RPG Blog Carnival: Underworld & Wilderness Adventures
Friends and strangers!
Through November I am hosting the RPG Blog Carnival, and I would like to invite you to contribute!
The theme is Underworld & Wilderness Adventures, and your contributions can be anything related to it, from your procedures and practices for creating and running them to random tables for generating and populating them to actual adventuring sites.
In OD&D Gary and Dave describe underworld and wilderness as places of adventure, peril, and treasure:
... the referee must draw out a minimum of half a dozen maps of the levels of his “underworld,” people them with monsters of various horrid aspect, distribute treasures accordingly, and note the location of the latter two on keys, each corresponding to the appropriate level. ... When this task is completed the participants can then be allowed to make their first descent into the dungeons beneath the “huge ruined pile, a vast castle built by generations of mad wizards and insane geniuses.” ...
Before it is possible to conduct a campaign of adventures in the mazey dungeons, it is necessary for the referee to sit down with pencil in hand and draw these labyrinths on graph paper. ... In laying out your dungeons keep in mind that downward (and upward) mobility is desirable, for players will not find a game enjoyable which confines them too much. On the other hand unusual areas and rich treasures should be relatively difficult to locate, and access must be limited. The layout of a level will affect the route most often followed by players. Observation of the most frequently used passages and explored rooms will guide the referee in preparation of successive levels, which, of course, should be progressively more dangerous and difficult.
The so-called Wilderness really consists of unexplored land, cities and castles, not to mention the area immediately surrounding the castle (ruined or otherwise) which housed the dungeons. The referee must do several things in order to conduct wilderness adventure games. First, he must have a ground level map of his dungeons, a map of the terrain immediately surrounding this, and finally a map of the town or village closest to the dungeons (where adventurers will be most likely to base themselves).
The theme is quite broad, and I encourage you to focus on gameable contributions—ideally something from or for your table that others could benefit from as well.
Simply share the link to your contribution (e.g. a blog post) in the comments below, and I will include it in the summary post at the end of the month.
I plan to write about how I roll up small random sites for sandbox play, from the resources I use to how I shape the site to how I then document and use it.
Fight on!
P.S. If you don't have a blog, but would still like to participate then you can either send me your contribution via email or comment below.
#RPGBlogCarnival #OSR #Resource
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