For a hobby built on imagination we sure do love retreading the same old dungeon cliches!

"Edgy" cult temples, abandoned mines, dark fortresses, caverns of unnatural evil, volcano tunnels, necromancer labs, creepy catacombs, haunted houses, slimy sewers, entrances to Hell... we're up to our eyeballs in professional and personal interpretations of these rote concepts. And of course video games are even more suffused with them.

Every now and then someone takes a big risk and goes way out on a limb... by applying an Egyptian or Mesoamerican veneer to one of the above! Oh shit, look out, we've got a maverick here!

In another thread I asked for examples of dungeons inside giant trees, expecting a healthy selection of what I thought was an obvious but not too overexposed idea. I got about two or three results.

As a collective, why are we so hidebound on this subject?

Dyson's Delves has a petrified purple worm.

Anomalous Subsurface Environment is whack.

As for the tree dungeon – it's a pretty damn good idea.

You're right, most dungeons are the same old same-old, but I guess the classics are inexhaustible. Which doesn't mean there's no room for novelty.

The Dungeon Is: a tessellated mosaic of Steve Buscemi staring into your very soul, each left nostril being a fissure deeper into the structure.

Better?

Quote from: Opaopajr;755979The Dungeon Is: a tessellated mosaic of Steve Buscemi staring into your very soul, each left nostril being a fissure deeper into the structure.

Better?

I once made a dungeon that was part of a fistula tract in a dragon's body, filled with demons and portals from another plane. It was a bit a fun and a nice change of pace, but I think players often do want to see familiar tropes and it is often the specifics of how those tropes are handled that matter to them.

To the OP, did you follow Dungeon during Paizo? They had a submission policy of not accepting things that were cliche or that had already been done to death. You might find some of the back issues useful if you are looking for differemt kinds of dungeons.

Quote from: BedrockBrendan;755981To the OP, did you follow Dungeon during Paizo? They had a submission policy of not accepting things that were cliche or that had already been done to death.

In practice I found that while this policy did yield a few truly novel concepts, most of them were just especially florid versions of the Egypt/Mesoamerica example I gave.

I'm not saying there's anything wrong with the old standbys if your players still groove to them, I'm just surprised at how little we innovate (or at least copy fresher innovations).

Quote from: OpaopajrThe Dungeon Is: a tessellated mosaic of Steve Buscemi staring into your very soul, each left nostril being a fissure deeper into the structure.

Sold. When are you running it?

Quote from: Shipyard Locked;755970As a collective, why are we so hidebound on this subject?

A dungeon inside a tree, or inside a purple worm, or inside a dead god, or whatever, is still rooms connected by passages filled with monsters and treasure. The idea that changing the trappings makes a dungeon 'original' is silly.

How about a dungeon into John Malkovich's head?

http://www.reeldealmind.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/11/DSC0736-M5.jpg

Quote from: Shipyard Locked;755970For a hobby built on imagination we sure do love retreading the same old dungeon cliches!

"Edgy" cult temples, abandoned mines, dark fortresses, caverns of unnatural evil, volcano tunnels, necromancer labs, creepy catacombs, haunted houses, slimy sewers, entrances to Hell... we're up to our eyeballs in professional and personal interpretations of these rote concepts. And of course video games are even more suffused with them.

Every now and then someone takes a big risk and goes way out on a limb... by applying an Egyptian or Mesoamerican veneer to one of the above! Oh shit, look out, we've got a maverick here!

In another thread I asked for examples of dungeons inside giant trees, expecting a healthy selection of what I thought was an obvious but not too overexposed idea. I got about two or three results.

As a collective, why are we so hidebound on this subject?

Because a RPG will always be limited by its default setting premise.

We've seen stuff like that in video games for at least 30 years, so it is kind of strange that we don't see it more often in tabletop rpgs.

Quote from: Shipyard Locked;755970As a collective, why are we so hidebound on this subject?

Yeah just all large human settlements are blocks surrounded by long narrow spaces used as pathway with various sections inhabited by specific social class or group. Don't get me started about it how it always about shopping at the stores.

Yes I am being sarcastic.

A boring dungeon is boring because it inhabited by boring people doing boring things. Want to make it more exciting make the inhabitant and what they are doing more interesting. The same with a city, wilderness or whatever. Exotic trappings/locale only go so far. In the end it comes back to what inhabitants the dungeon and what they are doing.

Quote from: Sacrosanct;756025We've seen stuff like that in video games for at least 30 years, so it is kind of strange that we don't see it more often in tabletop rpgs.

Computer AI only goes so far. So you have substitute it with something else to hole the player's interest. Tabletop RPGs don't have that issue.

Quote from: Black Vulmea;756014The idea that changing the trappings makes a dungeon 'original' is silly.

Quote from: EstarExotic trappings/locale only go so far. In the end it comes back to what inhabitants the dungeon and what they are doing.

Good points, but would you concede that some trappings are better for facilitating some content? Going back to the tree example, to me a swim up though a vertical shaft of viscous sap to reach and negotiate with a colony of possibly friendly giant burrowing insects feels more right amidst the tree trappings than it does amidst the shadow cult crypt trappings.

Quote from: jeff37923Because a RPG will always be limited by its default setting premise.

Well we're talking about fantasy right now, so in theory there is no limit, right? So why don't we take more advantage of that?

I remember several years ago we did an adventure inspired by a recent watching of Fantastic Voyage, but those seemed to be more of one-off style adventures.

Quote from: Shipyard Locked;756035Well we're talking about fantasy right now, so in theory there is no limit, right? So why don't we take more advantage of that?

A distinct lack of imagination in the userbase is my own opinion.

Probably because I haven't brought a party into one in almost three decades. It's probably starved to death in the meantime.