frankthedm
First Post
A hearty "Meh!" for this one.
-
NOW LIVE! Into the Woods--new character species, eerie monsters, and haunting villains to populate the woodlands of your D&D games.
Castle Caldwell and Beyond - your experiences?
- Thread starter Quasqueton
- Start date
Now that this is available via the D&D classics PDFs:
This is one of the WORST adventures ever published. The only redeeming feature is its brevity and price, which means that even though it is terrible and a complete waste, at least it isn't like you had to pay $20 for it, or have to read through some 50+ pages. I would easily put this in a worst 10 of all time category... certainly worse than the dreck that came out in the d20 glut of 2001-2004.
Reasoning:
The adventures are insulting to players and DM. Nothing makes any sense. It is a random monster bash for no reason.
Someone buys a castle and finds it is filled with monsters? The castle is a donut shape... a ring of rooms. The party goes from room to room in a big loop, fighing random monsters, with no rhyme or reason. There is a locked door that cannot be opened no matter what... until the party completes clearing the first level, at which point they can go to the second level, for a rinse-repeat.
Absolute garbage.
* I'd put the "Marco Volo" trilogy from 2E in the top 10 worst as well. That trilogy had some very entertaining writing, but the "adventures" are a case-study in crappy design. In that trilogy, the party has to be a chauffer to the npc "Marco Volo" who gets all of the action and all of the best dialog. The party follows long while the NPC do everything. So Castle Caldwell isn't crap in the sense that the players are reduced to passive observers for the DM showboating, but castle caldwell is crap in the sense that it makes no sense and the "plot" is stupid.
This is one of the WORST adventures ever published. The only redeeming feature is its brevity and price, which means that even though it is terrible and a complete waste, at least it isn't like you had to pay $20 for it, or have to read through some 50+ pages. I would easily put this in a worst 10 of all time category... certainly worse than the dreck that came out in the d20 glut of 2001-2004.
Reasoning:
The adventures are insulting to players and DM. Nothing makes any sense. It is a random monster bash for no reason.
Someone buys a castle and finds it is filled with monsters? The castle is a donut shape... a ring of rooms. The party goes from room to room in a big loop, fighing random monsters, with no rhyme or reason. There is a locked door that cannot be opened no matter what... until the party completes clearing the first level, at which point they can go to the second level, for a rinse-repeat.
Absolute garbage.
* I'd put the "Marco Volo" trilogy from 2E in the top 10 worst as well. That trilogy had some very entertaining writing, but the "adventures" are a case-study in crappy design. In that trilogy, the party has to be a chauffer to the npc "Marco Volo" who gets all of the action and all of the best dialog. The party follows long while the NPC do everything. So Castle Caldwell isn't crap in the sense that the players are reduced to passive observers for the DM showboating, but castle caldwell is crap in the sense that it makes no sense and the "plot" is stupid.
Last edited:
sabrinathecat
Explorer
Oh, there were worse modules... Much, much worse. One I don't remember the name of was a solo, do-it-yourself mod where you had to use the special marker to make the invisible ink show up as you went through. Terrible, terrible gimmik, and a worse story.
So yeah, not great.
Not too terrible.
I ran it a couple of times. That was before college, and 2nd edition took over.
So yeah, not great.
Not too terrible.
I ran it a couple of times. That was before college, and 2nd edition took over.
Lanefan
Victoria Rules
Funny that this ancient thread rears its ugly head right now: I've a friend who just dropped the puck on a Basic D&D campaign - using this as his first adventure.
Which might be the best place for it in a long campaign, come to think of it - most campaigns don't have much (or any) developed plot in their first adventure, which means a good old makes-no-sense monster bash could fit in well as a jumping-off point. It gives the party (and the players, if they don't know each other going in) a chance to size each other up and gain some xp and wealth, and the plot can figure itself out later.
Lanefan
Which might be the best place for it in a long campaign, come to think of it - most campaigns don't have much (or any) developed plot in their first adventure, which means a good old makes-no-sense monster bash could fit in well as a jumping-off point. It gives the party (and the players, if they don't know each other going in) a chance to size each other up and gain some xp and wealth, and the plot can figure itself out later.
Lanefan
frankthedm
First Post
It took a bunch of adventures, clipped out large chunks of content and context leaving behind a book of bare bones dungeons. It was the first material I ever ran for D&D and while I did a poor job, the book's one savings grace was it swiftly made me realize it is important for running a game to add content and context to any canned adventure.
truth...
Deuce Traveler
Adventurer
This was one of my first adventure modules picked up when I was little. Yes, it's not very good but it did teach me to think a little outside of the box as a 10-year old player. For instance, meeting a friendly monster in the form of a living statue, and the game allowing me to improvise weapons with workout weights. In the hindsight of twenty-six years I now have to agree that the module is not worth spending any cash on, and there are many more modules from this era that are better for BECMI DnD. I still love that cover, though.
I actually ran the first part of this recently; my year-and-a-half old AD&D campaign had an influx of new players (with a few older ones unavailable), and I needed a short adventure. So, I downloaded Castle Caldwell and ran them through the first level of the adventure.
Interestingly, the adventure states that it's for a group of 4-8 characters of levels 1-3. I had a group of eight players, most of 1st or 2nd level but a couple of henchmen from the older players at levels 3-4. The first level is *not* designed for a group that large. The largest group of monsters are four goblins!
Of course, most of the rooms are empty of anything interesting. I'm greatly amused by the boxed text, which often states, "The room appears empty", emphasis mine. Some have something hidden, most don't.
We had a couple of thieves in the group (both new players), and they had a lot of fun climbing up to windows (from which they spotted a pair of wolves, which the druid then befriended) and listening at doors. I let them make most of the rolls; it was more than the poor magic-users in the party got to do.
Unusually, it wasn't devoid of role-playing: there are three traders, who I used mostly as comic relief, and a talking statue, which completely confused the party, as it would only talk to Lawful characters. I don't know if anyone actually has an alignment in the group, but as most of the people talking to the statue were thieves, it wouldn't talk to them, although it did answer questions of the wizard!
A couple of weeks later (which was this Saturday), once again I found myself with eight players for AD&D... four new and four old. As a result, we played through the dungeon level of the castle. We finished it in 3 hours (like the previous part), which gives you an idea of how light it is, but quite perfect for this session. Once again, monster numbers were small, but this time I added to them somewhat. The doppleganger was hilarious, as a particularly naive wizard decided to go with him, whilst the rest of the group looked on, hoping to see something entertaining. Alas, one of the new thieves sneaked along behind - rolling the low move silently chance(!) - and was able to save him. Sigh. The doppleganger, at least, put up more of a fight. Particularly once the magic-user of the group (another new player), put half the group to sleep. Yes, four of them. And dopplegangers are immune to sleep spells. Too much fun!
When the dungeon is fairly dull, I can generally rely on my players to liven things up!
The biggest problem with Castle Caldwell and its dungeon is that it just doesn't make much sense. Why is the there a teleporter to a crypt in the dungeon? Why is there a stupid password phrase to get out? I'm a big fan of fun-house dungeons, but they generally have the advantage of being fun!
Interestingly, the adventure states that it's for a group of 4-8 characters of levels 1-3. I had a group of eight players, most of 1st or 2nd level but a couple of henchmen from the older players at levels 3-4. The first level is *not* designed for a group that large. The largest group of monsters are four goblins!
Of course, most of the rooms are empty of anything interesting. I'm greatly amused by the boxed text, which often states, "The room appears empty", emphasis mine. Some have something hidden, most don't.
We had a couple of thieves in the group (both new players), and they had a lot of fun climbing up to windows (from which they spotted a pair of wolves, which the druid then befriended) and listening at doors. I let them make most of the rolls; it was more than the poor magic-users in the party got to do.
Unusually, it wasn't devoid of role-playing: there are three traders, who I used mostly as comic relief, and a talking statue, which completely confused the party, as it would only talk to Lawful characters. I don't know if anyone actually has an alignment in the group, but as most of the people talking to the statue were thieves, it wouldn't talk to them, although it did answer questions of the wizard!
A couple of weeks later (which was this Saturday), once again I found myself with eight players for AD&D... four new and four old. As a result, we played through the dungeon level of the castle. We finished it in 3 hours (like the previous part), which gives you an idea of how light it is, but quite perfect for this session. Once again, monster numbers were small, but this time I added to them somewhat. The doppleganger was hilarious, as a particularly naive wizard decided to go with him, whilst the rest of the group looked on, hoping to see something entertaining. Alas, one of the new thieves sneaked along behind - rolling the low move silently chance(!) - and was able to save him. Sigh. The doppleganger, at least, put up more of a fight. Particularly once the magic-user of the group (another new player), put half the group to sleep. Yes, four of them. And dopplegangers are immune to sleep spells. Too much fun!
When the dungeon is fairly dull, I can generally rely on my players to liven things up!
The biggest problem with Castle Caldwell and its dungeon is that it just doesn't make much sense. Why is the there a teleporter to a crypt in the dungeon? Why is there a stupid password phrase to get out? I'm a big fan of fun-house dungeons, but they generally have the advantage of being fun!
Wish I'd seen this thread before I ran 'Clearing of Castle Caldwell' last year. It was appalling, dull, terrible adventure. One of the worst maps and monster collections ever.
Though I did run "The Rescue of Princess Sylvia" using 4e rules a few years ago, and that was actually ok. Not great, but passable.
Though I did run "The Rescue of Princess Sylvia" using 4e rules a few years ago, and that was actually ok. Not great, but passable.
Similar Threads
