# D&D 3.5 - Looking for good non-dungeoncrawling adventures



## MjTot (May 6, 2010)

Hi! I recently returned to DMing D&D 3.5, and I'm running/partially using pre-made adventures for the first time. Thing is, I was never really fond of dungeon crawling, so I'm having a hard time finding good adventures that do not focus on that type of gameplay.

So, I thought I could ask you guys, what are your favorite, non-dungeoncrawling, official adventures? (either web-based, dungeon magazine or modules).

PC level is not an issue, nor setting.

Thanks in advance!


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## meomwt (May 6, 2010)

There are lots of free adventures available in the WotC Third Edition Archive, some will be dungeon crawls, but I think that quite a few are not. They are all PDF files which can be freely downloaded. 

If you can poke around the Wizards' Archive, there's a set of sites called _Vicious Venues_ which are plug-and-play places of interest (some with enemies) to add to your adventures. 

ENWorld's massive Campaign Saga _War of the Burning Sky_ rarely has dungeon crawls in it: from memory, the first "dungeon" doesn't show up until about the fifth or sixth adventure. I've only managed to DM parts of the first adventure, but that's a doozie (escaping a besieged city surrounded by an enemy army and its contingent of mage-killing clerics).


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## Mark (May 6, 2010)

This will help - 

http://www.enworld.org/forum/general-rpg-discussion/154448-free-adventure-path.html

And some have enjoyed this -

(Low-level Adventure) The Whispering Woodwind - Creative Mountain Games | EN World PDF Store


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## Nightson (May 6, 2010)

Chimes at Midnight - Dungeon #133  It even has a sequel


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## Crothian (May 6, 2010)

Freeport TRilogy.  It has some underground adventureing but nothing complex.


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## Grymar (May 6, 2010)

Nightson said:


> Chimes at Midnight - Dungeon #133  It even has a sequel




THIS.

It is an incredible urban adventure.


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## Gilladian (May 6, 2010)

I second the Vicious Venues recommendation. Good stuff there.

If you really want good urban adventures with only a smattering of dungeons, you might try buying some of the Ptolus PDF chapters. All of them have LOTS of adventure tidbits. Many do tie in to the dungeons below Ptolus, but they are easy to limit.


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## olshanski (May 6, 2010)

Vault of Larin Karr by Necromancer Games:

This is a mini-campaign... it has 1 small dungeon crawl, but the majority of it is wilderness and town adventures.  It is very highly rated and one of the best adventures around.  It may have been written for 3.0 instead of 3.5, though.
It has great NPCs... lots of plots.... lots of things for the party to get involved with.


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## Remathilis (May 6, 2010)

Cage of Delirium by Goodman Games; the most non-dungeon dungeon crawl you'll ever go on.

Make sure to get the Midnight Syndicate CD that aligns with the module.


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## Aberzanzorax (May 6, 2010)

Is non official, but free ok?


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## amethal (May 6, 2010)

Paizo's module River into Darkness doesn't really have any dungeons in it, just a trip up a river inspired by Heart of Darkness / Apocalypse Now.

Its a great adventure (and is for D&D 3.5, not Pathfinder, if that matters)


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## Maggan (May 6, 2010)

I'm quite fond of [ame="http://www.amazon.com/Last-Dance-Penumbra-D20/dp/1589780078/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1273158989&sr=1-1"]The Last Dance[/ame].

/M


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## Jeff Wilder (May 6, 2010)

Nightson said:


> Chimes at Midnight - Dungeon #133  It even has a sequel



This is one of my favorite adventures from _Dungeon_.  It is kinda Eberron-specific, though.

(BTW, it actually has two sequels.  "Quoth the Raven," in 150, and "Hell's Heart," in one of the later online issues.)

Oh, there's also "Murder in Oakbridge," another excellent Eberron-specific murder mystery from _Dungeon_.



Maggan said:


> I'm quite fond of [_The Last Dance_.



I'll second this, and add another Penumbra adventure: _Maiden Voyage_.  This was my first 3E adventure (the voyage was to Freeport, at which time I ran that trilogy), and after looking it over again recently, it holds up very well.


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## olshanski (May 6, 2010)

I also liked the Last Dance, and it is certainly not a dungeon crawl, but it is also pretty much not a normal adventure at all, it is more like a single grand puzzle.  I did play it and my group had fun, but it was not a standard gaming session.


Here are some review of the Vault of Larin Karr:

It seems that every NPC has some secret involvement with another NPC (and there're about 50 NPCs)

The Vault of Larin Karr describes a standard fantasy valley. It has three villages, a large forest, a hill area, a complex underground system and many dungeons and places to explore. There is no linear plot. The characters will be hired to clean a hobgoblin keep and their final destination is the Vault itself, but the Valley is a place full of life, and there are many events happening at almost all times. It's the players' choice to get involved or not.


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## Stormonu (May 6, 2010)

MjTot said:


> So, I thought I could ask you guys, what are your favorite, non-dungeoncrawling, official adventures? (either web-based, dungeon magazine or modules).




How set are you on the adventures being "official'?

I'd like to recommend _Three Days to Kill _by Penumbra and _The Whispering Cairn _by WotC.


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## Marx420 (May 6, 2010)

I really enjoyed the module by skirmisher press, tests of skill. In addition to having a variety of tasty overland encounters and smaller scale dungeons the added mechanics which tie into their other product experts 3.5 (which fleshes out the expert npc class and skill system) were really solid. Though it has no cohesive story you could gut it for tight encounters and run a nice homebrew levels 1-4 with encounters that are downright lethal if not approached with thought and imagination.


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## threshel (May 6, 2010)

Red Hand of Doom.

It has hardly any dungeon crawls in it.  It's one of the best event-driven modules I've ever run.  My group is loving it.

As a bonus, all of the monsters and villains in it are based on released D&D miniatures, so if you have a collection (and I do!) it's a blast to lay out figures and say, "that's what you see!"  Great stuff!


J


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## MjTot (May 7, 2010)

Great suggestions everyone, I'm already looking at several of them.

I concur with Chimes at Midnight, but I already played it with this group. Same goes for Red Hand of Doom.



Stormonu said:


> How set are you on the adventures being "official'?
> 
> I'd like to recommend _Three Days to Kill _by Penumbra and _The Whispering Cairn _by WotC.




I might have expressed myself incorrectly. I do not care if the adventures are official or not, but I'd prefer adventures published by professional publishers, not fan-made.


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## Morrus (May 7, 2010)

MjTot said:


> I might have expressed myself incorrectly. I do not care if the adventures are official or not, but I'd prefer adventures published by professional publishers, not fan-made.




Well, I'm biased, but our War of the Burning Sky series has a tagline of "_Not a dungeon crawl_".  There's barely a single dungeon to be found in all 12 adventures, and those that are there are small.


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## pemerton (May 7, 2010)

MjTot said:


> I do not care if the adventures are official or not, but I'd prefer adventures published by professional publishers, not fan-made.



In that case, I'd say some of the other Penumbra adventures might be worth looking at - Maiden Voyage, Three Days to Kill and Last Dance have already been mentioned, but Hallowed Halls, In the Belly of the Beast, The Ebon Mirror and the one with the lake and the time motif (can't remember the name of it) also have got interesting, dungeon-crawl-free ideas.

There is also What Evil Lurks, from Necromancer, which is a bit more traditional in feel than the Penumbra modules but still not a dungeon crawl.


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## Allenchan (May 7, 2010)

I'll toss in The Prince of Redhand. Fairly specific to the greater context of the Adventure Path, but awesome for being a high(er) level, non-dungeon adventure. Great for mining ideas, imo.


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## Mark (May 7, 2010)

Morrus said:


> Well, I'm biased, but our War of the Burning Sky series has a tagline of "_Not a dungeon crawl_".  There's barely a single dungeon to be found in all 12 adventures, and those that are there are small.





That's still available as a free perk to new Community Supporters, yes?


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## haakon1 (May 8, 2010)

Three Days to Kill is fun, and quite short.  I used it as an intro module for my latest group.

The Tower of the Last Baron (Paizo) and The Stone Circle (WOTC) are also excellent (IMHO) non-dungeon modules.

Last Baron is about preventing a war by sabotaging/taking out a rebel noble.  So far, my players have taken it as an elaborate role-playing challenge, and are trying to negotiate with the baron right now (in my email campaign).

The Stone Circle takes place mostly in a village and the surrounding forest, with one lightly populated dungeon (with a memorably interesting "boss monster").


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## Remathilis (May 8, 2010)

haakon1 said:


> The Stone Circle (WOTC)
> 
> The Stone Circle takes place mostly in a village and the surrounding forest, with one lightly populated dungeon (with a memorably interesting "boss monster").




Methinks you mean [ame="http://www.amazon.com/Standing-Stone-Adventure-7th-Level-Characters/dp/0786918381%3FSubscriptionId%3DAKIAJ3AR2O7JYNGTEXWQ%26tag%3D20-malltownusa2-20%26linkCode%3Dxm2%26camp%3D2025%26creative%3D165953%26creativeASIN%3D0786918381"]The Standing Stone[/ame], Yes?


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## Maggan (May 8, 2010)

olshanski said:


> I also liked the Last Dance, and it is certainly not a dungeon crawl, but it is also pretty much not a normal adventure at all, it is more like a single grand puzzle.  I did play it and my group had fun, but it was not a standard gaming session.




Well, yes I agree but I didn't read the OP as asking for normal non-dungeon crawling adventures, just non-dungeon crawling adventures.

Adding to my recommendation, I think the OP should take a look at The Witchfire Trilogy. It's three connected adventures in the Iron Kingdoms setting, with a lot of outdoor action, evocative plot and story and some dungeons added to the mix. A bit heavy on the metaplot and at time railroading like mad, but I found it to be very good.

/M


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## haakon1 (May 12, 2010)

Remathilis said:


> Methinks you mean The Standing Stone, Yes?




Correct, sir.


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## olshanski (May 12, 2010)

I thought that "the standing stone" was solidly "meh"... A ghost paladin that attacks the players for no real reason?  I think this adventure had a number of problems.

I am probably in the minority but I didn't like either "Tide of Years" (the one with the lake and time motif) nor "Belly of the Beast" by Penumbra/Atlas.


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## pemerton (May 17, 2010)

olshanski said:


> II am probably in the minority but I didn't like either "Tide of Years" (the one with the lake and time motif) nor "Belly of the Beast" by Penumbra/Atlas.



Are you able to say a bit more about this?


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## Dark Mistress (May 17, 2010)

In addition to those listed I would suggest the Urban Adventures by 0one games as well. There is currently 6 in the series and they all take place inside of a city. There is some dungeon crawl involved but not a lot in the couple I have.


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## Beginning of the End (May 17, 2010)

_Maiden Voyage_ and _In the Belly of the Beast_ from Atlas Games are both roleplaying-intense scenarios that I highly recommend.


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## Jhaelen (May 17, 2010)

olshanski said:


> I thought that "the standing stone" was solidly "meh"... A ghost paladin that attacks the players for no real reason?  I think this adventure had a number of problems.



Well, yes, as written it is a bit meh. Still, our group had quite a bit of fun playing it (although I did make quite a few changes). I think it has a really neat story.



olshanski said:


> I am probably in the minority but I didn't like either "Tide of Years" (the one with the lake and time motif) nor "Belly of the Beast" by Penumbra/Atlas.



Both adventures are a bit out there. 
I really wanted to like the former, but I found it wasn't really well executed. The idea it was based on was nice. What stopped me from running it were the consequences of solving the adventure...

The latter reads really cool if you can get behind the idea of entering the 'belly of a beast'. It requires a good DM with improvisational skills, though. Like the former it's not such a good fit for a 'standard' D&D game, though.


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## haakon1 (May 24, 2010)

olshanski said:


> I thought that "the standing stone" was solidly "meh"... A ghost paladin that attacks the players for no real reason?  I think this adventure had a number of problems.




I went through it twice, as a player and then as a DM with a different group.  I found it great both times.

It's all about atmosphere, and solving a mystery.  It's low on combat, but the combat there is tends to be very memorable -- the attack on the PC's night encampment, the little ambushes, meeting the ancient warlord, fighting the shadows in an ancient cairn -- awesomely atmospheric stuff, if you're going for classic European/Celtic motifs.

Of all the adventures I've taken my players through, this among the top ones that gets talked about.

It may depend on what the players like, and how much the DM works with the material to bring it alive.


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