B2: Keep on the Borderlands

[Reynard]

Over the weekend I re-read (and then read again) B2: Keep on the Borderlands and was surprised at how good the module is. We never played it -- my brothers and I came in with the Elmore-cover Red Box, so we cut our teeth on Bargle's dungeons (we did play through the Isle of Dread, though -- that was still the module included in the Expert Set).

I would love to run B2 now, using either B/X or Labyrinth Lord, but alas I am not likely to find a group to play it.

What are your experiences with B2? Did you play it or run it "back in the day" or more recently? Do you hold it in high regard? Does it play as well as (I think) it reads? How many campaigns did it launch, and how many fizzled?

 

[francisca]

I played through it twice as a kid. had a great time.

I've run it twice as a kid as sidebar games, and once as an adult in a B/X game.

All 3 times I played up the evil cleric in the keep and made sure the control of humanoids in the caves was tenuous at best, so the players had the opportunity to play the factions off of each other.

It really is a great "toolbox", more of a bare-bones mini-campaign than an actual adventure.

I'm getting ready to use it again, this time with 1e AD&D, set in the World of Greyhawk, in the Clatspurs Range.

Here are my initial thoughts, reposted from another board. You'll note I have some unanswered questions, and who is really behind the evil temple is up in the air at this point. (I'm a big believer in JITDM (Just in time Dungeon Mastering.)

Premise:

As Iuz has grown in power, incursions into the Vesve Forest have become more and more common. Thankfully, the good folk of the southern reaches of the Vesve, with much support form Highfolk and Furyondy, have managed to stem the tide and frustrate Iuz's attempts to claim the Forest for his own. At this stage, only the northern reaches are under his withered thumb.

As a result, the focus of Iuz's underlings has been a campaign to establish strongholds up and down the Clatspur Range. This has met with moderate success, as the people of the mountains are as individualistic as they are tough, but have not managed a cohesive defense of their homelands.

These events have led Furyondy and Highfolk to enlist Perrenland in a joint venture to provide a common-good defense of the Clatspurs. An ancient, derelict keep on a bluff overlooking the Velverdyva River was cleared out and restored to defendable status a number of years ago, and manned by soldiers of the three sponsor nations.

From the Keep, scouting parties fanned out, gathered intelligence and struck the enemy. Now, however, each nation has had to pull some of its forces to shore up defenses in other portions of their territory. Of course, this comes just as Iuz has increased his presence in the range.

The 3 nations have now put forth resources to raise a small force comprised of scout/hunter-killer groups to harass, skirmish, and gather intelligence on evil humanoid movements within the range. In exchange for a safe haven, including cheap lodging and supplies, and minor healing, the Keep will pay a bounty for eliminating the enemy, and allow the mercs to keep any loot liberated from the humanoids, barring any that are identifiable personal property.

Additional background:

The temple in the cave of chaos is tied up somehow with Tharizdun, and/or the EEG. This will be the first indication of a greater force at work within the world of greyhawk, as Iuz, The Great Kingdom, the Scarlet Brotherhood, and disciples of Lolth, The EEG, and Tharz square off against each other as much as the forces of weal.

 

[pemerton]

I ran a Keep game a bit over 20 years ago, using 1st AD&D (with UA) as the system. I located the Keep in the Shield Lands on the border of the Horned Society (World of Greyhawk).

The PCs were a Duergar F/T and a Svirfneblin I/T, so the game became a thief/city adventure and the Keep component never made it out of the Keep itself. I don't remember the details, but I had the Keep being taken over by an evil cult which the PCs were trying to expose, while also doing a lot of looting. Either they were driven out of the Keep, fled when the Keep was overrun by humanoids, or followed the loot across the Nyr Dyv - I can't remember. But the game continued into Critwall and then the City of Greyhawk as a thief campaign (I do remember that both PCs became thief-acrobats, and there was a lot of jumping from rooftop to rooftop).

EDIT: For a different take on the Keep - which in my view also do a reasonable job on the limitations of this module for an inexperienced GM - there are reviews on RPG.net here and here.

 

[possum]

I just bought the module back in August, around the time of the first few sessions of the D&D Encounters module based off of it. I found it in my FLGS's used bin for $5.00 in good condition.

I've since read the module, but I've never had the opportunity to play it. I'd love to eventually.

 

[ExploderWizard]

The greatest strength of this adventure is the level of customization possible just within what is written without the need to produce a great deal of supplemental material.

For example:

The Castellan is working with the evil temple secretly because they have his child as a captive.

One or more of the humanoid tribes is rather neutral in outlook, and does not raid or harm humans. If the PCs can identify this tribe, then they will have powerful allies.

There is a schism within the preisthood of the evil temple. There are already agents of Law infiltrating the clergy to bring them down. Can the PC's discover who the good guys are?

The lizard men are at war with one of the humanoid tribes. They promise a truce with the keep in exchange for aid. Are they telling the truth or are the humanoids their real allies helping them to massacre the PCs?

I have played in this module several times and run it at least 4 times using BD&D. I used it as a starting point for my 4E campaign the year before last. We even played it once converted to GURPS fantasy.

It is very replayable especially if different hooks and plots are used.

 

[kaomera]

Oh, I loves me some B2. I learned to DM running it and layed and/or DM'ed it at least a half-dozen times using AD&D (at least a dozen if my memory isn't playing tricks on me). It was awesome and the way to start a campaign for our groups...

Looking back over it after all these years, it may not have been the absolute best way to start out - it certainly doesn't meet the modern standards for an intro adventure. But as others have pointed out it was the room to create and elaborate that made B2 so much fun. I know we couldn't really understand for a while why other modules weren't as much fun to re-play the second or third time through...

 

[engrishonly]

Well, you compare it to Keep on the Shadowfell, which has very specific hooks alongside some ability to redraft some bits behind the scene... but then the monsters have very set piece encounters (hiding precisely here, and so on)... The modern design is just different. Not necessarily better or worse, but different.

B2 isn't set up to hold you by the hand as a GM or player... but the Basic D&D ruleset doesn't limit your play in the way that a more heavy-handed set of rules is limiting (via the extreme definition of things, what you're allowed to do gets narrowed down to what the rules say). So you can try whatever you want with the old rules without breaking the rules because all the fun stuff isn't codified.

If you do run B2, then you have to adapt it to your players, the rules that you're using, and so on. It is fertile ground for ideas, but in the wrong situation, it can be a horrible experience.

 

[DizzySaxophone]

Good timing. My 3.5 campaign just ended so this last Friday I pulled out B2 to introduce my players to 1e. It runs really well. You will certainly need to fill in a lot of the information yourself as it truly is set to be a mini-campaign and not a single adventure. I used my own homebrew setting. I would suggest listening to the Save or Die podcast about this module. It really works well to start a campaign. My players enjoyed it so much that we ended up meeting again the next evening to continue.

 

[Stormonu]

Despite this being the oldest bit of D&D I own (unfortunately, I lost my holmes rulebook a couple of weeks after getting the box set, so this was actually all I had bookwise for D&D for 3-some odd years), I've played relatively little of the module all the way through.

Still, perhaps because I've had it so long and it was the initial basis for many of the adventures I wrote myself, I love this module and its keep. I've heard many folks mention B1 - In Search of the Unknown as a better starting adventure, but I've always preferred this module to it.

One thing that's always stood out is how PCs react to finding the female and young humanoids in the cave. It'd never fly in a module these days, but the quandary it put PCs in when dealing with "non-combatants" was some of the most interesting role-playing this module brings up.

"Breeyark!"

 

[Jorunkun]

As others have remarked, B2 has great potential for its open base-and-expedition structure. As a player, I enjoyed the role-playing in the castle (the evil priests, getting into the inner keep etc) much more than the actual dungeon-crawls. What bothered me even at the time (we were 15 or 16 the first time I played this) was how close together all the cave entries are, and how it is strange that all these different humanoids are so close together. Mike Mearls once wrote a very funny review of B2 for rpg.net expanding on this point. If I were to run B2 today, I think I would put more distance between the individual caves, remove some of the more incredible encounters (like the cleric lost in the maze ...) and probably put more site-based or random encounters into the wilderness. I would also try to interconnect NPCs at the Keep and encounters outside of it more.