An Oxford comma (or serial comma) refers to a comma placed before a conjunction (such as or, and, or but) in a list of three or more items.

“apples, oranges, and pears” (Oxford comma)

vs.

“apples, oranges and pears” (no Oxford comma)

When I was in elementary school we were taught that you should never use an Oxford comma. (Although we weren’t told that was the term for it.) At the time I didn’t think that made much sense because it’s far too trivial to come up with scenarios in which the lack of an Oxford comma would render a construction illogical:

“apples and oranges, left and right, and up and down”

vs,

“apples and oranges, left and right and up and down”

This is often taught as the “exception that proves the rule”. But here’s an example from Contested Will:

“Louis Benezet, an English professor at Dartmouth College, published the first of many Oxfordian volumes, Shakspere, Shakespeare and de Vere.”

Should the be understood as Shakspere, Shakespeare, and de Vere? (Implying an equality between the three names.) Or should it be understood as Shakspere: Shakespeare and de Vere? (In other words, with the latter clause being a subtitle.) Or could it be Shakspere; Shakespeare and de Vere? (With “Shakespeare and de Vere” being joined as a single unit vs. Shakspere.)

No way to know.

Which is why I maintain you should always use an Oxford comma in order to maximize the clarity of your text.

Go to Part 1

We started with a linear dungeon:

But after xandering the Keep, the result is this:

Note that we haven’t changed the actual key to the adventure: We’ve just restructured the environment in which those encounters are placed.

I’ve also prepped some detail-light maps to make the changes a little clearer. You’ll want to cross-reference with the maps from the original module. (The original Level 2, which is now Level 3, is unchanged, so I didn’t re-map it.)

I’ll take a moment to note that this isn’t the only way we could have done this. Other things we could have done:

• Put a secret door at the bottom of the pit trap in area 1 (leading to one of several possibilities on the second level).
• Have the kruthiks tunnel from area 10 down to area 15.
• Put a teleport in Sir Keegan’s tomb keyed to a matching crypt on the second level.
• One of the prisoners in the torture chamber dug a hidden escape tunnel leading to area 6 (where he was killed by zombies, the poor bastard).
• Could there be a connection between the pool in area 11 and the water-based trap in area 16?
• Could the access to area 15 north of area 16 be a secret door, with a more obvious entrance leading from area 17 (allowing meticulous PCs to potentially bypass the trap)?

The particular revisions I’ve made simply struck me as either the most interesting or the most appropriate or both.

But the point of performing this revision on Keep of the Shadowfell is not only to salvage another aspect of this adventure. My primary goal is to demonstrate how easy it is to implement these techniques in your own dungeons. If we can take an existing, linear dungeon and fundamentally transform it in just a couple of minutes using a handful of xandering techniques, then the effect can be even more dramatic if we were to design a dungeon from the ground-up using those techniques.

Here’s a quote from a recent interview with Jennell Jaquays over on Grognardia:

The core inspirations for Caverns of Thracia were threefold. The first was to ally the various “beast” races of AD&D as a unified force. The second was to build encounters that took place in multiple levels of a cave, where the open upper areas were situated above open lower areas. The final inspiration (that I remember) was the rather primitive, but unique plate armor used by Mycenaean soldiers. These became the human guards of the upper reaches of the Caverns.

Of particular interest here is Jaquay’s second inspiration: I can personally testify to the effectiveness of these open caverns in transforming the typical dungeoncrawling experience. They immediately force the players to think in three dimensions, while their ubiquity significantly contributes to the memorable layout of the dungeon.

But the important revelation to be had here, in my opinion, is the effectiveness of clearly delineating a small list of concrete creative goals before beginning your dungeon design.

Building on that point, notice that Jaquays only specifies a single non-linear design technique in her list of creative goals. (And it’s actually a very specific variation of a generalized technique.) And although that is not the only non-linear technique employed in the Caverns of Thracia, Jaquays’ riffs on that theme are a definitive aspect of the module.

Here’s my point: Earlier in this series, I listed a dozen xandering techniques. Next time you’re designing a dungeon, don’t feel like you need to cram ‘em all in there. Instead, pick one of them and try to explore it in as many ways as possible while you’re designing the dungeon. (If you want a more focused experience, follow Jaquays’ example and try to narrow your design theme down to a specific variant of one technique – just like multi-level caverns are a specific form of unusual level connectors.)

Xandering your dungeon is easy. It’s also fun. And this applies to both the designing of the dungeon and the playing of the dungeon. Nothing is more exciting for me as a GM than to sit down at the table and know that I’m going to be just as surprised by my players as I hope that my players will be by me.

And when it comes to dungeon design, that’s the unique and exciting experience that xandering unlocks.

ADDITIONAL READING
Addendum: Dungeon Level Connections
Addendum: Xandering on the Small Scale
Addendum: How to Use a Melan Diagram
Dark Tower: Level Connections

Go to Part 1

This is the complete map of the Keep of the Shadowfell, taken from the adventure of the same name. (The red arrow indicates the dungeon’s entrance. The black arrow indicates the connection between Level 1 and Level 2 of the dungeon.) At first glance, this dungeon may appear quite complex and interesting: There are lots of twisting corridors, and the PCs appear to be given an immediate and meaningful choice of three separate corridors upon entering the dungeon.

But as I mentioned earlier, when you straighten out all of those twisting corridors the overwhelmingly linear structure of the dungeon becomes quite clear:

The only legitimately interesting feature of this dungeon, from a cartographical standpoint, is the loop of encounters in areas 1 thru 4. Everything else in the dungeon has been designed to proceed in an essentially predetermined fashion: The DM sets up the encounters, the PCs knock them down, and then the DM sets up the next encounter.

What I’m going to do is take a few simple xandering techniques and use them to tweak the Keep of the Shadowfell in order to make it a more dynamic and interesting dungeon. By changing the macro-structure of the dungeon, we’ll be able to unlock the full potential of the “local interest” in the map (all those twisting corridors and mini-loops) and the encounters themselves.

To do this, I’m going to suggest making four slight adjustments to the dungeon’s design.

SECOND ENTRANCE: As described in my original remix of Keep on the Shadowfell, add a second entrance to the dungeon. About a half mile to the west of the keep, up in the foothills of the Cairngorms, there’s a natural cave that leads, more or less directly, to area 10 of the Keep.

(This is how the kruthiks and rats got into areas 9 and 10. As described in the remix PDF, the PCs can discover this entrance either by scouting the area around the Keep or by researching it in Lord Padraig’s library in Winterhaven. If this entrance is found before the PCs enter the Keep, it’s a nice reward for their cleverness and preparation. If it’s found during their explorations of the Keep, it can provide a valuable avenue of escape or allow them to sneak back into the complex after a guard has been raised at the primary entrance.)

ADDING A STAIRCASE: Add a staircase leading from the Torture Room (area 2) to the antechamber of Sir Keegan’s tomb (area 7).

(My primary motivation here is to remove some of the dead ends from the dungeon. By linking two of the dead ends together, I’m creating a dynamic loop. Note, however, that I’m actually linking the loop in just before the actual dead end of Sir Keegan’s tomb in area 8. This is partly due to the internal logic of the adventure – it doesn’t make any sense for a hallway to pass straight through Keegan’s tomb – but it’s also practical in terms of design: By leaving the branch into area 8 intact, we’re providing a flavorful navigational choice to PCs entering area 7.)

ADDING A SECRET PASSAGE: Add a secret passage leading from area 6 to area 15.

(This provides a second connection to the lower level, providing the dungeon with important multiple connections between levels. By properly positioning these connections, we can turn entire dungeon levels into looping structures.)

MOVING A STAIRCASE: Move the staircase leading to area 12 from area 5 to area 3.

(The primary reason for this shift is to open up some real estate between the primary and secondary routes leading to the lower level. Admittedly, this is a problem that only exists because of where I chose to put the secret passage. But this also allows the goblins to reach the lower levels without passing through undead-infested halls, thus correcting a problem with the original dungeon’s design. And by hooking a level connector into the far end of the adventure’s original loop we’re layering the complexity of the dungeon’s cartography.)

Finally, in order to make these changes fit into a natural, logical geography, I’ve simply inverted the entirety of areas 6 thru 8. With this change, these areas, which were originally a minor elevation shift requiring the PCs to descend a staircase from area 1, become a true “second level” to the complex, passing directly beneath areas of the first level:

(Level 1 is highlighted in red. The “new” Level 2 is highlighted in blue. And Level 3, the original second level, is now highlighted in green.)

Next: Xandering for Fun and Profit

You’ll frequently hear authors and IP companies bitching and moaning about the fact that they don’t see a penny when their copyrighted material is sold on the used market. Even otherwise fairly intelligent folks like Isaac Asimov have irrationally believed that people buying used paperbacks were sticking daggers in their backs.

Even if we ignore the ethically tenuous position of people who want to sell you a toaster and then prohibit you from ever selling that toaster to somebody else (which a few weeks ago I would have considered hyperbole, but then the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals decided it would be a good idea to gut consumer protection and ship American jobs overseas all in one fell swoop), the claim being espoused here is fundamentally nonsensical.

What they’re overlooking (either willfully or ignorantly), is the actual effect that being able to sell used books has on the original customer’s buying habits:

First, it influences their decision to buy. (“I’m willing to pay $50 for this textbook, but only because I know I can sell it back for $15 at the end of the semester.”) If they weren’t able to recoup a portion of their investment, they might never buy it in the first place.

Second, it amortizes risk. (“I dunno if this DVD is worth $20. But I guess if I don’t like it, I’ll be able to sell it for at least $8. $12 isn’t that much of a risk.”) Customers who can amortize their risk are more likely to buy. And if the product turns out to be good, they may not resell at all.

Finally, it injects fresh capital: The $10 you get from GameStop for your video game is often going right back into purchasing a brand new game at GameStop.

This effect is somewhat diffused and may, therefore, not be clear when it comes to books or DVDs or video games. But it’s crystal clear when you look at the auto industry: X buys a $30,000 car from Ford. X sells it a couple years later to Y for $10,000 and uses that money to buy another $30,000 car. A couple years later X sells his new $30,000 car to Y for $10,000, while Y sells the original car to Z for $2,000.

Holy shit! Ford has lost all that money spent by Y and Z! X is ripping Ford off! … right?

Nope. Because (a) X couldn’t afford to buy a $30,000 car every two years if he wasn’t selling to Y; and neither Y nor Z can afford $30,000 new cars. The money from Y and Z is, in fact, funneling right up the system and into Ford’s pocket. And everybody wins: Ford makes more money. X gets fancy new cars on a more frequent basis. Y and Z get cars they otherwise couldn’t afford.

This is why nobody in the auto industry makes a new car that they can sell for $5,000 despite the obvious market for $5,000 vehicles.. They’re already getting the money from the $5,000 market.

Go to Part 1

There is a temptation to think of the complexity arising from the Xandering Techniques as being inherently chaotic – a “funhouse dungeon” that doesn’t make any logical sense. But while that certainly can be true, the reality is that these techniques actually result in more realistic designs.

For example, consider the layout of my house. Ignoring windows (which effectively turn every room in the house into a potential point of entry), the Melan diagram looks like this:

I (tragically) don’t have much in the way of secret paths, sub-levels, or non-Euclidean spaces, but even in this simple structure we can see multiple midpoint entries and looping paths. I think if you take a moment to consider the architecture of the world around you, you’ll discover that linear paths are the exception and not the rule.

And yet how often do we see a D&D module featuring a giant mansion without any windows? (Because if there were windows, the PCs would be able to break through them and ruin the DM’s carefully orchestrated railroad.)

Nor is this effect limited to man-made structures. Consider, for example, this map of Robber Baron Cave, complete with hidden passages (click for a larger image):

It’s complex to the point of being virtually ungameable. (Although I take that as a challenge even as I type it.)

SIZE: My decidedly non-palatial house also makes the point that dungeons don’t have to be large in order to take advantage of xandering. For example, the map I designed for Darkwoods’ Secret only featured a dozen locations, but the flow of the dungeon looks like this:

This smaller scale actually highlights the gameplay impact of non-linear dungeon designs. It becomes very easy to see the many different ways in which the dungeon can be played: Can certain dangers be avoided? Will the PCs or the monsters determine the field of engagement? Where will reinforcements be coming from? What viable lines of defense can be held?

BEWARE THE SPRAWL: None of this, however, is to say that you should never use branching paths or create chokepoints for accessing the lower levels of the dungeon. (Any more than it is to say that every single means of egress should be secret or unusual.) It is merely to say that such features should be used to effect and not simply by default. Variety is the spice of dungeon design, after all.

It’s also important to realize that there really can be too much of a good thing: There is a point at which endless loops and countless connections within the dungeon result in meaningless choice instead of meaningful choice. In xandering your dungeon it’s important to beware this featureless sprawl of ever-looping corridors.

STRUCTURE IN THE DUNGEON: A comprehensive guide to effective dungeon design is beyond the scope of this essay, but there are a couple of useful barometers you can use in the process of xandering.

Difficult vs. Easy: Looking at your map, there should be areas of the dungeon which are difficult to reach and areas which are easy to reach. In saying this, I’m not specifically referring to isolated secret rooms (although there’s nothing wrong with those), but rather with large sections of the dungeon.

In making this assessment you are diagnosing whether you’ve made the dungeon too boring by making the choice of path through the dungeon irrelevant. You want the dungeon to benefit from being interconnected, but if everything in the dungeon trivially connects to everything else then navigation becomes meaningless.

Far vs. Near: Similarly, have the interconnections made your dungeon too shallow? Look at where the PCs will be entering the dungeon. There should be areas of the dungeon which feel far away from these entrances. If everything in the dungeon feels equidistant, break some of those connections or delve a little deeper in your design.

Note that “near” and “easy to reach” portions of the dungeon aren’t problems to be eliminated. What you’re looking for is an effective balance in the mix between all four of these design elements (difficult, easy, far, near).

LANDMARKS: Finally, the complexity of connections within a properly xandered dungeon can also leave the players feeling somewhat adrift. In some cases this can be taken advantage of. In other cases, it’s a problem that needs to be solved.

I started map development by literally copying and pasting a large chunk the Alpha Base ruins into one corner of the map. This established a particularly unique landmark in that corner. These large landmarks in skirmish maps help players immediately know where they are and let them navigate from point to point by in-game visual references. Ideally, each “corner” of any skirmish map is visually unique, and this was my design goal with Terminal Moraine.

Jennell Jaquays – Terminal Moraine Design Notes

Different context, but Jaquays provides the solution once again. In order to successfully navigate a dungeon, the players will need distinct, memorable landmarks to orient themselves.

If you’re designing a dungeon with lots of unique, interesting features, this problem will generally take care of itself: The players will glom on to whatever details particularly resonate with them, and use those details to guide themselves. On the other hand, it can never hurt to do another quick pass on your design and add in a few deliberate landmarks: A large bloodstain. A unique statue. A room of strange runes.

Of course, players may also provide their own landmarks: “Hey, it’s that ogre we killed last week. Awesome.”

On the other hand, you may also be able to use landmarks to mess with your players. Some landmarks could easily disappear. (An ogre’s corpse that gets dragged away by scavengers.) Those unreliable landmarks then open the question of how a missing landmark should be interpreted. (The runes are missing. Does that mean we’re in a different room? Or have the runes vanished?) And some landmarks which might seem unique could easily prove otherwise. (There’s the golden statue of a cyclops in a hexagonal room… but I thought that was on the other side of the complex. Did we get turned around?)

To flip it around one last time, particularly crafty DMs might be able to hide reliable navigation information into seemingly unreliable landmarks.

Next: Xandering the Keep on the Shadowfell