Let's Try Wallet Dungeons
The way Wallet Dungeons works is you roll "a handful" of D6s and push them together on the table so they're all touching. Each one represents a room of a dungeon and the numbers give you more info on those rooms. This is going to be a very quick dungeon crawl as I only own five D6s, so we'll get a classic five room dungeon.
First let's make our hero. I don't have a cleric character in my long running Scarlet Heroes campaign so let's try making one. As usual for Scarlet Heroes we'll go down the line of attributes rolling 4D6 and dropping the lowest.
Strength: 4 (-2)
Dexterity: 8 (-1)
Constitution: 12
Intelligence: 12
Wisdom: 12
Charisma: 12
Wow, not a great result. Luckily SH lets us rearrange those stats and says if no roll is 16 or better, pick one and set it to 16. Let's try:
Strength: 12
Dexterity: 12
Constitution: 12
Intelligence: 4 (-2)
Wisdom: 16 (+2)
Charisma: 12
I decided to keep the 4 and make a flawed character. This guy isn't the brightest but he's filled with righteous faith in his god. Let's make him a dwarf. All clerics get 6 HP. He has no Con modifier to add to that. His attack bonus is +1 and his fray die is 1D6.
At this point let's roll a random cleric background for him before we decide on his traits.
99: Worldly clerk
48: Light sleeper
84: Saved a learned sage
That's quite unique! Let's say Urist, for that's his name, has tired of his job administering the finances of his temple and taken up a warhammer to go and smite evil in the name of his ancestors who once did the same. This happened when a visiting priest was mugged outside the temple and he stepped in to help, whacking the mugger over the head with a tin box full of donations.
As a dwarf he gets 1 point in the trait Dwarvern Senses, 1 point in his profession he had in his clan, Clerk, plus three more points. Based on his background let's go with Good With Money (2) and Alertness (1). He gets 3D6x10 gold pieces which is 80. With that he buys a warhammer, shield and scale mail armour leaving him with nothing. That fills up 54 of his 60lb encumbrance but he's not interested in lugging tons of loot around anyway, he's only in it for the smitin'!
He gets one cleric spell. I'll choose Hand of Merciful Succor which heals 2D6+2 HP on touch and can be cast once per day. And that's it! His armour class is 5 (descending AC) and his warhammer does 1D6 damage since he's limited to that as a cleric.
Now for the dungeon. I roll the five dice and push them together, getting four rooms in a square with one jutting out to one side.
However fives are levels of a tower and I've got two, so I need to stack them. I close the gap and get this layout.
So, on the ground floor we've got four rooms: a hall, a crossroads, a split (?) and the first level of the tower. The second floor is just the tower. Hmm, I think this would work better with more dice, so maybe next time I'll try rolling a load of them in Tabletop Simulator and arranging them in a more 3D configuration. To determine what type of room each one is we take its number and add that to any dice touching it, then consult a table. I'll do that without telling you the results so you can discover the dungeon as Urist explores it. But first I'll use Scarlet Heroes to populate the dungeon. I roll a D20 and get:
16: Heretics.
The perfect enemy for Urist! Since it's such a small dungeon the treasure trove type will be C1: Minor hidden treasure.
Ok, I've just rolled for the contents of the rooms and the entire ground floor was empty, so I'm re-rolling. Now we're ready.
The sun is already high in the sky as Urist reaches the top of a hill and sees the ruined keep far ahead of him. A local told him about it over an ale in the inn the previous night. A former guild headquarters unninhabited for a century, a gang of outcast heretics had recently taken shelter there. They were an affront to the gods and Urist was determined to put an end to their no doubt foul activities.
He reached the building. A pair of large wooden doors stood before him so he pushed them open and found himself in a cavernous meeting hall, no doubt where the long disbanded guild gathered to discuss business. Looking around he found broken furniture and moth-eaten drapery. Rusted iron chandeliers lay on the cracked flagstones. There was one door in the west wall, so he headed towards it.
The door was locked. "Buggerit" the cleric muttered under his breath, and took out his warhammer. Aiming it at the keyhole, he swung downwards as hard as he could.
Urist makes a check (DC 9: Simple)
7. Failure.
He bashes the lock again and again, splintering the wood but making no progress on the lock. Unknown to him, the noise has drawn some attention. An armed acolyte of the heretics is creeping up on him, having entered through the double doors.
Urist makes a check (DC 9: Simple)
8 +2 Wis +1 Alertness = 11. Success!
In between hammer swings Urist notices a shadow moving on the wall in front of him and whirls around to see a ragged looking man approaching him with a machete raised above his head. This heretic clearly meant to cleave his head in half, so Urist closes the distance between them in an instant and swings his warhammer.
2 +1 Attack Bonus +7 Armed Acolyte's AC = 10. Miss.
Fray die: 4 damage.
It catches the side of the man's head. His attacker is thrown to the floor and lies still, blood oozing from his skull.
Searching the body, Urist finds a key and uses it to unlock the door. The room beyond is some kind of crypt. Sarcophagi are arranged against the stone walls. There are no windows here but Urist can see in the dark. Some of the lids of the vessels have been pushed onto the floor and it looks like the human remains inside have been looted. While he searches the crypt Urist notices a bronze armlet on a skeleton that must have been missed by the heretics who no doubt did this. It looks valuable, studded with blue lapis lazuli stones, but Urist has no intention of taking it. What kind of cleric would he be if he looted these poor souls?
There's another door in the west wall. This one leads to a room with water all over the floor. It seems to be seeping in under a door to the south. Another plain stone-walled chamber, there's a half rotten wooden staircase leading up to another floor and a large hole in the wooden floor which blocks access to a desk in the corner. He can see a small wooden box open on the desk with some gold coins in it. Looking into the hole, the water pours down into the darkness for many feet and he can't see the bottom.
Should he try to jump the hole to get to the money? He's never been able to jump very far, and he'd have to do it twice to get there and back again. But the coins obviously aren't in the possession of one of the skeletons in the crypt, so it wouldn't be looting the dead... Before he can talk himself out of it Urist runs and leaps over the hole.
Urist makes a check (DC 9: Simple)
7. Failure.
Urist defies death (1D4 damage die)
1: No damage, he succeeds at the check.
As he flies over the hole he suddenly realises he's not going to make it all the way. At the last moment he reaches out and his fingers find the edges of a broken floorboard, and he manages to pull himself up on the other side. What a ridiculous thing to do, leaping about like an elf just to get at some gold. He'd say extra prayers tonight to make up for it. The box contains 20 gold pieces, so he pockets them and then looks back to the hole again. There was nothing else to do except try to jump back over it despite the fact that he didn't have the body or the skill for it.
Urist makes a check (DC 9: Simple)
4. Failure.
Urist defies death (1D6 damage die as it's the second time this adventure)
5: 1 damage.
This time he grabs onto the floorboards again on the way back, but accidentally pulls his face into the splintered edge of the hole, cutting himself. Pulling himself up, he vows never to take such a stupid risk again.
Frustrated and angry with himself he throws open the door in the southern wall and is confronted with five angry-looking men. Four of them pick up machetes from a table. They are dressed in rags like the man who tried to sneak up on Urist in the hall, but the fifth man wears chainmail. He spins a fearsome halberd in his hands and shouts "Get him!".
Urist knows what to do. He rushes the closest man.
11 +1 Attack Bonus +7 Armed Acolyte's AC = 19. Miss.
1D6 fray die: 1 damage.
The heretic acolyte freezes in fear when he sees Urist coming towards him, and Urist's warhammer smashes hard into the middle of his face, sending him sprawling on the floor. The other acolytes move in next.
Skinny acolyte:
16 +1 Attack Bonus +5 Urist's AC = 22. Hit.
1D6 damage die: 1 (0 damage).
Scarred acolyte:
15 +1 Attack Bonus +5 Urist's AC = 21. Hit.
1D6 damage die: 4 (1 damage).
Crazed acolyte:
12 +1 Attack Bonus +5 Urist's AC = 18. Miss.
Temple champion:
8 +1 Attack Bonus +5 Urist's AC = 14. Miss.
Blades flash all around Urist who raises his shield and ducks instinctively. A machete bounces off his shoulder, the pauldron of his armour deflecting it. Another chops lightly into his arm but he barely notices, dodging under another machete swung by a man with a manic look on his face. He gets up only to see the halberd rapidly approaching his face, so he lifts his shield and parries it. Not bad for a temple clerk, he thinks to himself. One of the acolytes has left himself open to attack, the skinniest one.
Urist:
17 +1 Attack Bonus +7 Armed Acolyte's AC = 25. Hit.
1D6 damage die: 6 (2 damage)
1D6 fray die: 1 (0 damage)
Urist smashes his warhammer into the skinny acolyte's ribs, breaking several. Instantly he whips it around and into the face of another. Both men drop to the floor, the skinny one coughing up blood before lying still. In Scarlet Heroes damage from the damage die and fray die is spread between the enemies, who lose 1 hit die for every point of damage taken.
Crazed acolyte makes a morale check (Morale: 8)
9. Failure.
Temple champion makes a morale check (Morale: 10)
7. Success.
The chainmail-clad man barks orders at the other one, but he looks at the bodies on the floor, looks at Urist then drops his machete and runs out of the door. The last man watches him leave, a look of contempt on his face, then turns to Urist. "The gods have had their time, holy man. For each one of us you slay, ten more will take his place!" He roars in rage and whirls his halberd around his head. "Well..." Urist struggles to ad-lib a witty reply. "We'll have to see about that, won't we?"
Temple champion:
14 +1 Attack Bonus +5 Urist's AC = 20. Hit.
1D10 damage die: 2 damage.
Urist hesitates for a fraction of a second, wincing at his poor comeback, and the man's halberd hacks into his side leaving a deep cut (Urist has only 2 HP left).
Urist casts Hand of Merciful Succor
2D6+2 HP: 12.
Clutching at his side in pain, Urist's training comes back to him. While the heretic laughs at him he utters a prayer to the gods and feels a pleasant warmth spread out from his hand over the wound. He stands up straight again, fully healed and filled with holy purpose.
Temple champion:
12 +1 Attack Bonus +5 Urist's AC = 18. Miss.
The heretic looks shocked and afraid at this. He lashes out but Urist turns away his halberd effortlessly with his shield.
Urist:
4 +1 Attack Bonus +5 Temple Champion's AC = 10. Miss.
1D6 fray die: 1 (0 damage)
Urist fights back with his warhammer but the heretic just manages to dodge to the side, avoiding the blow.
Temple champion:
10 +1 Attack Bonus +5 Urist's AC = 16. Miss.
Urist:
10 +1 Attack Bonus +5 Temple Champion's AC = 16. Miss.
1D6 fray die: 5 (1 damage)
Emboldened, the heretic springs back up at Urist, lunging with the pointed top of his halberd's blade at Urist who pushes it down with his shield. He pulls his arm out from the shield and stamps on it, pinning the halberd to the floor and sending the heretic onto his knees in front of Urist. The man looks up at him with rage burning in his eyes before the dwarf brings his hammer down, cracking his skull and sending a sheet of blood down over his face. He crumples onto the floor like an empty potato sack, quite dead.
Urist takes a moment to catch his breath, then he picks up his shield. The room he stands in seems to be an old forge. Tools are strewn about the place and an anvil sits in front of the forge itself, long out of use. He finds nothing interesting here, so he climbs the old wooden stairs in the other room. They lead him up to the top of the tower and other than a nice view of the local village off in the distance, this final room offers nothing of interest. Twenty gold pieces richer, Urist begins his journey back to the village, satisfied with a good day's work slaying filthy heretics.
I highly recommend Wallet Dungeons! It was a lot of fun and I got a nice evening's gaming out of it. It would probably be really useful for GMs to quickly and easily generate a dungeon to slot into a campaign. Even with just five rooms you can get a good few hours of gameplay from it.
Have you used Wallet Dungeons? Let me know in the comments.
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