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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Philotomy Jurament" data-source="post: 5179936" data-attributes="member: 20854">For my part, it isn't that the ToEE couldn't live up to its own hype.  I think the lair vs. campaign design flaw is an actual flaw, not just perception (although definitely one most apparent in actual play)That said, I'd be surprised if the "legend factor" didn't influence Gary's thinking.  His reluctance to release the original Greyhawk levels, preferring to re-do them, makes me think he had strong opinions about how a published module should be presented.  What worked for him in his personal game wasn't necessarily what he wanted to present in a professional, published product.  His approach in publishing Castle Zagyg is a good example.  Another example like this is Greyhawk, itself, with Gary's home game using the "North American" Greyhawk, but where Gary re-did an entirely new version for publication, saying "When the company asked me to do a campaign world, I altered much of my actual setting so as to be able to pack in as much variety into a relatively small area—that constraint of printable map size—and provide an entirely different one than that I actually employed in my own play."I can't help but wonder if that tension between the needs of the home game vs. the constraints of published products isn't behind stuff like the long delay in publishing the ToEE (and Castle Grehawk, for that matter).  It's possibly also the reason so many published modules tended to be tournament style or lair style affairs, despite the existence of legendary campaign dungeons like Castle Greyhawk and El Raja Key in home campaigns.</blockquote>

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