Monster: Dungeon Cat

Dungeon Cat

Not giant. Not magical. Just a cat. In a dungeon.

AC: As Plate (agile, small target)

HD: 1/2
Att: 2 x Claw 1d3-1, 1 x Bite 1d3-2

SV: Death: 3 Wands: 15 Paralysis: 1 Breath: 17 Spells: 18

THAC0 (AB): 18 (+1)

MV: 40' / 20' climb (anything but sheer surface) / 5' Jump (vertical or horizontal)

ML: 3

Al: (Chaotic) Neutral

XP: -13
NA: 1 (2d4)

TT: U, but no individual items larger than their head

Special: 

• Dungeon Cats have learned how to survive in their dungeon. They will slink into hidden nooks, hiss in alarm at approaching encounters, and if it likes the party, lead them through safe routes, secret doors, and traps they don't trigger.
• 60' Darkvision
• Always roll for reaction on each encounter, regardless of past meeting. 
• They lair a small den beyond a hidden opening no larger than their head, that is itself in a secret area of the dungeon.

Commentary

Dungeons need more cats. I'm sure this has been done a thousand times, but I almost never see them in modules. There are Familiars of course, but Dungeon Cats have no masters.

Dungeon Cats are already on every encounter table. They appear when you roll a result that shouldn't be possible, or just doesn't make sense.

I encourage you to comment below, rather than elsewhere.

Long live the Blogosphere!

Maybe I'll Just Make A Dungeon

After a bit of a hiatus from keeping up with the RPG-sphere (and not feeling motivated enough to get any of my own projects - or 15 draft blogposts, or eleventy billion notional-but-potentially-gameable brainstorm/shower-thought notes - into a shareable state), I've been inspired by a few recent dungeon design posts, actually getting some good OSR dungeoncrawling under my belt, and playing around with some tools. Before I knew it, I've got a foundation for a dungeon that I like well enough to try to build out and complete.

It's fairly vanilla, likely only one level, and doesn't involve any particularly special concepts, but I want to try putting into practice some of the guidance I've accumulated over the years, as well as my own design gripes and druthers. Particularly since I've never really created a "whole package" dungeon, beyond a few small experiments, heady ideas for more high-concept projects, and Moon College.

And right now my pendulum has swung toward feeling like it's better to create gameable content and contribute to the B/X Commons than to work on hacks and systems, which is what I find myself usually inspired to do, but is more prone to Icarus Syndrome. Even if it ends up workmanlike; walk before you run and all that.

In addition to the dungeon, I'm hoping to refine some processes for both design and production that I will share either along the way or near its completion.

It will be a good-old, tropey Dwarf Stronghold (which I feel like is underrepresented these days?), focus on a gather-the-macguffins to unlock [a treasure or access to deeper dungeon at GM's discretion], and the working title is currently:

The Seven

and Dreg

 

No guarantees. My modus operandi is to get T-boned by something shiny in a nearby genre.