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Most classic modules were dungeoncrawls of some sorts, and there are a number of mega dungeons on the market these days, but I don't know if that's just because they are easy to write in a publishable form or not. I'm curious what the state of things are now.

More often than not I find myself running some sort of Dungeon Crawl, whether it's a premade module or something I made myself. I also like to have a central dungeon the players can go to and from in-between adventures, sort of like Caed Nua in Pillars of Eternity.

I find they're easier to run, and with the dungeon procedures in a lot of rules sets it's got a lot of support. That being said, I also run a fair share of overland adventures too.

I do periodically run dungeon crawls.  Often, I run them as technical games where resource management and time keeping are done very strictly.  In many ways, it's almost a board game. 

Every time I run one, I get more people trying to play than I can accommodate.  There's a real market for dungeon crawl games out there.

I do run dungeon crawls sometimes between running other sorts of adventures.  I'm not as big on megadungeons these days though. 

Most of the time I run games that have dungeons to explore. But I use a really broad meaning of dungeon like "mysterious indoor structure" or something.

I think the big appeal of dungeons is the "press your luck" aspect. The shape of the place means that the further you go the harder it is to escape. You can't just run off in any direction to escape. This is also embodied by the push-pull between possible treasure and resources like torches and food. You want to explore one more room, but your stocks are running low, but what if the next room has all the gold?

So any place that has that sort of dynamic, I would call a dungeon.

Quote from: 1stLevelWizard on December 27, 2023, 10:38:10 AM
and with the dungeon procedures in a lot of rules sets it's got a lot of support.

That's part of the reason for my question. I might have missed them but I don't think 5E has any dungeon crawl rules. Are dungeoncrawls an OSR relic or is it that folks don't feel they need codified rules for exploring a dungeon?

Quote from: Ruprecht on December 27, 2023, 11:07:13 AM

Quote from: 1stLevelWizard on December 27, 2023, 10:38:10 AM
and with the dungeon procedures in a lot of rules sets it's got a lot of support.

That's part of the reason for my question. I might have missed them but I don't think 5E has any dungeon crawl rules. Are dungeoncrawls an OSR relic or is it that folks don't feel they need codified rules for exploring a dungeon?

I use a set of homebrew rules but they are heavily based on early D&D rules.  If you have OSE you have most of what I use in the book.

I run something that resembles a dungeon crawl maybe 40% of the time.  More than occasionally, but it's not the predominant thing.  Also, I have a lot of stuff that is in kind of a gray area, where a small lair or two has elements of a dungeon crawl, but that's not the whole adventure.  I'm not wild about mega-dungeons except when learning a new system.

Quote from: Ruprecht on December 27, 2023, 11:07:13 AM

Quote from: 1stLevelWizard on December 27, 2023, 10:38:10 AM
and with the dungeon procedures in a lot of rules sets it's got a lot of support.

That's part of the reason for my question. I might have missed them but I don't think 5E has any dungeon crawl rules. Are dungeoncrawls an OSR relic or is it that folks don't feel they need codified rules for exploring a dungeon?

Well, I think a lot of that stuff was handwaved over time and so a lot of the written rules were removed or slimmed. OSR games are really good for dungeoncrawls since they have a lot of built in support for them, but when you compare it to something like 5e or even 3e, they just didn't have that playstyle it mind it seems.

I should say too that when I say dungeon procedures, I mean stuff like definite rules for torches, time keeping, resource management, wandering monsters, etc. All stuff meant to test the players, drain their resources, and, as rytrasmi said, test their luck. With later editions you have a lot of built in systems that remove a lot of those dungeon crawl elements so I think as a result dungeoncrawls see a lot more play in older systems.

Quote from: Ruprecht on December 27, 2023, 11:07:13 AM

Quote from: 1stLevelWizard on December 27, 2023, 10:38:10 AM
and with the dungeon procedures in a lot of rules sets it's got a lot of support.

That's part of the reason for my question. I might have missed them but I don't think 5E has any dungeon crawl rules. Are dungeoncrawls an OSR relic or is it that folks don't feel they need codified rules for exploring a dungeon?

I would actually assert the opposite. 5E doesn't have any non-dungeoncrawl rules (effectively).  I know, I know, you can find some basic travel rules in a few adventures or expansion books.  But if you look at the basic rules conceits in the main books, 5E almost exclusively focuses on the kinds of rules adjudications that are most likely to occur in dungeon crawling.  Most combats are assumed to be indoors (look at the illustrations and examples of play, facing, movement, optional rules, etc.).  Many of the normal dungeon-themed spells are retained.  Mounted combat is an afterthought (at best... I've tried to play a mounted knight in several of WotC's published adventures), the rules for it are vague, and it's not balanced or realistic (which you'd want one or the other, at least).  In fact, if you look at many of the earliest criticisms of the game, many people complained that the exploration portion of the game was undercooked (and class abilities didn't help with travel and exploration, but counterfeited them entirely), and that the game was much harder to run as a hexcrawl than as a dungeoncrawl.  Now, I have no idea what has been added post-Tasha's (because I'm not buying anything new from them), but those were legitimate critisicms up until I stopped playing.  I think a better case can be made that dungeoncrawls are the unspoken default of 5E (but just as vague as most of the non-combat rules in that edition...).

I started with dungeoncrawls, graduated to "serious gaming," but now am back to dungeoncrawls because that's where the actual fun is. The game part, not the amateur theatre hour nonsense that seems to have pushed RPGs into a realm of pure wankery. I prefer pretending to be Conan when he's going into the Tower of the Elephant or a forbidden city, not sitting on a throne dealing with political matters; I get enough of that crap in real life.

Quote from: Eirikrautha on December 27, 2023, 11:42:44 AM

Quote from: Ruprecht on December 27, 2023, 11:07:13 AM
That's part of the reason for my question. I might have missed them but I don't think 5E has any dungeon crawl rules. Are dungeoncrawls an OSR relic or is it that folks don't feel they need codified rules for exploring a dungeon?

I would actually assert the opposite. 5E doesn't have any non-dungeoncrawl rules (effectively).  I know, I know, you can find some basic travel rules in a few adventures or expansion books.  But if you look at the basic rules conceits in the main books, 5E almost exclusively focuses on the kinds of rules adjudications that are most likely to occur in dungeon crawling.  Most combats are assumed to be indoors (look at the illustrations and examples of play, facing, movement, optional rules, etc.). Many of the normal dungeon-themed spells are retained.

I'd agree with this. I've done more dungeon-crawl in 5E than I have since my AD&D days in the 80s and early 90s.

We used some of the published modules early in 5E, which were pretty bad. I later used a mix of classic modules updated to 5E in my dragon apocalypse game, and some one-shots. In my current campaign, I'm mostly using my own dungeon designs - they're relatively small and can be explored in a single session - but they're strongly themed. So maybe 2/3rds of my adventures have featured a dungeon, but often there is also some action outside the dungeon besides the dungeon crawl. So, say, the initial adventure was a murder mystery - but following the clues lead the players to a small Nazca-themed dungeon.

I'm not sure what dungeon-specific rules are that Ruprecht is thinking of. I haven't felt the need for anything that I can think of from earlier editions for dungeons.

Quote from: jhkim on December 27, 2023, 12:34:41 PM
I'm not sure what dungeon-specific rules are that Ruprecht is thinking of. I haven't felt the need for anything that I can think of from earlier editions for dungeons.

How far you can move/search per turn. How rest is required 10 minutes out of every hour, how often to check for random encounters while in a dungeon, that sort of thing. The concept of a quick rest could be impossible in a dungeon depending upon the frequency of random encounter checks.

Also  it seems random encounter tables based on dungeon level disappeared when CR showed up, at least I don't think I ever found them in the core three books or the SRD.

Quote from: Eirikrautha on December 27, 2023, 11:42:44 AM

Quote from: Ruprecht on December 27, 2023, 11:07:13 AM

Quote from: 1stLevelWizard on December 27, 2023, 10:38:10 AM
and with the dungeon procedures in a lot of rules sets it's got a lot of support.

That's part of the reason for my question. I might have missed them but I don't think 5E has any dungeon crawl rules. Are dungeoncrawls an OSR relic or is it that folks don't feel they need codified rules for exploring a dungeon?

I would actually assert the opposite. 5E doesn't have any non-dungeoncrawl rules (effectively).  I know, I know, you can find some basic travel rules in a few adventures or expansion books.  But if you look at the basic rules conceits in the main books, 5E almost exclusively focuses on the kinds of rules adjudications that are most likely to occur in dungeon crawling.  Most combats are assumed to be indoors (look at the illustrations and examples of play, facing, movement, optional rules, etc.).  Many of the normal dungeon-themed spells are retained.  Mounted combat is an afterthought (at best... I've tried to play a mounted knight in several of WotC's published adventures), the rules for it are vague, and it's not balanced or realistic (which you'd want one or the other, at least).  In fact, if you look at many of the earliest criticisms of the game, many people complained that the exploration portion of the game was undercooked (and class abilities didn't help with travel and exploration, but counterfeited them entirely), and that the game was much harder to run as a hexcrawl than as a dungeoncrawl.  Now, I have no idea what has been added post-Tasha's (because I'm not buying anything new from them), but those were legitimate critisicms up until I stopped playing.  I think a better case can be made that dungeoncrawls are the unspoken default of 5E (but just as vague as most of the non-combat rules in that edition...).

Well and with what you mentioned, you could port in exploration rules from the older editions fairly easily. Rules for overland movement per day, etc wouldn't take too much to implement.

Sadly a lot of my experience with 5e came from playing in games where much of that stuff was handwaved and I never bought the books since I played 3e a lot at the time. Now that you mentioned it though, 3e does have a lot of dungeon stuff too. I guess it comes down to how you tackle the dungeon.

I prefer "dungeon crawling" - whether its in a fantasy labyrinth, Victorian haunted house, abandoned military base, or alien space station - to any other form of RPG gaming.

Quote from: Ruprecht on December 27, 2023, 12:42:04 PM

Quote from: jhkim on December 27, 2023, 12:34:41 PM
I'm not sure what dungeon-specific rules are that Ruprecht is thinking of. I haven't felt the need for anything that I can think of from earlier editions for dungeons.

How far you can move/search per turn. How rest is required 10 minutes out of every hour, how often to check for random encounters while in a dungeon, that sort of thing. The concept of a quick rest could be impossible in a dungeon depending upon the frequency of random encounter checks.

Also  it seems random encounter tables based on dungeon level disappeared when CR showed up, at least I don't think I ever found them in the core three books or the SRD.

In 5E, random encounter tables aren't part of the core rules. They are common in adventures, though not fully standard. An adventure will typically have a random encounter table for a large dangerous area. There are four random encounter tables among the eight chapters of The Shattered Obelisk, for example.

Especially with a smaller dungeon, wandering monsters can be awkward as a mechanic. It makes sense for some of the creatures to move around - but if so, then they'll be eliminated from their usual haunt. Some wandering monster tables specify this, but many have monsters come from a seemingly infinite population - which is more appropriate for a wide-open area like the Underdark or a megadungeon.

Almost every hook I offer my players is some sort of dungeon crawl.

They create plenty of their own adventurers in-between biting hooks, or on their way to one.

In D&D, most of the time. In fact my last campaign I advertised as primarily a dungeon crawl, but we still did some overland, and the players did still start picking goals of their own after they had some levels under their belts.

In L5R and Traveller I went through a phase of deliberately avoiding dungeon crawls to force myself to come up with other adventures. That was worth doing for the exercise, but in hindsight I was also taking some game appropriate sessions off the table. Consider a deserted asteroid research station in Traveller for instance. Effectively a small dungeon, but - so what? Room by room with flashlights for a slow burn with maybe a combat or two, that's actually very sci fi. So I'm starting to add those back in.

Quote from: Ruprecht on December 27, 2023, 12:42:04 PM
Also  it seems random encounter tables based on dungeon level disappeared when CR showed up, at least I don't think I ever found them in the core three books or the SRD.

I don't know about the SRD but they are in the DMG.

Quote from: jhkim on December 27, 2023, 02:44:52 PM
In 5E, random encounter tables aren't part of the core rules.

Yes they are.  They are in the DMG which is one of the core books.  They are also in every published campaign. 

Overland Adventures and Dungeoncrawling, are my favorite gaming sessions.

Quote from: yosemitemike on December 27, 2023, 10:13:51 PM

Quote from: jhkim on December 27, 2023, 02:44:52 PM
In 5E, random encounter tables aren't part of the core rules.

Yes they are.  They are in the DMG which is one of the core books.  They are also in every published campaign.

Sorry. I should clarify. In the 5E DMG, there are rules and advice for DMs making up their own encounter tables and one sample encounter table, but there aren't a large set of premade encounter tables like there are in the AD&D1 DMG - where it has dozens of tables for wilderness, dungeons, and cities. Interestingly, 2E doesn't have premade encounter tables in the DMG, but 3E does have premade dungeon encounter tables in the DMG.

Quote from: jhkim on December 28, 2023, 12:11:00 AM

Quote from: yosemitemike on December 27, 2023, 10:13:51 PM

Quote from: jhkim on December 27, 2023, 02:44:52 PM
In 5E, random encounter tables aren't part of the core rules.

Yes they are.  They are in the DMG which is one of the core books.  They are also in every published campaign.

Sorry. I should clarify. In the 5E DMG, there are rules and advice for DMs making up their own encounter tables and one sample encounter table, but there aren't a large set of premade encounter tables like there are in the AD&D1 DMG - where it has dozens of tables for wilderness, dungeons, and cities. Interestingly, 2E doesn't have premade encounter tables in the DMG, but 3E does have premade dungeon encounter tables in the DMG.

That reminds me, the 2e book did introduce me to a really interesting system for random encounters. Basically it said that if you rolled a 1d12 and a 1d8, you'd have a statistical plateau where 9-13 are all the highest probability and have the same odds of being rolled. Then 2 and 20 are really low, so you'd make your common encounters the 9-13 slots, while rare stuff would be 2 or 20, etc. That blew my mind when I read that, and I still use it to this day.

Not sure how I would answer that question. I've not yet run a megadungeon, though I do tend to include a fair few dungeon-like environments in my games. The thing is that I tend to prefer those environments to be relatively smaller (no more than two levels on average), and I try to design them as real places first, and dungeons second. That tends to mean the actual crawling rules fall by the wayside.

Maybe this has something to do with the way I run games, but I find that a lot of the standard rules of dungeon crawling (exploration turns, wandering monsters, even torch duration to an extent) stop making sense unless either the players are exploring a very large complex, or you've stuffed every room with traps and encounters. The latter case strains my sense of credulity. Hard to imagine the old idea of an ogre not just living in a single room, but also co-existing with the gorgon next door. Even a large structure like a ruined castle, if populated sensibly, could realistically be explored in an hour or two.

So maybe my answer would be "dungeon: yes; crawling: no"

As an aside, I do agree with others that most versions of D&D play best in a dungeon/hex-crawling style. The resource/attrition based elements are so core to the design of the game that even all the changes made over the years by both TSR and WOTC haven't erased them. Not saying you can't run other types of game with it --I've done it-- but it does seem to be the way you get the best performance out of the system.

To me in 5e what you're getting is a nerfed illusion of dungeon crawling because of all the lame ass video game mechanics they've added like short & long rests, various cantrips and the like.  I find it hilarious when people who have only played 5e try to tell me how important "resource management" is.  Then I'll explain how 1e does HP recovery, spells, death , etc. and their jaws drop.  Really to me the only reason to play any old school mega-dungeon in 5e is because you want to replicate the "Gauntlet" video game experience.  Wizard needs food!

I usually include one or more dungeons as things the PCs may need to traverse on the way to accomplishing their goals, but they are almost never the focus or a campaign