Well, maybe not a megadungeon, but we shall see how big I care to make it. Anyway I want it to have some nods to Arneson's design style. Probably I will make it closer to a traditional BECMI D&D type dungeon when it comes to placing monsters by room, and I am not sure I want to make all the corridors be 90' off the grid, but are there other things a true Arneson dungeon ought to include?

-Havard

Do you have a map/basic setup, already? I'd say, that would be the defining factor, before anything else.

I don't have too much ready to be shared yet and I was hoping for some intial advice before I develop this further. But mainly we will have a Castle and a dungeon below it.

A few things I consider Arneson-style in dungeon design:

1) Dungeon corridors that are not aligned with the grid.
2) Vast hallways leading off into far distant dungeons.
3) Devices from the City of the Gods piled among treasure heaps
4) Secret stairways concealed in pillars.
5) Arneson favorite monsters? Slimes and puddings, Vampires, Dragons, werewolves, Dragons...what else?

Other things that belong on this list?

-Havard

I seriously would do it the other way round - define your necessities, then go from there. Arneson essentially worked on a fixed premise as well (orcs run over a castle from the inside), and built up on that. - As to *dungeon conventions*, I don't really think they exists, personally. :) - Not saying I am not curious to see how this develops, but I wouldn't really know how to start with it.

I think that randomness was a big part of the orignal Arnesonian dungeons, not as much a "master plan" as a "what would be cool here."

I'd look at the Monsters & Treasures Assortment for inspiration. I think that Dave keyed a lot of NPC "monsters" using level names: sorcerer, myrmidon, hero, and so on.

You absolutely need to use Arneson's point based stocking method - it's what he did.



Also NO planted treasures. Use the one of the two treasure tables in the FFC to randomly determine all treasures.

Here is the Loch Gloomin stocking tables reformatted



:lol: