Dungeon Scrawler

There are many reasons why people enjoy dungeon crawls. In brief, it is an activity that's well structured, viscerally satisfying, mechanically tight, comparatively easy to prepare, and frequently evocative--and as a core element of roleplaying games from the beginning, it enjoys the benefit of decades of refinement. Even so, the draw to dungeon crawling varies strongly across groups and playstyles, and among popular rules-lite systems it's not so clear why players would turn to this activity. To be sure, in the abstract it is not too hard of a sell to send a group of players into a dungeon temporarily--at least from time to time. The problem comes to the forefront, however, when the dungeons get big . (And you know I like big dungeons .) Big dungeons come with at least one of the following expectations: You should explore  this space. The idea that your path will not be a straight line in and out. You should come back  to this space. The objective here cannot be achieved in...

Courtyards, gardens, and training grounds--"relaxed" open spaces, often centralized and well connected to other dungeon spaces, rather than terminal rooms tucked in a corner. Here are the rooms: Getting a breath of fresh air First, let's address the "vibe" of this category. To my mind, a courtyard is essentially a large, open space that doesn't necessarily have a specific utility. When I think of courtyards, I think of spaces that are almost contemplative in their use--you go and sit for a while or walk around. They break up the floorplan and provide interesting entryways or crossings. "Gardens" are kind of this amped up even further with the additional angle of cultivated things, and stuff like training grounds are kind of adjacently relevant just because I've seen too many training scenes set in courtyards or something like that. I dunno, it feels right. *shrug* So that's where this is coming from. A...

Preservation rooms! The places where things are kept safe, for their value, or simply for their future utility. Here are the rooms: Saving stuff for later The basic gist of a "preservation room" is storing stuff. However, throughout this series we've dipped into that idea in many ways: Armories  store armor and weapons; Libraries store books and similar things; Food Rooms included various kinds of food storage; Galleries included museum like spaces... we could go on, but calling Tombs "storage for dead stuff" is verging on silly. What that leaves us is actually quite appropriate in the context of dungeons: we haven't really talked about storing valuables . Given that dungeons--classically speaking--are places where you find treasure (in all its forms), it only makes sense that you'd wander into some kind of vault or treasury. At least sometimes. Of course, that's not all we could place in this c...