A Dystopian Arena Survival Tabletop Roleplaying Game
What is Dungeon Runner?
Dungeon Runner is a tabletop role-playing game about unwilling contestants trapped in a deadly game show — fighting monsters, escaping traps, and navigating the spectacle of survival for an audience that demands both blood and drama. It draws inspiration from traditions of reality TV, dystopian death sports (like The Hunger Games or Dungeon Crawler Carl), and blood-soaked fantasy dungeons, where the stakes are life, death, and sometimes more.
If you're looking for a game with high stakes, weird loot, and deeply personal stories about resilience and resistance, look no further than Dungeon Runner.
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What is the System?
Unlike traditional dungeon crawlers, we built Dungeon Runner around the ethos of the arena. Every choice is for survival and the audience — because you are being watched. Players balance tactical play with showmanship through mechanics like:
EXPLODING Dice
That scale as characters grow in power. There is always the chance for you to exceed your limits, so let your characters do the same with dice that EXPLODE when the max-value is rolled!
Intuitive Character Creation
With an Intelligence Center system that helps you build believable characters. These aren’t just personality traits–they determine the way you most naturally react under pressure, how you tend to access magic, and which rolls get that little extra oomph.
Character concept art by Yasen Stoilov
Custom Species & Classes
You make yourself, using Feature Tables that add a touch of chaos to your best-laid strategy. With over 1 trillion unique possible combinations, your character will always be one of a kind with their own style and story.
Spells & Maneuvers
That every character, regardless of class, can gain access to. Want to play a spell-slinging warrior? Easy! How about a wizard who cleaves through their enemies with an enchanted great-sword named Sue? Sounds fun.
Wounds
That add tension and reflect the scars every encounter might leave. Embrace cinematic consequences that have narrative and mechanical.
Loot Boxes & Audience Favor
Delivering unpredictable gear, weird items, and moments of dark comedy, all earned by surviving the Dungeon and entertaining the masses.
Enemies & Threats
That are deadly, terrifying, and original. The Crysothryx, Tome Terror, Puppet-Maker, and Skrittle are just a sampling of what awaits you in the Dungeon. Show-Runner guidance and narrative hooks, traps and hazards, and even other Runners are all covered in the core book.
Concept art by Yasen Stoilov
Quick Start Rules
Sign up for the (very occasional) newsletter and download the Demo Packet.
Thank you
For supporting our game! We hope you have fun and survive this season's Run.