Recently, Alexis Smolensk over at the Tao of D&D published his second collection of essays, The Dungeon's Front Door & Other Things in the Deep Dark. Much like the first collection, How to Play a Character, DFD is a small but dense volume of essays that investigate a wide variety of topics. While How to Play was a compilation of various excellent posts from Alexis' blog, however, DFD takes the theme of dungeons and injects it throughout.
The result is a cheerful romp through the notion of dungeons in D&D. Alexis has changed his format slightly for this collection. Interspersed among the thirteen essays in the book are two short stories and one series of examples. I was pleasantly surprised to discover these: on his blog, Alexis tends to offer a lot of critical analysis but does not necessarily delve into the specifics of his method, a mystery which encourages the reader to devise their own solution and then toy with the implementations.
There are a few central tenets which are put forward. One is the importance of dungeons themselves. Alexis totes the dungeon as a world within a world, a place where the players can retreat from the chaos of the enormous outdoors into a confined, orderly box. To do so effectively, Alexis emphasizes the value of making the dungeon a world. What is possibly the best essay in the book (it's certainly my favourite), "Wyrd," chronicles the history for a mountain cave that is home to both a goblin community and some hungry jellies. "Wyrd" emphasizes the importance of having a closed system to your dungeons: where does food come from? where do tools come from? what are the defenses of the dungeons' inhabitants? Certain oddities, like untouched doors or piles of treasure, may seemingly defy the sense of the outside world, but Alexis reminds the reader that the dungeon is not like the outside world. It's alien and strange, and so are its people many a time. Maybe they revere doors? Maybe there's an old fountain deep down below which spits out coins? Who knows?
The DM might have some ideas. But the players may never know. Alexis again highlights the value of keeping one's hand close to one's chest while DMing. In "Wyrd," the players may arrive at any point during the history of the dungeon, and find something entirely different waiting for them. They may never know what happened. But a DM with such knowledge can cultivate a little mystery and a little strangeness to keep the players' emotions running high. Alexis recommends a little toying with the players' emotions to do so: his essay "Breaking the Fourth Wall" is all about playing with the players' fears. Little pranks when done right can provide a lot of extra fuel for keeping the players amped and excited, much like a rollercoaster ride.
And there should be lots of strangeness and mystery! DFD rightfully points out that real estate is expensive when you're carving through stone. This is an excellent point: though the dungeon is its own world, it's a small world. One door may be all that stands between the orcs and the gnolls. A pit may service both a hungry otyugh and goblins with garbage. Making your dungeons small, DFD explains, allows for every room to have a purpose (which the players may not understand). And often that purpose is fear. The dungeon is not something to be made gentle or welcoming, but a struggle to victory. This is one of the most important points of the essay, and in my opinion one of the best: the more the players fight, the sweeter victory is. The DM is on the players' side to help them accomplish this high, and DFD explains that by using busy dungeons and a gentle dose of evil, players can be given quite the incredible ride.
This is the majority of DFD, but the short "story" essays "Rest" and "Dungeon Extractions, Inc." are not merely diversions from Alexis' critical analyses. "Rest" features an account of a party trapped in a massive dungeon -- some of its references (the dwarf is the first to become upset by the fact that the party has been in the dungeon for "six hundred and twenty-two" days) are later explored in Alexis' essay on megadungeons "A Door Too Far." The story is humorous and showcases some of the absurdities of the dungeon, especially its attractive power. Even after such an enormous amount of time, by which point decisions like which fork to take become tedious, or after treasure, left behind (cannot be carried), has lost all real value, the party slogs forward.
"Dungeon Extractions, Inc." presents the success of a man who has essentially "industrialized" the dungeon crawl. A billionaire entrepreneur, Sir Phelonious (sounds like felonious, no?) the Elf has min-maxed a massive extraction team to capitalize on dungeons across the world, raking in billions in profits. Of course, Phil is aware that his business will soon cause economic collapse and the whole industry will fall apart: Alexis' characters are charmingly genre-savvy (as many D&D players are).
"Flora in the Recesses" is another fun diversion in the book, relatively sparse on Alexis' usual argumentation. Instead, Alexis puts his methods into action to display how the dungeon is justified, inventing plants to inhabit dungeons and to feed their residents. The plants integrate smoothly with the design of dungeon monsters: intensely peculiar but detailed enough to seem natural. It's a wonderful example of dungeon-world design.
All in all, The Dungeon's Front Door is a great read for DMs in need of a kickstart to reinvigorating their dungeons. It's unfortunately a short read, but nonetheless a valuable one on the philosophy of the dungeon. I am excited to experiment with its suggestions for my players.
The book is currently 20% off on Amazon, and you can also purchase it on Lulu.
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