Are ready made adventures like The Shackled City worth buying?

[Shellman]

Are ready made adventures like The Shackled City worth buying and running as a DM?

The last time I ever ran a ready made adventure (about 5 years ago) neither my players or myself were really into the story so we bailed on it and started a new campaigm. I ask the question because I have been looking at The Shackled City adventure path and wonder if it is worth buying the book.

Any comments from players and DM's who have played the adventure path would be greatly appreciated.

 

[HellHound]

95% of the games I run are from published modules.

You just have to be picky and I have no problem not running the ones I don't like, or modifying them slightly to suit my party.

Everyone loved the Shackled City in my group.

 

[JoeGKushner]

I'm getting ready to start Shackled City this Tuesday. First session will probably be me going over some house rules, action points and some other stuff, as well as approval of character creation, since I allow a lot of stuff into the game.

 

[Xombie Master]

I recently purchased WLD, and it has been fun. My reason for doing so is twofold. A) I just got a new job and have little time to work on the three to four games I was previously able to plan. B) My friends have all become Jaded, so I wanted to go back to basics and play a good dungeon crawl like when we were all 13-15 and all we cared about was killing monsters and moving on to the next room. So far it seems like it might end up being the best thing we've played in a long long time.

 

[IronWolf]

I played the intro to Shackled City over PBeM and it was a fun adventure. I think both the Adventure Paths look like good fun from what I have seen so far. As DM you can always tweak it a little one way or another to help it tie into a world you are running it in a little better to add the level of detail you want.

 

[Ryltar]

I purchased Shackled City with the premise that I'd modify it and integrate it into my own campaign. Thus far, it's working like a charm, because the "Cauldron" setting can easily be adapted to other cities, realms, or even planes. You just have to switch around a few details, but it's a lot less work than designing a campaign from scratch. I can't recommend the SCHC enough.

 

[JoeBlank]

I bought WLD as a novelty item, and could not resist running it. My players are having a good time too.

It seems I am sold on the campaign-in-a-book idea, and may keep going that route. Previously, I would try to squeeze published adventures into an ongoing campaign. I've found that works better for low level play, but it seemed more difficult to me at higher levels.

Slavelords of Cydonia just arrived, and I am tempted to run it too. However, it is more of a campaign framework, with the specifics less spelled out. I need to strengthen my DMing skills a little before I run it.

I have several of the Shackled City issues of Dungeon, but missed the start of it. I might pick up the book at some point, but I am more interested in Age of Worms, the new adventure path.

 

[Desdichado]

You can find more discussion on this issue on this thread started one day earlier.

 

[Quickbeam]

Yes.

I'm running "Age of Worms" for our group right now, and will probably purchase "Shackled City" to be run at a later date. The content is great and there's no reason that personal creative flair cannot be inserted into such campaigns. The real benefit IMHO is that folks with limited time are still able to run fantastic games for their groups without spending all of their free time preparing for the sessions.

 

[delericho]

Are ready made adventures like The Shackled City worth buying and running as a DM?

The answer is a qualified yes.

I ran the Shackled City from the magazines, which took 11 months from start to finish, with roughly one session a week. In that time, the amount of preparation time I had to dedicate to running the game was cut from about 3 hours a week to about 1 hour a week. So, that's a saving of about 88 hours of my (very limited) time. That being the case, the investment of $60 (the cost of the hardcover IIRC) is a no-brainer.

And that doesn't even take into account the facts that the game was better prepared, and ran more smoothly than a lot of my campaigns, and that we ended the campaign with me jazzed about the prospect of running another game. (Just in time to move house, and find myself in a gaming group with plenty of DMs )

I can't recommend the Shackled City highly enough.

As regards the question of published adventures in general, rather than campaign books like the Shackled City in particular, I would again say they're generally worthwhile. If nothing else, a published adventure is likely to give you a cool villain and a couple of set-piece encounters you can steal. With the heavily math-oriented approach of 3e, that's extremely valuable. Additionally, a published adventure can sometimes make the difference between a harried DM having something to run for a few weeks, and having to call off the game. That being the case, a subscription to Dungeon is something that every DM should probably consider.

However, it is worth noting that published adventures (and particularly the campaign books) are only worthwhile if you're actually going to get some use out of them. I can't justify spending $100 (or equivalent) on World's Largest Dungeon if I'm not going to use it, or buying the Drow War series for it to sit on a shelf. For a small module, that's no big deal. For an issue of Dungeon, it's also not really a problem - there will almost certainly be something I can use, and even if there's not it's only a few dollars.