tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7487871339000666216.post3483412040959941007..comments2024-03-28T06:20:47.668-04:00Comments on GROGNARDIA: I'm CuriousJames Maliszewskihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00341941102398271464noreply@blogger.comBlogger67125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7487871339000666216.post-363393920114095072011-12-15T07:48:10.836-05:002011-12-15T07:48:10.836-05:00"City of Skulls" is phenomenal and, to m..."City of Skulls" is phenomenal and, to my mind, a better work by Sargent than Night Below.<br /><br />"Ruins of Undermountain" is also quite excellent.R Parkerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/18411907126909551409noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7487871339000666216.post-61093165437228734912009-08-05T11:58:42.988-04:002009-08-05T11:58:42.988-04:00My friends played through D&D as teenagers at ...My friends played through D&D as teenagers at the time, mostly playing Ravenloft modules. <br /><br />Dungeon #70, "Kingdom of the Ghouls," by Wolfgang Baur, is the one adventure from that time that I wish to have played or run.Panglotthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07811340779409286134noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7487871339000666216.post-81916607325125022962009-08-05T02:22:10.754-04:002009-08-05T02:22:10.754-04:00The Haunted Halls of Eveningstar and Doom of Dagge...The Haunted Halls of Eveningstar and Doom of Daggerdale were very good as was LC3 Nightwatch In the Living City. The Shattered Circle was also pretty good. Anything with undermountain in the name was good and Return to the Tomb of Horrors was pretty neat too.Steamtunnelhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02597332921872904036noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7487871339000666216.post-77994804491669427182009-08-04T22:21:05.921-04:002009-08-04T22:21:05.921-04:00First time poster, not long-time reader.
I'm ...First time poster, not long-time reader.<br /><br />I'm feeling compelled to answer this, but I cannot give a specific answer.<br /><br />The 2e era is possibly the one in which I played and DM'ed the most D&D, yet I have very few modules from that time. Why? Because that was when I had the most time and creativity to "roll my own." It was when I ran Ravenloft's Gothic Earth, fell in love with Birthright; and ran other systems like Twilight:2000 and Space:1889.<br /><br />Since 3e and 3.5, I have become a parent and watched my gaming and prep time dwindle away. (My time to peruse the Web for various gaming blogs has gone up, though.) About 5 years ago, I read through a friend's near-complete Dungeon magazine collection, and bought about half of them from him, the ones that had adventures I thought I could chop up and squeeze into one or more campaigns.<br /><br />So, to close this ramble, I remain a fan of 2e and its Dungeon collection, and intend to run with those parts in the future.<br /><br />As an aside, your blog and some similar ones are encouraging my desire to introduce my sons to 1e or 2e AD&D, rather than the 3.5 my adult group has been playing. It has seemed like something easier to teach and grasp. Time will tell if I am right.Leehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13103472744612438430noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7487871339000666216.post-27426541396828822322009-08-04T14:10:55.976-04:002009-08-04T14:10:55.976-04:00In addition to the adventures mentioned, all of wh...In addition to the adventures mentioned, all of which are excellent, I think Die, Vecna, Die! might be my favorite way to end a campaign ever.Rachel Ghoulhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04765944479141792643noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7487871339000666216.post-8804468555330204182009-08-04T13:28:32.464-04:002009-08-04T13:28:32.464-04:00JD:
Nope. The first three were set in a generic ...JD:<br /><br />Nope. The first three were set in a generic world. The last one was retrofit into the Forgotten Realms. However, all were made for 1e. H4 came out in 1988. 2e didn't come out until 1989.<br /><br />Here's the cover of H4:<br />http://home.flash.net/~brenfrow/fr/h4.htm<br /><br />Here's the cover of FRE1 Shadowdale (one of the first, if not the first, 2e adventure produced):<br />http://home.flash.net/~brenfrow/fr/h4.htm<br /><br />Notice the difference in logos and the "compatible with" star burst on FRE1.<br /><br />Other good examples:<br />1e FRC1: http://home.flash.net/~brenfrow/fr/frc1.htm<br />2e FRC2: http://home.flash.net/~brenfrow/fr/frc2.htm<br /><br />1e WG7: http://home.flash.net/~brenfrow/gh/gh-wg7.htm<br />2e WG8: http://home.flash.net/~brenfrow/gh/gh-wg8.htm<br /><br />Funny side note: A pretty good portion of adventures and source books produced in 1989 had been in the can for a while and were actually more compatible with 1e than 2e (to the extent that there are compatibility issues) despite the 2e logo.Chris Tichenorhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11866673632888599928noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7487871339000666216.post-48286385334981072882009-08-04T12:06:28.512-04:002009-08-04T12:06:28.512-04:00For purely nostalgia's sake:
- Vecna Lives! (...For purely nostalgia's sake:<br /><br />- Vecna Lives! ('90)<br />- Greyhawk Ruins ('90)<br />- A Paladin in Hell ('98)<br /><br />Also worth noting, one of my all time favorite supplements by Carl Sargent: Iuz the Evil (1993)<br /><br />That said, looking over my list of books, it is a long list with few standouts.<br /><br />~DUnknownhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08891749689592806812noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7487871339000666216.post-70024318688426213802009-08-04T10:51:22.180-04:002009-08-04T10:51:22.180-04:00"A previous poster mentioned the Bloodstone s..."A previous poster mentioned the Bloodstone series. That was 1e."<br /><br />The first 2 in the series were 1e, H3 and H4 were coverted to 2E play and H4 was the first to carry the AD&D moniker of the new Forgotten Realms.<br /><br />So yes, 1/2 the foursome is 1e, the other half is 2e.<br /><br /><br />As for Night below being poorly written. Yes, parts of it are clunky and not that well done. I felt like the author was getting paid per word for most of it and just tossing stuff in there to make Book 2 meaty. Book 1 and 3 are fantastic. The hand outs are very well done and you get a good feel that you are part of an epic journey from the top of the world to it's very rotten core. <br /><br />I used it as a toolkit and a guide. I kept the plot the same but changed the order and layout. Had to as the Party was getting bored running through it. Changes here and there and they were gung ho to obliterate some aboleth.<br /><br /><br />Dungeon Magazines are the unsung hero here and a treasure trove of adventures. So many wonderful things came from there. I must go through them and see if I can use them instead of buying more adventures for my upcoming city game.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7487871339000666216.post-83279475843849998982009-08-04T09:50:31.036-04:002009-08-04T09:50:31.036-04:00I guess I really must take a closer look at my Und...I guess I really must take a closer look at my Undermountain box!<br /><br />How many non-worldspecific adventures did TSR publish during the 2nd ed era anyway? <br /><br />I remember a few good adventures for Planescape, but I can't remember any names.AndreasDavourhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17170806742393291962noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7487871339000666216.post-70605855348683311462009-08-04T08:39:33.182-04:002009-08-04T08:39:33.182-04:00Check out Citadel of the Sea in Dragon magazine is...Check out Citadel of the Sea in Dragon magazine issue 78 - we all had a blast playing this one through and it almost span off into a campaign.Pete Kinghttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03438651595079082035noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7487871339000666216.post-38364625867027973682009-08-04T04:36:36.866-04:002009-08-04T04:36:36.866-04:00I came to AD&D 2e after Mentzer D&D, so I ...I came to AD&D 2e after Mentzer D&D, so I completely missed all the 1e modules until recently. I must say I have never been a huge lover of modules, though I always found the ones in Dungeon magazine well-worth using.<br />I will also second the vote for Night of the Walking Dead, a wonderfully creepy Ravenloft adventure that I have used time and again. Actually, the only setting for which I own all the modules/sourcebooks is Ravenloft, which I used as a "drop in" setting to link various campaigns (my preferred ones being Dragonlance and Greyhawk). I also enjoyed Birthright, though the modules produced for it were not exceptional.Antoniohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17258180992723371727noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7487871339000666216.post-10098771682040958762009-08-04T04:20:58.805-04:002009-08-04T04:20:58.805-04:00From official TSR? The Ruins of Undermountain - th...From official TSR? <b>The Ruins of Undermountain</b> - that is, the first boxed set <i>only</i> - had a ring of authenticity to it that almost no other TSR product did at the time... some people have a problem with the succession of empty rooms, but it was a good opportunity to create your own stuff there - I had an area with a home base operated by hostile adventurers, a gambling hall, hidden temples and so on. It was also surprisingly non-linear in its approach for its time; way, way after the game got hickmanised.<br /><br />Beyond that? Nothing. Literally: nothing. Every other TSR module I owned was vacuous nothing (and the late boxed sets such as <b>Return to the Tomb of Horrors</b> were not much better). The only good and steady source of adventures was Dungeon Magazine, where <b>Asflag's Unintentional Emporium</b>, <b>Deadly Treasure</b>, the linear but creative <b>Moving Day</b> (where you had to take a barge full of exotic monsters such as cockatrices up a river), <b>Granite Mountain Prison</b>, <b>N'Bod's Room</b> and <b>Lady of the Mists</b>... <br /><br />I don't think most of these hold a candle to the real TSR classics, but at least they were playable, and designed by people who actually played games instead of simply designing them. Asflag's and Deadly Treasure stand out as modules which have aged very well IMHO. It is also interesting that some time after I started buying Dungeon (although not regularly; it was too expensive for that), the quality took a nosedive; somewhere around issue #50 or something. After that, there was nothing that inspired me, and I stopped buying.Melanhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07165894144553629675noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7487871339000666216.post-36020472546608692922009-08-04T01:07:43.888-04:002009-08-04T01:07:43.888-04:00I don't think you need to give it the benefit ...I don't think you need to give it the benefit of the doubt, JB. The point is that there were a number of widely-admired adventures, many of them in the same 'adventure/location/idea that can be reasonably dropped into any campaign world' that the best 1e modules had. They just came from a different source: submissions to a magazine rather than separately published modules. Some Dungeon adventures were setting-specific, but many (most, I think) were not. Dismissing the adventures because they weren't published as modules would be silly.Jonathonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12424548045152722964noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7487871339000666216.post-57864209852011361112009-08-03T23:55:42.782-04:002009-08-03T23:55:42.782-04:00I think it's a pretty big "strike" t...I think it's a pretty big "strike" that most of the fondly remembered adventures posted here are from Dungeon magazine. That would seem to say to me that the answer to JM's original question: were there any "universally lauded" adventure MODULES is "no."<br /><br />I would guess this has a lot to do with the multitude of settings available for 2E. People picked their poison and played things that fit it.<br /><br />1st edition had no shared campaign worlds, save perhaps Greyhawk, so the adventure modules were what were shared.<br /><br />I'm very much an "anti-fan" of 2E so I'm trying to give it the benefit of the doubt here rather than just saying all their modules sucked.JBhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08532311924539491087noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7487871339000666216.post-28217295869827935622009-08-03T23:43:48.317-04:002009-08-03T23:43:48.317-04:00"Not to be a wet blanket or anything, but am ..."Not to be a wet blanket or anything, but am I the only one who thinks those are strikes *against* it?"<br /><br />Not alone.Deltahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00705402326320853684noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7487871339000666216.post-26038247727881474102009-08-03T22:08:42.213-04:002009-08-03T22:08:42.213-04:00Just about everything in Dungeon. And I loved &qu...Just about everything in Dungeon. And I loved "Night Below" (several of those dungeon adventures were add-ons for it) and liked "Gates of Firestorm Peak."Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7487871339000666216.post-78173220204546435452009-08-03T21:56:53.181-04:002009-08-03T21:56:53.181-04:00As a throwback to the "killer dungeons" ...As a throwback to the "killer dungeons" of <i>First Edition,</i> I always enjoyed Monte Cook's <b><i>Labyrinth of Madness.</i></b> I consider it to be the <b><i>Tomb of Horrors</i></b> of <i>Second Edition</i> (although it's quite unplayable without errata).<br /><br />I'll second the <b><i>Dragon Mountain</i></b> love, although it took a number of years for me to "get it."<br /><br />I love how beautiful some of the boxed adventures were during this era, but I never got a chance to play most of them.<br /><br />I'm omitting all adventures tied to settings, since they seem outside the realm of this discussion. Still, many of those adventures were excellent (in my opinion).Steven Marshhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06600178337262614567noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7487871339000666216.post-86821074438698581112009-08-03T21:56:00.607-04:002009-08-03T21:56:00.607-04:00I stopped playing D&D not long after 2e came o...I stopped playing D&D not long after 2e came out, and on the odd occasion when I did play, it was usually using the 2e rulebooks with 1e adventures. I didn't purchase much from the 2e era outside of setting material, but over years I have picked up used copies of adventures for a variety of reasons, usually based on reputation, author, or specific setting material I wanted to have access to. <br /><br />So, with that in mind, the ones that come to mind for me are Gates of Firestorm Peak, Dead Gods, and Night Below. Never played them, but found them to be very enjoyable reads, and those are the 3 I'd choose from if I was to run a 2e adventure today.Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06915410231396312718noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7487871339000666216.post-42221360672782813692009-08-03T21:39:57.293-04:002009-08-03T21:39:57.293-04:00I liked Dungeon #26 or #28-- Nine-tenths of the la...I liked Dungeon #26 or #28-- Nine-tenths of the law: lycanthropy + magic jar.<br /><br />But the few modules I bought back then were second-hand. No matter how good any later module might have been, having enough money (i.e. being employed part-time) to buy all the titles I'd drooled over as a kid was too awesome.Brian (brian_cooper at hotmail d o t com)https://www.blogger.com/profile/02805168206752602148noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7487871339000666216.post-15128537631521600912009-08-03T20:45:55.719-04:002009-08-03T20:45:55.719-04:00What, no "Dragon Mountain" love?
Around...What, no "Dragon Mountain" love?<br /><br />Around here, we consider it the archetypal killer dungeon of the 2e era; "Dragon Mountain" was to us what "Tomb of Horrors" must have been to our predecessors, who were gaming when 1e was around.Iglesiashttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08416128782481346800noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7487871339000666216.post-32345045120818068352009-08-03T20:09:54.894-04:002009-08-03T20:09:54.894-04:00> Night Below was an excellent boxed
> set....> Night Below was an excellent boxed <br />> set. It had everything you needed:<br />><br />> *over arching plot line<br />><br />> *Threat of WORLD DOMINATION!<br /><br />Not to be a wet blanket or anything, but am I the only one who thinks those are strikes *against* it?Josephhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01355324231111953098noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7487871339000666216.post-79947871156344889992009-08-03T19:38:12.096-04:002009-08-03T19:38:12.096-04:00I agree with all the above, especially Planescape:...I agree with all the above, especially Planescape: Torment. Dungeon was a fantastic source of adventures.<br /><br />The Ruins of Undermountain despite being branded Forgotten Realms was also very portable, you could drop it under any city with a little work, though it does work best in conjunction with a book on Waterdeep. <br /><br />I’d also add Dragon Mountain to the list, I have players which go into fetal positions at the mention of kobolds after playing that one.<br /><br />For those who liked the Village of Homlet I found a little gem in the Wizard’s Challenge. A really nicely developed village with a lot of adventure seeds in it.Benny the Spacemanhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09640473186454902727noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7487871339000666216.post-61247469256164929312009-08-03T19:24:58.434-04:002009-08-03T19:24:58.434-04:00Fedifensor, Dragon #67. The dungeon's in an as...Fedifensor, Dragon #67. The dungeon's in an asteroid/castle floating in the Astral plane. It was pretty cool. Nov. 1982.brasspenhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00740202895575678193noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7487871339000666216.post-2610969226859865212009-08-03T19:10:34.967-04:002009-08-03T19:10:34.967-04:00This may seem like an astounding claim, but I ran ...This may seem like an astounding claim, but I ran 1-3 different "campaigns" for about 8 years (high school to college) without a published game world <i>at all</i>, starting with 1E and migrating to 2E (just said no to 2.5). <br /><br />I used advice from the 1E DMG (and thus Mr. Gygax), and inspiration from a friend's efforts, to do it. I was only vaguely aware of Greyhawk but preferred my homespun. The encouragement to <i>create</i> is so much more palpable in 1E.<br /><br />Dungeon Magazine was my source of published adventures for many of our games simply because you got more bang for your buck and, frankly, I was "poor but proud."<br /><br />So, the comparison with 1E modules is a little lopsided, since there wasn't a similarly prolific and adventuresome product around. What I call the "mad dash for cash" changed everything and made me even more resistant to buying.<br /><br />Rare non-dungeon module... anyone remember "Fedifensor"? :)Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03078137184651956189noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7487871339000666216.post-10614400529676066782009-08-03T18:09:02.161-04:002009-08-03T18:09:02.161-04:00The four 2e adventures that made it to the Dungeon...The four 2e adventures that made it to the Dungeon magazine top 30 are:<br /><br />Return to the Tomb of Horror<br />Gates of Firestorm Peak<br />Dead Gods<br />Ruins of Undermountain<br /><br />All of which have been mentioned in this thread. Only Ruins of Undermountain had come out before I had given up on 2e. TSR went through a real dry spell from about 1986 to 1992. After 1992, I can't really say because I'd stopped paying attention.Chris Tichenorhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11866673632888599928noreply@blogger.com