D&D 5E Your First Module

[fjw70]

First one played was B2. First purchased one ran was either U1 (Sinister Secret of Saltmarsh) or DL1 (Dragons of Despair). I cannot remember.

Back then we ran mostly home-brewed dungeons.

 

[ProgBard]

First one I ever bought was Tomb of the Lizard King. I doubt I ever intended to actually run it; I wanted the ideas and the monsters.

In fact, during my early RPG days, my circle was one that didn't go for premade modules at all, for whatever reason. I don't think we were philosophically opposed, we were just having too much fun coming up with our own stuff. I don't know that I ever seriously considered it until returning to the hobby in full force just a handful of years ago.

Which means that the first time I actually ever ran a prepackaged adventure as-is was probably just last year, when I DMed DDEX3-10: Quelling the Horde at a con. Wow.

 

[Helldritch]

I am quite surprised that so many people bought modules/adventures that they never intended to use in actual play. That is actualy the reverse for me. Every single module/adventure has been played out dozens of times with many different groups and heavily modified to fit groups, editions and even level.

From B2 set as a high level adventure in 3.5 ed (15th level or so) to a Test of the warlords (CM1) reduced to level 5 to 7 (instead of level 15+) in 4ed. I have played and modified published adventures to suit my needs and the needs of my players. I have incorporated published adventures within my own campaings and they were going toe to toe with my own designed adventures. A kind of filling the gaps. Sometimes the published adventures were the main plots. Sometimes they were just a filling the role of a nice change of pace from the main campaing. The only one I have never used was the Dungeon of death. It was a nice read but a module bent on destroying the world...

Any ways. I am really surprised that so many do not use and modify these adventures a lot more.

 

[Zardnaar]

I am quite surprised that so many people bought modules/adventures that they never intended to use in actual play. That is actualy the reverse for me. Every single module/adventure has been played out dozens of times with many different groups and heavily modified to fit groups, editions and even level.

From B2 set as a high level adventure in 3.5 ed (15th level or so) to a Test of the warlords (CM1) reduced to level 5 to 7 (instead of level 15+) in 4ed. I have played and modified published adventures to suit my needs and the needs of my players. I have incorporated published adventures within my own campaings and they were going toe to toe with my own designed adventures. A kind of filling the gaps. Sometimes the published adventures were the main plots. Sometimes they were just a filling the role of a nice change of pace from the main campaing. The only one I have never used was the Dungeon of death. It was a nice read but a module bent on destroying the world...

Any ways. I am really surprised that so many do not use and modify these adventures a lot more.

D&D has a collection element.

 

[AaronOfBarbaria]

D&D has a collection element.

It kind of doesn't though.

I mean, yes, people do collect D&D products (or other game products). But that is not because it is part of the nature of the D&D game to be collected, it is because there is significant overlap between the groups of people who find collecting enjoyable and the groups of people who find D&D (or other game products) to be enjoyable.

So while there are a significant number of people that have humongous collections of D&D products, and usually also have other collections whether they are board games, action figures, video games, stamps, minerals or something even less typical, there are a significant number that never even consider buying a D&D product that they don't intend to use.

I think the non-collector D&D fans actually outnumber the collector D&D fans, but that is because of the couple hundred folks I've personally gamed with, only a handful are collectors to any degree, and one of them (myself) has become a non-collector in recent years for various reason (namely a hurricane, the cost to replace what was lost being staggering, and realizing while working to rebuild the collection that I really didn't feel like I was missing anything important)

 

[Zardnaar]

It kind of doesn't though.

I mean, yes, people do collect D&D products (or other game products). But that is not because it is part of the nature of the D&D game to be collected, it is because there is significant overlap between the groups of people who find collecting enjoyable and the groups of people who find D&D (or other game products) to be enjoyable.

So while there are a significant number of people that have humongous collections of D&D products, and usually also have other collections whether they are board games, action figures, video games, stamps, minerals or something even less typical, there are a significant number that never even consider buying a D&D product that they don't intend to use.

I think the non-collector D&D fans actually outnumber the collector D&D fans, but that is because of the couple hundred folks I've personally gamed with, only a handful are collectors to any degree, and one of them (myself) has become a non-collector in recent years for various reason (namely a hurricane, the cost to replace what was lost being staggering, and realizing while working to rebuild the collection that I really didn't feel like I was missing anything important)

It was an explaination not a popularity contest.

Those collectors though probably make up a decent % of sales. I probably have more D&D items than 50 casuals.

 

[Helldritch]

Some books do have a collectible element but most of them do not. I own quite a lot of the adventures that were published over the years but I was never really fond of source books like the complete (insert whatever the title was in here) and other of their kind. Campaing books were an other matter but I'd only go buy those that somehow struk my fancies and could be adapted to the Realms or Greyhawk. I did play to some extent in Dragon Lance so I got these too but I went back to Greyhawk and the Realm.

Outer plane adventures and Spell jammers were quite a nice change of pace but yet, Greyhawk and the Realm called me back quite fast. I really don't understand why I would buy a book I would not use. Especialy an RGP book. I own hundreds of them and all have seen some use (save the dungeon of death...) no matter small it may have been. But buying a book for the sake of buying it? Not my cup of tea.

 

[AaronOfBarbaria]

Those collectors though probably make up a decent % of sales.

I'm thinking that is probably not the case, given how much WotC has talked about trying to make each book they release one that actually gets used at the table, rather than just sitting on the shelf.

I probably have more D&D items than 50 casuals.

That's not a great phrasing. It seems like you might be saying "casuals" as a pejorative. Especially since you are implying that it is how many D&D items one has purchased, rather than actually playing the game that determines whether one is a casual D&D player or whatever the other team you created in your mind when calling others "casuals" happens to be called.

 

[Zardnaar]

I'm thinking that is probably not the case, given how much WotC has talked about trying to make each book they release one that actually gets used at the table, rather than just sitting on the shelf.

That's not a great phrasing. It seems like you might be saying "casuals" as a pejorative. Especially since you are implying that it is how many D&D items one has purchased, rather than actually playing the game that determines whether one is a casual D&D player or whatever the other team you created in your mind when calling others "casuals" happens to be called.

I'm not looking down on casuals at all, when you have 400+ D&D items and spent 5k a year on D&D at one point (minis addiction) by default you are hard core. RPGs in general do not interest me that much just D&D and Star Wars (D6 and SWSE)

The casuals collectively buy way more than the hard core. Have a look at some of the other threads it seems most posters here are players and DMs and more than a few learnt on BECMI modules.

At 24 years of D&D I am a relative newb.

If you can hook the casuals and hard core you do well with games doesn't matter if its D&D, Mincraft, Warcraft or Tetris or a movie.

In other games if you drive away one or the other you get into trouble. The casuals pay for stuff, the hard core get new casuals.

If you think D&D is bad go play online games with a PvP element with virtual currencies online. The hardcore players get the free loot, the casuals complain about the hard core.

 

[UngeheuerLich]

Treasure hunt is the first module i ran. Converted it to 3rd edition on the fly. Night below the first i purchased second hand. Also converted to 3rd edition.
I think everything before that was more or less homebrew stuff with inspiration from the 3.0 forgotten realms guide.