Best dungeon crawl adventure of all time

Celebrim · Feb 10, 2015

GrahamWills said:
A new contender is Eyes of The Stone Thief, a seriously cool living dungeon. This dungeon doesn't just sit there waiting to be looted. It comes after you, you loved ones, and most importantly, your home.

This one sounds potentially good if the execution is as good as the concept, but is this one even in print yet?

Walter_J · Feb 14, 2015

There's so many good ones to choose from. T1 is probably the one I used the most, with or without Homlet. Anything from the B's could be good. A1 is always a good play and X2 can be a real trip and is hugely expandable. The Ghost Tower of Inverness and White Plume Mountain are good for quest-type adventures. Then of course, there is the GDQ series, in part or whole. L1 and N1 can be fun, even if you drop the dungeons in someplace else.

Eminence_Grise · Feb 15, 2015

I bought a bunch of old game D&D adventures as a christmas gift for myself. Amongst them is Expedition to the Barrier Peaks. My god! What a module that is! I don't remember the last time an adventure left me speechless.

Scrivener of Doom · Feb 15, 2015

Eminence_Grise said:
I bought a bunch of old game D&D adventures as a christmas gift for myself. Amongst them is Expedition to the Barrier Peaks. My god! What a module that is! I don't remember the last time an adventure left me speechless.

Me too.

I also had the same reaction on a recent re-reading of D3 Vault of the Drow. It's a stunning piece of work even if it requires some work to work, if that makes sense.

It also makes me wonder how good T1-4 Temple of Elemental Evil could have been if Gary had actually finished it before it was published. Sadly, we will never know.

GrahamWills · Feb 16, 2015

Celebrim said:
This one sounds potentially good if the execution is as good as the concept, but is this one even in print yet?

As is pretty (non-WOTC) common, the PDF is available. I confess that since I pretty much read most stuff on my iPad, although I do order the physical copy, it often sees little use. So ... yes, it's both available and not in print!

And the execution is really, really good. Frankly, I have very little interest in mega-dungeons and found the concept of living ones a little silly. So despite being a big fan of 13th Age, I didn't jump at this. In fact, the only reason I got it was that it was Sunday night, and I had a game to run Tuesday and was desperate for runnable ideas, and the writer, Gareth Ryder-Hanrahan has done kick-ass work on numerous other products and systems. So, having some free cash and being lazy I bought it and had a quick look for stuff to run.

Six hours later, at about 3am, I dragged myself off to bed and spent the next day trying not to completely convert my campaign to be just running this module. I think I've mostly succeeded, but it was close. What works best, to me, are the numerous hooks and adaptations. Not just the overall plot but most of the subplots have sets of variations for different ways to run and present things (and overall villains). There is an extensive set of non-dungeon adventures to tie into the dungeon, and even the dungeon is modular, with entire bits you can run / leave out / add to / re-purpose.

http://www.pelgranepress.com/?p=13408

Lanefan · Feb 16, 2015

What edition are you running and-or how much conversion are you willing to do?

Lost Caverns of Tsojcanth and Forgotten Temple of Tharizdun are both grand 1e crawls for mid-levels, and somewhat intended to be run one after the other though this is by no means required. Tomb of the Lizard King is another such. Bone Hill is a fine lower-level 1e crawl-with-extras. Maltese Clue by Judges' Guild is another good one for mid-levels.

For 3e and equivalent you can't go wrong with Forge of Fury for low-mid levels, and Rappan Athuk is excellent if you like your meat well-ground at all levels.

Lanefan

Schmoe · Feb 20, 2015

I'll echo the Caverns of Thracia as an excellent mega-dungeon. Also, I'm surprised no one has mentioned World's Largest Dungeon. There were quite a few play reports here on ENWorld a while back, and it sounded like people really enjoyed it.

S'mon · Feb 22, 2015

Just want to mention that Paizo's Rise of the Runelords has a lot of very nicely designed dungeons, the hardback version is well worth it. Written for 3.5 then converted to PF, it's easy to convert to other versions of D&D.

Lost City of Barakus is very solid, but the maps are a little pedestrin compared to eg Thracia.

One pretty obscure one - Gamemaster Publications 4: The Awakening is an awesome massive megadungeon crawl in a fallen dwarf fortress, with added war vs an entire duergar army! For 1e PCs around 7th-8th level, I think the best megadungeon I've ever seen. If you see it on Ebay snap it up! Someone sold one in January - http://www.ebay.com/itm/The-Awakeni.../261743717599?pt=Games_US&hash=item3cf1242cdf

Edit: Found it here, a bit pricy though: http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/GM-Pubs-G...382?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_3&hash=item19fba14c0e