The Caves of Chaos: Not very good?

[fuzzlewump]

I've DM'd this adventure multiple times in multiple editions, and left the approach up to the PCs ... and ended up with vastly different experiences each time. One group played politics between the various humanoid factions and started their own little internal war-by-proxy, for example.

What were the approaches, exactly?

I can't see diplomacy working, because of the language barrier. I like the suggestions to, for example, free prisoners from the hobgoblins and getting in that way. The problem is if you already killed gnolls or orcs, and you'll probably have to kill hobgoblins to get that point in the prison. And the first two entrances are goblins and kobolds who seem to like killing things and only speaking goblin and draconic respectively.

I can't really see a sneaky approach either, because the rogue doesn't have dark-vision or low-light vision... so the rogue has to carry around a torch while sneaking against things that all have dark vision. It was actually kind of funny how poorly designed that seemed to us. At least at level 2 the rogue gains the nightvision ability (though I imagine the simulationist/realism crowd might have something to say about that.)

If I run it again (unlikely, unless they keep this adventure the same but release new playtest materials) I'll probably make everything speak common, maybe make area cover a much larger geographic area for realism concerns, and to avoid what seems to be the weird scenario of all the monsters saying hello to eachother as one leaves to go hunting and another is returning. ("Hey, Joe." "Hey, Bob.") And maybe give the monsters a more explicit motivation that I can stick to and the players can discover and exploit. I just wish these things were already written in the module. I'm having to do work, and at a point I might as well scrap it and start over.

 

[fuzzlewump]

Perhaps an alternate way to look at this: every game is a contract between the DM and players. The players choose how their PCs act; the DM chooses how monsters act.

The PCs might decide to open every encounter as a combat encounter; it doesn't mean the DM has to, and vice versa. What happens if instead of fighting one side welcomes the other in, offers to surrender, offers a bribe, asks for help, says "Thank Pelor you're here and brought a cleric, we're under nightly assault from undead" or takes similar action?

Quick note, almost all of those solutions are made either impossible are very cumbersome to attempt to do through a language barrier. I feel like I keep coming back to that, but man, that really made things un-fun for us. Do people like the whole 'did you pick this language at character creation?' or 'have a wizard with a comprehend language wand?' minigame?

 

[variant]

Caves of Chaos is a sandbox adventure, it is what the DM and players make of it. If your players don't like a lot of combat and you run it as a simple dungeon crawl, you're doing it wrong.

 

[Astrosicebear]

Quick note, almost all of those solutions are made either impossible are very cumbersome to attempt to do through a language barrier. I feel like I keep coming back to that, but man, that really made things un-fun for us. Do people like the whole 'did you pick this language at character creation?' or 'have a wizard with a comprehend language wand?' minigame?

If it was obvious through playing that your characters wanted more RP and you chose to be RAW with the enemies, then you missed the most important paragraphs in both the DM guide and the adventure. You are the DM, you can change anything. If the party wants to RP, by all means the enemies speak common, at least the hobgoblins and orcs, and if not fluent, they can communicate at the least.

Is this running the adventure as written? No, its not in the text they speak common. Is it running the adventure as intended? Probably not.

It's your game, run it how you want, and how you think your players would enjoy it. Most adventures aren't rules and encounter scenarios with everything planned out like 4e led many to believe. Think of old skool, classic adventures, like this one, as "guidelines". Its a book of ideas and pre-generated monsters and rooms, to ease the DM's already troubled workload.

My suggestion... run it again... change it... dont let them go to the same area... what? Kobold cave entrance A doesnt exist? Hmm wonder what the other entrances have in them... The hobgobs and orcs are at war, but the goblins have an ogre about to attack? Thats a pretty interesting set piece encounter.

In all kindness... D&D has always been what the DM and players make it... if everyone is bored... you're doing it wrong.

 

[FinalSonicX]

I'm running this right now and my advice is that you should make it your own advanture.
The way I look at it, the Caves of Chaos module, describe what's the situation is in the first moment the PCs enter the ravine, from that point forward it's up to you what to do with it, for example I knock up a quick random encounter table for outside encounters during the night and I started the advanture by telling my players "roll a d6 1-3 you arrive just as the sun is setting 4-6 you arrive during the day" they rolled a one.

Once the characters start making a mess in the ravine you should consider how it will effect the caves status que. Personally, Unless my players will find some allies in the caves sometime soone they would get hunted by a combined attack force of monsters (that's if they survive the next session ) simply because they will become a major threat.

I've tried to make the adventure my own and to some degree have accomplished it, but ultimately the crux of the adventure is combat after combat with some light exploration sprinkled in between. As a DM, it's dull because the environments are simplistic, there are few points of interest, few interesting items or NPCs, an generally no story of its own. At the point at which I'm making all of this stuff up, I'm basically better off just making all of it up from scratch. I don't mind making it all up from scratch, but the Caves of Chaos does not strike me as a brilliant dungeon - a fun one for players but basically dull for me as a DM.

I was hoping for some element of randomization or areas where activity is high - like what I see in Barrowmaze. As of now it's just less interesting to me than a dungeon I could make myself.

 

[fuzzlewump]

If it was obvious through playing that your characters wanted more RP and you chose to be RAW with the enemies, then you missed the most important paragraphs in both the DM guide and the adventure. You are the DM, you can change anything. If the party wants to RP, by all means the enemies speak common, at least the hobgoblins and orcs, and if not fluent, they can communicate at the least.

Is this running the adventure as written? No, its not in the text they speak common. Is it running the adventure as intended? Probably not.

It's your game, run it how you want, and how you think your players would enjoy it. Most adventures aren't rules and encounter scenarios with everything planned out like 4e led many to believe. Think of old skool, classic adventures, like this one, as "guidelines". Its a book of ideas and pre-generated monsters and rooms, to ease the DM's already troubled workload.

My suggestion... run it again... change it... dont let them go to the same area... what? Kobold cave entrance A doesnt exist? Hmm wonder what the other entrances have in them... The hobgobs and orcs are at war, but the goblins have an ogre about to attack? Thats a pretty interesting set piece encounter.

In all kindness... D&D has always been what the DM and players make it... if everyone is bored... you're doing it wrong.

It seems like we agree the adventure as written is not very good. That's all I was really wondering about. I know how to make a game enjoyable, at least to a degree where our table is happy.

 

[Mircoles]

B2 was in a way a teaching module. The Dm was expected to fill in the gaps and make it their own.
One line from the module states; "Become familiar with this module, then make whatever additions, changes, or amendments you feel are appropriate for your campaign ".

It was never really meant to be run as is. You were expected to make it your own.

It even had a section on how to be an effective Dm. It's, umm, actually a pretty good read. Most Dms should read it, if they can, whether they are just starting or consider themselves vets.

Gygax new what he was writing about and I don't think that what he wrote in the module was ever reprinted anywhere.

As I go through the old module it occurs to me that it's more than thirty years old, older than a lot of people playing and the advice in it is still very, very relevant.

 

[Kaodi]

The Caves of Chaos would probably make enough sense if they were placed in Eberron.

The Caves exist in the mountains between Droaam and one of the less monstrous nations (probably Breland). The inhabitants were stationed here during the Last War, but with that over they have begun to fight among themselves, despite orders from the Daughters of Sora Kell. The Shrine belongs to a Cult of the Dragon Below.

 

[Agamon]

If it was obvious through playing that your characters wanted more RP and you chose to be RAW with the enemies, then you missed the most important paragraphs in both the DM guide and the adventure. You are the DM, you can change anything. If the party wants to RP, by all means the enemies speak common, at least the hobgoblins and orcs, and if not fluent, they can communicate at the least.

Is this running the adventure as written? No, its not in the text they speak common. Is it running the adventure as intended? Probably not.

It's your game, run it how you want, and how you think your players would enjoy it. Most adventures aren't rules and encounter scenarios with everything planned out like 4e led many to believe. Think of old skool, classic adventures, like this one, as "guidelines". Its a book of ideas and pre-generated monsters and rooms, to ease the DM's already troubled workload.

My suggestion... run it again... change it... dont let them go to the same area... what? Kobold cave entrance A doesnt exist? Hmm wonder what the other entrances have in them... The hobgobs and orcs are at war, but the goblins have an ogre about to attack? Thats a pretty interesting set piece encounter.

In all kindness... D&D has always been what the DM and players make it... if everyone is bored... you're doing it wrong.

This. I'd go as far as to say that if you were playing a game style that neither you or your players like, you aren't playing by the RAW. As you said, the advice to adapt to your play style it right there in the rules, and is what this playtest round is all about.

 

[I'm A Banana]

I had a similar problem, yeah.

The language thing didn't even come up, in my game: I assumed any creature with a reasonably humanoid INT would know Common. Certainly it's not that big of a deal for most human beings to be a little bilingual, especially if one language is "what's spoken at home," and the other is "what's spoken with others."

But yeah, we really felt the lack of social opportunities.