D&D General Planning a D&D editions tour

[Jolly Ruby]

As a 50th anniversary celebration I'm planning a tour across past D&D editions with my players. I want to run a short-ish module for each edition, preferably a "classic" one like Keep on the Borderlands, using just the core rulebooks. The candidates are:

OD&D: honestly, I'm skipping this one since it's really hard to run it without a retroclone, and I think using a retroclone that makes the rules coherent would defeat the purpose of playing OD&D. If someone have another idea I would be glad to know.

D&D B/X: B2 The Keep on the Borderlands. I think it perfectly encapsulates the pitch of a classic short-ish adventure to showcase the edition.

AD&D 1e: T1 The Village of Hommlet or U1 The Sinister Secret of Saltmarsh, both really good low level modules. I'm more inclined to U1, even though T1 is the most remembered one.

AD&D 2e: I don't know yet, but I want something to showcase where 2e era was different from 1e. Maybe something with Planescape or Spelljammer.

D&D 3.X: Maybe Red Hand of Doom, but I think it's too long for the premise of this tour.

D&D 4e: I really don't know, I never played 4th edition but I'm curious to give it a shot without judgements.

D&D 5e: Lost Mine of Phandelver, of course.

 

[overgeeked]

There are two 2E modules that were voted top 30 a few years ago. No idea on the length or appropriateness for your tour. Gates of Firestorm Peak. Dead Gods (Planescape).

For 4E, you could try Dungeon Delve. It's a short anthology of site-based adventures. Each one gives you a location, a few maps, and encounters. It's really just "here's a location, clear it" in most cases. And the locations are small and self-contained. It's almost like a book of 5-room dungeons.

Sounds like a fun idea though. Best of luck with it.

 

[aco175]

I was thinking that the OP was planning to have a night of gaming where the PCs started off at 1st level playing BX and then after a couple hours gain 2nd level and swap to 1e. Play a few hours of 1e- gain a level and now play 2e .....

That would be hard to pull off but be awesome. Maybe several nights of 3-4 blocks.

 

[Desdichado]

D&D 3.X: Maybe Red Hand of Doom, but I think it's too long for the premise of this tour.

Sunless Citadel is the classic 3e adventure.

I don't know for sure if there is a 4e adventure that meets the same level of "iconicness" but wasn't there something in the core books; a mini adventure, at least, that probably most people would have tried out?

 

[SpellObjectEnthusiast]

How long do you want each "module" to take? KotB, for example, will likely take 4-8 sessions to play through.

 

[Ringtail]

4e had Keep on the Shadowfell which was like the quickstart rules + adventure. Its set in the Nentir Vale and everything. Little dungeon, best part is its free on DriveThru.

Edit: Also Khyber's Harvest, a Free RPG Day (i think) set in Eberron. Looks pretty short though.

Sunless Citadel is the classic 3e adventure.

I really second Sunless Citadel. I love the hell out of that one as a player.

 

[jmartkdr2]

If the rules are coherent, is it really OD&D?

Thirding Sunless Citadel and Keep on the Shadowfell.

If there's an iconic OD&D adventure, it's either Castle Blackmoor or Castle Greyhawk, though I have no idea where to find either.

 

[grimmgoose]

For 4E, the adventure I got most of a kick out of was "Madness at Gardmore Abbey". It's about the Deck of Many Things, but (and hopefully I remember this correctly) sets the deck up as the MacGuffin (and kind of the villain?) of the story.

 

[overgeeked]

4e had Keep on the Shadowfell which was like the quickstart rules + adventure. Its set in the Nentir Vale and everything. Little dungeon, best part is its free on DriveThru.

Edit: Also Khyber's Harvest, a Free RPG Day (i think) set in Eberron. Looks pretty short though.

I really second Sunless Citadel. I love the hell out of that one as a player.

Sort of little. Keep on the Shadowfell is ~64 pages but it has 25+ encounters. At the height of 4E, playing it every other week for years, the best we ever managed to do was one fight in about 2 hours. So with a group of really on top of things, really know the rules players, that module would take (just the combat encounters) about 50+ hours to play through. With a group who's either brand new to 4E or hasn't played 4E in years, that "little" module could potentially take you longer than all the others combined.

Khyber's Harvest only has 10 encounters. So it's much shorter. But it will still take a lot of time to actually play through. Everyone knowing the rules and firing on all cylinders, my group could do that module in about 20 hours.

This is why I suggested Dungeon Delve. Each location has 3 encounters. With 4E combat, that's about 6 hours of play each.

 

[Mistwell]

D&D 4e: I really don't know, I never played 4th edition but I'm curious to give it a shot without judgements.

Madness at Gardmore Abbey is probably the best adventure for 4e, and though it's a larger adventure the way it's structured with patrons giving out quests it easily adapts to shorter form and highlights the best of 4e without being a railroad in my opinion. It has a good mix of combat, roleplaying, and skill challenges and unlike many 4e adventures is not a combat slog.