Six Savage Lairs

Lo, warriors! In ill caverns, places-weird and ruins-haunted, squat and gibber; lair-lurks, foul fiends, sea-things and stooped troglodytes, all atop spilling heaps of forgotten treasures. So leap, spring cunning and battle-crazed - broadsword humming - indue your thick-thewed frames in blood, gold - glory and legend!

Here are six, free, lair-style dungeons, inspired by the 3lbb and written for an OD&D lair design contest. They are lurid, savage and pulpy. The layout was predetermined quite stringently. Most notably, each lair must fit on a single side of A5. This proved a fun, albeit tricky, constraint. My first attempt; Caveman Lair, 15%, though terse, spilled over this single side limit, - though Diogenes of Dio's Dungeon did ascribe it "vance-quality" (while discussing its disqualification). See:

😏

Remember these are Lairs, different but closely related to 'true' dungeons. While largely occupied by a single 'monster' type, do not assume these are not places of tension and of simmering conflict that your players cannot explore and exploit. Some of the lairs are linked narratively but can be played in any order, making them a good fit for sandbox campaigns or linked one-shots. Each lair should be a good fit for a single session of play. 

Also four of the lairs belong to cavemen 💪

Herein you shall find:

• The Lair of the Cavemen (Oopulg's Tribe), suffering in a sea-cave under the yoke of savage merman conquerors.
• The Lair of the Mermen, a hub of imperial conquest, led by an imperious queen blinded to the traitors in her midst by the loss of her daughter. 
• The Lair of the Brigands who took her, and the foul fate they are suffering at the hand of their disinterested and capricious dark-lord.
• The Lair of the Cavewomen (Lankimbirizin's Tribe), hunted by chaotic humanoids and led by a dying magic-user who seeks to a new chief to lead his tribe to safety. 
• The Lair of the Cavemen (Big Borguluu's Raiders), a vicious band of raiders encamped in a ruined minster that holds its own secrets. 
• The Lair of the Cavemen (Bruug and Eewallaaa's Tribes), two tribes joined by the pairing of the chief and chieftainess suffer clashing cultures and the moral predations of two human missionaries.

Most art by Frank Frazetta with maps by Dyson Logos and Watabou's dungeon generator.

 

Death in the Dark - Meaningful Torchlight and Light-based Initiative

Some find that torches and light management generally to be easily forgotten during play. Something easily glossed over. This omission comes, often unknowingly, to the detriment of both the atmosphere and play of dungeon-delving adventure. So, what to do? 

This house-rule bakes light into initiative, taking light source management directly into and during combat. Presenting new dilemmas and meaningful choices as your party manages light to tip or rebalance combat in their favour - will they attempt to light that new torch or try to push on despite the disadvantage?

Once you have trained your players (and possibly even yourself) to regularly consider the darkness, and their provisions against it, you can start to use light/dark more and more in all different facets of play. Here’s how it works:

Use side initiative: roll once per round of combat (before the round begins), the highest roll determines which side (monsters or party) acts first.

• Monsters roll 1d6.
• The party rolls a d4 with no light, a d6 with one light and a maximum of d8 with two or more light sources (but the more spare light sources the better).
• (Alternatively, the party rolls 1d4, +1 per active light source, to a maximum of +2)
• The party wins ties but a light source is destroyed in the process.

The Role: 

Like the Caller, Mapper, or Chronicler roles, your group might appoint a Lightkeeper (Pointman, Underscout, Warden, etc). This player:

• Tracks the party’s active light sources.
• Rolls for initiative.
• Optionally, manages marching order and/or makes all the encounter rolls (though this can be its own separate player role).

The Lightkeeper player could use a simple tracker like this, with a number of counters/tokens/beads equal to whatever torches/lanterns/runes/lightbulbs/flashlights/glow-rods that the party possesses, placing them in the light bonus boxes or spare light 'pool' respectively. 

 LIGHT?:     

 ▢     ▢

(d6) (d8)

   POOL

[‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾]

[                     ]

[________]

Or

 LIGHT?:     

 ▢     ▢

(+1) (+2)

   POOL

[‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾]

[                     ]

[________]

On Light Destruction, Tips and Optional Rules:

• A light source is automatically destroyed on matched initiative rolls - the party cannot elect to lose initiative, so it's best to carry more than 2 light sources. 
• As the DM, don't neglect to describe how each light source is destroyed. How a light source is destroyed is deeply tied to the context of the combat - a giant bat might bite the candle out of your hand, a lamp might get flung into a nearby pool of slime, a candle might be dropped and trampled in the jostle of combat, a gnollish arrow might pierce your lantern or the darkness itself might swallow up the light of a torch leaving nothing but a burning ember. This description is important.
• Destroyed light sources cannot be reused, torches cannot be relit, lanterns cannot be repaired or refuelled.
• This form of light source destruction is in addition to light source depletion via rolls on the Overloaded Encounter Die.
• During daylight or well lit sections of the dungeon use normal d6 vs d6 side initiative.
• Your party will often run at the maximum initiative bonus but don't worry, they will burn through light sources quickly enough.
• Lanterns. Lanterns are better than torches in that they can be covered when the light wants to be hidden (unlike torches which must be extinguished and therefore, destroyed) and again, unlike torches, are not destroyed/depleted by overloaded encounter rolls that cause light depletion, they just run out of oil. Lanterns are only destroyed on joint initiative rolls. But feel free to house rule this as you see fit. 
• Use a good, workable encumbrance system. If using a slot-based encumbrance system, one torch should take up one slot. 
• Light Destruction on initiative roll draws is the most elegant thing about this - you can continue to use d6 vs d6 side initiative with just this tweak. 
• Dwarves have infravision, not dark vision so they still they still benefit from light sources in combat.
• Populate dungeons with monsters that target characters carrying light sources and creatures/traps that target light sources directly. 

Optional: Deader in the Dark
You can increase the severity of the darkness by altering the light to die size threshold. For more severe play; players without any light automatically lose initiative, roll 1d4 for initiative with one light source, 1d6 with two light sources and a maximum of 1d8 with a three or more light sources. Light source destruction on tied initiative rolls continues as normal. However, automatically losing initiative can become a predictable IGOUGO. It looses the 'appeal' of players managing to win initiative, despite their disadvantage, only for the monsters to predictably snatch back the initiative and effectively have 'another go' - performing their actions back-to-back.

Optional: Dungeon Scarring

If you want dungeon DARKNESS to be a fantastic and corrosive phenomenon, to feel like a living force that hates you - consider Dungeon Scarring. For every 10 minutes the party spend without a source of light (or whenever encounters are rolled for) the characters suffer from dungeon scarring - each affected player must pinch off a piece of their character sheet, no more than a few millimetres, that or poke a hole with a sharp pencil. To be even harsher, you can enforce dungeon scarring for each initiative roll the party makes without a light source. Your players will never forget their torches again. 

Postscript:

This is something of an adaptation of a method employed by James Young, which in turn I believe was inspired by Veins of the Earth's initiative system. Also, check out this cool meta house rule for initiative by Benign Brown Beast and this mega list of different initiative systems by Knight at the Opera.

The Hunting Die - Improving Encounter Rolls, Again!

The Hunting Die - Improving Encounter Rolls or, a Predatory Encounters/Underclock Alternative

Rather recently, I shared PREDATORY ENCOUNTERS which is a method to increase the number of random encounters and create a greater sense of tension in your games. Now, I'm sharing another method, a slight twist on the random encounter roll called 'The Hunting Die'. First, check out ANOTHER UNDERCLOCK by James Young, which deeply influenced this post (and special thanks to Goblin's Henchmen). Now, let's get into it: 

Take your Overloaded Encounter Die, usually a d6, decide on a formula you like (examples, here, here, here, here, here, here, here) and have encounters occur on a 1. THEN grab another set of polyhedral dice - big, scary ones. These are your Hunting Dice - they represent the dungeon inhabitants searching out your players. You'll only ever use one of these dice at a time. This Hunting Die starts as a d20 and is rolled simultaneously with the overloaded encounter die. 

Use the overloaded encounter die as you would normally, fulfilling its results as they occur (light depletion, dungeon effects, etc), with encounters happening as normal on results of 1. At the same time, you are rolling the Hunting Die. The Hunting Die only comes into effect on results of 1. Rolling a 1 on the Hunting Die triggers an encounter with the dungeon's 'main faction'. Rolling any other result causes the Hunting Die to decrease one Die size, but more on that later. 

What? 'Main Faction'? Huh? This is whichever faction, being or entity is most dominant in whatever area the party are currently in. For example, C.H.U.Ds in the Cannibal Clan Sewers, Doleful Shades in the Katabatic Cave, the Driller-Killer himself in the Lair of the Driller-Killer or the Slime Duke and his cohorts but only in the slimy northern chambers of the Chaos Kings's Megadungeon. This is not to say that the dungeon's dominant party should not appear on your usual, regular encounter table but it's good to promote encounters with the dungeon's main movers and shakers - you wouldn't want to run a vampire dungeon and encounter no, or not many vampires, would you? It's happened to me. Rolling two dice for encounters has its quirks, overloaded encounter die results can trigger at the same time as the Hunting Die encounter and if both the Encounter Die and Hunting Die roll 1's, you know what that means, double encounter!

For example

After rolling the Encounter Die and the Hunting Die (whether the Encounter Die results in an encounter or not) reduce the die size of the Hunting Die from a d20 to a d12. This represents that the dungeon inhabitants are getting closer to finding your players. Reduce the size of the Hunting Die each time it is rolled and does not result in an encounter (any result other than 1). Continue to reduce the Hunting Die after every encounter roll until it rolls a 1 and triggers a faction encounter. After the Hunting Die's encounter is resolved, the die resets in size back up to d20. This helps to keep both the feel of rising tension and the idea that an encounter can occur at any moment.

If the players draw attention to themselves you have a few options. Instant reduction in the size of the Hunting Die, or, if the characters are particularly overt, instantly roll the Hunting Die with the Encounter Die regardless of how much time that has passed. You can even do both at once. How you play this is up to your discretion as a DM.

Tips, Tricks, Options, Opinions and Alternatives 

• Keep the Hunting Die visible. Your players should know how close they are to being attacked, but, keeping die based will ensure more tension than a static and obvious 'right now' point. Consider it being a player role to keep track of the Hunting Die and roll for encounters.
• Certain actions may permanently reduce the maximum size of the Hunting Die. The Hunting Die max size will only reset to d20 if the players leave the dungeon. These actions may include sleeping in the dungeon, stealing particularly important treasure or killing dungeon leaders. 
• A more unforgiving option is that the first faction encounter, the Hunting Die only resets to d12. The die never resets to d20 until players leave the dungeon.
• There is no bespoke method for stealth with this method but reward your players for being sneaky and trying to waylay or hide from their pursuers. There is no reason to not have your players hide. It's fun. 
• This method also works for wilderness or overland encounters. For example, in the Mutated March of the Mad Mage you'd be pursued by the Mad Mage's Mutoids and in the Splendiferous Spirelands your party would be questioned by a patrol of Sir Spike Spiral's Spiny Spearmen (and so on). In particularly large regions consider local lairs, landmarks, hideouts, towns, etc when considering what/who the Hunting Die should represent. Consider that the Hunting Die encounter may have different results during the day and the night.
• Just as the Overloaded Encounter Die has things occur on any result of 1 through 6, could this be applied to the Hunting Die? For example, a result of 2 on the Hunting Die could represent that the Faction Encounter is close by. Any hasty/loud action could alert them. I would not do much more than this for the sake of my own cognitive load. 
• Consider how a Hunting Die's encounter should be different to a standard encounter. In dungeons and other underworld spaces, these encounters should, more often than not, be hostile, like white blood cells attempting to extirpate any outside intruders. 

An Epilogue on Encumbrance

This whole post was inspired by James Young's 'Another Underclock'. The one thing this method does not take into account is encumbrance as James Young's system does. I can only think of this - and it's slightly dumb - the more encumbered the party, the larger the faction encounter becomes. For example, if you are using encumbrance levels and your most encumbered player has an encumbrance of 4, then the faction encounter has an additional 4 HD. This works better for encounters with lots of individuals, the party are moving slower and their pursuers can better organise, so an extra eight 1/2 HD goblins - ouch. But this works less so for lone wandering monsters. Why would the minotaur have an extra 4 HD because the party thief is carrying too much treasure? It doesn't quite fit. Perhaps encumbrance could affect chances of the party being surprised or someone on encumbrance '3' would cause the Hunter Die encounter to be triggered on 1, 2 or 3 - but that might result in far too many encounters.