Dragonshard Diary #1

IGN PC is offering up the first in a series of diaries for Dragonshard, in which Liquid Entertainment's Ed Kaminski discusses the basis behind the Dungeons & Dragons RTS/RPG hybrid. Here's a bit to get you started:
We quickly began putting together a series of inter-connecting rooms, doors, and passageways much like those you would see in an issue of Dragon magazine, only ours were digital. Much to our dismay, we found that our computer-generated dungeon kit made things seem too confined and thus didn't give the environment the epic feel we were pursuing. It just didn't feel right. So, we changed our focus toward creating an entire underground city with towers that reached high enough to poke through the ground above, and glass domes that barely reached the surface, allowing just enough light into the depths for adventurers to explore. The city idea gave us an environment where all of our D&D demands could be met; a place we could fill with history, creatures, treasures, traps, and countless dangers.