Dungeon! (2012): Huh?

I finally picked up a copy of the Wizards of the Coast re-release of the dungeon crawling classic, Dungeon! and, on closer inspection I have been left wondering, well, huh?

As much as I appreciate Wizards breathing new life into this game and opening it up to a new generation of gamers, without forcing them to trawl E-Bay, a number of the changes that they have made have left me puzzled. Some of which just defy logic.

For example, one of the cosmetic changes that they have made is to include a minotaur, which is great. Minotaurs are a firm favorite of mine. But as a level 1 monster? Really? A minotaur on the same level as goblins and kobolds. Level 2 is only orcs and hobgoblins and, you're telling me they're tougher than minotaurs!? The values that they have assigned to defeat these monsters seems more than a little arbitrary as well.

The other major change (other than a tweak to the way magic swords work) is to the characters. This change is purely cosmetic, meaning that instead of Elves, Heroes, Super Heroes and, Wizards you now have Halfling Rogues (instead of the Elf), Dwarven Clerics (instead of the Hero), Human Fighters (instead of the Super Hero) and, Elven Wizards (instead of the Wizard).

Despite being purely a re-branding of the old characters, I did find it interesting that the introduction of Dwarves, Clerics and, Halflings didn't draw upon the expansions for those very classes released for earlier versions of Dungeon!

So all in all, the new release has raised a lot of questions, for me at least, but I am sure as with the previous versions the fans will set it straight in the long run. I may even have a crack myself. As a start though, some veteran players have released some interesting variants on the Wizards website that are worth a look.

Fighting Fantasy: Luck and Finesse

Fighting Fantasy combat as it stands, suffers from a problem akin to that experienced by many Tunnels and Trolls players before the advent of 7th edition.

The problem was (and still is with Fighting Fantasy in my opinion), that if the two combatants involved in a fight are fairly well balanced in the Skill department then combat itself can become pretty much never ending, with neither participant being able to land a blow and all the excitement that's supposed to come with risking life and limb leaving you feeling rather limp instead.

So what I see as the best solution is to introduce the Spite Damage mechanic from Tunnels and Trolls.

All this means is that every six rolled in combat, inflicts a wound regardless of who wins or loses the round. In addition to this "lucky" damage, when "Testing your Luck" to increase the damage that you have inflicted this round a success doubles the amount, including Spite (rounding up) but, a failed test halves it (rounding down).

Effectively this would mean that you could potentially dish out 8 Stamina damage in one round with a successful Test of Luck and a double six, which I feel is a nice replacement for the Mighty Blow rule that kills an opponent outright on a double six.

Finesse also plays a big part in combat I feel, so I have also added a house rule that inflicts an additional point of damage upon the losing combatant for 3 points of difference there is between the combat totals.

For Example, Dave the Delver (Skill: 10) is locked in combat with Mr Generic Goblin (Skill: 5). From the outset it is clear that the Goblin is outclassed but being slow of wits he chooses to fight for the sake of fighting.

Dave rolls 5,4 for combat whilst the Goblin rolls 6,1.

Dave wins the round 19 to 12, inflicting 2 damage as normal but, also an additional 2 damage for his finesse. So the Goblin is taking a rather nasty 4 damage but, it's not all one-sided.

That 6 rolled by the Goblin inflicts a point of damage upon Dave regardless of the fact that he came out on top in combat.