If you’ve missed the previous posts about a snowflake dungeon, you can find them here.
It’s been long enough that I forgot where I was.
I had to read back through the emails I already send out. I haven’t forgotten about it, though. The Snowflake dungeon continues.
Last time, I had been on step four. It was a doozy, taking every sentence in my original paragraph and turning it into a paragraph itself. I changed things a bit, since I’m writing a dungeon, not a book, and made 5 locations from each sentence instead.
But then when we got to the last sentence, it didn’t make sense to do the same. So what do we do?
Thus far, each of the four other sentences gave me five locations each, with each set themed around a specific faction. That means we don’t have ANY locations that aren’t faction themed. That seems like a good next step.
I want to break these down into two categories – Hazards, Curiosities, and Unaligned.
Hazards have some sort of inherent danger to them. They could be traps or obstacles to travel.
Curiosities do what it says on the tin. These might just be fancy set dressing in the dungeon. We’ll see.
Unaligned are monstrous encounters, but not with a specific major faction. This gives space for natural predators and little side stories.
So let’s do five of each. That’ll give us a total of 35 locations with the twenty I did earlier. Let’s see where we go!
Hazards
The walls here are propped up by wooden poles that are splintering under the weight of the stone. (Ruined Temple)*
Poisonous mushrooms grow on the rotting corpses in this room, sending toxic spoors into the air that sicken anyone who enter. (Ruined Temple)
A rope hangs from the ceiling. Puling it brings a large ceiling stone crashing down upon the person who pulled it. (Ruined Temple)
Thorny plants actively try to grasp paserby’s, their thorns sucking the blood from their victims. (Riverbend Cemetery)
A vent spews poisonous air into the room. (The Below).
Curiosities
A large statue, hands turned upwards. The head is broken off and missing. (Outside the Ruined Temple)
A gravestone that reads “Nethis Sven. She took her magic to the grave.” Digging here will bring the PCs to a board that covers a shaft. It leads to a small treasure room with magic items in it. (Riverbend Cemetery)
A large, black stone juts out of the wall. A thick sap runs down it. (The Below)
An underground spring feeds a steamy pool. Anyone who spends an hour soaking in here gains 1d4 hp. They can do this once per day. (The Wilderness).
Turnips, their tips visible above the dirt, “wiggle” in the garden amidst the other plants. If touched, they shriek and try to run way (they’re little turnip men). They’re considered pests in this region. (The Monastery)
Unaligned
A bear feeds on fish in this stream. (The Wilderness)
1d4 Giant Rats are eating the grain stored here. (The Monastery)
1d10 stirges fly around a fetid pool of water. (The Ruined Temple).
2D4 goblins are roasting stirges on sticks. (The Wilderness).
1d10 giant bats roost on the ceiling here. If disturbed by any noise, they’ll swarm anyone below them. This will be a connecting hallway in The Under, but it can be circumvented by going around it instead.
*This room needs to be by a monster room so that they have the option of luring people here.
There we have it! Thirty give locations down. It’s interesting to do this without having a map first – I usually make dungeons the opposite way. I guess we’ll see what works better.
TAGS: Game Theory, GM Tips, Dungeons, Snowflake Dungeon
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