this post was submitted on 22 Sep 2023
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looking for tips for running exploration (lemm.ee)
submitted 1 year ago by SwiggitySwole@lemm.ee to c/dm_academy@lemmy.world
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Hey everyone, I'm looking for any tips or advice with running exploration, as a recent example my players recently came across an abandoned ship and decided to climb aboard and look for any treasures that were left behind. They went room to room and I made an effort to describe each room in detail but the whole process felt very drawn out and repetitive. Especially if there's no special encounter in that room.

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[–] bionicjoey@lemmy.ca 4 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

It sounds to me like you could have either:

  • Prepared the ship as an actual dungeon where there would be some interesting dramatic tension moving room-to-room. This is the technique used in a lot of pulp fiction. If it feels like things have gotten too safe, have someone kick down a door and start shooting. Who are they? That's up to you. You can add more story to a place in order to justify putting some monsters for the party to fight. D&D is a game about fighting monsters after all.

OR

  • Skipped the room-to-room description and instead told the players about anything interesting they found in the whole ship. Like you could just say "you guys explore the abandoned ship. The whole ship is very decrepit and smells like seawater and rot. Most of the crew quarters don't seem to have anything of interest. In the captain's quarters, you find a large iron key on a rotting desk". If there isn't anything interesting going on, there's no point in dwelling on it.