Daniel (@dungeondive) looks at Vanaheim, an indie Game Crafter dungeon crawler whose designer, John, sent him a copy just as he was about to buy it (he later bought the upgrade pack and an expansion too). It is, by his own description, the dictionary definition of a dungeon crawl — create a character, descend, level up, find better loot, repeat — a hard roguelike where low-level death comes easily and you’ll burn through characters making progress toward the level-five goal: slay the Fire Drake for its skull.
What lifts it is the town phase and the loot economy. Between dungeons you spend coins erecting buildings — Tavern, Smithy, Alchemist, stable — each unlocking merchants and seeding new cards into a growing side-quest deck, so the campaign quietly evolves. He likes the paper-doll equipping, the level-gated treasure decks (you can’t haul out gear above your level, neatly simulating scarcity), and monsters with clever twists like kobolds that flee and ambush you wounded. His wishes: clearer skill rules and lettered rooms with custom non-combat tables. A genuinely promising, actively-supported crawl.
Vanaheim’s town-building between dungeon runs is what Daniel likes best — each building reshaping the quest deck. Do you enjoy a metagame layer between crawls, or do you just want to get back into the dungeon?