Excerpts from the Fourth Edition Starting Adventurer's Guide To Not Dying Horribly

Common Adventuring Gear

Some new Adventurers think that all you need to go Dungeon-Diving or Monster-Hunting is some armor, a weapon, and maybe a few snacks. This is most emphatically not the case, and most Adventurers who go delving while so poorly equipped will wind up dead the first time they go somewhere the Dungeon doesn't want guests. Below is a list of some basic equipment that will greatly increase an Adventurer's life expectancy, and isn't too hard to find.

Basic Magic Primers

Put quite bluntly, most people can muster at least a bit of magic with some practice. It won't be anywhere near as impressive as what a veteran Adventurer can muster, but learning a few spells gives you much better odds of getting out of a tight situation. Chapter two of this book contains instructions for four extremely basic spells that can easily save your life several times over, listed as follows.

-Smokescreen: If you need to get out of a fight immediately, filling the room with opaque smoke can make it a lot easier.

-Healing Light: A basic healing spell, but still one that can save your life if you find yourself bleeding out. Also prevents infections.

-Repulse: A simple pulse of force that shoves away anything you aim it at, which can help with getting nasty monsters out of your face.

-Theme Ping: This spell tells you the theme for the Mana of whatever you point it at, which can give you a decent idea of what sort of abilities they might have. Also useful for spotting disguised Daemons.

Still, don't stop there; pick up a couple of additional primers of starting Magic to increase the range of spells you can cast, and practice each to the point you could cast them reliably while panicking and in extreme pain-because you just might need to.

Mana Beads

It's a simple fact of life that Adventurers often cannot hold enough Mana internally to see them through a full Dungeon Delve. Fortunately, external means of Mana storage are fairly easy to come by, with the most convenient being Mana Beads. Mana Beads are often sorted by color, with those closer to purple holding more Mana-and being MUCH more expensive. All known colors of Mana Bead are listed below, along with the amount of Mana they contain.

-Black: 5 Mana

-Red: 10 Mana

-Orange: 15 Mana

-Yellow: 20 Mana

-Green: 30 Mana

-Blue: 40 Mana

-Purple: 50 Mana

Note: Most spells used by Adventurers use tenths of a Mana Unit to operate, if that.

Other Useful Items

There are some other things aside from those things that can greatly increase an adventurer's life expectancy, but which don't fall into either of the above categories. These can generally be split between consumable and non-consumable items.

A brief list of some consumables Adventurers could find useful for not dying is listed below. This list solely focuses on items an Adventurer could plausibly acquire on a tight budget.

-Grenades: If you open a door and find yourself unexpectedly face-to-face with a large number of monsters who want you dead, an effective way to deal with the problem is to toss an explosive device into the room and then slam the door. That said, this is terribly rude if the Dungeon is currently playing fairly with you.

-Detoxification Potions: Venomous Dungeon monsters and other toxic hazards are fairly common threats, which can easily prove fatal if left untreated; a detox potion doesn't work on all poisons and doesn't totally prevent damage in some cases, but it does work well enough that it can save your life if you take it quickly.

-Warp Tags: By far the cheapest and most accessible of teleportation magic, Warp Tags are keyed to a single location on creation. When activated, they will instantly transport the user to the pre-set destination, being consumed in the process. Cheap Warp Tags are usually limited in range, restricting the Dungeons they're useful in, but if you need to be out of a dangerous situation immediately there are few better options.

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WARNING: some Warp Tags require the user's Mana to activate; don't rely these ones, as they can't save you if you're beaten down and drained of Mana. ALWAYS get a Warp Tag with an integrated Mana Bead; even a Black bead can provide more than enough power for a 100-mile hop. Trying to save money here could cost you your life, and you only get one of those.

In addition to consumables, here are some other items that can greatly improve a new Adventurer's chances of getting out of a Dungeon alive. Since these pieces of equipment can be expected to have a fairly long service life, less emphasis on affordability was placed.

-Protective Eyewear: You do NOT want to be blinded, particularly by getting nasty stuff in your eyes. A good pair of goggles can stop that from happening. Try and get ones that won't fog up if possible, since obstructed vision is always something you want to avoid, no matter the source.

-Good Boots: Another part of your body you really don't want suddenly damaged is your feet; a spike through your sole is both agonizing and largely immobilizing. Again, in a Dungeon you will often need to run from danger, which damaged feet make much more difficult. A properly reinforced set of adventuring boots is designed to prevent such damage from occurring.

-A Light Source: Dungeons are sometimes dark, and non-Dwarf Adventurers can't usually see in complete darkness. As such, having some way to illuminate your surroundings is highly recommended.

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Dungeoneering Survival Tips

First and foremost, the majority of Dungeons want Adventurers to challenge them, at least to a degree. They want you to delve in and claim treasures from their depths, but they also want you to prove yourself strong enough to carry those treasures. The reason for this is quite simple; Adventurers are part of a Dungeon's reproductive cycle, not only acting as pollinators when they travel between Dungeons, but also acting in a seed dispersal role. Dungeon seeds are the main vector for both of these roles; those small gems all over Dungeon treasures are there for a reason, after all.

When you're in a Dungeon's comfort zone, excessive paranoia about traps and such usually isn't necessary. At that point, it's not really a fight as far as the Dungeon is concerned, so they will usually 'play fair', marking traps in such a manner as to subtly indicate them to a perceptive Adventurer, or having monsters not go for the kill right away. As long as you show that you are a skilled, competent Adventurer, you'll probably be fine.

Not going in properly equipped and prepared usually means the Dungeon will take a rather dim view of your competence right off the bat. In that case, you'll need to work your butt off in order to prove them wrong. If you don't prove the Dungeon wrong, you will either be hauled back to the entrance by the Dungeon's minions if they're feeling merciful, or killed if they aren't.

That said, if you go too deep into a Dungeon, it stops being a matter of proving yourself worthy to act as a seed-bearer, and starts being a case of desperate self-defense on the Dungeon's part. Thus, the single most important survival skill for any Dungeon-Delver is to recognize when you are leaving a Dungeon's comfort zone. In some cases, this is blessedly simple, with a sign clearly indicating that going beyond a certain point forfeits one's life. In other cases, the Dungeon is capable of outright telling you to back off, either directly or by speaking through a minion. The ONLY times when you should attempt to 'clear the Dungeon' past this comfort zone is if either said Dungeon has given you explicit authorization, or if said Dungeon has been actively causing harm to the region around it.

In the extremely hazardous cases where the end of a Dungeon's comfort zone aren't clearly marked, there are some other indicators which you can use to identify the point at which you should REALLY TURN AROUND AND LEAVE IMMEDIATELY.

-If the frequency of found treasure abruptly drops off, TURN AROUND

-If monster types that previously retreated when non-lethally defeated start suddenly fighting to the death, TURN AROUND

-If puzzles are replaced with concealed deathtraps that go off without any form of warning, TURN AROUND

-If there is a sudden lack of explorable, rewarding side-paths, TURN AROUND

If you don't follow this advice, you will in all likelihood be attacked by dozens of monsters at once coming from both in front of you and behind. If this happens, it means that you have officially gotten to the point where the Dungeon does not feel safe allowing you to continue living. Turning around is no longer an option. Your only choices are as follows: teleport out if possible, win the stupidly lopsided fight you just found yourself in, or die a gruesome death. In almost all scenarios, it will be either Option 1, or Option 3.

If you absolutely must Adventure in a Dungeon beyond their comfort zone, you must do so with the understanding that the Dungeon will be doing EVERYTHING in its power to kill you. This is ONLY a good idea if, as mentioned earlier, the Dungeon is causing severe problems for those living nearby (examples: monster raids, releasing deadly plagues). Regardless, you should go in with at least fifty other Adventurers for backup, check every single surface or object for traps, and get ready for the fight of your life. If you happen to kill the Dungeon in question, don't forget that the Dungeon's inhabitants keep existing when the Dungeon dies; they might try to ambush you on your way out.