Anyone else of this opinion? Or not?

[Etan Moonstar]

Three words: Oh. My. God. We played through a couple of (converted to 3e)Ravenloft mods using DnD chars and with CoC chars ... Oh. My. God.

Heh, yeah, it was a fun mind trip for them. They never did figure out whether they were up against a vampire, a werewolf, or just a really, really sick psycho. My favorite part was when the one guy got on his satellite Internet connection and ordered an RPG launcher to be flown in by helicopter. The next day, they heard the 'copter and ran out to the village square, where they watched as the helicopter flew past and up to the castle, which had a helipad. By the time they got there, there was nothing but the 'copter, a pool of blood, and an empty crate with the instruction manual for the RPG launcher in it.... Unfortunately, before the players could do more than just start to explore the castle (they had a fun run-in with a shadow, was priceless when they realized there was one too many shadows in the room given the light sources), D&D 3E was released and they immediately demanded to try it out (which is when I started running them through Night Below). They were so surprised when I told them they'd been going through the original Ravenloft module with modern BRP Cthulhu characters!

 

[Elder-Basilisk]

I've played modules and custom games. I've run custom games and written modules (only for the RPGA thus far).

There are modules that are easy and there are modules that are deadly.
There are home games that are easy and there are custom games that are deadly. (I think I killed as many characters in one and half years of running my custom home game as I have in three and a half years of running modules in the RPGA; judging from the story hour, Diaglo also runs a really deadly custom campaign).

I don't think deadliness corresponds to whether a game is published or custom.

Nor does quality. I've played in custom campaigns that are horribly linear, ones that have very weak plots (I was so desperate for something to do with our characters that I talked the other characters into joining the army), and ones where every monster had a gazillion hit points and +25 to hit (at 6th or 7th level). I've also played in modules where the challenges were varied and appropriate and there is a large amount of flexibility to account for PC actions and motivations.

So, I conclude that the quality of a game is not necessarily improved by its not being published. Instead, the quality of a game is determined by fair and skillful DMing, by accounting for character motivations and allowing a reasonable degree (or a cunningly crafted illusion of) freedom, and appropriate but challenging and varied combat encounters. Published modules generally need a little bit of adaptation in order to have all of those but unique scenarios need creating from scratch (which is often a dicier business).

 

[Alynnalizza]

Generally in my campaigns, about 25% of the games are ran from modules. However, I have never ran a module as written. I prefer to take the map, take teh descriptions of the room, minus npc's/monsters, and come up with a 'plot' that works for the overall game.

Though I have no real aversion to running a session from a module, I just enjoy tinkering with them tooooo much.

Thanks.

 

[Fenes]

I don't run modules. It simply is too much work to tailor them to my group's playstyle and current campaign. They also are usually way too combat, magic and dungeon-heavy for our taste. In short, they are neither cost nor time effective for me.

 

[Balrog]

As a Dm I find modules provide a good basis for adventure. But I tend to tweak them quite a bit, as some others have said.

A map from one module may be spliced to a city from my homebrew campaign. Especially if the map is memorable. For example, my PCs were venturing towards a seedy coastal town, so I lifted the town of Scuttlecove from the Porphyry House Horror adventure in Dungeon, renamed it to be consistent with my own campaign, changed a few NPCs that were vital to my town, and voila!

I have found that using modules actually requires me more work to fit into my campaign, but sometimes I cannot resist if there is good material there to adapt.

 

[Emperor Valerian]

I don't run modules either. I don't have the funds to purchase them, and I actually prefer writing up my own materials in my own homebrew. Also (as in my last game two of my players were also DMs) this cuts down on the chance of a player recognizing a module they've already been through in another game... which tends to be boring or frustrating for the player.

 

[ConcreteBuddha]

I'm playing in two modules right now, City of the Spider Queen and RttToEE, with two different DMs.

I find that the role-playing has degenerated into a war game. I feel that this is due to the fact that both DMs force the players to force their PCs to care about motivations that were forced upon them.

Translation: the PCs are being railroaded.



I don't really know how this can be fixed. By definition, the PCs can "leave" the boundaries of the module, but as soon as they do, the players have to drag them right back, or else the module ends (or the players have to make new characters).

This means that all of the PCs must have the unrealistic motivation of "defeat hordes of bad guys" and "clear out the dungeon" in order to stay within the confines of the module.

Motivations that a real person (and by extension a 3-dimensional character) cares about such as "start a business" or "find a spouse" or "run for city council" or "buy a house" do not generally exist without the extensive tweaking that other DMs in this post have done.



So yeah, modules, in general, suck, not because of any lack of quality, but because of the inherent format of a module.

 

[MerricB]

Modules don't suck. Players suck. They don't take the obvious path through the module, thus causing them to resent the DM for showing them the right way.

More seriously, Modules don't suck, but some modules don't suck more than others. The style of DMing and playing also has a lot to do with it. I recently ran Feast of Goblyns - a Ravenloft module - and the players had a ball with it. Why? Because I allowed them to go beyond the strict parameters of the module. (Actually, they weren't all that strict!)

Any premade adventure (and this includes the ones the DM does in his home) has this problem - if the PCs decide to leave the prepared boundaries of the adventure, the DM must improvise.

Cheers!

 

[ConcreteBuddha]

Modules don't suck. Players suck. They don't take the obvious path through the module, thus causing them to resent the DM for showing them the right way.

Nowhere in my post did I make the point that players don't suck.

Any premade adventure (and this includes the ones the DM does in his home) has this problem - if the PCs decide to leave the prepared boundaries of the adventure, the DM must improvise.

Cheers!

The point being that a DM-made adventure is already bounded by the PCs (because a DM knows his players), whereas a module is not.

Also, when the PCs do leave the boundries of a DM-made adventure (which generally aren't geared towards leveling a character 3 or more levels), the DM can spend a week to come up with a logical, consistent, adventure using those new boundries. A DM running a module does not have that capability without chucking the whole storyline.

("I paid 30 bucks for that module! And you guys screwed it up! Make new characters, I'm gonna keep running RttToEE until I get my money's worth!")

 

[Calico_Jack73]

One of my favorite adventures of all time was a module... A Paladin in Hell to be precise. I personally like modules as they give the DM more time to concentrate on fluff and filler for the adventure rather than the overall plot. I am NOT a big fan of running modules with a bunch of "grey boxed text" to read to the players... that sounds canned.