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Message: <blockquote data-quote="jessemock" data-source="post: 1353406" data-attributes="member: 15694">I love modules, precisely because I like to improvise:  almost all modules (almost all adventures/games) are railroaded, if not through plot, then through morality.  Our group always plays parties of mixed alignment; the typical expectations of a D20 game simply can't cover the range of decisions available to these characters.  We derail plots constantly.But that's where modules come in handy:  if I wrote up an adventure for our group, I could railroad it; in fact, it would take a great effort not to:  I know the characters too well (and the players even better).  Using other people's work foils my instincts:  the situations that they offer are of a different kind than anything I would ever present.  I can prepare somewhat for what the group may do, faced with certain circumstances, but I would never have come up with these circumstances on my own.I mean:  rescue someone?  or take down some amusin' cult?  No way!  I would have everybody setting up a drug conglomerate or orchestrating the downfall of the state or something.  This doesn't mean that I enjoy modules indiscriminately.  The modules produced by WoTC baffle me:  I have no idea how anyone could possibly enjoy them; they resist my best efforts at perverting them, too; they're just utterly bland.Green Ronin's Freeport modules (or the first three, anyhow) were excellent:  easy to run; good balance of action and investigation; just the right amount of detail.  But I chalk most of this up to their being little more than Call of Cthulhu knock-offs.Hell in Freeport was stupid--a nearly pure 2nd edition feel, only worse, because it took place in the planes without Planescape.I haven't run Black Sails yet, but it reads well and certainly conveys that 1st Edition "go around and pick up a bunch of crap" feel (but with video-game references!).  The finale looks like hell on a plate for the DM, however.I think Monte Cook and Bruce Cordell had exactly one good adventure each:  Dead Gods and Return to the Tomb of Horrors.  Everything since then has been dorkily disappointing.Converting first edition modules is a pain, but they're so weird that it's occasionally worth it.  Plus, it's neat to re-discover all those details of the ToEE and the Slavelords that I'd forgotten (the instructions for role-playing romance in the latter are a hoot).I like some of Necromancer's stuff, too.  All atmosphere, no plot--that's fine, when they get the atmosphere right, which they usually do.</blockquote>

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