The Lost Caverns of Tsojcanth - your experiences?

[Balrog]

My memories of this are rather fond. I have both played in it and DMed it. In 1983 in JH School, this was the very first AD&D module I ever played in. Up to that point I had played Basic and Expert D&D, until I joined with a small group that played AD&D. That was quite confusing. One guy from the AD&D side of things had a fighter with an 18/00 Strength, while I had an Elf with an 18 Strength from Expert D&D.

I remember the first run of the module being terrifying and quite epic. The terror was fostered due to the fact that the DMs younger brother had somehow gotten copies of the Monster section, and was totally using that info in Game. Of course, we didnt know that those Demon Princes werent in the adventure, but that didnt stop the younger brother and myself from jumping to conclusions about the content of the adventure.

Needless to say, every time we got teleported to the demiplanes, our imaginations got the better of us.

I remember the Vampire Daughter of Iggwilv just about killing our whole party, but we were saved by a henchman. We had great arguments after the adventure about who would possess the Lanthorn and other items.

Later as a DM, I ran the adventure in a mini-campaign tied into the Forgotten Temple of Tharizdun and later delving into the GDQ series.

 

[Balrog]

I would second those that were impressed by the demonic lore in the monster section of S4. I remember being particularly impressed by both S4 as well as the Unearthed Arcana, which was actually the first AD&D book I ever bought. The spells that were included, as well as the creatures, made both S4 and the UA very memorable. Monster Manual II was around that time also, and that also made quite an impression.

 

[dema]

Played it a few times.

I played tis adventure when I was about 6 years old. The vampire got me in the end, and I remember using the spinner from the LIFE game as a d10, we didn't have a D10 for some reason, I loved spinning that thing though.

Then when I was about 14 I played it again, with my cousin who got me into DnD big time (been playing for about 3 years then.) I remember the gnolls, and assassin, the big blue dragon who almost killed us all. The water genie (I think that was this one.) The wilderness part was the best though, influenced my method of creating adventures too. The demon book that came as a supp. really added alot to the mystic feel of DnD, back then when I was more in to the supernatural I thought maybe this is based on real things? Now, I'm too logical, and scientific to think about such things.

Oh and Drenzel, she was opps, no spoilers here I guess. She was a hotty, but didn't kill not even one person the 2nd time around. She turned into gas, we took her things, along with that latern, and ran.

It was a fun time.

-de

 

[HellHound]

First time I ran it, the party came in through the cave with the trapper... and a TPK was the result.

Overall, it was brutal and fun (for the second party, at least)

 

[Style]

First time I ran it, the party came in through the cave with the trapper... and a TPK was the result.

Overall, it was brutal and fun (for the second party, at least)

Isn't that the encounter where a trapper guards a rug of smothering? Heh heh heh - loved that room. Lars (the party's barbarian with mandatory greataxe) was almost crushed by the trapper and demanded first pick of the treasure as a consequence. ("Wahaaay! A flying carpet? Hey, I guess it was worth it after all...") Poor bugger.

He survived, though, miraculously enough. It was shortly after this that they spotted the gas spore and Lars, now in a frustrated rage, decided he was going to "do for that manky beholder, no matter what!" Swish, bang, medic!!

Come to think of it, Lars managed to make it through the adventure alive with more near-misses than anyone else. Scorched, stabbed, infected with spores, crushed, suffocated, level-drained...

No wonder he was such a vindictive sod when he ran White Plume Mountain for me.

 

[DarrenGMiller]

I ran this one as a 13 year old and have some fond memories of it. It is a shame I never got to do it again. This was a great adventure and the book of monsters and magic made it awesome. The vamp was a devastating opponent and the drawing of her wasn't bad either.

DM

 

[Olgar Shiverstone]

Loads of fun. I've played in it (lost my favorite elf character to an avalanche), and DM'd several times -- though none of the groups I DM'd ever figured out how to get to the center of the 2d level.

 

[the Jester]

Heh... I'm playing through this right now, in omrob's mid-level game.

Great fun! Gotta kill those gnomes, though- they're really snooty.

 

[T. Foster]

I ran this pretty early in my "gaming career," when it was just me and 1 other friend playing. I think this may have been one of the first adventures I actually DM'd (though of course I was also running 2 or 3 characters). It took me a long time to convince my buddy to play it because he'd seen the monsters in the second book (the demon princes and such) and thought they were all included in the module -- I had to promise him they weren't . I don't actually remember much about the actual play, but we successfully finished it and got all the treasure and had a lot of fun. Playing/running this was probably the highlight of those 'early gaming years,' at least for me.

Years later I tried to run it again for my main group of players, and unsurprisingly it was a huge, embarrassing disaster (ironic that I believe this is the very module that mentions how DMs don't like to tell stories of the players' ignoble failures; I guess I'm an exception...). After making a big set-up with the poem and the legend and all that, the characters headed up into the mountains. First encounter -- "gray-furred snake." he players all laughed about how lame that was, and the leader, a fighter of 7th or 8th level, stepped forward to slay it. Lost initiative, bit, failed poison save, dead. The other players made so much fun of him that there was no way we could conduct a serious session after that. And, unfortunately, they never had any desire to go back and try to finish the module. I tried to tell them how good it was, but they didn't care.

This is actually one of my very favorite modules, and one that I return to and re-read from time to time. The combination of wilderness exploration, roleplaying/negotiation (with the gnomes), tough dungeon-crawling combat (and it had honestly never occured to me how 'ecologicially dubious' this dungeon is until I came online and read people complaining about it -- you folks need to lighten up and appreciate it as fun on its own terms), some clever tricks and traps, plus a bunch of broader historical context that adds singnificant depth and detail to the World of Greyhawk and "AD&D cosmology," this module has just about everything you could ask for. And that's not even counting the second book which, before MM2 and UA was almost like a self-contained "AD&D Companion" all by itself -- new monsters (and not just 'gimmick' one-use-only monsters like most modules have, actual reusable new monsters), new spells, new magic items, even some new rules. A definite winner. Heck, thinking about it now I think I'm going to have to pull it out and re-read it again tonight!

 

[David Howery]

played in this one way back in 1E days with our massively munchkin party. I go along with the consensus of 'brutal'. Thank god for the gnomes... resting there was the only thing that kept us going. I can't remember any other adventure where we had to retreat so often to recover spells and hp. Oddly enough, I can't remember exactly why, but the big bad vampire lady proved to be the least of our troubles... something we did got her dead fast...