Playing AI Dungeon
Table of Contents
Getting Started
New Player Guide
AI Dungeon 101
Adventure AwaitsCommon Questions
AI Model Differences
About the AI
Account Questions
Community 
Feedback & Bugs
Memberships & Benefits
Other Questions
Privacy & Security
Status
Terms of ServiceHow does the Trending category work?
Trending has gone through some iterative changes over the years—originally, Trending was only decided by Play Count. This wasn’t ideal; it allowed spam and clickbait content to take over the Discover page, and made it hard to find genuinely well-made scenarios.
Thus, in December of 2025, Trending was restructured. Now, we try to figure out how much users genuinely enjoy a piece of content, not just how often they click on it.
What makes something trend is built on three signals, weighted equally:
- Do players keep playing?
- We look at how many different days a user returns to the same content within a week. If the player comes back to the Adventure on multiple days of the week, the Scenario is given a higher score.
- Do users stay engaged?
- We measure the average play time per user (how long is spent in the Adventure area) to understand whether the content holds people's attention. Higher average play time means a higher score.
- Does it create long-lasting Adventures?
- We track a “play-through rate”—which is typically set at about 40 actions, but can be adjusted when necessary. If most people who play reach 40 actions, the Scenario gets a higher score.
To keep things fair, we also have a few additional adjustments:
- Content with only a few players gets a lower score until it proves itself with a larger audience.
- This prevents 1-play scenarios from making top trending, just because one person played a lot on it.
- Newer content gets a slight edge over older content, so fresh creations have room to shine.
- However, even older content can shine on Trending if it is getting enough attention and playtime!
- We score different content types in their own separate pools so they aren't competing on an uneven playing field.
This system is updated regularly and used to help surface the best content in our discovery experience.
What constitutes an action?
We consider actions as individual story entries that are created by you, the AI, or another player (during Multiplayer games). Actions are counted once players get into the game screen, not during setup. ‘Continue’ counts as one, and ‘Take A Turn’ counts as two (to include the AI's output). Nothing else is considered as an action.
Do you have tips on how to get on trending?
Most creators will agree that getting on Trending is a lot of luck—after all, you can make a great Scenario, but people still have to give it a chance and play it in order to even have a chance at Trending.
Even still, there are some genuine things you can do to increase your chances—mainly focusing on increasing play time and engagement:
- Create a good out-of-the-box experience. Make sure that when someone starts an Adventure from your Scenario, they can start playing and get hooked immediately.
- If the player has to spend too much time fixing the Plot Components or setting up stuff that you didn’t, there’s a good chance they might just abandon it before it gets off the ground.
- When the Adventure starts off strong, you make sure that the player gets hooked, and will actually want to maintain their story and plot components later on.
- Add a greater arc for the player to follow. For instance, if the Scenario is about fighting a dragon, you could include that the dragon is actually the only thing protecting the world from a much greater foe. This smoothly allows the player to continue the story after the main objective is done.
- This is typically done in Plot Essentials, as that is where information like this will be most effective. Try to avoid forcing any routes directly on the player; keep it open-ended, and let them decide what to do with it.
- Introduce emotional connection. The stories that end up being the longest are the ones that players personally connect to. They see themselves in the story, or at least feel emotionally invested in what happens. Always add depth, nuance, and a genuine ‘human touch’ to your Scenarios—a little goes a long way.
- Test your scenario extensively before publishing. Note any walls that you personally run into, and fix them. Make sure all your plot components work. If you genuinely enjoy playing your own scenario, then it’s likely others will, too.
- Keep trying. You probably won’t get Trending on your first publish—most creators don’t. Thankfully, Trending isn’t the only way to gain visibility. Just keep publishing what you want to publish, and try not to let your creativity be drowned out by the prospect of numbers and stats.
- It’s completely valid to seek validation in your creations, especially when you’ve spent a long time on them. Just remember that creation should be fun, and to not burn yourself out.
- Not only that, but AI Dungeon is incredibly versatile. As long as you create what you want to create, you will certainly find an audience, even if it is small.
