Arriving at the Dungeon

After session zero and then five sessions the characters have made it to the Dungeon for the Dungeon Delve Campaign.1 I was nervous about the Dungeon and whether it would pass muster with my players. The Dungeon was an NPC of sorts as it was the centerpiece to the game (first real dungeon crawl) as well as my first real tier two game. Between not having much dungeon design experience and also the characters being more powerful than any others who been on the table before I was worried about being able to manage it all.

However, I think it turned out well. The character’s ship that was taking them and a small party of NPCs to the dungeon location amid a large world pillar arrived amid a misty morning like any other in the Sunken Sea. Then amid the mountain like stone edifice jutting from the water they find an ancient metal door set in the rock just above the water line.

There is an immediate tension among the characters as the Ghar Noble warrior starts trying to smash in the door while the rogue trys pick the lock amid the loud clanging and commotion. The rogue does succeed though I figure the clanging would have alerted some of the inhabitants and a straight stealth raid was now out the question.

The party enters the dungeon and thus begins the delving, which is where the Maps feature on D&D Beyond truly shines. I normally like to play theater of the mind yet I have found for large combats and combats where position matters then I quickly looses track of everything if I don’t use a map. I can add monster tokens and also npc tokens with ease while also creating some fog of war elements to make the map a mystery.2

It took me three different attempts to create a dungeon I was happy with in Inkarnate. I could have probably bought a map or even used a published adventure though I really enjoy map making so even with the multiple attempts I had a great time working on them. I am curious about how long the players will end up wandering through the dungeon before stumbling onto the end. We shall have to see.

  1. For the other entries on this campaign check out the first post in the series. ↩

  2. This system is not as advanced as some where you can set lighting cues and darkvision on characters so the fog of war varies by character, but it is still pretty good! ↩