Adventure Environments - Dungeon Master's Guide (2014)

Adventure Environments. Many D&D adventures revolve around a dungeon setting. Dungeons in D&D include great halls and tombs, subterranean monster lairs, labyrinths riddled with death traps, natural caverns extending for miles beneath the surface of the world, and ruined castles. Not every adventure takes place in a dungeon. A wilderness trek across the Desert of Desolation or a harrowing journey into the jungles of the Isle of Dread can be an exciting adventure in its own right. In the great outdoors, dragons wheel across the sky in search of prey, tribes of hobgoblins pour forth from their grim fortresses to wage war against their neighbors, ogres plunder farmsteads for food, and monstrous spiders drop from the web-shrouded canopies of trees. Within a dungeon, adventurers are constrained by walls and doors around them, but in the wilderness, adventurers can travel in almost any direction they please. Therein lies the key difference between dungeon and wilderness: it's much easier to predict where the adventuring party might go in the dungeon because the options are limited-less so in the wilderness. Villages, towns, and cities are cradles of civilization in a dangerous world, but they too offer opportunities for adventure. Encounters with monsters might seem unlikely within a city's walls, but urban settings have their own villains and perils. Evil, after all, takes many forms, and urban settings aren't always the safe havens they seem to be. This chapter provides an overview of these three environments plus a few unusual environments, taking you through the process of creating an adventure location, with plenty of random tables to inspire you. Dungeons Some dungeons are old strongholds abandoned by the folk who built them. Others are natural caves or weird lairs carved out by foul monsters. They attract evil cults, monster tribes, and reclusive creatures. Dungeons are also home to ancient treasures: coins, gems, magic items, and other valuables hidden away in t...