What does this mean? Does it give a chance for the wilderness encounter monster to be in its lair? Does it mean that if I find a lair, a monster may have a chance of being in it, or leave it empty? Does it mean that, should I encounter a monster in the wilderness, a certain percentage of them would be in a lair and the rest without? If I do find monsters in the lair, do I have to construct an entire dungeon, populated with the number of monsters rolled? The wording is unclear and no explanation is given.
I'm reminded of the chapter in The Hobbit where the dwarves ambush/are ambushed by some Trolls, and upon surviving the encounter find the trolls' lair and their booty of magic swords. The trolls' lair was actually just a cave with a simple bag buried under the dirt, not an elaborate dungeon.
I think it's easy to convert that into AD&D terms, if we treat the wilderness as the dungeon. As players encounter monsters, the % in lair could mean that the monsters are within the lair, that they have a lair, that a lair exists without monsters, that a certain percentage of the monsters are in the lair and the rest wandering around, or all of the above. The "lair" can be a simple abode - a tent camp for semi-civilized races or bandits, small caves or holes in the ground for creatures that naturally live in the wild, or whatever.
I think it's easy to convert that into AD&D terms, if we treat the wilderness as the dungeon. As players encounter monsters, the % in lair could mean that the monsters are within the lair, that they have a lair, that a lair exists without monsters, that a certain percentage of the monsters are in the lair and the rest wandering around, or all of the above. The "lair" can be a simple abode - a tent camp for semi-civilized races or bandits, small caves or holes in the ground for creatures that naturally live in the wild, or whatever.
The purpose of a lair is to hold treasure - the only relation it has to the rest of the game, and the only gain of passing the percent check, is that it allows you to roll on the "lair treasure" table for the monster. In short, its more rewarding to find the monster's lair as it will have more treasure. Turning the lair into a dungeon just adds too many steps to finding the treasure. A simple lair, populated by a band of monsters, that the players can clear out and spend a day searching to recover the treasure, is probably the most expedient way of handling it.
Creating simple wilderness lairs is also much easier and much more natural than dotting the landscape with dungeons. Unless a major part of the fiction of the game is that dungeons simply exist all over the world for no reason, much like an Elder Scrolls game.
Creating simple wilderness lairs is also much easier and much more natural than dotting the landscape with dungeons. Unless a major part of the fiction of the game is that dungeons simply exist all over the world for no reason, much like an Elder Scrolls game.
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