Quote from: Black VulmeaSo many 'novel' settings fall apart when the players actually try to interact with them because the writer or referee is so busy patting herself on the back at being 'different' she forgot she was playing a game.

This is a really good point, and might be an important reason as to why original dungeons are rare.  Designing and running traditional dungeons is pretty easy. It's hard to screw up designing a standard tomb complex, for example, and it's not very challenging creatively to think one up, map it, stock it with traps and monsters, and come up with a reason for the PCs to go there.  The groundwork has already been laid, it's all been done a million times before, and it's easy to find examples and templates for that kind of thing.

Designing something new on the other hand, and original and compelling and unique, is much more demanding on the DM.  Not only do you have to think outside the box in coming up with a unique concept, that concept has to be feasible and runnable in-game.  Some creators, as you point out, are going to nail the first and fall down at the second pretty quickly.

Ironically for a game of imagination, there's a lot of creative laziness out there.

Quote from: Shipyard Locked;756451The tree is important. The tree is suddenly ailing and could die. The interior of the tree is barely explored and poorly understood. It is unclear what exactly is weakening the tree, and simply going in there and killing or damaging anything you find wily-nily could do more harm than good. It is known that many of the living things inside the tree are benevolent but difficult to understand. The players will need to investigate this alien world to figure out how it works and pinpoint the source(s) of the problem.

Quote from: Shipyard Locked;756451At some point, to do so they will need to learn how to access deeper areas that do not currently have any passages into them, but they can't simply dig into the tree's flesh without training. They will need to communicate with the native burrowers who know what to chew through and what to leave alone. Trouble is, the party are speaking humanoids and the burrowers are clicking insects. Just imagine the undignified pantomime that could ensue.

Quote from: Steerpike;756468Designing something new on the other hand, and original and compelling and unique, is much more demanding on the DM.  Not only do you have to think outside the box in coming up with a unique concept, that concept has to be feasible and runnable in-game.  Some creators, as you point out, are going to nail the first and fall down at the second pretty quickly.

Ironically for a game of imagination, there's a lot of creative laziness out there.

Oh, is it pretentious wanker season again, already?

Give me a fucking break.

I thought I was agreeing with you...?

Your point seemed to be that making a novel dungeon actually gameable and playable was hard to do, and that most who attempted it failed due to their own laziness - getting wrapped up in their concept and not taking the time or thought to translate it into an actual thing to be used in a game.

I agreed, and suggested that this was probably why novel dungeons were rare and traditional dungeons predominate - most people aren't sufficiently creative or thoughtful to make a novel dungeon actually work in a game, they get stuck at the level of concept and assume that's enough.  So we're stuck with either an endless prade of traditional dungeons (many of them awesome, but as a whole rather homogenous - and, after a certain point, a bit redundant) or attempts to make "novel" dungeons that just don't work because they fail at the level of execution, execution generally being easier in tried-and-true dungeons.

Man, no way to win with you...

"What adventurers DO with it?" is a subtly challenging question, as differing tables give wildly different results. It's asking why they should care, and that's about as easy to herd as cats. Basically it is asking if you know your players' interests enough to engage them.

I have trouble with organizing PCs into taking a hook, so I develop more hooks, especially wherever the PCs go. That said, it can kill a lot of prep, so at some point I just go in for the ask, "what are you planning to do next session (or which hook interests you most)?" ADVENTURE! as a descriptor only goes so far.

(edit: As an example, I as a player am more likely to engage the gossipy servants and seal up the dungeon than 'seek glory and honor!' So general appeals to "do what adventurers do!" is to me about as stale advice as asking me to drink cod liver oil for health and fun. However, a location is only as interesting by how much it engages its environment. It either has a relevant footprint to PCs/players, or not.)

As for the Big Tree with Alien Sentience Living Inside high concept, it has the problem of being an elaborate subject noun phrase without the verb or object part to give it momentum. If something is too alien at some point it is easier to ignore such things until a more opportune, or poignant, time to visit. Basically try to answer the "what's it doing?" and "why should I care?" aspect of the rococo peacock of a noun phrase — with extra points for brevity.

Quote from: Black Vulmea;756486[Smug image responses]

Hmm, nah, I don't buy your negativity here. You don't have to try and "win" this thread you know. Unless you have specific criticism for me to consider I still think that basic premise would do fine with my current player base and most potential players too, especially ones who grew up on Zelda and Final Fantasy.

Your previous posts were genuinely useful, thought-provoking challenges. Could we go back to that approach?

Quote from: Opaopajr(edit: As an example, I as a player am more likely to engage the gossipy servants and seal up the dungeon than 'seek glory and honor!' So general appeals to "do what adventurers do!" is to me about as stale advice as asking me to drink cod liver oil for health and fun. However, a location is only as interesting by how much it engages its environment. It either has a relevant footprint to PCs/players, or not.)

As for the Big Tree with Alien Sentience Living Inside high concept, it has the problem of being an elaborate subject noun phrase without the verb or object part to give it momentum. If something is too alien at some point it is easier to ignore such things until a more opportune, or poignant, time to visit. Basically try to answer the "what's it doing?" and "why should I care?" aspect of the rococo peacock of a noun phrase — with extra points for brevity.

Now this is a legit comment. While I have a player base that for the most part finds heroism, exploration, and experimentation to be motivation enough, it certainly wouldn't hurt to throw in a more material/mechanical hook in there for the more reticent types.

How about this: The tree is an entity strongly associated with life magic, and it has been known to naturally produce magic items within itself that have to do with life: Fruit that can resurrect, amber that can be crafted into armor of regeneration, etc. Of course these substances are rare, but if you explore the tree enough you're bound to find a few samples.

Quote from: Shipyard Locked;756522Hmm, nah, I don't buy your negativity here. You don't have to try and "win" this thread you know. Unless you have specific criticism for me to consider I still think that basic premise would do fine with my current player base and most potential players too, especially ones who grew up on Zelda and Final Fantasy. .

If we look into the matter we may discover that when he isn't posting BV is really just a Rocky montage training for the next thread win. I wouldn't take it too personally, BV dishes that out to all of us, and that wasn't his A game. It could have been much more smug.

Quote from: Shipyard Locked;756522How about this: The tree is an entity strongly associated with life magic, and it has been known to naturally produce magic items within itself that have to do with life: Fruit that can resurrect, amber that can be crafted into armor of regeneration, etc. Of course these substances are rare, but if you explore the tree enough you're bound to find a few samples.

A lure of greater goodies is a solid start. It's passable to me in a "go-getter" party. Would normally bore me to tears individually. But rpgs are shared social events as much as anything, we compromise often.

The problem with your first attempt was it was based in a Star Trek "explore and preserve everything!" mentality. Which can work for some groups, but requires active players, and who are on the same motivation page. Sadly so many fantasy campaigns do not start on that same motivation (and how many would get off the ground of those that do, I wonder); the base assumption is heroics and loot, or whatever the fuck Adventure! is being defined nowadays.

So your endangered and essentially closed system, as the bugs don't really interact with others, was an exercise in the exotic for exotic sake. It was a quest to preserve the obscure through linguistic challenge, specialized terrain travel, etc. Again, awesome sauce for the right audience, but assume your audience is nowhere near the ballpark in wanting to game the equivalent of oblique, cinema vérité with subtitles.

Holy cow is it impossible for me to disagree with the premise of this thread more.  "Unique" dungeons are a bitch to integrate into a mileu, often typified by awkward DM shoehorning.

You want to know what the hobby needs more of?

Generic manor house.
Generic tower.
Generic castle.
Generic longhouse.
Generic guildhouse.
Etc., etc.

Give me some generic examples of places where people actually live and work, and I will use the shit out of it.  And end the silly hole in the ground.  Make buildings.  People live in buildings, not holes in the ground.

But generic examples don't exist.  I have many castle adventures.  But they all have their unique twist.  I do not have a single castle to use as an example of what one might find inhabited by a Furyondian lord.

Quote from: Opaopajr;756534The problem with your first attempt was it was based in a Star Trek "explore and preserve everything!" mentality. Which can work for some groups, but requires active players, and who are on the same motivation page. Sadly so many fantasy campaigns do not start on that same motivation (and how many would get off the ground of those that do, I wonder); the base assumption is heroics and loot, or whatever the fuck Adventure! is being defined nowadays.

So your endangered and essentially closed system, as the bugs don't really interact with others, was an exercise in the exotic for exotic sake. It was a quest to preserve the obscure through linguistic challenge, specialized terrain travel, etc. Again, awesome sauce for the right audience, but assume your audience is nowhere near the ballpark in wanting to game the equivalent of oblique, cinema vérité with subtitles.

Fair. I guess I'm not interested in primarily running or playing stuff in a tabletop RPG that video or board games can provide more efficiently. If all the players want is monsters and loot in a sequence of generic rooms they can go do Diablo III (which I'm currently playing for exactly that).

To brainstorm a bunch of reasons why a giant tree might be a good place to actually adventure in:

(1) The Tree is actually the fortress of a megalomaniacal druid who is animating the forest to reclaim the deforested lands of men.  Groves of murderous trees have butchered farmers and woodsmen dwelling near the edges of the wood, and slowly the forest is moving, travelling towads the towns and cities.  Drinking the blood of sacrifices through its monstrous roots, its branches impaled with the bodies of wood-cutters and hunters, its bark caked with gore, the Tree is a kind of living stronghold from which the druid conducts his vile rituals.  The PCs are charged with stopping the druid's rampage for a reward.  There may also be captive NPCs held in the Tree, soon-to-be sacrificed.  As for treasure, the Druid is said to possess a powerful staff and other objects of power that aid him in his rites.  The dungeon is unique insofar as the druid is in full control of it - the sap, the roots, the branches.  He often uses Warp Wood to move around, so the interior isn't laid out in a strict room-and-passages model and often requires the PCs to hack their way through walls, which in turn angers the Tree.  Parasites, dominated animals, crazed nature-worshipping cultists, and druidic traps riddle the Tree.  Most of it is very dark - there are no torches, since there is no proper ventillation and the whole place is dangerously flammable, though the Druid may teleport to burning areas to Create Water or otherwise extinguish flames.  Simply infiltrating the tree is one of the hardest parts - its at the center of an army of awakened, angry trees.  The party might have to fly in somehow, or transform themselves into woodland beasts, or pose as cultists.

(2) The Tree is home to a family of evil Dryads.  They've been seducing local menfolk and bringing them to their Tree to serve as slaves, bedmates, and playthings.  The party encounters villages outside the forest consisting entirely of women - the only males are young boys and wizened old men.  All of the other men have been Charmed and forced to serve their Dryadic mistresses.  The PCs could attempt to kill the Dryads, or somehow strike a deal with them to return the men, or try to rescue the men some other way.  The catch?  The "monsters" in the tree, apart from various fey, animals, and the Dryads themselves, are Charmed male villagers, who for obvious reasons the PCs will be reluctant to kill.  Additionally, the Dryads can move around the Tree simply by walking into the walls and melding with it, reappearing wherever they please.  Their spies (birds, beasts) infest the woods, potentially warning them of the PCs' coming.

(3) The Tree is the abode of a tribe of ravenous squirrel-folk.  Its interior consists mostly of vertical passages, requiring the PCs to climb up and down them rather than walking through them.  Usually the squirrel-folk are peaceful, but recently their food stores are running dangerously low, and they've begun stealing food from every human farm and household in the area.  Without their own stores, those dwelling in such places will starve during the long winter.  The PCs must trek through the snowy woods to the Tree and then somehow reclaim the stores.  Its a heist more than a traditional crawl, and the "treasure" consists of nuts, grains, and other stores rather than gold or jewels - although the suirrel-folk are also known to hoard other trinkets, and their shamans possess certain relics that may also be valuable.  Things are complicated further by the nest of tamed dire ravens the squirrel-folk keep in the upper branches that assist them in their thievery and help defend the Tree from attack.

I think any of these would prove reall unique, novel experiences in an environment very different from a more traditional dungeon, with challenges unique to the setting and an unusual, organic structure, very veritcal and non-linear.  Fire spells would be enormously dangerous to use inside the Tree (in the latter 2 possibilities, burning the Tree would destroy the stores or kill the enslaved villagers, so it'd be a very bad idea).

The Gazetteer: Elves of Alfheim pretty much provides a city in the trees. So all these convolutions and contortions are a bit much. There already is a fantasy racial trope that provides a need for big ass trees to live in.

The druid angle is also pretty useful, as that is an accepted trope and readily portable to individual campaigns.

But Old One Eye is right, there really is a lack of generic usable, but interesting, foundational locales. The challenge is keeping the general shape but adding small accents. This way it is memorable, yet easily modified to repurpose.

Quote from: Old One Eye;756546Holy cow is it impossible for me to disagree with the premise of this thread more.  "Unique" dungeons are a bitch to integrate into a mileu, often typified by awkward DM shoehorning.

You want to know what the hobby needs more of?

Generic manor house.
Generic tower.
Generic castle.
Generic longhouse.
Generic guildhouse.
Etc., etc.

Give me some generic examples of places where people actually live and work, and I will use the shit out of it.  And end the silly hole in the ground.  Make buildings.  People live in buildings, not holes in the ground.

But generic examples don't exist.  I have many castle adventures.  But they all have their unique twist.  I do not have a single castle to use as an example of what one might find inhabited by a Furyondian lord.

Check out the Crooked Staff Productions website. There are plenty of free PDFs of maps of generic homes, manor homes, city buildings, and fortifications to use in your games.

Quote from: jeff37923;756591Check out the Crooked Staff Productions website. There are plenty of free PDFs of maps of generic homes, manor homes, city buildings, and fortifications to use in your games.

That is an excellent resource.  Thank you.  Probably going to get some game time in my future.

Know of anywhere that takes this as a starting point and fleshes it out with typical D&D style inhabitants?

Quote from: OpaopajrSo all these convolutions and contortions are a bit much. There already is a fantasy racial trope that provides a need for big ass trees to live in.

Trying to understand your point here, but I'm a little confused.  Are you saying that because Elves live in trees they're the only race that gets to get used in relation to trees?  It seems that the whole point of the thread here is to imagine ways to move away from the usual fantasy tropes that've already been thoroughly explored (and sometimes done to death), like the elven tree-city, and imagine alternatives.

Apologies in advance if I'm misunderstanding.

Quote from: Old One Eye;756593That is an excellent resource.  Thank you.  Probably going to get some game time in my future.

Know of anywhere that takes this as a starting point and fleshes it out with typical D&D style inhabitants?

Yes. Several of the PDFs are set up in just that manner on the website. However, most do not. You just have to dig through them.