Hello! I just wanted to note that this was supposed to appear on 23/12/18, before I went to Italy. But something happened and it did not publish. I am still in Italy enjoying the sites here, well. See you all after the 9th of January.
Today we are going to talk about a concept on how to run mapless dungeons. Why would we want that? Because it is a handy tool for when you come unprepared due to your daily tasks were more time consuming than estimated. I did hand myself out saying I could write about this system, after successfully starting a game running entirely on this system on the Mosh discord server (according to others, I think I am doing an somewhat okay job at it). So here we are. However, the title of this post might be a bit misleading for we are not talking about mazes specifically, but it was how this concept was created and thus how I relate to it.
Concretely we are going to talk about:
- How to construct a mapless dungeon, maze, space station, or etc.?
- How to run said mapless location?
Let's tackle the first point. Before we even try to construct it, we need to figure out what requirements we need to fulfill. What are these requirements? Well, you are going to hate this, but they vary. If you are running a dungeon, you might want a treasure room, at least 2 secret rooms, and a ever-sleeping prince who might be awaken only by the kiss of someone of a similar mind. But if you are running a space station like this, you might want 3 shopping areas, a few airlocks, engine room, and etc. Last thing you could do, is just to wing it and see where the players actions bring you. However here is my guideline for how to do it:
- Write down what the characters might explore in a few words. Example: treasure room, secret rooms, the prince, and the necromancer who is in love with this prince.
- Now decide if there are supposed to be any challenges along the way. Note them down, and map these to a die. Examples: If the result (on a d4) is 1 or 2 there are a lot of dormant skeletons, 3 a cesspool and 4 a necrotic slug.
Now that we have these requirements/basic blocks to build from we can talk about what is in between the different rooms. Are there corridors, rooms, holes, stairs, or etc.?
- Create an amount of generic rooms before arriving to those specific rooms. Example: The entrance has 2 rooms before the first secret room can be found, the second one is behind the treasure room. There are two ways (left and right) to the treasure room with 3 rooms each. The prince is in the right way.
- Decide whether or not there might be some goodies and minor interesting things in some of these.
Do not care about how the rooms are connected, it is rather more interesting to leave it vague as you allow yourself a lot more freedom when playing it out. So now we have the basic dungeon written down, congratulations, you have made your first mapless dungeon.
So now comes the important bit. To tackle the second point, we need a system to decide for how long people stay in said room. Let me present to you the Actions per Room system I use in my games. I do the following:
- I decide what the range of actions I allow the players to take before something happens. Note: I consider each player’s action to use up 1 action, so if 1 player does 3 actions, it counts as 3 actions spend. Example: A range of 3-6.
- I map the range onto a die, if you want more variance use a higher range and larger die. Example: The range of 3-6 on a d4. The result of 1 = 3 actions, 2 = 4 actions, 3 = 5 actions, 4 = 6 actions.
- Every time the first player enters a new room, I roll the dice and note down how many actions they have before something happens (which is rolled for as well) and leads them to another room or a dead end. Example: I rolled a 2, thus the players have 4 actions in the room where there are lots of dormant skeletons (Because I rolled 2 on another d4).
Always provide multiple choices. They do not need to lead anywhere, but I advice that they do. I do both.
Let me be honest, you can use this with mapped dungeons as well, might even be easier.
So what if the players find a way to stop your challenge or encounter? They stop it, it will not happen. Save down the encounter for a later time.
So here is a practical play example of how I do it:
Me: You enter an open room where you are able to see that there is balcony with a second floor to it. After a bit of looking, you see that there is something that looks like a shopfront and it seems like it has stairs going up. You also notice a tugged away corner that might lead to some stairs.
Player 1: I go to the store front, what type of store is it?
Me: It is a perfume shop, in the middle it has a spiral staircase going upwards.
[... Jumping a bit here, the player rummages through the perfume shop before moving upstairs and this room has no encounter....]Me: As you approach the top of the stairs you see a body lying at the entrance to the upper shop on the left, on your right you see another door. The shop has mannequins and is a clothing shop. How do you approach? (I note down that this room has an encounter and 6 actions before I propel the encounter).
Player 1: I crouch down and observe the shop for a good hiding place that does not inhibit my movements and is close to the door to the right (1st action).
Me: [I describe what options the player has]
Player 1: I move over to the cashier desk and hide (2nd action).
Me: As you move over there, you hear a creaking around you. It sounds like movement.
Player 1: I look toward the direction of the creaking, what do I see (3rd action)?
Me: You see the mannequins and racks of clothes. After a little bit, you hear voices from the outside toward the left, where the body is.
Player 1: I try to listen to what they are talking about (4th action).
Me: They sound human, and what you can hear it seems like they are talking about finding shelter, but you are unsure.
Player 1: I wait for them (5th action).
Me: As you wait, you hear creaking moving and getting closer. How do you continue?
Player 1: I try to figure out where it comes from (6th action).
Player 2: [radios in and says something. On this one I was lucky that player 2 decided to join in at that moment and say something, it gave me a clean segway to the encounter.]
Encounter begins.
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