Laws of Dungeon Delving
- No matter how bad your last level was, the worst is yet to come. This law does not expire on the lowest dungeon level, since you still have to climb back up to go home.
- Your best adventure will be followed almost immediately by your worst adventure ever. The probability of the latter increases with the number of people you brag to about the former.
- Brand new magic weapons are monster-magnetic. Though this cannot be proven in the lab, it is a known fact that the more powerful the magic of the sword, the greater its attraction to monsters.
- Fumble rolls are mathematically as likely as Critical Hits. In play, fumbles are four times more likely.
- No matter how clearly stupid it may have been to attack a given monster, no matter how overmatched the hero was before the first blow was struck, all the surviving party members must solemnly chant "Bad luck on the dice roll, dude," or invoke the wrath of the universe.
- The greater the experience of the player, the more he overestimates the abilities of his newest character.
- The first level of every dungeon in the world has a secret desire to humiliate adventurers before they even see the lower levels.
- Waiting for the other guy to make his save and rescue you is the most painful torture known to man.
- The rate of consumption of consumables is directly proportional to the distance from any chance of stocking up again.
- Dice are alive. If they aren't, how do you explain the way they work against you?
- God-Calls annoy the Gamemaster. This is why they take such delight in presenting the called God as being annoyed by the summoning.
- NPCs are small, weak, lazy, lacking in initiative and dependent on your good will to survive...until you let them hold your magic sword, then they can out steal, outfight, and outrun you, your party, the city watch and most of the combined armies of the known world.
- All woods more than 3 miles from the city gate are demon-possessed. "Civilized areas" are points on the map, not circles or any other area-inclusive shape.
- The last three treasures or curses of a dungeon will automatically adjust your net worth to what it really should be.
- A severe fumble is a thing of awesome power and beauty.
- "Nice form" can usually be translated to "wasted motion." Similarly, "tough break" can usually be translated "way to miss an easy one, sucker."
- The person or monster you would most hate to lose to will always be the one who shows up after you fumble your weapon over the side of the canyon.
- Dragons have no word for "friend." They don't understand the concept. The closest they can get is "an enemy who isn't dead yet."
- Intelligence is your ability to learn new things. Wisdom indicates your ability to not kill yourself with the new knowledge.
- Charisma is not exactly how a person looks, there are a number of factors that work together. Still, remember that no centerfold was ever described as having a "nice personality" in her top ten compliments.
- Strength is the ability to lift heavy things. Constitution is your ability to walk to a cleric despite the pain from horribly overestimating your strength.
- The day you have more than enough Holy Water to clear the undead from the Castle is the day you meet your first Agnostic Vampire.
- All vows made during combat shall be valid only until the sunset of the same day.
Important Delving Terms
- Amazon: Party member out to prove she's more of a man than any man, while dressing to prove she's also more woman than any woman, and acting like she's more of a woman than any man can handle.
- Ballad: Form of entertainment describing the events experienced by victorious heroes.
- Dirge: Form of entertainment describing the actual events experienced by heroes.(See also: Eulogy)
- Blood: Inexpensive marking device used to inform other delvers where traps are located.
- Copper Piece: Inexpensive marking device used to show late-coming delvers where treasures used to be located.
- Bone: That part of a delver likely to last long enough for the authorities to determine exactly which dungeon you died in (Sometimes a critical question for determining disposition of worldly goods).
- Campfire: Device used to attract monsters, above and below ground.
- Chiurgery: the art of preventing people from bleeding to death by attaching leeches to suck them dry. See also: Quack, Suicide, Lingering Death and Amputation.
- Danger Zone: Subtract X (the number of times you have exited from a dungeon) from Y (the number of times you have entered a dungeon). Any time Y-X does not equal zero, you are in a danger zone.
- Dirty Harry Speech: A phrase, riddle or essay composed by adventurers during slack time to commemorate a victory, underscore an irony, humiliate a foe, or otherwise enhance the drama of a combat round. Also, a signal to villains to attack immediately because the guy doing the talking really, really expects you to wait politely until he finishes.
- Dragon Hoard: Place for adventurers to store shiny personal effects while they work their way through the reincarnation cycle back to Hero again.
- Dungeon Party: Means of leveraging your afternoon up from a mere suicide to a suicide pact.
- Face Off: The reason players are hard to identify following an orc attack.
- Familiar: Really cool, slightly useful and very dangerous aspect of being a mage, in that you bind a good deal of your soul and hit points to a small animal that couldn't fight its way out of a Teletubby slumber party.
- Fault: Mechanism for determining the member of the party that will be most useful when a human (or near human) sacrifice is required.
- Fog: Weather elemental used to allow your fate to sneak up close and prevent preparation or escape.
- Funny: Gamemaster word used as a synonym for "deadly."
"You hear a funny noise."
"Something smells funny."
"Something about the temple just seems funny to the cleric."
- Hero: The adventurer most willing to be the first to enter a dungeon (lair, den, nest, warren, burrow, labyrinth, ruin, marsh or any other term for the location of a collection of monsters).
- Wealth: Items of interest retrieved from the remains of the Hero.
- Hibernation: Method some monsters use to minimize the chance of being detected by a party and also maximize their grumpiness when the party stumbles over them.
- Magic Weapon: A device augmented by supernatural forces, designed to use adrenaline and confidence to cause suicide.
- Magic Wand: A 'Magic Weapon' for character classes that don't use swords.
- Holy Item: An object augmented by supernatural forces, usually involving the horrible death of a religious celebrity, used by a less famed follower of the same religion in thequaint hopes of preventing their own death. See also Magic Weapon.
- Mapping: Process by which a Gamemaster uses poor language skills to highlight a player's poor graphing skills (and vice versa). Usually resolved when all attempts at mapping are suspended during high speed transits. (See also: Retreat)
- Natural Weaponry: That part of a creature designed to poke holes in the adventurer's body parts. All animals have weaponry. Some carry it in their mouth (fangs), some carry it atop their heads (antlers, horns), and most have something painful on their feet (claws, hooves, steel-toed shoes). Classification is left to the naturologists, just be aware anything with a pulse will try to kill you.
- Negotiate: Means of delaying combat rounds for as long as it takes for the monster to figure out which of the party is the greatest threat.
- Ninjas: Disposable bad-guy combat round minions deployed for humor relief. Unless there's only one, then he's death on roller blades.
- Ocean: Place where pirates store armor and those who wear it during maritime combat.
- Optimism: An annoying characteristic of first-time characters. Not usually a problem after their replacements are rolled up.
- Oracle: Supernatural being with the amazing power to tell you exactly 76% of what you need to know to complete an adventure. No refunds.
- Plowshare: Shiny new metal tool the villager leans against while denying any idea of where your arms and armor may have got to.
- Rest: a state of non-exertion, without emotional pressure, blinding pain, closing pursuit or fear of betrayal from co-workers. See also: Death.
- Retirement: Long term rest See also: Dead and Buried.
- Retreat: Process by which delvers become aware of the fact that they no longer have access to the exit.
- Sacrifice: Means of drawing the attention of the Gods. Usually not your own
- Scouting Report: A specific genre of fiction produced by NPCs.
- Starlight: Naturally occuring phenomena used to determine that something big has ripped a hole in your tent.
- Tent: Packaging material for bear or tiger food.
- Supplies: Any consumable, and a reason to enter small villages while traveling towards adventures.
- Lynch Party: Reason to avoid small villages while traveling back from adventures.
- Tasty Meat Snacks: Body parts removed from delvers by means of traps, attacks, fumbles or other accidents and left to distract dungeon dwellers during retreat.
- Tentacle: Quick way to determine if a being or animal is from another dimesion and likely to munch your face off.
- Torch: Device used to explore dark spaces, ensure footing and search for clues, treasure and traps.
- Torchlight: Radiation from a torch used to lure monsters to the party.
- Darkness: Lack of radiation used to indicate the loss of a torch and (usually) the nearness of the monsters.
- Trail Blazing: Method of ensuring that all the villains in the forest or maze will be able to find you.
- Treasure Map: Device used by The Dark Lords to keep their dungeon dwelling monsters excercised and well-fed.
- Treasure: Ethereal concept used to entice otherwise rational citizens into investing time and money in committing suicide.
- Vulture: Naturally occurring phenomena used to find party members separated from the group.
- Impatient Vulture: Last thing seen by lost party members.
- Shark Fins: Vulture substitutes used during maritime adventures.
- Impatient Shark: Same as impatient vulture
- War Cry: Mechanism to make sure total surprise is never achieve in war, attack, ambush or assassination.
