OD&D Best Classic Adventures?

[Marc_C]

Presuming that AD&D 2E isn't too recent to be considered a "classic," I'll say that I think Lisa Smedman's S5 The Dancing Hut of Baba Yaga (affiliate link) is a superb adventure. The backdrop is fascinating for what it presumes (e.g. that various forces - such as Day, Night, and Twilight - have incarnations that can be interacted with), the adventure is thrilling for its scope (the Hut is "funhouse" dungeon, but with its own underlying theme), and Baba Yaga herself is an awe-inspiring character. I honestly can't recommend this one enough.

As per the EnWorld categories 2e is not Classic OD&D. For me if it has THAC0 (or combat matrix) and Saves VS Death, then it's Classic. ;-)

 

[Shakeshift]

I enjoyed Palace of the Silver Princess (B3) and Rahasia as low-level adventures with good art and a decent storyline. I also enjoyed Against the Cult of the Reptile God.

 

[John R Davis]

Starstone by northern sages is my absolute favourite adventure for the early 80s

 

[TerraDave]

I have it for 5e. But I don't think this group of players particularly likes megadungeons.
Do megadungeons even work in Basic/OSR? Like, I would think the entire game mechanic of combat, rest, recovery would breakdown very quickly.

You have a base of operations and go back and forth. City of Greyhawk, Dungeon of Greyhawk. This is combined with strategic play and growing magical resources, used strategically. And the occasional camping.

For less mega-dungeons there may also be special features. Castle Amber has a built in recovery mechanic. Hidden Shrine of Tamochan has poison gas that puts the players on a clock to not linger. White Plume may trap the characters' inside. Lost City has friendly factions, Temple of Elemental Evil less friendly factions, but these can all aid the party.

 

[TerraDave]

I'm seeing a lot of suggestions for AD&D adventures (which I'm not opposed to), but is there any guidance on how to scale down the power level of AD&D to BECMI? (Or to scale "up" the characters?)

I'm worried that low-level Basic characters would be devoured by Temple of Elemental Evil.

B...and often X...characters are super squishy.

Back in the day there had to be a lot of fudging to keep new characters alive.

There are also some style issues. Hommlet and Saltmarsh have various details to say "this is advanced". You can still cross-reference the AD&D books while using them, but may not want to. (They can also both be pretty deadly for AD&D characters).

Honestly, the single best adventure for your purposes is probably Lost City. It has allies and non-combat challenges from the start, and characters should actually gain levels in the adventure, so they can handle the finally.

Of course, you started this thread some time ago, so it may be moot.

 

[TerraDave]

Best not mentioned yet is the Baba Yaga's Hut from Dragon magazine. Incredible, and its certainly old school, by any definition.

Honorable mention, which I did not see--but maybe missed--is The Forgotten Temple of Tharizdun.


Don't send basic characters into either.

 

[jhingelshod]

In 5e I've run a number of old adventures.

N1 Against the Cult of the Reptile God
U1 Sinister Secrets of Saltmarsh
B2 The Keep on the Borderlands
B7 Rahasia
B10 Night's Dark Terror
UK2 The Sentinel
UK3 The Gauntlet
X1 Isle of Dread
X2 Castle Amber
X4 Master of the Desert Nomads
X5 Temple of Death

I'd run all of them again. B7 was the weakest but B10 was far an away the best adventure I've ever run. There isn't even a close second. There's a huge amount of play packed in those 64 pages and it took the party a number of sessions to complete.

I ran B10 Night's Dark Terror using SPI's Dragonquest rules and it was one of the best modules we ever played.

 

[John R Davis]

I ran B10 Night's Dark Terror using SPI's Dragonquest rules and it was one of the best modules we ever played.

And my first and fav rules set

 

[Hex08]

U1 - The Sinister Secret of Saltmarsh (I recently ran this last year using Castles & Crusades)
T1-4 - The Temple of Elemental Evil
G1-3 - Against the Giants (I ran this a few years ago, also using Castles & Crusades. I regret not doing the whole GDQ1-7 Queen of the Spiders)
B2 - Keep on Borderlands

 

[Casimir Liber]

I recently DMed Against the Cult of the Reptile God and scaled it up to starting level 3rd-ish (much better than handicapping last encounter). Players enjoyed it. I enjoyed DMing it. Lots of nice colour maps online.