Dungeon help

[Macrus]

I'm running a campaign and I want the players to go into a proper old fashioned dungeon. With like traps, monsters, puzzles. However I'm not the most imaginative person and I don't know how I start going about making one.

Cheers

[Edge of Dreams]

One good trick is to start by imagining what the dungeon used to be and why it was built. Is it the prisons under a crumbled castle? A mad wizard's hideout? A temple to a forgotten god? The lair of a foul beast or mighty dragon?

Once you've got a high concept like that, start considering what makes sense to have in the place. Design rooms, add traps and monsters, etc. Consider what things may have moved in and made modifications after the original owners, or whether the original owner is still there in some form.

[haplessvictim]

Is there any particular reason you want to create your own? I'd recommend picking a published dungeon module and then adapting it to your own campaign, etc. There were a lot of good modules published for 3rd edition (and now, Pathfinder) that have the advantage of playtesting and polish. Also, for many popular adventures you'll find lots of supplementary material on the web: player guides, handouts, advice about how to handle certain encounters, advice on leveling the monsters up or down depending on your party, etc.

If you're just plain interested in designing your own dungeon, start small. Use the five room dungeon (http://www.roleplayingtips.com/readissue.php?number=156#1) model to craft a small dungeon suitable for one night's play. Carefully observe what went well and what went wrong, what your players enjoyed and what they ignored, and you can start to create larger and larger dungeons. As mentioned in that article, even extremely large dungeons can be boiled down to the five "room" model, if you imagine a single "room" as actually being several chambers.

[fuggerhugger]

I use this website -http://donjon.bin.sh/adnd/dungeon/
The room descriptions are obviously randomly generated which is a pain but they can be easily modified.

Good luck with your game and have fun :-)

[almightycoma]

I use this website -http://donjon.bin.sh/adnd/dungeon/


i do too i think randomly generated dungeons are the easiest way to start (for me at least). they take a little work to be playable but its so much faster than trying to come up with your own layout. then making the other trillion little decisions that are involved in starting from scratch.

[Averis Vol]

I third donjons. If you ignore the fluff they throw in there the site gives you a good framework to start with, and it can even be themed.