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

[Man in the Funny Hat]

It is bad design for standard campaign play because its design is intended not to merely challenge but to KILL PC's. It puts the DM and the players in a directly adversarial relationship. However, the DM ALWAYS wins if the DM WANTS to win. The only way the DM can ever lose is by sheer incompetence. If the DM wants the PC's dead - they die. It's as easy as breathing to throw them up against something that they CANNOT defeat.

This is not to say that adventures that are deadly have no place. They do. But the point about letting PC's get in WAY over their heads is making it THEIR choice to tempt fate, not to make it the *DM'S* choice to seal it. Even there TOH is a less than ideal design because as mentioned it is still INTENDED to kill PC's for the sole sake of killing PC's. Any fool can do that by violating rules conventions, providing no-save traps without even providing a clue that a trap exists, creating new monsters specifically engineered to be unkillable and so forth. A good design would not need to resort to "No warning - you're dead - no save" to be a killer adventure.

 

[morrolan]

The vaunted 3e balance that you talk about makes adventuring feel like a series of risk/reward ratios that only an insurance adjuster could have fun with. It doesn't create memorable encounters, just "balanced" ones. That 1 in 8 chance of instant death, though, really makes you sweat! When you get past it, you've *been through something.* Why does everything have to be balanced and "fair" when I guarantee a real adventure wouldn't be?

That's another thing about the EL system...it makes everything in the world seem tailored to the PCs and their level. Whereas, the Tomb of Horrors was just sitting there in its hill, waiting for whoever may come to try and get to its juicy center. It lived in the world, it wasn't just waiting for some PCs to come fight through its 26 level-appropriate encounters in order to receive their perfectly balanced reward at the end of the day.

QFT

 

[gizmo33]

QFT

The funny thing is that when I used to defend 3E to the grognards, I would say "the EL system is a guideline. XP awards were always calculated based on the estimated difficulty level - the EL system just makes it a little more uniform and explicit. Nobody actually considers it an entitlement - that would be crazy."

I'm starting to think I was wrong about the last part.

 

[merelycompetent]

Interesting. I'm just wondering how the planning part works, though. Unless you *know* you're going through a trap-heavy dungeon, are you really going to consider preparing (er, memorizing) four knock spells, two passwalls, and a stone shape a good idea? Isn't it more about reactive ingenuity?

Apologies - I neglected to answer the first part of your question directly:

As by my previous post in the thread, we found out early on that we were going through a trap-heavy dungeon by the various divination spells. For that type of dungeon, we saw more advantage to filling all of our 2nd level spell slots with Knock, figuring that every chest, box, door, or other openable object would be trapped magically and mundanely. Each of our magic users (2 total, 1 single-class and one elf multi-class) had a passwall. I think only one of us had stone shape (IIRC, we used it to bypass

Spoiler

one of the sphere traps - we thought it was a disintegration field when we stuck a spear end into it and pulled back a smooth woody nub. It wasn't until much later, when I bought the module myself to run for some new players, that I found out what we'd narrowly avoided

. We did have more combat-oriented spells on our first and last forays into the ToH. When we uncovered what we thought was the final trick (we happened to be right), we pulled out, rested, loaded up for bear, and went back in.

So I guess the best answer is that, yes, sometimes we did load up on those spells (especially for ToH). More often we had scrolls with those on them, in case we couldn't pull out and re-prepare. When our magic-users got a Ring of Wizardry, we adjusted spells memorized for a broader range of situations. (I think our wizard had one for 2nd or 3rd level spells - not sure.)

 

[ruleslawyer]

See, now this is all good idea stuff. Interesting; gives me some thoughts about how to run my own PCs if I ever sit on the players' side of the screen again!

 

[morrolan]

The funny thing is that when I used to defend 3E to the grognards, I would say "the EL system is a guideline. XP awards were always calculated based on the estimated difficulty level - the EL system just makes it a little more uniform and explicit. Nobody actually considers it an entitlement - that would be crazy."

I'm starting to think I was wrong about the last part.

Lol, yeah you might be right. I mean, I see nothing wrong with the El system as a guideline. But the expectation players have based on it, that every fight should be fair and balanced, leads to a lot of problems. Well, if you favor a certain playstyle anyway.

D20dwarf's comment about the tomb sitting, waiting on a hill just hit the right chord with me. When the grizzled old timer tells the party "that place is a death trap - you'd have to be crazy to go in there, noone ever comes back", people often assume that means for a first level commoner. If our party goes in, we'll meet encounters based on our ECL. hooey to that!

 

[Umbran]

See, I have trouble with the poem as well as puzzles in dungeons that have clues. Why would a demi-lich or anybody else put such things in their dungeons? If the point was to keep people out, then the last thing you'd do is put clues to help them get through it. That is bad design if your design criteria is versimilitude.

Well, when handed a lemon, make lemonade!

The thing is, before you talk about verisimilitude, you have to know to what you're trying to be true. My copy of the module is back home, but if I recall correctly, we aren't told a whole lot about the personality of the lich. So, rather than assume stuff about him, and say the dungeon is not in line with that, look at the dungeon, and derive some of the lich's personality from it...

Consider - this is a lich we are talking about. Undead. This guy has used dark powers to transform himself into a nigh-immortal form, damning his soul for eternity in the process. He then continues to exist until he's outlived even what support the dark power has given him. All in all, I think this guy must have left the realm of what we'd call "sane" in normal humans.

Thus, his behavior in designing and building the place doesn't have to conform to normal human logic. Maybe he didn't want to be disturbed, sure. But maybe he also wanted to inflict pain and death on those powerful enough to challenge himself or others like him. Maybe he'd become a form of obsessive-compulsive with the puzzle thing. Maybe he actually was sane, but served a deity (sane or otherwise) who imposed this final rest upon him for some reason we've not yet explored. We can make him up a number of different ways to make the place consistent with the lich.

All of which may be moot, of course, because the PCs can't talk to him. But it is still a fun thought process.

 

[ruleslawyer]

I don't see the point in characterizing my argument as "unfair" when you probably don't understand it entirely (nor do I expect that I understand yours completely). Some of you on this thread have a chip on your shoulder on the subject. There may be a subtle difference between a "non-standard rules situation" and a situation that requires "neither an understanding of the rules or basic logic". I don't think it's unfair if the difference between the two is not immediately obvious.

I wasn't talking about your argument; I was talking about your specific use of the camougem as an example of how I wasn't grokking it, which is, in fact, "an unfair presumption" (to self-quote).

You're not in a position to infallibly judge either one. Your transparent analogy is mildly insulting, and IMO not that accurate. IME neither truth or error can "confound" truthful responses. The likely thing that "confounds" responses is emotion.

It wasn't meant to be an insulting analogy. And, by the way, who cares if one is in a position to "infallibly" judge? I think "competently" judge is a more appropriate standard, and I think we can do that as intelligent, educated people. I'm sure you and I can both tell the difference between an argument intended to appeal to your intellect and one intended to appeal to your emotions.

#1 seems to make a distinction that I cannot fathom. The elements, themes, monsters, etc. in DnD are derived, in part, from mythology.

That doesn't make an adventure and a mythological story the same thing in any narrative sense whatsoever. I'm not talking about the source material's genre, which really has nothing to do with this issue. I'm talking about the difference between a story and a game.

#2 really illustrates the heart of the matter, IMO. First - we're talking about earth elementals being summoned and burrowing down into the tomb. Secondly - IMO what you're illustrating is that understanding the cultural context of something that appears silly on the surface can give it a new meaning. The irony is that this is exactly what I've been trying to say.

No; that wasn't what I was illustrating. What I was illustrating was that the Trojan Horse, as a solution for the Achaeans' dilemma in besieging Troy, actually is a sensible and clever approach. Walking NPCs down corridors to trigger traps is not, IMHO. (Incidentally, if you'll read back up this thread, you'll see that I happen to think the earth elemental approach is reasonably creative. The specific use of "ridiculous" is a response to Robilar's approach.)

 

[painandgreed]

Thus, his behavior in designing and building the place doesn't have to conform to normal human logic. Maybe he didn't want to be disturbed, sure. But maybe he also wanted to inflict pain and death on those powerful enough to challenge himself or others like him. Maybe he'd become a form of obsessive-compulsive with the puzzle thing. Maybe he actually was sane, but served a deity (sane or otherwise) who imposed this final rest upon him for some reason we've not yet explored. We can make him up a number of different ways to make the place consistent with the lich.

All true, I didn't even hold this agianst this module as much as the idea with is often put forth in similar puzzle dungeons where there is no such explaination. It's too much like telling James Bond your secert plan while trusting him to be killed by some death trap as the serial villian takes his leave. Occationally, it works but it is still not the smartest idea.

 

[lukelightning]

Well, when handed a lemon, make lemonade!

Unfortunately these are Tomb of Horror Lemons. When handed ToH Lemons, you die no save.