D&D 5E What Don't You Like About Dungeons?

[cbwjm]

Kobold Press has a book called Engineering Dungeons which has a number of random tables, including things like the purpose and original builders, probably also something to do with current occupants. Even if you don't use the tables it gives an idea of things to think about which can help with immersion. If a dungeon was originally a dwarven mine then maybe there are signs in the dwarf language used for wayfinding, might not be relevant in the actual dungeon if the occupants have changed, but it adds a little something extra.

 

[rmcoen]

Kobold Press has a book called Engineering Dungeons which has a number of random tables, including things like the purpose and original builders, probably also something to do with current occupants. Even if you don't use the tables it gives an idea of things to think about which can help with immersion. If a dungeon was originally a dwarven mine then maybe there are signs in the dwarf language used for wayfinding, might not be relevant in the actual dungeon if the occupants have changed, but it adds a little something extra.

In the case of my dwarven mine, there were indeed signs in dwarven. And old mining gear. the PCs oiled up an old mining cart and pushed it along initially, to carry stuff they found while exploring! They even stumbled across the skeletons of dwarven rear guard and the goblins that were invading... and watched the skeletons animate and refight that last battle. Shrooms and fungus had started growing in wet areas, and giant centipedes (and a mama carrion crawler) were now living in the area, eating the shrooms. And far down, a goblin shaman was harvesting a vein/stream of naptha to make firebombs...

(and, after clearing out the goblin and his ogre allies, the PCs found the back exit of the mine, which gave them hidden access to enemy areas they couldn't reach overland!)

 

[W'rkncacnter]

a manifestation of a dying god's fever dream,

or, more worryingly, not a dying god - but one that's starting to wake up.

 

[Jolly Ruby]

I like dungeons, not as the sole feature of a campaign, but as an integral, even central, part of it. Dungeons are a great place to place your main conflicts because they are a space where the party can exert all the main pillars of play: of course you can have combat, but you can also have social encounters, specially if playing with factions, and exploration is the main component of a dungeon (and I dare to say, the only part where "exploration" really works on 5e).

Although, a campaign constituted only by dungeons is a bit boring, at least to me (both as DM and as player). What I like to do is use them sparingly, usually as the point of culmination of conflicts that started outside of it. For example, the party reaches a town and seeks out rumors, taking knowledge of a mysterious chain of murder. Maybe because there's a reward, some personal reason or pure curiosity, they try to solve the case. The clues they find lead to a number of suspects, until they find the culprit, a retainer of a noble house. Upon bringing him to justice, they discover the noble family is involved with the crimes, and maybe even are some sort of cult. Now the party has to infiltrate the family's villa and uncover the real reasons behind the murders. There we have, a dungeon!

 

[Clint_L]

I like dungeons, not as the sole feature of a campaign, but as an integral, even central, part of it. Dungeons are a great place to place your main conflicts because they are a space where the party can exert all the main pillars of play: of course you can have combat, but you can also have social encounters, specially if playing with factions, and exploration is the main component of a dungeon (and I dare to say, the only part where "exploration" really works on 5e).

Although, a campaign constituted only by dungeons is a bit boring, at least to me (both as DM and as player). What I like to do is use them sparingly, usually as the point of culmination of conflicts that started outside of it. For example, the party reaches a town and seeks out rumors, taking knowledge of a mysterious chain of murder. Maybe because there's a reward, some personal reason or pure curiosity, they try to solve the case. The clues they find lead to a number of suspects, until they find the culprit, a retainer of a noble house. Upon bringing him to justice, they discover the noble family is involved with the crimes, and maybe even are some sort of cult. Now the party has to infiltrate the family's villa and uncover the real reasons behind the murders. There we have, a dungeon!

A lot of this discussion sort of depends on how you define a dungeon. For me, the literal definition is anything I would use my dungeon tiles to build. But in terms of gameplay, a dungeon is functionally any interlinked series of confined spaces. A prison is, functionally, a dungeon. A network of caverns: dungeon. Even a bunch of forest clearings connected by paths and surrounded by nigh impassable terrain is in effect a dungeon.

Most combat encounters in D&D occur in either literal dungeons, or dungeon proxies. All that has really changed is that mega-dungeons are no longer the cornerstone of the game at most tables. But they are still awesome and I enjoy them.

 

[Jolly Ruby]

For me, the literal definition is anything I would use my dungeon tiles to build. But in terms of gameplay, a dungeon is functionally any interlinked series of confined spaces.

I tend to agree with both definitions.

 

[Dioltach]

Dungeons are great. 80s music is great. Now I want to create an 80s themed dungeon.

(Giving this a moment's thought, it could work. Rooms themed around particular songs. "You spin me round", "Take my breath away", "I'm on fire", "Maneater", even "Wake me up before you go-go".)

"The Union of the Snake", "Living on a Prayer", "Heart and Soul", "The Reflex", "Walk of Life", "Where Did I Go Wrong?", "Jump", "Eternal Flame", "Hungry Like the Wolf", "Don't Stand So Close to Me", "Rage Hard", "Road to Nowhere", "Toy Soldiers", "Flesh for Fantasy", "Devil Inside", "King of Pain" ...

Actually, I could probably make a dungeon based purely on Duran Duran song titles.

 

[Lanefan]

... "Magic", "Enter Sandman", "A View to a Kill", "(I am) The Warrior", "Hell's Bells", "Holy Diver" (and about 20 other Dio songs), "High Hopes" ...

And for something on the elemental plane of fire: "Beds Are Burning", "Pyromania", "We Didn't Start the Fire", "Sultans of Swing", "White Hot", and "(Tonight) Long Stick Goes Boom" ought to gets things off to a roaring start.

And as they return to town, one hopes for "Brass in Pocket".

 

[iserith]

"The Union of the Snake",

This is actually the name of the yuan-ti faction in my Archipelago Isles island-hopping sandbox. The largest of the islands is dominated by them and their city is built on a megadungeon. And yep, I got it from that song!

 

[Lanefan]

In the past I've named several homebrew adventures after songs, even if the name was the only connection:

Highway to Hel: a party walks into Niflheim to try and rescue a dead PC's soul from Hel, who stole it.
Stairway to Heaven: an invisible stair leads up into a cloud, inside that cloud is a mansion whose owners and staff have all been turned into nasty undead, courtesly of a Loki prank.
Ghost of the Heceta Head (a Lordi song): this one matches the song, where a decent ghost has been driven out of her lighthouse by some other nastier ghosts; the party aid the decent ghost.
Holiday in Puridius: named after Holiday in Cambodia, party went into a nasty realm (Puridius) to take out its very nasty leader.