Shawn Merwin and Chris Sniezak recently touched on the phenomenon of most groups always turning left when they came to an intersection in a dungeon, as part of their Down with D&D podcast.

The decision to “turn left first” is one I’ve observed at many tables over the last couple of decades. My feeling is that it comes partly from the decision to take the first option – we ask “do you turn left or right?” rather than “do you turn right or left?” – and then is reinforced with familiarity. Certainly, when exploring the mazey dungeons, a good strategy for not getting lost is to always turn in the same direction – it makes retracing your footsteps much easier!

One of the funniest D&D experiences I had came from this. We were playing the Mark of Heroes campaign, and it gave you the option to design your own adventure rather than play an official one. So, one of my friends designed a dungeon, and I played in it rather than ran it.

We had one player who was a very strong proponent of the “always turn left” strategy, and my friend designed the dungeon with him in mind. Unfortunately, for her, when we played the adventure, I was playing and our “always turn left” player was absent. So, at the first intersection – as I was very sick of people always turning left in my games – I got the group to turn right.

We waltzed right into the boss’s chambers and defeated him. If we’d turned left, we’d have to defeat a great number of minions first. We did mop them up on the way out, bolstered by the loot garnered from the boss!

I think players will tend to a default response to how they travel through dungeons because so many of the passages are all alike. To make the decision more meaningful, the DM or designer needs to give out information that informs the choice. If there’s a rotting smell coming from one direction and the scent of roses from the other, that at least gives the players something with which to work.

Exactly what sorts of meaningful information we can give is worth exploring further!