Megadungeon thread. How do you feel about megadungeons? Do you run megadungeons? Do you have any tips for running megadungeons? Post megadungeons.
>>94865213>How do you feel about megadungeons?Dislike>Do you run megadungeons? Nope>Do you have any tips for running megadungeons?Don't.
>>94865213>How do you feel about megadungeons?they are very hard to do without getting repetitive and boring>Do you run megadungeons?no>Do you have any tips for running megadungeons?get good at faction play among the creatures in the dungeon and also get good(read: fast) at restockingbut also, do not use utterly random creatures and remove them from the encounter table as you encounter them until enough time passes that something else has moved into its place
Best case for a megadungeon in my opinion, is like a fallen/enemy occupied city. I think that potentially lets you get around it seeming monotonous since there is room for verticality and more unique sections.
>>94865213Unless there is a complex factional dynamic within and between levels that simulates what you'd get on the surface between tribes and nations, then it gets boring slogging from goblin-room to orc-room real fast. Castle Greyhawk and Maure Castle did them quite well, with deep lore reasons for the dungeons and factions, machinations, even interdimensional pocket dimensions and escapades spicing things up.
>>94865213What people have said so far about needing factions is very true. There need to be different sorts of groups around the place that the party can potentially ally with. Trying to run it as a fortress owned by a single type of enemy just makes it questionable how the party can avoid being completely overwhelmed.Also, it's a good idea to have new portions of the dungeon become more accessible either over time or by clearing certain objectives. Same with the party finding new shortcuts to get deeper in with less backtracking. Helps to add new events and make the dungeon feel alive, and focus on getting to new places.
>>94865213Ewwwwww. DIsgusting. Dungeon crawl is the worst trope of RPGs
>>94865213Love 'em, run 'em, make 'em. Megadungeon crawl is the peak of rpgs.
>>94865213I think they're neat.>>94865276>>94866018>>94865233>>94867987You fags need to play games before giving opinions.
>>94869373>if you dislike any aspect of RPGs, you're a nogames!!!
People who say they hate them have never played one. Nor have they played tabletop games in general. Personally I love them! The perfect size to have meaningful campaign with meaty gameplay and worldbuilding that actually matters in game and players are interested in.
>>94865213>How do you feel about megadungeons?Like>Do you run megadungeons?No, but I want to.>Do you have any tips for running megadungeons? Do it.
>>94866873>What people have said so far about needing factions is very trueNah. Faction systems are like elemental weakness systems, crutches for people who can't design. The environment itself should be fascinating and varied enough that it captures the players' minds, purely by the wonder of what's behind the next corner. That is adventure.
>>94870193Post your purely environmental wondrous megadungon. Or dungeon. Or anything that's even close to the bullshit you're mouthing.
>>94870193>having characters to interact with in the RPG is a crutch>all you should have are areas that are empty and have no history in themGreat advice! Now, let's take advice from someone who actually can run a game.
>>94865213>How do you feel about megadungeons?Make them an option, but not the focus>Do you run megadungeons?Yes>Do you have any tips for running megadungeons?Give your players reasons to leave the dungeon regularly, so the endless stream of trap hunting, monster fighting, and loot gathering doesn't stagnate. Having it easily accessible from the players base of operation lets them use it as a way to pass time between plot hooks and quests.Don't have it be lifeless either. Every action has a reaction. Maybe the kobolds from two rooms over want to investigate what happened to the hag who was slumming it after they heard thunder claps and screaming an hour ago.
>>94870640Nah. You're not worth it.>>94870797I didn't say you can't have characters, I said you can't have factions. Major difference. The stupidest shit ever is "X and Y are fighting, you have to pick a side and help one against the other".
>>94871080>factions = "X and Y are fighting, you have to pick a side and help one against the other".nobody else can see what retardedly incorrect patterns you form in your brain, autist
>>94871080Nah you don't have one.
>>94871080>The stupidest shit ever is "X and Y are fighting, you have to pick a side and help one against the other".lmao you've never even touched a game let alone played one
>>94869373Anon do you enjoy every hobby and activity you've ever partaken in?
>>94871080>"X and Y are fighting, you have to pick a side and help one against the other" is the only way to have multiple factions interacting in a settingYou don't even imagine, much less play games.
>>94865213Wouldn't it be a slow and tedious experience?
>>94865213>How do you feel about megadungeons?why would they even exist
>>94873668That's why you explore them, to find out where they came from.
>>94870193Actual games aren't single image concept art, retard.
>>94873668WotC came up with a reason why their 5e megadungeon exists. You sincerely saying you're whose than WotC? This how you want to be remembered?
>>94870137You have brain damage. I don't care about your opinion one way or another but you literally are expressing evidence of brain damage with how you think about and treat strangers.
My first D&D game was my GM utterly screwing us over by springing an ambush on us as a consequence of us making several rookie mistakes exploring a megadungeon. Remembering it feels like a Seconds Before Disaster episode. I've been chasing that high ever since.
>>94869373I play plenty of games, I just dislike megadungeons because I find them incredibly boring. I like my games to involvea lot of overland travel, going to different places, seeing different hings. Plus I just hate the idea of dungeons whose interior layout makes no sense, and that applies to every megadungeon ever made.
>>94876928Also relevant. Christ I loved this comic.
>>94876928It might just be a niche preference and that's fine. I love them and I also love dungeoncrawler games like Nethack or Legend of Grimrock which I actively seek out.
>>94871091That's literally what factions are, in all videogames such as Fallout: New Vegas and Dungeons and Dragons. There's 2-3 groups that hate each other, and you're forced to become friends with one and enemies with the other. That's it. It's boring, it's been done to death and it doesn't belong in any RPGs (tabletop videogames).
>>94866018I actually agree with this anon and is where most of my dungeons and many of the monsters come from.Not too long ago, the known world was ruled by dragons and they ruled it greedily. The Draconic Empire was ruled like how dragons nowadays gather a hoard. Peoples were forced to settle down into towns and cities, and the biggest of cities had a strange contraption in the middle of it all: a magical crystal that fueled great works of architecture. Those who lived in the cities truly felt blessed, but it acted as a form of control for the ruling dragon emperor. The crystals were connected to the current emperor's life force. If he were to ever die without a successor, every major population center in the empire would essentially be nuked all at once.And that's what happened. The entire known world, all at once, suffered the greatest genocide because the tenth dragon emperor, suffering from infertility and great inbreeding, died from a horrific health condition. A whimper turns into a bang, and then a whimper once more. Every great man lived in the city walls, and most cultures were wiped out instantly. Many creations, inventions, and advancements in all fields both scientific and esoteric suffered greatly.The players haven't gone into one of the decaying husks of the empire's greatness yet, but they can still feel its presence when I describe them traveling a crumbling road to a massive stone corpse of civilization, and the arcane aberrations found within.
>>94873927Of course not. Actual games are dozens of locations, every single one of which should be interesting and exciting by itself. If merely looking around isn't fun in your game, you fucked up.
>>94865213include>teleporters>shifting areas>several factions in the dungeon>a cool backstory for the dungeon>entranceS. MULTIPLE ENTRANCES.>"Bosses">not every room is combat>safe areas to restread this also for ideas>>>/a/275443353>a safe town to sell wares and drink groggand may allah forgive me>"quest givers"
>>94877430factions develop naturally around limited resources, it doesn't mean you could fit FO:NV inside a dungeon because that makes no sense, you can't do FO style fetch quests. Your relationship with the factions is closer to Oz or some other jail drama.
>>94877512>Tower DungeonI really like how it does "safe areas". They've gotten fucked like half the times they rested. Including outside, in the shanty town dedicated to exploring the dungeon, shit keeps happening to them.
>>94877430wrong>corpse guild: want corpses retrieved so they can revive adventures and put them in literal debt to them. PC's might find a dead guy and make money turning him in. Or maybe somebody found them and now they owe a guild money or favors>The Royal Guard- Expedition Brigade: sent here to find a potion to cure the queen's incurable disease. Will pay for any info on this. And if the PC's find it and don't want to give up a cure-all...>The Monestary of The Damned: An insane cult dedicated to strength of arm and blood. Kidnaps anyone they can find and force them to fight in the Pits of the Damned. They're leader was born in the megadungeon and is said to has never left. His acolytes have a strange power granted by him and nobody has as updated maps as them.and none of these people would outright be at war with each other but they can easily come into conflict. and thats just off the top of my head you can make better shit than this if you try to not use only videogames as a reference point.
Love the idea hate the reality.Sloggish, repetitive, uncreative, boring.Unless it's an adventure through pseudo moria.
>>94878381its only that if its not an adventure itself. Think of megadungeons as a sereies of adventures/settings and its better.
>>94878649Megadungeons serve a different purpose than regular adventures.Megadungeons are for people that like torches and encumbrance, that like combat encounters and checking for traps.It's the fun of exploration.Because of that, there are features of an adventure that don't work for the megadungeon.You don't want any inciting incident or time pressure, 'cause there's no way to have fun exploring all the side rooms when you have to rush save the princess.And you don't level the encounters to the player, because you want the players to discover pre-existing floors with pre-existing levels.And you don't want a linear progression, because the ability to take a shortcut to a higher difficulty floor is a classic risk/reward choice.
would I be beaten to death by grognards if I tried to run a megadungeon because I like Dungeon Meshi which I will imitate
>>94877430>in all videogamesHoly shit please end your own life.
>>94865213>How do you feel about megadungeons?They feel like a relic from an era when staying home was boring and there was no internet so you needed long sessions. (Kinda like random encounters - maybe you needed to pad out the length of sessions in the 70's-80's but now it feels like a fight to keep everyone focused and get through some battles and plot points in a modern 4 hours every-other weekend game).Some media like Dungen Meshi leans into the absurdity which I like. EG, if you think about insane cost and time commitment of creating a multi-level underground lair, they'd need to basically be magical constructions. Places that aren't really part of our dimension and/or give a sense of wrongness, ala the Backrooms of the Black Lodge or the Overlook Hotel. Sure, you could work with slaves and charmed monsters and whatnot but would they be able to build something structurally sound? Overall I prefer moderate sized dungeons that were built for a specific purpose. Like the harem in Diablo 2 or Stonefast from 90's era basic DnD. >Do you run megadungeons? No. I also feel like with modern DnD there's way too many minesweeper type spells you can use at will. So prepare for players to bringing everything to a crawl by mage hand-ing everything, spamming detect evil and detect magic, etc.
>>94865213I really want to try a megadungeon, as I've found myself really enjoying smaller ones, but none of my friends likes the idea, even when I presented it as a GM and I've had no luck finding a game online that would revolve around it. Too busy hosting irl games to add an online one too.So I guess I'm just not gonna be able to play them and see what it's actually like. I am saddened by this state of being, yet feel powerless in changing it.
>>94865213Whoever did this image - I'd like to shake their hand
Its sort of fascinating to see how many ill informed opinions there are about how D&D gameplay changed over the decades.
>>94877512>read this also for ideas>>>>/a/275443353Nihei has a fantasy megadungeon manga now?!? Holy shit, thanks, anon!
>>94865233It's called DUNGEONS and dragons
>>94881191Will said grognards be playing your game?
>>94877871>>94878961>>94886137Good comments, I agree. >>94881191Grognards may sniff at it but if you run it in OD&D/AD&D then they'll play. You might also get a gaggle of 5E players trying to join because Dungeon Meshi is popular for now for at least the next year. But if you really want to be cool, run Tower Dungeon by Nihei.
>>94898061Yes, not but it's not called megadungeons and hyperdragons.
>>94898457>Megadungeons & HyperdragonsIt fucking should be, that's a way better name for the 2020s!!
you know whats a great idea for a mega dungon? MAGNAGOTHICA has Anzenmezzeron a bunch of cities stacked ontop of each other sinking into hell. Death is broken in it and somewhere in the deepest part of the city is the ultimate treasure the End of Death. But if you get your head ripped off and blown up you wake up in a grave somewhere mostly alive. Its also full of necromancers who are insane.
When does a dungeon become a mega dungeon? I've run games that take place entirely within one multilayer dungeon with one outside town for rest and shopping, is that a mega dungeon?
>>94898620I think if the dungeon is big enough to be a campaign unto itself, it counts.
>>94898620>More than 100 roomsor if the entire world is underground/a dungeon, like Arx Fatalis. God, what a great game. I miss that kind of worldbuilding.
>>94865213Neutral.They're a solution for a specific group dynamic, where you have a lot of players and can't schedule or manage them at the same time.You need campaign structure that's episodic, lets people drop in and out, and offers a lot of variety. It works very well for public games. If someone's curious, you can hand them a pregen and they can join. Few other campaign modes work as fluidly as the megadungeon does for these sorts of real life logistics.This is where exploration-based games shine. And in terms of bang for your buck encounter density and prep-reusability, you can't beat the megadungeon. >Do you have any tips for running megadungeons?The implicit premise of dungeon floor = expected PC level works well. Floors and sets of floors should have themes. There should be archeology that tells a story.World's Largest Dungeon sucks ass. Don't run it.
>>94886137>Kinda like random encountersWandering monsters in the dungeon exist to force players to hurry up. They introduce a tradeoff for moving at a snail's pace poking everything with 10-foot poles.>>94898414Now I kinda want to run a Blame-inspired megadungeon inspired in SWN
>>94899023Sounds like you have actually DM'd one or two. Which one(s)? Any tips regarding that particular one for a DM?
Is plopping a bunch of megadungeons in a hexcrawl map ill advised? Does it add anything that certain locations are just so huge that you cannot fully explore them? Most other locations are just regularly sized.
>>94865213I remember in the late 80s and early 90s, my friends and I thought they had a mystique. Someone who had finished an undermountain had nerd bragging rights of some kind that I can't quite express. But by the time we all had Dungeon Hack in 93 or 94, the magic feeling was gone. They sounded like a boring-ass slog. And that's how I've felt about them ever since.
>>94912594>plopping a bunch of megadungeons in a hexcrawlCringe.>plopping multiple entrances to a single megadungeon across a hexcrawlBased.
>>94914998easy, I'll just connect all the megadungeons to eachother, does that make it a supermegadungeon?
I’ve been following a guy post about his Arden Vul campaign for like a year and it sounds really good. Makes me want to pick it up despite its somewhat steep price.
>>94914998This isn't that bad an idea. Let them decide how deep they want to go no matter where they are, and maybe they want to only explore the outer part of a megadungeon and save the middle for when they level up more. Makes sense.
>>94865213I would like to set a game in Arx Fatalis-like setting but I don’t know how to make it interesting
>>94871080dogshit bait. heres the (you)
I kind of just love the aesthetic of megadungeons, what others see as breaking verisimilitude or game-y is what I like about them. Sure I like them to have a logical thread but I’m not too bothered about the caloric intake of the dragon who lives six floors deep.
>>94865213I want to play in a megadungeon but nobody else in my group likes dungeons.
>>94926121>how to make it interestingIt's inherently super-interesting! How would several different societies - from orcs to humans to magical nagas - rearrange their entire structure to survive underground when the sun has gone out and the surface is a frozen wasteland? Think about all the things that could develop:>new construction techniques and magics for underground excavation of whole towns>cooperation between hitherto enemy races>new siege techniques related to collapses, earthquakes, earthworks, tunneling>new weapons and armor types for underground exploration and fighting>magical air and water generators>vertical cities, towns, castles and dungeons that go mostly up and down, rather than horiztonally>"smokeless" cooking and forges to prevent asphyxiation>crawling mounts like worms, giant centipedes, and giant beetles>monstrous slaves like xorn, umber hulks, and catoblepas made to do work
What I still dont get (I wanna run one) is how can you make the dungeon in a way that players can go back to the entrance/surface without "magic teleporters"?I don't wanna insert those or just "this room is a long corridor that takes you to the begining"To be specific I'm running a Fallout 2d20 game with a megadungeon (or megavault in this case) in it and I find lame to just do elevators or teleporters if my players need to get outIm planning to run Karak Azgal on WFRP 2e too so same issue
>>94932593Surely a vault would be built with means to access deeper sections quickly from the entrance? They can be sealed off by some kind of security measure.
>>94932593I mean, you have a very good excuse to have elevators. Or just having access stairs or maintenance sections which functionally are just long corridors designed to take people around a location while bypassing rooms. Beyond that though, you can simply have places where the megadungeon intersects with some sort of canyon or crevice, where there can be a more ordinary exit and it's up to the PCs to climb out and build a shortcut if they want to use it further. Alternate entrances don't even necessarily need to be at another elevation, they just need to lead into an entrance that might otherwise be obstructed or hidden. Depending on how you're setting up the dungeon, you could even utilize traps for that purpose though. A pitfall that drops a PC down a level could also work as a shortcut on a return trip. Even more broadly though, the PCs should be capable of retracing their steps in order to return to the surface when they want to leave, so long as you don't have excessive amounts of wandering monsters. A 'shortcut' is mostly a matter of expediency in terms of a path that isn't going to pose any immediate dangers.
>>94932593Adding onto the other anon's suggestions, designing the vault in a spiralling pattern so that players aren't always progressing in the same direction (e.g. always down, always east) will allow you to open up shortcuts so they can avoid retracing their steps. They could defeat an enemy in power-armour who self-destructs their suit, collapsing the ceiling and revealing one of the rooms right next to the vault door. Maybe some sort of mutated wildlife (idk fallout lore) punches a hole through the walls when it charges past a player. Maybe they discover a team of wasteland scavengers have dissembled one of the vaults reactors, allowing your players to climb up the older boiler pipes.
