Below Gwarnath

It's funny how inspiration works. A few years ago, I was running two different 5e campaigns. One campaign, for my tabletop group of noob players, was a forest hexcrawl in a pretty classic, vanilla-fantasy setting. The other, for my online group of long-time players (35 years or so), was another hexcrawl, a re-imagining of B2 through the prism of the American Southwest. Both campaigns occurred in the same world, at the same time, but in different regions.

The former campaign ended successfully, and we moved on to playing Labyrinth Lord, then transitioned into AD&D/OSRIC where we are now. The latter campaign ended poorly, and I dissolved it with a bad taste in my mouth that sort of soured me on that campaign world. 

When I shifted my tabletop group to LL, I developed a kilodungeon based on a mashup of U1 The Sinister Secret of Saltmarsh and the Sample Dungeon from Holmes Basic. We used the Advanced LL rules, which was a good bridge from 5e. When they got to 3rd level or so, I began using OSRIC and they didn't really notice most of the rule changes. Technically, this kilodungeon exists in my 5e campaign world, and the girls are still gaming in it. I haven't returned to online play (as a DM).

Since rediscovering the simpler joys of the legacy rules, however, I've been considering a new campaign setting that better embodies classic adventure gaming. I want something less vanilla with more pulp elements. I want to inject some sci-fi and weirdness (but not gonzo-weird). And I want the players' activity to be mostly centered around a single megadungeon.

I've flirted with this concept over the years, and have accumulated multiple folders filled with various notes and ideas about what I could do. From my old King's Realm campaign from the 90s and 00s, I had the Lost City of Cwm Cannadr, a never-visited megadungeon within an ancient city that was swallowed by the mountains. From my 5e world, I had the Catacombs of Remedios, a magical, ever-changing labyrinth beneath the capital city, and Cragmoor, the multilevel, mountainside lair of an ancient red dragon. I have my abandoned Dungeon23 attempt: Tunnels Beneath the Earth, and its spiritual cousin in the unfinished Deep Vaults material. Most recently, I completed the 10-level Hurricane Dungeon, which I'll return to below. This is a lot of solid design work just sitting there, unused.

Though these dungeons are all different in background and scope, they share the same author (obviously), and certain stylistic and creative threads are all there as connective tissue. I just haven't hit on the right idea to tie everything together. The things I've come up with just haven't inspired or energized me to dive in to the work and start sewing the pieces into shape. I certainly don't mind tropes (in fact, I love them), but I just want the unifying creative idea to be a solid one.

So, last week, one of my long-time players from my 5e Badlands campaign expressed interest in learning about 1e. I agreed to walk him through the character creation process, and then run him through a little scenario (sometime in the near future; this hasn't happened yet). I'm finalizing two adventures to publish in the next few weeks or so, and I am at the stage of editing and layout that is boring and convenient to procrastinate on.

Needing a creative palate cleanser, I decided to work on the scenario for the playtest session. I had a blast developing the Hurricane Dungeon using the stocking tables, but I never used the random dungeon generation part for the map layout. This seemed like a fun excuse to try out those tools. Using the OSRIC tables, I drew the map in Roll20 as I rolled it out, with the default R20 grid size of 25x25 squares. At a 10' scale, this amounts to 62,500 sq. ft. of dungeon... a nice, contained little area to bang around in that wouldn't require a ton of work on my part. This is how the map ended up in Roll20...

Its a pretty low-res screenshot, but the basics are all there. I drew Room 1 and the stairs up as the entrance, then everything else was rolled out straight on the tables, including the stairs down. Unfortunately, there were no "Trick/Trap" results (bummer). I had to modify a few of the room dimensions and passage directions to fit the space, but that's to be expected. I also did the initial stocking rolls to determine the room contents, which you can see in small print (e.g., 'E' = Empty, "M+T" = Monster and Treasure, etc.) 

I rolled contents as soon as I completed drawing each room, which is different from how I handled the Hurricane Dungeon stocking. For that, I rolled a list of contents and then decided which rooms to place each piece of content in on the pre-existing maps. Here, once I knew the base contents of each room, I went back and rolled out the individual monsters and treasures. One thing I kept forgetting to do was roll passage width, which is why most hallways are only 10' wide, but in a limited space like this, I was fine with it.

I then took my monster and treasure lists and began outlining the dungeon key. That's when inspiration struck. At the top of my outline, I wrote the following stream-of-consciousness elevator pitch for the dungeon:

"The ancient city of Gwarnath lies in ruins atop the Plateau of Jjin. Hidden among the wreckage, numerous darkened portals, shafts, and broken stairs descend into its subterranean vaults. Tales of great riches and fabulous treasures abound, but the ruins are infested with monsters from the old world."

Not particularly original or groundbreaking, but something in those dashed-off lines sparked my imagination. Suddenly, I had a campaign concept that ties together all of my unused material in an unusual yet still-familiar setting. This "throw-away" adventure for a one-shot playtest will now form the cornerstone of the development of a megadungeon campaign that uses the previously-created material, stitched together by dungeon sections generated using the random tables and some of the custom methodology I used for the Hurricane Dungeon (a process which I've come to really enjoy... making creative sense out of random die rolling is a fun challenge).

I took the Roll20 map and applied my house style to come up with a new map, now with some branches leading off this 25x25 section into adjoining sections, to create a bigger level (eventually).

New ideas are flying, thoughts are being collected, and plans are developing, but this is the energy and motivation I've been missing for my home game. And its a setting I can use for both my tabletop group and online. I'll discuss the development of the outline and key in a near-future post.

The Hurricane Dungeon – The Curséd Caverns (Level 9)

With this map, the eighth of nine, we come to the finale of the Hurricane Dungeon. Out of all the levels, I fiddled with the content on this one the most as I wanted to both wrap up the threads that developed while writing, and come to some sort of conclusion at the bottom. This doesn't preclude expanding the levels and restocking the plundered areas, and there's a whole 'nother, even-higher level adventure to be designed for the Ivory Tower in the palace ruins, but the party can also call it a day if they conquer this level.

The original penultimate map is a more well-defined "location." I mean to say, it has a presence and implied function just by looking at it. It screams "evil temple" and seemed perfect for a conclusion-type area.

I like underground rivers, but even more than that, I love underground lakes. Gary really captured my imagination for natural underground spaces with the D-series of modules (and Tsojcanth, to a lesser extent). "The Sunless Sea" is just such an evocative name, and if the drow hadn't been co-opted by Forgotten Realms' "Underdreck" and turned into lame edgelords, I could have easily seen myself adapting Gary's source material into a full-on underground campaign.  I also relished accounts of the Black Reservoir level in Castle Greyhawk, so this level map is kind of my homage to all that.

A big lake in a cavern projects fear, creates a sense of vulnerability, implies unseen threats and alien danger... and, more importantly, suggests hidden treasure. Who knows what might be trapped in this cave beneath the black water? That scene in The Two Towers (the film) in which Gandalf fights the Balrog as they plummet down a chasm, then emerge into a vast space with their fires glimmering across the black water as they fall... I think it's my favorite scene in the entire trilogy. 

My first thought was to make this a drow temple-outpost, but as I said, I kind of hate the modern drow and wasn't sure I had a decent spin on the classic version, so in the course of writing the upper levels, I decided to make the inhabitants of the lowest level a mere cult of demon-worshipers. I made the decision earlier in the writing process, though I don't remember at which point (maybe as I was figuring out who the NPCs were for the Level 5 stocking roll), but the idea developed into a lot more than that by the time I got to writing the key for Level 9. Certainly, the decision gave me a generic creative goal to work toward that I (hopefully) make pay off at the end.

This level had a few more rooms than the previous two cave levels, and I added a few more just to provide extra living space for the cultists. I also added the new access from Level 8, plus some doors and other details like ledges and columns, and cleaned up a few incongruities and flaws in the map that were bugging me. After adding the title, scale, and shading, along with level key numbers, the map turned out like this:

I made my content stocking rolls for the original 26-room dungeon level and came up with the following initial results:

–Empty: 9 (34.5% / 35%)
–Monster:  8 (31% / 20%)
–Monster + Treasure: 6 (23% / 25%)
–Stairs: 0 (0% / 5%)
–Trick/Trap: 0 (0% / 5%)
–Treasure: 3 (11.5% / 5%)

The first % number is the percentage of the actual content rolls; the second % number is the typical expected percentage spread (per OSRIC guidelines). After adding 5 more keyed areas to the map, bringing the total to 31, I counted them all as "Empties," knowing I would have to fudge the final number in order to house the extra cultist encounters I intended to add to the temple. So, out of the now-31 rooms, the numbers looked like this:

 –Empty: 14 (45% / 35%)
–Monster:  8 (26% / 20%)
–Monster + Treasure: 6 (19% / 25%)
–Stairs: 0 (0% / 5%)
–Trick/Trap: 0 (0% / 5%)
–Treasure: 3 (10% / 5%)

As I filled out the key, added new enemies (and removed some), these percentages changed again, but I'll get into that further below.

The Hurricane Dungeon – The Curséd Caverns (Level 8)

Continuing down into the depths of the Hurricane Dungeon, Level 8's map was drawn on the fifth night without power. Like the previous cavern map for Level 7, there are only 21 encounter areas here, so about half the number as the "finished" levels.

I like underground rivers, so this map has a big one winding right through, with many side caves and tunnels filling out the level. A pair of waterfalls, various ledges, and a series of rapids provide some nice natural obstacles as well. There are no ways off the level other than the river channel, so I needed to add a few; specifically, the three tunnel connections from Level 8.

As for connecting this level down to Level 9, one major thing complicated the situation: Level 9 is not directly below Level 8. Rather, it is down one level but shifted completely to the right. On that map, the river channel enters the level in the top-left corner, directly connecting to the river outlet on this map. This means that the likeliest routes down to Level 9 would be in the upper-right portion of the Level 8 map.

I also rolled one "Stairs" results on the dungeon stocking rolls, so I added a single tunnel down to Level 9. This provides for only two routes off the level (including the river channel) which results in a bit of a bottleneck to further progress. The party will have to either master the river channel somehow, or locate the cave with the statue where the new tunnel leads down. Usually, you don't want bottlenecks like this in your dungeon, but it's not so bad in this case.

That's because the layout of this level makes it clear that the dungeon "rooms" lie along the river's descending path, so it should seem logical to the players to investigate the downstream area where the river leaves the map. If they do, they will find that the river dumps via waterfall into a huge cavernous reservoir overlooked by a ziggurat temple carved into the wall. At the top of the falls, another cave entrance leads into other areas of Level 9. How they reach this area is up to the players and their resources, but it will at least be obvious that more dungeon lies in this direction. Even if they can't manage to get further downstream here, the knowledge of this area should motivate them to search the E side of the level for another route in this direction, in which case they will quickly find the new tunnel in the cave with the statue.

For some reason, I labeled many of the natural features by writing on the original map, which I didn't do on the others. I took the opportunity to remove the extra words and clean up a few things while adding river fords in two obvious spots. One of the "Trick/Traps" I rolled was a collapsing bridge, so I drew a span over the river. I also drew a connecting tunnel between two previously-isolated caves to give the level a little more flow. After adding a key and shading, the map turned out like this:

My content stocking rolls (for a 21-room dungeon level) came up with the following results:

–Empty: 9 (43% / 35%)
–Monster: 6 (29% / 20%)
–Monster + Treasure: 3 (14% / 25%)
–Stairs: 1 (5% / 5%)
–Trick/Trap: 2 (10% / 5%)
–Treasure: 0 (0% / 5%)

The first % number is the percentage of the actual content rolls; the second % number is the typical expected percentage spread (per OSRIC guidelines). Another high-empty, low-treasure level unfortunately, but I'll have to make due.

The Hurricane Dungeon – The Curséd Caverns (Level 7)

With this level, we move into the lower third of the Hurricane Dungeon, a series of natural caves and tunnels I titled "The Curséd Caverns." (Yes, it's not a very original name, but that's sort of the point with this throwback adventure.) This was actually the map I drew on our fourth night without power, but I moved some of the maps out of creation order to put similar-looking maps together. I enjoy drawing natural cave networks and I was happy with how all three cavernous maps turned out.

This one is interesting because three tunnels lead off the map , enabling it to link it up with additional levels. It has plenty of loopy-doopiness which is essential for a good cave level, although the southern-most portion of the map is bottlenecked by a single passage.

A major negative issue with this level is the fact that it only has ~20 distinct "rooms," which is slightly less than half the average number of the other levels. I could have increased this number by treating some of the larger caverns as multiple spaces, but I didn't want to get into issues of dungeon logic. Having too many creatures and things crammed into directly adjacent spaces starts to strain believability (despite the fact that the format has pretty low thresholds already).

I seriously considered this option up until the time of writing, but once I started keying the level, I felt it ended up with the right density of encounters. I didn't design these maps with any purpose or even end-use in mind. Were I to create maps specifically for a megadungeon (rather than the reverse happening here), I would make sure that each level had a proper number of rooms (minimum of 30) and enough accessways between the levels.

Speaking of which, I had three staircases and three chutes from the upper levels to connect to this level. I also rolled one result of "Stairs Down 1 Level" in the stocking rolls, and I already had the three existing accessways leading off the map. In addition, one of the stairs from Level 6 continues down to Level 8. I built the various stairs from pieces of the other maps, and added a few extra details from the key like ledges, a bricked-up wall, a set of double doors, a pile of guano, and a pool of magic water. I also created a new tunnel to connect areas 14 and 19, just so that end of the dungeon didn't feel so isolated and linear. When completed, the map came out like this: 

My content stocking rolls (for a 20-room dungeon level) came up with the following results:

–Empty: 9 (45% / 35%)
–Monster: 4 (20% / 20%)
–Monster + Treasure: 4 (20% / 25%)
–Stairs: 1 (5% / 5%)
–Trick/Trap: 2 (10% / 5%)
–Treasure: 0 (0% / 5%)

The first % number is the percentage of the actual content rolls; the second % number is the typical expected percentage spread (per OSRIC guidelines). I was disappointed in the high number of empty spaces and low amounts of treasure on this level, but kept the results as rolled. 

The Hurricane Dungeon – The Chambers of Woe (Level 6)

The Level 6 map is actually the last of the series, the ninth map I drew post-hurricane (and, mercifully, our final night without power, which came on the next afternoon). This is also the last of the "finished" levels in which there is stonework, excavated rooms and corridors, and features like doors and such. The remaining three levels are caves and caverns (with the exception of a finished temple area on Level 9).

I recall designing this map specifically as a maze with chambers, rather than a functional "place." With a few exceptions, the rooms are 30x30 with doors at one or more cardinal points, and most corridors are 50' or less in length. It's a tight, circuitous space without obvious purpose. It reminds me of an architectural circuit board, which perhaps has some sacred geometric significance for the empress's arcane machinations.

 

Compared to other levels, there are fewer secret doors, but all the larger rooms are hidden behind them. I don't recall making that deliberate creative choice, but it's an interesting one from a design point of view. It will also create these tantalizing blank spaces on the party's map, obvious secret locations with difficult to locate entrances far removed from the actual area. I see this level as a place where the empress hid important things inside a baffling maze. (She's insane, so who knows what she's thinking?)

There are also four staircases to other levels, one ascending and three descending. I was able to incorporate the ascending stair into the map for Level 5, and I had two additional staircases down from Level 5 that I needed to add to this map. Finally, I rolled four access routes on the stocking rolls for this level: A chute down one level, a stair down 2 levels, a stair down 3 levels,  and a chimney down 2 levels. Finally-finally, the original map has two teleporting hallways which could be interconnected, or they could lead to other areas/levels.

In the end, trying to add more multi-level stairs into the cavern levels below proved too tricky to resolve in a way that was satisfying, so I kept the chute and the chimney routes, and counted the two teleporting hallways as the stocked stairs, one of which goes to Level 8 and the other to Level 9 (as a backdoor into the evil temple). Doing so also provided me with a rationale for the fire giant who lives on this level. With shading, titles, and all the incidental features added, the map ended up like this:

 My content stocking rolls (for a 44-room dungeon level) came up with the following results:

–Empty: 16 (36% / 35%)
–Monster: 8 (18% / 20%)
–Monster + Treasure: 10 (23% / 25%)
–Stairs: 4 (9% / 5%)
–Trick/Trap: 3 (7% / 5%)
–Treasure: 3 (7% / 5%)

The first % number is the percentage of the actual content rolls; the second % number is the typical expected percentage spread (per OSRIC guidelines).

The Hurricane Dungeon – The Chambers of Woe (Level 5)

Continuing my series on creating this megadungeon, this is the seventh map I drew during the power outage, which became Level 5. Again, this is because I wanted to keep the "finished" levels and the cavern levels together (with the caves being the lowest levels). The original map feels a little uninspired compared to the others, though it is probably a more "classic" dungeon layout.

There are a few interesting features on closer look. Large rooms and long corridors, lots of loopey-doopiness, many secret doors and passageways, false doors marked with a 'T' for "traps," and hey, look at that...stairs to the levels above and below! It's not too bad, actually. The central, cross-shaped feature, includes directional arrows and four movement options. That's cool. (I was certain I cribbed this idea from somewhere, and sure enough, a similar feature is in the OD&D Sample Dungeon.) So, I felt pretty good about what I had to work with as I started fleshing out this level, even if it's a little Plain Jane.

I had already connected the staircase up to Level 4, and I lined up the stairs down to an area on the map I was using for Level 6. That map for Level 6 also contained a staircase up in a different location, so I had to figure out that connection as well. The stocking rolls for Level 4 had also indicated two stairs, a pit shaft, and a trap door and ladder leading to this level, but I had already placed those by the time I began work on Level 5. Finally, my stocking rolls for Level 5 included an additional two staircases and a chimney exiting down from here. Once I added those access routes, along with the room key numbers, a title, and shading, the level looks like this:

 My content stocking rolls (for a 35-room dungeon level) came up with the following results:

–Empty: 11 (31% / 35%)
–Monster: 4 (11.5% / 20%)
–Monster + Treasure: 11 (31% / 25%)
–Stairs: 3 (9% / 5%)
–Trick/Trap: 5 (14% / 5%)
–Treasure: 1 (3% / 5%)

The first % number is the percentage of the actual content rolls; the second % number is the typical expected percentage spread (per OSRIC guidelines).

The Hurricane Dungeon – The Chambers of Woe (Level 4)

The fourth level uses the sixth map I drew, this one on October 2, 2024. Maps 4 and 5 were both cave networks, but I wanted to keep all six "finished" dungeon levels together, with the three cavern levels being at the bottom so I moved the order around. This particular level had some interesting features: Large rooms, a chamber with a huge pool of some sort, and a massive central chamber with an altar and four columned wings projecting out from it. A few secret areas, lots of statues, and a second pool of water provided additional inspiration but, like the previous level map, this one included no access points, neither stairs nor passages leading off-map.

I knew from keying Level 3 that I had added three stair locations down to this level, and there was a fourth stair down from Level 2 as well. I also knew that the next map I was going to use for Level 5 had an access stair drawn on the original, so I would have to place that stairway down on this map. Finally, my stocking rolls came up with five (!) access points, more than twice the average statistical percentage for a level this size. I didn't end up using all of the stocking access points as rolled, which I'll get into further below. After adding all the access points, title, and location numbers, the map looks like this:

My content stocking rolls (for a 41-room dungeon level) came up with the following results:

–Empty: 11 (32% / 35%)
–Monster: 7 (14.5% / 20%)
–Monster + Treasure: 13 (29% / 25%)
–Stairs: 5 (12% / 5%)
–Trick/Trap: 2 (5% / 5%)
–Treasure: 3 (7% / 5%)

The first % number is the percentage of the actual content rolls; the second % number is the typical expected percentage spread (per OSRIC guidelines). Pretty close, statistically, with the "Stairs" result being the only real deviation.

The Hurricane Dungeon – The Upper Works (Level 3)

Level 3 was the third map I drew during the power outage. The direct correlation between creation date and level number ends with this one, however. The level has a few unique features to the other maps I'd drawn so far. For one: It has an entrance portico and an exterior area (bottom); two: It contains no routes (stairs, etc.) to other levels; and three: It has a teleporting passage similar to Level 1, but its destination is "off-screen."

Again, these maps were just unrelated doodles at the time I drew them so I wasn't concerned with logical structure or access points. This particular map's weird features (at least the first two) created some design challenges as I developed these maps into the mega-dungeon.

The problem posed by the front entrance/exterior comes when lining up the maps. I didn't want to "shift" any of the maps if I didn't have to. In this case, if you lay the first three maps on top of each other, the exterior cliff wall drawn on level 3 intersects with a few areas on levels 1 and 2 above it. It's a discrepancy that's fairly easy to hand-wave if you're not nitpickey. But I am, so I accounted for the exterior space in the key, describing it as a recessed area carved into the cliffside. This kinda deal: >>>

Not the greatest solution, but it works. Especially because shifting the dungeon would have complicated some of the level connections that I still needed to add to the map. There were already two stairs and an elevator to be added from Level 2, and my stocking rolls added another two stairs down to Level 4. Counting the main entrance and teleporting passage as additional routes, Level 3 has seven points of access – not bad at all. (I added an eighth access point in the stirges' room, and the dungeon's ventilation system adds even more, unquantified access points, but both require miniaturization of some sort so I'm not counting them in the total.)

After placing all the new stairs and marking the destination point of the elevator, and then adding a title and key, wall shading, and some incidental details (such as blockages and a pit trap), the map came out like this:

 My content stocking rolls (for a 37-room dungeon level) came up with the following results:

–Empty: 16 (43% / 35%)
–Monster: 3 (8% / 20%)
–Monster + Treasure: 14 (38% / 25%)
–Stairs: 2 (5% / 5%)
–Trick/Trap: 0 (0% / 5%)
–Treasure: 2 (5% / 5%)

The first % number is the percentage of the actual content rolls; the second % number is the typical expected percentage spread (per OSRIC guidelines).

The Hurricane Dungeon – The Upper Works (Level 2)

With the Level 1 key under my belt, writing the key for Level 2 was simply a matter of refining the format using the map I drew on our second night without power. Note that I did connect this map with the first map, via the stairway in the center-west portion of the map. I included only one other exit from the level to the east-southeast, hidden behind a secret door. 

There was also the nearby circular room with two levers and a floor circle, which I recall thinking of as some sort of elevator platform/shaft while drawing; but it, too, was concealed behind secret doors. Getting off this level would be a challenge, as providing those inter-level connections wasn't an objective at the time I was just doodling a map. I also wish I had drawn passages leading off the map, to expand the level horizontally. I mean, I still can with some Photoshop trickery, but I wish I'd thought to.

In designing Level 1 for this megadungeon, I added two stairs down to level 2, so I knew I had to add those connections to this map as well. My stocking rolls came up with two additional "Stair" results: one "Stair down 1 level" and one "Stair down 2 levels." The descending stair on the original map (near the "elevator" room) was proving difficult to sync up with the map for level 3, so I made that stair the one that went down two levels (to Level 4) and made both newly-rolled stairs a single-level drop to Level 3. The elevator platform ended up also descending one level to Level 3. 

After adding the new points of egress, keyed room numbers, a title, and shading, the map looked like this:

 My content stocking rolls (for a 40-room dungeon level) came up with the following results:

–Empty: 11 (27.5% / 35%)
–Monster: 10 (25% / 20%)
–Monster + Treasure: 13 (32.5% / 25%)
–Stairs: 2 (5% / 5%)
–Trick/Trap: 2 (5% / 5%)
–Treasure: 2 (5% / 5%)

The first % number is the percentage of the actual content rolls; the second % number is the typical expected percentage spread (per OSRIC guidelines).

Classic Monsters Revisited – The Tween (Fiend Folio)

While stocking the Hurricane Dungeon, one of the monster results came up as a tween from the AD&D Fiend Folio. That book is mostly a collection of monsters from the UK gaming magazine, White Dwarf, which covered a variety of RPGs in the early days before it became the house mag for Warhammer. Many of these creatures first appeared as submissions to the magazine's Fiend Factory column, by authors of varying levels of expertise and creativity.

Some are well-crafted and interesting, but most are simply variations on other monsters, with few distinguishing characteristics (other than appearance), or are just completely unnecessary. A handful of monsters were contributed by Gary Gygax, pulled from his previously-written adventures and added to what was essentially the second "monster manual" before the third monster manual became the official Monster Manual 2. Certain Fiend Folio monsters are passable-to-great; the rest are hit-or-miss (with lots of complete whiffs).

Having never used a tween before, I was eager to give it a fresh look. The tween's most interesting characteristic is a rudimentary form of 5e's Advantage/Disadvantage mechanic. (Perhaps even its "inspiration"?) The tween is essentially an ethereal "ghost" that attaches itself to a host, forming a shadowy doppelganger that provides a tremendous benefit to its host, but at a high cost to everyone else. The creature's presence is summed up with this wildly generous understatement: 

A character with a tween partner is therefore something of a mixed blessing to any companions.

That's because, while the tween's "partner" (it's host organism) gains the ability to make two dice rolls whenever a roll is required and take the better result, every other creature within fifty feet of the tween must do the same and take the worse result. This includes the tween host's allies. It's a "luck eater," basically, transferring the misfortune of others to the benefit of its host (and it, presumably). This looks awesome on the surface, but it has some enormous flaws.

 For one, by adding this to your campaign, you're doubling nearly every roll made at the table, on both the players' and the DM's side. The description of this ability reads:

(A)ny character or creature with a tween 'partner' has two die rolls instead of one, whenever a die roll is called for, and may select the more advantageous of these rolls. (This applies to 'to hit' rolls, saving throws and the like.)

The phrase, "...whenever a die roll is called for" is a bit ambiguous as to the type. (Is it all die rolls?) We can assume, based on the two examples provided, that the design intends for this to apply only to rolls made with a d20 (as is the case with Advantage in 5e), and not to rolls for things like hit points, weapon damage, etc.

But what about percentile rolls for success, such as for thief skills? The tween's description suggests that it is manipulating the environment around its host to make this "luck" happen (guiding the host's weapon, for example), so shouldn't it also apply to finding a trap or picking a lock? 

In any case, the result is a lot of extra rolling for the host and his fellow party members. And that's not even taking into account that the DM will have to roll twice for every single NPC and monster within 50' and run all those numbers as well. The game will inevitably slow to a dice-rolling, number-crunching crawl.

A second flaw with this design is that the tween's presence would be an intolerable situation for most players (I would think). I mean, if I were a player in this group, my character would have to deal with the situation in the short term until we left the dungeon and got back to base, but that tween-inflicted character won't be making a return trip (not with my guy, at least). 

I can't imagine any party of players accepting "bad luck" on every roll (according to statistical breakdowns of 5e Disadvantage, this equates to –5 or so on average). There's just no way. That's an enormous penalty in AD&D and a recipe for interpersonal conflict between characters (and perhaps even players). It will get someone killed eventually. I can see a character being forced out of a group over this situation, which sucks. It's one thing if the characters create that conflict themselves; it's quite another when a random roll forces it on them.

Worse still, the tween can't be countered by normal spell means, like Remove Curse. The description says that once a tween selects its host, it "...will remain permanently with him until he or the tween dies." That's pretty definitive, so it doesn't sound like the party can convince the creature to bugger off. The only way to be rid of the tween's luck effect is to enter the Ethereal Plane and kill it. But it's a Neutral creature ostensibly trying to help its host, which may pose a moral dilemma for Good characters (this is kind of cool). A lenient reading of one line gives DMs a bit of an out if they want to grasp it: 

The tween has the ability to see a few seconds into the future and is able to increase its host's luck.

Those two clauses suggest that perhaps this ability can be turned on and off by the tween, instead of being always-on. That would change the calculus dramatically, giving the player an incredible ability, but requiring them to use it situationally (mainly by separating himself from the party by 50' or more during combat... a tricky proposition). Still, a lone thief with such a tween would be a powerhouse. 

I don't believe that is the intent, though. I think this is just a dick-move monster, as designed. This is not an uncommon situation with the Fiend Folio.

I've kept the tween encounter in the Hurricane Dungeon to stay true to the dice rolls, and I'm curious to see what happens if one of my players ever "acquires" it. In the level 2 writeup, I adjusted the tween's effect to be a straight –4 / –20% penalty to others, so as to reduce the number of rolls the DM has to make. The host rolls twice for their bonus, and player allies can opt to either take the straight penalty or make two rolls at disadvantage instead.

For my home game, I may even alter the tween's effect even further to make it on/off (at will, triggered at the beginning of the round), and say that every time a player used the advantage ability, a single random creature — friend or foe — within 50' would suffer the disadvantage roll (instead of every other creature). 

That way, it's a bit more balanced and usable, and the number of extra rolls is kept to a minimum. I like magic items with caveats that make them somewhat dangerous to use, and this is like that. Fellow players may be able to more easily swallow the choice to accept a personal risk of penalty in order to give a comrade a big extra bonus in a critical moment (and potentially inflict the penalty on an enemy). It then becomes a tactical decision, rather than the "mixed blessing" of an arbitrary, likely-lethal, party-busting curse.

The Hurricane Dungeon – The Upper Works (Level 1)

The first level of the megadungeon is, in fact, the first hurricane map I drew on the night of September 29. The storm rolled in around 3–4 in the morning, but when I'd gone to bed a few hours earlier, my area wasn't really expected to get much beyond some heavy rains and high winds. The hurricane took a big swing to the northwest and passed right over us on its way to some Biblical-level destruction less than 100 miles north. That area is still badly messed up 11 months later.

I woke up on my office couch around 4 AM because I could hear the roof creaking (never a good sign). You could feel the shifting air pressure. I got up and looked outside, but noped back inside when I realized how intense things had gotten. I'm originally from South Florida and went through many hurricanes as a kid, so I knew this was a big storm. I got in bed in my shorts and t-shirt, with my heavy boots in easy reach, and just lay there listening to the winds howling and the sheets of rain lashing the house.

I'd heard some trees going down at some distance away, and we lost our power around 5, but at 6 AM I heard the first tree(s) come down in my yard. A neighbor's mimosa fell across my backyard, taking a second tree (and part of his fence) with it. That was it! I got out of bed and started a vigil. I live in an older section of my city (my house was built in 1929) and have several hundred-year oaks within crushing distance (not to mention a few dozen smaller, but still-dangerous trees). 

So far, just the two trees had come down near me, but as I stood at my back door and watched, another 12 trees in my yard came down between 6 and 8 AM. My house sits on a moderate hill slope, and after the the torrential rains soaked the ground, the hurricane winds came up the slope, "against the grain" of the tree roots, and just toppled them, one after the other. Luckily, none of the oaks fell, but my neighborhood was now officially a disaster zone. My girlfriend slept through the whole thing. A crazy time and hard to believe it has already (only?) been a year.

The hand-drawn map came about while reading the DMG by candlelight that first night. I got tired of reading but felt some creative energy, so I just started doodling on a graphing pad. I began by rolling on the random dungeon design tables, but got bored with that so I started over drawing on my own, letting the rooms and corridors flow out of the pencil without any real design concept. I love creating maps and it usually doesn't take me long to start sorting out a good, logical floorplan. I ended up with this map:

Since this was only a drawing exercise I wasn't worrying about connections or routes between levels. As drawn, there is a staircase from "a" level above in the upper-left-center of the map that serves as the level "entrance." A second staircase to the left of that descends to "another" level below. There's also some teleporting halls with 4 entry/exit points, though there is an error, with only three letters (A–C) represented instead of four (A–D).

As I began developing this map into a connected dungeon complex, I realized I would need to create additional routes between the levels. I did not want to mark up the original hand-drawn maps (call me sentimental), so I used Photoshop to add some details to the digital image. Some of these details are copied from fragments of the existing map and repurposed elsewhere. Other details were hand-drawn on paper, scanned in, and converted into .pngs which I dropped into the map image.

I also created fonts for numbers and upper- and lower-case letters from my own handwriting, with the same pens I used to draw the map. After dropping in the room key numbers and a level title, fixing the issue with the mislabeled teleporting hall, placing a new grid, and adding shading to the solid walls of the dungeon, I ended up with this map:

Next, I settled on a methodology for stocking the dungeon, relying mostly on the AD&D/OSRIC tables to flesh out the level contents. My first set of rolls (over a total of 42 dungeon locations) came up with the following results:

–Empty: 19 (45% / 35%)
–Monster: 8 (19% / 20%)
–Monster + Treasure: 10 (24% / 25%)
–Stairs: 2 (5% / 5%)
–Trick/Trap: 0 (0% / 5%)
–Treasure: 3 (7% / 5%)

The first % number is the percentage of the actual content rolls; the second % number is the typical expected percentage spread (per OSRIC guidelines).

The Hurricane Dungeon – Surface Ruins (Level 0)

This post begins a series that will examine the process of turning my Hurricane Maps into a proper megadungeon, using the guidelines provided in the stocking tables found in the AD&D Dungeon Masters Guide and recreated in OSRIC. The methodology I'm using to create the dungeon levels sticks pretty close to these two sources, with a few modifications based on personal preference and a desire to expand the source of monsters across the three original books (favoring OSRIC stats over AD&D stats where the monster exists in both sources).

By the time I finished rolling up contents and writing keys for levels 1–3, I had built enough background connections into the material to warrant adding a surface ruin, to not only serve as an entrance area into the dungeon, but also provide a few clues as to what lies beneath. As a result, I'm starting this series with what is technically the fourth level I rolled out and keyed: The surface (level 0) of the dungeon.

Most of the interior dungeon levels have 35–45 chambers or obvious locations, so I was calculating the surface level as having half that many, or 20 potential areas. The surface ruins will have already been picked over, meaning little of obvious value should remain except natural lairs and a few secrets.

Since I intended the exterior space to have a larger map scale, I first placed the dimensions of the dungeon-scale (10' sq.) graph paper sheet in the (approximate) center of the larger-scale (20' sq.) graph paper sheet, then sketched out the map in pencil. Thus, each dungeon level map fits inside the boundary of the outer palace walls.

After a few corrections and retakes, I drew over the finished sketch with a Sharpie ultra fine-point and added more detail with an even finer-point Pilot Precise V5.

I finished off the map in Photoshop, adding shading and a key (this step was performed after making the content rolls and figuring out their locations). I considered drawing separate (10' scale) maps for the outer ruins and palace interior, but decided against it. I like the flexibility of uncertainty that makes it easier to add stuff later. Any interior encounter areas will be easy enough to sketch out on the battlemat, ad hoc.

I made all the content stocking rolls using the methodology I established. My results for the 20 estimated surface locations were:

–Empty: 9 (45% / 35%)
–Monster: 3 (15% / 20%)
–Monster + Treasure: 5 (25% / 25%)
–Stairs: 1 (5% / 5%)
–Trick/Trap: 1 (5% / 5%)
–Treasure: 1 (5% / 5%)

The first % number is the percentage of the actual content rolls; the second % number is the typical expected percentage spread (per OSRIC). They came out fairly close to the statistical percentages, leaving me with 11 locations to key (since I won't bother identifying or keying this level's empty spaces).

NEW PROJECT: The Hurricane Dungeon

My corner of the world got smacked by Hurricane Helene last September. While we were not hit as badly as some neighboring areas, the storm still did a tremendous amount of damage here. We lost power for nine days and internet service for nearly two weeks. Everywhere was trashed by high winds, fallen trees flattened many houses. It felt post-apocalyptic, but everyone stayed cool and we rode everything out as a community. I live in a decent-sized city experiencing rapid growth with lots of outsiders moving in,  but we didn't descend into Mad Max-style pillaging or fortified compound-building. That was reassuring, given my appetite for post-apoc/dystopian sci-fi. While walking through the debris-filled streets to scrounge up some food, I wondered how long that cooperation would last if we all weren't certain things would improve (and could see progress of it every day).

It put me in a D&D frame of mind. It's a given that the first editions of Dungeons & Dragons represented a post-apocalyptic fantasy world. Not Earth, but like Earth; enough that the same sorts of cultures, technologies, and gods had developed along nearly identical lines. The vague setting implied in the rules, and also suggested in Gary's tales of his own campaign, involved disparate feudal states clawing their civilizations back from the ruins of previous, more advanced societies. The players took on the roles of explorers setting out into the wild to recover incredible riches, lost knowledge, and forbidden arcane secrets from the ruins. All while the forces of darkness press ever inward on their fragile and isolated kingdoms. Great stuff, ripe for adventure! 

Fortunately, I'd just purchased a physical copy of the three AD&D hardcovers to replace the ones I stupidly sold back when I thought I was done with D&D forever. So, since I had no electricity and little to do at night but read by candlelight, I dove back into the 1e DMG for the first time in 30-ish years. I'd been reading a lot of online discussion about using the random tables to stock dungeons, and I was intrigued by descriptions of how the early dungeons were designed and played. I saw this as a great relearning experience.

My frame of reference for the game was minimal when I began playing Basic D&D in 1981. I'd seen some tantalizing advertisements for it in a few military modeling magazines, but there were no gameplay discussions or other players to teach me. It was just me and my buddy teaching ourselves how to play the game, and swapping DM/player roles to run entire parties through a few of the published adventures (B2, L1, X1, X2). 

When I started playing AD&D with a group of players in 1983, my DM's older brother and his friends had started with OD&D/Judges Guild/Arduin in the mid-late 70s. My DM learned to play at their tables and they passed down to him whatever Ur-knowledge of the game they possessed. I know some of those guys were early in the scene, and went to conventions and knew/had talked to many of the original players and TSR guys, including Gary, so I'm fairly confident they got the game's intent right. The mish-mash of house-rules and variant options they handed off to my DM and which we used, however, makes me certain that I never played "book-accurate" AD&D. The game I'm relearning now is very different from what we played back then.

Darconea's negative 7th level... very dangerous!

In any case, my DM had a mega-dungeon called Darconea, which was created and ruled over by an insane magic-user called The Wizard of Darconea (or WOD as we came to refer to him). It was a 20-level dungeon, with 10 "positive" layers up into Mount Darconea, and 10 "negative" layers below it. The maps were from the Dungeon Geomorph sets, hand-scrawled to modify the layout where needed. The dungeon rooms were keyed on single notecards and filed in multiple card boxes by dungeon level. Each room had something in it (monster, treasure, puzzle, trap, etc.), populated by the random DMG tables. When we cleared a room, he moved the card to the "Used" box and eventually created a new card to restock the room. 

Monsters were drawn from the Monster Manual but also from Chaosium's glorious All the World's Monsters books. Chamber walls, ceilings, and floors were painted with bright colors (rolled from the table in Appendix K), and there was a dungeon mini-game in which WOD awarded prizes to parties who could match colors in a single foray. The more matches, the better the prize. 

The dungeon was maintained by a crew of magical creatures called the Gnomes of Yipuuri (from All the World's Monsters - Vol III), who would appear post-combat, popping out of a hatch and lobbing canisters of scrubbing bubble monsters (also from ATWM) into the room to clean all the viscera and damage. You had to high-tail it out of the area or get scrubbed to death. There was an adventurer's town down on the negative 4th level with a magic item shoppe, and the negative 10th was said to contain a portal to Hell.

Who knows how many real-life hours we spent down in that dungeon, but it was a place we returned to time and again, all well-spent. It was a remarkable place that felt alive and active, dangerous but exhilarating, and oh-so tempting to keep pressing on. "Just a little further," we would cajole each other. So many fun memories and epic battle stories came out of it... stories we still laugh about 40 years later.

At the time, I was aware of all the dungeon tables in the DMG, but never once made actual use of them. As I read them now with fresh eyes (by candlelight, no less), I felt inspired to try my hand at creating a randomly-generated dungeon. Since I can rarely get to sleep before 1 AM, I had nothing else to do in the dark so I got a pencil and graph paper and started rolling some dice. After a few unsatisfactory attempts with the layout tables, I just started sketching free-hand, creating a series of nine maps—one per night—over the power outage period. I was pleased with how they turned out and now wanted to use the random stocking tables to populate the levels.

Once the power came back on, I got busy cleaning up debris and getting things back in order. Then the holidays came and went, and the maps and my intention to do something with them slid to the back burner. I kept thinking about them though, and I've finally decided to do work them up into a proper 9-level dungeon. 

My goal is to hew as closely as possible to the dungeon stocking tables, but not be a slave to them. The tables were only ever meant as guidelines to spur creativity. Gary wanted DMs to use the results as a springboard to riff their own stuff. The challenge I'm setting for myself is to roll on the tables, accept the results as rolled, and then try to fit all the incongruous pieces into some sort of "dungeon logic" that not only feels fantastical and thematic, but also "realistic" (by D&D standards). I want the end product to make sense as an adventuring locale. Forced limitations like these tend to stimulate my creativity in entirely different ways than when I'm just conceptualizing a dungeon theme and populating it accordingly. It's why I enjoy participating in projects like the annual Adventure Site Contest or Dungeon 23.

As of this writing, I have the first 5 levels completely rolled out, plus an exterior area above the dungeon which I added recently. I've written finished keys for the exterior and first 3 levels as well. I've really enjoyed this exercise so far and can't wait to see what the rolls come up with next. Level 4 gets batshit crazy.  I plan to post each of the nine levels (10 counting the exterior) to discuss how the tables rolled out and then drove my creative decisions. I'll also provide share links to download the maps and keys.

Methodology

For my purposes, I'm using the OSRIC tables to determine room contents because I like OSRIC's statistical spread a little more than the DMG's (for example, 60% of AD&D rooms are "Empty," whereas only 35% of OSRIC rooms have nothing in them). I want to use only official AD&D monsters, but from all three monster books, so I created a d12 table to determine which tables I would roll on for each creature: 1–6 = DMG (i.e., Monster Manual); 7–9 = Fiend Folio; 10–12 = Monster Manual II. For determining treasures, I roll 50/50 between OSRIC and DMG (often decided by which book I have open at the moment). OSRIC's tables are great for rolling up traps, tricks, and jewelry items, but I lean on the DMG for gem types and base values. 

As for whether treasures are hidden and/or "guarded" (i.e., trapped), I tweaked the guidance here. Both systems identify these features as optional, but the DMG explicitly makes it an either/or proposition with a single d20 roll: on 1–8, it's "guarded;" on 9–12, it's "hidden." Thus, AD&D treasure would not be both guarded and hidden using just the tables.

OSRIC provides for a 50% chance, but then instructs the DM to consult two tables to determine a treasure's guarding device (trap) AND its method of concealment. This "and" could be interpreted as an "or" in light of the optional nature of both tables. It's also possible to infer that OSRIC means a 50% chance on each table, which would allow for a treasure to be both hidden and trapped as well.

In either case, these features are only meant to be used "if desired" by the DM. I wanted to surrender that decision to a die roll so I simply determined that there was a 50% chance that a treasure was guarded and a 50% chance that it was hidden. This gives me four results: not guarded or hidden; guarded only; hidden only; or both guarded and hidden. It has resulted in a large number of traps which has me wondering about the original nature of dungeon traps versus treasure traps. The random tables only provide a 5% chance for a dungeon location to contain a trick or trap (independent of any treasure), indicating that they are meant to be rare and could even be non-existent on a dungeon level. I may dial the chances for traps or concealment down to 30% each to reduce the total number. (I don't want my players to get overly paranoid about everything being trapped... or do I?)

Same kind of situation with regard to magical treasures. Using OSRIC's spreads, there is a 35% chance for a room to contain a treasure. Of these, only about 6–7% will be magic items. Overwhelmingly, treasure will be items with gold piece value (i.e., experience points). That makes sense and is desirable, but I like doling out magic items, too—especially consumables like potions, scrolls, and wands. My initial rolls turned up very few items, and no magic weapons, even as the monster stocking tables were beginning to produce monsters requiring magic weapons to hit. Level 3 had no magic items on it at all. It felt paltry and disappointing, so I made an executive decision to add magic treasures to each level: three item rolls per dungeon level (so, six extra items on level 2, nine on level 3, etc.) Many of these items will be potions and scrolls, statistically, but I will likely cap this number going deeper, as a few of the extra items I've rolled thus far are pretty choice (especially for low levels).

I let the die results stand in most cases, only re-rolling a few results that made no sense (like a string of piercer results in a finished dungeon room), or that were too similar to another roll (like when I rolled 3 different tween rooms on the same level...I'm sorry, that's too many tweens). Some of those results have been wildly swingy (for example, the +4 Leather Armor on level 2), but I'm okay with that. Let's see what happens if the players manage to find it.

>>The Surface Ruins (Level 0) 

Hurricane Dungeons

Helene hit my neck of the woods pretty hard. I was without power for 9 days and just got internet back a few hours ago. My yard is a disaster, but I feel fortunate that there was no major property damage or injury to my family and friends. It was much worse to the north of us...cataclysmic even. Living a week without lights and technology was a major inconvenience, but nothing compared to what others are suffering from the storm.

I'm a night-owl by nature and can't really get to sleep before midnight/1 AM, so I spent a lot of that time reading by candlelight, mainly the AD&D DMG—a copy of which I just recently reacquired after selling my D&D collection back in the 90s. It's a sometimes-difficult read, but something in Gary's language is magical and really inspires me.

I typically hand-draw a sketch of any adventure I'm working on, but then create the finished maps in Photoshop. Map-making (and world-building by extension) was the juice that got me into D&D in the first place. I pored over maps in The Hobbit and Lord of the Rings, The Phantom Tollbooth, The Belgeriad, and many of my other favorite fantasy novels. I even decided to become an architect! (I didn't.)

Rather than pay attention in class, I drew elaborate interiors of complexes and spaceships, like this...

So, D&D was a natural lure, and I have tons of hand-drawn maps from my youth. I still love to create maps, and since I was just sitting in the dark, I thought I would try drawing a finished map by hand on actual graph paper. I was happy with the results—nothing elaborate; just a bog-standard labyrinth with little forethought to design. I just let the pencil flow.

Pleased with the results, I did another one the following night, and then ended up doing one each night of the power outage. I tried keying the first map with the random tables in the DMG, but the results there were pretty empty and boring. I might try to key these someday for fun, or use them for a rando dungeon level here or there. In any case, these maps are a memento of the storm.