D&D General All Time Favorite Dragon Magazine or Dungeon Magazine Content
- Thread starter Hexmage-EN
- Start date
cbwjm
Legend
I quite liked the monster association articles, not sure of that was the name of their group but they were a bunch of wizards trying to catch and study monsters. Can't recall if they started in 2e, but they did get 3e stats and they were fun to read. I can't remember if they were just an ongoing part of the monster ecology articles in if they were an evolution of them, being their own thing, but they were great reads. I remember one where they were hunting a pseudodragon and getting paralysed by its sting.
There was a short story called Ivory in the Blood by Brian A. Hopkins in Dragon #158. It’s about the last dragon slayer, who’s called back into service to kill the last dragon, long after everyone thought they were extinct. For some reason it’s managed to stay stuck in my head, even 32 years later.
I loved that story, and haven't even thought of it in ages.
They were called the Monster Hunters Association and the first one ("The Ecology of the Osquip") was published in issue #227. And yes, those started back in the AD&D 2E days and continued on into 3E. The MHA articles were just regular "Ecology of" articles using a recurring cast of characters, interspersed among other "Ecology of" articles written by other contributors.
Johnathan
David Howery
Hero
me too! I lucked out in that I was one of the authors in that issue, so I got two contributor copies along with my subscription copy, so I removed one set and cut it up, removed one set but didn't cut it up, and kept one issue pristine. Alas, I lost the cut out deck somewhere years ago, but still have the others...
David Howery
Hero
probably the most memorable thing about Dragon that I recall, weirdly enough, didn't involve D&D, but were the short and goofy games in the early issues.... Elefant Hunt (no, I didn't misspell that), File 13, Food Fight, Flight of the Boodles, etc.
Hussar
Legend
I actually have used flight of the boodles in my classroom
aco175
Legend
Not sure if everyone knows about the Internet Archive. Says it is a free library online, but judge for yourself. I was able to find collections of every Dungeon and Dragon Magazine to open and look at. There is even other RPG magazines like Ares and something in German.
Hexmage-EN
Legend
@aco175 I'm not certain the moderators here would appreciate this being linked here, especially since the magazines are still available for purchase on sources like DMsGuild.
Emirikol
Adventurer
From DRAGON (that havent already been noted):
118 Hero Points rules (and other stuff from that issue)
100 city beyond the gate adventure
86 (my first purchased issue) the 3d castle
Issues 1-150 All the "npc" classes that we allowed as PC classes
Greyhawk campaign updates
Best of the dragon mags
Dungeon
Simply watching the evolution of adventure design has been amazing!
Polyhedron
This mag had some decent stuff too once per 6issues but I got that too.
118 Hero Points rules (and other stuff from that issue)
100 city beyond the gate adventure
86 (my first purchased issue) the 3d castle
Issues 1-150 All the "npc" classes that we allowed as PC classes
Greyhawk campaign updates
Best of the dragon mags
Dungeon
Simply watching the evolution of adventure design has been amazing!
Polyhedron
This mag had some decent stuff too once per 6issues but I got that too.
AdmundfortGeographer
Getting lost in fantasy maps
My brother cut them out. He’s very precise so I let him. He also kept them! No big deal since we were in the same house.
I left to college and forgot about them. A couple years later I asked if he still had them. Seems our mom got fed up with his mess one day and tossed them among a bunch of other things that looked useless.
Ugh!
I recalled the Paizo-era Dragon tried doing it again but couldn’t get rights to the old artwork.
Hexmage-EN
Legend
I probably gave the impression earlier that I'm interested in planar content, and I feel like the 4E-era Dungeon Magazine adventures were especially good for that since the Epic tier was associated with the planes. For example, the Scales of War adventure path had adventures in the City of Brass, the Astral Sea, and even in Tiamat's lair.
The adventure I want to focus on in this post, though, is Dungeon #212's "Court of the Dark Prince", in which the objective is to rescue an angel of Kord named Galewing from the palace of the demon lord Graz'zt.
Here's the Adventure Synopsis:
I initially had a much longer post here, but I figured it would be better to boil things down to my favorite details.
The adventure I want to focus on in this post, though, is Dungeon #212's "Court of the Dark Prince", in which the objective is to rescue an angel of Kord named Galewing from the palace of the demon lord Graz'zt.
Here's the Adventure Synopsis:
I initially had a much longer post here, but I figured it would be better to boil things down to my favorite details.
- If the party meets with Iggwilv and things go smoothly she offers the ability to transform into chasme demons to pose as servants in Graz'zt's palace. To accept this gift a PC must catch and eat a fly Iggwilv generates.
- Once in Graz'zt's triple layer of Azzagrat the party can search for a potential informant called the Whittler. This tiefling suffers from supernatural amnesia that can only be counteracted by looking at and holding carvings he's made. When the party first encounters the Whittler he immediately begins carving a likeness of a party member so that he'll be able to remember meeting them. To get intel about Graz'zt's palace the party must escort the Whittler to his home and his collection of carvings while dealing with both a servant and a child of Graz'zt curious about the party's intentions with the Whittler.
- If the party managed to get a letter of introduction from the Whittler they can enter Graz'zt's palace as guests. They are escorted to a waiting area by twelve mariliths (there are lots of powerful demons in this place just acting as palace staff). Two other groups are already in waiting. One of the two, a squad of yuan-ti, can potentially be hired into working with the party temporarily. After a while an imposing force of demons arrive to inform the guests that Graz'zt will only meet with one group, leading to a battle to determine who will gain the honor.
- My favorite detail about the aforementioned waiting area is that it has a bathing pool that dissolves non-evil characters who relax in it too long and tries to keep them from escaping when the character realizes something is wrong.
- An aspect of Graz'zt meets with guests in the throne room, where he is currently being entertained by a large number of captive dancers who perform to a supernatural song created from the combined wailing of a choir of tortured succubi. If battle is joined seven of the dancers reveal themselves to be mariliths in disguise and aid the aspect and the additional two mariliths protecting him. Should the aspect be defeated Graz'zt himself appears to either continue the battle or try to intimidate the party into swearing their service to him.
- If Graz'zt is destroyed a failsafe he put in place preserves his essence for reformation. However, it draws from the power maintaining the connection of the three layers of the Abyss into Azzagrat, meaning that the layers separate (which causes chaos through the destruction of sections of Graz'zt's multi-layer palace and the outbreak of violence among the demons).
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For me, The Dragon's heyday was in the 80's. The quality of the content was all over the place but it was so varied. A lot of people hated it, but I really loved 'The Mansion of the Mad Professor Luvlow' (issue 49 I think?). I ran it multiple times in college. Finieous Fingers and Wormy were something I looked forward to every issue. I also liked 'What's Up with Phil and Dixie'. I loved reading 'Giants in the Earth' even when I disagreed with their presentation.
The issue where they printed the Deck of Many Things comes to mind. Any time they added new Gods to a pantheon was usually really cool. But let's be honest- it's all about the comics!
