The 5 Room Dungeon is a Story Structure

Roll 1D6 on each table.

Table One - Location
1 Cooking pit
2 Sleeping and rutting pit
3 Shit-pit
4 Treasure pit
5 Guest pit
6 Re-roll

Table Two - Content
1 Provisions & Poisons
2 Boss Lair
3 Trap
4 Safe room
5 Guardian
6 Re-roll

Quote from: GnosticGoblin on December 16, 2024, 03:28:05 PM

The 5 Room Dungeon is a Story Structure

It's not bad  advice, per se.  Very elementary, like a "baby's first RPG" video.  A structure like 5-room dungeons might be helpful for a newbie DM trying to create an engaging set of encounters, but it does miss the point.  It's like teachers who teach the 5-paragraph essay structure.  It never produces a good essay; just a "good enough" essay.

There are elements that appear in this structure that are worth learning, especially things like creating a consistent tone, varying challenge types, and pacing the challenges.  But it's missing a lot of the really advanced techniques, like verticality, player choice, and opposed elements/factions that can really make a dungeon memorable.

Oh, and story is not something a DM plans.  Story is what happens when the adventure is over and players are recapitulating their experiences.  Chasing story in dungeon design is a fool's errand, and will hurt more than it helps.

I never agreed with the 5-room dungeon thingy. Five rooms never really seem like enough space to do anything interesting with. It's almost as if people who recommend it either hate dungeons/dungeon design, or find arbitrary restrictions to be interesting. I think pure rng gonzo dungeons should make a comeback, but only with a 5-level 99-room limit. I mean, who cares if a dungeon makes logical sense, as long as the base scenario is interesting. I don't know. I'm too old and despairing to care anymore, I guess...