Along the way, though, they produced a lot of adventures and supplements. They ended up getting sued by TSR anyway in 1993, but were not successful, so TSR bought the rights to he line to stop it. They were not officially licensed – Gygax was in favor but outvoted at TSR – so they were careful to make clear the lack of endorsement. So Mayfair Games started the Role Aids RPG line in 1982, as one of their partners was an avid D&Der. Next up is another non-TSR product, another module produced by Mayfair Games for their Role Aids line of game supplements! I will come back and describe DCC in later posts, because the adventures are deliberately old school. PPS Dungeon Crawl Classics rules are really fun! They are an excellent synthesis of old school AD&D atmosphere and modern RPG rules that properly balance character classes and give everyone something to do. In DCC, the recommended character creation process is known as the “character funnel”: each player makes 4 0th level characters, and runs them through a dungeon! The survivor(s) become 1st level!īut this all started with N4: Treasure Hunt! PS: the module was one of the first set in the Forgotten Realms campaign setting, though it was assigned as such retroactively. This idea, of running weak characters through a dungeon to define them, has been adopted by the excellent old school D&D-type game, Dungeon Crawl Classics (2012), which I recommend! The monsters have a bit more “oomph” than the characters. Or die, as they are very, very weak characters! The module has lots of twists and surprises, and the interior art is quite charming! The module also has extensive advice on what to do if the players exhibit game-breaking stupidity. Eventually, they end up at a desecrated temple of a goddess, where a player can start down the cleric path… but there’s a problem! The goddess is angry that the orcs and goblins have trashed her temple, and she’s going to destroy the whole island! The players have 24 hours to find a way to escape, by exploring the ruins of an old palace nearby.
The players must first struggle to survive and wend their way to shelter between warring groups of orc and goblin pirates. But weather and an incompetent captain cause the ship to crash on a remote island. The adventure starts with the players abducted from their homes into slavery, and stuck below deck on an orc slave ship. If the player fights a lot, they’ll end up a fighter! If they sneak a lot, they’ll end up a thief! If they study the magical scrolls they find, they’ll be a magic user! And if they treat a goddess with respect, they’ll be a cleric! N4 was the first module to try an innovative approach: the characters are just “ordinary” people with no experience who are forced into an adventure (at -500 experience points)! Along the way, the actions they take will determine their class and alignment. The first thing you may notice when looking at the cover is that this module is unusual in that it is for 0th level characters! What is the deal with that? N4: Treasure Hunt (1986), by Aaron Allston.
As long as I’m still on an old school kick, let me try and catch up with all my posts from twitter! Part 1 of Old School Dungeons & Dragons on the blog can be read here.
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