With all that being said, it can be difficult to consistently avoid the “random number generator” with that first type of choice. SECOND VERSE, COMPLETELY DIFFERENT FROM THE FIRST The choice only needs to be blind if the GM and/or the players choose to leave it blind. Which means that PCs always have a meaningful choice when confronted with the option of going down or continuing to explore their current level.Īnd so forth. In the Arnesonian megadungeon, lower levels are always more difficult. The PCs end up with potentially valuable navigation information about the dungeon before they ever go into it. But his people also pay tribute to the vampires, leaving them totally impoverished but suggesting that the vampires probably have a huge hoard of treasure. For example, you revive the goblin scout you knocked out in this room and you force him to tell you that his tribe lives down the left path and that there are vampires living down the path to the right. The path to the right has been surrounded with crude goblin holy symbols and anyone familiar with goblin runes can read the word “NOSFERATU” spelled out in crude syllables. The path to the left has tracks showing that it’s heavily traversed by small humanoids. With that being said, however, there are several ways you can deal with that it’s probably a good idea to explore them in your dungeons: In many cases, this sort of choice is, in fact, a random number generator: If you have nothing to distinguish between the choice of going right or the choice of going left, you might as well flip a coin. (In other words, if you go left you’ll encounter the goblins and if you go right you’ll encounter the vampires.) And if you’re consistently finding it to be true, there’s probably something wrong with the way you’re either designing your dungeon or running your dungeon.īefore we begin, I think it’s useful to remember that there are two types of meaningful geographic choice that can happen in a dungeon.įirst, there’s the type most people talk about: Selecting which encounter you’re going to face next. While this can be true, the reality is that it generally shouldn’t be true. Here’s a common misunderstanding I often see voiced on messageboards: Choosing which direction you’re going to go in a dungeon isn’t a meaningful choice because the players have no way of distinguishing between the choices.

Guild of dungeoneering stupidity 4