Mannahnin
Scion of Murgen (He/Him)
As Reynard said, you can have plot and stories IN and around a mega-dungeon, but typically they are things that happen within it- it does not exist principally to service a given plot.
I don't think it exclusively has to be played in a Rogue-like fashion, either, but navigating the space and "solving" navigation puzzles are definitely part of the point, which makes it not 100% suited to 4E.
I did run Thunderspire Mountain in 4E back in the day, which was an interesting 4E-style take on a megadungeon. Instead of pages and pages or poster maps of mapped dungeon levels, 4E abstracted the vast majority of the labyrinth, providing a single high-level map showing relative positions of special and important locations (some of them detailed in the module, others briefly described for the DM to develop if desired). Skill checks could be used to navigate around the dungeon, and there was a list of random encounters, some or most of which had some connection to various sub-plots in the dungeon. If I rolled one I'd pull out a random dungeon battle map to represent wherever the encounter happened to occur. Detailed battle maps were given for planned set-piece encounters, and a map was given for the Seven-Pillared Hall, a small town of sorts, the base camp for various explorers and adventurers delving Thunderspire, run by a group of mages with their own agendas. I enjoyed it a good bit and as I recall my players did too.
I do think OSE or B/X, with a couple of house rules, would be my first choice for such a campaign. I used Labyrinth Lord a bit when I first started exploring the OSR, but I'm not super into the rules departures it makes.
I don't think it exclusively has to be played in a Rogue-like fashion, either, but navigating the space and "solving" navigation puzzles are definitely part of the point, which makes it not 100% suited to 4E.
I did run Thunderspire Mountain in 4E back in the day, which was an interesting 4E-style take on a megadungeon. Instead of pages and pages or poster maps of mapped dungeon levels, 4E abstracted the vast majority of the labyrinth, providing a single high-level map showing relative positions of special and important locations (some of them detailed in the module, others briefly described for the DM to develop if desired). Skill checks could be used to navigate around the dungeon, and there was a list of random encounters, some or most of which had some connection to various sub-plots in the dungeon. If I rolled one I'd pull out a random dungeon battle map to represent wherever the encounter happened to occur. Detailed battle maps were given for planned set-piece encounters, and a map was given for the Seven-Pillared Hall, a small town of sorts, the base camp for various explorers and adventurers delving Thunderspire, run by a group of mages with their own agendas. I enjoyed it a good bit and as I recall my players did too.
I do think OSE or B/X, with a couple of house rules, would be my first choice for such a campaign. I used Labyrinth Lord a bit when I first started exploring the OSR, but I'm not super into the rules departures it makes.
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