D&D 5E If you've run Keep on the Borderlands (in any edition)...

[Mouseferatu]

...what, if anything, did you decide is down the long, rock-filled passage?

You know what I'm talking about. A passageway near the Shrine of Chaos that's been filled in by a massive collapse. While a later source (maybe it was Return to the Keep?) implied that it led to Quasqueton (of In Search of the Unknown fame), that came long, long after the original.

Did you just not bother, and figure you'd work it out if/when it mattered? Or did you actually put something interesting on the other side (whether or not your PCs ever actually found it)?

(And were there any other official hints of what it might be, scattered anywhere? Other than the one I mentioned?)

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

I don't know that it ever came up, and we ran the bejesus out of B2 back in the day. Putting B1 down there is cute, but doesn't feel like it fits, since B1 is supposed to be a hiding place for adventurers' treasure, and not connected to a gumbo of humanoid tribes.

 

[Gilladian]

In one game a friend ran, the tunnel was cleared and in active use by a slaver group that was using the humanoid tribes to get their merchandise.

 

[Iosue]

In my game it led to another entrance to the Caves of the Unknown, for which I designed my own dungeon.

 

[steeldragons]

I've never run it like this, and it would take some ever so slight adjustment [D&D-to-AD&D], but it sprang to mind it could be a great entry (after some distance of uneventful underground journey) to connect to the crystal cave (of Beyond the Crystal Cave)...just that it's a crystal filled cavern instead of a cave.

Turns out the "cave-in" was intentional...but not from the Caves of Chaos side, from the faye creatures'/Crystal Cave's side to keep the evil humanoids from finding/destroying the Green Man's magical realm.

 

[Hriston]

I'm planning on using some of the ideas in this document wotc put out for the playtest:

media.wizards.com/downloads/dnd/DnD_Next_ReturnCavesChaos.pdf

The idea is that the caved-in area leads to an abandoned dwarf-mine that was intentionally blocked to keep the invading humanoids from getting their hands on the dwarves' gold. The dwarves, of course had delved too deep and opened a crypt full of undead, even more powerful than those in the Shrine of Evil Chaos, forcing them to abandon the mine. I was thinking that this would bring the PCs even closer to the source of necrotic energy that the cultists are exploiting to raise their army of undead, some sort of rift to the negative material plane, perhaps in the form of an artifact.

 

[Hriston]

As for Quasqueton, Return to the Keep on the Borderlands has it on the wilderness map where the original B2 has the Caves of the Unknown, but I don't think there's any indication that the rock-filled passage leads there from the Caves of Chaos. I'm thinking that I'm going to use B1 there as well.

 

[Mouseferatu]

*flips through module(

Okay, I sort of misremembered. The original doesn't say the passage does go to the Caves of the Unknown. It says it can if the DM wants.

 

[Mouseferatu]

Oh, interesting. In "Return," it's actually labeled as a passageway to Quasqueton. And the cave-in's gone.

I was wondering why the idea was stuck so firmly in my mind...

Although that said, the thing marked on the map (and to which the tunnel leads) is actually only a barrow that contains the entry to a passageway leading to Quasqueton, not Quasqueton itself. And that passage is still blocked by rocks.

Yeesh.

 

[Hriston]

Oh, interesting. In "Return," it's actually labeled as a passageway to Quasqueton. And the cave-in's gone.

I was wondering why the idea was stuck so firmly in my mind...

Oh, my bad! I guess I missed that when I was scanning through "Return" looking for ideas. In my campaign I've enlarged the scale on the wilderness map to 1/2 mile per square, so that would be a really long tunnel. But I suppose I could have the abandoned mine eventually link up to the entrance to Quasqueton. That's actually somewhat better than just coming across the ruins in the forest. After discovering all the undead in the mines, the PCs could make their way back up towards the surface only to wind up miles away from where they were, at the gates of Quasqueton.