Zardnaar
Legend
Best Adventures Including Dungeon+ 3PP
1st Place 3E
This is a surprising placing for me, I thought 3E would tend towards the middle. Its also a huge jump from near the bottom. The reason is Dungeon really was that damn good in this era along with 3pp gems from publishers like Necromancer Games (now Frog God). Dungeon also went monthly in this era and this was also peak Paizo in terms of quality with 2 great APs. Each issue of Dungeon usually had a really good adventure and you could probably find half a dozen good to great adventures per year as not every issue was a hit. The remaining adventures were also often decent with very few if any meh ones published. There was also a lot of variety and originality to go along with the quality.
2nd Place Pathfinder
Early Pathfinder they were on fire from late Dungeon. Unfortunately quality did decline as the adventures went from genric D&D type adventures to support the latest Pathfinder splat book. However quality never really tanked the more average adventures are often on par with the more average adventures from 5E. Much like 3E they had a great amount of original and innovative adventures, And while individual APs were often mixed individual components were often very good and those components add up to a lot of good adventures. Throw in Frog God Games and Kobold Press which have converted a few adventures to 5E and yeah.
3rd Place 1E
A lot of 1E adventures tend to pop up in top 20 and top 30 lists. A lot are true gem but a few have not aged well and probably say more about the people voting in the polls and brand awareness than the actual quality. They also tend to be dungeon hacks. Innovative 1E adventures did turn up in early Dungeon magazine and there are a lot of great adventures there as well in early Dungeon.
4th Place 2E AD&D
Most of the great 2E adventures are in Dungeon Magazine and some have turned up in the modern era such as the Mud Sorcerers Tomb. Others such as the Mere of Dead Men are prototype modern AP linked adventures. At some points of 2Es run though Dungeon while not bad was trying to support to many settings especially from 1992-1996 hence why I put 3E and 1E above it. While The Shackled City is usually regarded as the 1st modern AP (level 1-20), adventures like The Night Below are more like late Pathfinder and 5E (level 1-10 to 14 or so). 2E adventures are not as well known and are overshadoweed by more than a few bad ones.
5th Place 5E
There is no Dungeon anymore but there is a lot of pp and the DMGuild for 5E. Official WoTC adventures are a bit all over the place with really only 4-5 adventures I would count as a real hit. Some people might like Dragon Heist or SKT or whatever and they're not bad but they are on par with adventures like City of the SPider Queen from 3E or some of the OK Pathfinder APs. Not bad but not great. The Kobolds, Frog God Games are often converting stuff as well. To many derivitive adventures of mixed quality and the best stuff both in house and 3pp is actually converted or derived from previous editions and Pathfinder (TFtYP, GoS, Quests of Doom, the APs).
6th place BECMI
BECMI has some good and great adventures, but there is just not that many of them. Dungeon makes this even worse as that magazine was more AD&D focused but several good adventures pop up in its pages for BECMI but its a relative handful. A fairly good ratio of hits to misses just not enough of them.
7th Place 4E
When you can only find 2-3 maybe good adventures you have a problem. Dungeon and 3pp doesn't make this much better if you're lucky you might find half a dozen. To put this in perspective though you can take a slice of 2E run any year. Dungeon would do 6 issues with 4-6 adventures. You're probably looking at around 30 adventures in a year and you oculd probably find half a dozen good adventures in any one year. During Paizos run they had 12 issues a year but often only 4 adventures or so. Once again though in any year you can probably find more good adventures than 4Es entire run. 4E also had Dungeon but they are really really bad which was very evident after peak Paizos efforts in Savage Tide and later Dungeons.
So one of my least favorite editions wins the number 1 spot based on a few posts here reminding me what that edition actually had.
1st Place 3E
This is a surprising placing for me, I thought 3E would tend towards the middle. Its also a huge jump from near the bottom. The reason is Dungeon really was that damn good in this era along with 3pp gems from publishers like Necromancer Games (now Frog God). Dungeon also went monthly in this era and this was also peak Paizo in terms of quality with 2 great APs. Each issue of Dungeon usually had a really good adventure and you could probably find half a dozen good to great adventures per year as not every issue was a hit. The remaining adventures were also often decent with very few if any meh ones published. There was also a lot of variety and originality to go along with the quality.
2nd Place Pathfinder
Early Pathfinder they were on fire from late Dungeon. Unfortunately quality did decline as the adventures went from genric D&D type adventures to support the latest Pathfinder splat book. However quality never really tanked the more average adventures are often on par with the more average adventures from 5E. Much like 3E they had a great amount of original and innovative adventures, And while individual APs were often mixed individual components were often very good and those components add up to a lot of good adventures. Throw in Frog God Games and Kobold Press which have converted a few adventures to 5E and yeah.
3rd Place 1E
A lot of 1E adventures tend to pop up in top 20 and top 30 lists. A lot are true gem but a few have not aged well and probably say more about the people voting in the polls and brand awareness than the actual quality. They also tend to be dungeon hacks. Innovative 1E adventures did turn up in early Dungeon magazine and there are a lot of great adventures there as well in early Dungeon.
4th Place 2E AD&D
Most of the great 2E adventures are in Dungeon Magazine and some have turned up in the modern era such as the Mud Sorcerers Tomb. Others such as the Mere of Dead Men are prototype modern AP linked adventures. At some points of 2Es run though Dungeon while not bad was trying to support to many settings especially from 1992-1996 hence why I put 3E and 1E above it. While The Shackled City is usually regarded as the 1st modern AP (level 1-20), adventures like The Night Below are more like late Pathfinder and 5E (level 1-10 to 14 or so). 2E adventures are not as well known and are overshadoweed by more than a few bad ones.
5th Place 5E
There is no Dungeon anymore but there is a lot of pp and the DMGuild for 5E. Official WoTC adventures are a bit all over the place with really only 4-5 adventures I would count as a real hit. Some people might like Dragon Heist or SKT or whatever and they're not bad but they are on par with adventures like City of the SPider Queen from 3E or some of the OK Pathfinder APs. Not bad but not great. The Kobolds, Frog God Games are often converting stuff as well. To many derivitive adventures of mixed quality and the best stuff both in house and 3pp is actually converted or derived from previous editions and Pathfinder (TFtYP, GoS, Quests of Doom, the APs).
6th place BECMI
BECMI has some good and great adventures, but there is just not that many of them. Dungeon makes this even worse as that magazine was more AD&D focused but several good adventures pop up in its pages for BECMI but its a relative handful. A fairly good ratio of hits to misses just not enough of them.
7th Place 4E
When you can only find 2-3 maybe good adventures you have a problem. Dungeon and 3pp doesn't make this much better if you're lucky you might find half a dozen. To put this in perspective though you can take a slice of 2E run any year. Dungeon would do 6 issues with 4-6 adventures. You're probably looking at around 30 adventures in a year and you oculd probably find half a dozen good adventures in any one year. During Paizos run they had 12 issues a year but often only 4 adventures or so. Once again though in any year you can probably find more good adventures than 4Es entire run. 4E also had Dungeon but they are really really bad which was very evident after peak Paizos efforts in Savage Tide and later Dungeons.
So one of my least favorite editions wins the number 1 spot based on a few posts here reminding me what that edition actually had.
