When we first started playing D&D (1975 or so) we pretty much thought every adventure had to have a dungeon. It was the point of the game really. Sure, I quickly started enjoying fleshing out my fantasy world for the players to explore but honestly it was just a means to get them from one dungeon to another. That all changed after a couple years however and the actual 'dungeon delving' became less and less a part of our games. It was a conscious effort on my part as GM I guess, beginning to feel that we were somehow expanding the game and making it something unique to our group by actually avoiding the good ole dungeons everybody else was still using. (We weren't unique at all of course but in our secluded little group of geeks with no internet to connect with others we were oblivious)
Anyway, even after the foolish notions of 'doing it different' just for the sake of doing it different passed we never returned to the heavily dungeonified ways. Players came and went, I moved and picked up different groups several times but my games were still pretty void of traditional dungeon settings. Entire fantasy campaigns have been played without a classic dungeon included. Even now, 40 years later I can count on one hand the number of 'dungeons' Ive run in the last 10 years.
Reading through the posts here and on other sites it seems that Dungeons are still, at least in some games like D&D, very popular and the mainstay of many a campaign.
Do you feature them in your games regularly? Are they the heart and soul of your games around which the plots weave, or have you visited them less regularly in your games over the years?
Honestly, when I think about it, I miss the old Hack - I may have to work something up as a one shot or something for my current players.
Dungeons _per se_ are much less frequent. Generally locations now have some history that makes more or less sense, as do the people and creatures that are there and why, and any secret passages or traps or defenses, and certainly the loot. Usually that means the locations are not much like ye olde D&D dungeons, though they can function sometimes in similar ways. Though even pretty early in playing TFT, what with the noise rules and GM notes that got me thinking in terms of what the NPCs there know and how they react, once many/most of what's there is aware that fighting/intrusion/theft/etc is going on, most of the NPCs there are raising alarms, running, organizing, panicking, looting, and so on, which tends to make what happens quite a bit different from the (er, trope?) of dealing with dungeon rooms one at a time.
Quote from: rgrove0172;938120When we first started playing D&D (1975 or so) we pretty much thought every adventure had to have a dungeon. It was the point of the game really. Sure, I quickly started enjoying fleshing out my fantasy world for the players to explore but honestly it was just a means to get them from one dungeon to another. That all changed after a couple years however and the actual 'dungeon delving' became less and less a part of our games. It was a conscious effort on my part as GM I guess, beginning to feel that we were somehow expanding the game and making it something unique to our group by actually avoiding the good ole dungeons everybody else was still using. (We weren't unique at all of course but in our secluded little group of geeks with no internet to connect with others we were oblivious)
Anyway, even after the foolish notions of 'doing it different' just for the sake of doing it different passed we never returned to the heavily dungeonified ways. Players came and went, I moved and picked up different groups several times but my games were still pretty void of traditional dungeon settings. Entire fantasy campaigns have been played without a classic dungeon included. Even now, 40 years later I can count on one hand the number of 'dungeons' Ive run in the last 10 years.
Reading through the posts here and on other sites it seems that Dungeons are still, at least in some games like D&D, very popular and the mainstay of many a campaign.
Do you feature them in your games regularly? Are they the heart and soul of your games around which the plots weave, or have you visited them less regularly in your games over the years?
Honestly, when I think about it, I miss the old Hack - I may have to work something up as a one shot or something for my current players.
I followed a very similar path over the years. My first attempts at DMing were very much only dungeon crawls, but once I figured out how much fun world creation and exploration could be dungeons became less frequent. I did one last year, and will probably do one in the immediate future, but the intricate beauty of Tekumel, where most of my campaigns are set, coupled with my player's gaming style/preferences really doesn't require me to use them much. They're there if I want to use them, but aren't really needed by my players and I to keep the game going.
Shemek
Quote from: rgrove0172;938120Do you feature them in your games regularly? Are they the heart and soul of your games around which the plots weave, or have you visited them less regularly in your games over the years?
I rarely play fantasy Rpgs, and don't have any interest in D&D any more, so dungeons aren't featured in my gaming. On those occasions that I do run fantasy I might include some ruined locations to explore, but they're not massive underground complexes. I don't really get into that style of play anymore.
Quote...the heart and soul of your games around which the plots weave.
I don't generate plots in my games. I have timelines, and results that will occur if the characters do, or do not, react or take action. And I have NPC motivations and goals, and an idea of their reaction if their goals are obstructed. But the "plot" is not fixed - it will change dramatically based on player interaction, and I will often be as surprised as the players on the direction that it takes.
D&D has dungeons -- it is right there in the title.
I like dungeons. Have been delving into them for over 30 years now. They are easy milestone markers to remember. We play mostly hack and slash, and for our group, it works and works well.
I don't have a "plot" so the question is irrelevant.
Also, it took us all of 3 months to start going beyond the dungeon in Gygax's game in 1972. The point of the game is exploration.
If a rule book mentions checking for traps, guess what the players will say their characters are doing a lot of the time?
I met a guy online that claimed after 12 years of D&D they still played mainly dungeon adventures and loved it, never even looked to try something else. No harm in that at all, I was just a little suprised. Wondered how prevalent that was.
We're like that bar in the Blues Brothers: we like both kinds of roleplaying, dungeons and dragons.
Quote from: Gronan of Simmerya;938157The point of the game is exploration.
I am playing Skyrim with my 5yo son watching. I commented that it was odd that only I could ride a horse, not any of the companions we can get. Zac said, "only an explorer can ride a horse, not anyone else."
He gets it.
Quote from: Kyle Aaron;938183I am playing Skyrim with my 5yo son watching. I commented that it was odd that only I could ride a horse, not any of the companions we can get. Zac said, "only an explorer can ride a horse, not anyone else."
He gets it.
Unless you install one of the many mods that change this, riders all over Skyrim, wild horses for taming etc.
Quote from: rgrove0172;938120Do you feature them in your games regularly? Are they the heart and soul of your games around which the plots weave, or have you visited them less regularly in your games over the years?
Honestly, when I think about it, I miss the old Hack - I may have to work something up as a one shot or something for my current players.
Well yes. Dungeon crawls are a time honored tradition and the best way to weed out the weak, and reward the lucky. In Dungeons and Dragons, they are so important they get the first word of the game. They are great for low to mid level characters, and using stock villains (Goblins, Kobolds, low level undead etc) is expected. It's something that's easy for the Dungeon Master to do, so they can worry less about plot lines, and let the player characters come into their own. At the lower levels, players may still be working out things like personality and motives. I know I like to figure it out in play. So you run them through a meat grinder which happens to also grind XP and loot, and then when you have other adventures of a more complex nature involving in game politics and intrigue the characters have become more established.
The nice thing about running dungeons or any stock adventure is that you can take the time saved in game planning by planning for the future. Also remember, the best laid plans never survive first contact with the player characters. Letting them murderhobo through the lower levels let's you work out contingencies for when they inevitably run the game off the rails, likely sooner than later. Take advantage of this while you can, particularly when they are still low enough level that you can influence their travel time. Dungeons offer a lot of things in one convenient location. If it's big enough there should be possible rest areas (random encounters can happen) and maybe some sort of merchant, if the place is so big that there is an extended stay, such as in the case of megadungeons.
RP is great and everything but sometimes you just want to kill things and take their stuff.
Quote from: rgrove0172;938185Unless you install one of the many mods that change this, riders all over Skyrim, wild horses for taming etc.
That and over 100 other mods. :D
It's been at least ten years since I ran a dungeon where the player characters would be expected to advance more than one level, and now some of the dungeons are actually cloud giant castles or labyrinthine hedge mazes or whatever rather than underground excavations (or just one place in the Underdark), but I still consider them dungeons if there's more than one place to deal with something (trap, obstacle, NPC to negotiate with or enemy to fight) in a single place. (If there's only one thing, it's just a lair or a dwelling or a trap or whatever.) So, it's changed over time, yes. But I could still see a campaign that was entirely about exploring something like the Mines of Moria, and I still want the players to have to deal with an entire dungeon (more like an old style dungeon level, I guess) without resting/recovering resources.
Quote from: Krimson;938190That and over 100 other mods. :D
Yes I play skyrim with 237 mods running currently and would have more but am afraid eventually something will just implode!
I played in a handful of dungeocrawls. Always found them pretty nonsensical and immersion-breaking.
The majority of my D&D gameplay involves some form of dungeons.
Just like my Warhammer games mostly involve both war and hammers and my Shadowrun games are full of shadows and running.
I guess I'm kind of literal. :)
Quote from: rgrove0172;938120When we first started playing D&D (1975 or so) we pretty much thought every adventure had to have a dungeon. It was the point of the game really. Sure, I quickly started enjoying fleshing out my fantasy world for the players to explore but honestly it was just a means to get them from one dungeon to another. That all changed after a couple years however and the actual 'dungeon delving' became less and less a part of our games. It was a conscious effort on my part as GM I guess, beginning to feel that we were somehow expanding the game and making it something unique to our group by actually avoiding the good ole dungeons everybody else was still using. (We weren't unique at all of course but in our secluded little group of geeks with no internet to connect with others we were oblivious)
Anyway, even after the foolish notions of 'doing it different' just for the sake of doing it different passed we never returned to the heavily dungeonified ways. Players came and went, I moved and picked up different groups several times but my games were still pretty void of traditional dungeon settings. Entire fantasy campaigns have been played without a classic dungeon included. Even now, 40 years later I can count on one hand the number of 'dungeons' Ive run in the last 10 years.
Reading through the posts here and on other sites it seems that Dungeons are still, at least in some games like D&D, very popular and the mainstay of many a campaign.
Do you feature them in your games regularly? Are they the heart and soul of your games around which the plots weave, or have you visited them less regularly in your games over the years?
Honestly, when I think about it, I miss the old Hack - I may have to work something up as a one shot or something for my current players.
Started the Hunter chron just finished now which started with a "dungeon" which was a bandit lair. Had several other "dungeons", including archaeotech ruins and a slaver's den.
Planning to involve some kinda Native American underground ruin patrolled by a Guardian for the upcoming Mage chron that they can get to as a sidequest. That and I'll probably do a warehouse meet redux. Both of those are "dungeons", I guess.
I think of dungeons, to be honest, as more like instances or mission zones. I imagine that doesn't agree with what I assume to be a more traditional definition of it being "enter cave, avoid traps, kill orcs, take their shit, bounce" but then that's kind of shitty and boring and one-dimensional for it to be JUST that. Yeah, mission zones is better (though by no means does it mean that isn't a valid way of RPG'ing!).
Seeing Butcher's links on the SOTDL thread, I'm now starting to understand the specific type of RPG experience like 80% of the guys on here pine for. Definitely something from another generation for me -- I mean, it's on some Traveller shit (and I can't understand the appeal of that either). It's a different mindset to RPGs, very explorer-driven (NOT combat, two very different things) and abstracting stuff away that gets in the way of that. I'm about character-driven stuff, an experience akin to a Vertigo or Dark Horse graphic novel such as Scalped or American Vampire or Solomon Kane or even a Heart of Darkness tale.
Quote from: Tristram Evans;938197I played in a handful of dungeocrawls. Always found them pretty nonsensical and immersion-breaking.
The first time I ever ran D&D was a craptacular dungeon I made up that had no rhyme or reason... and that was the last time I ever designed such a thing.
Very few groups I've played with have featured them either.
Still, I've always like the idea of dungeons as secret lairs and enemy strongholds.
The dungeons in World of Warcraft made a big impression on me in that none of them are just random collections of creatures... they're all home to some faction (or factions), with a history and an agenda. They feel like living spaces rather than a collection of mooks just twiddling their thumbs waiting for adventurers to come by and kill them. Going into them feels to me like a commando raid with more important stakes than just XP and loot. I might be weird that way... but my motivation in WOW was always primarily about uncovering the story... and the dungeons seemed like concentrated doses of the plotline/atmosphere.
Not that any dungeon I'd design would be so linear or unchanging... but the ones I make nowadays aren't just zoos full of weird critters... unless one of them has an actual zoo in it.
Quote from: Simlasa;938206The first time I ever ran D&D was a craptacular dungeon I made up that had no rhyme or reason... and that was the last time I ever designed such a thing.
Very few groups I've played with have featured them either.
I have dungeon dice which I have used in the past, including a couple of adventures in Star Wars d20 RCR, where I used them for the ventilation system of a Imperial Star Destroyer. :D
Grove,
Dungeon is a place.
Hacking is something you do.
If one always means the other, that's just your self-imposed limitation.
"Dungeon" could mean...
- caves
- ruined city
- towers
- sewers of a living city
- the depths of Mirkwood forest
- fortified humanoid outposts
- the worst part of town
...or whatever.
In a "dungeon" you could be...
- questing to save the world (or the princess)
- killing shit and taking their stuff
- trying to find something for whatever purpose
- negotiating a truce between different warring humanoid tribes, bandit groups, cults so that you can do whatever
- trodding the jeweled thrones of the earth under your sandaled feet
- just exploring, Why? Because no one else has an equivalent level of stones and lack of self-preservation
...or whatever.
Bandits are living in an old fort they took over and built up a palisade, with moat and traps. Is that a dungeon? Does it become a dungeon if you move it underground?
Hallways, locked and trapped doors, undead guardians, an insane wizard in his lair...is it no longer a dungeon if it's an old bricked up mansion in the burned out part of the capital city, never renewed after a fire?
Hack and slash campaign, Us Against the Humanoids, fight after fight, week after week...as we house by house, street by street, block by block reclaim a city from the Horde that captured it. Is that a dungeon? Hell is that even Hack and Slash even though it's 100% combat?
Stop worrying about Genre and Tropes, forget coming up with your damn Plots, get roleplayers whose characters have goals and motivations and it won't matter if they decide they want to invade the Caves of Chaos to kill things and take their stuff, you still won't be running a "Dungeon Hack".
Yeah there's people that only do traditional DungeonCrawls, there's also people that go out of their way to avoid them. There's people that play entire 1st-20th Pathfinder Adventure Paths, one after the other with different characters each time, never deviating from a single word on the page and there's people who have never looked at a prewritten adventure.
Different locations in the game function in the same manner as Dungeons, if you consider a "dungeon" to be a web of challenges and reactions. The nearby caves are a dungeon. The abandoned warehouses are a dungeon. Lill's tavern is a (social) dungeon. Now, if you're talking straight out crawls in underground spaces, then I haven't done that, just that, session after session, since I first started playing. Not so much into massive labyrinths, megadungeons and so on, but I assume they're still used, and used regularly, but gamers all over.
My DCC game tends to alternate back and forth between long overland-exploration or city-based hijinks on the one hand, and dungeon-type crawls on the other.
My Dark Albion game very reliably goes back and forth between political/RP-focused or investigative adventures and dungeon-esque adventures (not necessarily dungeons in the classic D&D sense, but ruins, temples, haunted manors, cave complexes, enemy fortresses, etc).