How to make a great dungeon 101

[Jirah]

Think of a dungeon as a cake. Every layer, topping, frosting and attention to detail is important for the overall presentation and taste test. If only the toppings are good (which in this analogy refers to the music or setting or story significance), then it’s not a good dungeon sorta speak. The whole package must be worthy not partially.

Step 1: transition rooms
Dungeon formula is 3 bosses and 3 tracks to follow toward them, some diverge from this like Longstep or Pharos but most have followed this rule like law. Theirs many many ways the game has made these transition tracks engaging: Roaming mobs, traps, mini bosses, mid pull mechanics, raid wide spells, DPS checks list can go on. The best thing to do is pick any number of these and execute them in a balanced way, The worst thing to do is just gate mobs off for no reason, or have mobs have zero nuisances leaving the best approach to just spam Aoes for DPS, circulate CDs for tanks or focus on one singular party member for healing as Healers leaving the transitions bland and lifeless almost.

Step 2: Bosses
Dungeon bosses need to not cross the threshold of trial boss, but also have enough mechanics to be thrilling in itself, without overly stressing the healer. Raid wides and tank busters are the norm for most if not all bosses but also need a identity while also posing a thrilling experience for each of the 3 roles. The Griffon by example, while simple, expertly portrays each roles importance with the adds, big splashes of raid wides, sharp tank busters and proper positioning of the boss. The best ones replicate the same cause the worst ones have few or benign mechanics bordering on being undertuned or ignoring each roles strengths leaving it unbalanced and unfun.

Step 3: The Theming
Music, environment, Essentially all the petty stuff that can never make a dungeon great on its own but can enhance a quality one. Though important to the design philosophy, it can be seen as a massive waste of creativity in a barren run of the mil experience. Beautifully designed set pieces can very easily be brought down by very unthreatening circumstances

What makes a dungeon good or bad?
The game’s worst dungeons can be described as ones that limit your skills like the starting dungeons in ARR, besides that subjectively no “bad” dungeons exist. As positive as this sounds I would never call SHB/EW era dungeons great. They are mute in mechanical innovation, silent in role responsibility, and undertuned and underwhelming in terms of raw damage. If dungeons are supposed to be a cake, SHB/EW ones mostly are just bread. Neither bad but sparking no flavor, no fun, no euphoria.

[Kyrj]

You know what would make a dungeon good? If SE would stop putting walls after every trash pull. Look at all these tools I have at my disposal as a WAR or a GNB or a PLD, look at all that AoE that DNC has, so much potential for huge pulls and it's wasted on shit like pull two packs, wait at a wall, pull two more packs and then fight a boss, rinse and repeat. Idk why SE has gone down this path of babying it's players but it's starting to get real boring, and real old real fast.

[Kuroka]

Its not even about rushing, it just sucks to use a CD and dont have it on the next pack... lett us pull all or only 2 groups till the boss or SHORTEN our cooldowns a lot...

[LunarEmerald]

You know what would make a dungeon good? If SE would stop putting walls after every trash pull. Look at all these tools I have at my disposal as a WAR or a GNB or a PLD, look at all that AoE that DNC has, so much potential for huge pulls and it's wasted on shit like pull two packs, wait at a wall, pull two more packs and then fight a boss, rinse and repeat. Idk why SE has gone down this path of babying it's players but it's starting to get real boring, and real old real fast.

Back in the day with Amdapor Keep in 2.0, there was no walls between packs. The popular speed run start was to sac pull. The tank would pull everything, die and let the mobs reset. The healer would raise the tank after the mobs were gone. They wouldn't aggro the other players. This allowed people to skip the mobs entirely.

[Shurrikhan]

@OP. I agree with most of these, but also suspect that almost anything included as if by pure obligation is likely to be marred in some way by that. It's fine for there to be difficult encounters that do not feel like "boss fights". It's fine to get multiple bosses back-to-back. It'd be fine for the trash in some instances to be more involved (give more to manage/master) than most current dungeon bosses.

I wish they'd just... step off the templated road for a bit. The only hard requirement is that it be fun and, for those who at least mostly get it, be about as reward-efficient as other dungeons.

Its not even about rushing, it just sucks to use a CD and dont have it on the next pack... lett us pull all or only 2 groups till the boss or SHORTEN our cooldowns a lot...

This isn't a defense of obligatory dungeon walls, but... you just save enough CDs for the next pull. It's not like you need every CD for the largest pulling everything you can between walls.

[Jirah]

Back in the day with Amdapor Keep in 2.0, there was no walls between packs. The popular speed run start was to sac pull. The tank would pull everything, die and let the mobs reset. The healer would raise the tank after the mobs were gone. They wouldn't aggro the other players. This allowed people to skip the mobs entirely.

On the flip side it’s not hard to balance this, proper sectioning and interactables can mitigate this cheap run. Take Mt Gulg for example a literally living wall, or Temple of the fist where you need to DPS a gate down.

[hynaku]

Best way have a dungeon design contest and use the winners designs for next dungeons.