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Post by bloodchoke on Apr 22, 2014 0:11:58 GMT
In the first addition AD&D Dungeon Master's Guide, there was a list of inspirational and informational readings for DMs in the back of the book. Known as Appendix N, it is a list of essential readings compiled by Gary Gygax, including fantasy as well as real world info. It is available for free here: www.wizards.com/dnd/Article.aspx?x=dnd/4dnd/Appendix/NSince we've been discussing sharing game resources and inspiration, I thought it might be cool to start our own Appendix N, via a series of thematic threads. This particular thread will be dedicated to underground structures, from dungeons to caves. Often RPG dungeons seem to just kinda exist for the sake of it, without much explanation for why a sprawling underground labyrinth was built in the first place (beyond just, "dwarves built it a long time ago."). Obviously that's not always the case, but it does get difficult to justify all the dungeons our PCs generally pass through. Anyway, I have made three separate posts, one each for dungeons, catacombs and caves. Please help me expand them by posting more links as replies, and then I can add the links to the correct post. I've only included videos so far, but any media is welcome. First off, here is DM Johnny's thoughts on making dungeons and realism that kinda sparked my own thoughts. And btw, his channel is a gold mine of useful DM tips. Really good content and original ideas. I also need to acknowledge Grognard Games, who's Game Resources/Appendix N videos gave me the idea for this thread. He has a lot of good content on his channel, especially if you're into OD&D. www.youtube.com/user/GrognardGames
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Post by bloodchoke on Apr 22, 2014 0:13:57 GMT
DUNGEONS There is at least one historical reference for huge, undergroud cities created with ancient technology; the underground city at Derinkuyu, Turkey. There used to be a longer documentary on youtube I think, but I can't find it now, so take the ancient aliens stuff how you will. ttps://wwwh.youtube.com/watch?v=0qe4LGepivQ
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Post by bloodchoke on Apr 22, 2014 0:15:42 GMT
CATACOMBS The Paris Catacombs is sort of a given.
Here's some footage that is said to be from a camera found inside the Catacombs. Likely a prank, I would guess, but good inspiration anyway. I think sometimes we forget just how creepy it would be to find yourself wandering around an underground labyrinth, particularly one filled with corpses.
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Post by bloodchoke on Apr 22, 2014 0:19:28 GMT
CAVES
This cave is incredible, and apparently the largest in the world. Coolest part is that there are sections which have collapsed, dropping dirt and plant material down into the cave, creating underground forests, essentially. They even changed from evergreen to deciduous (or maybe vice versa) to adapt.
And the Crystal Cave. So much you could do with this for a game. . .
Here's a short video on how caves are formed. Just found this with a search, so there may be better videos out there.
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Post by beetlewing on Apr 22, 2014 3:35:30 GMT
You really hit the nail on the head with this post. 2 things have always bothered me about dungeons: - Their original purpose - the who/why/function - How creepy it'd actually be.
When I was young, we visited a cavern in Colorado. In the cavern was a pit that at the time (mid '80's) they still didn't know the depth of. Supposedly, in the 1800's, two guys running from the law hid out in the cave, and were never heard from again. At the mouth of the pit was a rope tied around a stalagmite and an old lantern... the kicker was that the rope only hung down into the (apparently) bottomless pit about 4-5 feet, with a frayed end. Kind of chilling to see in person, but to any players hearing that from a DM, it's no big deal.
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Post by bloodchoke on Apr 22, 2014 6:29:10 GMT
There's an underground sea in a cave in Tennessee I visited as a kid. It's called the Lost Sea, and I think may be the biggest underground body of salt water known. It was found by a young kid playing in some caves, or at least they told us it was, so I was terrified by the idea that I could have stumbled in there myself. Even with lights (which they turned off!) and tour guides, it was still pretty creepy in there.
But like you said, it's hard to make that sound scary to a player, especially considering what kind of enemies they know they're likely to face anyway. The underlying problem is probably just that immersion is pretty difficult to achieve at that level. I've been trying to find ways to describe as many of the 5 senses as possible, particularly smell, since it tends to trigger memories, but I don't really know that it works.
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Post by DMScotty on Apr 22, 2014 6:33:08 GMT
Cool thread.
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Post by thedmg on Apr 22, 2014 9:03:48 GMT
Dungeons are like dragons, literary and mythological devices. Although there are real dungeons, or prisons, located underground, they do not really exist in the way depicted in DnD, nor on that scale. Essentially the dungeon is a great story device which allows for gradiated levels of play.
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Post by ashrothedm on Apr 22, 2014 13:14:42 GMT
I've been to the lost sea in TN, and I can say that being in the dark anywhere on the surface of the earth is nothing like being in the utter black of a cavern with no light. The absolute helplessness and vulnerability is enough to instill dread into any bold adventurer. It is creepy, but impossible to convey to a person who has never seen pitch black before. It's very difficult to describe, but picturing black, and then realizing that the color you see is just a dark gray, sort of gives a new appreciation for what darkness truly is. What I like to do to create a labyrinth or an almost 1980s megadungeon, is to take something with purpose, like a dungeon or town, where everything has a purpose, and then collapse chunks of it, making something with a logical shape and accessibility suddenly transform into a labyrinth of twisting corridors and broken chambers. Taking a large area that was originally built above ground, and then burying it (real world examples: Pompeii, Ozette Indian village) gives a little bit of credibility to the massive underground complex. Sand, mud, ice, and water are just some natural substances that have buried cities. Ancient cities are buried and excavated to this day. My point here, is just that there are reasons for large complexes to be underground other than "they built it underground." If something were built underground, it actually gives more credibility to the illogical and unnatural paths that buildings and hallways take. Builders would take the path of least resistance, squaring up random cavern chambers and corridors. There is a reason that castles are built in irregular, and never duplicated shapes. The earth is difficult to move. Once the structure is there, years or centuries after being buried, the new denizens would retrofit the chambers for those strange things like torture or whatever. Building a structure would be strange for that purpose, but with crazy evil cultists running about, maybe a dungeon devoted to torture is not that out of place. In any case, once you have the foundation for building the thing, there is really no limit to explain why things are currently the way that they are in there. I like my dungeons to make sense. The adventuring group jokes about the massive numbers of crates, chests, and barrels that I put into my dungeons, but sometimes, that;s the only logical way for a large group of humanoids to survive in a strange place like a dungeon. I tend to follow this process: - What do I want them to encounter?
- Where is the thing at?
- How did this place get here?
- Why did the thing choose this place?
- How did the thing get in here?
- When did it get in here?
- How does the thing live in here?
Generally, I try to answer all of those basic questions, because I know that the group will question why things are the way that they are. Being able to answer those questions, for me at least, makes a dungeon much more engaging than saying "There is a giant chamber because you are going to fight a giant golem tonight, that's why." I prefer to have reasons, and throughout the dungeon, hint at the dangers ahead. I also try to clue them in on every ability that a challenging monster may have, like leaving lifelike statues in a medusa's lair. It adds credibility to the dungeon and the dungeon ecosystem.
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Post by dragon722 on Apr 22, 2014 14:23:22 GMT
I've been to the lost sea in TN, and I can say that being in the dark anywhere on the surface of the earth is nothing like being in the utter black of a cavern with no light. The absolute helplessness and vulnerability is enough to instill dread into any bold adventurer. It is creepy, but impossible to convey to a person who has never seen pitch black before. It's very difficult to describe, but picturing black, and then realizing that the color you see is just a dark gray, sort of gives a new appreciation for what darkness truly is. What I like to do to create a labyrinth or an almost 1980s megadungeon, is to take something with purpose, like a dungeon or town, where everything has a purpose, and then collapse chunks of it, making something with a logical shape and accessibility suddenly transform into a labyrinth of twisting corridors and broken chambers. Taking a large area that was originally built above ground, and then burying it (real world examples: Pompeii, Ozette Indian village) gives a little bit of credibility to the massive underground complex. Sand, mud, ice, and water are just some natural substances that have buried cities. Ancient cities are buried and excavated to this day. My point here, is just that there are reasons for large complexes to be underground other than "they built it underground." If something were built underground, it actually gives more credibility to the illogical and unnatural paths that buildings and hallways take. Builders would take the path of least resistance, squaring up random cavern chambers and corridors. There is a reason that castles are built in irregular, and never duplicated shapes. The earth is difficult to move. Once the structure is there, years or centuries after being buried, the new denizens would retrofit the chambers for those strange things like torture or whatever. Building a structure would be strange for that purpose, but with crazy evil cultists running about, maybe a dungeon devoted to torture is not that out of place. In any case, once you have the foundation for building the thing, there is really no limit to explain why things are currently the way that they are in there. I like my dungeons to make sense. The adventuring group jokes about the massive numbers of crates, chests, and barrels that I put into my dungeons, but sometimes, that;s the only logical way for a large group of humanoids to survive in a strange place like a dungeon. I tend to follow this process: - What do I want them to encounter?
- Where is the thing at?
- How did this place get here?
- Why did the thing choose this place?
- How did the thing get in here?
- When did it get in here?
- How does the thing live in here?
Generally, I try to answer all of those basic questions, because I know that the group will question why things are the way that they are. Being able to answer those questions, for me at least, makes a dungeon much more engaging than saying "There is a giant chamber because you are going to fight a giant golem tonight, that's why." I prefer to have reasons, and throughout the dungeon, hint at the dangers ahead. I also try to clue them in on every ability that a challenging monster may have, like leaving lifelike statues in a medusa's lair. It adds credibility to the dungeon and the dungeon ecosystem. I agree with u on this whole heartedly. I lovemaking the background history of the reason for the build/map. Thanks for putting it into words...
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Post by bloodchoke on Apr 22, 2014 17:11:12 GMT
Excellent post, Ashrothedm, thank you!
I like the point you bring up about surviving/living in a dungeon. This again is something I think can be overlooked. If humanoids live there, they have to have some access to food, whatever it is, and water. Food could include vegetation that grows underground, like mushrooms or something like seaweed. Biologists are still discovering strange life in places they never thought could sustain it, so in a fantasy world, an underground garden really wouldn't be that far fetched. You could even include an underground forest like that in the Vietnam cave.
Good idea about submerged cities too. Never thought of that, but they could make awesome adventure locations. I think such a place would be really cool if the players needed to find an ancient artifact, or discover what happened to a group of people. By one of the happy accidents of history, tragic events like the eruption of Vesuvius often preserve historical artifacts that would be long lost otherwise. An example is the scrolls of Hurculaneum, which were preserved by the ash of Vesuvius much longer than they would have otherwise. Clay tablets also survive by luck in a lot of cases. When ancient cities were sacked and burned, the fires would bake the clay tablets, turning them to hard stone that much outlasts paper and parchment.
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Post by tauster on Apr 22, 2014 17:30:13 GMT
There's an underground sea in a cave in Tennessee I visited as a kid. It's called the Lost Sea, and I think may be the biggest underground body of salt water known. It was found by a young kid playing in some caves, or at least they told us it was, so I was terrified by the idea that I could have stumbled in there myself. Even with lights (which they turned off!) and tour guides, it was still pretty creepy in there. But like you said, it's hard to make that sound scary to a player, especially considering what kind of enemies they know they're likely to face anyway. The underlying problem is probably just that immersion is pretty difficult to achieve at that level. I've been trying to find ways to describe as many of the 5 senses as possible, particularly smell, since it tends to trigger memories, but I don't really know that it works. I think the following is so obvious that actually I feel a bit stupid to mention it at all - I guess every GM worth his dice knows this... But still I forget this rule from time to time myself, so mybe it's worth mentioning it again. If you want to scare your players (not only in underground settings, but anywhere), one of the best methods is to limit the flow of information: You are the DM - you are their sole way of getting information. Metagaming aside, they can't know anything you did not decribe or mention. So simply don't tell them how large the cave is, just mention that their light sources illuminate their immediate surroundings - but fail to reach any walls. Throw in a comment that they have probably several miles of solid rock above them and that such a huge cavern should long since have collapsed... If they find tracks in the lightless tunnels of a cave or dungeon, don't simply tell them which creature probably caused it. Describe the tracks as vaguely as possible and let them speculate. Of course you have to give them something, or you'll quickly frustrate any ranger, druid or other PC with tracking skills. But never give them anything that is safe knowledge beyond any doubt. Or if you do, lead them regularly on the wrong track - they will soon get suspicious whenever you become too generous with knowledge! The same with monsters: Don't simply tell them that a tribe of troglodytes is attackig them from an ambush - describe the whisteling of the darts shot from blowguns by enemies hiding somewhere beyond the party's light source. Enemies who communicate with inhuman voices - and then suddenly a horrible stench starts to fill the dank air... Are they poisoning the characters?!? This is the classic rule of every good horror movie: You don't show the monster in bright light. You might see a quick glimpse of something running between the trees or through a door/window, or you see a distorted reflection, but the monster won't stand still and give you a good look at it.
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Post by gnomezrule on Apr 22, 2014 22:42:35 GMT
The biggest thing I noted about real world "dungeons" is the size and scale. I have a few years of Biblical Archaeology Review magazine as well as I started looking at the tombs in Egypt and so on. What struck me was its only one or two rooms and they are kinda small. Even large sites were often not one big complex but many small complexes in close proximity. Like many tombs in the valley of the dead in Egypt they are in the same valley but they are not interconnected.
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Post by kokigami on Apr 23, 2014 6:07:16 GMT
I've been to the lost sea in TN, and I can say that being in the dark anywhere on the surface of the earth is nothing like being in the utter black of a cavern with no light. The absolute helplessness and vulnerability is enough to instill dread into any bold adventurer. It is creepy, but impossible to convey to a person who has never seen pitch black before. It's very difficult to describe, but picturing black, and then realizing that the color you see is just a dark gray, sort of gives a new appreciation for what darkness truly is. What I like to do to create a labyrinth or an almost 1980s megadungeon, is to take something with purpose, like a dungeon or town, where everything has a purpose, and then collapse chunks of it, making something with a logical shape and accessibility suddenly transform into a labyrinth of twisting corridors and broken chambers. Taking a large area that was originally built above ground, and then burying it (real world examples: Pompeii, Ozette Indian village) gives a little bit of credibility to the massive underground complex. Sand, mud, ice, and water are just some natural substances that have buried cities. Ancient cities are buried and excavated to this day. My point here, is just that there are reasons for large complexes to be underground other than "they built it underground." If something were built underground, it actually gives more credibility to the illogical and unnatural paths that buildings and hallways take. Builders would take the path of least resistance, squaring up random cavern chambers and corridors. There is a reason that castles are built in irregular, and never duplicated shapes. The earth is difficult to move. Once the structure is there, years or centuries after being buried, the new denizens would retrofit the chambers for those strange things like torture or whatever. Building a structure would be strange for that purpose, but with crazy evil cultists running about, maybe a dungeon devoted to torture is not that out of place. In any case, once you have the foundation for building the thing, there is really no limit to explain why things are currently the way that they are in there. I like my dungeons to make sense. The adventuring group jokes about the massive numbers of crates, chests, and barrels that I put into my dungeons, but sometimes, that;s the only logical way for a large group of humanoids to survive in a strange place like a dungeon. I tend to follow this process: - What do I want them to encounter?
- Where is the thing at?
- How did this place get here?
- Why did the thing choose this place?
- How did the thing get in here?
- When did it get in here?
- How does the thing live in here?
Generally, I try to answer all of those basic questions, because I know that the group will question why things are the way that they are. Being able to answer those questions, for me at least, makes a dungeon much more engaging than saying "There is a giant chamber because you are going to fight a giant golem tonight, that's why." I prefer to have reasons, and throughout the dungeon, hint at the dangers ahead. I also try to clue them in on every ability that a challenging monster may have, like leaving lifelike statues in a medusa's lair. It adds credibility to the dungeon and the dungeon ecosystem. The world I tend to run, Tekumel, used this concept to justify the undergrounds or Tsuurum (that spelling is wrong.. I don't have my books handy and haven't found a ref on the web.) In the culture of the known world, it is standard practice to raise cities every few hundred years and rebuild them from the (often new) ground up. Tearing down parts, but often just burying structures whole. It serves both practical and religious purposes (creates work programs, depletes surplus population, pleases the Gods of Change.. etc). But the traditional and conservative people of the world also tend to want to hold on to their time honored places. So temples, clans and sometimes political groups will start surreptitiously excavating their old holy places, homes, and meeting houses to continue use. The world is very hot, as well, and much of the summer is spent in the first sub basement to escape the daytime sun. As a result, the "dungeons" are a somewhat lawless extension of the well ordered society above ground. And, they are moderately populated, with ongoing renovation, territorial disputes and adventuring. If you travel down deep enough you can find layers that were built by the ancients, and places that have become nexus points for interplanar travel, form times when either magic, or technology was more powerful and more dangerous. It is a pretty cool world for all that. But, ultimately, what one needs form dungeons is simply internal consistency for the world. In my old gritty realist D&D games dungeons were small, and cramped, mostly. I avoided using magic to power anything, because magic was too precious to waste on traps, or lava fields or such. But for a world where magic is basically common technology, hiring in wizards to plumb your dungeon for lava probably isn't that big a deal. As long as it has a consistency that gives the players a sense that all the parts make a whole.. it is working.
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