[Dungeon Fantasy] Area Knowledge: What does it do?

[Refplace]

Originally Posted by sir_pudding

You csn have maps of places from before they were abandoned and partial maps from incomplete expeditions.

Yes, but maps are not as broad or comprehensive as the Area Knowledge skill.

[sir_pudding]

Originally Posted by Refplace

Yes, but maps are not as broad or comprehensive as the Area Knowledge skill.

They are for the scholar's Book-Learned Wisdom.

[Varyon]

Originally Posted by tbone

My take is just this:

If the GM goes with the default DF (and DFRPG) non-setting, where there's just "Town" and "Dungeons" and no particularly detailed lands, countries, etc., then there's no real use for Area Knowledge.

If the GM does flesh out the world with named cities and lands and countries and physical features and all that, then there's a use for Area Knowledge.

There's also a third option - the GM doesn't bother to flesh out much of anything, unless someone uses Area Knowledge. In my example above, the GM may have just decided to have the characters wander around for a bit looking for the caravan and then track some generic goblins to a generic goblin camp and raid it... but because a PC opted to use Area Knowledge, the GM decides to come up with a specific description of the area where the caravan was attacked and lets the party get there faster than initially intended. Another use of Area Knowledge to see if there's anything important to note about these goblins means the GM decides to flesh them out - the goblin tribes of this area sacrifice victims at the new moon (and so now the GM decides when the next new moon is - maybe soon so the party needs to hurry, or far away so they have time to plan), but this also means they favor taking captives over slaughtering outright, which means a better reward for the party. Or maybe these goblins are weaker than usual but use a mild paralytic (reduces DX) to even the odds, and knowing this means the party druid can create an antitoxin for the party members to consume before the battle (resulting in an easier fight than against standard goblins). Yet another use of Area Knowledge to see if there's any exploitable terrain near the goblin camp creates said exploitable terrain - now the GM decides that, sure, there's a cave they could retreat to to reduce the goblin's numerical advantage, or a river they could use to expedite an escape, so now the party doesn't have to take on an entire goblin camp at once.

This approach requires a GM who is good at improvising, however.

[mburr0003]

Originally Posted by Refplace

Yeah Area Knowledge for a dungeon seems kind of superfluous.

Unless it's a mega-dungeon the PCs continuously return to. See also any other flavor of hex-crawl (for me the terms 'mega-dungeon' and 'hex-crawl' are largely synonymous).

Originally Posted by Pursuivant

AK ... should be a complementary skill for ...

And that's how I use it, a Complimentary Skill for 'x'.

Useful solely to go alongside some other skill to 'find stuff', be that a person, place, or thing. Also as a bonus to History to "know the history of the area covered by the Area Knowledge".

Sometimes it's more or less useful, but those situations are, well, situational.

[Michael Thayne]

Originally Posted by mburr0003

Unless it's a mega-dungeon the PCs continuously return to. See also any other flavor of hex-crawl (for me the terms 'mega-dungeon' and 'hex-crawl' are largely synonymous).

Are you thinking of "mega-dungeon" as in a massive complex that extends over many miles, or something small enough to map the entire thing out on the scale of feet, yards, or meters. Normally I would call the former a hexcrawl, and have seen "super-dungeon" proposed for when the entire thing is underground. It's only the latter—i.e. huge dungeons in the style of the original Castle Blackmoor or Castle Greyhawk—that I'd call a "mega-dungeon". If I want a generic term to cover both scales I might use "sandbox".

[mburr0003]

Originally Posted by Michael Thayne

Are you thinking of "mega-dungeon" as in a massive complex that extends over many miles, or something small enough to map the entire thing out on the scale of feet, yards, or meters.

Yes.

Or more to the point, in my definition, a mega-dungeon is a hexcrawl that has slightly more rigidly confined space. I only use the terms separately when one of them is meant to be an "internal complex" (be it underground, a domed city, space station, etc) and the other is meant to be 'more wilderness within a specific set of borders'.

It's only the latter—i.e. huge dungeons in the style of the original Castle Blackmoor or Castle Greyhawk—that I'd call a "mega-dungeon". If I want a generic term to cover both scales I might use "sandbox".

To me 'sandbox' represents more freedom than a 'megadungeon' or a 'marches/hexcrawl' is meant to afford... in a sandbox the PCs are afforded allowance to "leave the map", whereas if I'm aiming to run a mega/hexcrawl' it's very much "please stay within the confines of the map".

Of course if the map is big enough, then yes, sandbox is a perfectly valid definition.

I'm not sure how big "Blackmoor"* was, or rather how much 'non-dungeon stuff' it had inherent within it's boundaries, but for me the step from "megadungeon" to "sandbox" might just be something along the lines of Peter del'Orto's Felltower, as that has three large 'megadungeon/hexcrawl' areas within it (Felltower, Swampsedge, the Lost City or Da'bu) as well as a handful of smaller areas (Caves of Chaos, several gate adventure zones).

Granted as Peter is keeping strictly to the DF/RPG principle of "handwaved townsville" that's the only thing keeping me from just calling it a sandbox. But if I were running it, it would be (I don't keep with DF/RPG's 'handwave away town and society').


* Castle Greyhawk as I remember it was a megadungeon.