Five Dungeon Design Mistakes in Dungeons and Dragons 5e

[@Zhukov087]

Ugh. I have a player who constantly expects monsters to act like video game NPCs. "My gloomstalker ranger shoots one of the goblins with an arrow. 18 to hit. 9 damage." "She slumps to the ground with the arrow lodged in her skull, limbs twitching. The other four goblins snatch up their bows and scatter. One whistles to the wolves in the next room. Roll initiative." "Dude, wtf? I'm invisible, remember? They don't know I'm here." "Yes they do. They just saw an arrow come flying out of the dark and kill their friend." "Man, I used two whole spell slots in that fight! We need to long rest! We go back outside and cast Leomund's Tiny Hut 100 feet away from the dungeon entrance." "About 20 minutes into your rest you suddenly hear chanting and the hut is dispelled. Roll initiative." "Ugh. Guys, DM is punishing us for not doing as he planned." "Um. No. The enemies just found their lobby full of dead bodies, gathered up a patrol, took a look around and found a magical dome right outside their front door."

[@themetalone7739]

Not saying I would indulge either of those examples, necessarily, but I tend to let people do pretty much anything that follows the rules, and is fun to them. I can see how, maybe adding even one moment where the goblins look around in confusion, or just react in shock because the attack caught them by total surprise (they aren't *super* bright, are they?), and allow the guy a second shot from stealth, probably would've improved the experience for that player, and not harmed the game in any way. I can see why players want to go into fights prepared. If they were doing it between every encounter, I'd probably start hassling them with some attacks, but it's more fun going into an encounter when you know you can cast your really fun spells. Fun, more than ANYTHING else, is the name of the game. It is really easy to forget that, and I catch myself doing it sometimes...

[@StabYourBrain]

@@themetalone7739 That Player already got a free shot BEFORE rolling initiative. That's a lot. Assassin Rogues could nuke a giant with that opportunity and you want to allow them doing it TWICE? Also Gloomstalker Rangers get like the most busted first turn in the entire party PLUS they get to add their Wisdom Modifier to their initiative. It's not like they wouldn't have been able to instantly shoot three more arrows right after that first shot anyway. Goblins not being very intelligent is no excuse for trivializing combat like that either. Especially creatures that are not intelligent, rely on their instincts way more and if you're a GUARD and your instincts are telling you to watch your friend die from a brain hemorrhage caused by an obvious arrow for like two entire more turns, then you're obviously not suited to GUARD the entrance, because GUARDS are supposed to react to a threat like that. On top of all that, they're just Goblins anyway.. how much more pandering does a PC need to kill enemies with 7 fucking hp?

[@gerald216]

@@StabYourBrain I 100% agree with your assessment, but it definitely seems like a PC got you once or twice with this kind of bullshit

[@duncanmc797]

@@themetalone7739 do you run at high level very much? Cause as the others have stated that stuff quickly gets out of hand

[@morrigankasa570]

@@themetalone7739 Exactly, I agree with you.

[@fishroy1997]

"How high/deep/long is that tower/cavern/rope bridge? "About n+1 feet where n is the range of the spell you're thinking about."

[@ohexenwahno5652]

"I fly up there." "Roll a dex saving throw."

[@tzem2590]

"I was thinking about poison spray so this is 2 feet i jump in and walk to the other side"

[@cattrucker8257]

*thinks about Sending* *universe proceeds to implode and self-annihilate*

[@VinceValentine]

@@cattrucker8257 Then that tower is just the one in the middle of the Outlands, with Sigil on top. It's canon that Sigil rests atop an infinitely tall spire.

[@FangofFate]

In response to the Perfect Biosphere bit: one of my favorite ways to respond to players who say "It doesn't make sense that this is here" is to say "Yeah, that is strange. It strikes you as curious that this is here when it shouldn't be." Let their imaginations fill in the rest.

[@Observer31]

Yes! Act happy the player noticed! Make them feel clever :)

[@AnaseSkyrider]

@@Observer31 Even if in reality you just thought a swamp encounter nearby sounded cool.

[@fenixmeaney6170]

@@AnaseSkyrider if they give you grief about a swamp being where it shouldn't, remind them that black dragon lairs have regional effects

[@shishoka]

@Fenix Meaney That just makes them want to look for the dragon's treasure because the default player assumption is that you've scaled the encounter to give them a chance. First you should ask them why the swamp doesn't make sense to see if they actually know what they're talking about and provides you with a resource for terrain building in the future. The second thing that you should do is remind them of just how much work you put in for every game and expecting perfection in every way is unrealistic. This is even worse if you are playing online as displaying something like slope on most maps is especially difficult. (The most artistic method I've seen so far is to establish a static light source so that you can use shadow.)

[@AflacMan13]

Yyeeeesss!

[@mdp720]

Someone once called out that there wouldn't be a forest in the geography where I put it, or that there shouldn't be a giant oak in the middle, until they found out the lore behind it: It was the site of a huge magic battle. An archdruid turned all of the dead into trees with his dying breath, and himself into the oak. It's not a natural forest, it's a war cemetery.

[@toddalexander5015]

[Writing notes] "That's fucking sick, dude"

[@talongreenlee7704]

I had a similar thing with a bog filled with restless dead: zombie soldiers from the war that was fought there. Basically the marshes on the way to Mordor.

[@Battleguild]

@@talongreenlee7704 i misread zombie soldiers with zombie spiders. 😵

[@xaviercarmona4439]

During the climax of the last campaign I ran, my friend’s Druid (level 17 and decked in homebrew magic items) froze time in the immediate area of the final battle except for 10 people, who went on to build the foundations of the new world they are playing in my next campaign.

[@jasonrustmann9876]

@@Battleguild lol DM: "you are ambushed by zombie soldiers" Player 1: "wait, did you say zombie spiders!?" Player 2: "no i think he said..." DM: "SPIDERS! yep, totally said spiders, big nasty zombie spiders, roll initiative"

[@papasimscs]

I made the mistake of having a goblin cave with only one entrance. After thoroughly scouting to confirm this, the party choked the entrance with wood and brush and set it on fire. The goblins all died of smoke inhalation.

[@morrigankasa570]

I would be fine with that as a DM if was a low level type place. But if at higher level then I would have it be that the cave is filled with flammable gasses and liquids everywhere and all the loot that you could've gathered including some rare items are completely destroyed. Because the gasses and liquids acted as accelerants and increased the flames.

[@JimmiWazEre]

When the goblins saw that there were these PC types spending several hours collecting enough wood to do this, why didn't they alert the guards and come out to meet the PCs in full force?

[@papasimscs]

@@JimmiWazEre there were lookouts, who were very stealthily taken out early on.

[@Taurhasji]

I had this happen in the first area of my custom campaign. Thankfully, I had when creating the map added in another more hidden exit that the players also could have used to escape. Instead their enemies had to use it to escape the basement after the players snuck by and then barred the only exit they knew of and started a fire.

[@AtelierGod]

@@morrigankasa570 that would likely not accelerate the fire but just straight up explode with the shockwave likely hitting the players too.

[@CarlosRamos-xr9rj]

“We like our dungeon to be living, to be breathing…” so make the whole dungeon and every thing in it a Mimic… got it 😂

[@BrianWalker93]

I actually did this. Haunted pirate ship: turned out that the captain of the ship tamed an absolute behemoth of a mimic and made it his ship. Named it Annie, and yes the pirate had been based off Blackbeard himself. I had all sorts of weird shit happen on the ship and it freaked my players the hell out, it was great.

[@samuelsilbory6672]

Then after they get the treasure they discover all the coins are mimic eggs.

[@BrianWalker93]

@@samuelsilbory6672 They reproduce asexually like amoeba. But some of those coins are.. Its been months. They still don't know. They've spent so much of it too

[@jenniferferris44]

Ancient colossal mimic cave which would alter its layout as it continued to shift, inside tons of mimic adults that live within it, inside the mimic chests and bags(pregnant mimics) mimic coins(unhatched eggs). Our group accidentally wiped out most of a castle town that way

[@reaheames9938]

The dungeon IS the mimic

[@Swan-may]

A fun strategy strategy for the "that isn't realistic!" crowd is to put on a smug grin, and say "that IS strange, isnt it!" and refuse to clarify. My experience shows that they will immediately start guessing explanations,, then you pick your favorite of the bunch and build towards it.

[@jordangroblewsky2087]

Starting as a new DM, stealing my players ideas while they're trying to solve a problem has been super helpful. Also, it makes them feel like they "called it" and predicted the twist when really they were the ones that came up with it for me.

[@boredsenseless4496]

When it comes to drawing the maps of dungeons with multiple levels, I find that tracing paper is a huge help. You can layer it on top of one another to see how the structure of a building comes together, where stairwells would be placed, where guards might hear a fight coming from below them, etc.

[@DDCRExposed]

That's a really great tip and one so easy, people easily overlook it.

[@fu3zy]

I think acetate would work too but harder to get in larger sizes

[@jellegaard]

Tools such as Dungeondraft and DungeonFog also has layer and opacity functions to mirror this technique

[@mal2ksc]

@@jellegaard Photoshop and GIMP are adequate to the task too, if you don't mind doing it offline and importing it later.

[@morrigankasa570]

Kinda hard if you're on a fixed budget and the group meets/plays at your local library and none of you have a lot of money, so play in "Theatre of the Mind". But I agree with your point otherwise.

[@waffleswafflson3076]

The Colville Screw: They bypass half your dungeon, and decide to cheese the door instead of going through each wing and defeating the mini bosses and doing what they need to. The party gets to the final chamber, boss sounds the alarm. Every single enemy they avoided is now en route GG

[@ryanchapman2636]

I like this

[@Fury2580]

I thought this might play out at my table, then I realized that the only stealthy characters were the rogue and Monk. The Dementia Fairy would forger to be quiet, the Cleric doesn't have any experience being quiet, the Warlock isn't very dexterous, and the barbarian is...well...a barbarian, who happens to be high.

[@ayf449]

Or sacré them make them think twice from time to time. "You find a door at the end of the hallway/room that appears to be desperately jammed shot either to keep something in.. or something out." If you want to scare them even more if they decide to sneakily or not open the door "there appears to be (describe room and or furniture as nothing unusual) but you see nothing else you see no creatures here. Which makes you wonder.. which side of that door are you at now?"

[@Wgaberle]

@@ayf449 That is a thing of beauty right there. You made me shed a tear of joy as I imagine the panic that must be exploding inside the players minds.

[@dontmisunderstand6041]

That's an interesting approach because it also reasonably would let you get through most of the boss fight before help arrives (depending on the size of the dungeon). Even if we're talking a dungeon the size of an average suburban home, we're talking 5 rounds of combat probably to reasonably expect troops to respond to an emergency call. Then once the real battle is over, you have the epic escape sequence. It's cool. So much you can do with that without it actually just being a TPK every time.

[@iododendron3416]

mistake number 1: you forget the entry to the dungeon.

[@oOPPHOo]

Or you forget about the entries to an "encounter room" of the dungeon. I've had many awkward encounters start immediately after the door is opened which turns the fight in to fight centered around the choke formed by the door when, clearly, the DM imagined the fight to take place inside the room that was just revealed. Mistake number 2 is related: space. Think about space. I've been in too many rooms that are so small they almost can't fit both the party and its enemies. Some times there's tactical value (and therefor entertainment) in the cramped encounter room, but other times it's just a clearly unintended mess.

[@iododendron3416]

@@oOPPHOo oh yes, the too small hallway. I recently made that mistake when I started DMing. I made the hallway into a cellar just 5 feet wide, at one point a PC was standing on a downed PC, healing them. But since there were enemies all around, there was no place for the now healed PC to stand up. Luckily, the next round, one enemy got killed, so now their was room (for the PC to violently pushed into). Also, it made the encounter much harder than I wanted it, one enemy just kept dodging stuff so the whole hallway was effectively blocked.

[@maltava4534]

@@oOPPHOo On the flip side of this you can think about how the enemy may design a fort or den based on it's personality, defensive style, or aesthetics. We had an instance when the party fought its way into a Blue Dragon den. The Blue Dragon designed his den so that the main gallery was down a long corridor because a blue dragon's breath weapon is a line of lightning. The monster manual also describes the blue dragon has a very defensive fighter that likes fights of attrition. If it can run away until it can fly around raining lightning bolts on you it will. The party had to use proper tactics to get down the hallway without taking too much damage. Once things got too intense for the dragon it used it's lair action to collapse the ceiling and tried to fly out the hole to escape. We were prepared for an attempted retreat and got a wall of force over it before it could escape. It made the eventual victory much more satisfying knowing that we fought the dragon on it's terms and still came out on top. These types of encounters really reward the prep work and punish groups that go into a serious fight unprepared.

[@pepinillorick5741]

no joke

[@cubicengineering4715]

With regards to small rooms, I'll mention one of, if not the nost memorable fight I've been a part of. The context is that we were hired as guards by a family but found that they had some involvement in the assasins that turned up. We decided to go to their office and confront them though and while the guards found us as we snuck in we fooled them into being chill and taking us to the main office. We hear a scuffle and burst in to find the brother of the family choking the sister unconscious. However OOC all but one other person had to leave the quest (pbp) so just us two PCs were facing one tough enemy, going our best to evade the enemy and waste their time while the guard went for backup. We were level 3 bard and wizard pair, I carefully used Ray of Frost repeatedly to carefully skirt around and past the enemies walking distance as we slowly chipped away health and occasionally failed to subdue him with sleep. In the end the fight was ended after quite a while on the defence with the sister regaining consciousness again just long enough to super kill her brother with a ~48 damage Lightning Bolt. I'm a wizard player who likes to use movement and positioning very carefully, so the limited space and careful consideration of not what would deal the most damage, but keep us alive wasting his time I think was what was so fun. I was a tiny bit disappointed the fight ended with the Lightning Bolt even, though the following RP was well worth it and I like that NPC enough that I'm now on my third quest from her. Level 5 now and perhaps we'll see how Lightning Bolt works out when cast by me!

[@thehiddendwarf7313]

"One of the great strengths of fantasy is imagining things that never were, could not be, but that we wish could be" -Monty Martian This is actually a very solid line at 27:06

[@boppitude]

I cannot think of any Dudes more deserving of this Kickstarter success. You are great people doing great things. Keep it up and good luck!

[@jakeholmes9296]

Totally agree

[@alexinfinite7142]

I threw in for executioner level immediately. And I plan to combine it with some stuff from Grim Hallow 🤣

[@nickroyer3893]

For real

[@jaceg810]

DM: So there is a swamp at the foot of that mountain That player: Well, seen geological shaping and wind, air and water currents, with ground concistancy in mind, there should not be a swamp there. DM: But a big tragedy happened 100 years ago, someone drowned, and their spirit cursed the place to become these mashes.

[@WhiskeyPatriot]

“You take 1d4 necrotic for pissing off God”

[@arcticbanana66]

Back in the mid-90s when I started playing AD&D, I took a lot of inspiration from video games, particularly Final Fantasy and Dragon Quest (which was called Dragon Warrior at the time). I regularly designed multi-level dungeons with collapsed levels, broken floors, holes, balconies, etc., because that was a common occurance in Dragon Warrior, where falling down holes or floor edges to lower levels was a regular danger, and sometimes puzzle mechanic, in dungeons and towers.

[@128th]

"Locked in the dungeon" syndrom is presented in its extreme form at Dungeon of the Mad Mage, where in most of its levels trapped multiple different monsters that do not interact with each other in any form, even if they are separated by single room or corridor.

[@marcusbarugh919]

3 dimensional design is so important. I'm reminded of you campaign when you were dropped on top of the gatehouse of Drakkenheim to fight the gnolls and the hag coven. Such a wonderful encounter and one of my favorite parts. Congrats on all the Kickstarter success and I can't wait to lead my friends into Drakkenheim personally.

[@solar4planeta923]

Early campaign, we tracked our enemies to a cave, hidden under a bridge that crossed a swift flowing river. The gnolls came out and attacked us, and the cleric immediately used Command "Swim!". Removed a target right there. Every feature around you can be important.

[@RevPirateDan]

"Locked in the Dungeon". The reason it says "Bree-Yark" in the sidebar/flavour text in the Monster Manual entry for goblins is because is because it's a reference to the 1st ed adventure ("module") "B2 The Keep on the Borderlands". In the early part, the PCs can hear rumours, one says “'Bree-yark' is goblin-language for ‘we surrender’!” Later on, the PCs may find out otherwise, because it says: “When an encounter occurs, the entire bunch of goblins will attack and cry out an alarm (Bree-Yark!) at the same time.” thus alerting nearby rooms that will send goblins to aid. My point is that coherent dungeons that make sense did occur in 1st ed, and they can certainly happen in 5th.

[@jwmmitch]

Awesome reference! The first time I played D&D was when my older brother was in town on leave for Christmas and he took me and my other brother through Keep on the Borderlands ❤

[@Tristan_Shuler]

Now I’m thinking of a dungeon filled with poison gas where the mastermind is a Green Dragonborn Necromancer.

[@michaelsinclair1343]

Party consists of paladins who are immune to poison and ready to smite all of the undead minions.

[@Tristan_Shuler]

@@michaelsinclair1343 Paladins still need to breathe. If all the oxygen is replaced with poison, they better be able to hold their breath! Granted, some of the new lineages do not require breathing, but that would be heresy!

[@michaelsinclair1343]

@@Tristan_Shuler air genasi paladins 😀

[@Tristan_Shuler]

@@michaelsinclair1343 if a group wants to create a party of only Air Genasi Paladins then imma have to come up with a different dungeon. 😂

[@2g33ksgamingttv3]

​@@michaelsinclair1343 paladins get disease immunity not poison, monks get poison immunity

[@DDCRExposed]

The frustration I've had with the Resident Evil series and ground clutter blocking paths... 😒 ... You're telling me my character couldn't step over it especially under the circumstances? 😂 Yeah, video game logic is a pretty bad habit have when in D&D.

[@westcoastbreath]

Kelly: There are no invisible walls in D&D Wall of Force: Am I a joke to you?

[@dhiltbruner]

creeping power level when distributing magic items is the biggest balance issue as a new DM. Low level encounters are another.

[@mal2ksc]

Levels 1 and 2 are highly dependent on the RNG gods to favor you, and just a couple bad rolls can mean death. Unless a module specifically calls for a level 1 start, I almost always start everyone out at 900 XP, (beginning of third level) because of the inconsistent nature of encounter results in the first two levels. It's either that or make sure the party is owed a couple favors by local authorities, so they can get a free Raise Dead or two.

[@josephhamilton5668]

Players: Are you sure you want me to have this item, it's pretty powerful? DM: How many more sessions do you want to spend having your ass handed to you by bandits?

[@Ellebeeby]

The counter to Invisible Walls is objectives. “Sure, there’s a standard forest over there, but the Hobgoblin Warlord doesn’t like to be kept waiting, and is likely to start killing the hostages soon.” Unless it comes out of nowhere, this’ll tend to keep people moving forward rather than sideways.

[@Noobie2k7]

I think it is so easy for players to just forget that the world exists and keeps moving around them. They seem to just assume things they're not involved in just stand still until they get there.

[@MrSteveK1138]

😁 I remember when one of my players used Spider Climb to go to the ceiling and snipe targets with eldritch blast

[@romanabanin2216]

basically my rogue player who found slippers for wall walking. That item was one of the most helpful thing to the whole party in their adventures and I'm proud of that

[@politenonparticipant4859]

When you mentioned the way some videogames and dungeons are set up so that monsters just stay in their room and never leave, it actually made me think about how the enemies in Dragon Age act. Attack an enemy in one room and everyone in the next room over will sometimes run in and start kicking your butt. I'd never really noticed or appreciated that attention to detail before, so thanks for making me think about it.

[@dylanwight5764]

When designing encounters and zones, I stick to the philosophy that everything must have a purpose even if that purpose is only to distract from and disguise other elements of the encounter. One of my favourite encounters to throw into a game of Curse Of Strahd is a seemingly quick side mission at Vallaki wherein the players are asked to check up on an outlying farm because the residents hadn't come by the village in a while. They are warned that wolves patrol the forests and to be wary of the "ghost of the wind" as they travel the main road through the encroaching mists. As the party approaches the farmstead from the main path -- the paddocks and fields are surrounded by dense forest on three sides and the farmstead itself is visible from the main road -- they can't possibly miss the scarecrows that seem to all face inward toward the farmstead and fully encircle it in three distinct concentric rings. Spooky. As it happens, these are just hay and hessian scarecrows and their placement has no bearing on them being completely inanimate objects. The closer they get to the farmstead the easier it is to hear the swinging and slamming of the door in the breeze. Any player who makes a perception check notices that nothing else is swinging so hard, almost as if the current of air is coming from the building itself. Entering the house they realize it is cold enough that a layer of frost has settled on the furniture in every room except for the immediate area around the fireplace, which is still warm to the touch. A half-eaten meal remains on the dining table and the stone oven still has a roll of dough ready to be baked atop it. Everything is eerily quiet except for the creaks and groans of wood and metal in the wind. If a player moves to examine the bedroom, on opening the door a crash is heard from the tool shed around the back of the house followed by a number of howls. Shadows play across the windows as slinking figures pad around the verandah. A few moments later the front door squeals as its hinges are worked by some creature trying to find its way inside. If the players choose to hide and remain silent, the wolves prowl the house, nosing into each room without ever fully entering for a short while before all leaving and jogging away down the path to the main road and out of sight and earshot. Soon after any player in the bedroom hears a whimper from the wardrobe and reveal a young and starved child if they part the linen curtain separating it from the main room. The child is terrified but otherwise unharmed. And then the _wind-walker_ manifests at the border of the forest and starts slowly stalking its way through the fields toward the farmstead, moving between the scarecrows but focused entirely on the now occupied building... This is a boss fight intended for players leveled three-to-five and is going to test their ability to think critically about their environment and use the tools at their disposal to defeat this horror. It is an incredibly difficult fight for lower level characters but surmountable if they've been paying attention up to this point. While this encounter isn't exactly a dungeon, it's still claustrophobic and the avenues of action are limited which makes it crucial for players to understand their surroundings at all times.

[@PTGumby]

"Doors are easy to get around" Tell that to Vox Machina...

[@ohexenwahno5652]

"I took damage... AGAINST A DOOR!"

[@BeaglzRok1]

To be fair, they did get around a door. The issue is that not everyone got around the door.

[@AnEnemySpy456]

@@BeaglzRok1 They burned multiple spells slots and took damage to get past it.

[@blakdragon2202]

@@ohexenwahno5652 got to hate those revolving doors!

[@pepinillorick5741]

Ahahhaha

[@georgewashington7083]

"You can even go down the chimneys" DON'T DO THIS! Every year, someone dies while playing santa and going down a chimney not knowing it's dangerous.

[@twilightgardenspresentatio6384]

But I took the lucky feat

[@darienb1127]

@@twilightgardenspresentatio6384 Lucky feat doesn't give you fire immunity

[@Schilani]

In one of my session my party tried to go down a chimney to talk to the friendly village leader, because he was sleeping and the guards wouldn't let them in. One of them landed ass first into the still hot fire place.

[@rawr3060]

And the chimney is a mimic whose mouth you just entered.

[@talongreenlee7704]

@@darienb1127 it’s more that you get stuck and can’t climb up or crawl down and out, and get crushed or suffocate. It’s not a pleasant way to go.

[@darienb1127]

When it comes to writing things in fantasy that deal with the suspension of disbelief, there's a very simple rule to follow: It doesn't always have to make perfect sense. it just has to be believable. As long as someone can look at what you made and say "yeah i guess that makes sense", you're good. Typically, this can be done by having some kind of consistency with the rules or theme of whatever you are making, unless you are purposely breaking this rule to make something that is chaotic in nature.

[@ralieghwhite9076]

One of my favorite puzzles ever for a newer group was to put their powerful widget inside a spherical Prismatic Wall. Not advisable for well-studied players, but it was amazing for a group of casters and half-casters who were new to the game.

[@mikeprado4381]

“Whoa whoa whoa… THAT does not make sense.” The whole Fast & Furious franchise, anyone?

[@Revoltine]

It does make sense. It's all about *F A M I L Y*

[@Swan_River_Cowboy]

Buh Buh fast car go vrooom adb merica has police everywhere

[@sophialambert2616]

1st thing- congrats on the kickstarter going so far in such a short period of time! Psyched for the release and getting all the goodies I backed, fastest money I've dropped for a project in ages. I hope to see more from you gents in the future. 😊 2nd- this was all excellent advice for new and old DMs alike. Switching up dungeon styles can really go a long way in challenging players and creating a memorable session. One of my favorites I've tossed at players was a multi level mine situation after players had spent a great deal of time in the forest and urban environments. The mission was to help villagers find out what was the cause of some going missing and mental abnormalities happening to some remaining. They eventually uncovered it was a meenlock problem, whose underground territory was accidentally encroached on with expanding mining operations. They were hoping to recover survivors, so simply sealing up the tunnels was a last resort. The terrain shifted once they got into the meenlock tunnels, with multiple ways for smaller characters like the halfling and team mascot of a kobold to get around like the meenlock did, but the medium sized characters weren't so lucky and had to get creative. Especially because some rooms had weird fungi growing in them, that turned out to be shriekers and violet fungi, and when the shriekers got agitated, the noise would draw hungry grells from other nearby areas. After a few hilariously bad choices caused a cave-in, they ended up in cavern with an lake, and an exceedingly polite and bribe filled chat with the resident water mephit, who tried to avoid the aberrations roaming about as much as possible, got them sparking an idea for the little characters to take advantage of the small side tunnels the meenlocks used to bypass natural dangers, set off the shriekers in one area and herd the grells, and then bigger characters could semi-safely dash in the right directions within those bigger passages while the small characters traversed the next little tunnels and repeated the process to give the grells the runaround. They eventually managed to lure some of the meenlocks into situations, when the beasties were trying to discover what was causing continual disruptions, into precarious locations and being nabbed by the grells, and then picked off the remaining meenlocks in normal combat fashions. The situation took a session longer to resolve than expected, but once the players started thinking outside the box and realized they could use the dynamic setting and shifting monster locations to their advantage, it was like a 3d chess match of them versus the meenlocks, and they ultimately saved a couple of the villagers who hadn't yet been transformed into meenlocks.

[@macarandicheese2888]

These are all great tips. Some stuff I’m standing up like SAY IT AGAIN FOR THE PEOPLE IN THE BACK!!! And some I’m like huh… never thought of that. One of my favorite dungeons I’ve ever created the party skipped out on half of it because of random abilities I didn’t think of during creation. If there’s one thing I can suggest from my own experience in dungeon building. Drop a maze in your online dungeon and talk to the players in separate channels and watch them squirm as they see each other’s rolls but have no idea what’s going on (one of the few things that is actually better for online play imo). In our case it was keeping a devil trapped on their own little private prison, that the party accidentally let out. And created a whole new arc for us to play off of. Thanks again for the great content dudes! Can’t wait to send my players into drakkenheim once the Kickstarter is done.

[@dibens666]

Any obstacle that uses up party resources is a well designed one. So what if they bypass your elaborate puzzle with magic? They now have less spell slots for the boss encounter, job well done!

[@acadiangeek8483]

"Doors are surprisingly easy to get around" .... unless you're critical role lol

[@ohexenwahno5652]

Now I wanna see a one-shot of CR vs XP to level 3's Doorngeon

[@talongreenlee7704]

They stop arcane eyes, though, so it’s still worth it

[@nolif3gam3r43]

@@ohexenwahno5652 that and there has to be VERY MENACING….. CHAIRS!!!!!

[@SomeoneMysterious1352]

Unless the door has a one inch crack under it.

[@nolif3gam3r43]

@@SomeoneMysterious1352 fairy race?

[@sirgideonofnir6840]

I think that making your setting "realistic" makes the times when you break it more memorable. The whole world was believable but you come across this one place that makes 0 sense, might make your players more interested and actually explore to find out why it's that way.

[@garyvincent7397]

yo dude same profile picture

[@SonOfTheNorthe]

And your names both start with "G".

[@solar4planeta923]

Since I'm reading Zelazny's Amber Chronicles right now, I'm a fan of this idea. When things start happening that are not internally logical, take note!

[@cristiaolson7327]

My goal has been to create a world that makes sense within the context of a world full of magic, but the players will zero in on anything odd. I have a player who, in a previous campaign with our old DM, when told a wall had green slime on it (other walls had not up to that point), he decided to lick it to see how it tasted. Ironically, it was a touch-based puzzle to open the hidden door, but the slime was toxic... In our current campaign, he failed his stealth roll, so he decided to just use magic to create earthquakes in a passage that, upon well-rolled Investigation, most definitely looked like it might have been created by a large tunneling creature, and then everyone started stomping and making a ruckus to see what would happen. The monster was *supposed* to be fought after they'd cleared the dungeon and leveled up; it was very nearly a TPK. My players love weird stuff, and will go to dangerous lengths to investigate it in the most insane way possible.

[@Mr_Maiq_The_Liar]

One of my favorite experiences in a dnd dungeon is ease dropping on a conversation with tongues and listening to 2 yuan ti go. “Why aren’t you in the dinning hall on your break?” “Shave is there.” “Ah fuck that guy. What you got there?” “Wildcat want some?” “Sure”

[@ruthb7605]

I’ve had players go in through the roof so often that builders in my world now specialise in creating warded roofing tiles. I’ve yet to include the +1 crowbar in a treasure package, but I swear I will one day.

[@MagicScientist]

14:35 To expand on this idea, I've used the 'This area deals 1 damage of X type per round' mechanic very successfully 3 times, twice with fire (volcanos) and once with necrotic (area suffused with negative energy). Both times it was a good way to both up the tension, show the area was more dangerous than normal and still have a fun puzzle to solve. It also felt really good to those members of the party that already had resistance to those damage types, even though the puzzle was no challenge for them. It's also fun because later you can stack them on top of one another for a harder puzzle, for example cold and radiant damage in space. It also let me put monsters of a higher challenge rating than normal against the party, because I knew that if they dealt mostly damage of the type they needed resistance to to even get into the area in the first place, that their damage would naturally be lower than normal, without feeling like they were nerfed just to make them survivable.

[@Raiziguana_asoleandose]

if a player comes to me and says "a swamp can logically be there!" i would say: "You are probable right! But what does that means.... " That is enough for players to investigate whats the (Crazy magic) reason for that being there.

[@Daile0303]

I am running a game in Zendikar, and since the world is basically asking for it, the focus of the campaign is exploration. So, there are thesw things called "Skyclaves" that are basically floating cities of an old civillization that fell to the ground 4 thousand years ago. I decided to go for something different, and i made they explore a Skyclave that fell on it's side, so there were pit traps on the walls, broken doors whrere they just needed to kick the wood and crawl, crumbled walls/ceiling/floor with holes that lead to areas where, in a normal dungeon, they would reach later on, or maybe they fall to an area that they had already been before. They had to climb walls/floors/ceilings, and it made my players more lost in the exploration than if i used a normal dungeon. Everyone liked it

[@JonWeinand]

"It's just magic" is a bit of a let-down, but going into *how* it's magic is tight.

[@monkeysk8er33]

Any DM using the "it just works, it's just magic" copout isn't being a good DM. You, as the DM, should know your system mechanically, and lorewise, inside and out. There should always be a multitude of ways to succeed at anything and everything. Never be a single solution DM.

[@PotentialRain]

I think it's Brandon Sanderson's laws of magic that say "The amount of problems solved by magic, are proportional to the understanding of the magic a reader has". So by explaining why the magic is that way really eases the 'its magic' reason.

[@ClasticOne]

"It's magic" is a great first step and a terrible last step.

[@TheTwitchyBrownGuy]

@@monkeysk8er33 it's also the job of the players to understand that the dm has a lot going on, and sometimes they forget to figure out why something wouldn't work (or it would ruin the experience) and accept that. I have used this "cop-out" before, and my players have always been very understanding and have a good chuckle about it. The alternative is solving the problem in 15 minutes and everyone going home.

[@monkeysk8er33]

@@TheTwitchyBrownGuy What you described is lazy DMing. You should always be on your toes, or call the session early

[@mikecain7682]

As a fellow DM/player, homebrewer, Torontonian, writer, and lover of all things fantasy; I wish you gents all the success on the amazing Kickstarter and new content book!! (of which I have backed!) You guys have helped me with so much of my own writing and dnd campgain creating though your guides and informative videos. Thank you for what you do and keep up the fantastic work!

[@saldiven2009]

"What if we bust out the shovels and dig down into the dungeon." Well, you'll need to be able to dig through stone; dungeons made in dirt are too unstable to be safe. You'll need to know where to dig so you're not digging endlessly to the center of the planet because you missed a room or passage. Digging is time consuming and noisy, so the denizens of the dungeon will have ample time to prepare a surprise for you when you but through. All-in-all, digging a new entrance is a sub-optimal option that will probably be worse off for the party in the long run unless the GM decides to be nice to the party by having the enemies behave in an irrational manner. Regarding chimney's: the actual dimensions of the chimney pipe are much smaller than y'all seem to think they are. The exterior is decorative. The pipe itself is rarely more than maybe 12" across. Not an easy means of entrance barring size changing magic.

[@Voriclexx]

I had a player in my first homebrew campaign and setting scoff at my world map and say it doesn’t make any sense and those biomes wouldn’t be there. Was very hurtful

[@BKPrice]

You walk into the next room of the dungeon and encounter a group of monsters playing a tabletop role-playing game, where they have just walked into a dungeon room and encountered a group of monsters playing a tabletop role-playing game.

[@yearsofDeath-vv7nl]

I recently had my players going through a tomb with many levels going down. A decent amount of undead in each room, I made the mistake of having my zombies, skeletons, and carrion crawlers in each floor but didn't have them moving or exploring in the tomb. I feel I might have made up a bit with a room that had rafters along the ceiling and had the ghouls and ghast up there to ambush them as they were fighting zombies.

[@kevinglass1186]

Found your channel several weeks ago, and have been watching so many videos that you have put up over the years. Thank you so much for your content, since it is all helpful! There are a lot of good tips in this video. When I DM'd a campaign, I fell for the "it has to follow the rules" type of issues, but also built very 2d dungeons. I, after many of your videos, now have many new plans for future campaigns.

[@DungeonDudes]

So glad you’re enjoying the channel :)

[@oofguild7788]

A great way to create a room that the players can’t see without getting attacked/noticed, but without having to put in a door is to just make the hallway turn sideways. If they turn, they’ll get noticed. Now they have to use Minor Illusion to attract a monster, or use arcane eye.

[@Chetthew21]

Incredible timing, desperately needed, thank you much

[@elinamauno8833]

I have had a lot of fun getting around big jumps/leaps/climbs when playing a -1 Strength character with Misty Step/Dimension Door/Polymorph/climbing into a Bag of Holding while someone else climbs. I think in some instances it's fun when the DM can see that hey you're getting around this in a smart way. Sometimes, though, it makes the DM want to rage XD Probably one of the most frustrating ways we have bypassed so many areas of dungeons is Waterwalk and Control Water. Edit: pfft ahahaha the locked room dungeon design. In our first ever campaign (Lost Mines of Phandelver) our party made a huge ruckus and yelled (how's it going) in an echoing cavern... Ended up very nearly TPK'ing since that made every single enemy in the caverns come fight us at once.

[@talongreenlee7704]

I think the locked in the dungeon Syndrome makes sense if they have a fortified position. They know you’re coming, but they’re not going to come out and fight you because they’re hiding behind sturdy fortifications.

[@patrickmcathey7081]

mmm I have never had a player do the goes in bag of holding one that is quite clever.

[@elinamauno8833]

@@talongreenlee7704 Yeah it is quite silly so one might not think of it. You have 10 minutes of air in there, get in for the climb, or pop just your head out XD stupid, but it works

[@paddlesawtactic9788]

Also remember that dungeons are not seperate from the outside world. I ran a level 1 adventure where kobolds secretly moved into a cavern that was at the bottom of a well, and they poisoned the water supply by throwing all their refuse and garbage in the water. The players were investigating the village that the well was in, and a woman told them that something broke into her house and stole all her pots and pans. Another guy told the players that his supply of copper wire was stolen. Eventually the party went down the well, and started exploring the cavern. They triggered a trip wire that emptied a bag of pots and pans onto them. This was an alarm, so now the boss of the dungeon, a kobold inventor, knew that there were intruders (I made 2 different set ups for the boss depending on whether he knew the party was coming). My players had a good laugh at the fact that I took the time to foreshadow a trap like that in the village. I also realized really late into the creation process that the kobolds would need to drink too, so why would they poison their own water supply? So I added a spring to the boss room. This also gave the party a way to help the village apart from clearing out the kobolds. The party told the village about the spring, so now the village knows where to construct a new well.

[@treevenewson]

My players dragged the golden couch in S4: The Tomb of Horror's all through the dungeon and used it on the Juggernaut to slow it down. They made constant squee noises as they dragged through the dungeon, we laughed our @$$'s off.

[@compella1]

"that is a profoundly disappointing answer." -Monty Martin

[@godzillaaccount2672]

This makes me want to a design a dungeon.

[@deathless12345678]

Do it. Its fun in itself.

[@crapstirrer]

Fun to build at the time (I love water elementals that live in fountains) but ultimately disappointing as the party skips 90% of your well laid plans.

[@granttrain3553]

I have been building a mega dungeon for 2 years, I am always up for bouncing ideas off new folk! What to build together?

[@Battleguild]

Just remember to have an empty spacious room, with just a single chair in the middle. (There is nothing special about the room or anything in it.) Might help if you need to stall for a bit.

[@deathless12345678]

@@Battleguild this is hilarious and i am going to do this now

[@twilightgardenspresentatio6384]

“A craftsman, a paladin and a priest walk into a dungeon…”

[@lord6617]

I mean, if you are a wizard, you can LITERALLY valheim with Move Earth, Conjure Minor Elemental, Wall of Stone, & Fabricate.

[@patatas345]

Player:"That swamp can't be there" DM:*immediately starts writing plot hook/quest for swamp*

[@timtauber5557]

When designing elaborate multi level dungeons/lairs alway start on the bottom floor using graph paper and use tracing paper for each upper floor as you go upwards, this way you can make sure spiral staircases, pits, sloping passages, waterfalls, chasms, balconies, observation rooms, and finally the entrances or exits can be planned out to fit logically. The tracing paper will allow you to see what is below or above any area of the dungeon at all times, and simply sliding a blank piece of graph paper under one of the floors drawn on tracing paper will still provide the grid guidelines for movement and ranges etc.

[@BrianWalker93]

From the intro alone you can tell these guys are so goddamn chill and fun to be around. Its one of the reasons I subscribed. Because these two are the kind of people I'd wanna play with

[@mikecarson7769]

good advice, once again! Your designs in Drakkenheim have been so fun, realistic, and engaging. i start with the practicalities of the people who made/used the place. What did they do for their food sources, water, cooking, washing, dumping waste, lighting, sleeping and resting, security and alarm system, etc - - and then think of how those issues would be handled in a world with magic, dragons, giants, etc.

[@DMingThoughts]

18:00 My favorite thing about party's enemies being able to hear is a paladin constantly using Thunderous Smite and triggering all the monsters nearby.

[@krispalermo8133]

As the PC battle the first few rooms, the rest of the dungeon grabs what ever the can carry and run for their lives. Bit anti- climatic, be realistic. Such as a dragon digging a cave in to prevent the PC into its lair and going out the backdoor.

[@Maninawig]

I gotta say that I love these kind of videos as they might be designed for dungeon masters, but they also apply to players. For instance, you talk about two dimensional thinking about room design, but that also applies to abilities, like a shadow monk using a combo of Shadow Step and Slow Fall. Gaining the first ability at level 6, you can negate up to 30 points of fall damage, use your bonus action to move up 60ft and drop on a creature with an unarmored strike for 1d6+3 bludgeoning damage (with advantage) and 5d6 falling damage on the creature (all negated for you).

[@Rammex3]

Any thoughts on making a straight up dungeon making video and make one dungeon each and compare them? Would be fun and educational!

[@BleydTorvall]

Another thing to consider with smaller inhabitants like kobolds and goblins is that they're also lighter than most adventurers, so weight-sensitive traps can be used just about anywhere in their dungeons without them having to really worry about tripping the traps. A main room in a kobold den can have a pit trap in the middle of it that requires maybe 40lbs to trip it, which would allow a kobold (averaging around 25-35lbs) to travel over it without worry, but not common adventuring races, even gnomes and halflings.

[@SendohJin]

And almost no adventurer travel without like 25 lbs of gear.

[@helixxharpell]

Posting 2 yrs from this video's release.. I think this is one of your all's best videos. Just so much common sense. Like Colby's build videos You guys have inspired me to do walkthru videos for our Khor Kickstarter. Doing some generic dungeon design video series would be very helpful to DMs.

[@greglensink5265]

Monty's explaining how to break into a house. Classic!

[@paulcoy9060]

21:00 I bought some old modules, and in "In Search Of The Unknown" the DM had written down that one of the rooms had one kobold, and the next room had a Red Dragon. The second room was 20x20, but the door was still 5 feet wide. Never knew how he thought the Red Dragon would just stay in that room and not try to take it over.

[@zackakai5173]

Regarding suspension of disbelief, one thing I always appreciate in a fantasy setting is architecture that still makes sense from a real world engineering and design standpoint. I can believe a huge epic castle bigger than any real castle ever built, but I'm still going to notice if the walls are paper thin (real castle walls could be meters thick, both for defensive and for structural reasons), or if the battlements are only waist-height (real merlons should be head height to provide cover). Same goes for dungeons. This might be an ancient tomb that seems suspiciously well-laid out for killing monsters, but a stone ceiling should still be vaulted if you don't want the entire space filled with columns. Meanwhile pretty much any medieval-style dwelling in a colder climate would be laid out so the fireplace and chimney could heat the entire building. Etc, etc.

[@nemohimself2580]

For the video game door logic puzzle piece, just make it a portal door and the pieces set it to the correct coordinates, otherwise it opens to the fire plane or something.

[@B0neyKingofN0where]

"Doors are surprisingly easy." [Critical Role cast starts having nightmares about doors]

[@pepinillorick5741]

i saw them spend 3 spells and like 2 minutes with a door, one was 5th level xD

[@-WolfMan-]

Yep ... the Door may be protected (magically or otherwise) - Nothing sayin' that the Wall beside it is ... In the words of Homer Simpson, "JUST SMASH IT OPEN!!" 💥

[@bobbymadjid5733]

"doors are suprisingly easy to get around in dungeons and dragons" Crying in VM

[@Ryogenshe]

You guys have got my brain moving. I just watched your video on traps and you can combine the ideas from there with this. For example what if you have recurring dungeon the adventurers frequent that over time different enemy groups squat in where everytime they go rooms are repurposed. This dungeon could be filled with contextual traps like one that does no damage sprays oil to make the party flammable and now they can't go into a heated room or risk bursting into flame so they must find another path. Given enough options ane branching paths you could use the same layout multiple times and each time can be a different trip through the same space

[@hackcubit9663]

I'm pretty proud of myself that even as a fledgling dungeon master years ago I bore in mind a design "stance" of "these rooms should all serve their own purposes," even if those purposes might not be obvious to someone who's just wandered in.

[@romanabanin2216]

in my last game there was a simple dungeon, basically a mines which lead to an ancient portion of the underground abandonned city. In a boss room between these 2 dungeons were slippers for my rogue to walk on walls. After this I've started thinking 3D more than ever. Turned out to be amazing experience with all of these ambushes from above, crossing the pits and getting into a ceiling tunnels to scout the way or create the way for the others by ropes, chains or something else. That rogue surprised me as a DM and a player, pushing his capabilities 200% with just a pair of magic slippers

[@NullRageGaming]

Here's a tip for when your player points out a structural or geographical inconsistency: Just say, "You're right. This stands out as odd to your character as well." and just listen to the in party discussions that follow as the characters try to work out this oddness. Latch on to the excuse that the party likes the most, and go with it.

[@harmless6813]

Player: "That seems wrong." DM: "Make an intelligence check." Player: "Um... eight." DM: "Your character doesn't notice anything unusual." Problem solved. ;)

[@asherandai1000]

"Dungeon filled with poison" I remember this one from Critical Role first campaign... It was completely undone by an alchemy jug and water breathing.

[@Loalrikowki]

To be fair, if Mercer had wanted to he could have swatted that solution down pretty easily. I can't recall the specifics of how exactly they described the trick working, but reasonably in order to breathe the water you would need an open container at least large enough to stick your face in which you then need to carry around with you, sloshing about all the while. Then you have to contend with the fact that there's a finite amount of oxygen in 8 gallons of water and it's not going to last very long split between a party of 5 or 6 humanoids. Even if that isn't a concern, if the air is suffused with a poisonous gas, it's going to diffuse into the water pretty quickly and render it a dangerous source of oxygen as well.

[@asherandai1000]

@@Loalrikowki You can't recall the specifics of how it worked... and then you go on to literally describe the specifics of how it worked down to the last detail. I don't quite know how to react to that. However I do know how to react to "could have easily swatted that solution": So could any DM to any solution ever no matter how far fetched or legitimate it might be.

[@lilithvampyre1716]

I have an Aarakocra player who simply decided to fly as high as he possibly could and drop a town guard. Since he flew to such an extreme altitude, I told him that his wings would freeze over and he'd lose flight and he may not get it back. He did but I took his fall speed into account when he unfurled his wings and I ruled that the force of the air he was trying to displace dislocated his wings. He survived but still took a lot of fall damage and had a lasting wound he needed to tend over a Short Rest.

[@nickz9107]

Old DM didn't like encounters to be bypassed by pc's. So when we get to the end of the dungeon the large boss monster has a huge dinner bell. Yes it pulls the whole dungeon when it rings the bell. The first time it was funny, but eventually we just started hacking through everything because the dinner bell was usually a total parry kill.

[@jdRamza]

Did you ever try to cast silence before he rang the bell, and did he circumvent that?

[@JMcMillen]

@@jdRamza That assumes that the bell is within line of sight. The BBBM might just pull a chain or pull a lever and the bell located somewhere else starts ringing.

[@jeremonster02]

i think my favorite part of this video was the part about giving your dungeons a purpose for being there and giving the creatures within a purpose. one of my favorite book series gives a great way to give just about any dungeon a purpose. it's the Divine Dungeon series by Dakota Krout, it's basically a book about adventurers going into a dungeon, but it flips POV back and forth between one of the adventurers, and the dungeon itself as the dungeons of that world are living beings that use the essence around them to build there dungeons and create creatures and loot for adventurers. doing this not only gives the dungeon and creatures a purpose, but allows you to expand that dungeon further to give your players a dungeon that roughly scales with them to return to continuously.

[@Samukuai]

Fort Chalman from Oblivion works well as a rich family's mausoleum. It was the first dungeon I mapped out as a DM and it worked so well!

[@Dlstufguy2]

Pets, dogs, cats etc. One time I was in my basement and nailed something with a hammer, my dog was up stairs in the bedroom and came flying across the house barking thinking someone was breaking in. One time at 4 am and I was making a tuna sandwich for lunch. I didn't use the electronic can opener, I used the manual one. That little click and hiss caused both cats come running from 2 rooms and a flight of stairs away.

[@davinci451]

"Some of them will fall into the lava." Wow, that is one savage DM.

[@Vaalgrum]

Regarding the 2-d aspect you mention as the first topic, and more specifically the idea of breaking out picks/shovels to get through walls, my DM and I have found a rather fun little thing to do in a similar, limited vein. Using the spell primal savagery, which deals acid damage, he essentially will let me melt my way through limited areas like grates / door locks / etc., but the tradeoff is that it's SUPER slow, and leaves us open to getting mobbed by random encounters / wandering monsters. I think it's a fun tradeoff that doesn't have much room for abuse, and lets us have some additional utility that feels unique.

[@Mary_Studios]

Where was this yesterday when I ran my first "dungeon" that they had to go through. Oh well this will be helpful for future events.

[@DesolatorMagic]

DARN RIGHT I'm stealing the door and selling it to a scrapper! lol

[@russellee5216]

"Doors are surprisingly easy to get around in D&D" I...have not experienced this phenomenon as a player or gm. Doors are one of the biggest hurdles. lol

[@Mr.Verethron]

At some point in the Campaign I had my players walk through the Lurkwood where they knew beforehand they might come across an organization called the Chill (I had prepared some potential patrols, watchtowers and fortresses in the woods they would possibly encounter). The ranger and druid of the party said to the others "lets be as silent as possible while we pass through" (I was happy I heard that because that was my objective too). They did exactly that the first day of walking through the forest. The next day, though, at around noon they encountered a patrol of orcs and stuff. Did they hide? No. First thing that came to the Cleric's mind was and I quote "Let's kill them for the betterness of the world" and he ran in. They did so much noise that two nearby watchtowers heard the fight (I try to be as realistic and as tactician as I can be when they do stupid moves). They killed the patrol after a couple of rounds only to realise that alarming bells were sounding all over the forest. They ignored that of course and they started to have a conversation with the Cleric about him ignoring the party sometimes and blah blah blah while curiously the gnome wizard didnt say a word all this time, instead he was watching me smiling more and more as they were talking. His eyes began to realise what was happening in my head and screamed "RUN... RUNNNN". They took the first path they saw and ran. The next 3-4 days were a nightmare they will never forget. They barely slept. They barely ate. They fought and ran and fought and ran until they found themselves outside a barbarian village at the edge of the forest. They stormed in and begged for help only to realise those barbarians were trading with the Chill. For their good luck though one of the party being a barbarian from another clan from Icewind Dale helped ease the tension by speaking in a way they understand. They left all their valuables and their dignity at this place and went on their merry way towards Mithril Hall, beaten on all fronts but a bit wiser for the next time.

[@krispalermo8133]

Ran a game with a forest road controlled by werewolves, .. party went into the forest to hunt the WW. The WW dog nap and spent five days throwing rocks/ tree branches into/ onto sleeping PC the whole time. Do to the lack of the correct magic, sleep exhaustion drop the whole party. The WW bandits had them walk out of the forest on a grass root rope line and nothing else. " Please come again so we can rob you another time. " We had eight different player groups at my last game shop 15 years ago, .. everyone wanted to spank those dogs.

[@MasterFlarg89]

Whenever I've Dm'd Ravenloft, I always make the castle have a slight optical illusion about it, as it's shifting in it's stasis in time and misshapen like Straud's soul and the players who notice usually roll high on an insight or perception on the castle itself. That way, if I screw up dm'ing the confusing map, the players have this nice little theme to work with instead of "Dm forgot to look at the map again".

[@thedigodragon]

"We like to create these places that feel that they are living, that they are breathing, that they are alive..." Me (taking notes): *recreates dungeon-shaped mimic from 1e*

[@Nodjia]

In college, I was a player in a gaming group where we ran through a lot of dnd module adventures. One of the main DM's at the time was running a norse themed variant of the Straad Ravenloft storyline, where we were swept into a realm unable to leave due to the murderous deathfog. We had a night where the game was basically canceled after 10 minutes because we entered a ruin of a dungeon where there were narrow 5 foot wide hallways connecting everything, but each room was an isolated "large room". Our first encounter was a sneak attack by a hydra that was colossal in size, somehow living in a room barely twice its size. A friend managed to polymorph the thing with an amazingly lucky opposed roll, turning it into a tiny frog. The DM hadn't prepared anything else because he expected the fight to take a long time or kill the entire party. It felt so disjointed having weird narrow corridors leading to monsters that could never fit through, surviving for years at a time without being able to leave.

[@Ishoam]

One thing I like to include in dungeons are plain and simple staff members. People who are there to keep the place running but aren't prepared or expected to fight. For example, the 18 year old who's sweeping the floors probably wouldn't want to charge at the party and die for their bandit gang like someone who usually carries a sword would. Likewise, there are probably some creatures who want to avoid fighting the players at all, saying something like, "I just [do a mundane task like cooking the food.]" For me this adds a bit more realism in that not every NPC in the bandit camp is prepared to die for their gang in a one on four fight against adventurers. Plenty of roles you would expect someone to fill in a bandit camp or dungeon probably be just as happy not fighting the players at all.

[@karsten69]

When I make maps I roll my dice on 4 A4's and the type of dice dictates what feature and the number dictates how big it is. d4 are mountains d6 are rivers d8 are forest d10 are mines/dungeons d12 are lakes and d20 are settlements I then draw the map accordingly, it might not make geographical sense, but it's new and refreshing every time.

[@KuonilerariLoufanwald]

I feel like a lot of people get hung up on things making sense geographically. While it does make a world more immersive, don't get bogged down in how climates actually work especially when magic exists. Forgotten Realms is full of areas with biomes that are out of place thanks to magical influence. Plus, who says this world's geography follows our own? But your idea is super interesting and may have to borrow it for my own world building

[@AnaseSkyrider]

@@KuonilerariLoufanwald Perfect example I just made up: "Why are so many big towns this far inland? Trading centers exist in places that are either hubs to other trade routes or just off-shore along a wide canal to allow for sea travel." "Towns in this world are placed along centers where lots of leyline energy can be channeled from the Earth, empowering the magics of casters and hastening the creation of new spells, enchantments, and other magical wonders. Most of this energy is being actively used, however, so nobody in your party can use it to buff their spells."

[@AnaseSkyrider]

Also, how do you go about determining where to place these features and how densely to place them?

[@karsten69]

@@AnaseSkyrider where the dice falls on the paper is where the features are. River dice between two forest dice? River runs through the forest.

[@AnaseSkyrider]

​@@karsten69 So this would be hard to do digitally if you don't have the right paper and/or dice on hand. Hmm. I'd have to setup page coordinates and call a rand() function with some kind of programming tool like the Python shell. How do you normally scale your maps? Do you just use whatever scale you feel like at the time, like say an entire continent or just a region or what? Do you use anything to randomize *what* features you add, or do you just add whatever features you feel like but let the placements be random?

[@jacoboverstreet8553]

What do you mean “MOST” dungeons exist in 3 dimensions??? Did I miss the 4-D dungeon design class???

[@CharonsNightmare]

4th dimension: Time 😎

[@rcschmidt668]

Check out old school games where they had 2d maps.

[@thiluk8644]

I would love to explore a dungeon where you can cross to the Shadowfell and you can visit rooms as well as their Shadowfell echoes which would have a slightly different setup and enemies. It can work the same with the Feywild in a lost temple deep in the forest. if you really want to mess with the players, you can even use a different flow of time inside the Feywild side of the dungeon.

[@ruthb7605]

@@thiluk8644 Try and get hold of the 2nd Ed Ravenloft adventure Castles Forlorn, the castle exists in 3 different time zones with the players randomly transported from one to another as they explore the castle, with different encounters in each area depending on the time zone they are in.

[@Schilani]

@@ruthb7605 Good lord suddenly I want to design something like that. Currently running Tyranny of Dragons and my party is having a blast. I kinda want to continue after that, going into the nine hells. As nobody in my group has any idea about those, I could probably get away with doing whatever I want. And something like that might fit into hell quite nicely.

[@Illianor123]

The best version of the resident evil key is one that opens up a portal. No door to break down, no idea for where the portal goes. They're just got to try to find the keys. Good also to set it up to need a specific alignment of some items in the room (tuning wheels etc) as well.

[@thomaspetrucka9173]

I’ve found it most helpful to create challenges without a designated solutions. Players are given tools to solve problems, why shouldn’t we use our tools to simply create problems?

[@Gobamba]

Just the content that i needed to optimize my campaign! These Dudes indeed know some stuff about dungeons.

[@hellaradusername]

I make all my fortresses vertical in Dwarf Fortress, so the workshops are built above storage, which is built above the dining halls, which is built above the housing - things go faster because dwarves only have to go up a couple floors to get a drink or go to work rather than trudge across an entire dungeon. It's like a tower, underground. Where I *do* have a giant underground space to trudge across is a heavily trapped entrance with a barracks, drawbridges, pits over huge chasms lined with spikes, etc. This also goes for underground entrances.

[@GG-bw5qd]

On the topic of defeating a dungeon with a ladder, some time it is better to lean into the players alternate solutions. In the lost mines of phandelver, right next to the entrance of the first dungeon there is a fissure you can climb that takes you straight to the dungeon's boss avoiding a number of traps and enemies. This is what my part did when we played and it made us feel super clever.

[@krispalermo8133]

Create a dungeon with player flash backs. 1.) Guard gate at the front of a salt mine is attacked by orcs during a cloudy moonless fall night. Have the PC guard the gate get over run. 2.) Switch over and have the players PC orcs raiding a mine, and follow through with killing all the miners .. take notes on the players viciousness in the assault. 3.) Have the player pc all the miners getting killed off by the orcs, run the attacks the same way the players behave last time, .. yeah make them feel like jerks and murder hobos 4.) Spring raid, Players clear out the orcs that lived in the mine during winter. a.) Good number of orcs living just out side of the salt mind, .. and they block off/ seal the mines enterance. b.) the cold and salt persevered .the dead bodies. But the mine was seal off and no one is living in the mine. Other than for the undead and ghost. Just away for the players to relive a mine battle three times over. You can space the game's three/ four episodes over a few weeks/ months to catch them off guard as to what is going on.

[@flarelord8425]

@Dungeon Dudes - I am already excitedly brainstorming ideas for a Delerium-Flavored Blood Hunter. (I'd love to see you guys do a subclass for Blood Hunter based on delerium. A few ideas I have: A feature that allows Hunters Bane to help them learn about Delerium and mutated monstrosities in the city I like the idea that a Delerium Bloodhunter always has that first point of Contamination, but (maybe level 7 or 11?) gets advantage against further contamination(maybe not this exactly, but some sort of 'learned to handle the city better' at appropriately high levels, I know you cautioned against things at character creation that acted as 'keys' to the problem of the haze). When they use their Crimson Rite, they can expend a piece of delerium to gain a point of contamination and empower their rite with more damage based on either the type of delerium they expended or their own contamination level. (I was unsure if their rites should just be better vs contaminated beings, or this, but probably not both.) I also like the idea that they can roll twice on the mutation table and pick mutations of their choice, and, if they don't like their mutations, expend delerium on a long rest to reroll one of their mutations. Loose ideas, until I have the full contamination rules in hand, but, I'd love to see you guys run with it.

[@RedBlitzen]

"An often frustrating amount of life seems to come down to finding a balance point somewhere in between a minimum of two extremes." Been saying it for years. Gonna keep saying it for years more if I can. Feel free to use the quote. As far as I know I'm the first to come up with it.