# Let's Read...Everything D&D!



## KirayaTiDrekan (Mar 9, 2014)

Inspired by (un)reason's epic Let's Read the Entire Run of Dragon Magazine, I am going to embark on a crazy journey that will likely never be finished.

Reading and reviewing (almost) everything ever published with the D&D logo. 

I'll be going in order of original publishing date as noted in Echohawk's collector's guides with a few exceptions.  For example, A2 was published in July 1981, while A3 and A4 were published in May 1981, so I'll be reading through A2 alongside the others, rather than reading it after its sequels.

In most cases, I'll be using the PDF version of a product available on www.dndclassics.com or the recent premium reprints.  I'll also put a holder post in for a product I simply don't have access to and get back to it if I ever do get it (I don't foresee ever being able to acquire ST1: Up the Garden Path).

My criteria for what I'll be covering here is a little arbitrary.  I won't be doing magazines.  (un)reason has already covered Dragon Magazine admirably and I simply don't want to delve into Dungeon and other periodicals.  I won't be including D&D items that aren't really "readable" like character sheets, DM screens, geomorphs, etc.  I will be including D&D setting products that were produced under license by companies other than TSR and WotC - specifically 3rd Edition and 3.5 era Dragonlance (Sovereign Press/Margaret Weis Productions) and Ravenloft (Sword & Sorcery Studios) products.  I will not be including Kingdoms of Kalamar, Warcraft RPG, Diablo, etc.

In some cases I will also be including a play-through review, recounting my experiences with DMing an adventure or using a supplement with my current or past groups.  

I'm going to try to post once a week or more, but I make no promises.    Commentary, suggestions, anecdotes, etc., are very welcome.

Now, on with the show...

*Chainmail*

Originally published March, 1971

Version being read and reviewed: Chainmail: Rules for Medieval Miniatures (3rd Edition) (PDF) (PDF added to www.dmsguild.com January, 2017)

"Rules for Medieval Miniatures" by Gary Gygax and Jeff Perren

My first impression upon reading through this slim rulebook is that it is intended for an audience that is already familiar with hobby wargaming and knows the jargon.  Not being a member of that target audience, I felt like I was reading a math textbook written in Greek.  

Still, this is an important part of D&D's pre-history so when it became available in PDF, I snagged it as soon as I could.  I noted in my Original D&D reviews that it seemed like it was somewhat incomplete, referring back to Chainmail several times.  Unfortunately, reading through the actual Chainmail rules, even the Fantasy Supplement section, really doesn't clarify anything.  I still find both this game and OD&D itself to be effectively unplayable without bringing in some rules from later editions (BECMI mostly).  

I'm sure if I had someone to guide me through a battle I'd probably enjoy it, but I'm not likely to ever try to play a battle with these rules myself.


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## KirayaTiDrekan (Mar 9, 2014)

*Dungeons & Dragons 3-Volume Set

*Originally published January, 1974

Version being read and reviewed: Original Dungeons & Dragons RPG - Original Edition Premium Reprint (November 2013)

*Book 1: Men & Magic*

"Rules for Fantastic Medieval Wargames: Campaigns Playable with Paper and Pencil and Miniature Figures"  by Gary Gygax & Dave Arneson

Foreword: Gary Gygax introduces us to this first version of the D&D game with a little history of the Castle and Crusade Society and taking a subtle dig at traditional wargamers who "lack imagination."  The foreword is dated 1 November 1973.  Dave Arneson's Blackmoor is referred to here as predating Gygax's own Greyhawk, though both campaigns were still ongoing as of the writing of this foreword.  

After that the booklet doesn't have actual chapters, just a bunch of little subsections, so I'm just going to ramble a bit here.  First interesting tidbit is the number of possible players - from 4 to 50 (though the recommended DM to Player ratio is 1:20).  50 players!  Now I'm kind of curious just what that would look like.

For character classes we have Fighting Men, Magic-Users (who have some rudimentary item creation rules), and Clerics.  A note on Fighting Men - this being from 1974, the subtle (and not so subtle) exclusion of women is pervasive, most clearly evident in the name of the class that would become the Fighter.  If I ever try to run this version of the game, I'll be changing the language quite a bit.

We also have dwarves (who can only advance as fighters up to 6th level), Elves (weird multiclassing rules here - they can advance as fighters up to 4th level and magic-users up to 8th level, but must choose which one to adventure as for each adventure - they can't use their magic-user spells if they are adventuring as a fighter and vice versa), and Halflings (who are limited to fighters of up to 4th level).  There's also a paragraph about more exotic characters, like dragons, though its left entirely to the DM as to how such a character would work.

Moving on a bit, I found it interesting that the DM (referee) is supposed to roll for each player's ability scores - the player only notes them on the character sheet, along with whatever gold total the DM rolled for them.

There's a relatively extensive section on NPCs with the assumption being that player character's will hire NPC retainers and often choose to subdue monsters into service instead of killing them.  Amusingly, there's also a note about relatives (effectively replacement PCs) to whom a player character can leave their belongings to.  The new PC thus starts with better gear (though they still start at 1st level, regardless of the level of the other PCs).

Of interest in the equipment section are wooden and silver crosses (not holy symbols) and other items inspired by the horror genre's monster hunters (garlic, wolvesbane, stakes, and the like).  Gygax notes Leiber, Howard, and Burroughs as inspirations in the Foreward, but I would wager that Stoker and Shelley had a subtle influence as well.

There are several references to Chainmail in this booklet, mostly in reference to combat.  An alternative combat system is provided, though it is bare bones (the skeleton upon which later edition combat systems would be built).

Spells are rather vague and often open to DM fiat.  Magic-User spells only go up to 6th level and Cleric spells max out at 5th level.  There's an odd little side note about Anti-Clerics (evil clerics) who make use of the Finger of Death spell.

And that's it for Book I: Men & Magic.  Having started my D&D career with Mentzer's Red Box and moving straight into AD&D 2nd Edition, this little artifact is difficult to comprehend at times and feels somewhat incomplete, likely due to the strong ties to Chainmail (and the assumption that readers are at least somewhat familiar with it).

Next up: Dungeons & Dragons 3-Volume Set - Book II: Monsters & Treasure


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## Hussar (Mar 9, 2014)

Go to it!  Good luck!


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## KirayaTiDrekan (Mar 10, 2014)

*Dungeons & Dragons 3-Volume Set

*Originally published January, 1974

Version being read and reviewed: Original Dungeons & Dragons RPG - Original Edition Premium Reprint (November 2013)

*Book 2: Monsters & Treasure*

"Rules for Fantastic Medieval Wargames: Campaigns Playable with Paper and Pencil and Miniature Figures"  by Gary Gygax & Dave Arneson

 Open up this booklet and one is confronted by a table full of stats right away.  Unlike later editions where each monster had its own little (and not so little) "stat block" here we get all the stats up front with descriptions following.  There only 57 entries on the table, though some of those encompass a number of different critters (dragons, lycanthropes, etc).  The monsters are roughly evenly split up between humanoids (goblins and orcs and such), undead (skeletons, zombies, etc), mythological critters (dragons and so forth), and oozes.

Odd observations - Descriptions are pretty brief, usually no more than a paragraph per monster.  Orcs get a bit more detail with class levels noted for leaders.  The rock-throwing ability of giants has its origins as giants being effectively treated as catapults in the Chainmail rules evidently.  Dragons, of course, get a decent amount of page space, with a good portion of it devoted to subduing and selling them on the open market.  Only six age categories are noted - Very Young, Young, Sub-Adult, Adult, Old, and Very Old.  Notably absent are what we now consider some of the iconic D&D monsters - Beholders, Rust Monsters, Yuan-Ti, etc.  There is a note about other types of monsters the DM might want to use or come up with on their own, including robots, golems, and androids.  

Following the monsters, we have the treasure section.  Another table relatively similar to the tables in later edition Dungeon Master's Guides with random chances of various types of coinage, gems, jewelry, and magic items.  Interestingly, bandits, nomads, and pirates are noted as having prisoners as part of their "treasure" hoards.  

Magic swords are apparently always intelligent and have properties beyond the simple "+1."  The rest of the magic items hold no surprises, being nearly identical to their later edition counterparts.  Artifacts are mentioned briefly but not given stats.

Final thoughts: The gendered language is even more pervasive here with "men" used in a generic fashion to refer to humans and even non-human humanoids like orcs and goblins.  While I don't necessarily want to turn this into a criticism of the gender bias of the time, I'm really glad I didn't start with this edition and that current RPGs have done away with the bias for the most part.

Next up: Dungeons & Dragons 3-Volume Set - Book III: The Underworld & Wilderness Adventures


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## Olgar Shiverstone (Mar 11, 2014)

Dude, very ambitious -- but fascinating.  Enjoying the stroll down memory lane.  Keep it up!


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## TerraDave (Mar 11, 2014)

I imagine that 84 through 97 will be a little challenging.


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## pemerton (Mar 12, 2014)

MasqueradingVampire said:


> The gendered language is even more pervasive here with "men" used in a generic fashion to refer to humans and even non-human humanoids like orcs and goblins.  While I don't necessarily want to turn this into a criticism of the gender bias of the time, I'm really glad I didn't start with this edition and that current RPGs have done away with the bias for the most part.



I can't remember how Moldvay Basic does it, but Gygax's PHB and DMG use "he or she", "him or her" etc throughout. In this respect the language is much more inclusive than second ed. (I can't remember 3E.)

In other words, I think there was a retrograde step in language somewhere in the 80s which lasted for a long time.


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## Iosue (Mar 12, 2014)

pemerton said:


> I can't remember how Moldvay Basic does it, but Gygax's PHB and DMG use "he or she", "him or her" etc throughout. In this respect the language is much more inclusive than second ed. (I can't remember 3E.)
> 
> In other words, I think there was a retrograde step in language somewhere in the 80s which lasted for a long time.



Moldvay uses "he or she".  Mentzer as a whole avoids sentence constructions that required gender terms, helped by having the books written specifically for players and DMs respectively, allowing him to use "you".  When it can't be helped, he uses "his (or her)".  Also unlike AD&D, the level titles in B/X and BECMI have both male and female versions.

On one hand, I think OD&D could be cut some slack on the gendered language front, since rather than a mainstream RPG aimed at an inclusive audience, it's really more of a proto-RPG expanding on miniature wargames, particularly on Chainmail.  In this idiom, "men" referred to miniature units, rather than the specific sex of characters or players.  Thus it's use of goblins and other humanoids, in contrast to non-humanoid monsters, such as dragons.

OTOH, some of the material in the mid- to late-70s was mind-bogglingly, facepalmingly, head-shakingly sexist.  Not at all surprisingly, considering the pulpy sources the early creators were working from.


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## KirayaTiDrekan (Mar 12, 2014)

Yeah, I'm probably going to end up commenting about the "Pronoun Note" in the Rules Cyclopedia and "A Note About Pronouns" in the AD&D 2nd Edition Player's Handbook when I get to them.  They struck me as out of place then, even as a teen.

(Next entry coming soon.)


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## KirayaTiDrekan (Mar 18, 2014)

*Dungeons & Dragons 3-Volume Set

*Originally published January, 1974

Version being read and reviewed: Original Dungeons & Dragons RPG - Original Edition Premium Reprint (November 2013)

*Book 3: The Underworld & Wilderness Adventures*

"Rules for Fantastic Medieval Wargames: Campaigns Playable with Paper and Pencil and Miniature Figures"  by Gary Gygax & Dave Arneson

This one starts off a little odd, at least in comparison to later guides for DM's designing their own adventures.  Dungeon building is handled first by means of an example, along with anecdotes from Castle Greyhawk (it apparently had a bowling alley for 20' tall giants).  The example dungeon has a lot of what we might call "gotcha" tricks nowadays, with a lot of shifting walls and changing rooms designed to challenge (or frustrate) the group's mapper.  

It seems that the assumption back then was that players would delve into the same dungeon numerous times.  The booklet gives advice about revising and restocking dungeon levels between excursions to keep things from getting boring.  Another interesting tidbit - the wandering monster tables include level titles from the character classes.  So, a superhero (the title for a Level 8 Fighter) appears with trolls, minotaurs, and wyverns on the 5th level dungeon wandering monster table.  

The example of play makes me twitch as it seems the caller (the player designated to make decisions for the group and inform the DM), seems to be running the show with nary a peep from the other players, even dictating the actions of their characters.  Was the game really played like that back then?  I've never seen or heard of such a thing.

The rules for wilderness adventuring consist of discussions of the types of castles and stronghold members of each character class are likely to possess and wandering monsters found in the wilderness.  The world outside the dungeon is a very unforgiving place it seems since the tables don't make any distinction based on level.  Your 1st level characters are just as likely to run into a dragon as your 10th level characters.  There's another offhand reference to the work of Edgar Rice Burroughs with the wandering monsters table for deserts indicating that it can also be used for Mars.  

We then delve into the costs of building strongholds and hiring various retainers for both the stronghold and other areas (ship captains, assassins, etc).  Players are referred to Chainmail if they want to play out larger scale battles involving strongholds and such.  Aerial and naval combat are covered, however, in some detail.  

Taken together, these three booklets don't feel like a complete game, at least to me.  Abundant references to Chainmail and some gaps in the rules here and there make this original version of D&D feel like a reference work for those already "in the know" among the authors' wargaming club.  My assumption, then, is that when the game suddenly became popular, only then did they consider organizing the rules in a fashion designed to introduce new players to the game. 

*Play-Through Review*

Since originally writing this review I have experimented with creating characters and running a few sessions.  My current groups consist of my wife's character and her henchmen and my family's characters (wife playing a second character and our four kids), both of which are members of a mercenary company hired to clear out an abandoned city.  I'm basically running the city like a large dungeon crawl, as befitting the general focus of these rules.  I have, however, house ruled the game fairly extensively, using the D&D Rules Cyclopedia for combat tables and the like.  The kids are fairly unhappy with the limited character options (they were introduced to D&D via 3.5 and have played a lot of 4E and Pathfinder as well).

Next up: Supplement I: Greyhawk


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## Olgar Shiverstone (Mar 18, 2014)

MasqueradingVampire said:


> It seems that the assumption back then was that players would delve into the same dungeon numerous times.  The booklet gives advice about revising and restocking dungeon levels between excursions to keep things from getting boring.




You know, this is something we seem to have lost over the years.  While I'm sure some groups still do it -- I know my group did in 3E when we ran _Banewarrens_ -- I suspect the demise of the mega-dungeon plus the focus on encounter- or story-based adventures doomed the multi-excursion exploration.

It is something I'd like to see brought back in exploration-type play.


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## diaglo (Mar 18, 2014)

since i still run OD&D(1974) i'll just stick to some of your choice of things to review.



MasqueradingVampire said:


> *Dungeons & Dragons 3-Volume Set
> 
> *Originally published January, 1974
> 
> ...




20 is optimal. the game was born from wargaming. many times in wargaming you had sides/teams. and you elected a spokesman or Captain. for D&D the term is Caller.



> For character classes we have Fighting Men, Magic-Users (who have some rudimentary item creation rules), and Clerics.  A note on Fighting Men - this being from 1974, the subtle (and not so subtle) exclusion of women is pervasive, most clearly evident in the name of the class that would become the Fighter.  If I ever try to run this version of the game, I'll be changing the language quite a bit.
> 
> We also have dwarves (who can only advance as fighters up to 6th level), Elves (weird multiclassing rules here - they can advance as fighters up to 4th level and magic-users up to 8th level, but must choose which one to adventure as for each adventure - they can't use their magic-user spells if they are adventuring as a fighter and vice versa), and Halflings (who are limited to fighters of up to 4th level).  There's also a paragraph about more exotic characters, like dragons, though its left entirely to the DM as to how such a how character would work.
> 
> Moving on a bit, I found it interesting that the DM (referee) is supposed to roll for each player's ability scores - the player only notes them on the character sheet, along with whatever gold total the DM rolled for them.




this is still done today for many tournaments/conventions. we call these characters pre generated (pre gens). you skipped the part where the players optimized the PCs to their liking.



> There's a relatively extensive section on NPCs with the assumption being that player character's will hire NPC retainers and often choose to subdue monsters into service instead of killing them.  Amusingly, there's also a note about relatives (effectively replacement PCs) to whom a player character can leave their belongings to.  The new PC thus starts with better gear (though they still start at 1st level, regardless of the level of the other PCs).
> 
> Of interest in the equipment section are wooden and silver crosses (not holy symbols) and other items inspired by the horror genre's monster hunters (garlic, wolvesbane, stakes, and the like).  Gygax notes Leiber, Howard, and Burroughs as inspirations in the Foreward, but I would wager that Stoker and Shelley had a subtle influence as well.



see the note on Chainmail coming up.



> There are several references to Chainmail in this booklet, mostly in reference to combat.  An alternative combat system is provided, though it is bare bones (the skeleton upon which later edition combat systems would be built).



Chainmail was not optional. it is required. rules for exhaustion for example are on page 9 of Chainmail. also rules for other things for bonus or penalties to rolls.



> Spells are rather vague and often open to DM fiat.  Magic-User spells only go up to 6th level and Cleric spells max out at 5th level.  There's an odd little side note about Anti-Clerics (evil clerics) who make use of the Finger of Death spell.
> 
> And that's it for Book I: Men & Magic.  Having started my D&D career with Mentzer's Red Box and moving straight into AD&D 2nd Edition, this little artifact is difficult to comprehend at times and feels somewhat incomplete, likely due to the strong ties to Chainmail (and the assumption that readers are at least somewhat familiar with it).
> 
> Next up: Dungeons & Dragons 3-Volume Set - Book II: Monsters & Treasure




you forgot to mention Outdoor Survival too. which included rules for adventuring outside, tracking food/resource management, getting lost, etc...


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## KirayaTiDrekan (Mar 31, 2014)

*Dungeons & Dragons Supplement I: Greyhawk

*Originally published February, 1975

Version being read and reviewed: Original Dungeons & Dragons RPG - Original Edition Premium Reprint (November 2013)

"Rules for Fantastic Medieval Wargames: Campaigns Playable with Paper and Pencil and Miniature Figures"  by Gary Gygax & Rob Kuntz

We start with a Foreword by Gygax which notes two things of importance.  One, the supplement doesn't stand on its own and requires the Dungeons & Dragons Three Volume Set and two, the supplement is organized such that information pertaining to the original three booklets appears in the order of those booklets.  That is, new character info first, then new treasures and monsters, and finally advice for the DM on wilderness and dungeon adventures.  There's also a note about potential future supplements, with Blackmoor already in the works.

And so, the Thief enters the game.  In this version, the Thief is the only class that all races can take and that has no level limits for any race.  So, if your dwarves, elves, and halflings want to keep earning levels along with their human friends, thief is their go-to class.  The thief abilities that the class is known for are relatively the same here as they appear in AD&D 1E, BECMI, and AD&D 2E.  We are also introduced to the half-elf whose main claim to fame here is their versatility when it comes to multi-classing.

In the section that expands and clarifies ability scores is where we find the Paladin, a subclass of Fighter, described under Charisma since a character needs a 17 Charisma to qualify for the class.  As with the Thief, the Paladin didn't change much between its introduction here and the version found in AD&D 1st Edition.  Alternate hit dice and maximum hit dice values are presented, apparently as a means of balancing fighters and magic-users (we also see the fighting class referred to here as "fighter" instead of "fighting man" for the first time).

Combat is expanded and clarified, specifically the alternate system to the Chainmail rules, making the game a bit more complete.  Weapon type vs armor tables show up here, which make my eyes cross a bit.  

 There is a plethora of new spells, including some of the more powerful and infamous 9th level spells like Gate and Wish.  

Monsters are again presented in a big table, with some of the critters mentioned briefly in the original set now having statistics (like the Gelatinous Cube).  Dragons get some expansion including the metallic dragons and some words about the Platinum Dragon, King of Lawful Dragons and the Chromatic Dragon, Queen of Chaotic Dragons (no names as of yet).  The authors were evidently quite aware of gender issues even then, as the following note appears concerning the Chromatic Dragon - "Women's Lib may make whatever they wish of the foregoing."  From a game history standpoint, the Chromatic Dragon is presented as dwelling in a "stupendous cavern far beneath the earth" - her presence on the first layer of Hell apparently comes along a bit later (a Dragon Magazine article if I remember correctly).  The Beholder debuts here, also known as the Sphere of Many Eyes or Eye Tyrant.  Other monsters we now consider classic, iconic D&D monsters are also present, like the Rust Monster and the Owlbear.

Magic items get a major expansion with an extensive number of new miscellaneous items.  Some highlights include the Vorpal Sword which began life as a holy sword variant and more powerful version of the sword of sharpness, Portable Hole, Sphere of Annihilation, the Book of Vile Darkness (and its counterpart, the Book of Exalted Deeds), the Deck of Many Things, and a number of cursed items, mostly masquerading as normal items (bag of devouring looks like the bag of holding, bowl of watery death looks like the bowl of commanding water elementals, etc).  The Girdle of Femininity/Masculinity makes its debut here as well.  

The Underworld & Wilderness Adventures section is short and contains a few new traps and tricks.  After a brief list of monsters by hit die, the version I have then has one page of errata.

As other reviews have noted over the years, the Greyhawk supplement doesn't actually contain any information on the world of Greyhawk or Castle Greyhawk at all.  It does, however, expand the game considerably, adding a significant amount of material that we now consider to be iconic and part of what makes D&D the game we know and love.

*Play-Through Review*

Since writing this review I have dabbled with OD&D but ultimately decided I'm just not going to be able to run it as written.  What I have done instead is adapted D&D 5E for a similar feel.  Thus, I'm going to be introducing the Rogue (Thief) and Paladin (Oath of Devotion) to my setting in the next mini-campaign I run for my kids.

Next up: Supplement II: Blackmoor

(Apologies for the delay, I've been job hunting since getting laid off on the 17th.)


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## Ed_Laprade (Mar 31, 2014)

Sorry hear that you got laid off, hope the job hunting is going well!


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## diaglo (Apr 2, 2014)

MasqueradingVampire said:


> *Dungeons & Dragons Supplement I: Greyhawk
> 
> *Originally published February, 1975
> 
> ...



Greyhawk also introduces the power creep in print. the end to limited bonus and penalties to ability scores. you get % dice for str for fighting men. you get greater than +1 for damage, to hit, hps for all classes for Con, increase in the spell lvl, and more.
it doesn't limit the players from creating their own classes. dwarf paladin could exist. just not the version in the book or called that. how do you think the first thief or paladin happened? someone made them and asked to play them. the referee made a ruling. and viola. they made it into print.


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## KirayaTiDrekan (May 27, 2014)

*Dungeons & Dragons Supplement II: Blackmoor

*Originally published September, 1975

Version being read and reviewed: Original Dungeons & Dragons RPG - Original Edition Premium Reprint (November 2013)

"Rules for Fantastic Medieval Wargames: Campaigns Playable with Paper and Pencil and Miniature Figures"  by Dave Arneson

The forward by Gary Gygax takes a tongue-in-cheek approach, warning players away from this highly addictive pastime that is D&D.  He also acknowledges that Blackmoor is the oldest and longest running D&D campaign and Dave Arneson's role as the originator of the dungeon adventure concept.  

In the Men & Magic section of the booklet we are introduced to Monks (a subclass of Cleric) and Assassins (a subclass of Thief).  Monks are a sort of a weird hybrid between thief and druid, with unarmed combat thrown in.  Though a subclass of Cleric, they bear little resemblance to their parent class, with no spellcasting ability at all, just a list of interesting and unique special abilities.  Monks have the odd restriction of only allowing a certain number to exist at each higher level, thus forcing a PC monk to ascend the hierarchy via combat with NPCs (unless there are two or more monks in the party...that would certainly make for some interesting PC conflict).  Assassins are a bit more focused, functioning as thieves of two levels lower but gaining the ability to disguise themselves, use poison, and, of course, assassinate.  Assassins hit a glass ceiling at 13th level, with an additional "Guildmaster of Assassins" existing as a pseudo-level after that.  

Following the two new classes, we have a hit location system that, to my recollection, was not carried forward in any later editions except as purely optional add-ons.  

Moving on to the Monsters & Treasure section, we have some new monsters of note - A variety of aquatic critters, including the arguably iconic sahuagin.  There is also an interesting, albeit brief, discussion of were-creatures developing a split personality between their two forms.  The new magic items are also heavily centered around aquatic themes, including items like the Cloak of the Manta Ray and Helm of Underwater Vision.

The Underworld & Wilderness Adventures section of the book focuses almost entirely on what is, essentially, the first official D&D adventure scenario, the Temple of the Frog.  We start with some background on the Brothers of the Swamp, a cult intent on forcing their view of evolution on animals to replace humanity.  In later years, the Temple evolved into an outpost for raiders and the like, though many of the cult's experiments remained.  Unlike latter adventure locales, the Temple of the Frog is not an abandoned or ruined place but a fully occupied base of operations with an adjacent town.  The maps are fairly sketchy and difficult to read, but the descriptions are quite thorough, detailing the town and temple as an active place, full of guards and surprises.  The current ruler of the temple is noteworthy because he is not native to Blackmoor.  Stephen the Rock is said to be from another plane or dimension.  With a name like Stephen, my first assumption is that he's from Earth and that's what I ran with in my loose adaptation of this adventure for my Sunday group.  Stephen also has access to high tech gear and apparently communicates with an orbiting satellite space station of some sort.  The details here are a little vague but this does continue the trend we've seen thus far of a heavier mingling of sci-fi in this earliest version of D&D, where-as later editions focused on the fantasy elements.  Another interesting detail...the entire temple can animate into a huge frog.   

The book wraps up with a brief look at underwater adventuring, sages, and diseases.  

*Play-Through Review*

I loosely adapted Temple of the Frog for my Sunday group, using the D&D Next playtest rules (the last public playtest packet).  While I kept some of the key concepts (secret high-tech empowering the ruler of the Temple and the ruler being "not-of-this-world," I eschewed much of the layout in favor of episodic set-pieces, more in keeping with the style of the campaign I'd been running thus far.  I turned the temple itself into the head section of a dragon-shaped ship that crashed long ago, splitting into three parts on the way down (the other two parts will be used for Expedition to the Barrier Peaks and the spaceship section featured in the Wrath of the Immortals campaign).  Stephen became a clone of an Earth astronaut, one of the crew on the first manned mission to Mars.  The party was invited to dinner with Stephen, drugged, and captured, thus necessitating an escape from the dungeons of the temple.  While we had fun, I ended up feeling that I hadn't really captured the feel of the original and plan on giving it another go in the near future, with an eye toward staying closer to what's in the book while adapting it to D&D 5E.

Next up: Supplement III: Eldritch Wizardry

(And you thought I'd give up.  After a hiatus, I'm finally getting back to this insane little project. I can almost guarantee that there will be more hiatuses, announced and unannounced, in the future, but I plan on keeping at this regardless.)


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## TarionzCousin (May 27, 2014)

I just found this thread and enjoyed reading your posts so far. Keep up the good work!


MasqueradingVampire said:


> (Apologies for the delay, I've been job hunting since getting laid off on the 17th.)



Did you find gainful employment yet? We're worried.


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## KirayaTiDrekan (May 27, 2014)

TarionzCousin said:


> I just found this thread and enjoyed reading your posts so far. Keep up the good work!
> Did you find gainful employment yet? We're worried.




Unfortunately, no.  Still waiting to hear back from two promising interviews (Steve Jackson Games and Xaviant).  In the meantime, the search continues.


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## ronaldsf (Jun 2, 2014)

I just want you to know that I'm really enjoying your read-throughs! I've enjoyed (un)reason's series on Dragon as well -- it's so interesting to see the early development of the hobby. 

The fact that the first adventure module was an organized, defended temple that could transform into a frog is a big rejection of the style of dungeon laid out in the first D&D books. I wonder if Arneson had evolved his Blackmoor campaign along those lines between 1974 and 1975?


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## KirayaTiDrekan (Jun 8, 2014)

*Dungeons & Dragons Supplement III: Eldritch Wizardry

*Originally published April, 1976

Version being read and reviewed: Original Dungeons & Dragons RPG - Original Edition Premium Reprint (November 2013)

"Rules for Fantastic Medieval Wargames: Campaigns Playable with Paper and Pencil and Miniature Figures"  by Gary Gygax & Brian Blume

The forward, this time by Timothy J. Kask, TSR Publications Editor, offers this supplement to DMs as a means to combat the apparently already growing trend of "been there, done that" in the D&D community by throwing in some unpredictability via psionics.  

In the Men & Magic section, we are introduced to psionics.  I must confess that reading through this made my brain hurt a bit and I'm still not sure how this system is supposed to work.  I was able to figure out that each class has a different set of possible powers and that fighters lose followers when gaining psionic powers while magic-users and clerics lose spells.  Thieves are hit the hardest, I think, because they lose points from their Dexterity score.  We also get to meet the druid, a subclass of cleric, in this supplement.  Druids have their own spells and gain a small selection of special abilities, most notably, the ability to shapechange into animals of various sorts.  Like monks, druids of higher levels are rare and must face another druid in combat to gain another level, until they reach a glass ceiling at level 13 (The Great Druid).  Monks and druids are not allowed access to psionics.

An alternative initiative system is presented next, which is almost as confusing as the psionics system in this book.

The list of psionic powers by class presents a suite of powers that give each class a feel similar to much later versions of psionics.  Specifically, the fighter's (and thief's) powers create a Psionic Warrior vibe, the magic-user powers are reminiscent of a Psion focused on the clairsentience or telepathy disciplines, and clerics are the most well-rounded, resembling a Wilder slightly.  

No surprises in the druid's selection of spells as most of them are ones we're familiar with from later editions.  There's an interesting note about the effectiveness of mistletoe as a spell focus.  Mistletoe harvested with a gold sickle on Midsummer's Eve is most effective, though how, precisely, that works is left to the DM.  

The Monsters & Treasures section of the book first gives us a few updates to previously presented creatures, noting psionic potential and whether their normal abilities can reach the astral or ethereal planes.  The new monsters are mostly psionic creatures, including the iconic Mind Flayer.  We are also introduced to demons of various sorts, though they are classified as Type I, II, III, IV, V, and VI rather than given names.  Interestingly, Succubi exist outside that system of classification.  We also get to meet Orcus and Demogorgon, presented as examples of Demon Princes.  Finally, we have a note about demons' amulets, odd little trinkets that allow a measure of control over a demon prince.  Though this idea made it into AD&D, it was dropped starting in 2nd Edition.  I thought it was a nifty enough idea that I adapted it to for my D&D Next "Everything D&D Ever" campaign, though I replaced the amulets with daggers (killing with a demon prince's dagger absorbs the soul of the victim and empowers the demon prince while turning the wielder evil...but, only a demon prince's dagger, fully charged with a number of souls depending on the power of the demon prince, can permanently kill a demon prince).

For treasures, we have artifacts, with a number of now iconic items making their debut.  The Hand and Eye of Vecna, the Axe of the Dwarvish Lords, the Rod of Seven Parts, and several others all make their debut here.  In keeping with the theme of unpredictability noted in the forward, the powers of artifacts are not fully defined.  The DM is expected to select powers for artifacts from the tables at the end of this section.  Though the introduction to this section notes that artifacts are notoriously difficult to destroy, a couple of items (The Machine of Lum the Mad and Heward's Mystical Organ) are noted as being quite fragile and already damaged.  Another interesting little side note is that the Orbs of Dragonkind are not color-coded to the various dragon types as they were in later editions, but by age, with only five presented.  

The Underworld & Wilderness Adventures section is only a couple of pages of encounter tables for the new monsters.  

The original cover art for this booklet was rather risqué and, while the recent reprints paid homage to the original covers for all the other booklets, this one was a completely original piece in the same style, as WotC wanted to avoid any potential controversy associated with a nude female sacrificial victim as cover art.  Can't say I blame them.   

Next up: Supplement IV: Gods, Demi-Gods & Heroes


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## Shiroiken (Jun 9, 2014)

MasqueradingVampire said:


> *Dungeons & Dragons 3-Volume Set
> 
> *Originally published January, 1974
> 
> ...




Yes, what is today derided as "gotcha" tricks were the norm for most of D&D until about 3E or so. It was part of the mindset that you the player had to figure out how to get around the problems, not just the character. A high Int or Wis might get you a hint, but that was pretty much it. During this era, exploration was the primary pillar of D&D, not combat or role-playing.



> It seems that the assumption back then was that players would delve into the same dungeon numerous times.  The booklet gives advice about revising and restocking dungeon levels between excursions to keep things from getting boring.  Another interesting tidbit - the wandering monster tables include level titles from the character classes.  So, a superhero (the title for a Level 8 Fighter) appears with trolls, minotaurs, and wyverns on the 5th level dungeon wandering monster table.



Most campaigns were based around a single dungeon, which the players spent many, many sessions exploring. The titles seemed like a carry over from Chainmail to quickly determine the power of the character/unit.



> The example of play makes me twitch as it seems the caller (the player designated to make decisions for the group and inform the DM), seems to be running the show with nary a peep from the other players, even dictating the actions of their characters.  Was the game really played like that back then?  I've never seen or heard of such a thing.



I played this way for almost a decade, until I met a different group in college that was more... chaotic in nature. Remember, the primary pillar was exploration, and the easiest way to speed this up was for the party to elect a caller. This role nowadays might be referred to as "party leader" or "captain." A player could always disagree with the caller, especially about having their character take an action, but it didn't happen too often.



> The rules for wilderness adventuring consist of discussions of the types of castles and stronghold members of each character class are likely to possess and wandering monsters found in the wilderness.  The world outside the dungeon is a very unforgiving place it seems since the tables don't make any distinction based on level.  Your 1st level characters are just as likely to run into a dragon as your 10th level characters.  There's another offhand reference to the work of Edgar Rice Burroughs with the wandering monsters table for deserts indicating that it can also be used for Mars.



The assumption was that the world was not built for the PCs, but the PCs for the world. My own concern was for the inconsistency of this philosophy regarding dungeons (which had monsters only appear on appropriate levels). It was also, IME, a reason to keep the  players from wanting to push beyond the original dungeon, because it was  much harder to prepare for.


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## Emerikol (Jun 16, 2014)

One thing to realize folks is that the "caller" is not the boss.   Our nickname for the caller in our campaigns was menial decision maker.  For decisions that are pretty much random and have no basis the caller just decides.   Turn left or turn right, caller decision without more info.   Now if a PC provides a reason and he can do so at any time then the group could overrule the caller.   It really wasn't a dictatorship.  It was a concession to the fact that we didn't need a zillion menial decision makers.

I loved the old school playstyle and I'm still a lover of it.  The only thing I'd add is that my games had a lot of history and flavor to go along with the style.  They had enemies they really hated.  They had allies and connections.  All the roleplaying stuff that many talk about was there for us.   It's just that the dungeon itself in many cases was designed to be hard for the players as well as the characters and thats how we wanted it.


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## Emerikol (Jun 16, 2014)

Shiroiken said:


> The assumption was that the world was not built for the PCs, but the PCs for the world. My own concern was for the inconsistency of this philosophy regarding dungeons (which had monsters only appear on appropriate levels). It was also, IME, a reason to keep the  players from wanting to push beyond the original dungeon, because it was  much harder to prepare for.




Perhaps the multilevel dungeon is not a perfect trope.  I do believe though that a sandbox encounter where the more threatening monsters are generally further out from civilization very much makes sense.  You travel out from your homebase only a short distance in the early levels and much farther as you gain experience.

I never though as DM shielded my players from the reality of the world.  I absolutely insist on PCs created for the world and not the opposite.  If one of you major goals is not the exploration of the campaign setting then you likely aren't a great fit.   If the group is stupid and attracts two many monsters all at once they will be attacked by encounters far beyond what they can handle.  This is a trope of old school too.  Yes areas tend to have particular challenges but thats not guaranteed.  Being ready to run is always a good idea.


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## diaglo (Jun 16, 2014)

Emerikol said:


> One thing to realize folks is that the "caller" is not the boss.   Our nickname for the caller in our campaigns was menial decision maker.  For decisions that are pretty much random and have no basis the caller just decides.   Turn left or turn right, caller decision without more info.   Now if a PC provides a reason and he can do so at any time then the group could overrule the caller.   It really wasn't a dictatorship.  It was a concession to the fact that we didn't need a zillion menial decision makers.
> 
> I loved the old school playstyle and I'm still a lover of it.  The only thing I'd add is that my games had a lot of history and flavor to go along with the style.  They had enemies they really hated.  They had allies and connections.  All the roleplaying stuff that many talk about was there for us.   It's just that the dungeon itself in many cases was designed to be hard for the players as well as the characters and thats how we wanted it.




a caller was your CAPTAIN. think wargamers and having sides.
CAPT, my CAPT

edit: but more like a ship's captain... aka ... Colonel for the other services.


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## KirayaTiDrekan (Jun 28, 2014)

*Dungeons & Dragons Supplement IV: Gods, Demi-Gods & Heroes

*Originally published July, 1976

Version being read and reviewed: Original Dungeons & Dragons RPG - Original Edition Premium Reprint (November 2013)

"Rules for Fantastic Medieval Wargames: Campaigns Playable with Paper and Pencil and Miniature Figures"  by Rob Kuntz & James Ward

This supplement is notable for being the first without Gary Gygax's name on it somewhere (he co-authored all of the booklets up to this point except Blackmoor, which he wrote the forward to).  The forward here is by Timothy J. Kask, Publications Editor.  I'm not sure what that title meant at the time, but it sounds as though TSR had already started to expand fairly significantly by D&D's second year.  The forward states that Gods, Demi-Gods & Heroes is the last D&D supplement and that further material will be coming in the periodicals.  Hindsight shows us just how far from the truth that is.  The forward also talks about "Monty Hall" campaigns and how the stats for gods are meant to demonstrate how absurd characters above 40th level or so are.  This seems to imply that gods are meant to be the ultimate challenge to be overcome.  

The book is divided up by pantheons rather than the standard format in the previous supplements.

*Egyptian Mythology*

The first thing of note is that most gods throughout the book have an AC of -2, with a few notable exceptions here and there having lower AC.  From my experience with the Mentzer "Red Box" and the Rules Cyclopedia, AC -2 doesn't seem too overwhelming.  Nothing terribly surprising in the Egyptian section, though Ptah is noteworthy if only because I remember him coming to prominence in Spelljammer as a deity accessible throughout the spheres.

*Indian Mythology*

Another notable trend is that the ruler of each pantheon has 300 hit points while the others have some lower amount, usually in the 200s.  The Indian gods are interesting due to many of them having multiple heads and limbs, though the book doesn't provide illustrations of the gods so one is left to come up with deity anatomy on one's own (or look it up).  This section also introduces us to several monsters that would later come into more prominence in D&D: maruts, rakshasas, and nagas.

*Greek Mythology*

No big surprises here either except...  The Erinnyes (two n's) Furies are much different from the creatures that borrowed their name in later editions.  These erinnyes are three whip-wielding crones, not fallen angel-looking devils.  Also of note is the tendency among these gods to take a liking to mortals and gift them with something if the mortal does something particularly noteworthy.  

*Celtic Mythology*

Here we see the first of several deities that were later commandeered by the Forgotten Realms, specifically Oghma and Silvanus.  We also meet Balor (not a balor demon, but a disembodied head with eyes that kill and no other abilities).  

*Norse Mythology*

This is the longest and most extensive section in the book, apparently the favorite of the authors.  Odin, himself, gets a page and a half (compared to the paragraph devoted to the other heads of pantheons).  Tyr makes his debut here, another god that would find himself rubbing elbows with Elminster later on.  Hel is noteworthy for having the most detailed "how do you get to her lair" description.  Given the prevalence of elves and dwarves in norse mythology, as noted in this book and in norse folklore itself, it could be argued that D&D's fantasy roots lie more with the Norse than they do with Tolkien (though, of course, D&D borrows heavily from multiple sources of inspiration).

*Finnish Mythology*

This section bears an introduction that notes that folk heroes and mortals tend to feature more prominently than gods.  Thus, unlike other sections, we are introduced to a selection of heroes first, though they are just as powerful as most of the gods throughout the book.  Each of these heroes bears a variety of magic items, however, which tip the scales a bit in their favor.  Oddly, Mothers get their own monster entry and are quite formidable.  

*Mexican and Central American Indian Mythology*

This section is the smallest and the introduction notes that this is mainly due to space reasons and because information on these gods was hard to find at the time.  My main point of interest here involves a personal anecdote from my second ever D&D campaign as a DM.  One of my players was quite the fan of Incan, Aztec, and Mayan lore and named her wizard Mictlan Tecuhtli, after the god of death.  

*Chinese Mythology
*
The introduction here notes that the concepts of Yin and Yang should take precedence over traditional D&D alignment, though it is very sparse on the details of those concepts.  The section ends with a note about Chinese dragons, offering us our first glimpse at the Lung dragons that would be fully detailed in later editions.

So, the idea of gods as monsters to be fought originates here, something that would be expanded and more detailed in Deities & Demigods later on.  Hardly any information is given on worshipping these entities, their mortal followers, religions, and so forth.  By providing stats for gods, the authors were unintentionally fueling the "Monty Hall" style of play they sought to thwart.

Next up: Swords and Spells


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## KirayaTiDrekan (Jun 28, 2014)

*Swords & Spells

*Originally published August, 1976

Version being read and reviewed: Swords & Spells (PDF added to www.drivethrurpg.com April, 2017)

Fantastic Miniatures Rules on a 1:10/1:1 Scale by Gary Gygax

The red-headed step-child of the original version of Dungeons & Dragons, Swords & Spells is essentially Supplement V.  Its also called the grandson of Chainmail in the foreword by Timothy Kask.  The thing is, the foreword starts us off on a rather off-putting note as he informs the reader to trust the author because he knows better than you when it comes to rules for miniatures.  The foreword also reminds the reader that this is fantasy and therefore anything that doesn't make sense should be explained away with that notion.

In the introduction, Gygax explains the rationale for mixing model scales in a mass battle fantasy context - a need to account for exceptional critters and characters fighting alongside and against armies of lesser creatures.  Gygax then contradicts Kask by saying that referees will likely need to modify and expand the rules presented.

As an aside, I have rarely used miniatures in my D&D games - a couple of times with 3.5 and most of the few sessions I played of 4E.  And I always used the pre-painted plastic minis or cardboard counters available at the time  So, the detail with which this supplement goes into mounting figures on bases is a bit beyond me.  The intent here appears to be to have the mini's base represent the creature's reach more than its size as human sized creatures get bigger bases if they are wielding larger weapons.

The turn sequence for combat is reminiscent of what appears in later Basic D&D core rules, including the Rules Cyclopedia.  I find that rather intriguing given how maligned and/or ignored this supplement has become over the decades.  There are some similarities between this and its descendant, the D&D Minis game based on 3.5 (and later 4E) as well.  As is often the case with these older books, Gygax made me look up an obscure word because I'd never seen it before, in this "abatis."

Unlike the skirmish level combat of more modern games, these rules are, well, complicated.  Missile fire rules alone make my head spin more than the psionics rules in Eldritch Wizardry.  Magic and melee and morale are all likewise quite complicated.  I'm sure this stuff makes sense to miniatures enthusiasts but its all gobbledygook to me.

The latter portion of the book is tables, of course, and appendices which start a little after halfway through the book.  Appendix B is notable for introducing a point-buy army selection system not unlike that used in the 3.5 era D&D Minis game.  Appendix C provides an example of play...or tries to anyway.  It mostly seems like a muddle mess.

Next up: Dungeons & Dragons Basic Set (1977 Holmes)


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## KirayaTiDrekan (Jun 28, 2014)

*Dungeons & Dragons Basic Set (1977 Holmes)

*Originally published July, 1977

This post is a placeholder as I do not have access to this book.  When I do get my hands on a copy, I'll come back and edit my review into this post.

Next up: Advanced Dungeons & Dragons Monster Manual (1st Edition)


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## KirayaTiDrekan (Jun 28, 2014)

Side note...

At my current pace, I'll be caught up to the date I started this thread in about 60 years or so.    Hopefully EN World is still around by then.


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## DaveyJones (Jun 28, 2014)

MasqueradingVampire said:


> *Dungeons & Dragons Basic Set (1977 Holmes)
> 
> *Originally published July, 1977
> 
> This post is a placeholder as I do not have access to this book.  When I do get my hands on a copy, I'll come back and edit my review into this post.




don't forget the geomorphs and the monster & treasure book also included.
later versions had B1 and even later ones had B2 and dice/ or chits with a promise of dice in place of the geomorphs or m&t book

this was 2edD&D. at least if you read the copyright page...


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## KirayaTiDrekan (Jun 28, 2014)

I'll be reading and reviewing the adventures separately and skipping stuff like the geomorphs and such since there's not really anything to read there.


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## ronaldsf (Jun 30, 2014)

MasqueradingVampire said:


> The forward also talks about "Monty Hall" campaigns and how the stats for gods are meant to demonstrate how absurd characters above 40th level or so are.  This seems to imply that gods are meant to be the ultimate challenge to be overcome.




Heh -- and the response of many joyous gamers was to think: "If it now has stats, I can kill it!"

And since there was little information given on the religions and their practices, why else publish the book? It seems like the idea that "Gods are so powerful, they don't have stats" and GM fiat regarding world-building and gods would come up later.

And is it me, or shouldn't the word "forward" be "foreword" in these early books?


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## KirayaTiDrekan (Jun 30, 2014)

ronaldsf said:


> And is it me, or shouldn't the word "forward" be "foreword" in these early books?




That's my mistake, not theirs.  Either me just flaking on the proper spelling or an auto-correct fail.


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## KirayaTiDrekan (Jun 30, 2014)

*Advanced Dungeons & Dragons (1st Edition) Monster Manual

*Originally published December, 1977

Version being read and reviewed: Monster Manual 1st Edition Premium Reprint (July, 2012)

Bestiaries and Monster Manuals and such are always a bit of a beast (pun intended) to read so I'm going to touch on the highlights of the critters included here-in rather than analyze each and every monster entry.

The full title of this book is...

Advanced Dungeons & Dragons Special Reference Work: Monster Manual - AN ALPHABETICAL COMPENDIUM OF ALL OF THE MONSTERS FOUND IN ADVANCED DUNGEONS & DRAGONS, INCLUDING ATTACKS, DAMAGE, SPECIAL ABILITIES, AND DESCRIPTIONS.  By Gary Gygax.

(Caps are theirs, not mine.)

Interesting side note - the Premium Reprint includes the printing/edition note for the 4th edition (as in, 4th revision of this specific book, not 4E D&D), originally printed in August, 1979.

The foreword (spelled it right this time), by Mike Carr, starts off with the more usual "thank you fans" one tends to see in forewords, rather than the odd potpourri of topics in the original edition booklets.  The fourth paragraph deviates from the positive tone, however, cautioning against straying from official D&D products into the murky waters of imitators.  Do I sense the beginnings of TSR's negative attitude toward third party publishers?  The foreword rounds out with a DM advisory to not let players reference this book during play.

We then have a preface by Gary Gygax, acknowledging the contributions of others, particularly his wife, who apparently did most of the typing.  

Explanatory Notes are up next.  Nothing terribly exciting here except the definition of monster (any being encountered, human, demi-human, or otherwise, is considered a monster during an encounter) and magic resistance, which has a base value that varies based on the level of the spellcaster attempting to overcome.  The base value assumes an 11th level magic-user and goes up 5% per level below 11th and down 5% per level above 11.  Nice and confusing.  

And, finally, the critters.

One thing that strikes me off the top is that many creatures have notes in their descriptions about market value, either of the creature itself, its eggs or young, or body parts like pelts.  I remember similar values being present in BECMI but have rarely seen that aspect of creatures explored in modern editions (3.0 and later).  

Some creatures seem to be specifically designed to be "gotcha" monsters that punish players for using specific abilities.  Brain moles, for example, feed on psionic energy, and are relatively harmless to non-psionic characters.  Cerebral parasites are another anti-psionic critter...I wonder if Gary had something against the inclusion of psionics in the game?  Thought eater - ethereal skeletal platypus that feeds on psionic energy - what in the name of Gygax inspired this monstrosity?

There's also a few creatures that I don't recall seeing again in later editions, like the Brownie.  

One element I like is the small details about lairs and what sort of more powerful creatures may be encountered depending on numbers.  This generally applies to humanoids, as with the bugbear, which has notes on leaders, chiefs, and sub-chiefs.  Unfortunately, female humanoids are generally noted as less effective or entirely non-combatant.  From a pseudo-realism standpoint, I can see where that might be the case for certain humanoid cultures, but not all of them.  However, this book is a product of its time (1977) so it gets a pass (mostly).

Demons!  As noted in a previous review, I really like the demons' amulets idea and adapted it for my own campaigns.  I can see why it was dropped in later editions, but I think it adds a nifty little touch of occultism to the game (and maybe that's why it was dropped given the Satanism scare associated with the game in the 80s).  Among the demon superstars detailed in this tome are Demogorgon, Juiblex, Orcus, and Yeenoghu, along with the succubus, manes, and Types I through VI, who all get names now, in addition to the generic "types."  Thus the Balor finally takes its place as demon, rather than a disembodied head.  However, nifty little side note, Type IV, Type V, and Type VI are noted as being Nalfeshnee, etc; Marilith, etc; and Balor, etc; implying that these terms are proper names and that other names are possible for these demon types.  Marilith (as a proper name) made an appearance in the original Final Fantasy video game with an appearance nearly identical to the demon, adding further credence to the idea that these are individual names.  

Devils!  Devils have a similar item to the demons' amulets, in the form of talismans with similar properties.  In addition to lesser and greater devils we have a few arch-devils: Baalzebul, Dispater, Geryon, and the "Overlord of all the dukes of Hell," Asmodeus.  Erinyes make their debut as devils (as opposed to the crone-like beings in Gods, Demigods, & Heroes).  

Dinosaurs!  Quite a few of these terrible lizards running around in the MM, though their descriptions are quite brief.  

Dolphins are noted as being Very Intelligent (which, according to the Explanatory Notes, indicates a score of 11-12), an interesting nod toward dolphins being as intelligent as humans, a belief that hasn't gained much traction in the real world until recently.  Its also worth noting that 3.0 made dolphins as stupid as other animals, with an Intelligence score of 2.  

Dragons!  The classic five chromatic and five metallic dragons, plus Tiamat and Bahamut, can be found here in all their glory.  Only 8 age categories at this point, I'm not sure when they graduated to 12.  There's a fairly extensive section on subduing dragons and effectively enslaving them to be used as labor or to be sold on the open market.  Tiamat has moved to the Nine Hells from her old abode underground in the original edition.  Bahamut, meanwhile, dwells "behind the east wind" which is noted as being an unknown planar location.  

Skipping ahead a bit, I find hobgoblins particularly interesting as they provide a fairly good reason why an intelligent, Lawful Evil humanoid culture would not dominate the other races - in-fighting between tribes.  Something else of note, hobgoblins here have a dwarven-esque suite of detection abilities related to mining that they lost in later editions.  Seems an unfortunate loss of character for this race, which has always been one of my favorite "bad guy" races.

Speaking of favorites, the Ixitxachitl (good luck pronouncing that) is another long time favorite of mine.  I always found it intriguing that they can have class levels (specifically cleric) despite being non-humanoid.  The vampiric variant also tickled my fancy.

Kobolds!  Dogs or dragon-ling reptiles?  The description indicates neither, while the illustration clearly lends itself to the dog-like appearance.  

Larvae are an odd critter - soul-currency of the lower planes.  Another semi-forgotten idea that I think has a lot of traction and would like to have seen carried forward in later editions.  

Leprechauns provide us an amusing fourth-wall break as the illustration has one of them sitting on their entry's name and another apparently stealing the reference indicator at the top of the page (Leucrotta, which the little guy has tilted diagonally).  Like the brownie, however, these little fey were largely left behind in later editions.  

Men!  Humans of various sorts as monsters.  One of the more useful, in my opinion, entries in the book, with everything from bandits to pilgrims.  

Mummies are quite unusual in this edition compared to later editions in that they are connected to the positive material plane.  One wonders if that was a typo of some sort since they otherwise conform to their undead status and have their usual debilitating powers, including the dreaded mummy rot disease.  

Allow me to get back on the gender issue for just a moment with the nymph - there may be some mythological precedent for this creature's powers, but it still annoys me a bit that the exclusively female nymph's special power is her beauty and that she kills anyone who sees her nude.  

Orcs are Lawful Evil here.  Interesting.  

I remember reading a Forgotten Realms novel where the author was describing the native flora of various sorts, including a Spanish something or other.  Bam!  Immersion in the story ruined.  Why would a plant on a fantasy non-Earth world be named for an Earth culture?  Same thing applies to the Portugese Man-O-War in this book.  I know (from looking it up on Wikipedia just now) that this thing isn't technically a jellyfish, but, from a game mechanics standpoint, they are pretty much the same thing.  So, why not just call it a giant jellyfish?  (Mini and somewhat pointless realism rant done, we now return you to your regularly scheduled review.)

Its interesting that sahuagin get a special "History and Legend" section when no other creature in the book does.  

The book ends with an Appendix/table for treasure types and, wonder of wonders, an index.

Despite this being the first book for Advanced D&D, the monster entries here seem fairly compatible with original D&D.  I know I adapted them and used them as inspiration for my BECMI campaigns for many years (I never played AD&D but owned this book and Monster Manual II).  

Next up: Advanced Dungeons & Dragons (1st Edition) Player's Handbook


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## Shiroiken (Jun 30, 2014)

MasqueradingVampire said:


> The foreword (spelled it right this time), by Mike Carr, starts off with the more usual "thank you fans" one tends to see in forewords, rather than the odd potpourri of topics in the original edition booklets.  The fourth paragraph deviates from the positive tone, however, cautioning against straying from official D&D products into the murky waters of imitators.  Do I sense the beginnings of TSR's negative attitude toward third party publishers?  The foreword rounds out with a DM advisory to not let players reference this book during play.




This was because of the glut of homebrew that was available for OD&D. A prime point of OD&D was that it could by fully modified by DMs, and they usually shared their work (often in The Dragon). Part of the point behind AD&D was to have a fully detailed rules system that should not be modified, which makes it ideal for tournament play. Since this was the first book for AD&D, it makes sense that it would be included, and IIRC, it was included in the PHB and DMG.



> Some creatures seem to be specifically designed to be "gotcha" monsters that punish players for using specific abilities.  Brain moles, for example, feed on psionic energy, and are relatively harmless to non-psionic characters.  Cerebral parasites are another anti-psionic critter...I wonder if Gary had something against the inclusion of psionics in the game?  Thought eater - ethereal skeletal platypus that feeds on psionic energy - what in the name of Gygax inspired this monstrosity?



"Gotcha" monsters (and abilities) were usually meant to balance out certain aspects of the game. Usually the Fighter was the powerhouse of the group, until they met a Rust Monster, then the Barbarian or Magic User would be the star. The beholder likewise punished spellcasters, unless they were careful. As for psionic gotcha monsters, in AD&D, psionics were just a bonus ability for those who were lucky at character creation, so these monsters were basically there as a counter balance for the rest of the time. 



> Despite this being the first book for Advanced D&D, the monster entries here seem fairly compatible with original D&D.  I know I adapted them and used them as inspiration for my BECMI campaigns for many years (I never played AD&D but owned this book and Monster Manual II).



OD&D, AD&D 1E, BECMI, and AD&D2 were fairly compatible with each other by design. When 2E came out, they said in The Dragon, that 1E Assassins, Barbarians, Cavaliers, Monks, and Thief-Acrobats were fully playable in 2E with only a little bit of conversion work on the part of the DM. Adventures were IME, the easiest and best thing to convert between editions.


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## KirayaTiDrekan (Jul 13, 2014)

*Advanced Dungeons & Dragons (1st Edition) Player's Handbook

*Originally published June, 1978

Version being read and reviewed: Player's Handbook 1st Edition Premium Reprint (July, 2012)

The full title of this book is...

Advanced Dungeons & Dragons Special Reference Work: Player's Handbook - A COMPILED VOLUME OF INFORMATION FOR PLAYERS OF ADVANCED DUNGEONS & DRAGONS, INCLUDING: CHARACTER RACES, CLASSES, AND LEVEL ABILITIES; SPELL TABLES AND DESCRIPTIONS; EQUIPMENT COSTS; WEAPONS DATA; AND INFORMATION ON ADVENTURING.  By Gary Gygax.

(Caps are theirs, not mine.)

Mike Carr's foreword praises the diversity and intelligence of D&D players.  As you may have guessed if you've been reading these reviews, gender issues are near and dear to my heart so I tend to notice when a D&D book calls them out.  Here we have a note, "D&D players, happily, come in all shapes and sizes, and even a fair number of women are counted among those who regularly play the game."  For 1978, I suppose the fact that women played at all was rather remarkable.  At any rate, the foreword ends with a few suggestions for players to be even better players - Be organized, defer to the DM, cooperate with the other players, give advance notice when you're going to be absent, and get in the spirit of the game.  

After the Table of Contents, Gary gives us a preface describing how daunting a task putting together this book and the Dungeon Master's Guide was.  Back on gender, a couple of paragraphs in, Gary says, "You will find no pretentious dictums herein, no baseless limits arbitrarily placed on female strength or male charisma, "  Except that there are limits on female strength and no such limits on charisma.  One wonders what Gary's definition of "arbitrary" was.  Moving on, Gary also states his apparent dislike for spell point systems for magic, describing them as being for "monomaniacal statistics lovers."  The last paragraph goes into the usual thank yous, with a final thanks given to Judges Guild, which is rather interesting.

After a brief introduction to RPGs (this book is structured to be a reference during play, I think, rather than an introduction to the game), we get into ability scores.  Slightly before that is an amusing explanation of the term level.  D&D has always used "level" for a variety of things - dungeon level, character level, spell level, monster level.  Gary notes that he wanted to revise the terms to "rank" (replacing character level), "power" (replacing spell level), and "order" (replacing monster level).  I think the the game may have evolved very differently with just that small change in terminology.  We shall never know.  One thing the PHB doesn't explain - how to determine your character's ability scores.  The various dice rolling methods are given in the DMG.  Given that the DMG wasn't available for more than a year after this book was published, I am left to wonder how folks created characters (or ran the game for that matter) if this book was their introduction to the game in 1978.  One thing I noticed about ability scores - Intelligence seems to be entirely useless for non-magic-users and Wisdom seems to be entirely useless for non-Clerics.  Every other score seems to have varying levels of utility for every character, including Charisma if one's campaign makes heavy use of henchmen (from what I gather from previous readings and anecdotes from older gamers, henchmen were a pretty common feature in many campaigns).  Charisma also has an annoying bit of bookkeeping, at least if you're playing a dwarf or half-orc, since their Charisma penalties and racial maximums don't apply when dealing with their own kind.  

Races now include dwarves, elves, gnomes, half-elves, halflings, half-orcs, and humans.  Half-elves are pretty bad-ass due to their wide range of multiclassing options.  Those pesky level limits are a pain though (and really low for a lot of these guys).  Interestingly, dwarf, elf, and gnome clerics and halfling druids are all possible...as NPCs.  I have never been a fan of NPC only classes or options.  I may be a little weird though, because at my table I go by the mantra of, "If it exists in the world, you can play it...or try to, anyway."  

Classes are the classic four, each of which has at least one subclass.  Clerics have the druid subclass, fighters have paladins and rangers, magic-users have illusionists, and thieves have assassins.  Unlike how more modern games define subclasses, these guys are more powerful versions of their core class and have ability score requirements in order to qualify for them (proto-prestige classes).  We also have the oddball that doesn't fit in with the others, the monk.  The "fight your way to the top" concept from OD&D is preserved here for the druid, the assassin, and the monk (though the assassin can just assassinate the next higher-up individual rather than face them head on).  Assassins really seem to be designed for duet style play (one DM, one player) given the somewhat complex rules for assassinations which seem to be a solo endeavor.  Dual-classing for humans is just odd.  You switch entirely to your new class and can't use your old class abilities until your new class level passes the old.  

Skipping ahead a bit, weapons are, in a word, complicated.  First we have the Arms table in the equipment lists which has their prices.  Then have the "Weight and Damage by Weapon Type" table.  Each weapon does different damage based on the size of the opponent.  Then we have the infamous weapon vs armor table, more accurately known as the "Weapon Types, General Data, and To Hit Adustments" table.  And, if I'm reading this right, this big old table of adjustments vs various ACs only applies against opponents wearing actual armor.  Eyes crossing, moving on.

Spells are even more tedious to read through than bestiaries, so we'll be jumping through the spell section a bit.  Its interesting that Illusionists have their own spell list, separate from the standard magic-user and really, really odd, that they can take a handful of 1st level magic-user spells as one of their 7th spells.  Didn't the Dungeon Bastard make fun of that little gem recently?  Another thing that makes me a little weird compared to most gamers I know - I love spell components.  I love the concept of material components and all the nifty and odd little things that end up in a magic-user's (and cleric's to a lesser extent) equipment list because of them.  When DMing 1st-3.5, I always made a point of including spell components in the treasure hauls from enemy spellcasters.  Remember the Brownie from the Monster Manual and how I mentioned that the little critter didn't really make it past this edition.  Well, apparently a Lawful Neutral or Lawful Good magic-user could end up with one as a familiar thanks to the Find Familiar spell and a lucky d20 roll (a roll of 15, to be precise).  Oh, and 100 g.p. worth of material components.  Some spells suffered the same fate as the brownie, at least by my recollection.  The 1st level spells Friends and Push are things I haven't seen outside of this book, except I do recall one of those Endless Quest books featuring an apprentice mage trying to cast Friends on an owlbear and dying - "Your adventure is over, start again on Page 1."  Anyone know which book that was, out of idle curiosity?  Another spell that faded into obscurity - Cacodemon, a 7th level spell that summons a Type IV, V, or VI demon.  I wonder if this was a specific victim of the Satanism scare of the 80s?  It certainly has one of the longest spell descriptions, going into a bit of detail about the ritual involved and how to control the demon once you've summoned it.  

The next section is mostly advice about how to succeed at various adventures, with specific attention paid to Traps, Tricks, and Encounters.  As with ability score generation, specific combat rules are not presented here, instead appearing in the DMG, unlike later editions.  I'm not entirely sure what the rationale behind that was.  There seems to be a genuine vibe of DM elitism at times, like the Dungeon Master was the keeper of arcane and inscrutable secrets.  The section on poison is a little off-putting as well, admonishing players for considering its use and warning about game balance concerns.  It seems all poison was deadly back then, so I guess that's understandable.  

I think my favorite parts of this book are the Appendices.

Appendix I presents psionics.  Unlike OD&D psionics, I actually managed to wrap my head around how this system is supposed to work, I think.  Having psionic ability is entirely random, but I wonder how many Players begged for a reroll until they finally got a 00 (or 90 something, depending on one's Intelligence, Wisdom, and Charisma) on the percentile dice.  The pseudo-scientific and para-psychological terminology used in this section really gives it a very different feel from the rest of the book.  For some reason, the Sword & Sandals vibe comes across here more than anywhere else in the book.  Maybe Dark Sun is influencing how I think about psionics, but I get a huge Conan or John Carter vibe when I read this section (side note - my only exposure to those two heroes is via movies so take that last sentence with a grain of salt).

Appendix II: Bards.  The first prestige class.  I wonder if anyone managed to qualify and actually play this class.  I'd love to hear how that played out.  The ability score requirements are rather prohibitive by themselves and you have to play for a minimum of 13 levels in fighter and thief before you can finally become a bard.  One of my goals in life as a gamer is to someday play a 1st edition Bard, just to see if I can.  By its very nature, unless the DM starts the campaign at high level, the presence of a bard indicates that the campaign is a long running one.

Appendix III is a weird little alignment graphic.  I'm not sure what the purpose of this is.

Appendix IV touches on the planes of existence, briefly.  The Great Wheel is a rectangle here.  

Appendix V offers some suggestions on how to divide treasure.  This has rarely been a problem with my groups as they tend to give magic items to whichever character will get the most use out of them (thus benefitting the group as a whole).  

Closing Thoughts: I started with the Mentzer Basic Set "Red Box" and moved directly in to 2nd Edition, bypassing 1st Edition entirely.  I first tried DMing 1E about a year ago and had mixed results.  The players enjoyed it, but I found the rules to be cumbersome and awkward.  That said, I'd love the chance to play this version, either as a wizard or an aspiring bard.  Ah, the painful longings of a perpetual DM.  

Next up: S1: Tomb of Horrors


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## the Jester (Jul 13, 2014)

A guy in my campaign managed to do a 1e bard, and even got very high level in the bard class over time. The pc- I think her name was Mera- lasted until somewhere around... 8th or 9th level bard?... before finally dying due to old age.

Yep, long-running campaign, all right- and also back in the junior high/high school days, when there were hours of time for D&D almost every single day. Ahh, sigh of nostalgia.


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## Hussar (Jul 13, 2014)

I remember we kind of short cut the route to bard by playing a multi class half elf fighter/thief up to the minimum requisite level and then switching over to bard.  Didn't take that long if you did it that way.


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## KirayaTiDrekan (Jul 13, 2014)

Oh, derp, that was something I was going to mention in the review and forgot.  How exactly were half-elves supposed to become bards (without doing the multi-class fudge you mentioned) if only humans can use the dual-class rules?  The Bard description says you first have to progress as a fighter until 8th level, then thief for 5 levels.  Half-elves can't, technically, do that.


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## the Jester (Jul 13, 2014)

MasqueradingVampire said:


> Oh, derp, that was something I was going to mention in the review and forgot.  How exactly were half-elves supposed to become bards (without doing the multi-class fudge you mentioned) if only humans can use the dual-class rules?  The Bard description says you first have to progress as a fighter until 8th level, then thief for 5 levels.  Half-elves can't, technically, do that.




Half-elf bards, like druid/rangers after UA came out, required you to bend the rules. 

FTR I'm pretty sure it was fighter up to 4th through 8th, then rogue until you were one level higher, then druid (which was actually bard).


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## KirayaTiDrekan (Jul 13, 2014)

At least Fighter 5 (but before reaching 8th) and then Thief 5 (but before reaching 10th), and then druid (but actually bard, now).


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## KirayaTiDrekan (Jul 14, 2014)

*S1: Tomb of Horrors

*Originally published June, 1978

Version being read and reviewed: Dungeons of Dread S1-4 (March, 2013) by Gary Gygax

First things first - SPOILER ALERT!!!!

Still here?

Ok, here we go.

According to Echohawk's 1st Edition Collector's Guide, this little classic arrived in stores at the same time as the PHB, so that partially answers my question about what DMs and players did to get campaigns going while waiting for the DMG to come out.  Of course, this thing seems more like a campaign ender (usually via TPK) than a campaign starter.

As with most adventure modules of the era, the Tomb of Horrors made the rounds at conventions before seeing publication so it was probably already rather infamous by the time you could buy it in stores.  As a kid, my impression of AD&D adventures was that they were competitive and tournament based, so you couldn't play them in your regular home games.  That was a contributing factor in my bypassing 1st Edition and jumping straight to 2nd Edition from BECMI.  

There's very little set-up or lead-in.  There is some brief background on the big bad, Acererak, but the module just jumps straight in for the most part, trusting DMs to worry about getting their party there.  

Coming from a more modern perspective, where adventures are a fairly even mix of combat & creatures, traps & treasures, and exploration & encounters, Tomb of Horrors strikes me as being different from the beginning with two false entrances that give the place an Indiana Jones feel.  That feeling quickly gives way to an almost Saw (the movie) like array of death traps and some truly frustrating looking red herrings and arbitrary "no save" situations.  When I adapt this to 5th Edition, I'm going to tone it down slightly, by allowing saves in most cases (except, perhaps, the infamous demon maw, since a character has to willing go into the thing).

The variety of ways to die in this adventure is pretty impressive.  Everything from getting squashed into jelly, to disintegrating, to getting dropped into fiery lava, to starving to death in an isolated cell to getting your soul sucked out by the demi-lich himself.  

The module includes a series of illustrations meant to be shown to players when they encounter a particular area or trap.  These are, in my opinion, of a higher quality than the art seen in the OD&D books and the AD&D MM and PHB, though that assessment may have to do with the fact that they serve a purpose beyond mere decoration, providing clues and a visual reference as the players make their way through the adventure.  In that way, I am reminded of the 2nd Edition Dark Sun flip-book style adventures.

For being so packed full of death and destruction, the module is actually pretty short.  Given the relatively minimal combat, I could see this adventure only taking a session or two, especially if the party 1) TPKs or 2) falls for one of the false tombs and leaves none the wiser.  I can't help but wonder how many DMs, after the PCs returned to civilization feeling triumphant, let the cat out of the bag with a bit of smug laughter.

Next up: G1: Steading of the Hill Giant Chief


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## KirayaTiDrekan (Jul 14, 2014)

*G1: Steading of the Hill Giant Chief

*Originally published July, 1978

Version being read and reviewed: G1-3: Against the Giants (PDF) (March, 1981; PDF added to www.dndclassics.com January, 2013) by Gary Gygax

First things first - SPOILER ALERT!!!!

Still here?

Ok, here we go.

There's a lot of detail packed into this short adventure.  Each room has a full description of furnishings and what purpose the room serves, in addition to the occupants and treasures (and there's generous amount of treasure in this module).  

One tidbit I found odd - in the very beginning, the motivation for the PCs to take on the adventure is basically an ultimatum: the local lord basically tells them to clear out the giants and find out what's behind them, or else.  If the PCs don't succeed, their lives are forfeit.

One of the reasons this adventure is able to pack in so much detail is that there are no monster stats provided other than hit points for the most part.  The DM needs to have a Monster Manual on hand.  Guess I'm a little spoiled by modern adventures in that regard.  

Another awesome little detail - the wandering monsters in the place are all from set locations (even the chief himself could be wandering about) and will thus diminish the numbers of critters in the Steading accordingly.  Speaking of the chief, its likely the PCs will encounter him and deal with him while only about halfway through the adventure as there's an entire dungeon level to explore as well.

The dungeon level has an interesting story going on, with the orc slaves in open rebellion against their masters.  Thus, the PCs can find themselves a small army.  If they are sneaky enough, this little army could prove useful in upstairs area 11, the Great Hall, which has 38 critters hanging out in it, most of them giants, including Nosnra, the chief.  I don't imagine many parties survived that encounter if they just stumbled into it while exploring.

The chief's treasure room down in the dungeon level gives us our first clue about the true nature of the giant threat, a note from someone named Eclavadra and a map of the next adventure site, The Glacial Rift of the Frost Giant Jarl, as well as a convenient teleport device to get there right away.  I imagine that last bit was thrown in for tournament play so as to not waste time between adventures trekking through the wilderness to the next location.

Unlike the Tomb of Horrors, this adventure feels like a place with a purpose, so to speak.  It has atmosphere and a genuine "lived in" feel, with all the creatures here-in making sense within the context of the location.  I can't wait to DM this one and, also unlike Tomb of Horrors, when I adapt it to 5E, I'm likely not going to revise or tone down anything (although I might remove the teleport deus-ex-machina device at the end since I'll have no need to speed the party along).

Next up: G2: The Glacial Rift of the Frost Giant Jarl


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## KirayaTiDrekan (Jul 15, 2014)

*G2: The Glacial Rift of the Frost Giant Jarl

*Originally published July, 1978

Version being read and reviewed: G1-3: Against the Giants (PDF) (March, 1981; PDF added to www.dndclassics.com January, 2013) by Gary Gygax

First things first - SPOILER ALERT!!!!

Still here?

Ok, here we go.

As with G1, this adventure is densely packed with detail, making the home of the frost giants seem like an active, lived-in lair.  As one might expect, there are a fair number of cold themed critters in addition to the frost giants.  There's a few unexpected residents as well - visiting ogre magi, emissaries from the fire giants (bet they are miserable in all this cold), and an imprisoned storm giant who could be a potential ally for the party if they free her.

This adventure doesn't strike me as being quite as dynamic as G1.  Don't get me wrong, its still interesting and should be a blast to DM, but there doesn't seem to be as much potential story going on here.  When I run this in 5E, I'm going to take out the dragons, not because I don't like them but to fit my campaign world (dragons haven't been around for thousands of years).  I fully intend to replace the dragons but I don't know with what, yet.

Just like G1, the treasure chamber includes a map to the next adventure and a convenient means of teleporting there.  There's a bit of treasure that's rather annoyingly (if believably) hidden, making it likely that the PCs will completely miss it.  One thing that strikes me as amusing is that the final confrontation with the frost giant jarl essentially involves the party interrupting a romantic dinner with his wife.  

Next up: G3: Hall of the Fire Giant King


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## Kai Lord (Jul 15, 2014)

What an awesome thread MasqueradingVampire!!!

I don't care if you can't get through even the majority of D&D products, just reading your reviews of the classic OD&D and AD&D books as if they were new releases is transporting me back to a time when those amazing games were still sitting new on book and store shelves.  Keep it up for as long as you can!  And whenever you stop is fine, everything you've already posted is very, VERY appreciated.


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## pemerton (Jul 15, 2014)

MasqueradingVampire said:


> *G2: The Glacial Rift of the Frost Giant Jarl*
> 
> <snip>
> 
> This adventure doesn't strike me as being quite as dynamic as G1.  Don't get me wrong, its still interesting and should be a blast to DM, but there doesn't seem to be as much potential story going on here.



I'm about to run this in 4e (levelled up for a Level 26 party). I know what you mean about the dynamism (or lack thereof) - I've made a few changes to try and help with that. But I've also warned my players to warm up their dice-rolling wrists if they don't want to sprain them taking down all those giants!


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## KirayaTiDrekan (Jul 15, 2014)

*G3: Hall of the Fire Giant King

*Originally published July, 1978

Version being read and reviewed: G1-3: Against the Giants (PDF) (March, 1981; PDF added to www.dndclassics.com January, 2013) by Gary Gygax

First things first - SPOILER ALERT!!!!

Still here?

Ok, here we go.

From icy cold to hellish heat, its time to visit the fire giants.  Both G1 and G2 have included notes at the beginning about the party being able to find a relatively safe hidey-hole near the adventure site to stash their supplies and retreat to rest and level-up as needed.  G3 includes a similar note but this time its a bit less safe, with a cumulative risk per excursion that their temporary hidey-hole will be discovered.  

Since this adventure has two "big bads" - the fire giant king, Snurre, and the mysterious evil behind everything, your party actually gets to take down Snurre in the 3rd room of the adventure.  At first this seems a little anti-climatic, but, we do get to meet...

Drum roll, please.

The Drow!

I'm not sure if they appeared in any periodicals before this point, but this is their official debut as far as my read-throughs are concerned, except for a vague reference to them in the Elf entry in the Monster Manual.  

Before we get to the dark elves, let's take a quick look at the rest of the adventure.  Snurre's wife, Frupy, reminds me very much of Dolores Umbridge from the Harry Potter series for some reason.  Her precious "babies" (giant weasels" and her general demeanor just strike me as amusingly cloying, with a streak of cruelty and vanity.  In addition to the fire giants dwelling here, we have hell hounds, a chimera, an evil dwarf, ettins, trolls, a red dragon and a few other critters.  

There are story hooks and interesting NPC interactions here, making up for their absence in G2.  First and foremost is a rival contingent of drow who oppose Eclavdra and may be potential allies of convenience for the PCs.  Then we have the thief.  In the prison, in addition to an elf noble and her entourage, a couple of centaurs, some naughty gnolls, a crazy troll, and some skeletons, we have a nameless human thief.  Though she only gets a paragraph, this character screams recurring character to me as she likely joins the PCs only to rob them blind and take off at some point.  The brazen thief is a classic archetype, but I find her inclusion here to be a nifty little quirk with a ton of story potential.  Another potentially interesting development are a trio of mind flayers who are not involved in whatever the drow are plotting.  They are just observing the situation and keeping their distance.  Why?  Potential plot twists abound just by their mere presence.

So, drow.

The dark elves get a Monster Manual style entry in the back of the module, along with a couple of new spells, with notes on their spell abilities, typical classes, special arms and armor (which rots away in sunlight), poison-use, and light sensitivity.  Their origin story here is pretty generic with no mention of spiders or Lolth.  

The drow have, over the years, reached near-iconic status in D&D, surpassed only by unique D&D monsters like the beholder and, of course, dragons.  A lot of that is thanks to Drizzt Do'Urden who is still ten years of products away from making his debut on my reading list (assuming I include the novels).  What we do have are the beginnings of the matriarchal aspects of their society, with their ability scores and spells varying based on gender, with drow females generally being more powerful.  If you've been reading along with me so far, you know that gender issues are pretty important to me and thus drow are problematic and always have been.  They are based, somewhat, on Nordic myths of the Svartalfar, but that doesn't quite excuse them for being inherently sexist in their portrayal.  As an aside, I should note that, while I am critical of drow and the problems they represent, I still use them in my own campaigns.  I have worked around the issue of their typical portrayal as evil matriarchal dominatrixes by making all elves in my homebrew setting matriarchal.  Its sort of a bandaid solution, but, it works for me, at least for the moment.  

The adventure itself concludes with a note about potentially continuing the campaign with D1, in pursuit of any drow that managed to escape.  When I run this adventure, I will, again, be removing the dragon for campaign reasons and I'll definitely be using the drow rivalry story hook, as well as the thief prisoner, who I think will follow the party into D1, lured by the potential for loot.

Next up: D1: Descent Into the Depths of the Earth


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## KirayaTiDrekan (Jul 16, 2014)

*D1: Descent Into the Depths of the Earth

*Originally published September, 1978

Version being read and reviewed: D1-2: Descent Into the Depths of the Earth (PDF) (April, 1981; PDF added to www.dndclassics.com January, 2013) by Gary Gygax

First things first - SPOILER ALERT!!!!

Still here?

Ok, here we go.

Unlike all of the adventures we've looked at so far, this one seems specifically designed to be a "Part 1" as opposed to a standalone adventure.  There isn't a "BBEG" really and the adventure mostly consists of a hex crawl, albeit an underground one.  This module does introduce the Underdark, though it wouldn't be called that for a while.  

Wandering monsters (and drow patrols and drow merchant trains) take center stage here as the PCs are primarily traveling.  Among the wandering critters are beholders, which thus make their adventure module debut.  

There are three major locations of note - a drow checkpoint along the "road" that is basically a chokepoint against any potential incursions (and thus, an unavoidable encounter), a mind flayer enclave, and a troglodyte warren.  The trogs' warren serves as the "dungeon" of this adventure, though there is little "character" to the place.  The warren does feature a powerful lich (20th level) which seems likely to wipe out the party if they run into it.

There are a few implied opportunities to traverse safely past the drow.  Taking out the mind flayers is the best option, garnering the favor of the drow.  Its also implied that Elcavdra's actions were not sanctioned so if the PCs are allied with her rival from G3, they should have an in with most of the drow in this adventure.  We also see our first mention of Lolth, her symbol featured along with several other symbols, apparently house insignia or something similar.  

Overall, this adventure feels like filler, a "point A to point B" journey to get the PCs to the next actual adventure.

Next up: D2: Shrine of the Kuo-Toa


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## KirayaTiDrekan (Jul 17, 2014)

*D2: Shrine of the Kuo-Toa

*Originally published September, 1978

Version being read and reviewed: D1-2: Descent Into the Depths of the Earth (PDF) (April, 1981; PDF added to www.dndclassics.com January, 2013) by Gary Gygax

First things first - SPOILER ALERT!!!!

Still here?

Ok, here we go.

This is another filler adventure, albeit a more interesting one than D1.  The party is still on their way to find and deal with the drow and stumble onto a kuo-toa stronghold.  As there is still a lot of Underdark (or underworld as it is referred to here, the term Underdark having not been invented, yet) travel going on, wandering monsters take center stage again in the first part of this adventure, with the potential to encounter drow patrols, merchants, kuo-toa religious pilgrims, and a variety of other critters, all thematically appropriate to the setting.  

The first set-piece encounter is with an unhinged kuo-toa "monitor" (basically a monk) ferryman who can get the party across a turbulent river.  Without him, the trip across is going to be much more difficult and the party will end up quite a distance downstream in the process.  

After that, we get to meet the deep gnomes, aka Svirfneblin (good luck pronouncing that one right the first time).  These underground gnomes are potential allies against both the kuo-toa and the drow, though they do come across as a bit covetous when it comes to gems.

Finally, the kuo-toa shrine.  Kuo-toa seem to be inspired by Lovecraft.  Evil cultish fish people just seems to be something straight out of the Cthulhu mythos.  There are a couple of instances in the shrine where a PC has a chance of being transported to the Elemental Plane of Water and coming face to lobster-face with Blibdoolpoolp, the kuo-toa's pseudo-deity.  That name is more than a little silly sounding, but one must pronounce it properly (and present an expensive offering of pearls) in the presence of the naked-human-female-with-lobster-hands-and-head in order to gain a favor and be transported back.  

Not much story potential here, overall, though there are plenty of prisoners and slaves to liberate, including a paladin.  There are also a few seemingly worthless trinkets to collect that apparently have significance in the next adventure, Vault of the Drow.

At the end of the module we have Monster Manual style entries for the Drow (repeated verbatim from G3), Jermlaine (rat-loving kobold wannabes), kuo-toa, and svirfneblin.

Overall, D1 and D2 are mostly filler, but they do introduce most of the concepts we now consider definitive of the Underdark.  

Next up: D3: Vault of the Drow


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## KirayaTiDrekan (Oct 7, 2014)

Holy moly, its been quite a while, hasn't it.  Well, in my defense, I started a new job.  Yay me!  

*D3: Vault of the Drow*

Originally published September, 1978

Version being read and reviewed: D3: Vault of the Drow (PDF) (PDF added to www.dndclassics.com January, 2013) by Gary Gygax

First things first - SPOILER ALERT!!!!

Still here?

Ok, here we go.

My goodness did this thing take forever to read through.  In addition to life getting in the way, this module is just an impenetrable wall of text for the most part, with few illustrations.  That's great, because it means Gygax crammed a lot into this adventure, but it makes it a pain to read.

This adventure assumes from the get-go that you've played through D1 and D2 and there isn't much advice given for those who want to run this module by itself.  There's a note in the introduction stating that this adventure is designed for experienced players.  New players are going to have a rough time of things.

There are a lot of wandering monster tables as the adventure includes a fair amount of wandering around underdark passages and the city itself.  The first notable set encounter is a drow checkpoint which is relatively boring but necessary.  The second encounter is far more interesting, involving a vampire and his succubus lover.  Their area is covered in an illusion to make it look like a serene glade under a starry sky - quite inviting for a party that's spent weeks in the skyless depths of the underdark.  

If the party doesn't acquire some brooches, identifying themselves as guests or merchants or affiliated with a drow noble house, they are going to fail, most likely.  The guard tower at the entrance to the city is pretty killer all by itself.  Then there's the sororities and fraternities of fighters loosely associated with the noble houses that are full of drow ready to murder anyone without an identifying brooch or cloak.  

Erelhei-Cinlu...yeah, I'm not going to try to pronounce that.  There are some overview style descriptions of the city and the wandering encounter tables provide some interesting meat and roleplaying opportunities (especially the rakes...rebel drow and cross-breeds who are fed up with the drow nobility and are thus potential allies) but the DM is left to fill in the blanks quite a bit.

The same is true for the noble houses, with each only getting a listing of the ruling members classes and basic stats, important magic items in the house's possession, and the house's rank in the city.  There are also some notes about factions and inter-house alliances that could be of benefit to the party if they can play the politics a bit.  There's also some heavy hinting that not all of the noble houses are Lolth worshippers and instead revere the Elder Elemental Eye.   

The Egg of Lolth is the main temple and final dungeon of the adventure.  Inside, the party has the chance to meet Lolth herself if they are (un)lucky.  There is a massive illusion of Lolth as well that acts as a portal to the Abyss (and the final adventure in this seven-module proto-adventure path, Q1: Queen of the Demonweb Pits).

The module ends with Monster Manual style entries for Drow (repeated from previous modules), Kuo-Toa (repeat), Lolth, Mezzodaemons, Nycadaemons, and Svirfneblin (repeat).  

Overall, much better than D1 and D2, with a lot of potential if the DM wants to take the time to flesh out the city.

Next up: B1: In Search of the Unknown


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## Samloyal23 (Oct 12, 2014)

Egads, now I remember why I failed so many classes in 10th grade...  Yeppers, I was addicted to these old school modules back in the day. Good reviews, more please...


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## KirayaTiDrekan (Oct 13, 2014)

*B1: In Search of the Unknown*

Originally published November, 1978

Version being read and reviewed: B1: In Search of the Unknown (PDF) (PDF added to www.dndclassics.com January, 2013) by Mike Carr

First things first - SPOILER ALERT!!!!

Still here?

Ok, here we go.

This module represents the first attempt at an instructional adventure for beginners.  Its also an odd little experiment since its not finished, at least not in the sense that we, as modern gamers, expect it would be.  Part of the "instructional" aspect of the module is teaching the DM to stock the dungeon.  So, while the rooms have descriptions, they don't have any critters or treasures and the like.  Unlike later intro adventures that are designed to get the group right into playing as soon as possible, B1 takes the approach of teaching DMs how to prep and the beginnings of adventure design.  While an interesting idea, its not really any surprise that this module was quickly surpassed in popularity and iconic status by B2: Keep on the Borderlands.

This adventure is also notable as the first published adventure module written by someone other than Gary Gygax.  In this case we have Mike Carr, notable for being the only person known to have attended all 40 of the first 40 Gen Con conventions.  He also did quite a bit of editing in TSR's early days before moving on to a career on Wall Street.  Its also the first published adventure for the "Basic" version of the game, split off from OD&D as a separate line from AD&D.  This adventure was included in the Basic Set for a while before being replaced by B2.

When talking about the DM, Carr notes "he or she", which, though my memory may be fuzzy given the lengthy gap between some of these reviews, is the first such instance in the adventure modules.  As you know, the evolution of the role of gender in D&D is a topic of some interest to me, so this is fairly noteworthy.

The first five pages is made up of advice for the DM that's fairly independent of the adventure itself, covering things like adventure preparation, keying the map, how to deal with retainers and NPCs, determining marching order, designating a caller, etc.  The caller role is something I've talked about before as being a little foreign to modern gaming, as its basically a leader among the players.  The caller's role here is a bit reduced from how its described in OD&D, having the responsibility of determining the actions for the group as a whole, but not dictating actions for other characters.  Still, its not something I have ever utilized in my groups since I started playing in 1988.  There's also a fun little note that amounts to "no take-backs" - the DM is advised to set the party on a course of action dictated by the caller as soon as its uttered, even if they soon realize it was a mistake.

The adventure locale itself, the Caverns of Quasqueton, has an interesting set up.  Like Rufus and Burne of Hommlet fame, the place features two men setting up a home for themselves together.  As with Rufus and Burne, one is a fighter and the other a magic-user; Rogahn the Fearless and Zelligar the Unknown.  As a modern reader, my initial impulse is to infer a romantic relationship between the two, but I don't think that's the intent here.  Given the context of when this was written, I think its likely written from the perspective of allies banding together for mutual defense and profit.  Unlike Rufus and Burne, Rogahn and Zelligar are now assumed dead after one final adventure in barbarian lands.  So, now their isolated home becomes a dungeon locale, ripe for plundering.  One thing I think I'm going to do when I DM this adventure is have the reports of the pair's demise to be greatly exaggerated and have them return shortly after the party finishes looting their home.

Each of the locations and rooms within Quasqueton have quite a bit of description and detail.  As noted above, however, there aren't any monsters or treasure indicated.  The first keyed location is actually fairly gruesome - the remains of fallen adventurers and the guards they fought with, shortly after a pair of magic mouths warn the party away from further exploration.  Most of the rooms have a consistent description of years of dust, as well as signs of previous looting.  Room 4 features a "carved statue, full-size, of a nude human female, beckoning with arms out front in a very alluring pose" - it seems that, though this module is intended for beginning D&D players, it certainly isn't intended for children, given this and the scene of carnage in the first room.

Speaking of old gaming practices that seem a little obsolete these days, this adventure features a teleport room specifically designed to mess with the players and the group's mapper.  The room teleports the party to an identical room elsewhere in the dungeon, turned 90 degrees directionally from the other room.  The players will thus probably end up completely lost.

Room 24 puts to rest any notion of Rogahn and Zelligar being more than allies and possibly friends.  Rogahn's mistress apparently dwelled in this room and was "the most dearly won and greatest of all my treasure."  

Although most of the dungeon makes sense within the context of the premise - the mostly finished secret hide-out and home of a pair of semi-retired adventurers, room 31 is the nonsensical oddball, thrown in for a touch of the bizarre.  A room full of pools of various liquids, from healing to poison to a sleep potion to acid.  The purpose of the room eludes me, though it does remind of some of the odd, nonsense rooms in the first adventure in the Mentzer "Red Box" Basic Set.

Descriptions for the cave like second level are much less thorough with the exception of the museum room which is a monument to Rogahn and Zelligar's greatness.  One gets the impression that these two have some pretty over-inflated egos.  

After the room descriptions, we have a section of monsters and treasures that the DM should be placed in those rooms by the DM.  Its entirely up to the DM where to place both monsters and treasure so the adventure will likely be quite different every time its played through.  The monsters are fairly standard for 1st level adventures - goblins, kobolds, bugs of various sorts, and low-level undead.  The treasures are likewise typical of a 1st level adventure, with several cursed items among the smattering of magic items.  

After that, we have a list of character stats that can be used as pregen PCs or NPC retainers.  These characters aren't complete, in the sense that they have character sheets ready made.  They take some work to put together from the pieces parts on various tables in the back of the module.  

Finally, the module ends with 10 tips for players - Stay organized, listen to the DM, cooperate, etc.  Pretty standard stuff.

Although an interesting locale, ultimately the odd choice to leave some of the design work to the DM makes this module a little less than ideal as a beginning adventure.  

Next up: C1: The Hidden Shrine of Tamoachan


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## the Jester (Oct 13, 2014)

I just want to say that I love this thread.  It's really cool reading, and your reviews of everything are very cool and bring a lot of memories back.


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## Samloyal23 (Oct 14, 2014)

"Aaah, home at last are Rogahn..." 
"Aye, Zelligar, it has been a long journey away and back again."
"Hey, where did all the dead monsters come from, Rogahn?"
"And where did all of our stuff go?"
"Oy! You guys, how did you get in here? Put that stuff down! The wench, too, damn you!!!!!"

Yeah... This is going to get messy.


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## Deuce Traveler (Oct 14, 2014)

Kiraya_TiDrekan said:


> *Dungeons & Dragons Supplement II: Blackmoor
> 
> *Originally published September, 1975
> 
> ...





I just wanted to add that Tim Kask told me that he deserves greater writing credit for Blackmoor than he gets.  Supposedly Blume and Gygax came to him smirking and holding several wooden baskets filled with loose single page notes.  They said they had a job for him, and told him that the piled notes were everything that Arneson had given them on Blackmoor and that as editor it was Kask's job to put it all together in time for the quickly approaching publishing deadline (I think it was a week or two away).  Anyway, this was on top of Kask's other editorial duties.  Tim Kask said the notes were so incoherent or conflicting in places that he did away with much of it and wrote entire passages on his own.  I think Kask liked Arneson fine as an ideas kind of guy, but at the same time Arneson's lack of organization and manner of working drove Tim Kask nearly insane.

On the other hand, although he pulled a lot of long hours, Kask liked to take recreational pleasures while he worked, but you'll have to ask him about that yourself.


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## Deuce Traveler (Oct 15, 2014)

Double Post... oops.  I'll leave this by saying that the Drow never really did anything for me in any iteration through the various editions of AD&D and I was never a fan of Dritzz.  However, some of the old school artwork of them partaking in human sacrifice still freaks me out a little to this day.  So I very much disliked what was written about the Drow, but dug some of the older black and white artwork done on them.

I can't wait until you get to the Fiend Folio...


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## Deuce Traveler (Oct 15, 2014)

Just a few more quick comments.  Elves had advantages over humans in the early games since they could act as a armored spellcasting fighting-man/magic-user hybrid, but if I remember right they were also unable to be raised from the dead as they were entities of nature and therefore lacked souls.  So you were better in combat, but also more vulnerable in a way if you played an elf.

I would really suggest you play Tomb of Horrors as it is designed, and do not incorporate it into your campaign.  Instead use it as a tournament module and an ice breaker.  Have your players create high-level characters from whole cloth and run them and their retainers through the Tomb during a weekend where you need a break from the regular campaign.  If they have a complete victory they can celebrate and have bragging rights.  If a partial victory (some survive and with treasure), they'll have fond memories.  And if all are wiped out they can joke about it.  The other modules you can place into your campaign world with some tweaking, but Tomb of Horrors should not be modified.

Speaking of strange and memorable NPCs, didn't the Giants modules have a certain dubious dwarf NPC of note worth mentioning?

I still love the B1 module today.  It's just a fun, quirky experience filled with wonder and perfect for starting players.


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## KirayaTiDrekan (Oct 16, 2014)

Quick replies before I get to the next review...

Drow jumped the shark for me in Dragon #298.  There was an article that talked about drow twins and triplets murdering eachother in-utero.  That was just too much.  I could see demons and devils and such having something like that going on but for drow it was just ridiculous and over the top.  In my "Everything D&D Ever" play-by-post campaign (spoilers for my players) I am taking a different approach with them - they are banished from elven society for taking elven xenophobia to a genocidal extreme during the war against Blackmoor.  The survivors of Blackmoor want to see them tried and executed for war crimes but the other elven clans won't allow it and come to the compromise of exiling them to the underdark.

Regarding S1, I have some ideas for how I'm going to integrate it into my campaign (its actually going to the second adventure in the EDDE campaign).  (Spoilers again) As with every adventure in EDDE, I'm tweaking the backstory a bit while keeping some key elements.  In my version, Acererak is still an apprentice of Vecna, shortly after the fall of Blackmoor, but conspired with Kas to betray Vecna.  Vecna punished Acererak by imprisoning him in the Tomb of Horrors.  Vecna is thus the one responsible for the death traps and such, wanting to ensure Acererak is never released.  By destroying the demilich skull, the PCs will be unknowingly releasing Acererak, who will show up later in the campaign as either an antagonist or potential ally of necessity.  If the PCs fail, then Acer remains imprisoned.

Regarding B1, I like the backstory well enough, its just going to be a bit of a chore to populate.

And, as for the module I'm currently reading, C1, a bit of a sneak preview of my review - I love it!  I think it may be my favorite so far...though that depends on whether it keeps its niftiness throughout since I haven't finished reading it yet.


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## Hussar (Oct 16, 2014)

C1 remains one of my all time favourite modules.  I enjoyed the heck out of playing it.


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## KirayaTiDrekan (Oct 16, 2014)

*C1: The Hidden Shrine of Tamoachan *

Originally published June, 1979

Version being read and reviewed: C1: The Hidden Shrine of Tamoachan (PDF) (PDF added to www.dndclassics.com January, 2013) by Harold Johnson & Jeff R. Leason

First things first - SPOILER ALERT!!!!

Still here?

Ok, here we go.

Indiana Jones meets The Road to El Dorado, with a dash of Hellraiser and healthy dose of The Mummy - this adventure is freaking amazing.

This module was originally titled Lost Tamoachan, though I don't know if there were any revisions to the actual adventure itself with the title change.  Regardless, this is written as a Competition or Tournament module, complete with a relatively simplistic scoring system.  There a few notes about running the adventure campaign style vs. tournament style.  Tournament style features a timer of sorts in the form of poison gas that will slowly kill the characters if they don't escape.

The tournament version also features three very detailed pregen characters and opens with an intro that has the trio fleeing from bounty hunters and stumbling into the ruins, falling into the Shrine via the ground collapsing under them in the ruined city.  The bounty hunters are not actually featured in the adventure, though the pregen characters' backgrounds provide plenty of material to work with should one want to begin a campaign leading up to this module (which is what I will likely do when I get around to running this).

The adventure is heavily inspired by Aztec, Incan, and Mayan culture and mythology is obviously thoroughly researched in that regard.  Everything in the shrine is derived from or inspired by the gods of these cultures, translated slightly into the Olman culture of Greyhawk.  Even better, all of the various names of gods and other beings have a pronunciation guide.  

Every room is loaded with fascinating features so I'm going to cover the highlights.  As an overview, most of the creatures here are modified to be intelligent servants of the various deities or are undead appropriate to the nature of the place.  There are also numerous traps as befitting a forgotten shrine such as this one.

Room 13 features a nereid, which also has a Monster Manual style entry in the back of the adventure.  Nereids are elemental water beings inspired by myths of sirens and the like - beautiful female creatures or spirits that lure men to their doom.  As such, the nereid is described as rendering male characters unable to attack it.  For our trio of pregens, that means that only the cleric is immune to her charms.  If you've been reading my prior reviews, you know gender issues are of particular importance to me so, I find this particular creature's inclusion to be the only minor problematic issue with this module.  

There are a few areas where the party could potentially drown in water but Room 24 features a potential burying and drowning in sand.  Eep.

Room 28 has a gas spore, a "gotcha" monster that looks like a beholder but explodes when you hit it.  I'm not normally a fan of "gotcha" monsters, but this one seems to fit in with the theme of the module, representing a sun figure.

Room 29 is where I am reminded of the movie "The Road to El Dorado" as it features the game that also plays a prominent role in the movie, a form of basketball where the party must get the ball, that moves on its own and is your opponent, through a hoop.  

Room 35 made me squee a bit when I read it.  Xipe Totec, the Flayed One, is the deity referenced here.  In the early Hellraiser comic books, Pinhead is said to be the latest incarnation of that deity.  Here Xipe is a juvenile ogre mage.  And, amongst his treasure, is an intricately carved ivory box that is opened rather like a certain puzzle box.  I am huge fan of Clive Barker and the Hellraiser movie so this was a rather surprising and awesome proto-reference.  This module came out in 1979 but the Hellraiser movie didn't come out until 1987.  The short story the movie is based on, The Hellbound Heart, was first published as part of the Night Visions anthology series in 1986.  So, it makes me wonder if Barker may not have been a D&D player.

Room 45 contains a depiction of the land of the dead, with its various levels being a bit reminiscent of Dante's Inferno and other depictions of a multi-leveled Hell, though there is one facet that is more like Elysium.  

Room 46 features the debut of the gibbering mouther, a wonderfully grotesque and nightmarish monster and now something of a classic of D&D.  The mouther also gets a Monster Manual style entry in the back of the module. 

Room 54, the final room, doesn't have a "boss battle" - merely a puzzle of sorts as the characters must figure out how to finally escape the Shrine.  This is fitting as the objective of the module, at least in tournament play, is getting the heck out of dodge.

The module comes with a secondary booklet of illustrations, similar to the Tomb of Horrors, that are used as game aids, providing a visual representation of various rooms.  Also similar to Tomb of Horrors, these are very well done compared to the standard art of the time.

As noted in a previous review, as a kid I had avoided AD&D adventures as I was under the mistaken impression that they were only allowed to be played in organized play or conventions.  That didn't stop me from skimming through and reading Dragon magazine whenever I got the chance so I was at least vaguely familiar with the S modules, the GDQ modules, T1-4, and even the A modules.  But, the C "Competition" series was a complete mystery to me other than the names.  I barely knew anything about them until now.  And, with C1 at least, it looks like I was missing out on one of the best modules of the time.  I love nearly everything about this little gem and can't wait to run it some day.  There are only a couple of minor negative points - the nereid mentioned above, and some really skimpy amounts of treasure, at least compared to the other modules I've read so far.  Given that I'll be running this with 5th Edition, however, that isn't really a problem at all.

Next up: T1: The Village of Hommlet


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## Olaf the Stout (Oct 17, 2014)

I'm loving this thread so far.

C1: The Hidden Shrine of Tamoachan holds a special place in my heart as it was the very first adventure I played.  My Year 8 home group teacher ran it for my friends over a series of lunchtimes back in 1994 (the module was older than I was when I played it!).

I remember finding the key in the diorama at the start, but only after we had brought several of the figurines to life by picking them up and throwing them on the ground.  Other memories include:

- Desperately trying to kill a vampire after accidentally causing it to start to form
- Being knocked off my feet after opening a door that was holding back a heap of water
- Having someone in the party crushed under a statue after climbing on it to try and pry the gems out of its eyes

I'm not sure how far into the module we got as, like many 13yo boys, we were easily distracted.  I think the whole thing ended when one party member decided to attack another and an interparty fight broke out!


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## Samloyal23 (Oct 17, 2014)

Whither B2? Did I miss something?


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## KirayaTiDrekan (Oct 17, 2014)

Nope, its coming up soon.  Here's the next ten items to give you an idea of what to look forward to.

T1: The Village of Hommlet
Dungeon Master's Guide
S2: White Plume Mountain
B2: The Keep on the Borderlands
C2: The Ghost Tower of Inverness
The Rogues Gallery
S3: Expedition to the Barrier Peaks
The World of Greyhawk Folio
Q1: Queen of the Demonweb Pits
Deities and Demigods

The Rogues Gallery and The World of Greyhawk Folio are going to get placeholder posts for now as I don't have those two products.


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## Samloyal23 (Oct 17, 2014)

Yay! S2,S3, and Q1 seen big favourites as well...


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## KirayaTiDrekan (Nov 10, 2014)

*T1: The Village of Hommlet *

Originally published July, 1979

Version being read and reviewed: T1: The Village of Hommlet (PDF) (PDF added to www.dndclassics.com January, 2013) by Gary Gygax

First things first - SPOILER ALERT!!!!

Still here?

Ok, here we go.

This is the first AD&D adventure specifically designed for 1st level characters - "Introductory to Novice Level" according to the cover.  It was also meant to be the first in a series of modules dealing with the Temple of Elemental Evil.  As we'll find out later, that series ended up becoming one "super module" - T1-4: The Temple of Elemental Evil.

There is a significant amount of backstory and detail in this module, much more so than most of the previous modules we've seen so far.  There are indications that the area's history, a major battle with the forces of the Temple about ten years ago, was a campaign played by Gygax and his players.  Now, those evil forces, routed and defeated but not completely destroyed, are stirring again and its up to the player characters to do something about it.

Also unlike prior modules, more than half of this adventure is taken up with a very detailed, almost dungeon-like description of the titular village, with each building given an entry and several (the Inn of the Welcome Wench, Trader's Establishment, Church of St. Cuthbert, and the Guard Tower) getting their own maps and room entries.  There are tons of potential roleplaying opportunities here, especially at the Trader's Establishment as the merchants here are really spies for the Temple.  There's several potential henchmen about as well, mostly at the Inn of the Welcome Wench, though a fair number of them have their own dastardly agendas.

One potential negative point - Most of the inhabitants of Hommlet are ridiculously wealthy, at least in comparison to other 1st level villages in later modules and adventures.

Burne and Rufus merit special attention here.  They are a pair of semi-retired adventurers who have settled in Hommlet and are currently overseeing the building of a castle.  There are subtle hints that the pair share a more intimate relationship, though, as with the backstory in B1: In Search of the Unknown, it may just be that they are nothing more than friends, adventuring companions, and, for lack of a better word, roommates.  Elmo is also an interesting fellow - a spy of sorts for the nearby viscount masquerading as a drunken sot.  

The actual adventure locale is the Ruins of the Moathouse, a former outpost of the Temple of Elemental Evil, now a dark and dank ruin.  There are some bandits and critters to deal with in the upper level, but the lower level has the beginnings of a small army under the command of Lareth, The Beautiful.  An intriguing fellow, and, oddly, a human male cleric of Lolth. 

As with the village, the Moathouse has a more than generous amount of loot for a 1st level adventure (albeit a tough 1st level adventure).  PCs are likely to be quite well off for a while after this adventure, depending on how the DM manages wealth.

When I run this again with D&D 5E, I'm probably going to make Lareth a Warlock (I prefer demon lords and devil princes and such to not have clerics, reserving those for true gods, but allow them to have warlocks).  

The final note of the adventure is intriguing - if Lareth is killed, agents of the Temple will send an assassin after his slayers (the PCs).  A 10th level assassin - remember that this an adventure for beginning level characters.  The PCs are likely to be in for a bit of a shock when the assassin catches up to them.

Its worth noting that my first exposure to this adventure was through the 2003 PC game, Temple of Elemental Evil.  There are some notable differences (no mention of Elmo's secret identity, an extra bandit encounter in the Moathouse courtyard and a few other minor details) - what really stands out is the PC game's elaboration on the various NPCs of Hommlet, with most of them having side quests for the PCs.  I liked that aspect of the PC game and take inspiration from it when I run the adventure (see below).

*Play-Through Review*

I used this as the second adventure of my now defunct table-top campaign during the D&D Next playtest.  Taking some inspiration from the PC game, I set up some side quests in the village - most notably, having the merchant-spies use an agent to murder one of the feuding farmer-brothers and framing one of the PCs for the crime.  After clearing that up, the PCs went on to the moathouse and made an alliance of convenience with the gnolls, recruiting them to help in taking on Lareth's human guards and minions.  The gnolls, of course, turned tail and ran, leaving the PCs in a tight spot, but they prevailed in the end and took Lareth prisoner, using him to guide them to the Temple.  I played Lareth pretty much like Loki from the Marvel Cinematic Universe: lots of style and flair, and an almost likeable wickedness.  He proved to be quite entertaining.  

Next up: Dungeon Master's Guide (1st Edition)


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## steeldragons (Nov 10, 2014)

Yay! Very happy to see this thread again.

Really enjoyable comments and observations. Kudos for sticking with it. It is a truly daunting proposed project.

Have some XP for continuing toil.


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## KirayaTiDrekan (Nov 10, 2014)

steeldragons said:


> Yay! Very happy to see this thread again.
> 
> Really enjoyable comments and observations. Kudos for sticking with it. It is a truly daunting proposed project.
> 
> Have some XP for continuing toil.




If it were a chore, I wouldn't do it.    It is fun, just finding time is getting a bit difficult - I am, once again, unemployed.


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## KirayaTiDrekan (Nov 12, 2014)

Quick sidenote - The 1E DMG is a beast of a book so it may take me a while to get through it.  Don't despair if this thread lies dormant again for a while.  I shall return.


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## Deuce Traveler (Nov 12, 2014)

The older campaign characters may not have all been from Gygax's original D&D gaming group.  Instead, a lot of the action around Hommlet took place from Chainmail, such as the well-known Battle for the Moathouse and the lesser known Battle of Emridy Meadows.


http://www.dragonsfoot.org/forums/viewtopic.php?f=33&t=18778
http://www.dragonsfoot.org/forums/viewtopic.php?f=33&t=34464


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## ronaldsf (Nov 17, 2014)

Perhaps the DMG should be tackled one part of it at a time? I can't imagine a single post doing it justice!


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## KirayaTiDrekan (Nov 17, 2014)

ronaldsf said:


> Perhaps the DMG should be tackled one part of it at a time? I can't imagine a single post doing it justice!




It will be a longer than usual post to be sure.


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## the Jester (Nov 19, 2014)

Just the attempt is quite ambitious. I agree that doing it across multiple posts is probably wise.


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## KirayaTiDrekan (Nov 22, 2014)

A brief note before I dive into the DMG - I have edited the reviews for the 1st Edition Monster Manual and Player's Handbook, redirecting the links from the defunct WotC website product pages to the Amazon listings for those books.


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## KirayaTiDrekan (Nov 22, 2014)

*Dungeon Masters Guide* - Part 1

Originally published August, 1979

Version being read and reviewed: Dungeon Masters Guide 1st Edition Premium Reprint (July, 2012) 

The Full title of this behemoth is...

Advanced Dungeons & Dragons Special Reference Work: Dungeon Masters Guide - A COMPILATION VOLUME OF INFORMATION PRIMARILY USED BY ADVANCED DUNGEONS & DRAGONS GAME REFEREES, INCLUDING: COMBAT TABLES; MONSTER LISTS AND ENCOUNTERS; TREASURE AND MAGIC TABLES AND DESCRIPTIONS; RANDOM DUNGEON GENERATION; RANDOM WILDERNESS TERRAIN GENERATION; SUGGESTIONS ON GAME MASTERING; AND MORE.  By Gary Gygax.

(Caps are theirs, not mine.)

I'm taking the advice of a couple of posters and dividing this review up into smaller sections, rather than taking on the whole DMG in one post.  This book is a beast.  A classic, beloved beast, but a beast nonetheless.

Mike Carr's Foreword opens the book with the question of whether DMing is an art of science.  It is, of course, both, as well as a "labor of love."  

We then move on to Gary's Preface, in which he admonishes those venturing into the field of DMing to not stray too far afield from what is set forth in the book, lest their game be incompatible with those of other DMs or stray into bad DM territory.  Gary also talks about the many hats he wore when putting together this book and deciding what should go into it.  There is a subtle undertone of "Father Knows Best" or in this case "Gary Knows Best" in terms of what should and shouldn't be in the game.  Perhaps a little off-putting, at least from a modern perspective.  Apparently the goal of keeping DMs on a bit of a leash was to ensure that all campaign worlds could conceivably exist within the same overarching AD&D universe, allowing relatively easy transfer of PCs from one campaign to another.  There's also hintings of a vision for what would become the RPGA laid out as another reason for uniformity and adherence to the "laws" of the game.  

Gary also seemed to have a somewhat negative view of players in general, believing that every player will attempt to push a campaign toward Monty Haul or power-mongering style play.  Another less-than-subtle hint about Gary's attitude toward players is this lovely line - "As this book is the exclusive precint of the DM, you must view any non-DM player possessing it as something less than worthy of honorable death."  One wonders how any new DMs came about if the existing DMs didn't share their tomes of arcane insight - i.e. the DMG.  

As an aside, Gary was overly fond of the word "milieu" as it shows up a rather absurd number of times in the Preface alone.  

Second aside, in the Credits & Acknowledgements section of the Preface, we have the first instance of someone named who I have met, albeit online - Skip Williams, Dragon Magazine's Sage for much of its print run.  I interviewed Skip for my weekly news blog on the now dead and buried Gleemax back in 2007.  

Moving on to the Introduction, the first paragraph uses alignment tracking as one of the many "secret" activities that DMs engage in.  Did DMs really have little alignment graphs for each player character at the table?  I'm having a hard time imagining this as a regularly indulged in activity at the game table.  

Although tongue-in-cheek, yet another bit of animosity toward players presents itself - "In fact, what I have attempted is to cram everything vital to the game into this book, so that you will be as completely equipped as possible to face the ravenous packs of players lurking in the shadows, waiting to pounce upon the unwary referee and devour him or her at the first opportunity."  The last paragraph in the Introduction takes a similar tone, letting aspiring DMs know that the hard work put forth to create campaigns and adventures will likely go unappreciated by players.  Lovely sentiment, that.  

Next post I'm going to try to cover pages 9 to 36 or so, which cover various aspects of player characters in relation to the DM.

Next up: Dungeon Master's Guide (1st Edition) (Part 2)


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## Samloyal23 (Dec 1, 2014)

So, who was Gary playing with that would contribute to this attitude? Hmmm...


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## KirayaTiDrekan (Jan 16, 2015)

Quick update - I am looking for work, which is cutting in to my free time, and I have taken a break from reading old stuff to read new stuff (the 5E core books).  I'm also going back and designing a setting from the ground up using the older stuff.  All of this is a long-winded way of saying - I haven't forgotten about this but it may be a bit before I get back to ye olde DMG.


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## ronaldsf (Jan 19, 2015)

Not a prob -- I subscribed to this thread so whenever you're ready I'll get the new updates. Enjoy you're other endeavors!


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## KirayaTiDrekan (Feb 8, 2015)

*Dungeon Masters Guide* - Part 2

Originally published August, 1979

Version being read and reviewed: Dungeon Masters Guide 1st Edition Premium Reprint (July, 2012) 

Its been a while again, hasn't it?  Looking for work and catching up on 5th Edition have been occupying my time, but I figured it was time to get back to this and try to get the DMG out of the way so I can finally move beyond this behemoth.

In this next section - titled "The Game" - Gary is fairly adamant that AD&D is first and foremost a game, dismissing the idea of the "realism-simulation" as absurd, at best.  An "amusing and diverting passtime" and not something "to be taken too seriously."  In fact, Gary considers the game a "dismal failure" when used as a means of simulating medieval culture and warfare.  Given the realism and simulation vs game debates that continue to this day, this seems to be a topic just as prevalent then and likely to continue to be a source of contention for years and editions to come.

When talking about dice, Gary gets a bit unnecessarily mathematical when discussing probability, linear curves, bell curves, etc.  Later editions wisely omitted this sort of thing.  This section certainly makes my eyes cross (I am firmly in the story over rules camp when it comes to playstyle so the less math I have to look at, the better).  My wife always jokes about RPG rulebooks reading like textbooks.  Well, this section certainly resembles a math textbook.    Sidenote: It seems as though the d10 wasn't common as of the writing of this book as the dice section makes mention of using the d20 to generate number ranges from 1 to 10 and mentions the d10 as one of the "non-platonic" dice available.

After a discussion of miniatures and other accessories like character sheets, we finally get to character creation and the generation of ability scores (which, as you may recall, was absent from the Player's Handbook).  The classic 3d6 rolled in order is actually discouraged here, in favor of several other methods.  Method 1 is the well known 4d6, drop the lowest and arrange as desired.  Method 2 is rolling 3d6 twelve times and arranging the top 6 as desired.  Method 3 is rolling 3d6 6 times for each score and keeping the highest roll.  Method 4 is basically rolling 3d6 in order but doing so 12 times and keeping one set.  Having "grown up" on the Mentzer Basic Set, where 3d6 in order was the rule of the day, I find it interesting that that method is discouraged.  It also contradicts my memories of AD&D players I knew from my teenage years who were quite adamant about playing what I guess you could call "hardcore mode."

Moving on, the ability score section also talks about NPCs, where the DM is encouraged to simply choose scores for important high-level NPCs, use average scores for the general populace, and a special method for henchmen (roll 3d6 normally, but add +1 to each die for the henchman's prime requisite for their class).  

Wishes were one of the very few ways to raise ability scores once play started.  Regular ability score increases didn't show up until 3rd Edition.  

Next up, we have the proto-form of what would eventually become non-weapon proficiencies and skills.  There's a random table for player character non-professional skills, with things like armorer, farmer, miner, and teamster.  There aren't any rules associated with these titles, but the DM is encouraged to work ways to utilize these proto-skills in to the campaign.  

Gary's philosophy on starting level matches my own.  He recommends starting all characters at level 1, running separate adventures for new players if necessary to catch up to the characters of existing characters before integrating them into the main campaign.  I start all of my campaigns at 1st level and avoid starting characters at higher level whenever possible.  I just feel like it robs the players and the campaign the experience of playing through the early history of their characters.  Starting at higher level, feels, to me, like cheating.  Boom, 9th level - well, what did you do to earn those levels?

Character age, disease, and death are up next.  Age is a fairly elaborate affair compared to later editions, something else I personally prefer...I like to keep track of campaign time and see the characters age between adventures.  1st edition also had a variety of spells and other effects that caused unnatural aging, something that was done away with in later editions.  Haste was hazardous to your health back then.  

Despite emphasizing the lack of realism in the game, Gary goes to great lengths to simulate real world diseases and parasitic infestations (ew).  It seems quite likely that if you use this system for diseases, your characters will die of dysentery or some other awful affliction before they ever reach the adventure site.  

I think we'll stop here for now - I'll try for a bit more brevity in later installments as we're only up to page 15 so far.  

Next up: Dungeon Master's Guide (1st Edition) (Part 3)


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## Samloyal23 (Feb 9, 2015)

Crunch and fluff have to work together to make a setting feel authentic. The math must reinforce the story and show tangible results of character development...


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## Prince Atom (Feb 10, 2015)

I have been thinking, lately, about giving the players a certain number of attribute points and letting them distribute as they wish.  It has the possibility of a player putting most of his points into one or two attributes to get an 18, so maybe I'd better specify a necessary minimum attribute higher than 3 (but lower than 8).  On the other hand, the players can't complain that their dice were cold, and everyone's totals are the same before play starts.


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## Samloyal23 (Feb 11, 2015)

Playing a weaker character is just more of a challenge, you have to be willing to run from a fight and use cunning to avoid or defeat foes. Kids these days a so spoiled. My first character rolled 3d6 for each attribute and I was lucky to score an 18 and a 15. The rest of my attributes were 9-12 each. I considered myself very lucky.


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## goatunit (Feb 12, 2015)

Sorry to call back to something written in March of last year, but I thought I'd share some insight into the 4-50 players thing.

The idea was that a DM ran a setting. It wasn't the intention that 50 players sit at the table at once (although that could be a pretty epic event!), but that upwards of 50 players might participate in a setting, with the DM running different groups at different times. The notion of discreet campaigns came along later. Consider, for example, Gygax's account of certain sessions he DMed. He has told a lot of stories about games where someone delved into the dungeons of Castle Greyhawk alone. Presumably, this player had to trek through a few empty chambers already cleared by other players in the same "game."


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## Prince Atom (Feb 12, 2015)

Yeah, it sounds like Gygax (and maybe Arneson) had a whole lot of players who would come to them and schedule a play time.

Kind of like how the Western Marches game ran.


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## KirayaTiDrekan (Mar 5, 2015)

*Dungeon Masters Guide* - Part 3

Originally published August, 1979

Version being read and reviewed: Dungeon Masters Guide 1st Edition Premium Reprint (July, 2012) 

I'm going to try to speed this up a bit and zoom through the next few sections so I can get back to a more regular posting schedule.  This book may be a beloved classic but its organized like a...like a something that isn't very organized.

Character abilities and races get a brief overview from the DM's point of view before we move on to discussions on how to adjudicate the various class abilities.  Random tables for followers gained at high levels are up first, with clerics, fighters, thieves, and assassins all having relatively straight forward tables but rangers getting a complex series of tables that could see the ranger getting a flying mount, a mundane NPC, an animal, or even a storm giant!  The paladin's warhorse gets a special section of its own as acquiring it is an adventure in and of itself.  

After an in depth discussion of adjudicating thief and assassin abilities (including poison use), Gary discusses using monster as player characters.  Unlike later editions which have all had supplements with rules for this sort of thing, Gary provides only the barest of guidelines here.  The assumption is that the primary motivation for wanting to play a monster is munchkinism, not any desire to explore a significantly different sort of role.  The section also emphasizes the human-centric nature of the game and that human characters in a fantasy setting are fantastical enough without allowing monster PCs.  Being a fan of monster characters and later supplements like the Complete Book of Humanoids (2nd Edition) and Savage Species (3rd Edition), I find the tone taken here to be a little off-putting.  Lycanthropy also gets a fairly significant chunk of space in the book with a few rules to back up the idea that willingly playing a lycanthrope is a bad idea.

Alignment, alignment, alignment.  How many alignment debates have their been online and even in individual game groups?  I think a lot of the debate surrounding alignment stems from the extensive rules found in this book for it.  Alignment rules diminish with each edition until, now, they are practically non-existent in D&D 5th Edition.  DMs are encouraged to graph each player character's alignment...wait what?  Am I back in high school geometry...only graphing behavior?  This boggles my mind.  The "stick-up-the-rear" LG Paladin stereotype seems to originate here as DMs are told to not allow the other PCs to conveniently "fool" or distract the paladin while they indulge in nefarious, non-LG activities.  And changing alignment invokes a level drain penalty?  Whaaaat?  And don't get me started on alignment languages.  I'm glad those went away.  They never made sense to me.

After a discussion of money (keep PCs poor so sayeth the book), we get in to detailed descriptions of hirelings and mercenary troops with sages getting the most detail.  We then move on to Nodwick...er...I mean henchmen.  Henchman seem to be a pretty big deal in this version of the game and their loyalty has a complicated system of percentages that I don't even begin to want to figure out.

Time was the single most important thing in the whole game, at least according to page 37.  A campaign is meaningless without properly keeping track of time.  Reading a little more in-depth here, it seems that DMs were expected or at least assumed to have more than one group of players in their campaign worlds and so careful track of time was necessary to prevent overlap and paradoxes and such.  This also makes sense with the whole 50 player thing from the original edition.  

Spells are talked about next.  Clerics have an increasingly hard time getting their spells as they gain levels as the highest levels are all granted by DM...er...deity fiat and if the cleric has been misbehaving the deity can say "no."  Magic-Users have a slightly easier time of things, though, which spells they find and can thus attempt to add to their spellbooks, is still entirely up to the DM.  The metaphysics of spellcasting are more detailed in this edition than I remember from any other edition.  Apparently, all spells draw on energy from the positive or negative energy planes.  We then get into adjudicating specific spells.  

Adventuring in the wilderness doesn't hold too many surprises, other than a fairly detailed look at aerial adventuring and combat as well as naval adventuring and ship to ship combat.  We round that off with a brief look at underwater adventuring (which has seemingly always been overly complicated, regardless of edition).  A brief discussion of the planes includes a note about crossing AD&D over with TSR's other games of the time - Boot Hill (old west), Gamma World (post apocalyptic), Metamorphosis Alpha (sci-fi), and something called Tractics which I have never heard of.  

And, finally, we have the combat rules, conspicuously missing from the PHB.  Although relatively complex, AD&D combat doesn't seem anymore complicated than 3.5 combat, really.  Just some slightly different math (and lots of tables to consult).  We also have psionic combat with the defense modes and attack modes and...ouch.  Its ironic that the psionics rules hurt my brain.  

The discussion of saving throws takes an interesting turn, first going in to the rule's origins in wargaming and then discussing why they exist - the PCs are the protagonists and thus should have a chance to escape even certain death, hence the need for saving throws.  Poison saves get into the discussion of the abstract nature of hit points.  I'm reminded of the "damage on a miss" debates that raged across the D&D corner of the internet during 4th Edition and the D&D Next playtest.  Poison saves are an all or nothing save (i.e. Save or Die) because of the hit point abstraction.  Either the poisoned weapon actually scratched you and you die from poison (failed save) or the weapon didn't actually cause any physical harm despite reducing hit points (successful save).  

After briefly covering intoxication we get in to insanity, along with a random table and descriptions of various sorts.  I find insanity mechanics in RPGs to be troublesome for a variety of reasons.  Mental health is a real concern and turning various aspects of it into game mechanics that are poorly researched and are often played for laughs is not something I'm ok with.  However, the inclusion of such mechanics was pretty common in this era of RPGs (here in AD&D, Call of Cthulhu of course, and Palladium's first offerings in the early 80s to name a few, proceeding all the way to the 90s and Vampire: The Masquerade's exceedingly bothersome inclusion of the Malkavian clan of vampires).  Thankfully, most modern RPGs have done away with this sort of thing.

Experience Points are a bit more complicated here than they would be in later editions.  Monster XP is based not only on its level/hit dice but its individual hit points.  The more HP it has, the more XP its worth.  This was also the era of gaining XP from treasure, with a generally 1 to 1 ratio of gold piece value to XP.  The benefit of this system, though, was that the DM could control the rate of level gain pretty easily via the amount of treasure gained in adventures.  Of course, that also meant that player characters tended to end up with more gold than they knew what to do with by level 5 or so (since you couldn't buy magic items).  Gaining levels here is not automatic - the DM is encouraged to charge extra time and money for training based on how well the character roleplayed their general role and alignment.  "Poor" players thus end up having a hard time leveling up, regardless of XP.    

We shall stop here for tonight and try to push through another chunk of the book next time.

Next up: Dungeon Master's Guide (1st Edition) (Part 4)


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## KirayaTiDrekan (Mar 21, 2015)

*Dungeon Masters Guide* - Part 4

Originally published August, 1979

Version being read and reviewed: Dungeon Masters Guide 1st Edition Premium Reprint (July, 2012) 

This book is seriously kicking my butt.  Onward we go...

There's been a lot written about creating a campaign world over the years.  Here, Gary advises taking the "start small" approach - a village and a dungeon and detailing the world from there as player characters get powerful to explore those simple starting points.  I have created homebrew worlds with the "start small" approach and the top-down approach and generally prefer a mix of both.  I like to have an idea of the broader aspects of the setting (an outline of its history, the cosmology, and an idea of the nations and empires existing in the world) and then focus in on a village and adventure location.  The sort of organic development Gary describes is something I've only experienced a couple of times, however, as most of my campaigns don't last long enough to hit higher levels.

Gary seems to be a bit critical of hyper-realists (those DMs who insist on excruciating levels of realism and detail on things like weather patterns, climate, and ecology).  I wonder if such DMs were ever really common, however, as I've never heard of anyone being that painstaking.  

Moving on to Typical Inhabitants (of a campaign, I'm assuming) we have a nice little chart to approximate combat ability and hit points of typical commoners...with females having lower ability than males.  We also have another personal note on the subject of the terms freemen and gentlemen - "Note that the masculine/human usage is generic; I do not like the terms freecreatures or gentlebeings!"  Another indication that Gygax was fully aware of gender issues of the time and consciously chose the less equal path.  I know, I know, 1979 was a different era.  Let's just say I'm happy the game managed to evolve out of this sort of thing with later editions.

The accumulation of wealth by the player characters is always a point of debate.  How much is too much?  Too little?  What's available for them to spend their money on?  Gygax suggests using the logistics of getting treasure hoards home as a means of controlling wealth acquisition.  The dragon may have a huge hoard, but the PCs will only be able to carry a small portion of it.  By the time they get back to loot the rest, other monsters, bandits, etc will have plucked the place clean.  Its been my experience that a lot of players get rather bored dealing with things like encumbrance and such, however - they want to play Dungeons & Dragons, not Accounting & Logistics.

On page 95 we have a sample dungeon map that's quite familiar.  It makes its first appearance here but also shows up in the 3E, 3.5, and 5E DMGs.  We have an example of play utilizing this map, similar to the one found in 3rd Edition (though, here, the lead character does most of the interacting with the DM, which, as I noted earlier in this thread, seems like a titanically boring way to play for the other players).  

I intend to power through the rest of this book in the next installment as the magic items are coming up soon and, as with spells and monsters, I have no intention of reviewing every last one of them, only touching on the highlights.  That's all for now, though.  Until next time.

Next up: Dungeon Master's Guide (1st Edition) (Part 5)


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## Prince Atom (Mar 22, 2015)

I have worked climatology into my campaigns, but generally only when using the World Builder's Guidebook.  Other than that, I try to account for watersheds and low spots and rain shadows, but I don't bust my butt working it all out.

That's a lengthy example of play, but I recognize the end of it from 3E -- that poor gnome!  Way to leap to help him, group.


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## KirayaTiDrekan (Mar 22, 2015)

The Whiner Knight said:


> I have worked climatology into my campaigns, but generally only when using the World Builder's Guidebook.  Other than that, I try to account for watersheds and low spots and rain shadows, but I don't bust my butt working it all out.
> 
> That's a lengthy example of play, but I recognize the end of it from 3E -- that poor gnome!  Way to leap to help him, group.




The role of the gnome was played by the iconic halfling rogue, Lidda, in the 3E version.  She didn't fare much better.


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## Prince Atom (Mar 23, 2015)

She was left kind of up in the air.  It sounded like that gnome got devoured.


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## KirayaTiDrekan (Mar 25, 2015)

*Dungeon Masters Guide* - Part 5

Originally published August, 1979

Version being read and reviewed: Dungeon Masters Guide 1st Edition Premium Reprint (July, 2012) 

This is it.  I am finishing this book, no matter how long this post ends up being.  

NPCs - lots of tables for randomly determining everything about NPCs, mostly about their personalities.  We then get into a discussion of the roleplaying of special DM roles - Henchmen, hirelings, monsters, and some others.  Gygax leans toward making all NPCs, even good-aligned ones, greedy and even a little annoying.  There's also a series of detailed examples of how various groups of monsters would behave during attacks, retreat, and follow-up attacks by PCs.  Compatibility of humanoid troops rounds out the section - interesting and something I might consider using when I run adventures like Temple of Elemental Evil (where there's a fair variety of humanoid critters milling about).

Construction and siege rules appear next.  This all strikes me as being a slightly unnecessary level of detail, at least in terms of anything beyond how long it takes to finish construction.  The various types of constructions are nifty, especially if PCs want to build themselves strongholds, though I have never had a player in 27 years of playing D&D ever want to settle down and build a castle and/or run a domain.

The next section is titled "Conducting the Game" is all about the various kernels of DMing advice that have graced every DMG to various extents.  A few observations - I must say I prefer the Passive Perception style rules of later editions to secretly making listen rolls and such behind the screen for players.  I am a firm believer in letting the players control as much of the flow and narrative of the game as possible, though, while I provide the setting and challenges.  Gary's first piece of advice for handling problem players - kick them out.  Something I agree with.  Better no game than bad game as far as I'm concerned.  The infamous and amusing "blue lightning bolt from the heavens" method of punishing problem players also makes an appearance.  I find that sort of thing to be ridiculously heavy-handed and suitable only for a comedy campaign.  Something I have never been a fan of is bringing a character from another DM's campaign into one of my existing campaigns.  It just doesn't jive with the way I DM (each campaign is a contained story with each character being integrated in to the story and world).  

Interestingly, we have some basic conversion guides for Boot Hill (TSR's old west RPG) and Gamma World (TSR's somewhat gonzo post-apocalyptic sci-fi RPG).  These sections are significantly out-dated now, of course, since Boot Hill is long out of print and Gamma World has seen a number of editions of its own, with the most recent being a version based on the D&D 4th Edition rules.  Mixing genres is something I am quite fond of, however.  Two of my D&D 5E Play-by-Post campaigns here on EN World are genre-benders - one is a sci-fi meets fantasy space opera based on the classic "Lost in Space" premise, the other is a post-apocalyptic take on the classic Blackmoor setting, transplanting it to Earth 1,000 years after a magical invasion and apocalypse.  

Creating spells and items is a lengthy and expensive process suitable only to high level spellcasters.  Seems like everything is expensive...that explains where the seemingly absurd amounts of money in adventures goes, I guess...at least for the spellcasting PCs.  Even so, I've also never had players interested in inventing new spells or crafting magic items.

Potion Miscibility!  I love this table.  An effective and amusing deterrent to chugging a bunch of different "buff" potions.  

Energy Drain!  Oh how I loathe all variations of this mechanic.  Losing a level is nothing more than an absurd amount of paperwork, possibly (probably) right in the middle of combat.  The only mechanic that comes close to the level of irritation I have with level drain is ability score damage, which creates almost as much in-combat recalculating of the character sheet.  

And now we finally get to the plethora of random treasure and magic item tables.  I find it interesting that despite the admonitions against selling magic items earlier in the book and the level of difficulty recommended the DM set up in finding a buyer that there are, in fact, GP values listed in the magic item tables.  This also seems to run counter to the anecdotes of old school DMs and players who are strongly against the "magic item shop" style of play.  At any rate, the prices are quite a bit cheaper than their later edition counterparts.  

As mentioned before, I'm going to skim through the magic item descriptions as there are a lot of them, most of them relatively boring.  A few highlights...

The various control potions (potion of dragon control, potion of undead control, etc) are something that was phased out of later editions, with good reason I think.  They are basically, "Get out of this encounter free" cards.  I do, however, miss the various Protection scrolls (well, I should say I missed them in 3.5 and 4E as they are back in 5E).

The retributive strike on the Staff of the Magi and Staff of Power always fascinated me - sort of a last ditch, do or die thing when all else fails.  One of my unfulfilled DMing goals is to have an epic story moment where there's the possibility of a retributive strike, either by the PCs or the villain.

Lots of cursed items intermingled among the useful miscellaneous items.  I'm not really a fan of cursed items - they strike me as another "gotcha" mechanic that breaks immersion for me.

The Deck of Many Things - I love it dearly, but mostly for its wacky effects on a campaign.  I've only ever managed to use it once in a way that didn't completely derail the campaign.  

Speaking of cursed items - the Girdle of Femininity/Masculinity - this thing is such a can of worms.  Gender shouldn't be a curse, first and foremost.  However, it did provide a limited sort of outlet for folks like me (transgender) to have a bit of wish fulfillment in a time when acceptance was fleeting.  Ultimately, the progress society and gaming has made in the recognition and acceptance of the gender spectrum has rendered this item irrelevant in modern D&D...thank goodness.  

I don't recall ever seeing the Instruments of the Bards before; they're mechanically like staffs (collections of spells) but only usable by bards (they deal damage to non-bards).  I kind of like 'em, or at least the idea, since the bard in this game is something rather elite and unusual.  

I once used a Mirror of Opposition in a 2nd Edition campaign to create one of the campaign's primary antagonists (long story short, on one of the first adventures of a Dragonlance campaign, the entire party was duplicated and most of the doubles were defeated, but the duplicate of the party thief got away; later the PCs went after a dragon hoard only to discover that the duplicate had beaten them there - then the Mists of Ravenloft swallowed the PCs, the dragon, and the duplicate and cursed the duplicate and the source PC to experience eachother's wounds and pain).  

Artifacts - As with OD&D, most of the details and powers of artifacts are left up to the DM to determine.  Nothing surprising here otherwise as a lot of the classics had previously made their debut in OD&D.  

Appendix A: Random Dungeons - Nifty little batch of tables to whip up an adventure in a pinch, or even indulge in some solo play if one is so inclined.  It strikes me that the old dungeon geomorph products or modern dungeon tiles would come in handy for this sort of thing.  

Appendix B: Random Wilderness - Much less here to play with; the DM is left to improvise quite a bit more than with dungeons.

Appendix C: Random Monster Encounters - Interesting little note at the beginning of this section: almost all of the critters on the tables are from the Monster Manual with the notable exception of two daemons from D3: Vault of the Drow.  I find it amusing that on the 10th level of a dungeon, you can have a random encounter with an archdevil or demon prince.  And the infamous random harlot table is something we find hidden among the random encounters for cities and towns.

Appendix D: Random Planar Critters - This one is interesting in that its intended to conjure up a brand new outsider on the spot if the DM wants to liven things up with something that isn't in the Monster Manual.  

Appendix E: Big Sideways Table of Critters - Yeah...moving on.

Appendix F: Gambling - A variety of simple rules for dice and card games of various sorts.  Most of which are either based on real world games or simple games made up to use components likely to be in a gamer's collection - dice, checkerboards, and the like.  

Appendix G: Traps - Just a random table of traps.

Appendix H: Tricks - A variety of dungeon, let's call them obstacles, that DM's can toss in to confound players, most of them of the "gotcha" variety.

Appendix I: Dungeon Dressing - Tables full of minor decor to make dungeons more immersive.  

Appendix J: Herbs, Spices, and Medicinals - A great big list of plant-based odds and ends and what they might be useful for.

Appendix K: Describing Magical Substances - A handy guide for adding flavor (sometimes literally) to magic items.

Appendix L: Conjured Animals - Tables for the creature summoning spells - you couldn't choose your critter when summoning, you got whatever the dice pulled out of the ether, so to speak.  

Appendix M: Summoned Monsters - Same deal as L, but with mostly extraplanar critters.

Appendix N: Inspirational and Educational Reading - The most famous of the DMG appendices, in the introduction Gygax notes with fondness the imagined and made-up tales his father used to tell.  After the list of fantasy authors and their works, Gygax notes a few that had a direct influence on AD&D - de Camp & Pratt, REH (presumably Robert E. Howard, Conan author), Leiber, Vance, HPL (Lovecraft, I presume), and Merritt.  Though Tolkien is present on the main list, his absence from this "direct influence" list is striking.

Appendix O: Encumbrance of Standard Items - A table of items and weights; why this isn't in the PHB equipment tables is beyond me.  

Appendix P: Random Parties - Basically, putting together quick PCs for impromptu games.

And we end with a Glossary and an Afterword.  The afterword seems oddly contradictory in that it proposes that the rules should not take precedence over the spirit of the game, yet admonishes the DM to keep a tight grip on the game, lest the players take control.

We also have, wonder of wonders, a combined Index for both the PHB and DMG.

Despite being haphazardly organized and sometimes condescending in tone, the 1st Edition DMG is rightfully a classic among gaming tomes.  I am thankful, however, that this not the edition I started with.  I don't know that I would have continued had I tried to muddle through the AD&D books as a young teenager.

Next up: S2: White Plume Mountain

P.S. - Phew, I finally finished the darn thing.


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## Prince Atom (Mar 26, 2015)

Yay!  Done with the DMG!  We won't have to do that again until Unearthed Arcana!


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## KirayaTiDrekan (Mar 26, 2015)

The Whiner Knight said:


> Yay!  Done with the DMG!  We won't have to do that again until Unearthed Arcana!




Well Deities & Demigods and Fiend Folio are coming up before that, but those won't be quite so strenuous.


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## Prince Atom (Mar 26, 2015)

You know, I used to think of the FF as "the book with all the stupid monsters" but it's grown on me.  Or maybe I got less uptight.

I'm gonna hit my players with a flailsnail one of these days, I promise.


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## KirayaTiDrekan (Mar 28, 2015)

*S2: White Plume Mountain *

Originally published August, 1979

Version being read and reviewed: Dungeons of Dread S1-4 (March 2013) by Lawrence Schick

Quick side note: I have revised the S1: Tomb of Horrors review to redirect the link to the Amazon product page for Dungeons of Dread instead of the now defunct official product page on the Wizards of the Coast website.

First things first - SPOILER ALERT!!!!

Still here?

Ok, here we go.

Before I crack open the book, a brief preface.  White Plume Mountain is one of those adventures I'd heard of, seen the name dozens of time in Dragon Magazine and internet discussions, but actually know almost nothing about.  I'd heard of Blackrazor as some sort of artifact weapon but didn't know it was connected to White Plume Mountain until a couple of years ago.  

The "S" series of "Special" adventures are all meant to stand alone, which means that this adventure being for levels 5-10 when S1 is for levels 10-14 makes sense, I suppose.  Still, that makes the Dungeons of Dread compilation an odd choice when a "path" of adventures like the GDQ series would have made for a more interesting book.

The illustration of White Plume Mountain itself by Erol Otus is meant to look like an in-game map of sorts, including notes about various landmarks and denizens.  There is a mention of Dragotha, the undead dragon, in the upper left corner.  The term dracolich hadn't been invented yet, but I believe Dragotha was the first of those now iconic beasties.

Already I vastly prefer the hook for getting PCs in to this adventure over just about every adventure I've read so far, with the possible exception of C1: Lost Shrine of Tamoachan.  Three powerful weapons have been stolen from the vaults of wealthy collectors and the PCs are hired to retrieve them.  

White Plume Mountain itself is apparently an active volcano, which a wizard named Keraptis turned in to his private sanctum 1300 years ago.  Why is it always wizards?  Even if there's a fighter around, he's basically a sidekick (Vecna and Kas, Burne and Rufus, Zelligar and Rogahn).  Apparently wizards in Greyhawk are destined for villainy and lichdom or some other form of immortality.

There are some brief DM notes of the usual sort, along with a note about where in Greyhawk White Plume Mountain is located (northeastern Shield Lands).  There's also some suggestions for filling out the dungeon with more levels, including a possible confrontation with Keraptis himself.  

The mountain itself is apparently not a volcano at all but a mountain version of Old Faithful...a geyser.  The cave entrance breaths...which is weird...and cool.  I think, when I run this, I will actually make it Old Faithful since my setting is Earth 11,000 years after a magical apocalypse.  Taking a quick look at the map before getting in to the room descriptions, the place is divided in roughly three sections, which is appropriate since the PCs are after three different weapons.

Notable rooms include...

Room 2 gives us our first riddle, told by a gynosphinx.

Room 4 has 9 silver globes...pinatas basically, with a variety of critters and treasure (some false, some real), and false keys (and one real key) to the door which slams shut behind the party.  One of the treasures is an uber-powerful ring and a bit of a gotcha item since it loses all of its power when it leaves the room.  I'm not entirely sure what the point is, here.

Room 5 gives us our second riddle, featuring five flesh golems.  I am not a fan of riddles but, thankfully, so far, these ones are easy.

Room 7 looks like something straight out of an old school Super Mario Bros game - platforms you have to jump on to get across the room - if you fall, you die.  This module is getting weirder and weirder.

Room 8 is the home of the first stolen weapon, Whelm, and its vampire guardian.  If I were playing through this adventure, I'd be sorely tempted to keep Whelm for myself.  That's a pretty nice hammer.

Room 11 is straight of a funhouse - a spinning cylinder room.  Did I mention this place is weird?

Rooms 12 and 13 are home to the dungeon's caretakers, a werewolf wizard and her fighter partner (recurring theme strikes again), apparently hired by and then magically compelled to stay by Keraptis.  Also, erotic tapestries?  Why are there always erotic tapestries?

Room 17 features the second weapon, Wave, and its guardian - a giant crab and a boiling steam filled magical water balloon.  Weird...right.  Anyway, Wave is also a nifty weapon that might end up in the keep pile instead of returned to its owner - a trident with a variety of powers, though its drawback is a bit more hefty than Whelm's - it pretty much hates and wants to kill anyone who doesn't worship Poseidon (or some other god of the sea).  Oh, did I mention these items are all intelligent?

Room 19 superheats all the metal on the party, including armor.  Not sure of the point of this room either.

Room 20...oh, that's the point, get the party out of their armor so the ghouls in this room can ambush them.  Fun.

Room 22 is a frictionless room with razor pits and an illusory wall and...what?  As the young'uns say, I can't even with this room.  We have gone from weird to bizarre.

Room 27 is the residence of Blackrazor and its guardian, an ogre mage that disguises itself as a halfling adventurer.  Blackrazor is cool, but thoroughly evil (it absorbs souls).  When I was a kid first starting to play D&D, I came up with an artifact called the Dagger of Souls which does almost the same thing as Blackrazor.  Nifty bit of parallel evolution.

The purpose of the theft finally becomes clear with the end note - apparently Keraptis was testing new recruits to replace his old minions and sends a pair of efreeti to forcibly round up the party for indoctrination.  Oooookay.

We have a new critter to play with, the Kelpie, who gets a brief MM style entry after the end note.  Yet another Siren imitator, only this one is a sentient, shapeshifting plant.

A brief history of Keraptis and his demented gnome servants and a hand-out version of Keraptis' "invitation" round out the module.

This adventure is just plain weird.  Not completely illogically so if one considers that Keraptis must be a total loon, but still, this is definitely not one of my favorites.

Next up: B2: The Keep on the Borderlands


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## KirayaTiDrekan (Mar 28, 2015)

One more quick note...

I have revised the entries for the OD&D set and supplements to link to the Amazon page for the Original Edition Premium Reprint boxed set instead of the now defunct official product page on the Wizards of the Coast website.


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## KirayaTiDrekan (Sep 26, 2016)

Quick note...

It seems my reviews for B2, C2, The Rogues Gallery, and S3 have been lost.  I just finished reading Q1 but it looks like I'll have to redo those reviews first (because, like a silly person, I didn't save the posts elsewhere).

Also, my family and I are currently homeless and staying with extended family in New Mexico so expect the delays to continue.


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## Ath-kethin (Sep 29, 2016)

Kiraya_TiDrekan said:


> [snip] my family and I are currently homeless and staying with extended family in New Mexico so expect the delays to continue.




Holy crap.  Much as I enjoy your reviews, take care of yourself.  I'm glad you (and yours) have someplace to stay, and I hope you can get whatever issues you have sorted out as quickly as possible.  We will all be here for your stuff when you have time to get it back to us.  No rush.


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## Prince Atom (Sep 30, 2016)

Yes, absolutely take all the time you need -- we'll be here when you get back.


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## KirayaTiDrekan (Feb 21, 2017)

Surprise!  I'm finally back.  After a couple of months being homeless, things are returning to normal, mostly thanks to the VA (Veterans Affairs - my wife and I both served in the United States military).

I am going to start off by going over past reviews and doing some edits and revisions with new reviews coming in a month or so starting with a new review of B2: Keep on the Borderlands.

As a bonus, however, I have added a brief review of Chainmail to the first post in this thread.  Enjoy!


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## KirayaTiDrekan (Feb 21, 2017)

I have added a Play-Through Review to Post #10, Book 3 of OD&D (though the play-through covers the entire three-volume set).


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## Ath-kethin (Mar 21, 2017)

Hey hey! Nice to have you back, and I'm glad things have taken a turn for the better for you.


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## KirayaTiDrekan (Mar 31, 2017)

A brief play-through review for Supplement I: Greyhawk has been added to Post #13.


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## KirayaTiDrekan (Nov 3, 2017)

Post 26 has been updated with a review of Swords & Spells.  Also...I'm back.


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## Hussar (Nov 3, 2017)

Glad to see you back.  Excellent stuff and I hope everything is groovy with you.


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## KirayaTiDrekan (Nov 5, 2017)

*B2: The Keep on the Borderlands* 

Originally published December, 1979

Version being read and reviewed: B2: The Keep on the Borderlands by Gary Gygax

First things first - SPOILER ALERT!!!!

Still here?

Ok, here we go.

The Keep on the Borderlands is arguably the most well known and most played adventure module of the 1980s since it was included in the Dungeons & Dragons Basic Set, replacing B1: In Search of the Unknown.  Does that make it a good adventure?  Kinda.

Being an introductory adventure, the module starts off with advice for beginning Dungeon Masters, including encouraging players to hire some men-at-arms at the Keep should there not be enough players (the module recommends 5-9).  Much of this introduction is quite familiar to veteran roleplayers, particularly older D&D players from the 80s.  There's nothing particularly new and exciting here, though it was certainly helpful at the time.  One item of interest - Gygax uses "he or she" and "his or her" in reference to the DM, more fully acknowledging the possibility of a woman DM than in previous works.  

The introduction to the setting and adventure is terribly generic, though that means it could fit pretty much any setting (at least until settings started getting more exotic in the 90s).  The Keep itself doesn’t even have a name.  Its just referred to as “The Keep.”  Likewise, the NPCs within are all unnamed. 

As with T1: The Village of Hommlet, the Keep is highly detailed (almost like a dungeon itself) and the residents are more experienced and wealthy than one would expect.  

There are four potential encounters in the wilderness between the Keep and the Caves of Chaos.  One might think that these would be placed here to help the PCs gain a bit of XP before tackling the Caves but they are all quite deadly.  

The Caves of Chaos are…odd.  Basically, a collection of low-level humanoid lairs in the same hill/cave complex.  Given that most of these critters are scavengers and raiders, you’d think they would have killed each other off or at least all become subservient to the strongest tribe in the area.  Its also quite possible for PCs to wander into a higher level area than they are ready for.  This happened to my group during the D&D Next playtest, resulting in two TPKs before we called it quits.

The various lairs include kobolds, 2 separate tribes of orcs, goblins, an ogre, hobgoblins, an owlbear, bugbears, a minotaur, gnolls, and a “shrine of evil chaos.”  Like the Keep, the shrine inhabitants are quite generic so could be adjusted by the DM to suit any particular evil cult they have in their campaign. 

The Caves of Chaos map is quite possibly the worst I have seen in any module thus far if only because it is nearly impossible to read.  The contour lines of the hills, the blue of the background, the superimposed brush on the upper hills…its all a confusing mess.

This seems like a rather difficult adventure for beginning players.  There’s also not much story behind the Keep and the Caves – just a home base and a series of monster lairs.  Keep on the Borderlands may be a classic but it hasn’t aged well.

A much better, fan-made version of the Caves of Chaos map done by Weem can be found here.

Sidenote: The original version of this review was lost during a EN World crash.  

Next up: C2: The Ghost Tower of Inverness


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## Ath-kethin (Nov 12, 2017)

I have attempted to run this module on multiple occasions and it (the module) has never survived intact. But then, I almost think that was its design goal.

Good to me you back at it! I hope this means all is well with you and your family.


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## KirayaTiDrekan (Nov 12, 2017)

Ath-kethin said:


> I have attempted to run this module on multiple occasions and it (the module) has never survived intact. But then, I almost think that was its design goal.
> 
> Good to me you back at it! I hope this means all is well with you and your family.




More or less.  I'll never work again (I'm disabled) but we're getting disability benefits from the VA, so things are good enough for me to start this back up again.


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## KirayaTiDrekan (Dec 31, 2017)

*C2: The Ghost Tower of Inverness* 

Originally published December, 1979

Version being read and reviewed: C2: The Ghost Tower of Inverness by Allen Hammack

First things first - SPOILER ALERT!!!!

Still here?

Ok, here we go.

Two things stand out about this module from the introduction alone - an explicit connection to the Greyhawk setting, specifically the Duchy of Urnst, and that this is the second "competition" module.  Look most of the early AD&D adventures, this was written for a convention and then published for a general audience later.  Like C1: The Hidden Shrine of Tamoachan, this adventure retains the scoring notes and other tournament-esque elements.  There the similarities between C1 and C2 end, however.

The Ghost Tower itself is the abandoned fortress of yet another mega-powerful wizard, this one named Galap-Dreidel.  The tower also houses yet another powerful artifact, the Soul Gem.  The adventure begins as the Seer of Urnst convinces the Duke to enlist a group of adventurers to retrieve the Soul Gem.  The seer, of course, seems a bit shady.  

I'll be honest, I really don't understand the point of competition style play.  Thus the tournament scoring section is a bit of an odd read for me.  I started in the era of story focused gaming when AD&D 2nd Edition and Vampire: The Masquerade were the shiny new things.  The scoring system is a bit subjective which seems to be defeat the purpose if a tournament has different DMs running the module.  One DM may reward creative problem solving more than another, for example.  It all seems a bit arbitrary and pointless.  

As with C1, the tournament version includes a special introduction for the pregenerated characters - they are all convicts (well, almost all) being pressed into service.  I kind of like it and it could be a way to bridge C1 and C2 and use the same characters since, in C1, the PCs were being tracked down by bounty hunters.  However, as with the G series of adventures, there is a hefty penalty for failure - not quite the death sentence of Against the Giants, but almost as bad (back to prison).  

The dungeon level is little more than a multi-part mcguffin quest to assemble a key to the actual tower.  The non-tournament rooms seem a touch more "funhouse dungeon" and inexplicably odd than the rest of the dungeon.  And there's a Chess themed room.  I suppose it wasn't overused back then but, from a modern perspective - ugh.  There's also a seemingly pointless time travel element when the party moves from the dungeon to the tower itself.

The tower has a loose elemental theme to its levels.  The transition from the fire level to the water level involves a reverse gravity effect and I had a pretty hard time wrapping my brain around it while reading it.  The entire water level is effectively upside down due to the gravity switcheroo.  Like the Chess themed room, elemental themes seem to be a touch overused in early D&D adventures.  

The Soul Gem itself is the "final boss" of the adventure as it sucks character's souls into it randomly until the characters can grab it and teleport back to Urnst and the Seer.    

The module is rounded out with a few visual aids, the pregen characters, a monster entry for the firebat, and the DM record sheet and scoring sheet.

Though not as bad as White Plume Mountain, the Ghost Tower is definitely a "funhouse" dungeon along the same theme - built by a mad wizard to house powerful artifacts.  I am definitely not a fan of this style of adventure.

Sidenote: The original version of this review was lost during a EN World crash.  

Next up: The Rogues Gallery


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## KirayaTiDrekan (Jan 15, 2018)

*The Rogues Gallery*

Originally published January 1980

Version being read and reviewed: The Rogues Gallery by Brian Blume with Dave Cook and Jean Wells

This is basically a big book of tables of NPCs of every class (AD&D 1st Edition specifically).  While interesting, the intro which explains the various abbreviations used in the tables notes that things like AC and to hit bonus don’t take into account magic items, or even Dex bonuses.  The magic items belonging to these NPCs are “purposely left sketchy and incomplete.”  The usefulness of these pregens is thus also sketchy.  I suppose they’re handy as starting points, but for something a DM needs right now in an encounter, there’s still far too much work to be done.  

The table for clerics in the PDF version I have is missing the brief introductory paragraph the other classes have, possibly due to a scanning error.  Each table uses a percentile roll except the bards table, which only uses a d20 (since bards are a pseudo-prestige class and are thus supposed to be quite rare).  There is also a table for multi-class characters.  

There are also tables for sages, o-level characters, caravans (which are heavily guarded - makes sense - I always wandered just how trade even exists when the wilderness between towns is often full of hostile critters), city guards (and watches and patrols), pilgrims, and bandits and buccaneers. 

We then get sections on a few monsters that are particularly complicated to run - couatl, ki-rin, shedu, liches, and NPC dungeon parties.  The dungeon parties are just a list of classes and specific magic items owned by individual members.  So, you have to go back to the previous tables if you want at least some of their combat stats.  Interestingly, the lower level parties have a few men-at-arms on hand while the higher level parties have henchmen and hirelings.  

Finally, there are individual descriptions of various personalities, aka the player characters of Gary Gygax and his various players.  A few of the names attached to various spells throughout D&D’s history can be found here.  Bigby (a reclusive, mostly retired 13th level magic-user), Mordenkainen (a 16th level magic-user and the highest level character in the book), and Tenser (a 14th level Lawful Good magic-user who loves combat).  The bard, Fletcher, reminds me of a bard NPC named Piper I created for my own campaigns - a scheming, inscrutable type who is always a couple of steps ahead of everyone else.  Grimslade, a Neutral magic-user, seems like the sort of character played by someone who just wants to be disruptive and contrary.   Most of these characters are Neutral at best, with several being outright evil.  One wonders what sort of campaigns these folks were playing.   

While useful for its time, this is one of those books that didn’t age well.

Sidenote: The original version of this review was lost during a EN World crash. 

Next up: S3: Expedition to the Barrier Peaks


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## Hussar (Jan 15, 2018)

On the point about alignment.

I wonder just how much the game was colored by the Gygax's players.  From the stories I've read, they were, well, right bastards in character.  Neutral to evil indeed.  I wonder, and I imagine there's no way to know, how much things like Paladins, and the rather stringent alignment descriptions, and class/alignment restrictions, that sort of thing was influenced by the group that was doing a large amount of the play testing.


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## Echohawk (Jan 16, 2018)

Kiraya_TiDrekan said:


> The table for clerics in the PDF version I have is missing the brief introductory paragraph the other classes have, possibly due to a scanning error.



It does indeed look like this is a scanning error. Here is the missing text:



			
				The Rogues Gallery said:
			
		

> Clerics are often sought out during the course of a campaign, for characters are always in need of healing and diving advice. Before allowing such services to be obtained, the DM should be familiar with those sections of the DUNGEON MASTERS GUIDE which involve clerics and their spells.
> 
> Clerics have several points of information unique to their class. These are spell level and spell failure. The number under spell level (SL) is the highest level spell that that particular cleric can cast. This is provided for quick reference, so the DM may easily see what spells the cleric is capable of using.
> 
> Spell failure (SF) lists the percentage chance that any spell cast by the cleric will fail to work. This only appears in a few of the listings as it is an attribute of low wisdom. Conversely, high wisdom clerics will receive bonus spells. The PLAYERS HANDBOOK details this and further information necessary about clerics and their spells.


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## KirayaTiDrekan (Mar 6, 2018)

*S3: Expedition to the Barrier Peaks* 

Originally published February, 1980

Version being read and reviewed: S3: Expedition to the Barrier Peaks by Gary Gygax

First things first - SPOILER ALERT!!!!

Still here?

Ok, here we go.

EN World ate the lengthy review I had typed up so - short and sweet.

Expedition to the Barrier Peaks is the culmination of the sci-fi hintings and cameos that appeared in various D&D products since its inception.  There would be a few flirtations with the premise later on, but this adventure seems to be the most concentrated dose, so to speak. 

The crashed spaceship that features in this adventure is actually a single section of a larger colony ship that was separated to quarantine a deadly plague.  The adventure suggests that the ship-section entered the reality of Greyhawk via a black hole from an alternate reality.  There is also a section of a spaceship featured in a couple of Mystara (D&D Known World) products, most prominently in Wrath of the Immortals.  I like to think they are parts of the same ship.  

Given the general recreational nature of most areas, this section of the ship would seem to be rec-room of the larger vessel, so to speak.  Gymnasium, swimming pool, theater, arcade, cafeterias, lounges, and a botanical garden and aquarium.  The garden, however, is now the deadliest area of the ship.  Its a veritable death trap and it would surprise if any party managed to get out of there without losing at least one player character.

The technology in this adventure has a very Lost in Space/Star Trek feel to it, from the dials and buttons on the control panels to the designs of the robots (the police robots remind me of the robot in Lost in Space).  If I were running the adventure today, I would update the tech to modern sci-fi sensibilities.  

Several new monsters appear in this adventure, including the vegepygmy, which appears to originate with this module, their origins being from irradiated plants in the botanical garden.  Most of the critters are noted as having been captured during the ship's voyage, implying that the reality this ship comes from also has intellect devourers, mind flayers, shedu, and couatls.  

Some parts of this adventure are written with tongue firmly in cheek but I think it could also work as a horror-tinged sci-fi adventure - the player characters stumbling across it drifting through space and board it to investigate.  One of the issues with this adventure is the paradox of futuristic and modern items being familiar to the players but not their characters.  My solution when the situation arises is just to tell the players what the item is and let them sort out how their character reacts to it. 

The preface notes that this adventure traces its origins to Metamorphosis Alpha, one of the first sci-fi RPGs to hit the market and that the adventure served as a means of introducing D&D players to sci-fi roleplaying and adventuring.  S3 hasn't aged well as sci-fi continually advances and the spaceship feels like the setting of a B-movie.  

Sidenote: The original version of this review was lost during a EN World crash.  

Next up: The World of Greyhawk Folio


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## KirayaTiDrekan (Mar 6, 2018)

*The World of Greyhawk (Folio)*

Originally published May, 1980

Version being read and reviewed: The World of Greyhawk by Gary Gygax

This is one of those products that I didn't think we'd ever see in PDF.  But, lo and behold, it popped up today, so, here I am, writing this review.  This is the first true setting product for D&D, with all prior products up to this point being core rulebooks, supplements, and adventures.  It would be followed by Dragonlance in 1984, though that line presented its setting material within the pages of its adventures, at least early on, and then the Forgotten Realms in 1987, which would become D&D's signature setting, for better or worse. 

The foreword by Allen Hammack notes that Greyhawk is the primordial D&D setting.  Interestingly, he makes no note of Blackmoor, despite that setting possibly pre-dating Greyhawk.  Also of note in the foreword is mention of Quag Keep, a novel by Andre Norton that features the Greyhawk setting.  That novel also, I believe, introduced the trope of fantasy gamers being drawn into the world of the game, a trope that would be used again several times in novels like The Sleeping Dragon by Joel Rosenberg.  I tried to read Quag Keep but it was...well, not good, and I didn't get past the first chapter. 

The book goes right into population size rather than having any sort of intro.  And that section also manages to make me twitch as it talks about "males fit to bear arms" and "males in prime condition" and "men-at-arms."  If you have stuck with me this long, you know gender representation is a big deal for me.  I realize this is a product of its time and Mr. Gygax was from a different era but, as noted in previous reviews, he was also aware enough of gender issues to comment about them, somewhat inappropriately, in some books.  

The actual text is meant to be read as if it were written by a character in the world but Gygax's writing style and tone still shine through.  His style, however, has the flair of a fantasy scholar, even when he's writing something like the DMG.  The planetary arrangements as briefly discussed in the note on astrology would end up being taken literally when Spelljammer came along, giving the Greyhawk world a geo-centric solar system.

The present day of the setting is given as 576 CY (Current Year).  The timeline would advance a few times as D&D editions rolled out.  I believe the last official date for the setting was 591 in 3rd Edition's Living Greyhawk Gazetteer.  Someone correct me on that if there's a later source that advances the timeline after that. 

There is an assumption in the text that the reader will be consulting the included map while reading to provide context for locations and such.  Since I'm reading the PDF, this proves a bit difficult.  While four distinct human cultures are noted as having settled in the Flanaess (the actual area of the world detailed in the book), very little is mentioned of who these people were except that the Suloise were mainly evil folk.  

Greyhawk's history seems similar to Europe's up to the late Middle Ages or so, at least in broad brush strokes.  The so-called Great Kingdom is at the center of most of the history, first conquering a large amount of territory and then splintering into various independent nations.  The present state of the world is one in which evil is on the upswing, with a corrupt lineage ruling the Great Kingdom.  Iuz, who I remember from a large variety of sources, is also at large, ruling a nation.  Greyhawk's history seems to be dominated by humans.  Demi-humans are noted only in how they react to their human neighbors.  The Battle of Emridy Meadows gets specific mention, having previously been noted in T1: The Village of Hommlet.  

After a brief section on languages (I rather like the explanation of the Common tongue's origins), we finally get into the gazetteer, with each nation or territory getting a paragraph or two.  Each entry notes the nation's ruler (including class and level and the title they are addressed with), capital city, population, the frequency of demi-humans and humanoids, and the nation's primary resources.  Each nation's military forces get special attention in the nations' descriptions.  Blackmoor is listed as a small "little known territory" the ruler of which is addressed as "His Luminous Preponderancy."  I think maybe some of the animosity between Gygax and Arneson that would become infamous in the early 80s is being expressed here.  While most entries have some history and notes on military forces, there is little to nothing said about the culture, religious practices, character of the people, or other "fluffy" details.  The only two nations have a woman as head of state - the elven land of Celene and the County of Urnst.  The City of Greyhawk gets one of the larger entries, though the reader is directed to the upcoming City of Greyhawk product for more details...which didn't hit store shelves until 1989 under the AD&D 2nd Edition banner.  Most of the rulers are in the 12-18 level range - something I always wonder about is how hereditary rulers get to be such high levels.  They don't adventure, per se, so where are they getting XP from? There are three different nations named Ulek which has always confused the heck out of me.  One of the Uleks is mostly human (County), one is mostly elven (Duchy), and one is mostly dwarven (Principality).  There are also two nations named Urnst (County and Duchy).

After this, we have a section on geographical features - mountain ranges, forests, swamps, etc. There aren't many surprises here and the information is mostly dry.  There are plenty of adventure hooks to be had in most of these descriptions.  This section is oddly organized - alphabetical, but with the more minor features organized into sub-headers.  Several locales from published adventures are noted in the entries.  The Invoked Devastation is mentioned several times throughout the book, this section in particular, but never gives a clear idea of what it was, other than a massively catastrophic event.  

A section on honorifics and knighthoods is next, followed by a glossary of runes and glyphs.  The book ends with a small set of credits and an advertisement for Gen Con.  In the PDF, twenty pages of maps round out the page count.  I don't know if these were poster-maps are folio pages or what in the physical product. 

The human-centric philosophy espoused in the AD&D rulebooks is on full display in this book as demi-humans are scattered across the Flanaess with only a couple of actual nations.  This is in stark contrast to Dragonlance and the Forgotten Realms, both of which have several notable nations of elves, dwarves, gnomes, and halflings (or kender in the case of Dragonlance).  

I enjoy reading setting books more than any other type of RPG product.  This iteration of Greyhawk was the prototype, so to speak, and is thus, by comparison, a bit bland and lacking in detail.  But, it still has some fun adventure hooks here and there.  


Next up: Q1: Queen of the Demonweb Pits


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## KirayaTiDrekan (Mar 14, 2018)

The previous post has been updated with a review of The World of Greyhawk (Folio).


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## KirayaTiDrekan (Mar 17, 2018)

Next ten reviews will be...

Q1: Queen of the Demonweb Pits
Deities & Demigods
A1: Slave Pits of the Undercity
Dungeons & Dragons Basic Set (1981)
Dungeons & Dragons Expert Set (1981)
X1: The Isle of Dread
A2: Secrets of the Slavers' Stockade
A3: Assault on the Aerie of the Slave Lords
A4: In the Dungeons of the Slave Lords
B3: Palace of the Silver Princess


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## pemerton (Mar 19, 2018)

Kiraya_TiDrekan said:


> In the PDF, twenty pages of maps round out the page count.  I don't know if these were poster-maps are folio pages or what in the physical product.



The physical product came with two big maps - the City of GH is very close to the right edge of the left map, while (from memory) most of Urnst (and maybe the Bright Desert also - I haven't got my maps ready to hand) is on the left side of the right map.

Greyhawk is the only published setting that I regularly use, although I tend to use the maps and the basic tropes and outline of history rather than all the minutiae.


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## KirayaTiDrekan (Jun 17, 2018)

This has been an entertaining and educational road, but I need to set it aside so I can concentrate on actually playing while dealing with the vagaries of real life.  

May the dice be kind and may your adventures be epic.


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