Want a dungeon in a rush? Listed here are some fast methods that will help you design your subsequent delve. By no means be caught too unprepared once more!
Dungeon design is among the few bits of enjoyable a DM can stand up to without having to also have a social gathering or a sport able to go. Even so, many a DM has been caught unprepared by their social gathering’s sudden determination to enter the sewers/beneath the lord’s manor/into the darkish crypt you have been positive they weren’t going to delve.
And now that you must ensure that there’s one thing attention-grabbing – and ideally harmful – there. Have to construct a dungeon in a rush? Don’t fear. We’ve bought your again with some fast and soiled dungeon design suggestions.
Theme Dungeons Make Life Straightforward
While you completely have to design one thing rapidly, decide a location, decide a theme, and go from there. Generally this would possibly recommend itself by play. The social gathering is on the lookout for the situation of the idol of a misplaced/forgotten snake god. Serpent temple is fairly straightforward.
However even in the event you can’t consider one, simply decide a central theme and go loopy with it. Typically, theming the dungeon round a sure sort of monster works extraordinarily properly in a rush. Examples embrace
- Snakes – Nagas, Yuan-Ti, Big Snakes, Snake Cultists
- Bugs – Big Bugs, Demon Bugs, Some Sort of Queen
- Demons – Lesser Demons, Demon Cultists, Possibly A Cult Chief
However you may as well use a location as a theme:
- Historic however weirdly magically superior destroy – Constructs for days
- Entice-filled Temple – Spikes, Scything Blades, Snakes
- Vampire Fort – Something Gothic, from Vampires to Skeleton Knights
Be Lazy and Roll
After all, you don’t even have to make any choices in any respect. You’ll be able to let the cube resolve for you. The varied D&D books and random turbines on the market are full of concepts and all you need to do is act that alea and let your cube decide what monsters, treasures, and even what types of rooms you’re going by subsequent.
Seize a Blueprint and Flip It
You’ll find blueprints for a shocking variety of well-known and unknown buildings on-line. Simply seize one and switch it round so it’s the wrong way up. Take one thing like a Pure Historical past Museum and spin it on an axis till it fits your functions as a temple of an historic evil. Each show space could be an encounter spot.
Simply be cautious of the herpetarium.
The Easter Egg
Or in the event you’re actually caught and pressed for time, simply keep in mind, everybody steals. However in the event you do it proper, it’s a loving homage. Just like the Wilhelm scream. Or the Akira slide.
And the identical can maintain true with dungeons. Take the design for one thing like “the Nostromo” and make it fantasy. You don’t even have to alter the plot, simply the main points. As an alternative of a Xenomorph, it’s a demonic insect or no matter.
Or seize one thing just like the Beast’s fortress from Magnificence and the Beast and make a dungeon filled with animated objects that your gamers encounter. Simply depart references like a breadcrumb path to softly lead your gamers to acknowledge their environment. If you happen to allow them to “notice the reality” they’ll really feel like they’re in on the joke and also you’ve saved your self effort and time as a result of all you need to do is copy the factor you already like.
The Villain’s Lair
When all else fails, right here’s a three-room components that hits each time. Decide a boss combat you wish to have, decide a room. Put two rooms in entrance of it which have monsters loosely associated to the boss, make the third room an enormous boss combat area, and also you’ve bought a complete whole session’s value of play proper there.
It really works in just about each online game, from Skyrim to Future 2 and past!
What are your favourite methods to get a dungeon in a rush?
