What are the worst classic D&D adventure modules?

[TarionzCousin]

The worst AD&D adventure I have ever played in my life was "Dancing Hut of Baba Yaga". At the end of the adventure, my friend wanted to write a letter to Lisa Smedman to ask for refunds.

Roger Moore's Dragon Magazine treatment of Baba Yaga's Hut was so superior to this that when I bought the module, I glanced through it once and never opened it again. Ugh.

Which one of these had the tank in it? That was weird and completely unexpected.

 

[Beginning of the End]

I regard crawling into a devil's mouth as skillful play - something interesting and exciting is more likely to happen and that's what I want when I play an rpg. Prodding everything with a 10' pole, or getting your orc slaves to enter every room first, is the play style Tomb of Horrors encourages. This, to me, is a bad play style.

Judging the Tomb of Horrors as if it were supposed to fit into a normal campaign is to take the module out of context. It's a special, one-shot dungeon that's specifically designed to do something that isn't the normal style of play.

And when it's used in its proper context, it's a fun little scenario.

EDIT: Using the 10' pole on the devil's mouth won't even tell you it's dangerous. It comes back with the end missing, but it's reasonable to assume it's been teleported rather than disintegrated. The former being more common dungeon weirdness than the latter. I think this is what people mean by arbitrary - it could be a teleporter, it could be a disintegrator, how are you to know?

I've run the module several times. Every group that has used the 10' pole trick has correctly intuited that there's something wrong with the demon's mouth. (Largely because there's an actual) magic portal right next to it that they can compare behaviors with: The archway gives them their pole back; the demon's mouth doesn't. Even when they've considered the possibility that the end of the pole has simply been teleported away, they hedge their bets and go for the known-safe option.)

Other successful mouth-avoidance techniques: Correctly interpreting the poem ("shun green if you can"; the demon bas relief is green). Throwing an object through both portals and then using a locate object spell. Divination spells. And an identify spell.

In fact, I've only had three fatality incidents involving the demon's mouth: One group sent two PCs through before bothering to do any kind of investigation. Another group thought of the locate object tactic but didn't have the right spell prepared, so they decided to use locate person instead to figure out where the portal went (only to discover it wasn't a portal). And a third group dead-ended elsewhere in the tomb and back-tracked to the demon's mouth to "see where the other portal went" (having concluded that it must not be dangerous like they thought, since there wasn't anywhere else for them to go -- they were wrong on both counts).

In other words, every single group I've ever played with has correctly determined that the demon mouth was dangerous once they decided to actually investigate it. (Although in one case they later out-thought themselves back into the wrong conclusion.)

I will also give a dishonorable mention to the guy who saw what happened to the pole and then stuck his hand in to "see if it will do that with organic stuff, too". (It did.)

 

[Mark Hope]

I will also give a dishonorable mention to the guy who saw what happened to the pole and then stuck his hand in to "see if it will do that with organic stuff, too". (It did.)

A player in the first group I sent through the Tomb did this too, except he thrust his entire arm in. Ouch.

 

[MoxieFu]

Shun green?

Wasn't there a hint in the adventure that the characters were to "shun green"? The demon's head surrounding the black orb was GREEN. I don't think players have any right to complain if they forgot or ignored that warning.

When we played it back then our DM warned us of it's lethality. We decided to roll up new characters of the appropriate level and were allowed to keep them if we survived. This to me was a very fair way of handling the module.

 

[unan oranis]

A player in the first group I sent through the Tomb did this too, except he thrust his entire arm in. Ouch.

I watched a whole party of five hop in one after the other. lol.

 

[Eridanis]

Which one of these had the tank in it? That was weird and completely unexpected.

I'd have to pull out the module to check it (please don't make me!!!), but the Dragon adventure definitely had a Soviet tank in one of the rooms.

 

[Quartz]

I regard crawling into a devil's mouth as skillful play

A truly rat-bastard designer would have spheres of darkness in the mouths, leading to greased chutes with Spheres of Annihilation at the bottom.

"Yes, it's safe to enter the mouth!"

 

[kyuss]

Sorry for the thread necromancy, but I've read through this entire thread and am amazed that no one mentioned Red Sonja Unconquered (or any of the Conan modules). I've just finished re-reading this module last night. Horrible is too kind. Dumb plot, terrible writing, nothing for PCs to really do, silly new game mechanics (that apply only to the pre-gen characters. What??), perversely high level suggestions (10-14th), terrible BBEG. It's not even that sort of fun in an interesting to read kind of bad either. I can't imagine subjecting a group of players (even ones that I hated) to the 30 min or so of play time needed to finish this garbage. Worst. Module. Evar.

 

[billd91]

The Red Sonja module is probably not widely held by a lot of people out there. Not that widely known. I think I have a copy of it, but I had completely forgotten about it when this thread initially came up.

 

[Ulrick]

It looks like all the regular "classic" modules have been criticized already. What about modules by third party publishers like "The Judge's Guild." Do they count?

See, I have this module "Approved For Use With Advanced Dungeons & Dragons" called ZIENTECK, published in 1981.

The plot is simple: Explore the ruins within the Black Angel woods to recover the treasures of the dead wizard Zienteck. But beware the Dragon Griendal!

Other areas (undeveloped) to explore include the Temple of Borlg in the Pentan Swamp within the Nyltige Valley. You can possibly purchase supplies at the Town of Meyrorkton. And then there's some weird location on the map call the Qualak's Triangle within the Plain of Boulders. A village called Pahuut-Kaou resides within the Kaou mountains.

If you like the lame names of these fantasy locations, you'll love the running commentary from the author himself through the descriptions of the dungeon!

#1 Very obviously, this in an entry room which is essentially empty but for three huge mosaics dominating the wall...

#11 This room is a gas- literally. Just past the bend in the hallway is a pressure plate that will release paralyzing gas into the entire hallway.... the effects of this gas last for d6 days.

#12 Formerly tastefully decorated, this room is now an unmitigated mess...

#15 Careful watch you step! Any wanderer who doesn't tread carefully will find themselves stumbling down a deep incline...

#17 Another cell-- or is it? The requisite bed and chest are here, yet the bed is king-sized...

#20 Great battle scenes in the arena are depicted in this hallway. In the center of the hall, however, is a mural of a Spear with Stars all around it. Odd, to say the least.

#22 The walls of this hallway depict scenes of well-armed men carrying away beautiful women from this burning castle-- the party's over.

#23 A barracks containing three bunk beds and three chests. There is nothing of valure here. Looks familiar, doesn't it?

#27 Surprise! You're in another hallway...

#56 An empty hallway don't waste your time here.

#66A barracks room which also acts as a receiver for room #58. The prerequiste three bunk beds and three chests are to be found here. Not to be found here, however, is any treasure or did you already guess that?



Finally, in my copy of the module, pages 24 and 25 are colored purple. I don't know why.