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<blockquote data-quote="KesselZero" data-source="post: 5930369" data-attributes="member: 6689976">My favorite D&amp;D moment from the last four years occurred while delving an ancient dwarven tomb. We found a seemingly abstract pattern carved into the wall. Points on it were labeled in Dwarven so it was clearly a map, but none of our characters spoke Dwarven. If we had, we would have figured it out in a second, but instead all five players were on their feet, huddled around the handout the DM gave us, trying to make sense of this map. Eventually we started comparing it to our map of the campaign area-- &quot;Hmm, this point and that point are in the same relationship as where we are now and the lost elven forest city we've heard about, so that big marking must be the elven city&quot;-- and suddenly it hit us: we weren't just in any old dwarven tomb, we were in the tomb of one of the three great dwarven heroes of old! And those other two small marks must be the locations of the other two heroes' tombs! And there was a big mark for the elven city because the wall map was made at a time when the dwarves and elves were closely allied against the monstrous hordes, which we knew from moldering wall hangings earlier in the tomb that showed dwarves and elves fighting side-by-side!It was a thrilling moment in which we the players did all the heavy lifting. No skill checks were rolled, and in fact it would have been short-circuited if anyone had known Dwarven. There was tension and drama; we learned more about the campaign world and engaged meaningfully with the environment; we got sucked into the gameworld completely for a few minutes.That's exploration!</blockquote>

[QUOTE="KesselZero, post: 5930369, member: 6689976"] My favorite D&D moment from the last four years occurred while delving an ancient dwarven tomb. We found a seemingly abstract pattern carved into the wall. Points on it were labeled in Dwarven so it was clearly a map, but none of our characters spoke Dwarven. If we had, we would have figured it out in a second, but instead all five players were on their feet, huddled around the handout the DM gave us, trying to make sense of this map. Eventually we started comparing it to our map of the campaign area-- "Hmm, this point and that point are in the same relationship as where we are now and the lost elven forest city we've heard about, so that big marking must be the elven city"-- and suddenly it hit us: we weren't just in any old dwarven tomb, we were in the tomb of one of the three great dwarven heroes of old! And those other two small marks must be the locations of the other two heroes' tombs! And there was a big mark for the elven city because the wall map was made at a time when the dwarves and elves were closely allied against the monstrous hordes, which we knew from moldering wall hangings earlier in the tomb that showed dwarves and elves fighting side-by-side! It was a thrilling moment in which we the players did all the heavy lifting. No skill checks were rolled, and in fact it would have been short-circuited if anyone had known Dwarven. There was tension and drama; we learned more about the campaign world and engaged meaningfully with the environment; we got sucked into the gameworld completely for a few minutes. That's exploration! [/QUOTE]

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