Like many gamers, my introduction to role-playing games came via Dungeons & Dragons. As both a player and a DM, we dealt with more dungeons than dragons. To a fantasy role-player dungeons did not mean prison; it was a generic term with mazes to map, filled with traps and foes (and, with luck, loot). In my early days dungeons also didn’t have to make much sense. After mapping out a maze of caverns or man-made (or Dwarf-made) passages, no one asked “who designed this place and why?” Years later, when my friends and I were playing HackMaster I couldn’t help but ask that and try to make sense of it. Now that I’m starting to examine Pathfinder as a role-playing option, I’ve been considering consistency and believability in my own dungeon creations.
Game Flavor
Presumably, the gaming group in question is interested in playing a fantasy role-playing game with mazes and monsters; but different players like different things. Do the players like to map the space as they progress or do they prefer the GM to take care of the “book-keeping” and rely on skill rolls for any maze-like structures? Do the players prefer riddles and puzzles to combat and trap checks? Dungeon crafting is more rewarding when it’s suited for the group playing and the group’s preferred “flavor” will determine where the most work in dungeon-crafting takes place. If players aren’t going to map the dungeon, then the DM can create a loose sketch without needing to determine dimensions for every passage.
I once made the mistake of attempting to run a dungeon based on the original Infocom text adventure Zork. My players were neither interested in mapping nor solving puzzles with enigmatic solutions. It did not go well. This was one of my first lessons in game flavors. If the players aren’t having a good time then the GM isn’t, either.
Type and Purpose
Dungeons come in many forms: mines, caverns, ruins, catacombs, castles, hedge mazes, sewers, space ships, magical towers, etc. Sometimes one form of dungeon might lead into another. The type of the dungeon should be conveyed in its architecture/layout. Mines may spread underground, chasing after precious ore, but will have few locked rooms and no dance halls. That is, of course, unless the mine was later re-purposed as something else (for example: a vault, cathedral, or mushroom farm). Should that be the case, then the dungeon may take on a more amorphous quality, being two things at once. Even if it’s never directly communicated with the players, it is important for the GM to know the history and purpose of the dungeon to help maintain a proper suspension of disbelief. Dungeons should have an internal consistency that makes sense with their background.
A decade plus ago I was a player in a HackMaster game (for the details on that, you can read Ed McEneely’s Hack for More column on RPG.net). Ed had a more laissez-faire attitude toward dungeon design and population (often putting everything together last-minute). For the context of reviving the “old school” type of hack-and-slash play we were aiming for this worked, but there were few nights that went by where at least one of the players didn’t express some incredulity about the layout or happenings in the dungeon (most of the time I was that one player).
Denizens and Encounters
The beings that inhabit, haunt, or are otherwise summoned to the dungeon should also make sense based on the dungeon’s type and (current) purpose. Because one dungeon type could lead into another, spill-over might be expected or be the reason for the adventure itself (example: goblins, expanding their caverns, dug into sewers which led to a castle), but encounters should include beings/things germane to the dungeon(s) at hand. Likewise, the size of creatures in the dungeon should make sense to the space they’re in.
This is one of the problems I’ve encountered most when playing fantasy role-playing games. Dungeons are often a hodgepodge of monsters at every turn with no explainable reason for them to be there or how they’re co-existing with the beasts in the next room. This is made worse when the creature encountered in a room with a locked door is too large for any way into the sealed area. It’s one of the dangers of using random encounter tables without also applying judgement and a reason I prefer to specifically decide on the creatures populating the game-space.
Traps and Puzzles
Traps and puzzles are the spices to the meal of the dungeon-dive. Sure, you could have a meal without spices, but it wouldn’t be as exciting. But just as the right spices enhance the meal, the wrong spices can have a negative effect. Traps should make sense to the space and purpose of the dungeon—it wouldn’t make sense to have a pit trap in a main or heavily-traveled thoroughfare. Likewise, one would not place a riddle puzzle on an outhouse, because when you’ve got to use the outhouse you don’t want to slow your progress by solving a riddle.
The old Grimtooth’s Traps books were fun to read, but rarely made sense to me. Some traps were blatant, while others were so inconspicuous/obtuse I could visualize the trap setter setting off their own traps. Of course, I was also the kid who wondered how the knight in Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade set and re-set his traps… especially the one about spelling the name of God.
Mystery and Details
A well-designed and believable dungeon should offer the players details and clues to lead them forward and provide a narrative for the adventure. For example, adventurers might encounter light spiderwebs that grow thicker and thicker throughout their trek. As the party delved further into the dungeon, the webs would contain the corpses of other dungeon denizens. Some passages would be thick with webs, slowing the party down or forcing them to take alternate routes through the dungeon. Every so often the players would engage in combat with a giant spider, until they found the nest positioned at the center of the webbing. Or, for a simpler example, a door is blocked from opening. When the players later reach the room from a different route they discover a stone table pushed against the door to fortify it from invaders. These mysteries and individual stories, great and small, help prevent each dungeon from being the same monster and trap crawl over and over again.
This is a lesson I learned from video games. Early CRPGs were little more than endless corridors of monsters and traps, feeding into a repetitive loop. As video games evolved, the more memorable games gave their dungeons not only an over-arching story and reason to exist, but also had smaller narratives woven throughout the dungeon. A room would contain the corpse of a previous adventurer who had a journal noting how they had broken their leg and were now trapped. Thanks to these details each dungeon felt unique, even when using the same visual assets.
Hidden Rooms and Passages
Hidden rooms and secret passages should not be over-used, but offer depth and nuance to a dungeon. When adding secret doors to a dungeon the GM should consider its placement and purpose. A secret passage can come in many forms: a hidden route for escape, a crawlspace, a walled off part of the dungeon, or a cavern/vent too high or too low for the adventurers to notice. Obscured areas should provide the players with a reward for exploration and observation. This reward can come in the form of treasure, a confrontation, a shortcut, or clues into the story or plot.
One of my pet peeves as both a player and GM are the players who check for hidden passageways at every turn. They slow the game down and provide no flavor. I’ve found that the better GMs provide subtle clues when a passageway is nearby. These clues come in the form of footsteps sounding different, slight breezes in cramped quarters, or faint noises beyond. Players paying attention will notice the clues and use those moments to search for the obscured area.
Scale and Balance
A well-crafted dungeon has three main components: fun, believability, and balance. A GM should be challenged but not overwhelmed when crafting their dungeon and players should be challenged but not against impossible odds when attempting to traverse the space. Dungeon complexity also affects the time it takes to build and conquer the dungeon and is something to be considered in its crafting. Some groups prefer dungeons that take multiple sessions to complete, but others may not have the time or stamina. A dungeon does not have to be large to be interesting and believable.
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