In one of last week’s posts, I summarized the statistical look pacing of AD&D as implied by The dungeons that results using Appendix A. Fluid the Druid dug into the intricacies that result from the use of the Dungeon Encounter Matrix on page 174:
And helpfully added that you have a 1/200 chance of encountering bugbears on Level 1 of any given huge ruined pile, and a 1/125 chance of encountering demons.
Please hold on that last one hit me right in the brisket, because that number came up in my solo campaign out in the Wolflands. Which led me to the realization that what I was REALLY asking in that post was, “is it really worth it to delve dungeons?”
My experience with Appendix A indicated that no, it most certainly was NOT. The risks were too high, and the rewards too low. The slot machines just weren’t paying out no matter how many adventurers I fed into them.
Gygax famously stocked his modules with huge amounts of loot, but balanced that out by hiding most of it such that players were most likely to find enough to justify a delve even if they didn’t scrape the place clean of every last copper. Appendix A dungeons, if they are balanced at all, must use a different strategy, particularly when used by the solo gamer.
And that cuts to the question whether the lethality of a random delve is offset by the potential jackpot waiting at the end of that bloody rainbow. My calculation that 80 rooms would provide both the XP and the GP necessary to level up ignores the chance of encounters during the periodic checks.
Again I point you to fluid the Druid who’s already run the math on that issue. Call it a wash, more encounters means more treasure, but at the same approximate rate. Call it 80 encounters rather than rooms and you arrive at the same result. Lose a few PCs in the process, and you’re looking at 100 encounters to boost a four man crew up to Level 2.
This raises the question of how many encounters you can get through in a single session. Damned if I know. What I do know is that gaming once per week and averaging ten encounters (monsters/tricks/traps/loot) each gives us ten weeks or two months. Let’s call it three months of dedicated effort, and that means another 300gp just for monthly upkeep costs! Which leaves precious little gold left over to purchase equipment upgrades.
But it is possible, and despite all of the low returns, the dungeon as scratch-off ticket does have its charm. It’s from the hope, and you go into every dank hole with an attitude that this could be the one, if you do it often enough you might just hit that million GP diamond. On average you might not win, but you’re not playing for the average, you’re playing for the exception.
Men have always been endurance hunters. Our ancestors chased gazelles across the Savannah until the poor things were too exhausted to run any farther. Our modern imitation at the hobby table is no different. Our characters are not chasing their dreams they are steadily wearing down the odds until they get lucky. Play long enough, and it’s bound to happen.
And I think this intellectual exercise has proven that Gary knew what he was doing when he designed the system that leans into human nature. Sure, 50 years of the games survival is a testament to that, but now we’ve proven it mathematically. And that counts for something.