Tales From The Yawning Portal - 7 Classic Dungeons Updated To 5E!

Coming in April is WotC's next official D&D product, Tales from the Yawning Portal. This hardcover book contains seven classic dungeons updated to 5th Edition, from adventures such as Against the Giants, Dead in Thay, Forge of Fury, Hidden Shrine of Tamoachan, Sunless Citadel, Tomb of Horrors, and White Plume Mountain. This is, presumably, the product previously codenamed Labyrinth. It's set for an April 4th release, for $49.95.

When the shadows grow long in Waterdeep and the fireplace in the taproom of the Yawning Portal dims to a deep crimson glow, adventurers from across the Sword Coast spin tales and spread rumors of lost treasures.

Within this tome are seven of the deadliest dungeons from the history of Dungeons & Dragons. Some are classics that have hosted an untold number of adventurers, while others are newer creations, boldly staking a claim to their place in the pantheon of notable adventures.

The seeds of these stories now rest in your hands. D&D’s deadliest dungeons are now part of your arsenal of adventures. Enjoy, and remember to keep a few spare character sheets handy.

For use with the fifth edition Player’s Handbook, Monster Manual, and Dungeon Master’s Guide, this book provides fans with a treasure trove of adventures, all of which have been updated to the fifth edition rules. Explore seven deadly dungeons in this adventure supplement for the world’s greatest roleplaying game:

• Against the Giants
• Dead in Thay
• Forge of Fury
• Hidden Shrine of Tamoachan
• Sunless Citadel
• Tomb of Horrors
• White Plume Mountain

Find it on WotC's site here. Forbes has an interview about it here. Mearls says "We're announcing a new D&D product, a book coming out this spring. It is called Tales from the Yawning Portal(out March 24th in local game stores and April 4th everywhere else) It's a collection of seven of the most famous dungeons from Dungeons & Dragons history. They're all collected in one hardcover book. The idea behind it is not only do you want to capture some of the most famous dungeons from the game's history, but we also wanted to give a selection of adventures that you could in theory start at Level 1 with the first dungeon and play all the way up to Level 15 by playing the adventures one after another."

Cover Image

Gibbering Mouther

Hidden Shrine of Tamoachan



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[Kalaron]

Ah, precious Hidden Shrine. I've been playing it for conventions ported to 5E, using the tournament rules for scoring, on real time play of 2 hours. It generates an amount of anxiety and fumbling never seen before on more tame and relaxed settings. I salute you, WotC, I salute you.

 

[OB1]

Count me as being very excited for this product! While I've played D&D since the mid 80's, it's only been with 5e that I've ever played or used any pre-gens, so these are all new to me. The only non-core books I owned prior to this edition were the 2e complete wizards handbook and the 3e Manual of the Planes.

As our group has 3 DMs in it, we are planning to pass the TYP around and let each DM run 2 or 3 of these, with everyone else creating new characters for each adventure.

At the same time, I can feel for those who've played these before and want something fresh. As a huge Star Wars fan, the last two installments, while fun, have also been extremely frustrating as they are nothing more than nostalgic rehashes of 40 year old material, offering almost nothing new or interesting for someone like me. I get why they are doing it (to make billions of dollars and try to establish an entirely new generation as a fan base), but I hope that they start to really try new things soon. My worry is that the success of Awakens and Rouge will instead lead Lucasfilm to take even fewer chances...

 

[Jester David]

I have no problem with this.

Not for every dungeon, but a recurring "Joker" villain seems sweet.

Which would be great if he was recurring, but he never reappears. Or actually appears. There's this 1,300 year old presumably human wizard and he doesn't show up. He just steals a bunch of magic items and hides them in his crazy lair (sans a bedroom and wizardly laboratory) and then watches events on a crystal ball for giggles. He's not a villain, he's a reality TV host. Be probably live streams his reaction video to the punk'ing as well.

 

[Goemoe]

Yawning portal is a fitting name. *Yawn* Seems Wotc runs out of ideas. They cover their own songs now. How sad.

 

[dagger]

Yawning portal is a fitting name. *Yawn* Seems Wotc runs out of ideas. They cover their own songs now. How sad.

Your yawn joke is pretty original though.

 

[Lidgar]

Extremely pleased to see this. While I could quibble about which "classics" I would have preferred to be included (like, how can you not include X1 and I1 if you include C1? They all taste great together!), it's a fine list of modules all in all.

Also, while some may find this a "lazy" release, I am waaaay lazier than WotC. Happy they did the work for me.

Plus, updated maps and monsters. I wonder how much re-writing/cleaning up of text will happen?

I wonder if there will be any effort to link the seven adventures? Will there be a common plot line/thread, such as the RoSP, as others have suggested? Fun.

 

[Sacrosanct]

Talk about a can't win for them.

WoTC: puts out new material
"This is crap! These APs suck. They sure don't make them like they used to. Those older adventures were great."
WoTC: releases updated, AL compatible versions of iconic adventures in one book
"This is crap! How lazy. What, they can't come out with new ideas?"

 

[dagger]

I would like to see them update the following to 5e (and yes I know about DMs Guild):

Temple of Elemental Evil
Slavers Series
The rest of the adventures AFTER Against the Giants

 

[Waterbizkit]

Steering clear of the debate between whether this is a lazy move by WotC or not, because quite frankly I have neither the time nor the energy to argue with people who seem to feel more strongly about it than I ever could, I'll say this:

I'm going to buy this. It'll be the my only other purchase beyond CoS and the core books so far and I'm looking forward to it. I haven't run these as a DM (I typically homebrew) and I've never played them as a player. So new to me and my group... and just what I was looking for.

 

[pauldanieljohnson]

I really miss the old paperback adventure module format. I wish WoTC would have some staffers doing nothing but releasing old modules converted to 5e. Keeping the original art, too.