My Odd Relationship with Megadungeons

Big dungeons are a major part of D&D - it's in the name of the game "DUNGEONS & Dragons". The earliest games were Dave Arneson encouraging the first player characters to explore the ruins of Castle Blackmoor, and Gary Gygax likewise had Castle Greyhawk. I'm sure those more knowledgeable than me about the early days at Lake Geneva could expound further. These were the foundations on which this mighty hobby was built. Even today 50 years later old-school grognards yearn for the eventual publication of Gygax's original Castle Greyhawk. MAR Barker had his underworlds beneath the ancient cities of Tekumel and Ed Greenwood gave us Undermountain below the city of Waterdeep. And with the rise of firstly the OGL (Open Game License) and then the OSR (Old School Revival) many other creators have offered their megadungeon creations. 

Here I should make a distinction between megadungeons and regular-sized dungeons. The generally accepted definition of a megadungeon is one that forms the backbone of a campaign - the PCs are not expected to properly clear it out but return to it time and time again, exploring a bit further and a bit deeper with each expedition and each experience level gained. Other dungeons are typically visited only once, and if the dungeon is of modest size the PCs may well investigate all the rooms and kill all the hostile inhabitants.  But megadungeons have similarities to wilderness environments - they are big and expansive enough that the dungeon as a whole can never be completely explored or cleared of monsters. 

Regular readers of this blog will notice that in the posts where I detail a dungeon with actual monsters, traps and treasure, they are not megadungeons. This is partly because of the nature of a blog - I don't think detailing a megadungeon level with hundreds of encounter areas is really feasible for a blog that I hope to post on each fortnight. But it is also indicative of my own motivation and focus - I enjoy creating dungeons but only in fairly short bursts. As such moderate sized dungeons of around 20 encounter areas suit me better. Beyond 30 encounters I will start getting bored, tired and running out of ideas - others might not be impressed with my lack of focus but that's just how my mind works (or fails to work after a while). The three tags for this blog that illustrate this are:

• Dungeon of the Month (from way back over 10 years ago!)
• Scenarios (when I restarted this blog 2 years ago, not all of which are conventional dungeons)
• Logos Locations (my prefered format at the moment, using the work of Dyson Logos)

However, I still like the idea of a megadungeon. There is still both a sense of nostalgia, treading in the footsteps of the founders of this hobby along dark and winding passages (prodding with a 10' pole regularly) and also a sense of exploration and wonder. Although some DMs and authors want their dungeons to have verisimilitude and to make sense at least within the fantasy game world, others view dungeons as free from that constraining logic - hence the "funhouse" dungeon where anything can be encountered as long as it is challenging and entertaining. The idea of the dungeon being a form of Mythic Underworld, connected to but not quite part of the "normal" campaign world on the surface, is an idea that has been discussed and expounded on various forums and social media platforms. Another concept that could apply to both smaller dungeons and megadungeons is the idea of dungeons as infestations, which I sometimes use. 

My compromise between my short attention span and my sense of wonder of megadungeons has emerged as blog posts that talk about various megadungeons in broad overview but not detailing specific encounters. Basically there are megadungeons in my Mystara campaign, but I'm not going to go through them room by room. Off the top of my head, the ones I have posted about so far in this iteration of the blog are:

• Goblins of Zugguth Peak
• The City of Madness: Capital of the Arvorians (although other Arvorian cities are hinted at, this one has a map of the surface ruins)
• The Abandoned Palace of Al'Jaboorzi
• Derothgar, the Fortress of the Damned
• The Disappeared Fort of Tandallos (although this could be a regular-sized dungeon that has only been outlined)
• The Ruins of Allaktos
• Tarrag Duun - the Lost Dwarven Fortress

Enthusiastic DMs are more than welcome to have a go at mapping and detailing these for use in actual adventures. 

Another compromise that so far has not been published on the blog is the idea of dungeon sections like geomorphs that can be linked up to form a larger map. Since each section only holds a certain number of rooms and encounter areas, detailing it seems less overwhelming than staring at a map with 200 or more rooms (Ed Greenwood's Undermountain maps from the 2E boxed set spring to mind). Here are some dungeon sections from an aborted attempt to completely redo Quasqeton. I didn't get far with it (I detailed the rooms for the first two sections) but the concept of dungeon sections is still valid. 

One thing I am aware of is that player attitudes towards dungeons can vary. Systematically exploring an underground dungeon for treasure and magic items is a very nerdy, slightly obsessive, activity.  Kill the monster, search for treasure, move on to the next encouter (checking for traps and secret doors all the time). Although there is verbal interaction between party members, they generally only interact with the DM's world by combat and puzzle-solving. And I think this is one of the reasons why I have kept the fully mapped and keyed dungeons here relatively short; because I don't know what players might think about megadungeons, which aren't to everybody's taste. Maybe they are properly old-school, happiest when kicking down dungeon doors and fighting the orcs guarding that chest. But I have also encountered enough players to know that some enjoy banter with townsfolk, finding out about local politics and perhaps getting involved in schemes and business ventures. For them everything should be in moderation, including dungeons. And even though a party could leave a megadungeon for an above-ground adventure, there may be players who quietly roll their eyes at being directed back to the same dungeon when there is an entire fantasy world to explore. 

Of course I'm not going to lay down any rules (and you would quite rightly ignore them if I did). But I hope that enough readers share elements of my viewpoint that you will continue to follow this blog and would be interested to hear your views on megadungeons in the comments below.