The Dream Patrol Report:
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Assertion: "Empty rooms build tension" is wrong. Those are bad DM's. Halls and normal doors count as empty rooms, so real rooms should always be fun. You should NOT have to work to find the adventure. You should NOT have to be bored in order to find the adventure. Be bored does NOT make the fun parts more fun.

Assertion: Every single room has to have an interesting description. There are no empty rooms. Abandoned armories have things in them. Caves are full of moss, strange rock shapes, dripping water, tracks in the ground. I think I'm going to reject this assertion. I believe these descriptions are actually a side-affect to the next point.

Assertion: In a homemade adventure I don't know what is going to happen. I am discovering things as the players are and am genuinely excited to do so. This comes across. I run an awesome homemade adventures with almost no prep. I don't do a good job running a module.  In a module I have the answer in front of me. The ghostly chess players can't be interacted with. I am bored because there is nothing to work with. I already know the outcome of the room when the players go in to it. Same with an empty room.

What is it that enables this in a dungeon? In a town it is people?

Monsters are people. How often should monsters attack? The tables say "almost every time" They are wrong. How wrong? Can you talk to the orcs/Mol-Min on level 1? To the boglings/kobolds? Can you talk to these sorts of intelligent monsters all the time? Almost all the time? Is "attacking" the most boring thing that can happen with a monster encounter? Should the players ever be fighting intelligent monsters? Scope: in a dungeon like this?

This is the original key to room in Dwimmermunt, and Jason Alexanders reworking from several months ago, from a thread on TheRpgSite:

Originally Posted by Dwimmermount
The wooden door to this room is partially gnawed through, as it is the nest for 9 giant rats. In addition to the rats, the room itself contains broken pieces of wood, straw, string, and other random detritus that these vermin have collected and brought here. Amidst this rubbish can be found 2000 cp, a jeweled pin (800 gp), a gold necklace (200 gp), and an expensive comb (30gp).

Jasons take:
This room contains broken pieces of wood, straw, string, and other random detritus that 9 giant rats have collected and brought here. In the center of the room -- in a space cleared of rubbish -- are twenty skulls arranged in a circle. Each skull has been filled with exactly 100 copper pieces.

When anyone enters the room, a number of rats equal to the number of people entering the room will circle counter-clockwise around the circle of skulls, approach the entrants, rise up on the hind legs, and stretch out their paws as if waiting to receive something. Each of the rats has the holy symbol of a Thulian god branded onto its back.

If the rats are given a coin, they will place it in one of the skulls. (But there will still only be 100 coins in each skull.) If they are given any other valuables, they will scurry away and hide them in the piles of refuse. If anyone attempts to cross the room without giving them a coin or something else of value, the rats will swarm and attack.

WHY are these different? Why is the interactivity in Jasons 'good' and the interactivity of searching two dead dwarf bodies (as they appear so often in otherwise empty rooms) "bad"? What's the diff? Action vs. passivity? Bizarre shit going on? Some combination of the two?

The Pretty Girl wants something to think about when it's not her turn. To keep herself engaged. (history? puzzle rooms?) Pokeboy and Little Girl are in power fantasy mode and want to be cool.

The Pretty Girls claims to like to map. She also claims to hate mapping. Assertion: there is no "putting your time in" in order to have fun. If mapping is not fun then there should not be mapping. The DM should draw it or provide one, or something like that. Torturing the players is not cool. What does this do to 'the unknown?' Provide some sort of map but keep The Unknown somehow?

Quote from: bryce0lynch;624697The Dream Patrol Report:
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Assertion: "Empty rooms build tension" is wrong. Those are bad DM's. Halls and normal doors count as empty rooms, so real rooms should always be fun. You should NOT have to work to find the adventure. You should NOT have to be bored in order to find the adventure. Be bored does NOT make the fun parts more fun.

Disagree.  What if my players made that observation independently when they played through my own megadungeon years back?  Are they bad players?  Brain damaged?

In fact Amy, a very story-oriented player, commented on the "slow burn tension" of this kind of game in a follow-up e-mail; she hadn't played a straight dungeon game in years, and loved it.  No one felt that they had to "work for fun,"  no one felt bored mapping out sparse areas and such.

I don't think every room, corridor and door needs to be "interesting" (whatever that means).  It gets a little stupid if every encounter is rewritten in the manner of The Alexandrian's rewrite of the infamous 2000cp rat room, imo.

Don't get me wrong.  Lyche's dungeon had dozens of weird features (what the Moldvay book calls "specials") and gussied up encounters.  But it wasn't non-stop; the players would run across 1-3 of these during a long session.

Another random thought occurs.

One thing that kept my players interested in exploring more and more of the dungeon from level one had to do with some descriptive elements.  My room notes were very terse, with one line of brief description, one with monsters (if any), one with treasure and location (if any).

In order to keep my descriptions consistent, I included indications of how the walls were decorated (they were plastered and painted); different sections of each level were painted with different colors and patterns.  It wasn't really an important detail, to me, more a reflection of the builder's aesthetic sense, but it intrigued my players, who were trying to figure out the scheme and its significance.

Does this count as "interactivity"?  Not really, to my mind, but it was something.

Quote from: bryce0lynch;624697The Dream Patrol Report:
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Assertion: "Empty rooms build tension" is wrong. Those are bad DM's. Halls and normal doors count as empty rooms, so real rooms should always be fun.

Remember your audience here - you're DM'ing kids. What they enjoy is different than what adults enjoy. I can't DM the same with my daughter versus my normal group.

Quote from: bryce0lynch;624697Assertion: "Empty rooms build tension" is wrong. Those are bad DM's. Halls and normal doors count as empty rooms, so real rooms should always be fun. You should NOT have to work to find the adventure. You should NOT have to be bored in order to find the adventure. Be bored does NOT make the fun parts more fun.

I disagree in part. What I feel is important that the mega-dungeon has a logic that can be used as a basis for choice of where to explore. Just throwing player in a maze is a boring for most. But give them a clue about the deeper content than they will have the motivations to explore regardless of the number of empty rooms and corridors.

Again the problem isn't the empty room, the problem is that the players might as well throw darts on a grid for all the meaning their choices have.

Quote from: bryce0lynch;624697Assertion: Every single room has to have an interesting description. There are no empty rooms. Abandoned armories have things in them. Caves are full of moss, strange rock shapes, dripping water, tracks in the ground. I think I'm going to reject this assertion. I believe these descriptions are actually a side-affect to the next point.

A published megadungeon has a tension between word count and detail. Having the same level of detail as a tournament style module will make for a huge and unwieldy product. I am not saying this to defend Dwimmermount, I don't think any of the published megadungeons have found the right balance.

If one is going to publish a megadungeon within a reasonable word count then you are going to have rooms and areas with little more than a descriptive name and maybe a sentence of description. The expectation is that the detail will be supplied for the places that truly needs it and the referee is expected to ab-lib the rest.

While Tegal Manor is perhaps too terse with mostly one line description of room. I had no trouble making the adventure interesting because of the additional detail supplied on the map.

Click on the image for a larger view.


I think in the end, I feel the correct approach is not just describe the areas of the megadungeon but to teach the reader how the author ran the megadungeon. And to supply the same tools and aides the author used. Anything one person can do can be taught.

It is simply impossible to publish a product with every room having the level of detail of Rob Kuntz's Living Room (a detailed description of a single room from Castle Greyhawk).

Quote from: bryce0lynch;624697Assertion: In a homemade adventure I don't know what is going to happen. I am discovering things as the players are and am genuinely excited to do so. This comes across. I run an awesome homemade adventures with almost no prep. I don't do a good job running a module.  In a module I have the answer in front of me. The ghostly chess players can't be interacted with. I am bored because there is nothing to work with. I already know the outcome of the room when the players go in to it. Same with an empty room.

I find that I have a dozen or two dozen good ideas for an adventure. Once it expands beyond that scope then the well starts going dry. Everybody has a limit. Beyond which they have to start relying on aides to generate ideas and details. That is value of published adventure.

But published adventure differ on how well they save the referee time and effort. Some referee find time totally useless, while other couldn't run a campaign without them. In short there is a bunch of factors that determine whether a published adventure is useful or not.

Quote from: bryce0lynch;624697What is it that enables this in a dungeon? In a town it is people?

A megadungeon is more setting than locale. I think part of the answer for a published megadungeon product is to treat much of it like a setting. Label a warren of two dozen rooms as the kobold lair. Provide important NPCs, give descriptive names, detail the half dozen important places, and expect the referee to ab-lib the rest based on the logic of the setting. Finally write a bit on how you, the author, would ab-lib it.

The introduction to the level is where the author would describe the relationship of the kobolds to the rest of the megadungeon.

Quote from: estar;624734A megadungeon is more setting than locale. I think part of the answer for a published megadungeon product is to treat much of it like a setting. Label a warren of two dozen rooms as the kobold lair. Provide important NPCs, give descriptive names, detail the half dozen important places, and expect the referee to ab-lib the rest based on the logic of the setting. Finally write a bit on how you, the author, would ab-lib it.

I prefer tournament style. I don't want to ad-lib something I paid money for.

Crazily enough, I prep my megadungeon by writing tournament-style, because it relieves me of some of the ad-libbing. Plus, ad-libbing interesting traps and "specials" is a pain because they don't riff off player activities as much as an interaction with monsters/NPC's would.

This doesn't mean that the dungeon isn't reactive - stuff does move around in response to the players, and things move into "cleared out" areas. But it gives a well-described initial state.

As far as practically running a tournament-style megadungeon, you just need to know the intros to the various levels so you have a vague idea of what's going on below, and then the level the players are exploring, and a few rooms down on the levels below in case the fellas get curious and poke their noses down.  You don't have to know the workings of the entire thing at any given time.

Anyhow, that's how I do it.

Quote from: PatW;624735I prefer tournament style. I don't want to ad-lib something I paid money for.

There is nothing wrong with your preference and if in the long run if your viewpoint represents the majority of the market then the consequence then will be a limited number of expensive products. Pretty much the situation we have now. None of the mega-dungeon product I heard of were particularly profitable and most published as a labor of love even by the big names like Necromancer and Goodman Games.

Why not just describe empty rooms in passing?  "Okay, the next chamber is just filled dust and debris...there are doors here and here, where are you going now?"

That way the game doesn't get stalled out with the players meticulously looking for a hidden Cool Thing that doesn't exist, yet they know there is a room there that they can backtrack to to set up camp in if they want.

Quote from: misterguignol;624740Why not just describe empty rooms in passing?  "Okay, the next chamber is just filled dust and debris...there are doors here and here, where are you going now?"

Personally I do this, they just get a sentence or two. But there's a big difference between that and one-page dungeon format, and only about 1 in 6 rooms is truly empty that way - there's often a trap, loot, secret door, or other interesting feature.

Room description needs to be enough to impart authorial intent (especially flavor), but without useless frustrated-novelist levels of detail.

Quote from: misterguignol;624740Why not just describe empty rooms in passing?  "Okay, the next chamber is just filled dust and debris...there are doors here and here, where are you going now?"

That way the game doesn't get stalled out with the players meticulously looking for a hidden Cool Thing that doesn't exist, yet they know there is a room there that they can backtrack to to set up camp in if they want.

That's exactly what I do, and what I advocated earlier in this thread. The problem isn't so much (at least in my experience) having too many empty/uninteresting rooms/areas as too many rooms/areas that the players think are going to be interesting and turn out not to be - wasted effort attempting to interact with something that's non-interactive.

Can't speak to megadungeons specifically, but two elements seem to help with empty rooms: time pressure, and goals.

If time is a factor (wandering monsters, time pressure from a deadline, etc.) then players will have to move quickly through empty rooms and won't have time to be bored. If this means something surprises them, that's fun.

Empty rooms with secret doors could be a problem, though. Especially if the door is key to moving forward or strategically leap-frogging a section. Players can choose to slow down (time tradeoff), and GMs can streamline the process by rolling for searches. There can also be a puzzle element--architectural or other clues to where a secret door should be.

Goals: it's a matter of whether the PCs head into dungeon with an attitude of "entertain me, m*****f*****s" or if they're trying to do something specific. This should also focus their attention and let them skip over the empty spaces.

Quote from: Elliot Wilen;624766Can't speak to megadungeons specifically, but two elements seem to help with empty rooms: time pressure, and goals.

If time is a factor (wandering monsters, time pressure from a deadline, etc.) then players will have to move quickly through empty rooms and won't have time to be bored. If this means something surprises them, that's fun.

Empty rooms with secret doors could be a problem, though. Especially if the door is key to moving forward or strategically leap-frogging a section. Players can choose to slow down (time tradeoff), and GMs can streamline the process by rolling for searches. There can also be a puzzle element--architectural or other clues to where a secret door should be.

Goals: it's a matter of whether the PCs head into dungeon with an attitude of "entertain me, m*****f*****s" or if they're trying to do something specific. This should also focus their attention and let them skip over the empty spaces.

Great observations.

The time factor is a big one, yeah.  If you actually track how long a torch or lantern stays lit, those empty rooms suddenly become something more than a bore.

I have a set of movement house rules for movement and mapping that also played into this.  At the standard movement rate, I'd give players dimensions and distances as on the map, as well as compass directions.  They could double the rate and I'd give the dimensions and distances in terms of, say, how far their torchlight reached.  At triple rate, dimensions and distances became very vague; "long" corridor, "really big room", "virtually a closet," etc.  At running speed (4x+), I'd give no distance indicators; "you run forward and the corridor branches left and right," etc.

So many assumptions go into making assertions about what makes the game work for a group.  Threads like this remind me of that.

I had some time to think about your comments while being swamped at work yesterday. I'm going to be all over the place in this post. Sorry.

Empty Rooms
I think I'm talking about some seriously empty/boring rooms when I say Empty Room. The empty rooms in Dwimmermount that have no purpose beyond simply being empty. A meaningless room, maybe? Just some dust and rubble/debris. The Pretty Girl doesn't like feeling that her has been wasted. Even some clues or dungeon history gives her something to think about when 'its not her turn.' She also believe that empty corridors and most doors qualify as empty rooms ... boring and meaninglessness compounded. Now what's the role of the TRULY empty room?

Rest & recovery of resources? Wouldn't it be cool if the players had to worry about a safe place to crash? "Crap! We're all down to 1hp each and no spells and the only place we've found safe to rest is back 3 hours, unless we want to rest i that room with the glowing red column!" But that can't happen in Dwimmermount.

Can you really skip over an empty room? Kind of "GM Fiat" the empty room away in description as several of you have suggested? What about the whole time/resource management thing? You auto-advance the turn tracker or don't advance it at all? That doesn't sound too kosher?

I think that the EXTREME empty room syndrome shown by Dwimmermount really pushed me hard and is making me examine

*) the role of TRULY empty rooms. (above)
*) what interactivity is (the TSR vs OSR thread has some good stuff there, and relates to Dwimmermount since DM seems to be the opposite of interactivity)
*) the role of "talking to the monsters" in the dungeon. How much does one rely on the Monster Reaction tables? I believe the monsters are going to mostly be hostile, on average. That shift a bit if the leader has a CHR mod and a lot if its a great CHR mod. Are you proving that CHR isn't a dump stat by using that table? Or should you be able to talk to most monsters by default? Maybe do something else, like have the "friendly" orcs have an OBVIOUS bag of loot in order to spread some discord. ($$=easy XP!) Wouldn't this appeal more since you adding a social element, giving the players more room to hang themselves, and still not rule out combat at a later date when they are caught with hands in the loot bag?

I solved te mapping problem, I think. It doesn't quite deal with the "did we draw the map correctly?" issue, but solves a lot else. Rather than me draw a map on graph or paper of a battle map, I went ahead and turned to an old technique.

The DM draws a map on posterboard before play and covers it with newsprint. The players use an x-acto knife to cut away the newsprint as they march along. There's a mini on the map to show where they are but the map isn't really to scale. I usually leave off secret passages, etc.

This style moves things along quickly; they keep cutting till they come to something. It avoids all of the mapping questions. It does remove the 'uncertainty' from the players mapping; maybe there's some way to modify this technique to get that back?

I saw this style of mapping when I was nine years old the very first time I ever saw the game D&D. It was at The Game Preserve when it was on the hill in Broad Ripple.  I was with my older sister; I think she was there to buy some pot.

Oh, and most of those rooms are empty. Reptile men came out of that pool of water. in the lower right and they found a body to loot in that cavern in the middle. 

https://plus.google.com/u/0/photos/100747085754234335719/albums/5841794244646012417/5841794247524367010?authkey=CKi6kcCxvLa0SA

Not much time ATM but the purpose...well, one purpose of truly empty rooms is to connect parts of the dungeon together. Especially if it's a corridor with multiple doorways off of it. You've also got space in general--which can be used in the course of combats which start elsewhere, or which figures in logistical/strategic concerns (we are now x feet farther from the staircase), and overall geometry (if the levels are staggered then you need a passage away from the "center" of one level to get down to the next, etc.). Now these can all be occupied or "interesting" in theory but that may make things too crowded.

Ultimately I can't speak to DM since I haven't seen it and I don't even like the name...but empty spaces have never really been a problem for me. I mean, I visualize going through a structure, just as I see myself doing so in a FPS such as Marathon (edit: Halo to you whippersnappers), and as player I take much of the responsibility for not getting bogged down in empty spaces...by just walking through them with more or less caution.

RE: Empty Rooms

For me personally, empty rooms in large dungeon complexes serve one primary function; spacing.

Looking at some of the more compact and densely populated dungeon maps its next to impossible for any shit to break out without the whole dungeon being alerted almost immediately.

Even if that doesn't happen, the PCs have no unoccupied space to retreat to, so you have to either fight the dungeon inhabitants as one large force, or pretend that the gnolls in apartment 6C don't give a rats ass about crime in the neighborhood.

The very best thing about empty rooms are the uses the players find for them. Empty areas give players a chance to use them for rest, set up ambushes, build defensive positions, and whatever else they can think of.

That being said, even empty rooms can have interesting features to avoid being a long series of plain square chambers with piles of debris. Broken furniture and fixtures, a crevasse in the wall or floor, odd construction features that could be used by inventive parties. Basic decent dungeon dressing.