilizing hirelings and henchmen). It will certainly have mysteries and puzzles, as well as combat. It will have secrets and sublevels that remain long undiscovered, and uncovering things like this will be a big reward (and bragging rights) -- "you'll never believe what we found on the second level in that big room with the obelisk -- yeah, the one you guys explored a few months ago." It will have a nearby town or city, and probably a wilderness around it (or nearby). In my experience, you don't even have to pre-arrange all these things -- they'll happen naturally, during play. (Incidentally, I have a [url=http://www.philotomy.com/#creating_dungeon]new musing on creating an old-school dungeon[/url] up on my site.) [/QUOTE]

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