Even if you don’t know Jennell Jaquays’ name, you’ve probably explored a tabletop RPG dungeon she created or played a Quake level she designed. The legendary designer and developer’s death last week sparked all manner of tributes from across the industry—but none seem so perfectly fitting for her legacy as a new attempt to crowdsource a memorial megadungeon in her honour.
Return to Perinthos is being put together by tabletop designer Violet Ballard of RV Games; the plan is for people to submit content for it over the next two weeks, whether that’s fully written and illustrated sections of dungeon, or just component parts like maps and map keys that can be fleshed out by the organisers and volunteers.
Once enough entries have been gathered, a crowdfunding campaign will be launched to collect it together into a book and have it printed, with all profits going to help Jaquays’ family with medical and funeral expenses; after that, profit from future sales of the book will be donated to the charity Trans Lifeline—very appropriate, given Jaquays’ devoted activism for trans rights.
If you’re not familiar with the concept of a megadungeon, it’s… well, a big dungeon. That is, one big enough to be a tabletop campaign setting unto itself, not only sprawling with rooms and encounters, but also often featuring different factions to interact with. Return to Perinthos draws inspiration from The Caverns of Thracia, a sprawling and influential dungeon created by Jaquays in 1979 with a theme of Greek mythology—though Ballard hopes to ultimately “represent aspects of all parts of Jennell Jaquays’s career from old school to Dungeons & Dragons to Traveller to Quake and everything in between”.
If you want to submit pages for the book, or volunteer to help with putting it together, just head over to its itch.io page and sign up. You can also donate directly to Jaquays’ family through their fundraiser for her medical expenses.
