Is the original Tomb of Horrors a well-designed adventure module?

[gizmo33]

It also breaks the rules FAR too often in a way that would have repercussions if the same abilities were available outside this small area. Invisible gems that cant be detected by see invisible? Unresistable sleep gas poison? Magic that works in anti magic. Why didnt this guy rule the world again?

What rules does it break? Invisible means that you can't see it. A spell that detects invisible doesn't break the rule, but a spell that prevents detecting the invisible does? True, there's no "sidebar" about the spell.

"Repercussions" if the same abilities were available outside of the area presumes that you (the reader) know the conditions under which these things were created. Perhaps there were unique circumstances to why magic would work in the anti-magic that could not just be duplicated any place that you liked.

Of course in 3E anything you see in the dungeon must be the work of a Feat plus X experience points and Y gps. So the assumptions you are making are more natural in that game system, but not at all in 1E IMO. "The guy" probably found his sleep poison gas on some remote plane of the Abyss - he doesn't use it to conquer to the world because he had only one dose of it and used it on his tomb.

Of course how do I make that look like "(Craft Poison Gas, 300 xp, 7500 gp)"? I don't know.

 

[Jefe Bergenstein]

What rules does it break? Invisible means that you can't see it. A spell that detects invisible doesn't break the rule, but a spell that prevents detecting the invisible does? True, there's no "sidebar" about the spell.

"Repercussions" if the same abilities were available outside of the area presumes that you (the reader) know the conditions under which these things were created. Perhaps there were unique circumstances to why magic would work in the anti-magic that could not just be duplicated any place that you liked.

Of course in 3E anything you see in the dungeon must be the work of a Feat plus X experience points and Y gps. So the assumptions you are making are more natural in that game system, but not at all in 1E IMO. "The guy" probably found his sleep poison gas on some remote plane of the Abyss - he doesn't use it to conquer to the world because he had only one dose of it and used it on his tomb.

Of course how do I make that look like "(Craft Poison Gas, 300 xp, 7500 gp)"? I don't know.

Its the cheesy combination of constant rule breaking magics. Its not just the invisibility, the anti-anti-magic-magic, the unsavable spells, the undetectable doors... its the COMBINATION. Its all of it, thrown together. And yes, its presence should have had some impact...

I'm sick of the grognard hypocrisy. If a character tried to pull off this crap, he'd be labeled a munchkin. But its fair game for a DM to do it. Sorry guys, I'm calling BS. Gygax threw a bunch of crap together to be "kewl", like any 11 year old DM would.

Feel free to keep stroking your egos on randomly guessing your way through.

 

[BluSponge]

I don't really think that's a good comparison, considering Indy figured out how to bypass the traps by deciphering riddles and clues, not just by watching the other guinea pigs getting killed by the traps.

What's to keep you from doing the same, as GM? Providing clues that the players could track down in the campaign? Or, in a one shot, giving each of the players an obscure clue about a single trap? Just because it's not in the module doesn't mean you couldn't do that.

Personally, I think the adventure is designed rather well, for the same reasons most people have listed already. It challenges the player by forcing them to be cautious and specific in their actions. Few of the traps in ToH are obvious, but most won't kill you if you don't monkey with them too much.

BTW, I played in ToH in a tournament a few years passed and was one of the few who did make it out (never found the demi-liches tomb, just an alternative exit). This despite one of the player's deciding she would play her character as a complete homicidal/suicidal maniac, tripping traps while flying and invisible to cause as much trouble for the other party members. Which made the game considerably LESS fun for me.

Which begs the question. Are people's negative perceptions of ToH because of the module's design? Or based on bad DMing/problem players in the group?

Tom

 

[BluSponge]

Its the cheesy combination of constant rule breaking magics. Its not just the invisibility, the anti-anti-magic-magic, the unsavable spells, the undetectable doors... its the COMBINATION. Its all of it, thrown together. And yes, its presence should have had some impact...

At the risk of spoiling the adventure, could someone point out where there were anti-magic rooms in the tomb? I mean, I remember a whole section about some spells working differently (going ethereal in the tomb was bad news, IIRC). But I don't remember any room where magic just didn't work (except the tomb's own enchantments).

Tom

 

[Henry]

Ehren, we ran into this before, and up until this point I've seen no problem with what you've been saying, but can you please stop the name-calling of "hypocrites," calling a fellow poster immature, etc.? I can understand not liking the module, and your reasons why, but sinking to the name-calling is a little much, especially since the person you were replying to didn't go there, either.

It's been going pretty well, but I'd rather not see it degenerate into an insult-fest.

Thank you.

 

[Mark Hope]

At the risk of spoiling the adventure, could someone point out where there were anti-magic rooms in the tomb? I mean, I remember a whole section about some spells working differently (going ethereal in the tomb was bad news, IIRC). But I don't remember any room where magic just didn't work (except the tomb's own enchantments).

Tom

There is one area specifically under an antimagic effect:

Spoiler

The False Treasure Room is under an antimagic effect, with the sole exception that auras (magic, good, evil etc) are still evident).

This is further developed in the revised version, which you can download from the WotC site.

 

[gizmo33]

And yes, its presence should have had some impact...

I don't know what you mean by "should have some impact", but I'm guessing, again, that you're making assumptions about what should and shouldn't be true in a fantasy universe. Building his tomb on top of a zone of "somewhat anti-magic" that has certain effects on certain spells doesn't seem like the end of the world to me.

AFAIK, Gygax designed the module without having to have a rules justification for every single element that his imagination told him should be there, and that was suited to his and his player's playing styles.

I'm sick of the grognard hypocrisy. If a character tried to pull off this crap, he'd be labeled a munchkin. But its fair game for a DM to do it. Sorry guys, I'm calling BS. Gygax threw a bunch of crap together to be "kewl", like any 11 year old DM would.

It seems unreasonable IMO to charge "hypocrisy" in a situation where players and DM are not on equal footing. Of course I didn't buy the 3.5 E books, so maybe that's been changed now. Alot of 3E people certainly act like it.

Munchkins go by the rules anyway - they'd never do what you're accusing Gygax of doing in the ToH. In fact, the munchkin philosophy IME is the total antithesis of the ToH - in many cases it involves an almost worshipful reverence of the rules. "I can't imagine a first level commoner that gets +7 to hit with a crossbow! - therefore, it doesn't exist." (That's a reference to an NPC in the Village of Hommlet BTW - sorry if that gives you nightmares.)

I just put a tower full of Rakshasa in the Shadowlands IMC. No, I did not have to establish the logic of doing such a thing to some sort of "player approval commitee". I did not have to fill out a form to prove that my design didn't break some sort of demographics rule in this week's latest splatbook (but there are only 11 rakshasa maharaja's in the game! You can't do that!)

Call me a hypocrite - but yes, I would not allow a player IMC to just plop down some tower with Rakshasa in it that worshipped his character. Oh well.

Feel free to keep stroking your egos on randomly guessing your way through.

And next time you put a 9th level NPC in your game, I want to see an itemized list of where he got every single experience point.

I don't see this as an ego issue anyway. I'm not Gygax, if that's what you think, otherwise your statement is incomprehensible. It's not egotistical to like a certain module, or to understand it's assumptions. If you're complaining that the DM seems to have a unique role and authority in the game of DnD, I'm stumped as to how to address this.

 

[Shadeus]

If you were playing this as a campaign why not just summon earth elementals to burrow your way down to the mithral vault and bypass everything entirely. .

Funny...that's exactly what we did. Although we didn't know where we were going and ended up in the screen room with the glass chest that shot out darts (the one from the illustrations).

I loved this module, but it is a campaign killer for sure. We did it as a one shot and I'm proud to say I was the only one who survived (only because the demi-lich went after rogues last in the list of people to kill).

 

[ruleslawyer]

Munchkins go by the rules anyway - they'd never do what you're accusing Gygax of doing in the ToH. In fact, the munchkin philosophy IME is the total antithesis of the ToH - in many cases it involves an almost worshipful reverence of the rules. "I can't imagine a first level commoner that gets +7 to hit with a crossbow! - therefore, it doesn't exist." (That's a reference to an NPC in the Village of Hommlet BTW - sorry if that gives you nightmares.)

I just put a tower full of Rakshasa in the Shadowlands IMC. No, I did not have to establish the logic of doing such a thing to some sort of "player approval commitee". I did not have to fill out a form to prove that my design didn't break some sort of demographics rule in this week's latest splatbook (but there are only 11 rakshasa maharaja's in the game! You can't do that!)

There's a big difference between changing flavor text, demographics, or... well, anything campaign-related and arbitrarily changing the way the rules work a number of times in combination. That's why almost every DM I know tells the players what his house rules are. ToH actually confounds player cleverness by mucking with the rules. Normally sensible tactics are simply rendered useless without explanation, requiring, to quote Pants, "borderline ridiculous" (and, in the case of Robilar, boring and unimaginative) tactics to get through the module.

I think this one is a real stinker. I've had Garnfellow's experience with this; I've run it several times and it ends up just being boring and frustrating for the players and myself. Any possibility of using deductive reasoning to overcome the obstacles begins and ends with the poem. For instance, there is no other way to figure out what end of the scepter to touch to the crown. Is there a reason why gold should work and silver not, or vice versa? Perhaps my greatest problem with the dungeon lies in the huge number of secret doors. In 1e rules, this amounts to an arbitrary raised middle finger to the players, since there's no way to find these without stopping and trusting to your 1 in 6 chance. In fact, it seems to me like the only way to adequately walk the dungeon is to do what Abraxas's group did and just burrow straight to the vault.

IMHO, running ToH requires far more in the way of luck than skill. Thus, I simply can't agree that it makes for a good player test.

 

[Joshua Randall]

It does little or nothing to actually play to the characters, and mostly tests the players.

Bingo. That's why I voted "no".