[poll] Do your dungeons make logical sense?

[MarauderX]

They MUST, as a DM and a player I am always looking at places in a logical fashion and I can't stand it when things don't line up or make sense. Call me a freak for details, but I can't stay into the dungeon if it isn't making much sense - like how many beholders live next door to a dragon and share a room with a basilisk. As a player it's gotta be well thought out or else I tend not to like the campaign and want to quit. When a DM I make sure things are worked out well in advance and try to include information about ANYTHING the PCs might run into.

 

[ThoughtBubble]

I'd love for my dungeons to make more sense. But given that I was running a weekly campaign, I simply didn't have the time. Now I'm trying to build them logically, but logically, I figure that there probablly wasn't a really good reason to build a large expanse of tunnels when it's so much easier to make above ground housing. Thus, I decided not to think about it so much, toss something together, and focus on getting my players to take their characters out of hiding to go investigate the thing.

Maybe someday they'll make sense.

 

[Wormwood]

Bah.

When weighing verisimilitude versus playability, playability always wins.

The most I'm concerned about is that everything fits neatly on a battlemat (lots of right angles, not a lot of rough cavern walls, 5' square base).

Oh, and I avoid mazes, since player mapping is boring.

 

[Dragonblade]

I try to make all my dungeons logical. But when I was ten years old and first started playing D&D years ago that wasn't only the case.

I would have rooms with monsters in them and no logical reason for them to be there.

Basically a vampire in a lounge chair, sipping a bloody mary next to a pile of gold. Just waiting for some band of adventurers to open the door and relieve the hideous boredom!

 

[Gez]

Do your caves have a functional ecosystem?
My dungeons are rarely big enough to have an ecosystem, outside of normal-sized vermins and microorganism. Just a normal building, that happens to be used by an antagonist, with some guards and sentries, sometimes pets and traps too. Those that have ecosystems are funky pocket planes or are connected to the Nether (underdark).

Do inhabitants make logical use of their resources (magical items can be sold if they can't be used, etc...) ?
As much as possible.

Do your evil temples have a viable way of staying in business (income vs expenses) ?
Yes.

Do you place privies on your maps? If not, do you put chamber pots in the rooms?
Provided the place hasn't been built to undead, construct, or other creatures that don't need such facilities, yes.

Do you worry about lighting (torch brackets, braziers...)? Food supply, storage, and preparation? Repair and maintenance? Laundry?
Yes.

Do you have a supply of fresh water? Fresh air?
Yes.

How is the place heated in the winter?
It depends. Deep caverns have a constant temperature and don't need to be heated. If there's a need, there are way to heat the place. Usually simple chimneys, but magic may also be used (permanency + heat metal or firewall, for example).

Is there a key to every lock (even if it's in the room that's locked)?
Provided the key hasn't been destroyed, lost, or taken away by someone who's far away from the "dungeon", yes.

Are there pillars to keep the ceilings in the bigger rooms from collapsing (that's the limit of my archetechural knowledge)?

Depends on how the room was made. I allow for a bit of fantastical architecture when it fit the place.

If you have undead, do you know who created them, why, and what their orders are? Do they follow the rules for number of undead controllable at once?
Yes, yes, yes, usually.

Traps. Who resets, reloads and repairs them? Are they in places where inhabitants might accidentally set them off (That's a no-no)?
In an abandonned dungeon (old ruins, etc.), noone resets, reloads and repairs trap. Otherwise, there inhabitants. They may be placed in dangerous places, depending on the mentality of inhabitants.

Do your creatures have mates, eggs, young, non-combatants, etc?
Yes, when appropriate. (A lich lair don't need youngs, a bandit outpost won't have non-combatants, but a village or camp will.)

 

[s/LaSH]

Always loved realism. I have a little more emphasis on it in my campaign because it's historical, so things like Roman ruins and abandoned fortresses have to make sense, but then I have to do something extra, like hit it with an earthquake and have half the dungeon ten feet lower than the first half. And have distinct living quarters for the squatters that moved in a few weeks ago. And have a reason for undead in sealed rooms. And put something very nasty indeed in a locked room and then drop hints about its master from five hundred years in the past. (Chapter One of my webcomic, actually. Based on the map in the back of the PHB.)

Right now I'm on thin ice with a real dungeon crawl, which appears to be mostly set up to keep people out and is built backwards. It's... weird. But I had to have swinging blades and a pit of alligators at some point, right? And it gave me a chance to play the Raiders Of The Lost Ark march when the PCs triggered the lava trap in the first room. (Let's just say the people who built this place don't have your mundane human concerns. It's like a screen door for them.)

 

[Desdichado]

Where's the "I don't really do dungeons" option?

 

[Mulkhoran]

Other

Mine make no sense at all. No euclidean sense, that is.

Ph'nglui mglw'nafh Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn!

 

[Vaxalon]

Do your caves have a functional ecosystem?

Yes. In my present dungeon, it's based on a magical gourd that grows when fed fresh blood from intelligent victims.

Do inhabitants make logical use of their resources (magical items can be sold if they can't be used, etc...)

Sell to whom? But yes, if there are two friendly groups near to each other, they will trade if they have the opportunity.

Do your evil temples have a viable way of staying in business (income vs expenses?)

I try to limit the population of any ruling class, temple or not, to ten percent of the total population.

Do you place privies on your maps? If not, do you put chamber pots in the rooms?

Many races don't have privies per se; if a stream runs through their territory, they designate the upstream part as the water source and the downstream part as the sewer.

Do you worry about lighting (torch brackets, braziers...)? Food supply, storage, and preparation? Repair and maintenance? Laundry??

Lighting isn't an issue with races that have darkvision. Food supply depends on the race. The Stronghold Builder's Guide helps a lot when answering these questions.

Do you have a supply of fresh water? Fresh air??

How do you mean, fresh air? Caves that have more than one entrance almost always have a breeze blowing through them. Have you been spelunking much? People don't suffocate in caves unless they get trapped in a small space that is sealed off by water.

How is the place heated in the winter??

I guess you haven't been in caves much. I'd recommend doing some research.

There's a cave in Wisconsin, Firebird cave, where I went camping as a boy scout. It was midwinter. At night, it dropped to about ten below outside. The cave was sealed off by a simple wooden wall... no insulation. Inside the cave it was a nice toasty 58 degrees fahrenheit.

Is there a key to every lock (even if it's in the room that's locked)??

Yep. I write down on the lock description who has the keys to that lock, and make sure to write down on the creature description that it has a key or keys.

Are there pillars to keep the ceilings in the bigger rooms from collapsing (that's the limit of my archetechural knowledge)?

Either that, or magic.

If you have undead, do you know who created them, why, and what their orders are? Do they follow the rules for number of undead controllable at once??

Not all undead are controlled. Ghouls, shadows, wights, wraiths, and vampires can reproduce. On the rare occasion that a necromancer is creating undead to control, yes, I keep track of those rules.

Traps. Who resets, reloads and repairs them? Are they in places where inhabitants might accidentally set them off (That's a no-no)??

Sure.

Do your creatures have mates, eggs, young, non-combatants, etc?

Not always. War-parties don't have them, and some races (such as kobolds, in my game) don't have non-combatant mates.

 

[Vaxalon]

... I figure that there probablly wasn't a really good reason to build a large expanse of tunnels when it's so much easier to make above ground housing.....

If you look at the way the rules work, underground tunnels are about the only kind of construction that is really secure. An above ground castle is just too vulnerable to attack.