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| this map is not accurate, but you could use it if you want to |
So we've been playing Arduin using a custom system that I'll release when it's a little more done. Ah, heck, you can
view it now if you want. We tried out Caliban because it's one of Uncle Davey's famous dungeons, but the thing about Caliban is it really only has keyed rooms described. And it's huge. That's a lot of space that the DM should find a way to make interesting. Any hints, Dave? Well, yes, he made very gonzo rooms descriptions for the actual keyed areas. It would be real obvious that these rooms have treasure if you didn't expand on the "empty" rooms everywhere else, so take Hargravian descriptions and table-ify them! Don't forget to scour Arduin grimoires and All The World's Monsters for wandering beasts to help obfuscate those treasure guardians' purpose.
Obviously, lots of the ideas for these tables came from reading Arduin dungeons. I can't separate Jeff Rient's DNA from this (I don't know if he actually added his own stuff into
his tables, which I consulted).
Each room has a base structure. There is a 1d4th chance that they have some sort of of extra material paneled on, specked in, scratched in, etc. Consult the Other Features table below the first for that.
Base Composition (usually just the walls) [d12]:
- Igneous rock: 1) basalt, 2) granite, 3) foidolite, 4) obsidian, 5) porphyry, 6) tachylyte, 7) living stone (tough, but can bleed), 8) carved into statuary, which can be pushed to open secret doors.
- Sedimentary rock: 1) sandstone, 2) limestone, 3) shale, 4) dolomite, 5) silt-stone, 6) fossils, 7) coal, 8) stardust-silt.
- A prismatic wall or walls: 1) half-way from the PCs' entrance, 2) making a tunnel, 3) bisecting the area vertically from a height of 1d6 feet, 4) running perpendicular or parallel to another prismatic wall, 5) filling the room as a mist or sparkly motes, 6) that forms a few rounds after a PC has entered the space, 7) in front of each exit, including secret ones, 8) making a maze.
- Meteoric rocks: 1) stacked, 2) built into stonework and radioactive, 3) in a crater this room was built around, 4) as flagstones that may glow.
- Stonework: 1) dry stone, 2) mortared, 3) simulated by cutting into natural rock, 4) relief-carvings, 5) stacked as to conceal any secret doors 6) just stacked, 7) flagstones that conceal a pit or secret tunnel .
- Earthen works (prone to cave-ins if ill-built or damaged enough).
- Metal (may be burnished or rusted): 1) brass, 2) copper, 3) iron, 4) bronze, 5) tin.
- Jade: 1) blood-red, 2) green, 3) random color.
- Crystals (random color): 1) giant, 2) 1cm nodules, 3) tiny and sparkly, 4) thick and flat enough to act as transparent panels.
- Chalcedony (random color of): 1) agate, 2) aventurine, 3) carnelian, 4) chrysoprase, 5) heliotrope, 6) moss agate, 7) chrome, 8) onyx.
- Futuristic material: 1) plastic (random color, might give off weird gas if burnt), 2) carbon fiber, 3) tension sheets, 4) pykrete, 5) circuit boards, 6) asbestos, 7) red tape.
- Void: 1) cosmic (if you jump too high, you will float away), 2) darkness left over from the before times, 3) a bottomless pit lies beyond the confines of the floor.
Other Features [d20]:
- Paneling: 1)Cherry-wood 2), amber, 3) mirrors, 4) wrought metal, 5) pine, 6) plaster.
- Arrases, Tapestries, or Hanging scroll-paintings: 1) pastoral, 2) apocalyptic, 3) demons, 4) götterdämmerung, 5) creation myth, 6) dungeon history, 7) dungeon clue, 8) faded beyond recognition.
- Bones on floor or embedded in walls: 1) elves, 2) men, 3) demihumans, 4) monsters, 5) animals, 6) cryptids.
- Graffiti: 1) prophecies, 2) faction banter, 3) obscene 4) murder-hobo pictograms.
- Abandoned attempt by someone to break through wall or uncover a secret door.
- Fur: 1) animal hides, 2) [insert animal here]-skin rug, 3) strange (blue fur carpeting everywhere, etc.
- Filled with: 1) mist, 2) steam, 3) gas, 4) trash, 5) jungle, 6) shadows, 7) holograms, 8) diminutive monsters.
- Lots of fungus: 1) giant, 2) psychedelic, 3) ambulatory, 4) screamers, 5) sleep-spores, 6) culinary, 7) on ceiling only, 7) squeak when stepped on, 8) glow for d6 hours after plucking
- Covered in lichens, moss, and slime.
- Pillars: 1) doric columns, 2) caryatids, 3) standing stones, 4) a menhir, 5) ionic columns, 6) columns with relief carvings, 7) a monolith with clues or mystical powers.
- Something up with the ceiling or floor or both: 1) same as the walls, 2) covered in glass, 3) covered in 1 exploding d6'' of liquid, 4) blood pool or stain, 5) spiked, 7) a catch for a secret door, 8) rocks, ready to fall.
- Supernatural fire (random color and effect, much as prismatic walls).
- Traps: 1) trap triggered, 2) trap obvious but un-triggered, 3) hidden, 4) hoax-trap or illusion.
- Dusty, cracked, or both.
- Swirls, speckles, or veins (random color or material or both from the top table).
- Drapes (random material and color) large enough to conceal things behind.
- Ancient civilization junk: 1) mummies stacked up all about 2) teracotta soldiers, 3) scrolls, 4) litters (paliquins), 5) boat or boats, 6) sarcophagi, 7) pottery, 8) musical instruments.
- Everything polished or transparent (even if transparency is usually impossible.
- Site of a battle: 1) recent, 2) old, 3) ancient, 4) haunted.
- Gilt: 1) vermeil, 2) silver-leaf, 3) gold-leaf, 4) gold-flecks, 5) silver-flecks, 6) electroplated with copper.
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Share good posts with good goblins. Claytonian at the gmails.
