''Dungeon'' (originally published as ''Dungeon: Adventures for TSR Role-Playing Games'') was one of the two official

magazine A magazine is a periodical publication, generally published on a regular schedule (often weekly or monthly), containing a variety of content. They are generally financed by advertising, purchase price, prepaid subscriptions, or by a combinatio ...

s targeting consumers of the ''

Dungeons & Dragons ''Dungeons & Dragons'' (commonly abbreviated as ''D&D'' or ''DnD'') is a fantasy tabletop role-playing game (RPG) originally designed by Gary Gygax and Dave Arneson. The game was first published in 1974 by Tactical Studies Rules, Inc. (TS ...

role-playing game A role-playing game (sometimes spelled roleplaying game, RPG) is a game in which players assume the roles of characters in a fictional setting. Players take responsibility for acting out these roles within a narrative, either through literal ac ...

and associated products; ''

Dragon A dragon is a reptilian legendary creature that appears in the folklore of many cultures worldwide. Beliefs about dragons vary considerably through regions, but dragons in western cultures since the High Middle Ages have often been depicted a ...

'' was the other. It was first published by TSR, Inc. in 1986 as a bimonthly periodical. It went monthly in May 2003 and ceased print publication altogether in September 2007 with Issue 150. Starting in 2008, ''Dungeon'' and its more widely read sister publication, ''Dragon'', went to an online-only format published by

Wizards of the Coast Wizards of the Coast LLC (often referred to as WotC or simply Wizards) is an American publisher of games, primarily based on fantasy and science fiction themes, and formerly an operator of retail stores for games. It is currently a subsidia ...

. Both magazines went on hiatus at the end of 2013, with ''Dungeon Issue 221'' being the last released.

History

TSR

''Dungeon'' (initially titled ''Dungeon Adventures'') first received mention in the editor's column of ''

'' Issue 107 (March 1986). Lacking a title at that point, it was described as "a new magazine filled entirely with modules" made available "by subscription only" that would debut "in the late summer or early fall" of 1986 and "come out once every two months". The publication's original editor,

Roger E. Moore Roger E. Moore (born July 11, 1955, in Winchester, Kentucky) is a designer of role-playing games. He is best known for his long-running tenure as editor of ''Dragon'' magazine and was the founding editor of ''Dungeon'' magazine. Early life Moor ...

, elaborated on this basic outline:

''Dungeon Adventures'' is a new periodical from TSR, Inc., in which you, the readers, may share your own adventures and scenarios from ''
AD&D In insurance, accidental death and dismemberment (AD&D) is a policy that pays benefits to the beneficiary if the cause of death is an accident. This is a limited form of life insurance which is generally less expensive, or in some cases is an add ...
'' and '' D&D'' gaming with the legions of other fantasy gamers. Each issue offers a number of fairly short (but often quite complicated and long-playing) modules, selected from the best we receive.
What kind of adventures do you want to see? We're going to offer as broad a spectrum of material as possible:
dungeon crawl A dungeon crawl is a type of scenario in fantasy role-playing games in which heroes navigate a labyrinth environment (a " dungeon"), battling various monsters, avoiding traps, solving puzzles, and looting any treasure they may find. Video games a ...
s, wilderness camp-outs, '' Oriental Adventures'' modules, solo quests, tournament designs, '' Battlesystem'' scenarios, and more.

The premiere issue of ''Dungeon: Adventures for TSR Role-Playing Games'' was undated, but "November/December 1986" appears on the cover of the subsequent issue, and Moore stated that it had been released prior to the November issue of ''Dragon''. The magazine's format consisted of 64 pages of short ''D&D'' and ''AD&D'' game adventures of various lengths, themes, and tones, written by both amateur and professional fantasy role-playing writers. In conjunction with the first anniversary of ''Dungeon Adventures'',

Ken Rolston Ken Rolston is an American computer game and role-playing game designer best known for his work with West End Games and on the computer game series ''The Elder Scrolls''. In February 2007, he elected to join the staff of computer games company B ...

included a brief review in Issue 125 (September 1987) of ''Dragon''. Regarding the modules themselves, he called them " eap and cheerful, full of the basic fun of ''D&D'' games", and said that they reminded him of "the selection of game sessions you find at gaming conventions or in old-fashioned modules". Rolston commented on the anthology format, which allowed writers to "publish fine little bits" and provided "great training grounds for new writers" that offered "an opportunity to experiment with offbeat themes and tones". Rolston concluded that "sophisticated gamers will find a lot to snicker at here, but there are some cute ideas", and added that the "writing ranges from young and enthusiastic to polished, and when compared with some of TSR's current modules...the quality of the layout and graphics is quite decent."

Wizards of the Coast

With the sale of TSR due to solvency concerns, the magazine came under the umbrella of

in 1997, and the company printed the next 30 issues. With the release of Issue #78 in January 2000, the long title printed on the cover was simplified from ''Dungeon: Adventures for TSR Role-Playing Games'' to ''Dungeon: Adventures''. By Issue #82 (August 2000) it was simplified again to ''Dungeon''.

Paizo

In late 2002, Paizo Publishing acquired publishing rights to both ''Dungeon'' and ''Dragon'' magazine titles as part of a move by

to divest business ventures not related to its core business.

Return to Wizards of the Coast

On April 18, 2007, Wizards of the Coast announced that Paizo would cease publication of ''Dungeon'' in September of that year. Scott Rouse, senior brand manager of ''Dungeons & Dragons'' at Wizards of the Coast, stated, "Today the

internet The Internet (or internet) is the global system of interconnected computer networks that uses the Internet protocol suite (TCP/IP) to communicate between networks and devices. It is a '' network of networks'' that consists of private, p ...

is where people go to get this kind of information. By moving to an online model we are using a delivery system that broadens our reach to fans around the world." Coinciding with the release of the 4th edition of ''Dungeons & Dragons'' in June 2008, Wizards of the Coast launched a website that included online versions of ''Dungeon'' and ''Dragon'' magazines for subscribers. In this new format, ''Dungeon'' (now subtitled ''A Dungeons & Dragons Roleplaying Game Supplement'') retained its mandate to deliver adventures of varying lengths and levels as well as articles with information and advice for DMs. Mainstay columns such as "Dungeoncraft" (written by

James Wyatt James Wyatt (3 August 1746 – 4 September 1813) was an English architect, a rival of Robert Adam in the neoclassical and neo-Gothic styles. He was elected to the Royal Academy in 1785 and was its president from 1805 to 1806. Early life W ...

) were retained, and DM-focused articles that formerly appeared in ''Dragon'' magazine (like "Save My Game") were incorporated into ''Dungeon'', making it a "one-stop shop" for DMs. The magazine shifted to a landscape format with the intent of making the articles and adventures more readable onscreen. Content was released daily and gathered into

PDF Portable Document Format (PDF), standardized as ISO 32000, is a file format developed by Adobe in 1992 to present documents, including text formatting and images, in a manner independent of application software, hardware, and operating systems. ...

compilations on a monthly basis. In May 2011, Wizards of the Coast stopped the monthly compilations and left content in single article format. In October 2012, Wizards of the Coast resumed monthly compilations.

Cessation

In the September 2013 issue of ''Dragon'' (#427) an article by Wizards of the Coast game designer and editor Chris Perkins announced that both ''Dragon'' and its sibling publication ''Dungeon'' would be going on hiatus starting January 2014 pending the release of the ''Dungeons & Dragons'' 5th edition product line. The final online version was Issue #221 in December 2013. The successor magazine, called Dragon+, was subsequently released online on 30 April 2015.

Content

Each issue featured a variety of self-contained, pre-scripted, play-tested game scenarios, often called "modules", "adventures" or "scenarios". Dungeon Masters (DMs) could either enact these

adventures An adventure is an exciting experience or undertaking that is typically bold, sometimes risky. Adventures may be activities with danger such as traveling, exploring, skydiving, mountain climbing, scuba diving, river rafting, or other extreme ...

with their respective player groups as written or adapt them to their own

campaign setting A campaign setting is usually a fictional world which serves as a setting for a role-playing game or wargame campaign. A '' campaign'' is a series of individual adventures, and a ''campaign setting'' is the world in which such adventures and c ...

s. ''Dungeon'' aimed to save DMs time and effort in preparing game sessions for their players by providing a full complement of ideas, hooks, plots, adversaries, creatures, illustrations, maps, hand-outs, and character dialogue. It was a resource containing several modules per issue, significantly cheaper than standard-format modules. From Dungeon's founding in 1986, it published content that could be used in a variety of forms of ''Dungeons & Dragons'' systems, much like its sister magazine, ''Dragon''. When Wizards of the Coast merged all ''D&D'' product lines into one, 2000's 3rd Edition, ''Dungeon'' published exclusively 3E content between September 2000's issue 82 and July 2003's issue 100, which shifted to 3.5E. With the release of 4th Edition in June 2008, issue 155 saw the 3.5E content dropped and focused exclusively on 4E. Like ''Dragon'', ''Dungeon'' was cancelled by Wizards of the Coast before the release of 5th Edition.

Polyhedron

Polyhedron In geometry, a polyhedron (plural polyhedra or polyhedrons; ) is a three-dimensional shape with flat polygonal faces, straight edges and sharp corners or vertices. A convex polyhedron is the convex hull of finitely many points, not all o ...

'', the monthly membership publication of the Role-Playing Game Association, was combined with ''Dungeon'' into a single magazine beginning with Issue 90 (January 2002) and lasting until Issue 111 (June 2004). Many of the ''Polyhedron'' sections presented complete mini-games for the d20 system in genres other than fantasy. Editor Erik Mona changed the format in September 2004, starting with Issue 114, discontinuing the ''Polyhedron'' component and focusing solely on ''Dungeons & Dragons''. Each issue included three adventures, one each for low, medium, and high levels. A few issues each year also contained another substantial article which provided further details on the setting of one of the adventures (Previously, ''Dungeon'' almost never had features other than modules). Following the adventures and articles, many issues included the three-page "Dungeoncraft" column, at the time written by Monte Cook, as well as a handful of shorter articles on various subjects, collectively titled the "Campaign Workbook".

Adventure Paths

Beginning in 2003, ''Dungeon'' magazine featured episodic, multi-part adventures, referred to as "

Adventure Path An Adventure Path is a series of interlinked adventures (campaign) for tabletop role-playing games which can be played in succession and lead characters to advance from lower to higher levels, through a particular path of events. While campaig ...

s", which were designed to take a group of player characters from the beginning of their adventuring careers (1st level) through epic levels (20th and above). As of April 2013, four such serials were published: ''

Shackled City ''The Shackled City Adventure Path'' (or simply ''Shackled City'') is a role-playing game Adventure Path designed for ''Dungeons & Dragons'' (''D&D''), originally appearing as a series of modules in ''Dungeon'' magazine, and later collected in a ...

'', ''

Age of Worms The ''Age of Worms'' Adventure Path (or simply ''Age of Worms'') is the second Adventure Path for the ''Dungeons & Dragons'' role-playing game, published over twelve installments from July 2005 through June 2006 in ''Dungeon'' magazine. A campai ...

'', ''

Savage Tide The ''Savage Tide'' Adventure Path (or simply ''Savage Tide'') is the third Adventure Path for the ''Dungeons & Dragons'' role-playing game, published over twelve installments from October 2006 through September 2007 in ''Dungeon'' magazine. It ...

'', and ''Scales of War''. In August 2005 the ''Shackled City'' Adventure Path was collected into a hardcover edition with various revisions and corrections, new background information, and a bonus adventure meant to fill a gap near the beginning of the series. Similarly, several shorter campaign arcs (typically consisting of three parts) and various sporadic, open-ended series and side treks were featured in these later issues.

Recognition

;Awards * 1990:

Origins Award The Origins Awards are American awards for outstanding work in the game industry. They are presented by the Academy of Adventure Gaming Arts and Design at the Origins Game Fair on an annual basis for the previous year, so (for example) the 1979 a ...

for Best Professional Adventure Gaming Magazine of 1989 * 1991: Origins Award for Best Professional Adventure Gaming Magazine of 1990 * 2002: ENnie Award for Best Aid or Accessory * 2005: ENnie Awards for Best Cartography ("World Map of Greyhawk", Issues 118–121), Best Adventure (''

Maure Castle Maure Castle is a fictional location in the World of Greyhawk setting for the ''Dungeons & Dragons'' fantasy role-playing game. Maure Castle is a massive castle and dungeon complex located in the Duchy of Urnst. Publication history Maure Castle wa ...

'', Issue 112), Best Aid or Accessory (''Dungeon'' magazine), and Best Free Product or Web Enhancement (Maps and handouts, Issues 114–122) * 2006: ENnie Awards for Best Cartography, Best Adventure, and Best Campaign Setting/Setting Supplement (''Shackled City'' Adventure Path); and Best Free Product or Web Enhancement (''Age of Worms'' Overload) * 2007: Origins Award for Best Fiction Publication of the Year 2006 * 2007: ENnie Award for Best Free Product (''Savage Tide'' Player's Guide) ;Nominations * 2006: Origins Award for Best Role-Playing Game Supplement of the Year 2005 (''Shackled City'' hardcover) * 2006: ENnie Award for Best Production Values, Best d20/d20 OGL Product, and Best Product (''Shackled City'' Adventure Path) * 2007: Origins Award for Best Fiction Publication of the Year 2006 * 2007: ENnie Award for Best Adventure (''Age of Worms'' Adventure Path)

Notes

External links

''Dungeon Magazine'' archive
(all issues)
Paizo Publishing
– Products, resources, news, and message boards for ''Dungeon Adventures''
RPGnet
– Partial catalogue of ''Dungeon Adventures'' issues with cover images, content descriptions, and user reviews and comments * Unofficial indices of adventure modules: ** ** {{Dungeons & Dragons franchise media Bimonthly magazines published in the United States Dungeons & Dragons magazines ENnies winners House organs Magazines established in 1986 Magazines disestablished in 2007 Magazines published in Seattle Magazines published in Wisconsin Monthly magazines published in the United States Online magazines published in the United States Online magazines with defunct print editions Origins Award winners Role-playing game magazines TSR, Inc. magazines Wizards of the Coast magazines