Spicing Up the Empty/Mundane Room: A Random Table

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Castle Room
Art by Eric Quigley

The art of the empty room is a curious line to walk.  On the one hand you want to keep things interesting… otherwise the players will meta-game that the room with no/little description has nothing worth discovering.  On the other hand, you don’t want the players to waste too much time trying to discover something that isn’t there.

Below is a chart to help with giving the empty room something of a description.  (And with 12 rows–giving love to the d12–and 5 columns we get nearly 250,000 combinations.  Maybe less or more because in some cases you don’t use all charts and in other cases you roll twice again.)  As for stopping the players from wasting their time: after they spend a minute or two examining an odd feature, start dropping hints that there isn’t more to it–unless the players in their paranoia give you a great idea!

Random charts are a regular feature here.  Some prior examples: Random Charts for “Spell Accents”, Coin Description Generator (Random Table), Random Unusual Weather Table, Random Magic Fountain/Pool Effects Chart, Hexmap Alphabetical Random Charts: Ruins, Random Omens Charts, Fun With Potions: Random Charts for Expired Potions, Random Potion Description Charts, Random (or not) City Name Charts

These charts are designed to help flesh out a truly mundane room.  The odd features are all benign and not intended to be magical or traps. The original purpose column should help you think of what furniture & items may be in the room. You can also augment the description by reminding the players what the dungeon or building looks like in general: size & material of the door, height of the rooms, style of stonework, etc. See an example or two below the chart.

And of course, feel free to adjust the results if you’re inspired/if it fits your adventure/story.  If you know the guards like to gamble, put some cards (or dice) in the abandoned guardroom, for example.

Roll a d12 for each of the first three columns.  The 3rd column’s results determines which of the 4th & 5th columns should be rolled.

d12 Original Purpose How It Has Aged Has Odd Features? Odd Feature Column A Odd Feature Column B
1 Antechamber Recently used for original purpose; well kept. No A wall discoloration shows something was on the wall at one time… Several broken arrows are discarded in the room.
2 Barracks Recently used for original purpose; is currently very messy. No Faded Summoning Runes on floor in chalk Floor is cracked & uneven making quick maneuvers difficult.
3 Bedroom Room’s purpose has been converted (roll again for the newer purpose) but it was converted well and neatly done. No A skull, conspicuously placed A motto is carved into a wall.
4 Dining Most of the room has been recently destroyed by fire. No Water drips from above A curse is scrawled on one wall.
5 Guard post In addition to its original purpose, the room was used as an impromptu campsite. (Remains of a small fire, discarded food waste, etc.) Column A Bat guano and rose petals sprinkled in a corner of the room. A smell of rotten flesh permeates the room.
6 Kitchen The room was under construction when the area was abandoned. Column A Rat hair can be noticed near a hole in the wall. The floor is covered in a thin layer of oil.
7 Larder The room was poorly constructed. Anyone with an engineering/architecture background will notice obvious issues. Column A Claw marks are on the inside of a door. The ceiling is much lower than other rooms/halls nearby.
8 Shrine The room was obviously burned nearly completely a long time ago. Column B A sconce is still warm. A wall has partially collapsed.
9 Storage Very old; The dust was disturbed a long time ago; a creature’s skeleton lays on the floor. Column B Unusual number of cobwebs. A deck of cards was left behind.
10 Study Very old; dusty; evidence of many spiders and insects can be seen Column B Floor slopes almost imperceptibly. A few stones on one wall have many tiny holes.
11 Trophy Very old; covered in dust; recent footprints can be easily seen Col A & B Room is watched through an almost undetectable hole or magic. The room is much more moist than nearby rooms.
12 Workshop Ancient and undisturbed Col A & B Roll 2x for this column Roll 2x for this column

Here is a first example: 5 (guard post), 8 (burned long ago), 10(col B), & 11(more moist).  This room has the burnt remains of a pair of tables and several chairs. The doors are sturdy can be barred from the inside.  You feel the room is more humid than usual but otherwise it seems normal.

Here is another example: 3 (bedroom), 11 (ancient, undisturbed), 11(col 1&B), 8 (sconce is still warm), & 2 (cracked/uneven floor). So this is tricky–if this is a mundane room, why is the sconce warm if the room is ancient & undisturbed?  We should drop that detail or re-roll it. We get a 9 (Unusual number of cobwebs).  An ornate 4-post bed with once-rich fabrics dominates this room.  A small desk, bookcase, and washstand confirm it as an ancient lesser noble’s bedroom. The floor seems to have settled unevenly over time, but it (like the furniture) is covered in dust.  The only sign that fresh air has reached the room at all are the cobwebs.

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