dungeonkommander

[dungeonkommander]

found my new favorite d&d character background

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archfey for @trickyghoul

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“I want to visit that orc potion maker… Derza, she runs New Moon Elixirs”

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handy-dandy guide to undead druids. do not approach in the wild unless you are a trained professional.

[dungeonkommander]

Dungeons and Dragons Player Bingo! Presented to you by a very tired DM

[dungeonkommander]

Do you have any suggestions on how to make Dungeon Crawls more.. exciting or have a better atmosphere? Rather than just "The hallway extends 20ft and turns left.." I love dungeons, but as a DM it feels like my delivery is.. bland.

Lots of DMs struggle with this, and for good reason. 

Dungeons are the most mechanically straightforward aspect of the game besides combat, and the immediate shape and contents of them is more pressing to players than the atmosphere. 

But, there are some simple ways to make your dungeons more atmospheric. Here’s my proposed solutions, both a long thinky one and a fast random one:

I think that dungeons should thought about as ‘once functional spaces’. Every place in the world has a purpose for which it was built, even if it’s a weirdo crazy one. Dungeon rooms should almost always be more than just treasure, traps, and monsters. 

For example, temples have cloisters, treasuries, storage rooms, waiting rooms, choirs, sanctuaries, apse, washing rooms, etc. Each of these rooms has specific objects and furniture inside them, as well as different acoustics. They get decorated with frescoes and murals or hanging art or sculptures. They’re cultural places. Think about them as physical spaces that people would use. 

Now imagine something happened in them, long ago. Why is this place a ‘dungeon’ and not still used? What event caused it to be abandoned? A battle? Plague? Was the place cursed? Come up with that and you can seed the rooms with small historical details: evidence of fights, skeletal remains, treasures hidden so they could be reclaimed later (but never were).

Now add the effects of time and nature. Fabric rots, metal rusts, stone erodes and crumbles. Plants and roots push stone tiles aside, and water seeps in and floods deep places. The passage of ages scours away history and purpose. Now, your once functional rooms don’t appear so functional, but their purpose can still be intuited.

Now add some new tenants. Monsters are always the first to reclaim abandoned civilized spaces: goblins make shantytowns out of old human ruins, beasts make warrens in sepulchral tombs, small dragons and basilisks favour places with statuaries and abandoned treasures. No matter the space or its original purpose, monsters move in and call it home. Sometimes multiple species of monsters…and then they fight or argue over sharing space.

So now your dungeon has a vivid look and feel. The important bit now is to think about how that imagined space sounds and smells. 

With every room and hallway, imagine how its history smells. Is it acrid or pungent? Smokey or mouldy? Does it smell surprisingly pleasant? If so, that’s often a worrisome sign, because it means something sentient might already be there. 

Audio can clue players into a space faster than any other description. Wind whistling indicates access to the surface…or a much deeper cave. Dripping denotes water (you hope). Creaking could mean doors…or ghosts. Large spaces echo, and sounds warp and distort the further away they are. There’s even different kinds of silence. There’s an empty, lonely silence that comes with long dead spaces, or the claustrophobic close silence of small spaces. 

Appeal to your players senses besides sight. Describe what rooms smell, sound, and even taste or feel like. This is a surefire way to make your dungeon rooms stand out. For example:

“You enter a 20 by 20 foot square room. It’s a stuffy old parlour. Pushing the door open you immediately smell something caustic and sour, but you don’t see an immediate source. All the furniture is rotted, but some of it looks smashed. You can hear the faintest scraping of something against the wall in the adjacent room”.

If that seems like a lot to write, try something like this: Reveal each bullet point as the players inquire about them, or when they make Perception checks:

Parlour, 20 ft square room.

The room feels uncomfortably thick and stuffy.

All the furniture is rotted out. Some of it is smashed. Evidence of a fight.

Smells caustic and sour. The smell comes from under a tattered rug. It’s beholder puke. 50gp if collected and sold to the right buyer.

Scraping sounds from the cloaker in the next room.

So maybe you already have a pretty basic dungeon and you need to make each room (or block of rooms) less boring. Here’s my handy set of sense tables:

Random Room Sensations:

For each room you want to enhance, roll four dice (a d12, a d10, a d8, and a d6). Your rolls will determine what’s up with this room. Every time you roll a result, cross it out and replace it with a new one you come up with.

Smells (1d12):

Sickly sweet, like rotting fruit or wilting flowers.

Musty, like old people and expired cologne.

Tangy, like body odour and grime.

Dusty, the choking scent of age and ghosts.

Foul, like waste and death; something unholy.

Crisp, like freshly cut grass or unchecked plant life.

Soggy, the lingering smell of still water and flooding.

Pungent, like rot and decay.

Spicy, like herbs and dried ingredients, aged.

Electric, a faint aroma of ozone and metals.

Earthy, like fresh dirt and clay, mixed in with the copper of blood.

Roll again twice, both smells clash together.

Sounds (1d10):

Claustrophobic silence.

Deep, echoing silence.

Low moaning or groaning.

Creaking of wood in the distance.

Faint, maddeningly indistinct whispering.

Faint, maddeningly indistinct whispering in a language you don’t know.

Metal scraping against metal, rhythmically.

Dripping of some kind of liquid onto stone.

Dripping of some kind of liquid into more liquid.

Roll again twice, both sounds are present.

Touch Sensations (1d8):

Dryness on the skin, chapped lips and dry eyes.

Cold dampness, water beads on metal items.

Humidity, clothes become hot and heavy, metal feels colder.

Dry heat, throats become parched, skin itches.

Pressure change, ears pop and noises distort.

Static tingling, hair stands up on end, goosebumps.

Unholy chill, shivers, goosebumps, a sense of unease.

The feeling of being watched, an uncomfortable presence.

Kinds of Darkness, if applicable (1d6):

Grey, distant darkness that yields to lantern light.

Cloying, smothering darkness that seems to draw close to you.

Eerie still darkness that feels like it holds endless monsters.

Calm, still darkness that invites restfulness.

Flickering, shifting darkness where the room seems to be moving.

Impenetrable darkness that makes darkvision endowed races feel at uneasy.

I hope all this helps make your dungeons a little less boring. The dungeon tables in the back of the 5e Dungeon Master’s Guide from @dndwizards is also helpful in this regard. 

[dungeonkommander]

Writing With Color – General Topics

A collection of WWC posts that deal with more general writing advice, character creation and diversity topics applicable to most marginalized people, particularly People of Color and some ethnic and religious groups.

Writing Characters of Color: The Generals

On “Overthinking” Writing Characters of Color

On White Authors “Getting it Right”

On White Writers Writing Characters of Color (I, II, III)

Researching PoC + Supporting Writers of Color 

So You Want To Save The World From Bad Representation

Writing POC with Little Experience

Writing Authentically From Your Own Experiences

Useful Non-WWC Posts

Diversity Exists in the Real World by shiraglassman

How to Write WOC and MOC if you are White by kaylapocalypse

“I feel pressured to be inclusive in my writing!” by nimblesnotebook 

On White Fear & Creating Diverse Transformative Works by saathi1013

Diversity/Representation Topics

Diversity vs. Exploiting Cultures

Diversifying a Predominately-White Cast

On “Diversity Quotas”

On Excluding Diversity Out of Fear

Different Heritage POV’s in a Story

Including Realistic Diversity Naturally

“Normalizing” Protagonists of Color

Villains of Color

White-Dominant Rural Areas and Diversity

White Privilege, Publishing, and Diversity Quotas

Writing: Making Efforts in Diversity 

Character Creation

Character Creation: Culture or Character first?

Character Design and Assigning Race and Ethnicity

Characters’ Races Added Last During Development 

Determining your Characters’ Race and/or Ethnicity

More on Assigning Race after Writing

Characters of Color & Culture

A Discussion on Culture and Erasure

“Culturing” Culturally-disengaged PoC

Characters of Color with “No Culture”

Mixed Race + Disconnect from Culture

Stereotyped vs Nuanced & Audience Perception

Tradition and Culture vs. Stereotype

Western Neutral Characters

‘Whitewashed’ Character of Color?

Fantasy & Coding

Defining Coding (& Islam-coded Fantasy)

Denoting Race in Fantasy Setting

Fantasy Races Based off of People of Color

Naming People and Places, Avoiding Explicit Coding

Racially-coding Aliens

Real Religions in a Fantasy World

Religion in Fiction & Fantasy

South Asian-Coded Fantasy Caste System

Whitewashing in a Fantasy Setting

Including Racism in Fantasy

World-building: A Fantasy World without Racism

Writing Sensitive and Controversial Topics

Do I Need Permission to Write About Marginalized People?

Writing a Genocide to which you have No Personal Connection

On Outsider-Written Stories About Issues Of Another Group

Outsider-Written Stories, Issues of other Groups, Speculative Situation

Writing about Prejudice between People of Color

Reclaiming negative, dehumanizing stereotypes outside the group

Representing yourself when “yourself” isn’t white

Racism and Micro-Aggressions 

Everyday Racism, Friendship and White Allies

Incorporating Micro-Aggressions in Writing

Racist Characters + Including Racism in Stories Not “About” Racism

The Pitfalls of Racist Character Redemption Arcs

PoC Educating White Privileged Friend (Context: Black Characters)

–WWC

[dungeonkommander]

Anybody else got like,, rlly random connections to famous ppl?? Like my older brothers were friends w Jennifer Lawrence when they were like 12 and I just found out I’m friends w the cousin of the girl who voiced honey lemon in big hero six like, idk what I’m supposed to do with either of these tid bits I feel like I was supposed to live my life in ignorance of them

[dungeonkommander]

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Dice throws

#dice #d20 #dungeons #dragons #dnd #d&d #weapons

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Here’s a sample of some of the more exotic D&D races I’ve drawn recently!

In order: Sylren, firbolg twilight Cleric for @laonii Tekko, lizardfolk Druid for instaricky_ on IG Hyacinth, faun Druid for @infusedwithfiction Asher, Yuan-ti Fighter for @xixien Aadya, platinum dragonborn Fighter for @autumn-w1nds Zilwa, half-orc, half dragonborn Druid/Barbarian for @jinxie013 Toot-toot, dragonborn Bard

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Nothing screams D&D than a group of adventures taking a long rest in some god's tomb?

[dungeonkommander]

Worldbuilding: Economy

Money makes the world go around and economics of a region makes it flourish or flop. Money and trade are important aspects of any world and you must pay attention to what your kingdom produces or lacks in resources.

Resources and Goods

Though we may touch on this again with another post. Your land must produce something. Even if it is a barren wasteland, your land must produce something in order to survive. It can produce items in categories.

Food: Food is a great way to make money. A seafaring kingdom might produce fish. A landlocked kingdom with fertile soil will produce wheat, barley, rye and other things. All of this can be sold either in the kingdom or abroad, a portion of the trade of course going to the government’s treasury. Food is always a good trade scheme but be mindful that it is something that can falter or be easily destroyed.

Materials: Kingdoms will produce some semblance of a material. It could be stone for building, gold for decoration, sulphur to make gunpowder or flax for making clothes. Materials are always desired at home and abroad and if your kingdom produces the best or most of a certain material it will be famous for it. Like Sheffield steel or Italian leather.

Skill: Sometimes people can be traded or their skills at least. A kingdom that sells a skill will be prized. Think of Sparta and their warriors, Athens and its wise men, Florence and its sculptors and painter or Japan and its software developers. A skill will enhance prestige on the world stage and give them a reputation.

Markets, Plazas and Agoras

When we talk about buying or selling, we often forget where this occurs. Every great city has a marketplace and every major town will have them. When you pinpoint where a character lives or where the story takes place, you should think of it’s economical value and status. Questions to ask yourself.

Home: Which city has the most power in the economy? Which costal areas are the major ports? Which city is the richest? How far do people have to travel to sell goods or buy them?

Abroad: Is there a trading route like the Silk Road? Which kingdom is the richest or poorest? What kingdom is hardest to travel to? Or the closest trading partner? Are there any countries that have been banned as trading partners?

Money or barter

There are two common types of payment for a good. You can pay with money or swap it for something else. Money of course can be in coin of note form. Look at my Fantasy Guide to Currency for more of this. Barter is easier in some cases. You have a goat and you want a small row boat. Is the goat worth the boat? Will all the milk the goat produces match or make more money that the fish the boatman catches? Do nobility use one system and the poor use others? When the tenants of a land pay rent is it in coin or barter? If they can’t pay in coin is bartering a common alternative?

Banking

All the world runs on the backs of banks. Pushing all the bad shit aside, banks are there to loan money or to store it. Banks give out loans for businesses or for projects. Most banks would expect some kind of repayment. In Renaissance times, a bank that did this was slandered as usurers. Banks have often wielded power. The Medici bank brought the owners up to the status of first family in Florence, Grand Dukes of Tuscany and even Pope. What do people think of the banks? Are they hated for their biting rates? Are they respected for their fair dealings with the people? What does the bank own? What are their relationship with the people, nobles and royalty?

Transportation and cost

To sell anything will cost you. You must calculate how much it would cost to make a good, transport it and sell it to a buyer. If you were selling something across the sea, how much will shipping cost you? If you were to have items brought to your home from another city, how would you do it?

Here is a problem for you to practice with: If a poor farmer wants to sell a cow in the capital and he lives fifty miles away beside a major road and river, with no wagon or horses and no money for passage on the river, how does he get there?

[dungeonkommander]

[dungeonkommander]

......... different fantasy races should be impacted differently by each other's alcohol

no more if this "fine elvin wine" shit, I am going to personally write a fantasy setting in which every human knows that elf booze tastes and feels like fantasy la croix. there's barely even a flavor, and you'd need to drink a few to even get tipsy.

meanwhile, every human with a lick of common sense knows that you need to plan accordingly if you're going to be drinking dwarven liquor, because it hits you hard and fast and you'll lose feeling in your legs faster than you thought was physically possible. the hangovers are the stuff of legend.