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Blizzard Pass - your experiences?

Blizzard Pass

Just joined ENWorld and came across the "Classic Dungeon Memories" page, and what memories they have brought up! I've had great fun reading through everyone's dungeon reflections throughout the various modules.

I decided to comment on this adventure as no one has any firm memories about it, or at least memories that jibe with my memories.

This particular adventure was the first in TSRs Invisible Ink Series, which I believe lasted for only two modules--Blizzard Pass and The Maze of the Riddling Minotaur. Both were solo adventures designed so the player couldn't "cheat" by reading passages beforehand (and thus avoiding the the traps and conflicts that were difficult). So, the invisible ink pen was used.

And, like some others have said, the darn pen dried up before the adventure could be completed. And, like others have said, through the miracles of the internet you can download the entire text of the adventure, and worry no more about the dreaded pens.

On to the adventure (and I'm going on 20 year-old memories here). You play a character that has been wrongly accused of murder. At the start of the module, you are running away from a mob hellbent on your lynching. Running for your life, you escape your would-be captors in one of a long line of wagons making up a caravan.

Tucked away neatly under a pile of pelts you wait it out and hope for the best (i.e. making necessary saving rolls).

Soon, a wintry storm slams and batters the caravan and through the blinding blizzard some nasty, stooped creatures appear. Was there a fight here? I can't remember, but eventually you're taken prisoner and placed in a cell within a set of caves.

First, you must find a way to escape the cell, then make your way out of the caves to freedom. Along the way, you will fight troglodytes, kobolds, and a creature that resembles an overgrown frog with some kind of special ability or magical power, while discovering the stereotypical evil mage residing within the hillside and his nefarious plans for world conquest (or maybe it was just city conquest).

Really, this wasn't a bad adventure. I recall enjoying it as a 15-16 year old that was fairly new to RPG. The combat system was different than normal D&D. You had to use the pen to ink-out a certain number of squares, and within these blocks you were instructed whether you hit or missed your prey (Yes, TSR thought you would even cheat on the die-rolls, apparently).

It was straight-forward standard fantasy gaming fare, and worth a couple of hours of investment of time if you had nothing else to do.
 

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What I found most interesting about this module is that the group adventure in the back featured a main villain who was a cleric known as "The Master." Another D&D module (two, actually), X4 and X5, both featured an evil cleric known as "The Master" and his plot to take over the western nations. Both X5 and M1 (and possibly X4, I don't recall) were written by David Cook.

Coincidence? I think not...
 


Had that one in german 18 years back or so, and I remember it being fun, but no real details. Except that it didn't come with some kind of ink pen. All the "invisible" text was simply overlaid by a red box, and you got a red foil with it to be able to read the text beneath the red box. :cool:
 

Olgar Shiverstone said:
I found the group adventure to be a fun side trek, but the solo module lacked replayability once the pen dried up. Still have it, though -- anyone have a good pen?
about 5 years ago i asked this same question on the TSR boards.

i got a bunch of interesting recipes to try. but none of them worked. :(
 

This was actually one of the first modules that we ever played (the group version, not the solo), I think the first I ran. Despite the fact that it was fairly short, the players never did make it through. All in all, it has nostalgia value for me but otherwise wouldn't be that memorable.
 

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