Tags
Adventure, Dungeons & Dragons, Fantasy, Kudos, Maps, One Page Dungeon, OSR, Pathfinder, RPG, Tim King
Tim King is at it again. Last month he gave us two one page dungeons using maps recently posted to the blog. Today I present his latest creation, the Lair of the Serpent Lord, using my most recent isometric map.
Lair of the Serpent Lord (Click for PDF)
So yeah, just click that graphic to download the PDF.
This is also a reminder of how slow I am to post awesome stuff here sometimes. Tim sent me this in email exactly a month ago today. I’m slower than molasses in a Canadian winter. So thanks, Tim, this is awesome!
Dyson's Dodecahedron 
One page dungeons are, IMHO, the epitome of good, solid, useful and fun dungeon design. I’ve been told they aren’t “real adventures” because of lack of….’stuff’ (re: “fluff”), but I grew up playing D&D when it was a DM’s job to write his own adventures for his own friends/players. Plots? Stories? Background details? Easy stuff for a DM to come up with on the fly…epicly drawn maps? Encounter tables? Monster stats? Treasure placement? Now *thats* the stuff that takes time!
Thanks for an AWESOME adventure I’ll probably use for a quick one-off test of the Astonishing Swordsmen and Sorcerers of Hyperborea system (I just got my boxed set in the mail last week! 🙂 ).
Anyone who criticizes a one-page dungeon for not being an adventure is missing the point:
Of course they aren’t an adventure, they’re a place that part of an adventure happens. For instance, this one is a great one to use whenever your adventure includes chasing after a stolen Object of Power(tm) as a bit.
Mind you, I would be careful about declaring “game building element X is easy and Y is what takes time.” I’ve known people who could toss together a better than decent little dungeon like this in a couple hours and have fun doing it but for whom doing plots and stories was a massive slog.
Chakat, I fully agree with you, whether you want to use these one pagers as a stand alone play or incorporate it with minor mods into a bigger adventure both are great. There are those who thrive on building the details of an adventure and there are those who live in the greater scope of vision of a world they are building. Like an urban planner, one can layout the streets and zoning but architects worry about the house and building design. One page dungeons clearly show the portential of the designer to work with a team to build a comprehensive world one brick at a time.
🙂