Design a Dungeon Challenge!

Anyone up for DMing? This is a challenge that anyone can join. Rules?

• Design an original dungeon that is relatively short.
  • Estimated length should not exceed two sessions.
    
  • The dungeon must have at least one gimmick OR puzzle.
    • Although the dungeon itself must be original, the gimmick or puzzle can be based off something that already exists.
  • The dungeon must have at least one boss.
    
  • All player levels are allowed, except Level 30+.
    • Part of the reasoning is that I simply don't recommend it, because the requirements for challenging enemy design are much tougher than lower levels.

---

After all of the quests in this contest have finished, I will go through and judge each of them. FYI, I will be judging more on dungeon design than DMing skills, though due to the nature of the game, I can't help but attribute part of the judging towards that. While those with more DMing experience may be at an advantage, if you have a better dungeon design, you're more likely to win.

• A note - anyone that is around for all of the quests, be it player or spectator, is also able to judge.
  
• Anyone will be allowed to simply comment.

---

For entering the contest, you'll get various rewards, depending on the number of people that join...

• 1 Person - One of your characters will get 1 Heart Container, 1 Magic Container, and Rupees equal to your character's level * 40.
  
• 2 People - One of your characters will get 2 Heart Containers, 2 Magic Containers, and Rupees equal to your character's level * 60.
  
• 3 People - One of your characters will get 3 Heart Containers, 3 Magic Containers, and Rupees equal to your character's level * 80.
  
• 4 People - One of your characters will get 4 Heart Containers, 4 Magic Containers, and Rupees equal to your character's level * 100.
  
• Quite frankly, if more than 4 people join, I'll be surprised, but I'll throw in more rewards the more people that join.

The reward for having the best dungeon design is...

• One of your characters gets a second personalized item.
  
• All of your characters gain the benefits from entering the contest instead of just one of your characters.
  • The character that you chose to get the benefits from entering will gain the benefit again.

---

You may start at any time between two and four weeks from now, so if you want to join, post in this thread!

Today on the ZURPG forums, we see a regular user in their natural habitat of browsing the forums. This user happens to come across a contest thread where creativity takes a role. The not-so-ordinary user believed that it would be a good opportunity to enter the contest. One man may not be enough to plan out the most mind-blowing dungeon, but the challenge will certainly be an interesting one.
In case you couldn't tell, I am willing to participate in this contest.

I am willing to participate in this contest. What I have for another improv dungeon will suit this perfectly.

This is of interest to me.

So I've been told by two people that they're willing to design the dungeon, but not DM it. Instead, they'd like me to DM it. Technically, since this is a dungeon design contest, it's viable, but I'm not sure where I stand on it. What I may do is if anyone defers me to DM it, the person will get the entry benefit but cannot get the winner reward, even if it turns out to be the best dungeon.

By the way, regarding that rewards thing, if it somehow goes over 4 people entering...... it'll probably be bonus Rupees, Scrolls, and Reroll Points. I'm not willing to increase the number of Heart and Magic Containers given beyond 4 each, which is already pretty insane.

---

When I posted this, there was a large flaw I ended up overlooking...
The Enemy Database is still horribly out of date, and I'm still not sure when I'll get to it. That said though, if anyone wants to use enemies from the database, just prod me about them so I can give a least a partial update (that is, updating specifically the enemies people wanna use from the database). As for creating enemies, I'll try to get some guides up within the next week, namely design tips. Enemy design will be part of the judging, since it kinda goes hand-in-hand with dungeon design.

And once again, general rule, if you include original items in the dungeon, they must pass through me first. This includes any items on any enemies, due to a chance they may be stolen or dropped.

I am quite interested in this! I may not be as experienced as others here, but I'm very creative (not to mention I've almost completed a whole, big Zelda Classic quest).

I'll be looking forward to seeing those guides! I'm not sure I understand the "size restriction" on dungeons, not having done many, so hopefully the guides will help enlighten me.

A late challenger appears!

Count me in on this. I had an idea for a dungeon out of the blue, so consider my hat to now be in the ring.

Okay, here's a list of theoretically confirmed people joining in.

• Orithan
  • Current DMing the Phantasm Hall Dungeon for the 20s range of characters. Due to shenanigans of the first session, it is likely to last two more sessions. The 20s range will be unavailable until this quest is over.
    
  • Includes Dex, Gurloz, Kirran, Red Enrics, Darte Fellshard, Baegba (APC), and Oliander (APC).
• Darte
  • Once Orithan's quest is over, Darte intends to be yoinking the 20s range of characters. Quite frankly, anyone inexperienced in DMing shouldn't take higher level ranges for their dungeon anyways, so this works out fine.
• Darklink
  • Theoretically set to start 28th-30th weekend. Level range, somewhere around the 10s. Probably the lower 10s.
• DoubleEx
  • Theoretically set to start 21st-23rd weekend. Level range, somewhere around the mid-10s.
• Fireblast124
  • Waiting on response from him regarding what he wants in terms of when to start and what level range.

And Lightwulf has expressed wanting to give it a shot. Given his scheduling, I think I have an idea that'll work out for him.

Just gonna throw it out there, but I might just drop an improv dungeon in when I get the chance. Being as it will be improv, as my last session I DM'd went, expect randomness.

Though if I get the time, I'll properly plan one out and -possibly- get a story to go along with it. We'll see.

Sweet! Hope you get the time to do one; the more, the merrier! FYI, anyone in the dungeon contest, I'm extending the start date to be "until the end of the month". I'm aware that to some extent, that may not be possible due to scheduling conflicts between quests that try to run simultaneously, so if that does prevent your quest from starting before the month is over, I'll try to get you to start the quest within the next week or just ASAP in general.


I'm not sure how many of you are aware of this, but we do have a Guides forum. I know it doesn't have everything, but I'm trying to get more up as soon as I can. 48 hour weeks are currently killing me and kinda preventing me from getting more out, not to mention a backlog of other stuff. Recently, I added guides for Status Effects. The guides cover probably most things you'll need to know about them, unless you're going for something very complex, in which case, design it first, and then prod me about how to fix it up. Up next for guides, I know various people have been wondering, "How do I run multiple enemies?" and stuff like that, so I'll have a guide for that. In terms of quest design-wise, I've got two more guides in the works with regards to the DMing guides. While they are oriented towards the quest design itself, a lot of it is also real-time DMing, so those guides'll should help everyone out a lot. Hopefully, if work gives me some amount of break, I can get those guides up along with getting through a backlog of quest thread updates.