So after two long DJMGRPGS campaigns we got nostalgic and decided to do a Classic 1st ED AD&D Greyhawk campaign starting with The Temple of Elemental Evil. After setting up many ‘to scale’ battle scenes I thought I might try drawing a ‘to scale’ map. We use a 1 inch = 5 foot scale so that is what I drew the map to. It took 10 poster sheets of paper, 2 large black markers, a yellow & red marker, tape, ruler, and some white out. It took about 4 hours to do and I wanted to share it with everyone here. Now I have to take it down and cut it up into table sized pieces to put our miniatures on... :shock: Has anyone read Little Wars? :?:
Wow, that's great! I am playing through that one right now. Still on the 1st dungeon level after 5 or 6 assaults... It's going to be a long fight!
THANKS!! But if you are not running the game as DM then- STOP LOOKING AT THE MAP! :shock: Don’t you know what will happen to a Player if he is caught looking at “DM’s Eyes Only”material?! Look, just don’t let your DM know and it will be O.K. But if he finds out, make sure that you tell him I had nothing to do with anything… :roll: Lol! Just joking. I am glad you dig it! :lol: Our game is this Sun. and I keep debating if I should take it down and cut it into smaller pieces so my Players cannot see the whole thing. On one hand it is a time saver but on the other it takes away some of the mystery. Cutting it up will still save time while not letting the Players have an undue advantage.
That reminds me of the time around ten years ago, when this fresh off the street unknown player kept edging towards TOEE in Greyhawk and he blurted out total minutiae from the T1-4 adventure. I checked out his "stack" of "character sheets" when he went to can and it was loaded with home made TOEE hot sheets/cliff notes. When he finally got his way to go to the temple, I said the temple was disintegrated when they got there and you should have seen his face.
Lol! :lol: Wow, that is like cheating at Russian Roulette… So did you confront him and if so what did he say? :shock: My assumption is that he was looking for some kind of clout amongst you and your group. :roll:
I never understood why people would want to cheat in an RPG. It just seems to go against the spirit of the game. I remember being at a Con a number of years back and I realized who the "infiltrator" in the party was just 10 minutes into the game. I was very tempted to just walk up to the NPC and stab him in the back but after thinking about it I realized that I would destroy the game for the other players. It was a fairly easy to guess plot for someone who'd been gaming as long as I've been but the other players had not been gaming as long. If you'll notice I LOT of plots get recycled over the years. That's why I try and take a standard plot idea and "tweak it" like crazy so that it really throws people off.
I just closed out that group because it was an attempt at using D20 with fresh faces and it immediately got stale fast! So I never got back to them and chucked all that and went back to the old campaign of yore. Theres more weirdness to the tale with running into that person later on at the last genCon in Milwaukee but I'll refrain from the details.
Well, you don't necessarily have to cut it up.. stop by your local Kmart / Walmart / S-Mart ("shop smart, shop S-Mart!") and buy a cheap *ss black sheet. Then us binder clips to clip the sheet to the map - as the players explore the map, you can then either adjust the sheet or cut pieces out to reveal the rooms. Should work, methinks.. Andy
Thanks, Kveldulf! That sounds like a good idea! If I can swing it before the game I will do it and let you know how it worked.
Well, having played AD&D since around 1981 or so, it is kinda hard to NOT know what is in most modules. I own nearly all of them and have read most of them cover to cover many times over. But that doesn't detract from the fun of playing in them. The other players in the group all own ToEE as well and have played it before. This was all made known to the DM ahead of time. He tweaks encounters here and there to throw us off once in a while but, byand large, we are playing it as written. But oddly enough, knowing what is coming has not seemed to help us that much in any event. The dice demons continually try to dash our dreams of glory. We played Monday afternoon for a few hours and managed, between the three of us players to roll, successively, 17 attack rolls all under 8. It was weird. We won initiative 11 times in a row, but for 3+ of those combat rounds, we didn't hit squat. The Ogres and gnoll-skeletons didn't suffer our poor luck however...
Well, its kind of easy repopulating the Caves of Chaos but when somebody starts talking the politics of factions in the TOEE after being "Yeah, wasn't that an old module, I think?" it kind of burns the concept of it being ready to use and drop in. Instead (in my case) you're feeling like you've got a new used car to show off and you find out its been owned priorly and rebuilt by the guy you're going to show it off to! Sure it can be further heavily customized but the heavy layers of characters loses something. It isn't as reusable as lets say the GD series (G1, G2, G3, D1, D2, D3) because it isn't like the "event" (the drow conquest of the surface) is that relevant. How many times can similiar unique characters respark the same potential turf war that makes the adventure finishable? If its just the place repopulated then you'd have to come up with a whole new reason for the problems or its going to be "work with them and trick those guys, go to this room for the magic items, don't worry Saint Cuthberts got it, don't forget our knightdom or free sword in the inky chamber room, and don't forget to bring the anti-fungi weapons, yada, yada, yada" all over again. The thing about TOEE is if they've went through it before its like an ordeal that isn't so forgettable. So if they have what they were supposed to bring to TOEE (fresh ideas for recon, assessment, planning and execution) then the wonder just disappears if they're just posing as some kind of super players. Which frankly everyone wants to appear as. The easiest switch out that I could see might be a big one like Lolth and Graz'zt (and/or the EEG) because having it packed with drow would be a major WTF factor that would make them delete their prior assumptions and make known (and unchanged) areas have more potency. Plus it wouldn't be so strange since this takeover is hinted at in the moathouse.
Hmm.. Lolth would shake things up, but then again she's got her own series. You could go with someone who's gotten less screen time and perhaps get even more WTF factor. My pick would probably be the Slaad Lords from the Fiend Folio; they were pretty colorful villains but never got used in a module that I'm aware. Plus, they come with with own built in support group of Slaadi.. Could also go with one of the more less-used demon lords - Fraz'Urb'Luu (sp?), Pazazu, Kostchtchie (sp?), Juiblex to shake things up some. Of course, if you really wanted to give the playerys a bad day you could swap Grazzt with Hextor, or an avatar of his >: ) Andy
Sure, why not? Although personally, I'd not use slaadi but not because they're non-Gygaxian but its that whole "created by a pre-pubescent teen" stigma that they and the githyanki have! Ewww! Seriously, a recreation of the St Cuthbert altercation doesn't necessarily have to happen either.
Would you care to elaborate? I personally never got that feeling about slaad or githyanki. Is there some personal background or some written information that gives you that feeling?
Yes, do tell Gene. In have the same curiosity that Geekpreacher does. :?: Sometimes I find your posts a bit cryptic, but as it usually turns out I just need more edification. :idea: :arrow:
I hear ya but it is working fine so far. Sure the initial wonder of something new isn't quite there, but no one remembers every nook and cranny and with a slight tweaking of a small percentage of the encounters, it still feels fresh and exciting. Perhaps a secret door is moved to another location, instead of a room that was empty before, it might have stirges, etc. And as for using Lolth, that is a great idea, especially if you drop Q1 from the GDQ series and replace it with a D-4 featuring none other than the Elder Elemental God. Besides, between Lareth and Falrinth, there easily could be a Lolth connection...
Ahh, thanks! That makes sense since the FF was a UK deal. Do you know what issue of WD they were in? Thanks for the lesion. I hope you have the time to chat a bit at GCII so that I can pick your brain and fill my own. I have issue 1-5 of WD but have never seen any more around here. Must be an OHIO thing. :roll: I also remember reading somewhere that the random encounter tables were messed up in the back of the FF, do you know anything about that Gene? Or does anyone know anything about that?
Guess that's why they didn't bother me. The "kid" is six years older than me so I've gotta give him some props for writing them. (I googled him after your answer.) Wish I'd written something back then that's now a part of D&D history. Oh, the article I found on Wikipedia also said he came up with the Death Knight. Anyone know whether that's verifiable or not?
Heh, having had that content rammed into my crop by every "by the book" DM, its kind of devilishly heartwarming to remember back with pie all over their faces. Seriously, the death knight and githzerai staples were written by the same conpletely unaware amateur as well. Those FF charts are screwed because they're not scaled up but you know what thats news from the stone age I haven't really thought about it since 84-85.
