Comments on: In-Play: Dungeon Delves

By: AlioTheFool

AlioTheFool — Fri, 11 Sep 2009 10:31:56 +0000

There is a hardcover book titled Dungeon Delve from WotC that has individual delves spanning the entire range of levels from 1-30. It also looks like another is being planned (at least according to a thread on the Wizards site a few days back. I don’t have that thread link handy though.)

Delves are definitely fun. Not all the time, but for a nice bang-bang change of pace.

By: Jeremy Southard

Jeremy Southard — Tue, 08 Sep 2009 17:23:53 +0000

I used the WotC Dungeon Delves book for a few of my campaign’s encounters. I don’t have a problem rewarding XP for them as long as it doesn’t effect the overall storyline. If one or more of my players mention something about vampires (“ugh…my gf is in LOVE with Twilight”), then the next time they show up in a town, they may find Dungeon Delve #10 – “A nest of vampires has claimed a dark forest and the surrounding human towns as its domain. Some of the local residents revere the vampires and serve as daylight guardians and spies. However, most of the townsfolk live in a state of dread. Those townsfolk have finally scavenged enough valuables to hire a band of adventurers to destroy the nest.”

Sure, I lost a session of storytelling that goes towards the campaign, but as shod on tuesdays said, it gives me an excuse to play with monsters I may not normally use and everyone still has fun. Besides, it shows your campaign world is much bigger than just the places and people you make up for the party to interact with. And who knows…there may be items, npcs or experiences that come out of that session that spark ideas for other content in the campaign. Suppose the head vampire gets away in the end and goes to work for the main villain of the story, or one of the PCs is bitten and begins to have vampiric tendencies that the party has to deal with for the rest of the campaign. Suddenly they have to make arrangements to travel if it is during the day and they have to find the party member a source for blood so he/she doesn’t go crazy and turn on the party. Anything is possible.

By: JackOfHearts

JackOfHearts — Tue, 08 Sep 2009 03:19:59 +0000

I thought about giving out xp for my ongoing campaign for the dungeon delve but didn’t do it. I like the idea of giving out a group action point based on how well they do using the point system.

By: Asmor

Asmor — Mon, 07 Sep 2009 23:45:29 +0000

Here’s the bit on my DDI tiddlywiki for dungeon delves published in dungeon… There’re only 3 at the moment.

http://asmor.com/tw/ddi.html#Delves

By: Exedore6

Exedore6 — Mon, 07 Sep 2009 20:15:35 +0000

This sounds different from the old Dungeon Delve format that WotC used as an organized play event (and the book by the same title) which was 3 encounters, no time limit, designed to be played competitivley (as in the DM trying to kill the PC’s). They didn’t make the official ones available to DM’s that weren’t running an event in public. They put the program on hold last June, promising on a new format. I think it intends on being the D&D equivalent to Friday Night Magic. Hopefully there’ll be some support for home players as it works well for the “I want a tacical mini’s game, but I don’t want to buy a new game” crowd, the ones that miss DDM.

By: Argent

Argent — Mon, 07 Sep 2009 19:06:18 +0000

I haven’t had the chance to try anything like this but I have to say the reports from those that played in the numerous Delves at Gencon have really wetted my appetite to try this out. I’m even considering dropping the odd timed encounter into my existing campaign to challenge my players just that little bit more.

I bought the Dungeon Delve book from WotC and it made great reading with 3 encounters per Delve, and a Delve for every level from 1 to 30. Its a great resource even if you just plunder it for ideas.

By: shod on tuesdays

shod on tuesdays — Mon, 07 Sep 2009 16:23:58 +0000

This sounds like exactly the sort of thing my current group needs to learn how to play 4E more efficiently; we’re still relatively new to the system and our combats tend to get bogged down in rules confusion and out of character rambling. Plus it would give me an excuse to play with monsters I wouldn’t otherwise be throwing their way.

I wonder what a good use of the delve rewards system would be outside of a con experience. If the 1-4 points had some benefit to the group, it would provide incentive beyond the thrill of victory (if such an incentive is needed).

I hesitate to reward actual campaign xp for a successful delve, but… Perhaps the points earned could be a separate pool of action points that are available to the whole party to spend during our campaign?