Classic Dungeons: all of them to exist in the new edition

[howandwhy99]

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Please explain... I don't have any of the 'Expedition to___' if that's what you are referring to. And if it is, what did they do?

And FWIW, if the classics aren't brought back to life in 4E, then they won't be classics much longer. As people my age and older leave the game, so will the memories of those classics... unless new players are given the opportunity to experience them in 4E.

Actually, I change my mind. I've been reading Expedition to Greyhawk Ruins and that has some of the best dungeons around, but with a plotline and poor transitons. Queen of the Demonweb Pits has a plot added too. Undermountain and Ravenloft thankfully don't, but I would still get the old modules just for the contiguous maps.

The Tomb of Horrors and White Plume Mountain conversions by WotC hold true to the originals.

Edited:

I guess that's just how things were back then. It having no overall plot elements aside from "There's stuff in there, let's go in", is really limited imho.

Limited how? Limited is the forced plot codified into gauntlet dungeons as too much of GH Ruins was made into. Plots are for NPCs, not PCs. Limiting is having your choices, your goals, your successes and failures, your impact on the world, all predetermined by your DM.

Players control the PCs, DMs control the NPCs. You can do everything you could do in the real world, but it's a fun, danger-filled imaginary world. No one has written a story for you to force you down it. That doesn't fit the definition of a game.

 

[Maggan]

I think it is cool that the people at WotC have the guts to express opinions about the game, both the past, the present and the future.

And he's not saying that it's not D&D. He's saying it's not D&D to him. And many have the same feeling. Just because it was part of the genesis of the game, doesn't make every bit and piece feel like D&D to everyone.

As a tangent, I have noticed that comments like those in the article generate a lot of talk about the new edition. A lot of exposure. A lot of free advertising. Since I have difficulties imagining that the people at WotC don't realise how every word they say is subject to intense scrutiny for heresy, I've come to the conclusion that they are playing the crowd like a fine-tuned violin.

/M

 

[Rechan]

No, that's not really the intent at all. It really varied on the module. But largely most modules of the "classic-era" certainly had protagonists who had not-so-healthy designs on the friendly inhabitants of the local environs, but the modules (mostly) didn't come out and say "ZOMG! ZOMG! BAD GUY! GUNNA DO BAD THINGS! IT GONNA HAPPEN LIEK DIS N' DIS N' DIS! YOU DM! YOU CHUT UP!!! YOU JUST MAKE MOD-OOL GO! YOU HAVE PEECEES TO STOP THEM N' DEY STOP 'EM LIEK DIS N' DIS N' DIS N' DIS!!!1111eleventy-one!"

Calm down there, fella. I never got that impression from modules these days.

And usually I plan an entire campaign in advance, so re-writing hooks and such has never been an issue; I just plan for their integration.

 

[Rechan]

Limited how? Limited is the forced plot codified into gauntlet dungeons as too much of GH Ruins was made into. Plots are for NPCs, not PCs.

Well yeah. I thought we were talking about NPCs. What are you talking about with regards to PCs? I don't see this in today's modules?

 

[Prince of Happiness]

Calm down there, fella. I never got that impression from modules these days.

And usually I plan an entire campaign in advance, so re-writing hooks and such has never been an issue; I just plan for their integration.

No, I'm cool, I'm just being my oddassed-self. I dig both "styles" of module (plot-heavy & plot-light) a lot anyways, but I like the more open-ended modules for the players that I was used to having around that would go just about everywhere but where you planned for them to go.

 

[Branduil]

Of course, Expedition To The Barrier Peaks was obviously written by some sci-fi obsessed hack with no understanding of what D&D was about.

Oh, wait, that was Gary Gygax, who only CREATED THE GAME!

What's that you say, there was a certain Dave Arneson also involved in creating the game, and who even had the first D&D campaign ever? Surely he didn't approve of the way Gygax distorted D&D by introducing sci-fi elements?

I'm sure he would have been outraged if not for the freakin' aliens, lasers and starships in his Blackmoor setting.

Somehow, I think the game's creators knew a little more about D&D than anybody mucking with it now.

Well, fortunately, the game has since moved away from such disconcerting elements, for the most part.

 

[Rechan]

I like the more open-ended modules for the players that I was used to having around that would go just about everywhere but where you planned for them to go.

Guess it's just different style. I've never had PCs just decide "We're leaving this country and just going Elsewhere!" I always end up with the unmotivated schlubs that wait for the plot to hit them in the face and then wander behind it.

 

[Prince of Happiness]

Guess it's just different style. I've never had PCs just decide "We're leaving this country and just going Elsewhere!" I always end up with the unmotivated schlubs that wait for the plot to hit them in the face and then wander behind it.

I'd get a mix, and I'm six of one, half-dozen of the other myself. Maybe it's too much Morrowind* for me.






*Oh noes! Video games!

 

[howandwhy99]

Well yeah. I thought we were talking about NPCs. What are you talking about with regards to PCs? I don't see this in today's modules?

Really? I have over 200 modules for 3e and most include little synopses at the front detailing the order of events for PCs. The Players, not the DMs' NPCs. NPC plans are usually given in the background.

Background is typically where NPC plots were in older modules too. Sometimes they didn't even have that. The DM was expected to devise both strategy and tactics for NPCs just as the Players were their characters. (it's an old wargaming standard I guess) These publications were called modules so they could modularly fit into your campaign world. I actually wouldn't mind some more detailed NPC plots in published games, but the whole status quo railroading of PCs in most is a 2E perversion that needs to go. It's making Players listless in a dynamic entertainment where they make the choices not the movie director/author. Not only that, it's making players believe TTRPGs are the same as computer "RPG"s... without the computer to do the math for you of course.

NWN is a good example. It's not even close to D&D, yet, because railroading is the new tradition, it is believed to be so.

 

[Rechan]

Really? I have over 200 modules for 3e and most include little synopses at the front detailing the order of events for PCs.

Eh?

You mean "Y happens in response to the players doing X"?

Because I see no way you could have a published adventure without assuming certain things happen, unless it's just a gauntlet of rooms full of unrelated monsters and traps.