Is Slave Pits of the Undercity a well-designed adventure module?

Is the classic AD&D1 adventure module Slave Pits of the Undercity a well-designed adventure module? (Although Slave Pits it is the first part of a four-part adventure series, this poll is only concerned with this one adventure module. The others will be discussed separately.)



I’m not asking if you like it or had fun with it. I’m not asking if it is a great piece of D&D history. Just, is it well designed as a published adventure for general D&D play?

If it is, what could current module designers/authors learn from it? What should current module designers/authors try to emulate about it?

Quasqueton

it is a well designed tournament module

I really like this module. IMO, it captures the ethos of 1e design. The adventure assumes that you must infiltrate an evil city and then break into a temple. It gives you enough info and interesting stuff to run the dungeon crawl portion of the adventure, but the stuff leading up to getting into the city is all in the DM's hands.

We had a blast playing this (probably 20 years ago). The module plays very well-I may have to incorperate it into the current campaign and run it again.

We had a blast playing this (probably 20 years ago). The module plays very well

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Playing a module (as a Player with a PC) rarely gives one real insight into a module's design (good or bad). A good DM can make a bad adventure play well, and a bad DM can make a good adventure play poorly.

I would have thought that respondants in these threads have actually read the module, not merely played in it.

Quasqueton

I voted yes, but with one caveat. If used for tournament play, it can be used straight up. If used for campaign play it is absolutely incumbent upon the DM to study the map of both the upper portion of the ruined temple and the lower caverns/sewers thoroughly, as there are many access points, side passages and possible connections that aren't described or are glossed over in the text. It is especially important to note that there are at least 4 (more if you count scaling the walls) access points into the upper part of the temple that PCs can use to infiltrate and take the occupants by surprise.

IMO the map for A1 is a perfect example of a non-linear adventure. The PCs have all sorts of possible routes to take through the complex and each one carries with it both benefits and drawbacks.

In addition, the adventure presents a great number of different non-combat challenges to PCs, from balancing across narrow beams to swimming through fast-moving sewage.

I would say it ranks as one of the best tournament modules.

I'm torn on this one. While I like it, there are some issues with it IIRC. A few OOP monsters where one wonders how they can exist next door to all the rest. There is also the issue of all the new monsters such as the Aspis. I don't think throwing in random new monsters, especially when there would seem to be more of them in the world is necesarily a good design quality I'd like to see modern writers follow. The plot, rooms and dungeon flow seem ok, but I haven't run this one in a long, long time. I started to convert it to 3.5 to run it as the next part of my hack and slash games, but conversion of the new monsters was a roadblock.

I said, No.

While I have run it in a campaign and everyone really enjoyed it - it was with a great deal of modification.

And even as a tournament module it suffers because the layout of info is inconsistant and often jumbled (as I remember it).

This is the kind of series of adventures that would benefit from a total re-imagining while keeping to the basic premise.

painandgreed said:

There is also the issue of all the new monsters such as the Aspis. I don't think throwing in random new monsters,

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I replaced them with a growing sub-cult of were-rats, led by a few people who worked for the slavers and got infected and were seeking to take over the operation for themselve - thus creating a conflict within a conflict.

I found this adventure to be a perfect example of abysmal design. (And I did DM a group through this one time.)

It’s an old burned-out temple being used as a slaver base.

1- A basilisk (or 2?) is loose in the area, even listed on the wandering monster chart – how do you conduct slaver business in a compound with an untamed basilisk running around free?

2- Ghouls and ghasts are loose in the area, even listed on the wandering monster chart – and only one minor cleric in the whole compound.

3- There are numerous rooms where the occupants can’t logically get out and move about the complex because of obstacles, traps, monsters – how did they get into that room to begin with?

4- There are tricks set up that expect the PCs to enter the room from illogical (in the sense of the defense expectations) directions – why set up a deception directed at someone coming up out of the sewers? – why aim a flamethrower inward toward the interior of the temple?

5- The orcs (the main grunts of the base) are so outclassed by the uncontrolled monsters of the place, one wonders how the place survives.

Now, sure, a *good* DM could finagle all this into some sense, but a well-designed adventure shouldn’t require that. Just about every encounter in this adventure is illogical (in an in-game sense). As much as I loved the premise, both of the slavers compund and the city (and I made Highport a full campaign location), the actual design of the adventure is dumb.

Quasqueton