One inevitability large portion of most Blades of Exile scenarios is that of the dungeons. In a good scenario, dungeons can not only add strength to the arch of the scenario, they can, in many cases, be the sole reason that particular scenario is any good. On the other, poorly designed dungeons can cause an otherwise fair scenario to be considered far below par.
Some general rules to help better dungeon design:
- Make them original!
No one needs yet another fort filled with bandits, where nothing interesting is going on. If you have a cave full of goblins, make them somehow interesting, or unique. Burned To The Ground does this well — introducing an enslaved society of Kobolds within the Goblin cave, which will turn on their Goblin Masters midway into the dungeon. Or look at Farmhands Save The Day!! for another excellent example of how to make a standard dungeon complement interesting and original.
- Keep the dungeon above the Mendoza line.
I have a rule of thumb when designing dungeons — there must be at least two interesting encounters/events per dungeon level, or else I scrap the entire thing. A dungeon filled with little else but hordes upon hordes of creatures, even interesting ones, and their loot, soon becomes nothing more than a monotonous hack & slash fest. Make sure there are at least two interesting events or encounters per level to break this monotony. These can range from an interesting attack by the dungeon’s denizens — see for example the Hobgoblin ambush in The Caverns of Stylbore Mountains — to an interesting dialogue with some friendly creature within the dungeon — a prisoner for example — to an interesting puzzle. Two is the minimum, I advise aiming higher, but making sure no levels ever fall below that line.
- Make sure it’s justified.
For me, this is one of the most common and frustrating errors by scenario designers. They look at the capabilities of the editor, and figure out some nifty teleporter, lever, or conveyer belt puzzle, without ever figuring out why it would ever be there. I’m not an idealist, I realize that in many cases dungeons need to be created first, and justified second, but I do believe the justification must come before a dungeon can be considered of truly high quality. There are many egregious violations of this, some even occurring in otherwise excellent scenarios. The Tower of Nado in Rubacus has about a half dozen illogic puzzles, the teleporter maze in Aftershocks is pointless, and even Tatterdemalion breaches this concept on at least two occasions (the Lich’s tower and the Troglodyte Caverns). There *must* be a reason for everything in a dungeon, even if it’s an after the fact reason. A poor, forced explanation is still relatively better than no explanation at all. A final note — if you can’t come up with a logical reason for a given trap/puzzle, consider an illogical justification. Mischievous Faeries, Lunatic Mages are two of my favorites. Or consider the Dream Dungeon in Requelle’s Nightmare. The twisted dream logic explains away any inconsistencies, allowing logic problems to get out of the way of what becomes the gold standard for dungeon design.
- Remember, more is not necessarily better.
One of the reasons that everyone but Bob Sushi hates the Demon Island/Doom Moon design is that the dungeons get so repetitive, so boring, and so mind numbingly tedious, so quickly. The concepts themselves are well done. But the constant “What am I thinking?” puzzles, endless combat, and traps devoid of all logic turn off many BOErs.
Finally, I’ve found this principal can actually help me when I run into design block. Rather than sitting around idly daydreaming up some new trap, I think about the dungeon level itself. It exists prior to the party going into it, so what’s occurring there? Maybe there’s a squabble between the creatures themselves. Maybe they’re planning some new maneuver. Whatever they have been doing, represent it within the dungeon. It adds life and detail, and can often help you brainstorm up new ideas.
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