They don't care much, though they may ask questions about inconsistencies after the session (to which I often reply, "Yeah, I'm just stupid."):-)

Quote from: AsenRG;995202None at all. They assume things make sense, and if they see any of your examples, they'd try to find out how that works, and probably a way to turn it to their profit:).
If they see the animal or giant creature, they'd want to know who put it there, and who feeds it.
If they see the non-undead in the sealed dungeon, they'd want to find the stasis pods or conclude it has been breeched.
If they see the mish-mash of monsters living next to each other, they'd try to sic them on each other.

So, you'd better have an answer to all of the above;).

^-- This!!! Exactly this!

Some of that depends on the dungeon and its nature. If they're exploring a very weird, magical kind of dungeon, players seem to be more accepting of that kind of thing, and will often assume there's a "magical" explanation for any oddities (and there usually is). If they're in a more mundane kind of "lair" dungeon, such oddities might attract attention and questions.

In general, I take that approach that weird and fantastic oddities might be present, but should make some sort of sense within the framework of the game world and the specific dungeon/site (so "verisimilitude within the game world" rather than "realism"). My players never complain about this kind of thing, so I guess whatever I'm doing is working fine.

Quote from: The Exploited.;995097Personally, in my old age, I prefer a dungeon to make some sort of sense. I'd prefer to investigate a lair or cult's haven.

But it only has to work with its own internal logic... So if the game is somewhat 'gonzo' then one could expect some kind of strangeness and that works for me too - because it works in the context of the game.

This. "Internal logic" is the key. My players expect that, almost always have. Except for Mary Ellen. She just wants a pet dragon.

Quote from: RPGPundit;995084How nonsensical can a dungeon be without your players complaining? I don't mean having goofy monsters or comedy, I mean things that are illogical: a Giant creature in a room with no doors big enough for him to get out of, an animal locked away in a room it can't open a door to that somehow hasn't starved to death, a dungeon that had been completely sealed for 10000 years that somehow has a bunch of non-undead intelligent monsters just living in it, a mishmash of creatures living right next to each other without killing each other, etc?

Do they allow a certain amount of irrationality? None at all? Or do they really not care about this kind of thing?

They tend to care a lot. If something jars then they coment on it, if it continues to jar they hate it, but if something then happens that makes it fit they love it.

Quote from: AsenRG;995202None at all. They assume things make sense, and if they see any of your examples, they'd try to find out how that works, and probably a way to turn it to their profit:).
If they see the animal or giant creature, they'd want to know who put it there, and who feeds it.
If they see the non-undead in the sealed dungeon, they'd want to find the stasis pods or conclude it has been breeched.
If they see the mish-mash of monsters living next to each other, they'd try to sic them on each other.

So, you'd better have an answer to all of the above;).

So yes, but you let the players do it for you?  Fair enough.

Zip a dee doo dah, zip a dee ay...

OD&D is the game of "Explore the Fun House from Hell," and I wallow in it.

Now, I try my best to make sure players know BEFOREHAND that's what they're gonna get; the key to success is proper management of expectations.

Also, if somebody has an idea that might lead to a good adventure -- "Hey, I have an idea, if we can figure out how that gang of giants is getting their food..." --- I will HAPPILY come up with something "logical" or at least plausible enough for the purpose of an adventure.

But if somebody is busting my nuts because it's "unrealistic," I'll put a McDonald's on the seventh level of the dungeon.  "The monsters eat FUCK YOU, Phil, that's what they eat."

Though I did take the last step recently of setting it up such that Lord Gronan has deliberately built this nightmare dungeon complex as a Darwinistic training ground for heroes.

"There are Things trying to eat this world.  I don't want this world to be eaten; I'm not done living on it.  If I were immortal, and could travel through space and time, I'd travel the time streams looking for the greatest heroes of all time.  I'm not, I can't, so I don't.  If you can thoroughly explore this entire dungeon over the next five years, you'll be good enough to be worth talking to."

It matters to me, a little (I accept that clearly monsters don't need to eat/drink anything like biology would require), but my players don't seem to notice. It may as well all be random.

In the last adventure, there was an intelligence draining trap. The players walk into the room, and there are a pair of troglodytes, standing right in the middle of the room and using poor camo, even talking "they can't see us, hur hur hur."

"Free Eeepee!" cry the heroes, who slaughter them. They go back and rest, and come back to the room...another trog, also acting stupid. "Free eeepee!" say the heroes as they slaughter another trog.

They hit the IQ-draining trap, but never make the connection...

My players probably wouldn't care if they knew what they were getting into in the first place. But I care, and I wouldn't get much enjoyment out of running an irrational dungeon. I didn't have a problem with them when I was 12 - but that was more than 3 decades ago, and hey, tastes change.

The person running this website is a racist who publicly advocates genocidal practices.

I am deleting my content.

I recommend you do the same.

I as a DM expect a Dungeon to make some sort of logical sense and the people I run DnD for expect that as well.
I'm not saying a whole ecology of the Dungeon has to be perfect, but at least some sort of effort for it to make sense it expected and required.

Quote from: Justin Alexander;995581And this is the reason why: "LOL NOTHING MAKES SENSE!" holds up in actual play right up until the point where the players decide they want to do more than just wander aimlessly from one room to the next, caving in the skulls of meaningless monsters with no purpose or reality beyond standing in those rooms waiting to get their skulls caved in.

Well, we're talking about dungeons, after all. Wondering the rooms can be taken for granted:).
The meaninglessness, however, isn't part of the deal;).

Quote from: RPGPundit;995084How nonsensical can a dungeon be without your players complaining? I don't mean having goofy monsters or comedy, I mean things that are illogical: a Giant creature in a room with no doors big enough for him to get out of, an animal locked away in a room it can't open a door to that somehow hasn't starved to death, a dungeon that had been completely sealed for 10000 years that somehow has a bunch of non-undead intelligent monsters just living in it, a mishmash of creatures living right next to each other without killing each other, etc?

Do they allow a certain amount of irrationality? None at all? Or do they really not care about this kind of thing?

They comment on it. I think a certain amount of gaming involves abstraction, and so some illogical stuff crops up. The more obvious stuff I try to avoid, but sometimes I bow to the logic of gaming over the logic of the "real world". It's a lot more fun to have a giant dragon on the bottom of the dungeon, and how he got in there is a mystery.

For me the dungeon needs to make rough sense or it feels too video gamey.

My players expect my dungeons to have some kind of reason for being as they are. I mean, "making sense" is an extension of the rule of thumb here: it's just like real life, except magic.

I make dungeons based in weird arcane shit all the time. But the pcs can figure out the underlying principles if they work at it.

Now that I'm think on it, I don't think I'd consider a dungeon successfully designed if it didn't make some kind of sense.