In this series, I am going to talk about things that I think every good dungeon should have. Of course your mileage may vary.

Many of the dungeons I’ve been to in Atlanta have colorful lighting — either it’s used as an accent or it changes color, sometimes with the beat of the music. It looks cool, but it’s not ideal. 

Depending upon the color of the light, it can be hard to see certain kinds of marks on people’s skin. Red washes out other similar shades and it’s impossible to see how red someone’s skin is getting before it’s too late. Blue can make it difficult to make out redness as well. It’s one thing if you’re doing impact, but what if you’re doing rope? If you’ve accidentally cut off someone’s circulation, you need to be able to see their skin changing color just in case they’re too far into subspace to let you know they can’t feel their hand or foot. 

Colorful accent lighting is all well and good, but the main lighting in the dungeon should be normal soft-white light. 1763, a now-closed Atlanta dungeon, had some colorful accent lights but the primary lighting was white. It can be dim — although not too dim, or it can be difficult to see what you’re doing. The dungeon at TASSP is good about this; the lights in the room that is used are on a rheostat, so they can be dimmed pretty far. 

Previously:

• Tables