Re: Basic D&D or T&T with random dungeons

Posted by MortiS-the-Lost on Aug 07, 2012; 2:03pm
URL: http://the-lost-and-the-damned.71.s1.nabble.com/Basic-D-D-or-T-T-with-random-dungeons-tp7578416p7578424.html

Billiam Babble wrote

Do players find tables a bit too much of a fuss?

Yes

…


Ok I should really write more than that.

Random dungeon generation is a key factor to many games and a welcome addition to many others. Like it or not it always has it's uses at some level from solo-play to helping a GM come up with an adventure.

What I'm going to do now is ramble on about the 2 main distinct uses of random dungeon generation: In-game and Pre-game generation.

In-game generation is normally seen in solo-play or GM-less games so that the players never know what's coming and some times it's used in the same way in GM ran games. Most dungeon generation methods are like what you have posted above, a AHQ style series of tables (called matrices in AHQ for reasons I won't pretend to fully understand) and they work well on paper but not so well once they hit the table …
The trouble is this; depending on the complexity and number of the tables in the generation system the game will stop dead for a minute or more each time a new door is opened while you roll to see what's on the other side.

Another problem with the dice and table based method is being able to set-up what you've generated on the table top. If you're using a dry-erase battle-matt or just paper and pencil you can draw out pretty much anything the generator throws at you with little to no problems besides those of your artistic skills. However if you're using set of pre-made tiles no matter how flexible the set is you will eventually either run out of pieces or come across something your tile set simply cannot cope with. Even if the dungeon generator is designed carefully with the tile set your using in mind this sort of thing can still happen, in AHQ you'll often find yourself trying to decide between re-rolling in the hopes of getting something you haven’t run out of yet or pulling apart another section of the dungeon to get the tiles you need (not to mention what to do when the dungeon expands it's way awkwardly off the table edge and you have no space to move it into). And a 3rd way of coping with this problem that wouldn't recommend is stopping to print off the extra tiles you need!

Then there's the matter of where the dungeon ends – not only do you have the problem of a dice and table based dungeon being potentially infinite in size, but you've also got nothing to stop the objective room turning up right next to the entrance or at least the dungeon turning out to be shorter or much longer than expected. A dungeon generated randomly like this is rarely a logical one in it's layout and execution especially if you've got room with distinct features - how many Throne Rooms or Prisons dose one dungeon need? and why are they all next to each other while the Kitchen and Eating Hall are on opposite sides of the dungeon at the ends of winding trapped filled corridors?
The easy way out of this is to make most rooms empty and generic, but the end result of that is boring dungeon. It's like having a book that randomly rearranges its chapters with every read - every chapter would have the characters doing fuck all, because it wouldn't make sense otherwise, meaning you loose out on any plot (maybe this is how Twilight was written?)

These problems all stem from one factor – the table and dice method is too random but also too ridged, because dice have no memory of what they rolled and can't be stopped from rolling something you've run out of or don't want.

So what's the alternative?  For In-game generation I heavily favour the card based systems like that used for WHQ.
Firstly having a designated card for each dungeon tile (or in the case of Wrath of Ashardalon and CaStlE RaVenLoFt the tiles are the cards) means you never have to worry about running of pieces during a game, if you've run out of 4x8 rooms or 2x10 corridor pieces the cards for those pieces will have run out too and the generator will not generate any more of them.
Also the card based generator is very easy to customise and expand – if you've made yourself a new dungeon tile for the set, just make a new card to go with it and shuffle it into the deck, on the same note if your exploring a dungeon that is unlikely to have a certain type of room or feature (an undead crypt complex manned by skeletons is unlikely to have a kitchen and that lost temple out in the desert probably won't feature an ice-cave) then you can just take out the cards you don't want to use for that adventure. There is no way of doing this with a dice and table based system without having to re-write the tables.
The main factor with the card based system is speed, draw the card, put down the tile – the only thing that might slow you down is finding the tile, but of course in Wrath of Ashardalon and the like the tile is the card so this never happens.

A card based system also allows you to control the number of rooms/sections in the dungeon by simply including the desired number of cards in the deck you use for that session – want a short adventure, use less cards and vice-verser if you want a longer dungeon. By making sure the objective room card is shuffled into the deck near the bottom you can also prevent the adventurers completing their quest right at the beginning of the dungeon.

The method used in Wrath of Ashardalon has it's own downfall however – the tiles all have to be the same shape and size which limits flexibility greatly. While this is not such a problem in the more abstract dungeon games which use the same method – such as Dungeon Quest and Labyrinth – in a 1” square = 5ft environment with multiple squares making up each tile – such as Wrath of Ashardalon and CaStlE RaVenLoFt – it restricts the size of room and what sort of features you can put inside them – while having sections with no walls on some edges or no walls at all so they can flow strait into other tiles goes some way toward creating larger spaces it also creates a random mishmash of illogically placed walls and open spaces more often than not – you're unlikely to randomly layout a grand pillared hall.
But all random generation methods suffer from this to some degree or another – as I said before a random dungeon is rarely a logical one.

While I have used in-game random generation a lot in the past I find a pre-mapped adventure much more preferable, especially as a GM. Random generation still has it's place in pre-mapped adventures though – and that's where we come to Pre-generated random dungeons.

When writing an adventure I will often use a randomly generated dungeon as a starting point. Any of the above methods work just fine. The length of time needed for the table and dice generation method is of course much less of an issue when you haven’t got your players sitting round the table waiting to see what's going to be in the next room while you flick through endless pages of tables and make roll after roll.
You also have the luxury of looking at the end result of the random generation and swapping round and/or taking out any illogically placed rooms before putting the dungeon into play.