The Original "Dungeon" Delver

Today marks the birthday of Abraham Merritt, an early twentieth-century writer whose work I have long championed on this blog. That advocacy sometimes feels quixotic, since Merritt is far less read today than many of his contemporaries. That’s a shame, because his distinctive contribution to fantasy deserves wider recognition. Merritt helped popularize the idea that the greatest adventures are not across oceans or among the stars, but beneath our feet.

Again and again, Merritt sends his characters downward into hidden worlds. The Moon Pool is perhaps the clearest example. What begins as a scientific expedition soon becomes a descent into a sealed subterranean realm, complete with alien rulers, strange technologies, and layered environments that must be navigated step by step. The story almost reads like a traditional dungeon expedition, with each new chamber revealing fresh dangers and deeper mysteries.

Merritt returned to this idea repeatedly. Dwellers in the Mirage takes explorers beneath the Arctic ice into a buried world populated by ancient races and quasi-divine beings. Even The Metal Monster, though set in a remote valley rather than underground, follows the same logic of a sealed environment ruled by an inhuman intelligence, structured for exploration rather than mere sightseeing. In all of these stories, Merritt treats space itself as the engine of narrative.

Of course, Merritt didn’t invent the idea of subterranean worlds, but he transformed it. Earlier writers often treated hidden realms as philosophical curiosities or lost utopias. Merritt turned them into adventure locales – layered, dangerous, and ruled by inhuman powers. Most importantly, his characters didn’t simply arrive in these places. They descended. Depth meant danger, and discovery always came at a cost.

That model proved enormously influential. You can see echoes of Merritt in later writers such as H.P. Lovecraft and even Richard Shaver. More importantly, for the purposes of this blog, you can see it in Gary Gygax. In Appendix N of the AD&D Dungeon Masters Guide, Gygax placed Merritt alongside Robert E. Howard, Lovecraft, Fritz Leiber, Jack Vance, L. Sprague de Camp, and Fletcher Pratt as among “the most immediate influences upon AD&D.”

Why would he do that? I can’t say for certain and it’s quite possible Gygax explained his reasoning elsewhere (if so, I’d love to know where). But I can’t help suspect it has something to do with Merritt’s portrayal of underground expeditions. After all, the gameplay of classic Dungeons & Dragons looks something like this:

• Enter a ruin
• Descend level by level
• Encounter strange monsters and factions
• Recover dangerous artifacts
• Retreat to safety

That’s more or less The Moon Pool with dice.

Merritt’s real gift wasn’t tone or character, but structure. He showed how to make a location the driver of adventure. His hidden worlds are layered, ancient, and repurposed, exactly like a good dungeon. They feel inhabited, dangerous, and full of history.

Every time a referee designs a buried city, a sealed vault, or an underground empire, he's working in a tradition Merritt helped popularize. He taught readers (and later gamers) that every cave mouth might be a gateway and every descent a story waiting to happen. Even if almost no one remembers him today, that doesn’t diminish his contribution. Merritt helped shape how we imagine adventure itself. That’s a legacy worth celebrating, especially today, on the 142nd anniversary of his birth.

Be of Goodly Order

Long ago, I wrote about a fantasy art book that fascinated my childhood friends and I. Called Down in the Dungeon, the book featured color illustrations of a locale called Zarakan's Dungeon. Because there's very little text in the book, there's almost no context for anything depicted in it, beyond this overview of the subterranean complex.

It's a very cool illustration, especially because all of the artwork included in Down in the Dungeon can be placed within it. In fact, if you look carefully at the overview, you can even make out smaller versions of some of the scenes found elsewhere in the book. For example, in the upper right hand portion of the overview, you can see a bunch of pillars. Those pillars – and what's around them – can be seen more clearly in a pair of other illustrations.

In the book, these two illustrations are side by side, as you can see from the creature passed out from intoxication in the first piece, whose hand can be seen in the second one. In the book, a captain accompanies them, reading "Neutral Ground. Be of Goodly Order." Clearly, this is meant to be a bar or tavern located within the dungeon, where all its various inhabitants, monstrous or otherwise, can rub shoulders not only with one another but also with adventurers – so long as they all are "of goodly order."

It's a pretty strange concept, a bar within a dungeon and yet I can recall at least one dungeon I played in as a young man that included such a thing. The bar was explicitly a "safe area" where characters could rest and even re-supply, though to a limited extent. I don't know where the referee, whom I met at a "games day" at a local library, got the idea for such a thing. I'd never seen anything like it before (since I hadn't yet encountered Down in the Dungeon) and I recall finding it odd. However, my fellow players and I went along with it, since there were all sorts of weird NPCs in the place with whom we enjoyed interacting. Plus, as I said, the bar was a place where our characters could rest up, heal, and get more food/water, arrows, and other similar things. I suppose the referee intended it as a mercy of sorts, since the rest of the dungeon was pretty brutal.

Has anyone else ever encountered something like this in a dungeon? Are there any examples of it in fantasy literature or perhaps in a fantasy RPG? I can't shake the feeling that I'm failing to remember something obvious.

A Tale of Two(?) Dungeons

In the comments to last week's post about The Official Advanced Dungeons & Dragons Coloring Album, an anonymous poster theorizes that "the map used here is identical to the one in the Holmes basic set intro adventure" to which commenter Frank replies that it's "not identical, but very close." In the interest of discussion, here's what the Holmes Basic Set map looks like:

Meanwhile, the map from the Coloring Album looks like this:

If you look carefully at the two images, you'll see that Frank is indeed correct: the dungeons are very similar to one another but not quite identical. Even so, many of the most iconic features of the Holmes dungeon are still present in the Coloring Album version, like the sea caves at the bottom left and the rat warrens at the middle top. Zach Howard, over the excellent blog Zenopus Archives, has a useful post in which he looks at some of the similarities and differences between the two versions.

I'm fairly confident that the map appearing in the 1977 D&D Basic Set was created by Holmes himself, though I'm 100% certain of this fact. If so, that makes its reappearance in the Coloring Album, albeit in modified form, all the more fascinating to me. Why was it chosen? Was it because its compactness made it especially suitable for the pared down "D&D Lite" of the Coloring Album? Why not make an entirely new dungeon map? I suspect the answer is probably fairly mundane, but I can't help but wonder.

Six Months In

It's now been six months since the start of Dungeon23. Though I tend to be skeptical of these kinds of bandwagon-y Internet "challenges," I nevertheless decided to participate in this one, because I thought it a worthwhile endeavor in its own right – the creation of a twelve-level, 365-room dungeon over the course of a year – and because I thought its pace – one room a day – was sustainable. Sitting here at the beginning of the second half of the year, I still think that. In fact, I'm very glad that I've stuck with this, even if it's occasionally been harder to do than I'd anticipated.

As you may recall, I chose to use Dungeon23 as an opportunity to develop the Vaults of da-Imer, a subterranean area beneath the former capital of the Empire of Inba Iro. My hope was that my daily work would eventually provide me with an adventuring locale in which to playtest Secrets of sha-Arthan, as well as give me the opportunity to flesh out parts of its setting. I also felt it inculcated good discipline in me by ensuring that, no matter what, I wrote something every day if I wasn't going to fall behind on the whole project.

That's not quite what happened, alas. At the moment, for example, I am five days behind in my pace, but I have little doubt I'll be able to catch up soon. Part of the problem for me is that I am no cartographer. Drawing maps is something about which I do not feel confident. Likewise, I opted for an approach that broke down each month's level into two to four "complexes," each consisting of somewhere between 8 to 15 rooms. While a great idea from the perspective of variety, not to mention providing multiple pathways to explore the Vaults, it increased my workload significantly, hence my occasional backlogs of work.

On the other hand, I've completed six levels and 181 individual rooms so far. That's not nothing. I doubt I'd have made it this deep into the Vaults of da-Imer if I didn't have the artificial frame of Dungeon23. I remain reasonably confident that, at the end of this year, I'll complete all twelve levels and 365 rooms. The end result won't be pretty, but it'll be a substantial amount of raw material from which to build something more polished. Even now, I often find myself going back and adding to or editing previous entries, as better, more complete ideas come to me. Frustrations aside, this has been a worthy project. I hope others have found it similarly useful to them. 

By Hand

Last month, I mentioned that I'd be participating in Dungeon23, a challenge to create a 12-level, 365-room megadungeon one room at a time over the course of 2023. One of the reasons I decided to take this up was because I'd already intended to begin more extensive playtesting of the rules for my The Secrets of sha-Arthan RPG this year. Having a large subterranean locale ready for players to explore would help me in this effort, as well as providing me with an opportunity to flesh out the setting further. Thus was born the Vaults of da-Imer.

Though I was very excited by the prospect of detailing the Vaults, one aspect of this project gave me pause: mapmaking. Even in my youth, when I had the time to devote to such things, I was never very good at cartography. Of course, back in those days, I also wasn't very self-aware and so my obvious shortcomings didn't much affect me. I'm not so lucky in my middle age; I am keenly aware of the inadequacy of my mapmaking skills. However, I am elected to proceed nonetheless, drawing the Vault's maps by hand, in the hope that doing so might, if nothing else, encourage me to keep at it until I reach some mediocre level of proficiency.

To that end, here's the first map I drew for the Vaults of da-Imer. It's from a section of Level 1 known as "The Threshold." I've opted to give the Vaults a node-like structure rather than the more traditional approach to dungeons. Hence, Level 1 consists of five complexes of 4–8 rooms, each effectively its own "mini-dungeon" within the larger whole of the Vaults. I've never done a dungeon like this before, let alone one consisting of 365 rooms, so it'll be interesting to see how it turns out in the end.

The Tumíssan Underworld

While I am busy developing the Vaults of da-Imer as my Dungeon23 project, cartographer extraordinaire, Dyson Logos, has decided to devote himself to the underworld beneath the western Tsolyáni city of Tumíssa. 

Dyson plays the stolid warrior Grujúng hi Znáyu in my House of Worms Empire of the Petal Throne campaign. Over the last nearly eight (!) years of play, he's established himself as not just one of the pillars of the campaign but also as a keen student of all things Tékumel. That's why I'm really looking forward to seeing what he comes up with as he works his way through this project. By the end of the year, his Tumíssan Underworld will likely have become one of the most extensive "dungeons" ever made for use in Tékumel. I have no doubt it'll be a great one.

Dungeon23

Megadungeon for 2023. 12 levels. 365 rooms. One room a day. Keep it all in a journal. ⁦@LukeGearing⁩ let’s do this. pic.twitter.com/tCVgh8i1MF

— 💭 Sean McCoy (@seanmccoy) December 5, 2022

An old mantra of this blog has long been that "roleplaying games were born in the megadungeon." By this, I simply mean that most of the earliest examples of what we would today recognize as RPGs were played in the context of exploring an immense, subterranean locale filled with monsters, magic, and mysteries – Dungeons & Dragons, Tunnels & Trolls, and Empire of the Petal Throne, to cite just three examples, all assume that much of a campaign's action will center around delving into the depths. Obviously, roleplaying games can (and should) include so many more activities, but there's something satisfyingly primal about braving the mythic underworld and returning to tell the tale.

To be worthy of the name, a megadungeon shouldn't merely be vast in size, it should also contain enough to hold the players' attentions for a long period of time. Unlike smaller, more focused "lair" dungeons, like those typically found in published adventure modules, a megadungeon is a sprawling, rambling thing that isn't about any one thing, nor is it possible to "clear" it. Instead, it's a place to which the characters can come again and again over the course of weeks, months, or even years without ever fully exhausting. A megadungeon can thus be the centerpiece of a campaign, in the way that Castles Blackmoor and Greyhawk were in their respective campaigns and the Jakállan Underworld was in the earliest Tékumel campaign.

I was reminded of all of this for two unrelated reasons. First, as you'll know, I've been working on a science fantasy RPG I'm calling The Secrets of sha-Arthan. When I first conceived of the idea a year and a half ago, I called the project The Vaults of sha-Arthan. The Vaults of the title are megadungeons by another name – deep, ancient labyrinths reputed to contain the secrets of the deific Makers. From the beginning, I knew I wanted to develop one of these Vaults as the basis of a sha-Arthan campaign and have been slowly poking at the idea ever since.

Second, Sean McCoy, the creator of Mothership, proposed something that's come to be known as Dungeon23. The idea quite simple: create one room each day for a megadungeon throughout the entirety of 2023 and then share the results. I thought this was a great idea, if only because it took what might otherwise have seemed like an insurmountable endeavor and broke it down into a much more manageable form. Since I was already contemplating the development of one of the Vaults of sha-Arthan for use in a campaign, Sean's idea struck me as worthy of an attempt.

So, among other things, 2023 will see me attempt to flesh out the Vaults beneath the ancient city of da-Imer one room at a time. Since I already have a lot of ideas of what that fabled underworld might contain, I'm pretty confident that I'll be able to keep up the pace for a while. Of course, this is a marathon, not a sprint. The real test comes after a few weeks or even months, after the novelty of the exercise begins to wear off and the realization that a year is a long time to commit to a single project.

I'll undoubtedly have a few more thoughts on this, as I work on it over on my Patreon. For now, I only wanted to say publicly that I intend to pick up the gauntlet Sean has thrown on the ground. Wish me luck.

Fun and Challenges

One of the things at which the OSR excels is categorization and the creation of jargon to encapsulate these new categories. Though perhaps inevitable in any thoroughgoing examination of ideas, these practices can be somewhat off-putting to newcomers, not to mention conducive to tedious obscurantism. At the same time, categories and verbal shorthand are genuinely useful, despite the confusion they can engender to those not well versed in their intricacies. 

As its title suggests, dungeons are a foundational element of the play of Dungeons & Dragons. It should, therefore, come as no surprise that, since its inception, the OSR had devoted a lot of virtual ink examining and re-examining dungeons from nearly every possible angle. Consequently, there's also been a concomitant amount of jargon invented to describe dungeons and aspects of them, such as megadungeon or the term I want to talk about now, funhouse dungeon.

Take a look at this map:

The image above is small, so please click to enlarge it and examine its details. The map originally appeared here and is entitled "The Quintessential Dungeon." It's a really nice piece of work in my opinion, both in terms of the brief way it presents its information but also – and perhaps more importantly for my present purposes – the way it manages to include so many well-worn components of old school dungeons. There's a bottomless pit, an alignment-reversing mirror, collapsing stairs, and a subterranean river, not to mention such de rigueur monsters like a rust monster, a mimic, and green slime. 

I find "The Quintessential Dungeon" utterly delightful in the way it sincerely and unironically celebrates all the things I so strongly associate with my early experiences of playing Dungeons & Dragons. (It also reminds me a bit of Zarakan's Dungeon from Down in the Dungeon, which may explain its appeal to me.) I think it's a good example of the kind of thing that some might call a funhouse dungeon, in that it contains a weird mélange of tricks, traps, and monsters seemingly lacking in a unifying principle (beyond the suggestion that the place is a wizard's testing ground to recruit adventurers. 

Over the years, I've used the term funhouse dungeon without any qualms. Indeed, I've even use the term in reference to some of my favorite published D&D adventures, like White Plume Mountain and Castle Amber. Though I meant no disrespect to the designs of these modules by my use of the term, I've lately started to think "funhouse dungeon" might be too glib a term for what we're talking about in most cases. The essential feature of dungeons of this sort is not that they're chaotic jumbles devoid of any rhyme or reason but that they include lots of deadly challenges intended to test the mettle and ingenuity of the characters who dare to enter them.

My point – assuming I have one – is that, rather than being silly, what we typically call funhouse dungeons are actually quite serious, in the sense that surviving them requires more than a hack 'n slash approach to its contents. Likewise, the varied nature of those contents should be viewed not as an anarchic mess but as yet another aspect of its challenging nature. Because one room might contain a group of trolls who've captured a halfling and the next a teleportation trap, the players have to keep on their toes in a way they might not in a dungeon that follows more naturalistic principles.

Perhaps I make too much out of what is ultimately little more than a terminological issue. What I most wanted to say in this post is that I think, as I have grown older, I've acquired a much greater respect for dungeons whose primary purpose is to present a gauntlet of clever tricks, cruel traps, and gimmicky monsters for the characters to overcome in pursuit of gold and experience points. I used to think less of dungeons of this sort. Nowadays, I recognize that funhouse dungeons – or whatever better term might replace it – can be every bit as satisfying, not to mention terrifying, as more plausibly built subterranean labyrinths.

Retrospective: Snakepipe Hollow

The modern roleplaying game was born in the dungeon and the earliest RPG campaigns revolved around exploring them. 

For those of us interested in the history of the hobby, it's therefore something of a tragedy that none of those "tent pole" dungeons, like Castles Blackmoor or Greyhawk, ever properly saw print. Instead, what we got were smaller, more focused dungeons intended for limited use (which makes sense, since, in most cases, they originated in the nascent tournament scene). While many of these published dungeons are excellent and indeed iconic, very few of them are suitable for long-term play, particularly when compared to the founding dungeons of the hobby.

I mention all of this because I've lately been doing a deep dive into the early years of Chaosium's RuneQuest, with an eye toward trying to put my finger on why I much prefer its portrayal of Glorantha to that of contemporary RQ. An important piece of that puzzle lies in Snakepipe Hollow, a collection of adventures written by Greg Stafford and Rudy Kraft and first published in 1979. Its title refers to a region of Dragon Pass that's home to the three levels of the Caves of Chaos (no, not those Caves of Chaos, even though they also first appeared in 1979), inhabited by all manner of inimical beings, such as ogres, scorpion men, and broos, among many more.

At the start of the book, Greg Stafford pens a remarkable introduction, in which he explains the origins and purpose of both Snakepipe Hollow the product and Snakepipe Hollow the place within Glorantha. For that reason, I'm going to reproduce it in full here:

This scenario pack provides a setting, motivation, and cast of friendly and hostile characters for the referee needing or desiring to construct a RuneQuest adventure on short notice, or for the readers interested in Dragon Pass as a place for active fantasy.

This book presents a unique section of Dragon Pass geography in some detail. This form presents this material in the same way as we prepared and ran it in our own campaign; we believe it will fit well into many different FRP campaigns.

There are several scenario suggestions, including appropriate NPC (non-player character) stats, which offer opportunities for people to enter this wild and dangerous region. These may take them to a part or all of the sections here. Referees are urged to make up their own as well.

The scenarios are not specifically designed for any number or quality of player characters. However, due to the nature of the region, we suggest that there be a good healthy mix of types, with parties numbering six to ten player characters with NPCs tossed in to provide play balance where necessary.

This pack is designed for repeated play. It contains one wilderness and three interior maps, almost 200 monster stats and over 25,000 words of description presented in a modular and flexible format.

GOOD LUCK!

There are two points that stand out to me. First, Stafford states clearly that the material in Snakepipe Hollow derives from his home campaign and that it's presented "in the same way as we prepared and ran it." I take that to mean that it's not been notably altered from what he used with his own players. Second, he emphasizes that "this pack is designed for repeated play." Thus, this is not a one-and-done product, but instead something that's able to hold the players' attentions for an extended period of time. 

Viewed from a certain perspective, Snakepipe Hollow starts to sound, to me at any rate, as if it's another example of an early tent pole dungeon. I won't go so far as to call it a megadungeon, since there are fewer than 60 keyed locations within the Caves of Chaos. Further, I don't believe that a dungeon need be "mega" in extent to qualify as a long-term campaign focus, but that's a topic for another post. Nevertheless, I think a reasonably good case could be made that Snakepipe Hollow possesses the level of depth and complexity needed to occupy the center of an entire campaign, especially when one remembers that the Caves of Chaos sit within a larger wilderness area that is every bit as treacherous – and rewarding – as they are. 

If I could refer to Stafford's introduction just one more time, I'd like to note that he calls Snakepipe Hollow a "scenario pack." That's yet another bit of evidence in support of the idea that the Caves of Chaos and the area around it was imagined not just "as a place for active fantasy" – what an evocative turn of phrase! – but as the focus of weeks or months of regular play. In addition to keys for the wilderness and the Caves, Snakepipe Hollow presents multiple potential NPC patrons, groups, rumors, and "help wanted" notices, all of which provide the player characters with reasons for venturing into the Hollow beyond mere treasure hunting. This is not just useful; it's vital, since it'll help frame the characters' expeditions within the context of the larger world, which is exactly what's needed to keep a campaign humming along indefinitely.

Since I was never a player of RuneQuest back in my youth, Snakepipe Hollow is, frankly, revelatory in the way it suggests that the hobby's early emphasis on tent pole dungeons was still alive and well, even in California. More significant still is that the Caves of Chaos and their surrounds may be one of the few published examples of those early campaign dungeons. If so, I think Snakepipe Hollow needs to be more widely known and studied than it seems to be. I know I'll be spending a lot more time with it in the weeks to come.

White Dwarf: Issue #26

Issue #26 of White Dwarf (August/September 1981) features a cover by Ian McCaig, an artist well known for his contributions to movies and album covers. Ian Livingstone's editorial floats the idea of the White Dwarf's becoming a monthly periodical but also expresses concern that doing so might affect its overall quality. To ensure this doesn't happen, he needs more regular contributors, particularly for games like D&D, Traveller, and RuneQuest (three games I strongly associate with WD, particularly the latter two). It will be interesting, from a historical point of view, to see how soon his call for new writers has any effect on the magazine's content.

The issue kicks off with a remarkable article by Marcus L. Rowland entitled "The DM's Guide to the Galaxy." Subtitled "Space Travel in D&D," Rowland sketches out the broad outline of what space travel might look like in Dungeons & Dragons, drawing on existing rules for inspiration and insights into the nature of space in a universe where magic works. Having long been a fan of the concept of fantasy space travel, this article pleased me, though I wish it had been longer and more fully fleshed out.

"Open Box" tackles four new game products, starting with Games Workshop's own Apocalypse, a game previously entitled The Warlord, which involves the struggle between small empires in post-apocalyptic Europe. The reviewer gives the game a 9 out of 10, which may well be justified, but the fact that the review appears in a Games Workshop periodical makes me question his objectivity. Also reviewed are High Guard for Traveller (also 9 out of 10), Expedition to the Barrier Peaks (9 out of 10), and Knights of Camelot (a mere 7 out of 10). 

Part II of Roger Musson's "The Dungeon Architect" focuses on the architectural features of a dungeon, starting with often forgotten elements like verticality and transit. Musson makes the very good point that dungeons exist in three dimensions; yet, many referees fail to take into account height and depth. Likewise, he draws attention to rapid means of getting in and out of the dungeon, such as teleport systems and the like. I find such considerations fascinating, since they're clearly reflective of an earlier, megadungeon-centric style of play that had already begun to fade by the time I entered the hobby. The logistics of a dungeon "expedition" were much less onerous in my youth, so it's good to be reminded of the way things were played before me. Musson rounds out the article with an examination of what he calls "vindictive" features, such as traps, one-way doors, etc.

"Jump Drive Problems" is a collection of short submissions on this topic for use with Traveller. They're a follow-up to the original article on this subject, which appeared in issue #24. Meanwhile, "Lizard Men as Player Characters" by Roger E. Moore and Michael Brown is exactly what its title suggests: providing guidelines for making this reptilian race available for players of AD&D (and even references Quag Keep in support of the idea). "Amber to Red" by Neil Cheyne is a Traveller scenario, the winner of a competition sponsored by the magazine. The scenario involves the hijacking of a starship, with the players taking the roles either of the hijackers or the defenders. It's a perfectly serviceable adventure, complete with starship deckplans, but nothing special in my opinion.

Part IV of Lewis Pulsipher's "An Introduction to Dungeons & Dragons" turns its attention to fighters and thieves. Pulsipher has a lot more to say about the latter than the former. He stresses the flexibility of the thief class and its many potential roles in a party. Frontline fighting, however, is not one of them and repeatedly emphasizes the need to "think thievishly" when playing the class – good advice. "Treasure Chest" continues to offer a grab-bag of new magic items, like the potion of quiet spell casting (which eliminates the need for a verbal component when imbibed) and the assassin's toolkit (filled with all manner of nasty aids to murder). Finally, "Fiend Factory" presents a collection of new humanoid monsters, like shadow goblins and winter kobolds. It's not the column's best installment, though its inclusion of proposed collective nouns for D&D monsters is fun (a confusion of umber hulks, a heard of ear seekers, and a fraction of halflings being some of the best ones).

Issue #26 is a solid, workmanlike effort – nothing special but nevertheless filled with entertaining and occasionally thought-provoking material. As I keep saying in these posts, White Dwarf is inching ever closer to resembling the magazine I remember from my youth (which isn't surprising, since my first issue was #32). It's a worthy alternative to Dragon, both in terms of its focus and, more importantly, perspective.

Retrospective: Telengard

I didn't own a computer until I was well into the start of my third decade of life. Nevertheless, from my elementary school days on, I had ready access to them, thanks to friends and classmates whose families were more technophilic than my own. For example, my best friend in the latter years of grade school (and who shared my love of D&D) owned a TRS-80 on which I spent endless hours playing a primitive Star Trek game. Similarly, a high school buddy of mine had an Apple IIc, making it possible for me to play Wizardry. So, while I didn't have a computer of my own, I was quite familiar with many of the primitive models available in my youth and used them when I was able.

Of all these, the one I remember most is the Atari 400 8-bit computer. A neighborhood friend, whose older brother was a gaming mentor, owned one – or, rather, his father did – and our little circle of boys used to gather round it in his living room to goggle at this marvel of modern technology. We also played games, as we were able, most of them quite forgettable. Of course, we didn't care at the time. The mere existence of a computer game was usually enough to hold our attention, resulting in a lot of wasted time.

Looking back on those days, one game continues to stand out in my memory as being better than the rest: Telengard, released by Avalon Hill in 1982. Telengard was what would nowadays be called a "dungeon crawler" in that the focus of play was navigating one's randomly generated character through an immense, 50-level dungeon filled with all manner of monsters, traps, and treasures. Like most computer games of that era, it was exceedingly limited, both in terms of options and presentation, but that didn't matter. To a thirteen year-old in the early '80s, Telengard was unbelievably cool – and about as close as you could get to digitizing the experience of playing Dungeons & Dragons.

That's because Telengard pretty much was D&D. I'm honestly surprised that TSR didn't sue or at least legally threaten Avalon Hill over the game. Characters in the game had the exact same ability scores as in D&D and the purpose of the game was to amass experience points through defeating monsters and finding treasure, thereby achieving higher levels of power, just like D&D. The selection of monsters (36 in all) included a number obviously derived from D&D, such as the gnoll and experience point-draining wraiths and spectres. Spells and magic items were likewise derivative of Gygax and Arneson's creation, with elven cloaks and boots, magic missile, and cure light wounds available, among others. As I said, I'm startled that TSR let this slide.

The primary difference between Telengard and D&D is that the computer game had no character classes. Instead, every character was equally adept at casting spells and engaging in combat. Spellcasting was handled through the use of a spell point (or "spell unit") system, but was otherwise reminiscent of the way D&D handled magic. Interestingly, turn undead was a spell; indeed, the spell list is a mixture of those available to clerics and magic-users in D&D. This gave your character a bit more versatility than in D&D, but that's understandable as Telengard provided neither an option for multiplayer nor for the acquisition of henchmen. Instead, your character was left to his own devices in facing off against the dangers of the dungeon.

To call Telengard unforgiving is an understatement. Not only were the contents of dungeon rooms random (though, like D&D, scaled to level), the entire game was played in real time. In fact, the game manual, as I recall, takes great pains to point this out to the player. There are no safe areas except outside the dungeon itself. Further, you cannot save your progress within the dungeon. The combination of these factors meant that caution was advisable, just as in D&D. Of course, the computer was even more merciless than a living referee; no amount of whining or wheedling could convince it to keep your character alive after a foolhardy decision or a bad throw of the virtual dice.

And yet, we loved it. Some of that love was no doubt a function of neopohilia. The very idea of playing a fantasy game on a computer was simply so captivating in itself that we didn't care how hard it was to survive. At the same time, I also think that its difficulty appealed to our competitive instincts and desire for genuine challenge. Being able to escape the dungeon with enough gold to gain a new level felt like a genuine accomplishment, especially when we knew just how easy it was to turn the wrong corner and run into a dragon or a vampire, not to mention a teleporter trap that sent us to some unknown lower level. The very unfairness of Telengard was part of its attraction, I think – but then the minds of teenage boys are strange things.

I don't know that I'd enjoy Telengard or a game like it anymore. At the time, though, it was genuinely engrossing and I can still remember how much fun we all had facing off against the program. There are days when I wish I could have these kinds of experiences again.

"Inscrutable Dungeonmaster Par Excellence"

Had he lived, today would have been the 74th birthday of David L. Arneson, co-creator of Dungeons & Dragons. 

There's not much I can say about him here that others have not already said better – a big change from the days of my youth, when Arneson and his contributions to the hobby weren't as well known as they are today. In the years since his death, Arneson's star has risen considerably, particularly among those of us who favor the earliest editions of D&D. That's as it should be. 

Dave Arneson was, after all, "the innovator of the 'dungeon adventure' concept" on which the entire game was founded. It's an idea of such remarkable durability and flexibility that it remains a centerpiece not just of D&D and its many imitators but also of other forms of entertainment that have grown up in its wake. In a very real sense, so much of modern popular media was born in the dungeons beneath Castle Blackmoor in the first years of the 1970s and we have Arneson to thank for lighting the spark that would one day grow into a brilliant flame.

Happy Birthday, Dave.

White Dwarf: Issue #3

Issue #3 of White Dwarf is dated October/November 1977 and features cover art by Alan Hunter, who did a number of illustrations in the Fiend Folio. Its first article is entitled "Solo Dungeon Mapping" and is credited to Roger Moores – please note the terminal "s." I assume, though do not know for certain, that this is a typographical error and that the author's name is, in fact, Roger Moore, better known as Roger E. Moore, who would later go on to become editor of TSR's Dragon. Moore's byline appeared extensively in the pages of gaming periodicals starting in the late 1970s, so it seems very likely that this is the same person, but I could be mistaken.

In any case, "Solo Dungeon Mapping" is an unusual article. First, though intended for use with Dungeons & Dragons, it makes reference to Empire of the Petal Throne as another game for which it could be useful. Second, the very loose system that Moore presents seems intended to create dungeons with few rooms per level but lots of long corridors and passages up and down between levels. Now, there's nothing wrong with this approach, of course, but it's quite different from the much more cramped style I tend to associate with dungeons.

Fred Hemmings offers another installment of his "Competitive D&D," This time around Hemmings presents more details on the chambers of his competition dungeon, Pandora's Maze, which I welcome, given what he implied about it in his previous two articles. The intention here is to provide examples of the mix of encounters, tricks, and traps he uses in scenarios of this style. Likewise, Don Turnbull continues to plug away at his "The Monstermark System," with a third entry. As before, I found the article long and tedious, with an emphasis on mechanical and mathematical minutiae of little use to me. It's odd because, for years, I had heard people speak so glowingly of the Monstermark and assumed it was easy to use – apparently not!

"Open Box" tackles a large number of Judges Guild D&D products: Ready Ref Sheets, The Judge's Shield, TAC Cards, Tegel Manor, City State of the Invincible Overlord, Character Chronicle Cards, and The First First Fantasy Campaign. By and large, these were all well received by the reviewer, Don Turnbull. For myself, I was struck by how much Judges Guild had already released by this relatively early date. Also reviewed was FGU's Citadel, Fourth Dimension (its original, pre-TSR version), and TSR's Battle of the Five Armies. 

Lewis Pulsipher continues his "D&D Campaigns" series, with a lengthy discussion of his philosophy of refereeing. Early on, Pulsipher describes his vision of the referee as a "friendly computer discretion," who interferes in the course of play as little as possible, because "the referee is neither infallible nor completely impartial." It's an interesting perspective and one with which I am largely in agreement. He then elaborates on just what he means by this, offering many examples of how this philosophy operates in practice. I know that Pulsipher is often regarded as smug and stuffy in his approach to gaming, but I found this article engaging and look forward to future installments.

"Colouring Conan's Thews" by Eddie Jones is an overview of miniatures painting – another reminder of this hobby's roots. "The Loremaster of Avallon" by Andy Holt presents more D&D house rules, most notably his card-based combat system, whose use eluded me somewhat. I shall have to re-read it several more times to get a better sense of how the system, which uses 100 cards, each bearing a symbol on it, actually works. John Rothwell's "The Assassin" is a variant of the class presented in Blackmoor, while Ian Waugh's "New Magic Rooms" presents two chambers for placement in a dungeon whose interiors operate according to unusual rules. 

I have to admit that I was less impressed with this issue than I was with the previous one. Aside from Lewis Pulsipher's article, there was little that stood out to me as being either original or useful to me. That's the nature of periodicals, of course, but I had hoped that White Dwarf, compared to Different Worlds, would hit the ground running. I guess it's still too early to pass judgment on that score.

Random Roll: PHB, p. 101

Page 101 of the AD&D Players Handbook contains a long section entitled "The Adventure," in which Gary Gygax the "three major types" of locales in which player characters might find adventure, namely the dungeon, the wilderness, and the town. He then discusses each of these locales separately, highlighting not only what makes them unique but what a character venturing into them ought to consider before doing so. Though his comments on each are short, I think they're nonetheless worthy of a closer look.

Adventures into underworld mazes are the most popular. The party equips itself and sets off to enter and explore the dungeons of some castle, temple or whatever. Light sources, poles for probing, rope, spikes, and like equipment are the main tools for such activity.

I think the equipment Gygax mentions by name is telling: not weapons or armor but torches, poles, rope, and spikes. This is indeed an "expedition," as he terms it elsewhere, one on the model of archeological excavations or perhaps the Victorian adventure tales of H. Rider Haggard (or even "The Tower of the Elephant").

And since none of the party will know the dungeon's twists and turns, one or more of the adventurers will have to keep a record, a map, of where the party has been. Thus you will be able to find your way out and return for yet more adventuring. As you party is exploring and mapping, movement will be slow, and it is wise to have both front and rear guards.

Do RPG campaigns regularly include a mapper anymore? In my youth, it went without saying that someone should be keeping a map. Otherwise, as Gygax says, how would you find your way out again – or, just as importantly, take note of unusual features that suggested there might be hidden chambers nearby? In my House of Worms campaign, the players are blessed to have a professional cartographer in their company, but, even if they didn't, I'm pretty sure they'd keep track of the underworlds they explore.

In the dungeons will be chambers and rooms – some inhabited, some empty; there will be traps to catch those unaware, tricks to fool the unwise, monsters lurking to devour the unwary. The rewards, however, are great – gold, gems, and magic items. Obtaining these will make you better able to prepare for further expeditions, more adept in your chosen profession, more powerful in all respects. All that is necessary is to find your way in and out, to meet and defeat the guardians of the treasures, to carry out the wealth …

That's a very succinct way of describing the gameplay of Dungeons & Dragons, don't you think? More than that, it also draws our attention to the things Gygax considered the essential elements of a dungeon: rooms (including empty ones), monsters, treasure, traps, and tricks – a good list!

Adventuring into unknown lands or howling wilderness is extremely perilous at best, for large bands of men, and worse, might roam the area; there are dens of monsters, and trackless wastes to contend with. 

The wilderness is where Gygaxian naturalism lives – literally – hence the following admonitions:

Protected expeditions are, therefore, normally undertaken by higher level characters. Forays of limited duration are possible even for characters new to adventuring, and your DM might suggest that your party do some local exploration – perhaps to find some ruins which are the site of a dungeon or to find a friendly clan of dwarves, etc.

One "problem" with D&D, it's that the wilderness surrounding a dungeon is frequently far more dangerous than the dungeon itself, given the lack of an artificial level-based framework for assessing threat to the characters. Gygax's comments here remind us of that.

Mounts are necessary, of course, as well as supplies, missile weapons, and the standard map-making equipment. Travel will be at a slow rate in unknown areas, for your party will be exploring, looking for foes to overcome, and searching for new finds of lost temples, dungeons, and the like. 

Once again, mapping and slowness are mentioned – but then D&D is primarily a game of exploration. Nevertheless, Gygax quickly notes that that's not all the game is about.

Cities, towns, and sometimes even large villages provide the setting for highly interesting, informative, and often hazardous affairs and incidents. Even becoming an active character in a campaign typically requires interaction with the populace of the habitation, location quarters, buying supplies and equipment, seeking information. 

Though not intended as such, these sentences could serve as a rebuke of critics who deride D&D as a purely "hack 'n slash" game. Some of my favorite moments in D&D (and other RPGs) have arisen from interactions with NPCs in a settlement as the characters sought out rumors, lodging, or equipment. 

These same interactions in a completely strange town require forethought and skill. Care must be taken in all one says and does. Questions about rank, profession, god and alignment are perilous, and use of an alignment tongue is socially repulsive in most places.  

Everything Gygax says here demonstrates the need for the creation of a social structure and culture for the campaign setting. Without these, there can be no context for adventures and many opportunities for fun interactions will be missed.

There are usually beggars, bandits, and drunks to be dealt with; greedy and grasping merchants and informants to do business with; inquiring officials or suspicious guards to be answered. The taverns house many potential helpful or useful characters, but they also contain clever and dangerous adversaries. Then there are the unlit streets and alleys of the city after dark … 

If this section has made anything clear, it's that, in a good campaign, adventures can be found anywhere.  

Different Worlds: Issue #11

Issue #11 of Different Worlds (February/March 1981) is an interesting issue to me, because its content continues to differentiate the magazine from its contemporaries, like Dragon or White Dwarf. For whatever reason, Different Worlds published a significant number of "theoretical" articles about roleplaying, which is to say, articles about roleplaying rather than simply articles providing additions and options to existing games. If I had to guess, I imagine this reflects the local culture out of which Chaosium and, by extension, Different Worlds, grew. I've noted on a couple of occasions that California, like the Midwest and the East Coast, was distinctive in its approach to RPGs, so I suppose it shouldn't be surprising to see this distinction reflected in its periodicals. 

The issue begins with "Running Low Level Dungeons" by Robert Plamondon, which offers some advice to referees on the necessity of taking beginner dungeons seriously, as a means of "hooking" people into the hobby. Plamondon's concerns are twofold. First, he feels strongly that even low-level dungeons should be every bit as interesting as high-level one. Second, he feels equally strongly that low-level dungeons should be accommodating to the inexperience of new players and thus not "killer" in their approach. Mind you, Plamondon seems generally opposed to dungeons designed to kill characters, seeing this as somehow antithetical to the purpose of RPGs. 

"A Change of Hobbit" by Ronald Mark Pehr is an odd piece. It's a critique of D&D's portrayal of hobbits (halflings) on the basis that it differs from they way Tolkien portrayed them in The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings. Beyond that, Pehr's main complaint is that D&D pigeon holes halflings as thieves and doesn't acknowledge their skills as warriors. These are fair points, if being true to Tolkien, is one's goal, but I'm not sure that was ever the point of including halflings in the game. (I resolve the matter by dispensing with halflings entirely.) Part two of "Gems & Magic" by Steve Marsh and Margaret R. Gemignani is also here, completing what began last issue. I'm a big fan of "natural" magic items like this, so the article was most welcome to me.

"A New Computer System for Traveller" by Martin Connell is an attempt – in 1981, I remind you – to offer new rules for computers to make it "truly representative of the far future." More amusingly, Connell notes that his rules are based on his experiences with an "IBM 360, and IBM 3033, a PRIME, and several hobby computers." He also consulted with "several friends who are computer science majors." I don't mean to mock Connell, whose larger point about how outdated Traveller's computer rules have always been is sound, but only to point out that, when it comes to technology, predicting the future is not always easy. Personally, I've generally found Traveller's somewhat retro approach to computers less problematic than trying to import the moving target of "realistic" far future computer rules into the game.

"The Fourfold Way of FRP" by Jeffrey A. Johnson is a follow-up of sorts to the articles by Glen Blacow and Lewis Pulsipher in issue #10. It's another stab at trying to describe types of gamers and approaches to roleplaying. Johnson offers a diagram consisting of two axes, one relating to personal goals (power gaming vs storytelling) and realism (pure fantasy vs simulation). Honestly, this isn't a bad approach, though, as with most such articles, I marvel at gamers' desire to try and codify everything into neat categories (I am as guilty of this as anyone).

There is a huge collection of lengthy reviews in this issue, starting with a positive one for Azhanti High Lightning. Also covered are Tunnels & Trolls (also positively) and DragonQuest and several smaller adventure publications of which I've (mostly) never heard. What stands out about these reviews is how lengthy they are, something I appreciated, since, if nothing else, they afforded the reviewer to explain his own perspective in detail. This is particularly useful in the case of case of the T&T review (by Ken Rolston) and the DQ review (by Michael Stackpole), since there are multiple points where their own opinions differed with my own. Even more interesting is that the review of DragonQuest was followed by a rebuttal of sorts by the designer, Eric Goldberg. Good stuff!

John T. Sapienza reviews Beasts of Antares and several other novels in the saga of Dray Prescot. Sapienza also provides D&D game statistics for some of the magical items and monsters that appear in the series. "The Cult of Kali" is a "gateway" cult for RuneQuest by Greg Costikyan. Meanwhile, "The Sword of Hollywood" by Larry DiTillio is a new column about fantasy and science fiction movies, this time focusing rumors of the D&D movie, a new Star Trek TV series, and pre-production of the third Star Wars movie, Revenge of the Jedi. 

Lewis Pulsipher's "Personalities of Role-Playing Gamers" presents fifteen types of roleplayers, ranging from "The Barbarian," who always plays fighters and likes combat, to "The Puppet," who does what other people tell him to do, and "The Entrepreneur," who's always looking for ways to make money in an adventure. It's a fine, if limited list, but, much like Johnson's article earlier in this issue, I'm not quite sure the point of all these attempts at codifying the hobby and its players. Ending the issue is another column by Gigi D'Arn, which sadly doesn't contain any remarkable bits of gossip worth mentioning here. Oh, well.

General Rules for Dungeon Designers

Jon Salway recently pointed out Ken St. Andre's "general rules for dungeon designers" from the first edition of Tunnels & Trolls (1975), which I reproduce below.

For the benefit of those, like myself, whose eyesight isn't as good as it used to be, these general rules are, as follows:

1. Let your imagination run wild. You can do anything you want to.
2. Put in a lot of stuff. Nobody wants to mess around in a dull dungeon.
3. Use as much humor as you can, but don’t be silly or juvenile.
4. The deeper the dungeon, the more dangerous it should be.
5. Every trap or spell should have some way of being avoided, nullified, or overcome. You need not tell people how to save themselves, but there should be a way. It is definitely not fair to teleport everybody who enters your solar room into the heart of the sun.

There's nothing here that I think is controversial, with the possible exception of point 3. Many people, myself included, are wary of overt humor in RPG material (with certain exceptions, obviously) and not unreasonably. On the other hand, I don't think I've ever participated in a game session that wasn't regularly punctuated by laughter, puns, in-game jokes, and other tomfoolery – nor would I wish to do so. At the same time, one of my longstanding objections to T&T is that it veers a little too close to the "silly or juvenile" that St. Andre wisely warns against (take a look at the spell names, for example). 

Point 2 is where I think St. Andre is really on to something. In a dungeon-centric campaign, it's vital that there be "a lot of stuff" in the dungeon in order to hold the players' attention and encourage them to spend more time in the place. Of course, "stuff" isn't just limited to monsters, treasures, and traps. I imagine things like factions and long-term mysteries. Frankly, those are two elements I'd consider important for any type of campaign, but they're especially important in dungeons, I believe, in order to avoid the inevitable boredom that might otherwise creep in after kicking open the doors of untold rooms on multiple levels over many weeks or months. 

Can anyone recall similar sorts of dungeon design rules from other RPGs? I enjoy reading advice like this, doubly so if it reflects the thoughts of someone who had a reputation for being a good referee (and Ken St. Andre is one such person).

A Tékumel Dungeon Poem

A few weeks ago, my friend, Zzarchov Kowolski, creator of Neoclassical Geek Revival, pointed me toward this blog entry that put forward a challenge to create a "dungeon poem." The idea behind the "poem" is to take a specific map by Dyson Logos and key it using minimal text. Even though I have grown allergic to these kinds of online "challenges," I was initially quite excited by this one, since I thought it'd give me a chance to stretch myself a bit. Writing minimally is not easy for me, so paring down my text would take some serious effort – too much as it turned out, which is why I abandoned the idea.

Zzarchov, however, is both disciplined and persistent and convinced me, during one of our chats, to take up the challenge again, which I did yesterday morning. Over the course of about an hour I put together a terse (for me anyway) description of a small underworld beneath the Tsolyáni city of Jakálla, which I present below. It's certainly not as concise as possible, but I take some small pride in having limited myself to three sentences to describe each keyed area. The end result is satisfactory, though I readily admit that it's not my best work. On the other hand, its economy lends, I think, a certain degree of mystery to the underworld that might not have been achieved had I indulged my usual logorrhea.

The Bednallján practice of Ditlána, by which a city is ritually purified, razed, and then rebuilt every 500 years is a well-established one in the Five Empires, resulting in vast under-cities reputedly filled with rubble, wreckage, and riches. So, when poorly compensated workmen with even poorer skills inadvertently uncovered an ancient staircase on the lowest level of the Tower of the Red Dome in the Foreigners’ Quarter of Jakálla, its proprietor, Shúkoaz Vishshé, saw wealth – and danger. Rather than descending into the depths himself, he instead turned to the indigent foreigners and visitors of no status who formed his clientele, offering them a “fair” share of anything they discovered in the darkness beneath his establishment.

Tracy Lesch

My fondness for dungeon vermin is almost as strong as my fondness for Dave Megarry's Dungeon! boardgame, which was my gateway to the hobby. Yesterday, I was looking at the monster and treasure cards to the original 1975 edition, such as the one depicted above. According to the credits, all the artwork on the cards were the work of Tracy Lesch. The name, though not immediately recognizable to me, nevertheless seemed familiar somehow. I did a quick scan of my early TSR products and discovered that the name appeared in the credits to OD&D's Supplement II: Blackmoor. Here's a good example of Lesch's work.

I know nothing about Tracy Lesch, though I suspect that he or she was likely involved in the Twin Cities scene, given that his or her work appears in both Dungeon! and Blackmoor, two products associated with that area. That may be a mistaken surmise on my part, though, but I don't have much more to go on. If anyone knows any more, I'd love to know it.

Huge Ruined Piles

Men & Magic, Volume I of original Dungeons & Dragons, in a section entitled "Preparation for the Campaign," rather famously describes a dungeon as a

"huge ruined pile, a vast castle built by generations of mad wizards and insane geniuses".

The quote is a popular one in the OSR and for good reason: it's incredibly evocative. Reading it, I find myself thinking of an immense, crumbling Gothic structure, perched precariously on some mountaintop and sprawling across its slopes. In this, I've likely been influenced by the cover illustration to OD&D's Supplement II: Blackmoor.

What's interesting is that both the Blackmoor and Greyhawk campaigns were centered around – and indeed named after – a castle (as was Rob Kuntz's El Raja Key). Despite that, it was the levels beneath those two castles that served as the focus of player character action rather than the castles proper. Castle Greyhawk did have an "upper works" (as did Castle Zagyg), but they did not occupy much of the player's attention, at least according to one account by James M. Ward. For Castle Blackmoor, we have a map of the surface levels of the castle, presented in Judges Guild's The First Fantasy Campaign, but they're sadly not very interesting – hardly a "huge ruined pile."

Speaking of Judges Guild, the 1977 module, Tegel Manor, is in some ways closer to this ideal, though, at only 250-ish rooms, it's probably too small to be called truly "sprawling" (though moreso than either Castle Amber or my own The Cursed Chateau). 

I've written before about "above ground" dungeons, but, in that case, I was thinking mostly of ruined cities on the model of Glorantha's Big Rubble, which is itself worthy of further discussion. However, my present musings are occasioned more by today's Pulp Fantasy Library entry. I now find myself thinking about immense, haunted castles – an unholy amalgam of Castle Dracula, Neuschwanstein, and the Winchester Mystery House, peopled with all manner of monsters and perhaps even the degenerate descendants of the original inhabitants á la H.P. Lovecraft's The Lurking Fear

It's funny really that "the dungeon," meaning an improbable warren of subterranean tunnels should become the default environment for adventuring in RPGs. On one level, it makes perfect sense, since dungeons, as conceived by roleplaying games, have no real world analog, thus freeing the referee to map them according to his own fancies. Mapping a castle, even an absurdly large and rambling one, might demand at least a little knowledge of the layout of such buildings and that can impede one's creativity. I've experienced a little of this myself, in detailing the surface ruins of Urheim, since it's meant to be a "real" fortified monastery where all of its buildings have a clear and logical purpose. 

That aside, I don't see any reason why a would-be designer of a massive castle "dungeon" need be limited by real world considerations. My references above to Neuschwanstein and the Winchester Mystery House were chosen specifically to highlight the legitimacy of whimsical, irrational, and downright deranged design choices. After all, if your huge ruled piles is the result of "generations of mad wizards and insane geniuses," why should its floorplan be bound by normal logic? 

I remain quite taken with Jason "Philotomy Jurament" Cone's notion of "the dungeon as mythic underworld," which I believe comports almost perfectly with OD&D's presentation of the game's play environment. But we need not be too literal when it comes to adopting this perspective. Properly presented, a sprawling, crumbling castle can be every bit an example of an underworld as any series of monster-infested tunnels. Indeed, if one looks at Gothic fiction from the late 18th through 19th centuries and beyond – fiction that has had a clear influence on fantasy roleplaying – cursed and haunted castles abound and entering them is often metaphorically akin to descending into Hades (consider Jonathan Harker's trip to Transylvania in Dracula, for instance).

Obviously, creating a dungeon of this sort will require some re-thinking of the traditional structure of levels and the difficulty associated thereto. Off the top of my head, I might suggest dividing the castle into wings, with certain certain wings being "low level" and others "high." Alternately – or even in conjunction with wings – one might instead opt for a vertical approach: as one ascends the castle's spires, it becomes more difficult. Another possibility is simply to dispense with such artificial notions and opt for a more "organic" one, where the challenge is independent of location and characters exploring the place must learn to be clever to avoid running into dangers beyond their present abilities. The possibilities are quite large and, were I a better cartographer, I might start work on my own huge ruined pile. Alas, my skills in this area are negligible, so it won't be happening anytime soon. One day ...

The Perfect Dungeon

For various reasons, we've lacked quorum (defined as "half the total players plus one," which is five in this case) in my weekly House of Worms campaign. That's fairly unusual, but Real Life™ has intruded on everyone during 2020, so we do our best to roll with the punches. One of the joys of a long campaign like this one is that it has years of momentum behind it; there is no danger that, even if we somehow didn't meet for more than a month, the campaign would fall into desuetude. 

Those of us who have been available have used our regular meeting time simply to socialize, talking about matters of interest to us all. Though not limited to gaming, that's naturally a common topic, particularly our memories of games past. During one such chat, the Moathouse from Gary Gygax's The Village of Hommlet came up, where it was generally agreed that it's a truly great low-level dungeon. One of my players is Dyson Logos, who plays Grujúng hiZnáyu, a mighty warrior who enjoys direct solutions to problems, which sometimes means Grujúng is often left out of conversations among his more nuanced clan mates. Anyway, Dyson put forward the notion that the Moathouse is near perfect, for a variety of reasons, and I am inclined to agree with him, as I said on this blog some time ago:

Then there's the moathouse, which has everything I crave from a low-level old school dungeon: a plausble backstory, lots of vermin, and several encounters that might, if the PCs are foolhardy, lead to deaths. To my mind, the moathouse ruins provide a superb template which other referees might use in creating their own starting dungeons. It's a great example of Gygaxian naturalism in action, which is itself a reminder that, while the campaign may be set in a fantasy world, that doesn't mean the world exists solely to fulfill the players' fantasies. There are many encounters – such as the giant crayfish – that will kill low-level PCs if they are stupid enough to charge in until they are ready to do so. I like that a lot and it's something that D&D has slowly lost over the years, much to my disappointment.

I don't think I'd change a word of what I wrote above. If anything, I'd probably wax even more lyrical about the things I adore in the dungeon – and by "dungeon," I also mean the upper level on the surface as well. In fact, that upper level is just as important to the feel of the place as the dungeon proper. The foes on the surface consist of dangerous but mundane creatures, like giant frogs, snakes, spiders, and rats. There are also lots of brigands – underutilized opponents in my opinion. There's an "extraordinary ordinary" vibe to the upper levels that, I now realize, has probably influenced my conception of Urheim's own surface ruins more than I had realized. They're just great in my opinion, striking the perfect balance between being too mundane and too unnatural. I prefer my adventure locales to start out relatively "normal" and slowly build toward weirdness. That's why I like lots of empty rooms filled with seemingly random and inexplicable debris: they keep things understated and allow the tension to build, since the characters and, by extension, their players start to feel lulled into false sense of security.

The lower levels are just as good, with a solid selection of monsters, ranging from various Chaotic humanoids (bugbears, gnolls, ogres) to weak undead and soldiers in the employ of Lareth the Beautiful, "the dark hope of chaotic evil," as Gygax so memorably calls him. Say what you will about Gary but he certainly knew how to turn a phrase. I'd wager that no module written since first edition AD&D has ever had a single line of text worthy of memory, let alone quotation. All in all, it's a perfect package worthy of continued study and emulation.