Post/Author/DateTime	Post
#1 Jimbro Jul 23, 2015 5:36:12	I recently wrote about why I like smaller dungeons on my blog. Anyone else out there feel the same way?   For those who love huge dungeons and big dungeon crawls, what is it you love? How do you keep players engaged and build an interesting story? I'd love some dungeon building advice. I always enjoy making large dungeons, but running them sometimes feels like a drag.
#2 Imaculata Jul 23, 2015 9:34:54	I've always liked smaller dungeons better, because I think people tend to fill their dungeons with a lot of boring empty corridors. I think it's better to have a small dungeon full of meaningful rooms instead. It is one of many points in my Dungeon Master Don'ts thread.
#3 AaronOfBarbaria Jul 23, 2015 10:26:02	I like my dungeons like I like my adventures in general: just long enough to feel a sense of progress more granual than "start adventure > do one thing > end adventure", but short enough that the players haven't forgotten where things started by the time they reach the conclusion.   When I design, for example, a dungeon that is "an ancient wizard's tomb, crawling with undead," it is probably only half a dozen different encounters, with some potentially happening in the same room (like battling the standing guardians in order to get to the chief sarcophagus, which when opened results in battle with whatever was inside).   The only time I deviate from "short and sweet," is when that is basically the point - like the campaign I am running right now where the characters are all trapped in "dungeonland" and looking for escape, but it is all dungeon, all the time until they do.
#4 Tempest_Stormwind Jul 23, 2015 10:46:21	Our dungeons are usually small enough to map out on a single whiteboard. They're usually crammed with story interactions, with the size of the dungeon only mattering inasmuch as they provide setpiece backdrops. (For instance, a chase dungeon may be physically larger, but functionally it's still one single chase scene. Alternatively, a small shipyard might serve as the backdrop for three setpiece story elements, occasionally clashing against each other if the PCs aren't careful or don't pay attention to timetables.)   That doesn't mean a small dungeon can't be as involved as a large one. For example, one of my DMs threw this bad boy at us once. I should note it lacked any interior light sources (and had fog-of-war rules enforced), had several traps, and had foes who were trained in stealth and linked via hive-mind (so if any of them saw any of us, all of them knew where we were, but because of their stealth abilities, we couldn't even tell how many of them there were, or if they'd moved into an area we'd explored but couldn't see anymore). Oh, and like every adventure we've run since 2006 or so, there was also a lot of time pressure at the campaign scale, which forces the players to act fast rather than act cautiously.
#5 Ralif_Redhammer Jul 23, 2015 11:58:26	There’s a place for both, but one of the things I like about smaller dungeons is that it allows for more time in the world outside of the dungeon.   For a big old school dungeon crawl, the thrill of the unexpected is a big appeal. What will be in the next room? And also, how far can we get in this run, before we have to turn tail and return to the surface?
#6 sleypy Jul 24, 2015 17:37:03	I like the slightly larger dungeons with empty rooms because it takes away the automatic safety of choke points, but also gives the creatures and PC strategic option like falling back to a room that is more advantages.