You Don’t Have To Leave Wolfy Behind... In 'Pets & Sidekicks' Your Companions Level Up With You!

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Message: <blockquote data-quote="touc" data-source="post: 8008760" data-attributes="member: 19270">Depends on what you want out of it. This is not an adventure for hack n' slash. The preface from the original module said it's a "thinking man's dungeon."It was an anti-hack 'n slash adventure, Gary's answer to players who thought they'd collected enough magical items and tricks of the trade to plow through anything DMs could shove at them. I've run this in AD&D, 3.5, and 5E, and I don't use conversions. I run it from the original module, which takes very little work. Some things to consider:Fights are irrelevant. They were supposed to be. You can rest as much as you want, making fights pointless. In the original module, there's only 1 true combat in the entire dungeon (gargoyle). Everything else is avoidable or actually a puzzle/trap. Yes, the original boss is actually a puzzle if you read closely. You can only beat this puzzle by doing X, Y, or Z. A great irony is (spoiler for anyone who wishes to play it): [spoiler] you don't have to fight the boss. It's so built into us that there's a final boss level to fight that players likely would never consider they could simply ignore the hostiles, grab the loot and leave.[/spoiler]Traps were originally solved by cleverness. Poles, patterns, and quick thinking. Originally, you could think your way through the traps. You didn't get a "Perception" roll set on autopilot. You had to tell the DM exactly what you're doing, and it was all being done originally on a time limit (tournament play). If players know this coming in advance, that they're going to have to puzzle their way through it, it will raise the stakes. And, it puts life and death of the character solely in the decisions of the players. Many of the original traps were "make the right choice or be screwed."It used to be a badge of pride: I survived. The easier you make the dungeon, the more the legacy of the Tomb is diminished. It can be a meatgrinder, but it's a unique one in that a party of 20th level characters might fail, but a party of 3rd level characters, in theory, could puzzle their way through and succeed. Your combat prowess is supposed to be largely irrelevant. Hence, the "thinking" part.So again, it depends what you want out of it.</blockquote>

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