Ok...I know some of the TSR cover art was poor but my God this cover is absolutely ridiculous! 😂🤣😂 Did the artist (Fred Fields) ever even play D&D?! Looks like a cheap community theater adapted a D&D adventure. Those Gnolls look more cuddly than terrifying...and the lesbian aunt magic-user with her Dress Barn cocktail dress?! Pure 1990s cheese.
Excuse me, but we DO talk about 4th. Mainly to bad mouth it, but that's still talk. Usually trash talk. :) Oh, i guess I should mention I liked this video and the previous one on the original B2. Good work.
Thanks Demetri! Not a big channel, shoot I don't even have a normal release schedule, but I try and release stuff every now and then.... mainly the stuff no one else is really covering. Yet. Also, the one rule about 4e is that we never talk about 4e.
Nice review, mate! This was one of the few redos of a classic module that lived up to expectations and in some ways improved the original. I quite enjoyed running it as a DM. I wished I could have played it instead though. Heve you ever reviewed A Paladin in Hell? I can't remember offhand if it was for 2e or 3.5e. It was based on the picture from the 1e Players handbook showing a Pa!adin fighting off Devils in Hell. That module is a TPK waiting to happen if the PCs aren't prepared.
If I didn't already own this module I would totally have bought it based on this review. I am sure as heck going to pull it back out and re-read it. Another excellent review.
The Skelotor and Zombive ( I spelled those from memory, so I apologize if those are spelled wrong) are from Module L1: the Secret of Bone Hill. Good Review!
Ka? bold? lol. Ive been running this module for the last 7 months. Group#3 and #4 are currently 2nd level. I have greatly expanded this module way beyond the printed pages. Dozens of handouts, letters to and from all the bandits, necros and preists, all new VTT maps, Pages and pages of dialog. Expanded the Bandit lair. My players are having a great time playing this live and in Fantasy Grounds.
So it also has a Monty Python And The Holy Grail reference in Ser Robyn. More specifically "Brave" Sir Robyn's annoying bard, following the characters around and singing about them? Hah! A little too obvious callback, though.
One possibility would be for an extra bugbear to be running for the keep as the PCs are heading for the Caves for the first time. His original mission was to warn the Keep that the cult is mobilizing and some help would be nice. If the PCs don't kill him they now know time's a factor.
Thanks! It is actually placed in greyhawk instead of Mystara. Though canonically the Keep on the borderlands is suppose to be ported to any setting. The Grand Duchy of Karemikos (I think) places the keep kn the mountains of Karemikos
Nice review...and thanks for showing the maps so we get a clearer picture of the scope of this sandbox. Seems the same size as the original classic adventure 👍🏼
You asked for it, so I tried to implement it, glad you found it useful! And in reference to the size of it, its pretty much exactly the same map, just made nicer.
@@johnbalk6091 Hmmm...I guess our right. Still, I had many battles outside the Caves of Chaos involving Lizardmen and other baddies in the nearby swampland. The adventuring party had plenty of opportunities to explore the lands that this module is set in.
@@johnbalk6091 The question is...in your opinion does this adventure hold up as an introduction module to D&D B/X? After 40 years and playing this several times I'm thinking "Thunder Rift" might be a better option as my 10-year old niece and nephew want me to introduce them to D&D...unless you have another option. 🤔
The bard Sir Robin sounds like a nod to Monty Python’s and The Holy Grail’s cowardly Sir Robin. Sir Robin had an annoying bard companion, whom he was eventually forced to eat!
I recently played this adventure in my latest campaign. After making a couple of tweaks, of course. I didn’t care much for the idea of the keep being in sad shape. Got rid of that. Plus, I placed it in Karameikos, it’s original location high up in the northern mountains. Other than that my players loved it, because it was a throwback to our childhood when we first started playing. What made it great was how the passage of time made it fresh, because of subtle changes over the years. Great module.
This module is a weird relic of that period when TSR still existed but only as a shell for WOTC. You can see the WOTC influence on the module quite clearly in the rather turgid adult themes that the writers have inserted into the adventure... the original B2 was rather kid-friendly, but the sequel has sex-slaves (Mendel's "nubile" servents), necrophilia, stripping games, bestiality and more. The implied setting of the module is also very confusing... there are Mystara monsters (the Bhut, for example), Mesopotamian deities (Ereshkigal) and even a recommendation to place the Keep in Greyhawk! I do not think the module is as good as the original B2 by any stretch, but it does perhaps showcase how AD&D adventures could be weird and inexplicable hodgepodges that do not need to make sense. A few final comments, the suggested rules section in the beginning actually breaks some of the rules of 2nd Edition AD&D, which is interesting to see in an official project and perhaps an indication that the writers were not actually all that aware of the 2e rulebooks, and finally the interior artist (Glenn Brewer) did a terrific job capturing the classic "sketchy" art style of the earlier modules-his numerous illustrations all tell evocative stories and are a real standout feature of this module.
Don’t see why not, mostly it’s just a switching of monster stat blocks, and a little creativity on the DMS end to take any module and port it over to their game system
these are defo the best reviews i have seen so far, i love how you go into such detail about what happens in them and you refrain from constant badgering about how older books are better then new books. You get my sub, really good work.
Thanks krootmen (Guardsman here) I’m finishing a grueling job transition currently, so I should be back to producing win a month or so. Thanks for the sub!
Great review. Appreciate your take and views. Wish I had found your channel sooner. Have you seen the Hackmaster take on the Keep on the Borderlands? Thanks.
The whole premise of this module is kinda weird. Return to the Keep on the Borderland after 20 years with new characters that would be clueless to what happened 20 years ago. Any character that went through it in the past would be far too high a level for the adventure so it's really just a poor version of the original. Might as well just run Keep on the Borderlands.
Players might know though, and have a good time seeing what the area is like 20 years after their old characters encountered it. Or, if player's didn't play the original, it can still be fun to feel a sense of history as NPCs talk about the decline of the keep and garrison, and you see old gnoll structures in the cave where gnolls no longer live, etc.
I've used Keep on the borderlands many times. And each time my players have changed it, and I implement that change with the next set of players. The returning players enjoy seeing thier actions caused the storyline to change, and new players like to see the older players get excited over the change. This module requires a little bit of work to get the same response, but tweaking things up for a new adventure, with some of the things older PCs did is always popular
I would love see a review of B1 In Search Of The Unknown which has a open end into underground network of tunnels which could connect with the Caves of Chaos; and B3 The Palace of the Silver Princess which has a secret door leading off map which is left open for the DM to expand on
