Why do D&D players/DMs/writers still think that the concept of D&D-style dungeons is believable?
It's so fucking contrived it's ridiculous.
You've got a bunch of monsters and stronghold defenders spreading themselves throughout a complex, but they're not going to investigate any weird noises or raise alarms, oh no, they'll just sit tight in their rooms while adventurers systematically fight room after room. Organized defense forces are for chumps, am I right?
There are traps everywhere in a dungeon for some god forsaken reason. Lots of them are magical too. Instead of paying for high-tech/magical doors and locks, and alarms to help organize the defense forces, let's get our engineering department to design elaborate deathtraps instead!
There's treasure spread around in nooks and crannies. I mean, who needs a treasury or a vault when you can leave gold and magic items lying around in corners, eh?
The only reasons dungeons still have traction are because it's easy mode for DMs running tightly contained adventures, everyone's been Stockholmed into the genre convention, and the name of the game has "dungeons" in it.
>That Slime cutie nibbling on a sword while all of this is happening.
Tyler Perry
"Not satisfied with starting edition and general wars, OP decides to continue to suck more cock to produce more shitty bait."
Nathaniel Kelly
I tend to shy away from traditional dungeons unless they are undead creatures, I also rarely use traps although when I do I make them easily bypassable by the inhabitants, they are meant as fortification aids rather than "lol u fell in a pit and now there are 9 chainsaws in your face". Also if characters make too much noise killing something, other things show up.
Charles Butler
I think your being petty and mean about it but I essentially agree. The only way a dungeon crawl could be conceived as realistic is if you solid snake style stealthed in room by room. Fortresses and lairs are meant ot be death traps for assailants, not the occupants
Henry Sanders
A "dungeon" is any building. Headquarters. >but they're not going to investigate any weird noises or raise alarms, oh no, they'll just sit tight in their rooms while adventurers systematically fight room after room. Organized defense forces are for chumps, am I right? Your DM sucks. Taking enemies down quickly and quietly is highly desirable, letting them raise the alarm and rally a defense usually makes everything more difficult. >There are traps everywhere in a dungeon for some god forsaken reason. Lots of them are magical too. Instead of paying for high-tech/magical doors and locks, and alarms to help organize the defense forces, let's get our engineering department to design elaborate deathtraps instead! Regarding D&D alone, traps are intended for ancient fortifications or the master base of someone who desires a magnificent defense and fully expects invaders in their estate, such as a Lich or Vampire. Otherwise, they should generally be found only near the entrance (say, for bandits) or are the result of a trap-making race (e.g. kobolds, drow). You're not gonna find a trap in the bathroom of a centaur. Also, nearly every door is usually locked in dungeons, which is why a rogue or a caster with Knock are recommended traveling partners. Arcane Lock is an easy spell. >There's treasure spread around in nooks and crannies. I mean, who needs a treasury or a vault when you can leave gold and magic items lying around in corners, eh? You keep everything valuable in your bank, mate? You don't have a statuette or jewelry just hanging around? First aid kit in the closet? In logical dungeon design you're not going to get a 900GP diamond sitting in a hallway, anyway. You're going to find it in the master room, which of course is past the actual master foe.
Hudson Morris
I've played enough dwarf fortress to know when some singular idiot is in charge of everything this is exactly how things end up.
Josiah Rodriguez
>Why do you still use dungeons in your game?
Because me and my group enjoy them. Besides, they work for certain types of games.
Jaxson Myers
My dungeons have patrolling guards which horns to alert others, large treasuries, and traps that only activate if you don't know they're there. Your GM just sucks.
Nathaniel Long
>believable
And this is where you missed the point
James Adams
>You've got a bunch of monsters and stronghold defenders spreading themselves throughout a complex, but they're not going to investigate any weird noises or raise alarms, oh no, they'll just sit tight in their rooms while adventurers systematically fight room after room. Have you tried playing with a DM who's not retarded?
Adrian Perry
In the sense you've put it, as tomb raids. Otherwise we don't do "dungeons". If the party sneaks into the fortress, they better be sneaky or else they'll be killing their way in.
Ryder Perry
this.
Here is how to play D&D >Stick to alignment, at ANY AND ALL TIMES Yes, this means if you pick LE you must have a mustache and you MUST twirl it.
Lincoln Thomas
It's almost like warlocks, demons, dragons and elder gods are autists on a power trip instead of a council of engineers designing the best defense force for a castle.
Dominic Bell
>Why do D&D players/DMs/writers still think that the concept of D&D-style dungeons is believable?
Hahaha, what? Nobody thinks that you stupid fuck. I'm not even mad at you, I'm just curious how you become so completely divorced from the thought patterns of actual people outside yourself that your own utterly untested pre-conceived conclusions about random shit becomes "absolute fact" to you.
It's not supposed to be realistic. It's supposed to be a GAME, dumbass.
Alexander Peterson
It's something you see all too often on Veeky Forums. People completely incapable of divorcing something from the ideas of realism/authenticity, trying to explain everything within the rules and structures of the real world rather than accepting that a fantasy world can operate on a completely different set of rules, making things that would otherwise seem ludicrous to us entirely appropriate in the context.
Jeremiah Reyes
>not playing a setting where dungeons are created by bored gods to watch adventurers fight through
Leo Edwards
Everything you are saying that dungeons lack do appear in many games and premade adventures. I don't know what the fuck you are going on about.
Evan Davis
I don't run or play that kind of game, they generally fell out of favor around 1985 or sooner. Unfortunately, video games and worthless DMs keep the concept alive. WoW is a perfect example.
Isaac Garcia
>Not playing a setting where archwizards build elaborate gameshow dungeons and televise all the adventurers dying horribly.
Ayden Hall
>Why do D&D players/DMs/writers still think that the concept of D&D-style dungeons is believable? >D&D >believable
Nathan Barnes
I straight up had my players in a setting where Dungeons periodically fall, burning, out of the sky mounted on enormous, town sized drilling rigs which submerge them under the earth and kick up enough dirt and rock to create cave systems on top that lead into them.
Also, the motive for adventurers delving was that the state wants to prevent magical weapons from being used to arm rebels against the state and terrorists so they pay a bounty for absolutely emptying the place. They don't give a fuck that these things disgorge armies of skeletons into the surrounding countryside, that's for the guardsmen to deal with.
Adrian Martinez
The dungeon is was usually not meant to be inhabited, and was not built by the creatures inhabiting it. Usually it's a tomb or vault of other non-residence, trapped to keep intruders out but not actually meant to be staffed, long abandoned, forgotten, and re-inhabited by monsters who just happened along.
Adrian Roberts
>What is the entire "cursed tomb" trope.
Jason Mitchell
I kinda want to do that now. I can see some real potential.
>run x setting >have players see weird screens that show different worlds/planes >drop hints throughout the story arc >at the end kill the "BBEG" >then fade to black >they wake up in a futuristic world where people bet their lives in super realistic virtual reality vidya game
Andrew Russell
I've only run a handful of old D&D modules and it seems like a lot of the ones people call the best involve patrols, using your brain, non-random layouts, and secret doors being more important than traps. Like the Village of Hommlet where you spend time with the village of NPCs, hex crawl to the fortress, and find an asshole behind layers of security hiding in the basement.
Or Ravenloft where Strahd literally is expected to come out of hiding and have a laugh at you wandering the castle more than once before you fight him.
Christopher Moore
personally I'm a fan of the concept of Dungeons being living things, the OSR game The Nightmares Underneath illustrates it quite well, as does some other stuff like this article I like;
No one thinks they're believable, but D&D isn't about realism. It's an escapist fantasy. If you wanted to play a game without dungeons, you wouldn't play D&D. And any decent adventure should have some of the monsters try and run to get help if the PCs don't kill them first, so they don't just sit and wait to die.
Julian Allen
World of Warcraft "dungeons" have nothing to do with true, old-school dungeons.
In my setting most dungeons are literally tombs housing wealth and the dead as offerings to the God of Death. Traps are there because you don't want adventurers stealing the Gods offerings ( wonder why undead are suddenly everywhere? He's pissed off ) and because the dead trespassers is a kind of offering itself.
Josiah Wilson
What's the most realistic dungeon in an RPG?
Caleb Johnson
Tomb of Horrors, because it's literally designed as a deathtrap for adventurers and for no other reason.
Wyatt Ward
Because it was never meant to be believeable or logical it was meant to be a contrived way to get adventure Just listen to the name, Dungeons and Dragons. "Adventure Below and Adventure Above".
Benjamin Rogers
Why are wankers still complaining about dungeons? After 40 years you'd think they'd give it a rest.
John Myers
>they're not going to investigate any weird noises or raise alarms >There's treasure spread around in nooks and crannies. I mean, who needs a treasury or a vault when you can leave gold and magic items lying around in corners, eh Your strawman is bad and you should feel bad. If you're actually as retarded as you're pretending to be then I'm sorry.
Jace Cook
>but they're not going to investigate any weird noises or raise alarms, oh no, If you forget you're phone in China and ask a cop to call the ambulance for you, they'll tell you to fuck off.
Ryan Myers
It's the DM's fault if the enemies act like retard bots.
