Worst D&D adventure of all time?

[Sholari]

Patriots of Ulek
Queen's Harvest

 

[Hussar]

i can tell you with a very informed opinion that the DL modules are crap.

I too ran the first 9 of these. So, I've got a pretty informed opinion as well. They sucked. Badly. You couldn't kill any NPC for the first, what, 8 modules? Hope you have your tickets ready, cos this train is leaving town. Very, very bad modules.

On a side note, DL 16 and 17 (or was it 15 and 16?), the ones with the mini side treks, actually had a number of pretty decent adventures that saw use in my campaigns.

It just goes to show that one man's garbage and all that.

 

[DarrenGMiller]

Here is my list (not in order):

Hour of the Knife: Railroaded plot with a twist to guarantee the ire of every player at the table.

Needle: Silly talking spiders that say, "Gee Whiz!" over. and over. and over. Actually, this silliness and politically correct "young gamer/child friendly" phase of 2E was one of the things that made me stop playing for a while. Any of them could make this list.

The Silver Key: The PC's can stay trapped in other bodies forever, and likely will.

Lost Island of Castanamir: bad gimmicks

Secret of Bone Hill: I know someone else praised this one, but my players were bored and confused. We scrapped it quickly.

Dragonlance: based on novels. "Come on ride the train..." We actually played the first nine adventures.


Gargoyles: see Needle

Puppets: see Needle

Howl from the North/Five Shall Be One: I bought these with great expectations of an epic quest, but discovered it was only a plot to destroy my favorite campaign setting!

Curse of Xanathon: see Needle

Now on the other hand, here are some that we played and enjoyed: Expedition to the Barrier Peaks, Tomb of Horrors, Castle Greyhawk, Beyond the Magic Mirror and Dungeonland, Ravenloft, Egg of the Phoenix, Ghost Tower of Inverness.

One final question: If we subtract the nostalgia factor, would Keep on the Borderlands make this list?


DM

 

[Silver Moon]

Secret of Bone Hill: I know someone else praised this one, but my players were bored and confused. We scrapped it quickly.

We had a bad experience with that one too, but I think it was more the fault of the novice DM than the module.

 

[Hussar]

The Silver Key: The PC's can stay trapped in other bodies forever, and likely will.

Oh, come on, that one was great! Orc points? Bloody stellar idea. You got xp for acting like an orc, but, if you did it too much you stayed an orc forever. The other players nominated you for an orc point every time you did something orcish. My players loved this thing. Had an absolute blast in it. One of the few 2e modules I really enjoyed.

 

[Remathilis]

To answer two posters earlier

Bleak House: No matter what we did, we ended up railroaded. Good story, but the DM needed to know everything or else it crashed like a house of cards.

Deva Spark: The stats were the least; I didn't know how it looked, acted, or anything. Plus, the method was contrived on how you got there. My Players STILL rib me for that module...

 

[Cam Banks]

I too ran the first 9 of these. So, I've got a pretty informed opinion as well. They sucked. Badly. You couldn't kill any NPC for the first, what, 8 modules? Hope you have your tickets ready, cos this train is leaving town. Very, very bad modules.

Sure you could kill them. Some of them will come back later, but most won't. It was a cinematic thing, aimed at representing the same sort of obscure death rule that was so evident in old movie serials and action adventure novels. The campaign wouldn't break if you killed the bad guy too early - after all, Verminaard dies at Pax Tharkas by all accounts in the novels.

Cheers,
Cam

 

[Zappo]

I haven't played many modules, and I've been quite careful to pick those that felt good. The worst one was a Vecna Reborn converted to 3e, which went pretty much this way. Appear in city A. Meet guy, who on a metagame level we knew to be trouble but had no reason IC to worry much about. Travel to city B. Find out that guy is the high priest of Vecna and will resurrect the god in 3, 2, 1... get back to city A as fast as humanly possible. Meet with guy, who is just completing the ritual and whose CR is 12 above our level. Die quickly. Even with hindsight, I can't see a way to complete it. We could have gathered more information or found out the truth earlier, but that didn't change the fact that we were 8th and he was 20th.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

There IS no point to The Secret of Bone Hill. Modules in that day, like Keep on the Borderlands, featured places to loot and that's it. Make your own adventure.

My groups always ended up invading the baron's castle (which was totally statted out for such misbehavior, incidentally) and trying to rob his treasure. If you can't have fun robbing the lord of the manor, you may be clinically dead.

 

[VirgilCaine]

There IS no point to The Secret of Bone Hill. Modules in that day, like Keep on the Borderlands, featured places to loot and that's it. Make your own adventure.

My groups always ended up invading the baron's castle (which was totally statted out for such misbehavior, incidentally) and trying to rob his treasure. If you can't have fun robbing the lord of the manor, you may be clinically dead.

I see now. Very open. Cool.