Friday, March 21, 2014

Deep Dark Dungeons Dungeon Crawl Rules

For a while now, I've been playing dungeon crawls with Song of Blades & Heroes and Song of Gold & Darkness. I love both rulesets, but I've found SGD to be extremely focused on two players going head to head. This isn't a bad thing, but I prefer a more co-operative experience, especially one that can be played solo.

So slowly I began making small changes, adding random tables and generally fiddling around with each game until I think I am somewhere close to that goal. At the very least I'm having fun with it and I have been getting a lot of requests to see what I'm using, so I am ready to let people have a look-see at the rough draft.

I do want to stress that last part. These rules make sense to me and I'm not 100% sure I've articulated them properly. I've no doubt forgotten things I do and there may be holes I've missed entirely. I'll be happy to address any questions that pop up and there will most definitely be revisions in the future.

So, without further ado, here are the rules for Deep Dark Dungeons. Just click the link below to grab the PDF. You will definitely need copies of Song of Blades & Heroes and Song of Gold & Darkness. These rules do not stand alone and I may possibly have slipped a few other rules for other supplements that I've forgotten about as well.

Deep Dark Dungeons V1.2.1 (6/3/19)

And here's a Party Sheet to keep track of your adventurers and any damage, treasure, skills, equipment, etc. they may pick up along the way.

Party Sheet

I hope that everyone finds these fun and I'm sure that I'll get some good feedback on making the rules clearer. My hope is that maybe I will find the time and ambition to work this into a full SBH stand-alone game similar to Song of the Splintered Lands or Song of Arthur & Merlin. That might be a pipe dream because I am monumentally slow at this sort of thing, but one can always dream.

As always, if you like what I've done here and wish to support the cause, there is a lovely little donate button on the left hand of the page.

Happy gaming!

17 comments:

  1. I just came across this. These ideas are really good. I prefer cooperative gaming as well, so this is right up my alley. If you ever need a playtester... :)

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    1. Play test away, please! That's part of why I posted them up. I don't have anywhere near enough time yo play test them myself. I would love feedback.

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    2. I am thinking of trying to adapt them to roll20. Have you used that site before? It is fantastic--- I have played a lot of 4th edition D&D on there. If you would like, we could give it a go on there sometime. I don't have a ton of experience with SBH, but I am a little familiar with the "core" books.

      Also, I saw on your blog you were at Boston Comicon. I didn't attend this year, but I live about 45min out of Boston. :)

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    3. I tried it out when it first launched and it was too buggy for me, but it's no doubt improved. It wouldn't take much adaptation I imagine, except for the measuring stick thing. But as long as there are maps, "models" and stats, I don't see how it could be an issue.

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    4. the distance is easily solved with your square rule, also it has hexes so you could use that rule too. I personally prefer squares on roll20 because it grids nicely, and I can do better map work that way.

      Anyway, let me know if you want to give it a shot. Again, really nice work.

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  2. Thanks for sharing your work! Quapitaine Quebec

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  3. Currently I have been using your dungeon crawls rules and found one minor change and one addition:

    1.) Mystic Runes, 6, I would rather use Pentacles from SGD. I randomly generate dungeons as I go and it works better that way.
    2.) After The Battle, I would add another category under Spending Gold, Introducing A New Model, gold cost would be 3/2 point cost

    That's the only changes I've made so far.

    Best regards.

    P.S. I added the SGD p17 reference to the Treasure table under Exploration.

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    1. I'm glad you are enjoying the rules. Obviously if something works better for you, change it! That's what this hobby is all about.

      1) I can see where generating the dungeon randomly could make teleporting difficult. Personally I avoided using pentacles because I found them a little boring. They pretty much just create an area of non-movement for a random class of creature that has very little chance of actually being in the room. Might I suggest instead of teleporting a random direction that the model reappears D3 turns later in the middle of a randomly determined room that has already been explored? Or possibly even the dungeon entrance?

      2) I had left out adding new permanent models to the party to prevent the party from getting too big, but it is certainly something to consider. I would still leave it as double cost like resurrection to discourage too much expansion.

      As for the page reference, I can see why you would add it. I accidentally left it out because I had been toying with making up a set of new magic item tables with new items. That idea has not been completely abandoned. ;)

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  4. Hello, I've translated your great DDD rules into Spanish. My intention is to upload them in the files section of the FB SOBH Group and in to my humble blog (http://lacriptadelocris.blogspot.com/). But first of all, I only would do it if I have your consent. If you like, I can send you a copy if you want to see the document (plain text). Thank you for the well work done.

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    1. That's great! I'm glad people are enjoying my rules! As long as they are free And credited as my work you can certainly translate and distribute my rules.

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    2. Here's the blog entry with the translation. Thank you very much!

      https://lacriptadelocris.blogspot.com/2018/12/deep-dark-dungeons-traducido-al-espanol.html

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  6. Good magic items! Thank you for sharing!

    I've translated v1.2 in to Spanish here (all credits for you):
    https://lacriptadelocris.blogspot.com/2019/01/deep-dark-dungeons-v12-en-espanol.html

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  7. Hi man! I've updated the Spanish translation to v1.2.1. Here it is:

    https://lacriptadelocris.blogspot.com/2019/10/deep-dark-dungeons-version-121.html

    Thank you!

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  8. I still play this occasionally and plan on playing it with my son when he gets a little older. Best fan-made expansion ever! Hope you're doing and enjoying the holidays. :)

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    1. It makes me really glad to know people are still using this!

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  9. Glad to find this, may adapt it for Sellswords & Spellslingers, as Ganesha has not added a dungeon crawl yet. They've been so successful with 4AD, which I enjoy, but I want more detail for combat with minis. Thanks!

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