Dungeon Corner #3
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If this first month of looking at Dungeon magazine has taught me anything it’s that even though I knew this was going to be a big undertaking, I’d actually underestimated exactly how much work it is if I want to look at these issues in any meaningful depth. And that’s fine – it’s not putting me off doing it, and I’m going to continue with it for as long as I’m able. But I’m definitely going to experiment with the format in these early issues and figure out the best way to make this work. I also haven’t quite figured out what I want to get out of this project beyond finding some cool things in these adventures, but I think that will come with time as I work through the issues. Thanks for bearing with me!
Today we’re wrapping up issue 1 by looking at the final adventure from this inaugural issue, Carl Smith’s Guardians of The Tomb. This is described as “a silent forest, a lonely shrine, and no survivors” which sounds very cool. Carl Smith was part of the Dragonlance design team for TSR and worked on an AD&D Lankhmar adventure (CA1 Swords of the Undercity), so I expect that this adventure will feel the closest to an “official” module out of all the work in this issue.
As with The Elven Home, this is designed to be dropped into an ongoing game while the characters are travelling. Designed for 2-6 characters of 3rd-5th level, this sees the group stumble across an abandoned shrine to a forgotten thief who may or may not be the avatar of an evil thievery god. The area is overgrown and abandoned but, curiously, there is no wildlife in the area at all.
The entrance to the dungeon itself is located on a small island in a shallow marsh. I don’t know what it is about this sort of setting but it really appeals to me and I love seeing it. Maybe it’s because I grew up playing in the woods and stumbled across lots of weird old structures in exactly this sort of setting, so it evokes a very specific sort of nostalgia for me, but whatever the reason this is one of my favourite ways to present a location for players to stumble across.
Something I’m always interested in is how early D&D adventures handled what we now think of as skill checks before skills were codified. We see modules asking players to roll under their attributes very early in the life of the game – I think Judges Guild were doing this as early as 1975, and there’s an article by Katherine Kerr in an issue of Dragon magazine (I can’t remember the issue number, unfortunately) that gives a method for turning ability scores into percentage chances. It’s not uncommon for individual modules to offer unique ways of doing things for that specific module, though, and this one is no different. Here we see a system wherein “any character [can] roll a percentile score equal to his intelligence, expressed as a percentage” in order to sense that the party is possibly being watched. This is basically “roll under, but on percentile dice” and I really like how simple it is.
Characters can find a slippery walkway of submerged stones under the swamp that leads to the entrance, and we’re given various ways for them to slip and fall into the water. One interesting thing comes in the way it deals with flying or levitating characters:
Anyone attempting to fly or levitate across the lake discovers unexpected turbulence. Warm air over the lake contacts the cooler air from the surrounding woods, causing sudden drafts. The chances of turbulence disturbing a flight over the lake is 75% on warm days only.
Characters find that maintaining flight (by animal, spell, or device) is difficult but not impossible (flight speed slowed by 1” per 6” normal speed, so flight at 12” becomes 10”). However, those levitating across may find themselves at the mercy of the winds, even being pushed into trees at the lake’s edge or into the shrine itself (causing 1-4 hp damage per round) — or down into the lake’s razorweed.
I think this is interesting to contrast with the way scrying is dealt with in Into The Fire. There the magic is simply negated entirely, and I said in my writeup of that adventure that I really hate when modules completely nerf a character ability. Here we’re still fiddling with the way in which characters are able to use their abilities, but in a way that tells us something about the area we’re exploring rather than simply saying “no, that doesn’t work”. This is the sort of thing I really like to see, because it’s signalling to players that things are weird here without making them feel useless. It’s also much more memorable than “that time we got told we couldn’t scry”.
The razorweed at the bottom of the swamp is also doing some interesting things design-wise, dealing damage that varies based on the height of the creatures who fall into it. Here’s how it works:
Anyone falling or walking into a patch of razorweed suffers immediate slashing damage from the hundreds of bladelike leaves on the plant. This damage varies with the size and surface area of the victim. Human-shaped beings take 1d4 hp damage if they are 3’ or less in height; for every foot of height over 3’, an extra 1d4 hp damage is taken. Four-legged beings take 2d4 hp damage if 3’ high or less at the shoulders, and an extra 2d4 hp damage for every 1’ over that height.
I don’t think I’ve ever seen this sort of thing before, and I think I love it. Height is usually only meaningful when it comes to the physical dimensions of the dungeon, and I love a natural hazard that says “you’re bigger, so you’re in contact with more of it, therefore you take more damage”.
The rest of the dungeon itself is a little underwhelming, being one big trap. The shrine is a single room filled with warnings not to steal from it, and if players ignore those warnings it seals itself shut for a full day. At night an army of shadows – two for each PC, plus 1d12 more of them – attacks anybody inside the shrine. This is basically a TPK machine that punishes players for looting it. I love the setup and the location but I can’t say I’m particularly fond of this execution, and I wish there was a little more here – maybe a larger dungeon complex beneath the shrine that the shadow assault forces players into in order to escape, or something of that nature. Still, as a weird location to drop into your world that players might stumble upon this is pretty cool, especially if you run a high consequence “fuck around and find out” style game. It’s certainly true that all the warning signs are there that this isn’t a place to fool around with, so maybe the potential TPK is entirely earned if players are daft enough to ignore all of said warnings.
Overall this issue is largely forgettable, but I don’t think that’s surprising really. Much like how I’m not yet sure what these posts are, exactly, this first issue feels like Dungeon trying to find its feet in a lot of ways. There’s definitely some cool stuff in here – the sentient sword with separation anxiety from Into The Fire is my personal favourite, and I think with a bit of work Guardians of The Tomb could be turned into something really great, too. If it’s done nothing else, this issue has highlighted some things I really love about D&D and has made me want to write dungeons again, which is nice.
Now that I’ve worked through the first issue and you’ve read these posts, I’d love to hear from you about what you’d like to get out of this series as it continues. I’m happy to be very self indulgent and just follow my own interests here, but if there’s a specific angle you’d like me to look at these from please do let me know!
