Tomb of Horrors

[Falconer]

I ran half of this module the other day. Damn, what a great module. Definitely one of my all-time favorites! Regards.

[Scott]

It's been 21 years since I ran this adventure, and a few more since I played it. My understanding of the game, and the ongoing campaign have increased so much since then. I'd really like to run it again wih some good players. Problem is, all of the good players I still game with regularly have all been through it multiple times, and own it.

[geneweigel]

Argh, I accidentally deleted my post. Eww that stings!



I played it in an evil campaign.

I originally said it was similiar to Kuntz's style (setting off traps with orcs) but I think it was a little more stylistic then self-preservation. We were sending hordes of goodly captives off to their doom.



That campaign was a riot. The ongoing humor was very Blackadder-ish in style (if you've ever watched that show with "the most evil men in all of England".) We eventually ended up making the Bright Desert our base of operation. We searched for a lost city and ended up recruiting the entire undead populace to the cause of evil for evil's sake. I built a Gothic anti-cathedral to Nyarlathotep with a tri-lobed tympanum over the main doors. It turned into a real outdoor equivalent of Vault of the Drow. And we started a project to turn an underground aqueduct to a canal to the sea for "international subterfuge". However, the funds ran out, we were supposed to do another "job" and the campaign stayed where we left it.

The name the DM used was "Necronia" but we weren't sure if we were going to keep it. I chose the title of "Bishop" for my holding but I can't recall what the others had (Barons or whatever) but we ran it like a Greek oligarchy..ahem...I mean City of Greyhawk oligarchy.

[gantry]

THE TOMB!

Very cleanly written and just a fun bit of adventuring. At least I thought so...

Years back I DMed it. When the players asked what I was like I offhandedly (showing my gaming immaturity then) said its kind of a killer. They actually went out and bought it! Halfway through I had to change different things making it look like I couldn't read properly. Then Finally Acererak killed the lot.

I was so disappointed. But it is a very well put together module and I wish I had played it before ever reading it.

[Scott]

I did play this before I DMed it, but the DM was clueless. When I bought it and read through it, it was still like reading something new.

Scott

[amalric]

I ran it many years ago, but we were all young hack-and-slash merchants back then, and none of us really got it. Really good stuff, when you read it back.

[GT]

I don't remember which of my old players ran through--Woodstock, Yokon and Kato for sure... probably Therain the Mage as well... I believe they made it about 2/3 of the way through, and then retreated and went on to other things. I don't recall that they ever went back and finished it (as opposed to S2 and S3, which they went all of the way through). Rather like the Temple of Elemental Evil... Maybe if I can re-assemble the old players they can take another swing at it. I think this was like the 2nd module I ever bought (B1 was probably first...); and I bought it and D2 at the same time (I didn't know D2 was part of a series yet, so I had to go back and get the rest of G and D series when I had more spare cash!)

[GT]

Hard to believe that was almost 30 years ago, now... Where the hey did that time go? Oh, yeah... school and work. ^__^

[Scott]

I think it's been 26 years since I last played/DMed ToH.
I have a group of players that are almost there (level-wise), but I haven't had any real gaming time lately.

[GT]

Despite never having gotten to run a group all of the way through it, I have an extremely fond place for this module in my heart. I was just starting to read the Conan stories, and had just done the Lord of the Rings shortly before; and this module encapsulated everything a "module" for high levels should be! My group had actually only gone through B1, S2 and some adventures of my own when I got around to running this, so they really weren't ready--that was my fault as an "over-anxious" DM, I reckon... we gamed intensively from 1979-1983; I had only been first exposed in 1978 and I was also still running in the Purdue group run by Jim Simons at the time. (There were 3 or 4 AD&D campaigns running at that time on campus).

[Scott]

I've been reading through different campaign journals lately, and I’ve read a few accounts of the Tomb of Horrors. I’m dismayed. The Tomb of Horrors, the most legendary difficult dungeon from 1E, repeatedly nerfed beyond recognition. Players marching through it and killing Acererak without appearing to be challenged at all. Apparently the Realms of Horror repackaging doesn’t help. Casting a Legend Lore spell gives you a ‘How to Kill a Demi-lich Checklist’, and the DMs don’t seem like they are trying to challenge the players at all. And a bunch of other wacky stuff like letting the players fix the broken staff of the magi. I’ve become a more player-friendly DM recently, but this stuff is just crazy.

[deogolf]

I remember a good friend of mine running us through it; man, what grinder it was for us. We were still pretty new to the game and pretty much had our butts handed to us. I think we finally made it out, but not until lost at least 75% of our group. But, it was a lot of fun!

[Scott]

I remember playing this as a kid, in middle school, and some other middle school DM ran it for me and a friend, and we walked through it with no problems. When I read it, I was amazed at what a beast of a dungeon it was. I've only tried to run it once, and it ended in a TPK.