Into the Unknown: Dungeon Survival Handbook – belated review

I am finally holding a copy of the Dungeon Survival Handbook in my hands. I’ve been planning to write a review for this since before it came out, however my copy was coming through the post. I won’t bore you with diatribes of just how bad Royal Mail is, I’m sure you all know this, and will instead just tell you that it was very late and move on to the review itself. After having read it, I have this sort of funny feeling about it. I can just about imagine this book yelling at other DnD sourcebooks, “anything you can do, I can do better.” Quality of writing, presentation and content is an ongoing theme. Whilst it is lacking in focus, it excels at execution.

I remember first spotting this on the DnD product catalog. There was a vague description that revealed only what I already knew from the title – this book is about dungeons. After the previews hit Dragon and Dungeon magazines, I knew there would be six themes and three new races – Kobolds, Goblins and Svirfneblin (someone please teach me how to pronounce this) – but the concept of the book was still shrouded in a veil. Is this targeted for players? Dungeon Masters? It seemed like a player oriented book but I wasn’t sure. Even after reading through it, this feeling still sort of lingers, but I very quickly learned to push it away and simply enjoy the book for what it is.

So what is it? Well, it’s a bit of everything really. There are new themes, races, powers, items, locations, monster descriptions, dungeon descriptions and DM tips on how to build dungeons or Underdark campaigns. Sounds like a huge book you say? Not really, it’s pretty much the size of a regular DnD sourcebook. My initial worry was that with so much variety in content, there wouldn’t be enough space for detail, but actually, this is one of the most in-depth fourth edition supplements out there, coupled with great artwork, and a cover laden with spiderwebs, and the Rise of the Underdark logo.

The entire book is split into three chapters. The first two are dedicated to players and the third to the DM, although I believe that the DM will find the second chapter just as useful as the players. The first chapter covers the themes, races and new powers. Whilst there are only six themes (Bloodsworn, Trapsmith, Deep Delver, Escaped Thrall and Treasure Hunter), they are covered in great detail and seem to be tailored to the sort of player that wants to make the theme the focus of his or her character. It presents a detailed overview of how such a character would think, act and develop – useful tips and a treasure trove of information for anyone looking for some inspiration. The themes themselves are interesting and tie together well with the new races – who wouldn’t want to play a Kobold Trapsmith Rogue? We also get some sample character backgrounds tied to each theme.

Races, like themes, get a better treatment than in any other book before. The write-ups are twice the size of the ones in Player’s Handbooks and come with a plethora of racial feats and utility powers – a great way to make sure the races are playable in a game that has so many options already. The racial backgrounds seem to be written in a way that lends itself to some interesting roleplaying opportunities for each other. For example, goblins are greedy and selfish, not understanding the concept of sharing, whilst svirfneblin are communal and always look out for the good of their group. A roleplaying situation waiting to happen. The racial feats are useful and make me want to play the new races. Goblins, for example, can get +1 bonus to damage against anyone larger than them, or can gain combat advantage against anyone who attacks them with a melee attack and misses. Powers have distinct race specific flavor and names – the Kobold power “Load Slingpot” being a prime example. Finally, I get to roll that D6 as a player, and see if I can hit someone with a gluepot.

New powers are tailored around various Underdark organizations, be it the Deep Delvers or Seekers of Lost Lore – every class will find some options here, together with more character background ideas.

Chapter Two is devoted to learning about how to survive a dungeon. This chapter feels the most representative of the book’s title. It gives players ideas on how to find secret doors, avoid traps, navigate dangerous terrain, solve puzzles and even explains how certain monsters act – without spoiling the stat blocks. DMs that don’t have much experience will find this just as useful, as it will give them an idea of what to expect from their players and prepare accordingly. The end of the chapter offers some mundane and magical items. Personally, I love mundane items. I feel like 4th edition is over saturated with magic, and sometimes, simple equipment options can lead to better roleplaying, so this is a welcome addition to the adventuring gear list.

I’ve only had a brief skim of Chapter Three but I am saving the best for last – I’ve found some great dungeon mastering tips but I won’t spoil them – I couldn’t recommend this book more, just get it yourself and you’ll see how great it is. DnD Next seems to be heading in a direction where dungeoneering will be very important so this supplement will be a great addition to your collection whether you intend to keep playing 4E or move on to Next – the tips in the last chapter are definitely transferable to different editions or even different games.

Sidenote: I was very surprised to find mentions, and even images of covers of products from previous editions of DnD. It seemed like fourth edition was avoiding this, but this is a step in the right direction – let the players find out about past products. After all, if they hunt them down on eBay it will only increase their passion for this game!

How I learned to stop worrying and love Halls of Undermountain

I have an admission, and it’s not one I’m comfortable making. As far as RPGs go, I’m quite new to the whole thing. I mean, by now I’ve played tabletop roleplaying games for about 8-9 years, but any convention you go to, any public play game you attend, there’s always that one guy. That guy who goes, “oh I’ve been playing DnD since it came out in 1842, before the French Revolution bla bla bla…” You know the guy I mean. It might even be you. That’s OK though, I’ve come to accept that I’m a relative newbie, and mostly blame it on my post-soviet upbringing. What I am ashamed of though, is that while I’ve been a roleplayer for almost a decade, I’ve only been playing Dungeons and Dragons since 2009. Shock!

By now, some of you might be thinking, what has this got to do with Halls of Undermountain, the new supplement/DM tool that was released today? And what’s up with that horrible movie pun title? Well, believe it or not, this is a product review, but we’re still getting to the review part. So, Undermountain. I imagine this name means many different things to many different players. Ffor me it’s the first thing that made me want to play DnD. One of the first roleplaying games I have played was that Vampire game all them trendy kids used to play. I didn’t have much say in the matter, even though I was the DM. None of us had ever played tabletop roleplaying games before, but the group consensus was that we should play Vampire, since all goth stuff was cool at the time. Don’t get me wrong, I think the World of Darkness games are brilliant, and they have a special place in my heart. But as I was weaving plots and conspiracies between elder creatures of the night, my heart was yearning to explore a world of fantasy. In my group, I was the only one.

OK one more paragraph and we’ll reach the review part – I promise. This realisation, that I want to play DnD, took quite a bit of time to solidify. I’ve always been a fan of the computer games. Baldur’s Gate, Icewind Dale, etc. And the more I thought about roleplaying games the more I wanted to explore those worlds by myself. Visit my version of Fareun, or Sigil, or even the Underdark. And I remember very clearly, how one slow day at work turned into a day of exploration of DnD. It was a day when a book called Expedition to Undermountain came out, and it’s cover captivated me so much. It instantly became my office computer wallpaper. Here, I thought, is what I want – a sense of mystery, intrigue, and a journey into the unknown.

I never bought that book. As I mentioned, my group never wanted to play DnD. It was too mainstream for them. As it happened though, I had a drastic alteration of life, and a new geographical location coupled with a return to university provided me with a bunch of young creative writers who all wanted to play Dungeons and Dragons. And since then, I’ve heard the name Waterdeep, and Halaster Blackcloack, and Undermountain many a time, but I knew there was so much lore behind it, I was too scared to explore it. After all, I am a DnD newbie, and I feel like there’s years of fictional history that I missed out on.

So it took me two paragraphs. So sue me. I got there in the end. (drumroll) Here comes Halls of Undermountain, the new guide to the first level of the infamous sprawling dungeon. The first thing I’d like to mention about the book, is that it’s just a few pages shy of the 100 page mark, which DnD books normally tend to exceed. To counter-balance that, the book includes two gorgeous poster-size maps, one of which features the first level of the dungeon in it’s entirety.

The contents of the book itself are mostly focused on exploring this first level. We get some history on Undermountain, a write-up on the Yawning Portal – a tavern providing immediate access to the dungeon, filled with colourful NPCs and various side-treks. We also get a suggestion for an overarching campaign that will incorporate the three adventures that form the structure of the encounter write-ups, designed for levels 1 to 5. And the rest is said encounter write-ups.

Here is where things get interesting. Just by looking at the big map, I’ve noticed that the room where the players are supposed to begin their dungeon trek, marked as encounter 1, directly leads to encounter 66, which itself leads to five or so other encounters, that don’t follow any numerological pattern. I was afraid that I would have to read the entire 77 encounters before I could even begin running an adventure in this monstrosity (glad to report that that’s not the case). This is also where my shame of being a newbie took over. I started worrying about not really knowing anything about Undermountain. There were so many books before this. What if I end up with a player who’s been to this dungeon so many times, he knows the first level by heart?

The book deals with this in a simple yet elegant way. It tells me, that Undermountain is my dungeon. It’s whatever I want it to be. My own version. Or my player’s version. Either way, it’s supposed to be unique at every table, and it’s for us as gamers to decide what comprises it. The book goes even further than that, and encourages you to improvise a lot of it. If the players step through a portal and end up in a swamp – the book won’t tell you what’s in the swamp. But it will encourage you to just make it up on the spot. It even provides room randomizing tables (which are great!). I was always dubious about improvising in DnD. Sure, I play Fiasco often, and sure, once I ran a Gamma World game that I made up there and then. But DnD is different. It feels sloppy not to prepare. A mark of a lazy DM. This book however makes it feel different. I somehow got the sense, that if I ran an Undermountain adventure – it would be OK to improvise. After all, if the book tells you so, so you can’t be blamed for being lazy. I let go, and learned to just embrace it for what it is.

A few other bits I’d like to mention. I’ve really enjoyed the way the encounters were presented. Reading them feels like reading a choose your own adventure book. Most of them lack any maps or monster stats, instead referring the DM to the poster map, or to the Monster Vault respectively. I imagine this has been done to conserve space, and I think that it was the right call. There is, after all, enough material in this book to keep you going for quite a few months even if you play this campaign weekly. The map for the Yawning Portal is amazing. Everyone at my FLGS couldn’t stop gawking at it, and I can’t blame them. Just get the book and check it out for yourself.

 

Encounter Workshop: Burgler Alarm

Ok so I’ve had a surprising amount of traffic generated by my Dungeon Command playtest preview, and I want to follow that up with something cool but very different. I love designing encounters. I feel like fourth edition lends it self very well to game design, and there’s so many things to tinker around with. So I thought that I’d run a series here, where I share some of the better encounters that I have created for 4E. These will not be your familiar two page spreads, won’t have a detailed map or the entire encounter scripted out. I would like for you to view these as toolboxes – you can change and reshape these encounters into whatever you’d like them to be. I present you with a core, and some ideas of how to develop it, but the rest is in your hands.

So here goes:

Encounter: Burgler Alarm

This encounter is designed to work in any adventure. As the title suggests, the encounter essentially is an intruder alarm, (and a very sophisticated and effective one). It is up to you, as a DM, to decide who is using this burgler alarm: it might be a deranged wizard who’s protecting her tower from pesky intruders trying to steal her research, or it could be set up at the entrance of a base for fanatic cultists. You know your adventure better than anyone, and you should have no trouble inserting this. I ran it in an adventure set in Hammerfast, at the entrance of the dragon Calastryx’s lair, at the end of Heroic tier. My friend Simon completely ‘refluffed’ this encounter to work in his Dark Sun campaign.

In any case, the alarm system should be set up in the entrance room of what is effectively a dungeon. Ideally there are only two exits in this room, one leading to outside the dungeon (where PCs come in) and one leading into the  dungeon. The room should be at  least 11×11 square size. It doesn’t have to be set to a rectangular shape – as long as there is enough ample space in the middle to maneuver – things should run fine.

The center of the room should have some sort of a basin that holds a special liquid, to which we’ll refer to as ‘sound water’. The basin can be anything – in my adventure it was simply a pilar with a concave top with the sound water poured into it. In Simon’s adventure it was an immobile magical gong, simply because water is not very appropriate in Dark Sun. The basin has it’s own stat block.

There should also be four statues in the room that are diametrically opposed. You can determine the distance between the statues and the fountain yourself, but I would recommend it to be three to four squares appart.

At this point I would like to appologise for my drawing skills. Just saying.

So this is how it works. Each statue, mechanically, is a brute, and deals a great amount of damage for it’s level. In addition, whenever one statue is killed, the rest of the statues get an extra damage die, making them even tougher. The statues have a speed of one, and cannot substitute their Standard action for a move action, charge or run. The statues sense any living being or construct within five squares and activate as soon as anyone approaches (ignoring any beings that are allowed to enter the dungeon). When they activate, each turn they move closer to the basin

holding the ‘sound water’. As soon as they are within reach, they will hit the sound water with their hammers, severely debilitating the adventuring party and possibly killing them. This will also produce a sound loud enough to alert anyone within the entire dungeon. Therefore the goal of the adventurers should be to stop the statues before they reach the basin. If they somehow fail to do this, but survive, suggest to your players that retreat is always an option. Maybe they can lick their wounds and attempt again. On the other hand, they might completely ignore the trap and venture forth into the dungeon – great! The statues will hit the basin within seconds and alert everyone to their presence, increasing the difficulty of every encounter in the dungeon. They might also decide to spill the water in the basin. Great, the water makes a tremendous sound alerting everyone in the dungeon. If they do decide to stay and fight the statues, give them clues of what the statues are trying to achieve by describing their movement.

This encounter should flip the familiar rules of combat upside down, and make your players thinkoutside of the box. Powers that daze are usually valued highly, but in this case they simply stop the statues from attacking, which might seem beneficial, but that’s all it does – which is ok, since the main priority is for them to reach the basin. As soon as they do – they’ve won. Powers that pull, push, slide or prone however are much better, since they lock the statues down. Your melee players will find it very tough since the damge output at the start of the encounter is pretty big. As the encounter progresses, the output will be big enough to knock out even the toughest defenders.

Describe every statue having a different color rune. When it fades out – have that rune light up on every other statue. This will serve as a hint to the players that the statues ‘power up’ when one of them falls.

I have included two sets of stats for the statues. One is of regular difficulty, designed for a standard five player adventuring group of level 8, and the dwarven one is in ‘nightmare mode’ – a stat block for an optimized group, or one that is very good at controlling the battlefield.

p.s. Big thank you to Logan Bonner – it was his monster design that inspired this encounter, and the monster stat block is an altered version of his Runic Statue from the Runecutter’s Ruin adventure found in Dragon #186.