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Almost Done with V&W issue 2

A topic by Logen_Nein created Jan 04, 2023 Views: 86 Replies: 3
Viewing posts 1 to 5
Submitted

I just need to populate the dungeon I am including and key out all the rooms...but I'm flagging...creativity drained...

Host

Why don't you post up the theme of the dungeon and see if we can brainstorm a few ideas on the forum if that helps get this over the line?

Submitted

it is a level 3 to 4 ancient dwarfish hold recently opened and occupied by Chaos. I'm randomly rolling a traps table and encounter table now...then comes room dressing.

Host

Here's a quick brainstorm; I'm interpreting this as a dwarven military fort

Layer 1 - The Dwarven Fort

  • Rooms: Barracks, Armoury, Meeting/Drinking Halls, Forge, Training Area, Well (Water Source), Indoor Gardens (i.e. Mushrooms - Food Sources), Underground Caverns and Canals (connect areas), Tunnels, VIP Quarters, Library of Dwarven Artifacts
  • Traps: Assume Dwarven traps would be outward facing to prevent external intruders so things like drawbridge, moat, battlements, stakes. Inside the defences are focussed on containing an external breach so things like narrow tunnels/paths to bottleneck intruders, boiling oil, tripwires. Some of the inner rooms may have their own traps to protect contents such as locks, pressure plates, alarm systems
  • Contents: Weapons, armour, tools associated with the military; remains of food/drink or entertainment; forge/hearth, tools, displays of dwarven craftmanship; statues, banners, inscriptions to the dwarven gods or previous leaders; library of information such as notes, scrolls, parchments referring to the lost dwarven kingdoms of the past (future adventure hooks)

Layer 2 - Chaos

  • I would firstly consider what is the source of the chaos and how did it appear. Let's assume a dimensional rift in the fabric of reality which has caused chaos spirits to enter the dwarven hold and this has started to drive the inhabitants mad and eventually corrupt them (my example but feel free to use your own)
  • Using this as the basis of chaos as an example, you could have signs and evidence of this madness such as smashed and broken artifacts, dwarven graffiti,  scrawling weird phrases on the walls, dwarves building odd looking shrines to chaos, signs of disruption, evil spirits, animated objects, corrupted zombie dwarves..

Layer 3 - Now

  • Who occupies the hold now? If chaos is the current inhabitant then leave as is. If this took place some time ago then overlay the place with the current inhabitants and features associated with them.

Layer 4 - Links

  • Link objects/monsters/encounters between different rooms or areas so you are building objects, locations and creatures you can interact with (i.e. key found in one area opens a door in another, dwarven carvings tell of evil spirits ahead - a warning etc).
  • This can act as rewards or clues for exploration and investigation, tell a story of the place and foreshadow events. All the sort of cool elements players can fathom out for themselves without having to look at their character sheer (i.e. the 'osr' style of play) 

TLDR - Take the origin of the place and write down the functional details of the place then overlay what has happened. Layering these elements then starts to create some interesting rooms with a link to the history/story of the place

Does that help getting those creative ideas flowing?