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

[Hussar]

Whoa, what? I flat out disagree. In the OD&D era, challenging the players wasn't just acceptable, it was the norm. In fact, it is still a valid play style - in part for the reason that it is the players sitting around the table, not their characters. Seriously, and I ask this because I don't get the mentality you expressed -- what is wrong with challenging the players? Why is it bad wrong fun?

True, challenging players was the norm.

However, I don't play myself in a DnD game. I play a character. I can't cast spells, swing a sword or make undead explode. But, my character can. Testing solely the player without any nod towards the character he happens to be playing is poor design. In other words, read the sig for how I feel about this issue.

On a side note. There is nothing wrong with challenging the players. That's cool. However, it should be limited for the same reason I don't throw quadratic equations in my dungeons. Sure, my players could likely work them out, but, that completely breaks suspension of disbelief for me. If the only way you could solve a puzzle is by metagaming, then it's a poor puzzle. IMO.

 

[Lorgrom]

Whoa, what? I flat out disagree. In the OD&D era, challenging the players wasn't just acceptable, it was the norm. In fact, it is still a valid play style - in part for the reason that it is the players sitting around the table, not their characters. Seriously, and I ask this because I don't get the mentality you expressed -- what is wrong with challenging the players? Why is it bad wrong fun?

Biggest problem with "challenging the players" is that when you force players to use there knowledge. They get in trouble for meta-gaming. Besides just becouse a player may be of average Int and Wis, the character they are playing my be of exceptional Int and/or Wis. So is it really a good test of the characters abilites to give the player a riddle/puzzle/trap they could not figure out. But there characters SHOULD be able to figure out. Or worse yet, a player who is quite intelligent who is playing a character who is dumb. Shouldn't the characters abilites be challenged (and suffer for failing), instead of getting by due to the players abilities (meta, problem solving, education, etc)?

 

[Glyfair]

Biggest problem with "challenging the players" is that when you force players to use there knowledge. They get in trouble for meta-gaming. Besides just becouse a player may be of average Int and Wis, the character they are playing my be of exceptional Int and/or Wis. So is it really a good test of the characters abilites to give the player a riddle/puzzle/trap they could not figure out. But there characters SHOULD be able to figure out. Or worse yet, a player who is quite intelligent who is playing a character who is dumb. Shouldn't the characters abilites be challenged (and suffer for failing), instead of getting by due to the players abilities (meta, problem solving, education, etc)?

This is my point in an earlier post. This wasn't really part of the game in those days. Witness the limited number of abilities that were given to the characters (especially when it came to social skills).

Get in trouble for metagaming? It usually wasn't a concern in those days. There was a tiny big of concern about "in character" and "out of character" knowledge. Still, you were expected to use the player's skills more than the character's skills outside of combat simulation.

It's not a bad way to play the game, and certainly can be just as rewarding as with other gaming styles.

 

[Lorgrom]

This is my point in an earlier post. This wasn't really part of the game in those days. Witness the limited number of abilities that were given to the characters (especially when it came to social skills).

Get in trouble for metagaming? It usually wasn't a concern in those days. There was a tiny big of concern about "in character" and "out of character" knowledge. Still, you were expected to use the player's skills more than the character's skills outside of combat simulation.

It's not a bad way to play the game, and certainly can be just as rewarding as with other gaming styles.

Agreeded, back in 1st edition and most of 2nd edition. The focus was normaly on chalenging the player. But in todays gaming enviroment, its challenge the character (hence skill checks, stat checks, feats, class abilities, racial abilities, etc). Perosnaly if I am playing a system that does a good job at defining what my character can and can not do. Then challenge that character. If the system (the story teller systems come to mind, as does Amber) do not give you such definations on what the character can do. Then get rid of the mental stats and challenge my abilities.

DnD 1st and 2nd edition were challenge the players. 3.X edition is challenge the character.

 

[Delta]

Anecdote time. I introduced a good friend to D&D for the first time in his life circa 2004, with him at age 40. We played a 3E campaign and he routinely said out-of-game he felt he wasn't really "getting it", he didn't get into the roleplaying-story bits that some other players did.

Then in 2005 I ran him through old module O1, a solo thief-sneak-puzzle adventure (something like a very watered-down S1). And he loved it! At one point he said something like "Ah, now this is what D&D should be like, a bunch of puzzles to figure out". I thought that was pretty funny, and had to describe how the RPG community has pretty consciously decided to move away from that in intervening years.

 

[Raven Crowking]

Really, this is badly designed IMO. It does little or nothing to actually play to the characters, and mostly tests the players. Even for the time, that wasn't exactly acceptable, although it was certainly done. Granted, lacking any sort of skill rules, it was almost impossible to test characters rather than players anyway.

I loved playing in it, I loved running it, but, I would certainly never use it as a standard for new adventures. It's more an example of what an adventure shouldn't be.

The whole idea of "game mastery" and tactics in 3e is designed to challenge the player rather than the character. Your fighter is not assumed to be using optimal tactics; you must decide what those tactics are. There is nothing wrong with this now; there was nothing wrong with this then.

However, I said "No".

Sure, I enjoyed killing characters in the ToH as much as anyone (I was the player, tossing parties of four from the back of the Rogues' Gallery into the meatgrinder like the bit in The Wall....they all came out sausage. I must have killed every name character in that book to the delight of the DM. "Well," I would say, "If I do X, it'll probably kill me. But...." ).

I wouldn't have used it for actual campaign play, though, and I have no objection whatsoever to a body count.

(BTW, the note that most of the classic modules were originally designed for tournament play -- not for campaign play -- might have a lot to do with the amount of treasure in them as well. In other threads, you hear a lot about how 1e was as bling-filled as 3e, and these modules are used as "evidence". I know that players IMC were willing to brave modules because they offered a higher haul than my stingy self did, but my memory as a player is that I seldom came anywhere near finding everything valuable in a module.)

 

[Gentlegamer]

See, that's borderline ridiculous to me. That's not out of the box thinking, that's just stupid.

That's how Robilar (Rob Kuntz) made it through . . . he ordered his orc servants forward!

As one who firmly believes the objective of the game is to challenge the players, with the characters as the playing pieces by which they interact with the "world," I've always liked the Tomb of Horrors. I believe the intent of the module is given in the DM's materials: to challenge experienced players.

Gary recounted in the forward of "Return to the Tomb of Horrors" how one tournament group ingeniously dispatched the demi-lich by placing the crown found in the throne room on its skull and touching the "wrong" end of the scepter to the crown, instantly disintigrating it. Gary had to be called over by the DM of the round for a ruling. He said that he certainly had not thought of that and saw no reason why the tactic wouldn't work. The group was awarded first place for the tournament. Player ingenuity rewarded!

 

[the Jester]

Tomb of Horrors - I voted No, but it has both good and bad design elements.

How many people played through it tournament style vs campaign style? The style in which the ToH was used definitely influenced what the players could do. Everyone I know personally that played through it used it as a one shot - so the suggested idea of spending several sessions with this module was not an option. So as far as the resources available go - I think people are overestimating what was available. Because it often was a one shot there weren't unlimited augury, divination, commune and contact other plane spells.

Just to address this aspect of your reply for a moment- how long does it take to say, "At the green face we cast an augury to see if we should touch it... then we go rest a day and recover spells"?

Yes, I recognize that no divination is a 100% sure-fire thing. However, certainly others in this discussion can recognize that divinations, played properly, even in 1e, can provide clues...?

 

[Pants]

That's how Robilar (Rob Kuntz) made it through . . . he ordered his orc servants forward!

That's fine. I still don't think it's 'clever' or 'out of the box.'

 

[Glyfair]

Agreeded, back in 1st edition and most of 2nd edition. The focus was normaly on chalenging the player. But in todays gaming enviroment, its challenge the character (hence skill checks, stat checks, feats, class abilities, racial abilities, etc). Perosnaly if I am playing a system that does a good job at defining what my character can and can not do. Then challenge that character. If the system (the story teller systems come to mind, as does Amber) do not give you such definations on what the character can do. Then get rid of the mental stats and challenge my abilities.

DnD 1st and 2nd edition were challenge the players. 3.X edition is challenge the character.

Hmmm...after dwelling on this I'll probably start a new thread. However, maybe this is what a lot of the threads about discontent with 3.X have as a foundation. Players are feeling they aren't being challenged, rather the set of stats sitting on the table are what is being challenged.

I have sympathy for both sides, which is why I want to think about it before taking it further. I do fully believe it's possible to run a 3.X game that is engaging both to the character & the game. However, apparently some are focusing too much on one element.