1E DMG: The Ultimate Dungeon Creator

What started out as a potential Act III for the module I'm working on has... expanded.

9 nearly full pages of old-school mega-mega-mega-dungeon. 

All created using the random tables on pages 170-172 of the AD&D 1st Edition Dungeon Masters Guide by Gary Gygax, published in 1979.

Why? Because drawing dungeons from just the scratch of my imagination has become kinda boring. 

I marked my entry point in the center of a page and simply went with whatever happened. It was linear at first, but it soon expanded; side passages upon side passages, straight, diagonal, parallel, intersections -- 4-ways, Xs, Ys, Ts, all leading to chambers and rooms of all shapes and sizes (it's implied but never explicitly stated that rooms have doors and chambers do not). These tables are designed to go on and on and on; there are occasional dead-ends, but if you don't consciously stop it, it probably will not stop (25% of periodic-checks introduce side passages and 50% of side passages introduce multiple side passages).

I wanted every passage to take you deeper down the rabbit-hole, so no looping was allowed until deeply forward for every path. Every new corridor goes underneath any room or passage it crosses, but eventually loops do occur, plenty of them. At times, it's like solving a puzzle; decisions have to made, to connect or not connect? Sometimes I beg for a dead-end and sometimes I have no choice but to place one and sometimes a loop is allowed. This place is wild. I get lost just looking at it. If players were mapping it, they'd fuck up quickly, just as they would if it were a real place.

This process also reinforces the notion of space; not every room will be occupied (could/should still be interesting though) and there are many long, twisting corridors. Noise wouldn't travel here very well, not clearly. Certainly you might hear echoes and clangs and screams, but they would haunt like distant nightmares. It's easy to see adventurers snooping about, even fighting, without disturbing much of anything at all. What about the goblins in the next room? With Gygax's system, chances are, there are no goblins in the next room. 

Eventually I came to the edge of the first page, all four edges, and thought, what the hell, let's keep going, and before long, it became clear that it would bleed over onto at least 9 pages. I configured entry points to align with Act III if I insanely go in that direction. Who am I kidding... 

Some thoughts...

Wandering Monsters are built in. That's right, on the main d20 "Periodic Check Table" a roll of 20 results in a wandering monster, not a check, an actual random monster right then and there. So, I put an X on the map, always in a corridor. Sometimes they occur in bunches. So, what if wandering monsters were always handled this way, and, is that a repeated occurrence or just a one time thing? Just thinking out loud; one time occurrence is obvious to me, unless something (a glyph?) is spawning creatures.

Stairs... come up plenty of times, but there's no way I'm doing levels below this monstrosity. So, I simply put stairs in the corridor -- almost always going down. Combined with the fact that new passages go under already drawn ones, the farther out you go, the deeper underground you are. It's shaped like an underground hill. This could be how danger (dungeon levels) is measured. Center page -- dungeon levels 1 and 2; 8 pages surrounding the center page -- dungeon levels 3 and 4; 16 pages surrounding that -- dungeon levels 5 and 6, etc. So danger equals distance from the center as opposed to levels straight down. 

Tricks/Traps come up as often as stairs and such; all in corridors. I've never been a fan of hallway traps because they're punitive and make the game an unfun slog. The players have no defense other than to check every 10' of the place. So whatever these turn out to be, there must be clues.

Special passageways... Rivers, caverns, chasms, streams, all come up periodically, but I've avoided all so far. I have a certain look in mind -- the cellar of Castle Dracula, complete with arched columns, vaulted ceilings, and at times, unfinished floors. I may add subterranean canals at some point, but I'll be damned if I taint this place with caverns.

After a few weeks, all 9 pages are nearly complete (much more complete than the pic I posted above) and it has a shit-ton of passages bleeding off in every possible direction. This implies a larger ring of 16 new pages for a total of 25. I would love to keep going until all natural dead-ends are met, but this could become comically large. So, is it now just a work of art? A curiosity? The odds of it stopping on its own are astronomically low. I wonder, what is the largest dungeon ever made using these tables? This is probably unknowable.

And then you must stock it!

Your mind would never imagine what these tables create.

Gary Gygax was a genius.

Medieval Doors

These are not like modern doors.

No knob to turn.

No door handle.

Often, the outside has a keyhole and nothing else.

Maybe an iron loop or rung to grab, but these are most likely used to pull the door shut when leaving; may double as knockers.

Hinges are on the inside.

They almost always open inward. 

On the inside are often multiple locking mechanisms beyond a possible keyhole: Latches that slide sideways, latches that slide into the floor and ceiling. Rungs for wooden beams to slide into. 

They are solid as fuck.

You are not hacking through these doors with your weapons.

It takes one full 10 minute turn per attempt to pick the lock which may include multiple latches and such. Two turns if a non-thief is somehow attempting. (My rule).

It could take one full turn before that to search for traps... or you could say that is part of the picking process, but still, two rolls, three, if you find and need to remove prior to picking. Whatever, one turn minimum for the whole process.

One full turn per attempt to open a stuck or heavy door.

Looking at the doors below, bashing them down seems ludicrous in many cases and of course should result in a mandatory and heightened wandering monster check.

It's hard to imagine hearing anything through them... that's why it's a special thief ability. And you're putting your ear to where the door meets the floor, not up against the door itself like you're trying to crack a safe. (Maybe while picking). Perhaps an ear to the keyhole.

Attempting any of the above forfeits any hope of surprise. In fact, it should guarantee surprise against the PCs.

Simply opening the door should forfeit surprise. Imagine the noise.

Doors are obstacles.

Game on.

Spell Research

Been awhile...

Cool way to mix random spell determination with choice...

When you level up (or even at character creation) and are gaining new spells, you roll randomly to determine what spell(s) has turned up in your off-screen research (you're a wizard, you're always researching).

This requires random lists of all possible spells (by level) in whatever system you're using. You may have to make these yourself. (I have such disdain when spells are simply listed without the option of random determination; laziness).

After a spell is rolled and you want to learn it, you need to make a learning check. In AD&D 1E this would be a "chance to know spell" check. In 3.Path, it would be a spellcraft check. If you don't want to learn it, you can pass and roll again (you can only "pass" a number of times equal to your level). You may regret this, because that spell is lost to you until you randomly roll it again or find it in the wild. (Speaking of, if you have a scroll with a spell that you want to learn, you can skip the random roll and try to learn that spell instead. Failure means you didn't learn it and must roll randomly. Success means you learned it and the scroll is destroyed. Critical failures could get interesting, as could critical successes.)

• Spell Books are coveted because they contain a variety of spells you can choose from, thus bypassing random research. But learning rolls must still be made.

If you fail to learn a spell, you record that spell on a list of "spells being learned" and can try again the next time you gain a new spell of that level. This will probably be an easier roll as your skill/intelligence score should/could be higher. If not, a small bonus may be granted each time an attempt is made.

Success on your learning roll means that you've learned the spell, of course.

More flavor... How did you find the spell? (Roll this before you roll for the spell, as it might influence whether or not you choose to learn it).

1. Library Research.
2. Dream/Meditation.
3. Another Wizard. (This might cost you, perhaps 1,000 GP/spell level, but thanks to expert tutelage, this spell is always cast as one level higher).
4. Demon/Devil. (Could be a multitude of beings, but as I view magic as black...) Learning the spell from a demonic/devilish source could come with a price such as a contract, blood sacrifice, or physical/mental corruption: Horns, rotting flesh, scars, hooves, etc. (represented mechanically by stat loss), but, the spell is learned with greater potency; cast as 1d4 levels higher.

And just like that, Wizards are infinitely more interesting.

 

Castles & Crusades: Save Redux

In C&C, all class abilities and saving throws are resolved with Siege: A stat-based saving-throw and class ability/skill mechanic.

Of your core stats: Str, Dex, Con, Int, Wis, Cha, two are primes and the rest are secondaries (there's an option for tertiaries as well; also of note, humans start with three primes). Primes start at 12, secondaries start at 18 (with tertiaries it is 12, 15, 18, a better option in my opinion). These are target numbers -- like classic saving throws.

To make a Siege check, you add your level and your stat bonus to a d20 roll to meet/beat that Siege target number. Further, that target number will probably be modified by the level of the threat, such as saving against a spell cast by a 7th level wizard or disarming a trap set by a 10th level NPC. In many ways, that's logical, but, as you gain levels, you will have to face tougher threats, which leads to the following reality: The more levels you gain, the more skilled you become...and...the more challenging the traps, spells, and locks also become, so... are you really improving? Sure, if you encounter a 1st-level trap, but, this has been a problem since 3rd edition.

The beauty of older systems, with regard to class abilities, is that you actually got better at what you did without the fear of encountering more complicated obstacles. Locks were locks, poison was poison, spells were spells, and traps were traps. Period. Sure, you would occasionally encounter some kind of modifier, e.g., save at -4 against this or that, but that was kind of rare. It was good to know that if you had a 70% chance to disarm a trap... you had a 70% chance to disarm a trap.

Now, I don't want to bash C&C (as I like the game) but Siege can break down, making your base primes unstoppable by around 7-9th level, practically mandating more complex obstacles.

Example: 8th level thief, 18 dex (+3) -- prime (12). That's +11 (level 8, + 3 for dex) to your d20 roll, in essence, the base target number becomes 1 (12 - 8 - 3 = 1) Unless this thief (rogue) meets more complex threats, all successes are automatic, unless you count a natural 1 as an auto-fail. Now the GM, must, to keep things interesting, assign an almost arbitrary difficulty level to your roll. "Oh btw,  that lock was built by a 15th level locksmith!" 

Yeah, no.

Another thing, I know it sounds logical that higher level wizards cast tougher spells, but better saving-throws as you leveled up was a specific counter-weight to the powerhouses that high level wizards became.

• Palladium Fantasy handles this fairly well, with wizards gradually becoming better at casting; their spell's save number improves by 1 every 3 or 4 levels of experience.

And also, should higher level wizards cast tougher spells in a game where each spell is a specific magical formula designed for a specific purpose (Vancian!) regardless of the spell-caster's experience? -- But that's a whole separate topic, because... D&D is actually quasi-Vancian; some spells do in fact scale with caster level. Otherwise, you'd have a 1d6 fireball spell, a 2d6 fireball spell, a 3d6 fireball spell, and so on.

Also, I'm a fan of the notion that if a thief makes his stealth roll, whether moving silently or hiding in shadows, then he succeeds, period. No perception checks. The thief's failure IS the perception check.

And so, here is my Save Redux for C&C (and any version of the game really)...

A more standard saving-throw/ability-check system. The target numbers start the same: Primes: 12, Secondaries: 15, Tertiaries: 18. Subtract any ability modifiers. And those are your fixed saves. These saves improve by 1 every 3 levels. Except for rare circumstances, your roll is NOT affected by caster-level, monster level, or artificially inflated locks/trap levels, etc. See below...

•  0 at levels 1-3
• -1 at levels 4-6
• -2 at levels 7-9
• -3 at levels 10-12
• -4 at levels 13-15
• -5 at levels 16-18
• -6 at levels 19-21
• -7 at levels 22-24

Your Save numbers are frozen at 24th level (and no save can ever go below 2) never to improve (unless your core stats improve, maybe). For any progression beyond this (such as an Immortal system I've fiddled around with for levels 25-36) you would roll with advantage (if for some reason you don't know what advantage is, it's rolling 2d20 and keeping the best result).

We'll use a rogue as an example since they use Siege more than any other class (with comparisons to AD&D saves): 

1st level human rogue...

                                                        New Siege Save                    AD&D

• Str:   12          Tertiary               Siege: 18                  Poison/Death:  13
• Dex: 18 (+3)  Prime                  Siege:   9                  Paralyze/Poly: 12
• Con: 13 (+1)  Secondary           Siege: 14              Rod/Staff/Wand: 14
• Int:   12          Prime                  Siege: 12                             Breath:  16
• Wis:   9          Prime                  Siege: 12                                Spell:  15
• Cha: 14 (+1)  Secondary           Siege: 14

                                                          Average: 13.1                      Average: 14

At 13th level, he looks like this:

• Str:   12          Tertiary               Siege: 14                  Poison/Death:  10
• Dex: 18 (+3)  Prime                  Siege:   5                  Paralyze/Poly:   9 
• Con: 13 (+1)  Secondary           Siege: 10              Rod/Staff/Wand:   8
• Int:   12          Prime                  Siege:   8                             Breath:  13
• Wis:   9          Prime                  Siege:   8                                Spell:   9
• Cha: 14 (+1)  Secondary           Siege: 10

                                                         Average: 9.166                      Average: 9.8

At 24th level, good for sure, but still vulnerable...

• Str:   12          Tertiary               Siege: 11                 Poison/Death:    8
• Dex: 18 (+3)  Prime                  Siege:   2                Paralyze/Poly:    7
• Con: 13 (+1)  Secondary           Siege:   7            Rod/Staff/Wand:    4
• Int:   12          Prime                  Siege:   5                            Breath:  11
• Wis:   9          Prime                  Siege:   5                               Spell:   5
• Cha: 14 (+1)  Secondary           Siege:   7

                                                        Average: 6.166                      Average: 7

Now keep in mind, C&C's saving throws categories are linked to core stats as follows (with some spells affecting different stats):

• Str:    Paralysis, Constriction
• Dex:  Breath Weapon, Traps
• Con:  Disease, Energy Drain, Poison
• Int:    Arcane Magic, Illusion
• Wis:  Divine Magic, Confusion, Gaze, Polymorph, Petrification
• Cha:  Death, Charm, Fear

(I have reworked these saves to my fit own logic, including shifting death saves to your best save and I also reassigned lock-picking and trap-removal to Intelligence; Dex is for avoiding sprung traps). My version with Death being your best save...

• Str:    Paralysis, Constriction
• Dex:  Breath Weapon, Traps
• Con:  Disease, Energy Drain, Poison, Polymorph
• Int:    Arcane Magic, Illusion & Confusion, Lock-Picking, Trap Finding/Removal, Searching
• Wis:  Divine Magic, Fear, Gaze, Petrification
• Cha:  Charm, Loyalty, Morale

C&C gives options for alternate stat bonuses, such as the more modern ones started in 3rd edition. These would only change some numbers by 1.

The above rogue is only slightly better than his AD&D counterpart because of stat bonuses, which other than wisdom, are not applied to saves in AD&D. Your typical fighter would be slightly worse off in Save Redux.

Under Save Redux™ (which can actually be applied to any version of the game) if you want to attempt something that falls under the jurisdiction of another class, like thief abilities, tracking, and other non-mystical stuff, treat all stats like tertiary stats with zero level adjustment; stat bonuses do apply though, so: 18 minus stat bonus. Also, it gets one point harder with every attempt. So a fighter with a +1 Dex bonus (I prefer Int here, but whatever) trying to pick a lock would have to roll a 17+ no matter what his level is. And if he fails, his next attempt is 18+, and if he fails again and tries again, 19+... that would be 30 minutes (3 turns) wasted, and at least one wandering monster check.; (C&C doesn't use "turns" but you probably do). And you could rule that once you hit 20, it ain't gonna happen.

And speaking of monsters...

In C&C, monsters have two saves, physical and mental; one or both can be primary (secondary takes the slot of tertiary). So, that would be 12 or 18 adjusted by the level chart above. Examples...

• Gargoyle (5HD): P:11, M:17
• Young Adult-Adult Green Dragons (10-12HD): P:9, M:9
• Titan (17HD): P:7, M:7
• Goblin (1HD): P:12, M:18

Monsters are slightly more vulnerable under Save Redux™, however, percentage-wise, they're not too far off from AD&D 1st edition.

Now just for fun, I'll take it further and give monsters three saves because a lumbering beast can have loads of fortitude but no agility, so: Fort/Reflex/Will, with varying combinations of primaries, secondaries, and tertiaries. The above four monsters perhaps now look like...

• Gargoyle (5HD): F:11, R:14, W:17
• Young Adult-Adult Green Dragons (10-12HD): F:9, R:12, W:9
• Titan (17HD): F:7, R:10, W:7
• Goblin (1HD): F:15, R:12, W:18

The beauty of Save Redux™ is that it's cleaner; there's no math, and it still gives you that collision of old and new.

All for now.