Envision what you think is the ideal session, and work backwards from that to game design.
That's probably not helpful. But that's my high level approach, because it's just like a board game or any other game. "I want a game where players crawl a mine. I don't have one on my shelf, so I'll make one. Ok, where do I start?"
As Angry GM says, adventures are game design. They
are the game. And we need to build the games we want to play.
Something less fuzzy:
- How do you prepare for something like this?
Wikipedia. Research mines, especially older ones. (Apologies if you're already an expert on mining).
From R&D I start to gather some core facts about the environment. (Feature Location.)
For example, two cool decisions you get to make:
- What material was being mined?
- What primary mining method was being used?
Doing some R&D gives you adventures with that realistic edge and details for emergent gameplay.
Maybe you're is an above-ground desert salt mine. Or a tundra copper mine.
Once you start detailing Setting, look for ways in the Polish stage to turn some ideas on the head or make them perfect for our type of gaming.
Our
What If... tool helps here.
For example, What If...the material being mined has changed the monsters. Giant Copper Centipedes and Slithering Salt Centipedes sound terrifying.
Anywho, after some R&D and filling up my notebook with details about the topic, I keep that handy for Build and Polish. I'll put asterisks beside stuff that's particularly appealing to me that I want to build my game with. In other words, I do R&D to start filling my adventure's Bucket List.
- Do you have maps (that I could borrow)?
Not being cheeky here, but I use Google. What you find on the internet is legal to use for personal use like a game night with friends. At least, in Canada it is.
I love DungeonDraft. I can't wait to have time to get good at it. You could also Google a real map and trace it in your mapping app of choice.
For mine design, these tips are fantastic:
https://thealexandrian.net/wordpress/13085/roleplaying-games/jaquaying-the-dungeon
To answer the question though, I do not have any maps. I need to find an app to organize all my files, I can't find anything on my hard drive any more.
- Do you have other tools you use?
- Do you use maps with fog of war for this?
Are you using a VTT? If so, I've found Fog of War great.
But I don't use FOW every time. If I have a players map (no labels or secrets revealed) then I often give my players the map up front.
This gives them a bunch of interesting stuff to think about, plan over in a backchannel, and keep some players more engaged.
Caveat by introducing the map in-game as potentially not being accurate. In VTT land, I do this by changing maps via drawing tools. It looks amateur, but so far no complaints.
In real life, I draw maps for players myself during the game, so I make whatever changes I want as I go based on current gameplay.
If you can find some images of the environment, that helps a lot. Especially if you use details from those images to effect matters of import during play.
- Do you have specific tips to increase the fun in a theater-of-mind approach (to make the progress and depths vivid?
It depends on the system. Sly Flourish champions TotM fights, but it doesn't work for me for D&D. Too many numbers in the system players need to understand to go without a battlemap in my experience. This actually happened for a DCC game I played in recently, too. The GM broke TotM to put our tokens on map so we saw relative distances and positioning because the group was getting confused.
Check Sly Flourish's site for his great tips of TotM.
My #1 tip for TotM is to wield the game rules in a friendly way conducive your TotM. As soon as you involve positioning, distances, and tactics that need map support, you'll need a map.
For vividness, you can draw from any R&D details you learned or noted. Turn your mine into multiple 5RDs where each 5RD's Feature Location is a new environment theme. That keeps things fresh in players' eyes, and gives to a storytelling tool for conveying player progression.
My goto reference here is Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness and the movie Apocalypse Now.
- How do you approach an exploration of a mine vs. a standard cave system or dungeon?
Make the mining stuff useful to gameplay.
Make what was being mined part of your design.
For example, you might decide mining carts were used. Those now become Checkov's Gun for Room IV or something foes leverage for advantage.
Also, the track can be used to trap the players (most people will make assumptions when you introduce concepts like "mine" and "mining carts on tracks" and you can leverage that for Room III and IV). I guarantee players will follow the tracks blindly and not think to look for sink holes under the tracks waiting to collapse.
I hope this helps a bit. Sorry I'm unable to provide a complete answer - I'm under a writing deadline.
Cheers.