Exploding the Encounter Die
The overloaded encounter die is perhaps the most useful tool for running a dungeon crawl. It is quick, simple and hefts considerable mechanical weight with ease. If you haven’t already read the original article, Necopraxis has developed it further into a useful tool for town, wilderness and combat turns. For a brief summary, the overloaded encounter die checks for random encounters, the expiration of light sources and other effects of traversing a dungeon with a single d6 roll. This method uses randomness to simulate a timer. That is the merit of “overloading” the encounter die, but what about exploding it?
I use an exploding, overloaded encounter die (the Alarm Die) to simulate the dungeon reacting against the player-characters’ intrusion and to provide a risk vs. reward tradeoff. It was initially inspired by the idea of Alarm Dice over at The Yak-Men Cometh, where the player-characters accumulate a pool of dice that lead to tougher encounters and more valuable treasures. My main innovation is replacing the dice pool with an encounter die that increases in size, like a Usage Die from The Black Hack in reverse. I’ll walk you through how it works and hold of on the whys and wherefores until after.
The Alarm Die
The referee tracks time spent exploring dungeons in hours and rolls the Alarm Die every hour. Exploring an important area of the dungeon takes an hour. A short rest in a safe area of a dungeon takes an hour. Two to six shorter activities combine to take an hour. The player-characters must rest for every six consecutive hours of dungeon exploration. At the end of each hour, the referee rolls the Alarm Die.
| Alarm Die | Result |
|---|---|
| 1 | Nothing Happens |
| 2 | Duration |
| 3 | Omen - Table I |
| 4 | Encounter - Table I |
| 5 | Duration |
| 6 | Omen - Table II |
| 7 | Treasure |
| 8 | Encounter - Table II |
| 9 | Duration |
| 10 | Omen - Table III |
| 11 | Treasure |
| 12 | Encounter - Table III |
| 13 | Duration |
| 14 | Omen - Table IV |
| 15 | Encounter - Table IV |
| 16 | Treasure |
| 17 | Duration |
| 18 | Omen - Table IV |
| 19 | Encounter - Table IV |
| 20 | Treasure |
“Duration” means player-characters mark Duration for all of their active effects with a Duration (e.g., light sources or spells). [If your system of choice doesn’t use duration, mark a use for the light sources or distinguish a random light source.]
“Encounter” means player-characters have a random encounter. Roll on the indicated encounter table. [I will explain what “Table I” etc. mean below]
“Omen” means player-characters notice evidence of a nearby encounter (e.g., tracks, spoor, a trail of blood). Roll on the indicated encounter table to inspire the clue.
“Treasure” means the party increases its Treasure Die by one step or gains a d4 Treasure Die if it has no Treasure Dice except for d20 Treasure Dice. [I will also explain Treasure Die below; it is integral to this risk-reward trade-off.]
The Alarm Die represents the dungeon reacting to the invading presence of the player-characters. The larger the Alarm Die, the tougher the encounters but the likelier the player-characters are to find treasure. The Alarm Die begins at d4. As the party delves deeper into the dungeon, the Alarm Die increases as follows:
d4 → d8 → d12 → d20*
(*Note that this skips d6 and d10. This is just for probability reasons - the common denominator of 4 keeps the odds of Encounters, Durations and Clues stable).
The Alarm Die cannot be increased above d20 or below d4.
The Alarm Die increases by one step when the player-characters:
Activate machines
Solve problems violently
Enter a new zone or level of the dungeon
Raise the stakes in any other way
The Alarm Die decreases by two steps when the player-characters rest in the dungeon. It resets to d4 if they leave the dungeon.
Dungeon Encounters
The ascending encounter tables represent the dungeon’s gradation of danger. Each dungeon should have four random encounter tables (I - IV). Each table includes several common results for that zone of the dungeon, a few uncommon results and one strange or especially dangerous result. I typically have three results for each table with one result being 3/6 likely to occur, one being 2/6 likely and the third 1/6 likely, but there is really no limit here (except your free time). In The Waking of Willowby Hall by Ben Milton, there are three tables representing the dungeon “awaking” over the course of the adventure, and each table has 20 results (with some results appearing on multiple tables). Restock the tables after encounters to keep the dungeon fresh as it’s explored. The following tables are examples, each table representing a deeper zone in the same dungeon.
| 1d6 | Encounter Table I | Encounter Table II | Encounter Table III | Encounter Table IV |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 1d6 emaciated dwarves scrubbing orcish graffiti | 1d4 troglodytes offering raw meat to a caged bear | 1d4 orc sentries grumbling about their ogre of a boss | Forbidden orc and dwarf lovers fleeing their families |
| 2 | 1d6 dwarven smiths busy with a clandestine project | 1d6 troglodytes dragging a fresh orc corpse with glee | 1d6 orc archers repairing a bridge across a chasm | An ooze appearing as a puddle of putrid water |
| 3 | Glowing runes animating 1d8+1 dwarven skeletons | A swarm of bats, blood dripping from their fangs | 1d8 exhausted orc raiders carrying a wounded ally | A pile of bones knitting itself into 2d8 orc skeletons |
| 4 | An animated dining set restlessly rearranging itself | A giant lizard struggling against its rusted chains | An orc shaman adding ingredients to a fresh stew | A giant worm whose face peels to reveal pincers |
| 5 | A dwarven sentry guarding a pensive dwarven despot | A wise troglodyte sorcerer admiring their treasure | A swarm of dire mosquitos buzzing about a corpse | A wraith of a dwarven mage racked with crippling guilt |
| 6 | A demon planning to trick outsiders into freeing it | A sentient stalagmite with tentacles, teeth, and one eye | An ogre warlord playing fetch with 1d6 dire wolves | A black dragon stealthily swimming in an inky lake |
I based these on the first published module I ever ran. Can you guess it from these results?
Treasure Dice
In dungeons, the party generates Treasure Dice which the party can spend when the player-characters discover treasure troves. Each time the Alarm Die results in “Treasure”, the party either gains a d4 Treasure Die or increases its largest, non-d20 Treasure Die by one step, as follows:
d4 → d6 → d8 → d10 → d12 → d20
When the player-characters discover treasure in the dungeon, they may choose to roll accumulated Treasure Dice on treasure tables of their choice and obtain the result. Such treasure is in addition to any other treasure they find stocked in the dungeon, just like random encounters are in addition to the hard-keyed monsters in the dungeon. Treasure is the collective property of the party and the players must decide together how to divvy it up (if such divvying is even desirable).
The Treasure Dice system blends player-choice and randomness in doling out treasure. By default, I have separate treasure tables for Armor, Books & Maps, Melee Weapons, Ranged Weapons, Valuables and Vehicle Modifications, but I usually have a dungeon-specific treasure table for individual dungeons. Each of these tables have 20 (or more) results, starting out as close to worthless (e.g., the “1” result is “Heavy Rock” for Melee Weapons, “Smooth Rock” for Ranged Weapons and “Shiny Rock” for Valuables) but ranges to highly valuable and magical artifacts toward the “20” end of the spectrum. If you are familiar with Macchiato Monsters, it is similar to the starting equipment tables in that system. Except for the dungeon-specific treasure table, the players have access to these tables. This gives some agency for the players to pick what treasure they find. For instance, if they really want a Laser Sword, maybe they will use the d20 Treasure Die on the Melee Weapons table. But it doesn’t guarantee them what they seek. Even a d20 can result in a 1, leaving players feeling like Charlie Brown on Halloween. This gambling aspect is usually fun for players in a way that either selecting treasure or having fully random treasure does not provide. Though for the dungeon-specific tables, it is closer to random. It feels more like a mystery box, the “Door Number 3” of treasure tables. And because the standard tables are available for any dungeon, the dungeon-specific table is usually too tempting to pass up. The Treasure Die can be an optional feature of almost any dungeon-crawler-type game, but it is useful in tempering the whims of the referee in treasure distribution. This is particularly important for Prismatic Wasteland, which uses an abstract Wealth system (a controversial discussion for another day), with treasure in dungeons as the most consistent method of making money for itinerant adventurers.
Why To Explode the Overloaded Encounter Die
The Alarm Die weighs the risk of tougher encounters with the reward of increased chances of treasure. The chances of encounters are stable at 25% no matter the size of the Alarm Die, but larger Alarm Dice increase the likelihood that such encounters are against deadlier denizens that dwell deeper in the dungeon. The only Alarm Die results that changes as the Alarm Die is increased are the chances of nothing happening or the party increasing their Treasure Die. At a d4 Alarm Die, there is no chance for a Treasure Die. At a d20 Alarm Die, this chance has swelled to 20% (reducing the odds of nothing happening from 25% at d4 to 5% at d20). Treasure-hungry adventurers want to stay at the highest Alarm Die possible, so they will push all the glowing red buttons, recklessly solve problems with violence (a tougher proposition when rolling on the harder encounter table) and rest only when necessary. A more cautious party can rest often as they skulk about and will therefore face less challenging encounters but will also receive fewer results of treasure. Many dungeons are designed to reflect this kind of tradeoff, but the Alarm Die does it automatically.
