Nov. 20: Turning Word Clouds into Dungeons

Forsaken Scriptures and Minimalist Dungeon Delving

Dungeon crawls are an integral part of fantasy TTRPGs. Most players expect to end up in a dungeon at least once while playing games such as 5e Dungeons and Dragons or Pathfinder. The slow crawl, the exploration and the loot have been longstanding appeals. But they often demand planning from a storyteller’s perspective to provide an appropriate amount of traps, monsters, strange pathways and treasure. The descriptions presented in books like Dungeon of the Mad Mage or Tomb of Annihilation provide plenty of content. Still, it’s not always easy to process for new DMs since a dungeon may expand over 40-50 pages with text descriptions, stat blocks, maps and more.

Insert Forsaken Scriptures. Penned by game designer Nyhur and illustrated by Mattia Pinetti, this small volume provides 15 dungeon maps in the form of “word-maps”, where the language and font are mixed into unique shapes that not only simplify the dungeon planning but tell a story. The book will be released in English by Nigredo Press in December 2024 an is explicitly designed for Mork Borg and its old-school grimdark dungeon grind storytelling approach, but Nyhur seems to believe it could be adapted to other game systems.

Critical Hit News spoke with Nyhur about the new map model and the tools it offers storytellers.

So, where did Forsaken Scriptures come from?

I'm a full-time game developer, so I'm working on RPG games such as Forsaken Scriptures or other stuff like that. Forsaken Scriptures came around as an idea during the pandemic four years ago. I saw word clouds and it just inspired me to go and try to do something similar for RPG games. I saw somebody somewhere that was doing something similar. The concept started with just a few dungeons that got positive reviews. So I contacted Mattia Pinetti (the artist behind the original designs) in 2022 and I worked on most of the dungeons of Forsaken Scriptures. It started with only four but expanded to about 15 now.

Why make word-cloud-based TTRPG maps? 

I was experimenting with a new approach I did not see around. I was getting into Mork Borg and doing some content for it. And I love how on the face and immediately the maps were not only to read but to grasp. They offered a little bit of lore of vibes, but also game-wise, the mechanic was very simple. It is very simple to teach to new players. So, I started wondering how we could combine this purely graphic approach with minimalistic descriptions.

I love writing but am not very good at writing chunky text sections. It gets very tricky for me. I've never been so good at writing long pages of descriptions, and I love to be minimalistic when trying to convey an image through few words rather than give my own take on the subject on the room, on the monster. I always like to just hint at something and then let the reader, the gamemaster, fill in the gaps with what fits for his group and adventure. 

Is this map method explicitly designed for DMs or players? 

I think it can be played either way. As a DM, I can read through it and it will be a very fast readthrough dungeon. You don't have to combine the text and the map and figure out what's happening in that environment. You already have it all laid down in front of yourself. So that's like a very short prep approach for an adventure for the DM. But on the other side, I would love it to see it as a GM-less kind of adventure. You don't need a gamemaster or anything. You just drop the map down in front of two or three friends and roll some characters. You go through the location and explore it yourself, and do the usual shared narrative stuff. You would also take turns in the spotlight to fill in the details and gaps of what's going on, especially since this is made for Mork Borg, which is very much a theatre of the mind game.

Do you think this methodology of creating word maps is applicable outside of something like Mork Borg? Could I use these for a 5e or  Dragonbane game?

You can use these maps in any other game you would like. Of course, it requires more prep because you need to create the creatures and the difficulty classes for different challenges or whatnot that adventures usually will provide you already.

Thanks again to Nyhur for talking to me!

What’s your preferred way for making dungeons? Could a word cloud approach be useful to you?

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