Shared Experiences: Worlds Largest Dungeon, Shackled City or Other?

[Crothian]

How about: it's cheaper.

Not for me

 

[MacMathan]

It seems like RttToEE has become something of a shared experience for a lot of people I have encountered. There was a pretty good sized fan effort based around it to convert it to 3.5

Personally I am leaning towards Shackled City, based on what I think the players would enjoy more, although I do own both.

 

[Turjan]

How is Shackled City official??

It's got the "Dungeons & Dragons" logo on the cover. Looks pretty official to me .

As to the "shared classics", I'd also mention the "Sunless Citadel". After that it will get sparse. "Return to the Temple of Elemental Evil" has quite a reputation. Here on EN World, Freeport or some of the Necromancer Classics ("Tomb of Abysthor", "Vault of Larin Karr") might get this status, but I don't think they will be known far from these circles.

I don't think that WLD or Shackled City will qualify for "shared classics", at least not past their initial adventures/locations. For similar reasons, the "Whispering Cairn" might qualify, although it comes a bit late in the 3.x life cycle. I don't think that any of the high level pieces will make it into shared experiences.

Edit: I didn't answer the first question: I never played WLD - no interest. Shackled City is slightly more interesting, but also a bit heavy on dungeons and weird half-outsiders. The Age of Worms looks more compelling to me .

 

[Steel_Wind]

I'm sticking with WLD. I do think shared experinces are important and I tried to promote that in August but it didn't take.

How is Shackled City official??

6700 posts in the Age of Worms forum on Paizo's site suggests it's taking just fine.

 

[Crothian]

6700 posts in the Age of Worms forum on Paizo's site suggests it's taking just fine.

Huh, I thought they'd have more....

 

[Turjan]

Huh, I thought they'd have more....

If I got the signals right, Shackled City didn't really sell that well, despite its good reputation here on EN World. Age of Worms sees some buzz, but that's just from Dungeon subscribers, and how many are those?

I have to say that WotC's call for adventures earlier this year surprised me somewhat. From all what I've heard, adventures sold relatively well during the first years of 3e, but this slumped down to only very small print runs in the 3.5 era. I'd really like to know how "Sons of Gruumsh" sold.

 

[MacMathan]

As long as they sold enough to give Age of Worms the compiled hardback treatment I will be happy

 

[jdrakeh]

Given the choice only of those two to run campaigns, I'd go with Shackled City.

Me, too.

There's significantly more variety in the types of adventures

That would be the key, I think. By all accounts (many of them on these very forums), WLD gets old fast, and I think that has a lot to do with the limited styles of campaign that it supports. I recall a bevy of similar complaints about the old Undermountain boxed set, for much the same reason.

I do think the "campaign in a box" offers a great shared experience for generations of gamers

Truthfully, it all depends on the campaign - I think that Shackled City will work well in this respect, as it is capable of supporting many different styles of gameplay, whereas I think WLD will fall short in this respect, specifically because it doesn't.

I think its the smaller adventures that have the real chance to become true shared experience classics

I agree, but again I think that this is directly linked to the many different styles of play that a given module can support (note that many popular Basic D&D and AD&D 1e modules were little more than vague plot outlines with different scenario approaches listed therein). Notoriously 'railroady' modules chained to one style of play were largely considered failures.

[Addendum: Note that the "campaign in a box" is also not a new idea. At all. Check out the old City State of the Invincible Overlord campaign sets from Judge's Guild and Mayfair games, respectively.]

 

[Akrasia]

... [Addendum: Note that the "campaign in a box" is also not a new idea. At all. Check out the old City State of the Invincible Overlord campaign sets from Judge's Guild and Mayfair games, respectively.]

And of course there is the new 'Wilderlands of High Fantasy' box campaign set. I'd take that (with CSIO) over either WLD or Shackled City.

(Note that the Mayfair version of the CSIO has nothing to do with the original JG version, or the new JG/Necro version. It is a horrible aberration, best ignored.)

 

[DragonLancer]

I haven't bought WLD nor I have I seen it (just too big for my tastes), but Shackled City really is the bomb. Its an excellent campaign laid out with rich plot, story arc (even anticipating a lot of potential PC actions), and has a great epic feel to it. A real classic.