You liked that map huh?
Why pointcrawl dungeons are great.
This article contains affiliate links, meaning I get a commission if you make purchases using these links, at no cost to you.I put one of my dungeon ‘maps’ up on the OSR subreddit. There were a few questions, so I’m going to address them in three chunks. This week I’ll talk about why I like pointcrawl dungeons, next week how I make them (here), then after that how I run them (here).
Here’s the map in question.
If you’re wondering how I made this, I used Affinity Designer with this drawing tablet, though I really need to upgrade to something like this, and prefer to use a Cintiq when I can access one. A lot of the time though I just wack out the iso-paper, where I draw with Faber-Castell Pitt Pens.
The Lay of the Land/Dungeon
Pointcrawls are often used for overland travel. Take this example from A Fistful of Feathers (which is free), one of my favourite Cairn adventures. It’s a network of locations and travel times between them.
For dungeon maps, this is less common. Here’s a traditional example from Dyson Logos (it’s a very concrete representation of the space):
There are examples of pointcrawl dungeons in print though.
Mothership’s Gradient Descent:
Which as you can see is quite large.
In these examples, the dungeon is represented as an abstract ‘network’, rather than as a concrete illustration. ~Both the examples are from work by Luke Gearing. I might worship his work a tiny bit~
I’ve used this approach in some of my own work - Void Above and Written in Blood.
This format enables GMs to have a concise overview of a large industrial facility.
This one lacks connections, but uses the idea mapped onto a thematic illustration.
Why I’ve got a thing for pointcrawl dungeons
Flexibility: I don’t think about specific distances, I’m too improvisational for that! Having this kind of diagram liberates me from being locked into a specific layout.
Blank canvas: I like improvising the details of a space. A box with a number means everything is mine to determine.
Connections: This approach means I focus on making the links between spaces interesting.
Reuseable: I can reskin this pointcrawl. I’m not locked into a thematic illustration. This can become a research facility for a sci-fi game.
More imagination: I find players are more creative when I take away visual aids. They think outside the box because there’s no box to begin with.
Easy production: I don’t need to be an artist to produce these, and they are quick to make. I can draw a small one on paper in 5 minutes if needed.
Prep Level Agnostic
Another draw of pointcrawl dungeons is that the level of prep required is more flexible.
With a concrete illustration, you have to decide things like corridor lengths, room sizes, maybe even a consistent level of detail in the rooms. You also can’t change these on the fly so easily. With a pointcrawl, you can reshape the space with little work. ~Which is great if you are adaptive and improvisational like me~
In theory, using a pointcrawl dungeon means you can rock up to the session with just the pointcrawl and improvise the rest. How much you want to prep is up to you.
If you are looking for a nice notebook to draw pointcrawls in check out my hexbooks, notebooks designed for GMs running hexcrawls and mapping dungeons.
Another milestone this week. Last week we celebrated our Kickstarter Void Above making it to physical retail. This week we welcomed our 100th subscriber in less than 2 months of newsletters! A massive thank you to everyone who has subbed to MurkMail, you are wonderful. Don’t forget to tell your friends about us ;)
Recommendations
Podcast: Between Two Cairns reviewed X1: The Isle of Dread. I’m enjoying breakdowns of modules written some time ago, and seeing what they can teach me that has perhaps been lost among my own generation of players.
Blog: The Motley Fool gives us the rundown on legal trials in medieval England. This is great if you want to add some verisimilitude to a grounded Anglo-medieval game.
Word: “verisimilitude” - the appearance of being true or real. Matt Colville likes this word, it’s one of my favorites. It’s a more specific term than immersion. To me, it’s more about the idea of believability, rather than simply being engrossing. It’s about something feeling real, a feeling that I think is invaluable when playing TTRPGs. ~The editor made me write this~
Book: Exeunt Press released a neat set of dice games to include in Mork Borg. When I get round to running a Mork Borg sandbox, I’ll be using this for some extra flavour.
this is also how every ttrpg for solo playing should be designed, so you dont know shit about the room until your inside of it
isometric point crawl dungeons are just so stylish and sleek, plus they tend to leave room for your own notes instead of covering the page with cross hatching