So, what makes 1e adventures so great?

[Numenorean]

The UK series of modules are in my experience, the best 1st edition modules written. Graeme Morris wrote some very good and flavorful adventures.

I've gamed for nearly 23 years and my favorites are the UK series ....


Followed closely by D3, and Queen of the Demonweb pits. These two modules can easily become campaigns themselves. I like how open they are. The G series was fun to play, so was D1-2. The Temple of Elemental Evil when combined with T1 was fun too! Another favorite of mine is the Lost Caverns of Tsojcanth! Great adventure.

I think the biggest stinker of the old 1st edition line are the A series of modules. Very very overrated. Tomb of Horrors, at least in my circle of friends, was always viewed as a gag module.

Thats my 2 plats.

 

[DarrenGMiller]

I agree that with most of the recent posters who have said that the portability of these "modules" is one of hte main reasons for their "classic" status. I use published adventures fairly often and usually modify them somewhat to fit my campaign. When I am planning my campaign, I usually look through my adventures to see if any of them would fit into my campaign concept. Usually, the easiest adventures to plug in are those story-light classics that provide some good locations, maps, NPC's, etc., maybe even a good BBEG to start working into the campaign before the PC's get to the adventure. If an adventure is too story-heavy, it is too difficult to work in.

As an example, take Necromancer Games' "Crucible of Freya." This adventure has a very specific plot. Bad guys come to town and steal a cup. PC's have to chase them to their keep and get it back. When using this adventure, I had to scrap the entire story and use its BBEG in a totally new way. Thankfully, NG seperated the story text from the location text and put the story in the first half of the adventure and the locations and NPC's and maps in the second half of the book. This made scrapping the story much easier.

By contrast, I followed that adventure up with the old T1: "Village of Hommlet" (which seems to be a pretty popular adventure right now). There was little plot or story in that original, so I just gave Lareth motives that fit my cmapaign. I could use almost everything in the book and it still fit, rather than only using half of the material, like I had to do for Crucible.

It is, IMO, much more difficult to port any of the Dragonlance adventures or even most of the Forgotten Realms adventures since they are so tied into the campaign world. Even most of the published Eberron adventures seem to have something in them unique to that world, like dragonmarks or whatnot that make them seem artificial if you try to port them to a generic or homebrew world, or even Greyhawk (which most would say is THE generic world).

Some adventures that I have ported into the campaigns I have run since 3E came out:

White Plume Mountain and Ex Keraptis Cum Amore (from Dungeon)
Falcon trilogy
Lost Tombs trilogy (I know, 2E, but still pretty light on story for the most part)
countless adventures from old Dungeon magazines (many are very story light and portable)
Village of Hommlet
Isle of Dread (also used Portents of Dread from Dungeon)
Treasure Hunt
Destiny of Kings
The Forest Oracle
U1-3 Saltmarsh trilogy
Ghost Tower of Inverness

The adventures I have used from 3.x are:
Sunless Citadel
Forge of Fury (VERY modified)
Standing Stone
Heart of Nightfang Spire
Bastion of Broken Souls
Against the Barrow King
Freeport Trilogy
Crucible of Freya
Tomb of Abysthor
countless adventures from newer Dungeon magazines

Out of the two lists, I am sure that not all of them could be considered "classics" or even great adventures, but I think there are more of those on the first list. How many of the adventures on the second list will become "classics" remains to be seen.

I would love to see comments from one or more of those writers who designed the "classics" regarding what, if any, design principles or philosophies were used. Many of the newer adventures come across, to me anyway, as feeling formulaic or contrived. There is too much of an effort to include x number of CR y encounters, etc. That is one of the things missing from older adventures that makes them better. Newer adventures spend too much time either trying to replicate older ones or escape from them.

Well, just my $0.02 contribution to a thread I have enjoyed reading.

DM

 

[VirgilCaine]

I think the biggest stinker of the old 1st edition line are the A series of modules. Very very overrated. Tomb of Horrors, at least in my circle of friends, was always viewed as a gag module.

That's because it is a gag module. Or at least, not for everyday play. It's for a "Shrodinger's challenge" for characters from a serious campaign or for knocking some overconfident players down a notch.

 

[Soluzar]

I would love to see comments from one or more of those writers who designed the "classics" regarding what, if any, design principles or philosophies were used. Many of the newer adventures come across, to me anyway, as feeling formulaic or contrived. There is too much of an effort to include x number of CR y encounters, etc. That is one of the things missing from older adventures that makes them better. Newer adventures spend too much time either trying to replicate older ones or escape from them.

Find your way to Dragonsfoot forums. Frank Mentzer posts there often. He's like one of the regulars, and he designed quite a bit of classic material, including ToEE. Yeah, it was a joint credit, but he can still tell you a lot about what went into making the Temple. And he has.

 

[Grazzt]

Tomb of Horrors, at least in my circle of friends, was always viewed as a gag module.

And rightly so. IIRC, Gygax said he basically created that module to show the power-hungry, Monty Haul munchkins that yes, there are still challenges and there are still things out there that can kill ya.

 

[Twowolves]

One thing I liked about the old modules was that they provided the challenge, but it was up to the DM to make the story fit into his game, and up to the players to tackle that challenge. In a sense, it was like "there it is, now what are you going to do about it?" There didn't seem to be as many preset solutions to problems, or back story explaination as to why the characters were there, just the facts. The hill giant steading was just THERE, now what are you going to do about it? Why are the PCs there? Up to the DM to fit the reason into his game, make it personal, or at least logical. How would the heroes deal with it? However they wanted to try, let the chips fall where they may.

Those reasons, and many more already stated in this thread, make 1st ed modules such classics.

Twowolves Howling

 

[toberane]

Ah, D1-2 Descent into the Depths of the Earth. That was the first module I ever bought (not counting Keep on the Borderlands, which came with my Basic D&D set). I have to agree that the lack of plot is a kind of refreshing novelty in these days of high drama adventures.

Don't get me wrong. The reason that we currently play High Drama adventures (and rarely from a module anymore) is because the group I play with is mostly made up of people who have been playing for more than 2 decades and have matured to the point where we enjoy the role-playing as much as we enjoy killing things. However, you just have to love the simplicity of modules like D1-2 that have a LICH as a regular dungeon encounter. Not the big bad guy. Not a climax to the adventure. If you don't know to look for him, it is easy just to walk past the cave he makes his lair in and never even know he's there. Just down the way are some troglodytes and other medium level encounters, while a lich who was presumably a powerful magic user just sits in his cave for no apparent reason. It's almost like Monster Manual Apartments, where any evil fiend can find a cozy little home, regardless of race, creed, or Encounter Level.

And in the early days of the game, they didn't ask why a lich was content to live in a small cave surrounded by other creaters that had no ecological reason to be there other than the designer thought that they would be fun encounters to put in. The players just pulled out their swords and spell components and started hacking and blasting away. And then a few yards down the way, they would be likely to trigger a trap that would kill half the party, and they might get a single saving throw to avoid it IF THEY WERE LUCKY.

I love the simplicity of these old games, even if I did find myself shaking my head in wonder at the out-of-place lich in D1-2 a few months ago when I re-read the module.