Planning to do the Tomb of Horrors...

[Katana_Geldar]

Ever since I read the original dungeon I've wanted to run it, I have it on pre-order on Amazon and they say it should arrive sometime in August, which means running it sometime in September when one of the players gets back from CV.

It's rather long-term planning for my group, but I want to book in the time well in advance as it's going to work well with back-to-back sessions...except I think I scared them.

They're panicking between what little I know about the 4E update and what little I have been willing to tell them about the original. A very small part of me is trying to take this into account when I run it...but that would not be true to what the dungeon is meant to be, would it? I feel as a DM, I need to run this so I can stop being so nice to my players and giving them breaks.

But it would be nice to tear a character sheet to bits because he jumped into that sphere of annihiliation...

On a side note, who else is planning to run it so soon out of the shop? I've seen Acererak's stats, and he bad ass!

 

[korjik]

I have told my DM that if he even tries to run us through the Tomb, I will walk out of the game. The old one is not an adventure, it is an exersize in futility and frustration.

 

[fanboy2000]

I'm running the 4e conversion the RPGA gave out for free in August at an event my FLGS is running. It'll be a one shot. After that, I'll probably use the new Tomb of Horrors as a template for trap room and levels in other dungeons.

The original dungeon is really a test of player skill more so than character skill. Because of that, it's existence has created overly cautious paranoid players. Players who have actually played through it are even worse.

If the new book in July follows the conversion, the new Tomb will be fairer in that, while still deadly, PCs will often get skill checks prior to taking actions and traps have to make attack rolls.

 

[Katana_Geldar]

I do like the rather Gygaxian mindset though, making players be properly paranoid.

 

[Katana_Geldar]

Hate to double post, but one of the things my players are aksing me about and I don't have answers for is gold allowed and weapons. I have given them some basic guidelines for character creation that can be changed, but how nice or mean should I be with this? They are limited to core and the Adventurer's vaults.

 

[Marius Delphus]

DMG p. 143, Starting at Higher Level.

 

[Festivus]

Just to note here, the one you have on order from Amazon is not the same adventure as the one from AD&D you had read. The RPGA reward adventure is the conversion of that classic, and you can't buy it from Amazon. You can probably get it still if you go to the Wizads site and update your contact information (assuming you are a herald level GM with the RPGA, and if you aren't you can take the exam and become one).

 

[Katana_Geldar]

Yes, I am aware that the adventure I have on order is different to the RPGA one and the original, but the original is all the info I have to go on at the moment (my players know that) and being rather vague with recomendations and saying that a lot of what I have told them is guess-work.

And I'm not an RPGA member, no point as I never really go to cons and neither do my players.

 

[Taed]

You can probably get it still if you go to the Wizads site and update your contact information (assuming you are a herald level GM with the RPGA, and if you aren't you can take the exam and become one).

You no longer need to pass the Herald exam to get DM Rewards. There's someplace on the WotC web site that says that, but as "proof", my son didn't take the exam, isn't a Herald, yet still got the Reward.

When I first looked at the Herald exam, I was shocked that anyone was able to pass it as there's a fair amount of minutia. But then I found out it was open book, so even though I was just a starting DM, it only took me 30 minutes (you're given 60) and I got 100%. It's not too hard if you've played/DMed a bunch of times and have skimmed through the books to know where the information is in the books (PHB, MM, DMG).

 

[Jhaelen]

You no longer need to pass the Herald exam to get DM Rewards. There's someplace on the WotC web site that says that, but as "proof", my son didn't take the exam, isn't a Herald, yet still got the Reward.

That's not correct.
Village of Hommlet and now Tomb of Horrors are _not_ DM Rewards. They're the rewards that everyone gets for updating the RPGA personal info once a year.

The DM Rewards for which you qualify after DMing and reporting a certain number of games (6/half year, IIRC) have been Ship Tiles and a Dark Sun Box for minis with condition cards. To schedule and report games you have to make the Herald test.