Yesssss I love it when someone tells it like it is on THac0 lol. My dad ran the Keep for my buddies and I, back in the mid ‘90s. The Mad Hermit lived on forever in infamy, probably the most defining encounter of D&D for me.
Hey thanks! THAC0 wasn't all that hard! I think most folks who complain about it never actually even played with it. And yesssssss, the Mad Hermit is fantastic!
If you played in the very early '80's you would have started with that, if you started after 1983 you started with Frank Mentzer's Castle Mistamir (from the Metzer Basic Set DMG), but may have come across the module separately or simply the Caves of Chaos in the "In Search of Adventure" compilation. One great advantage of Keep though is the keep itself; giving a home base, tavern, place to gather roomers, and chance for roleplaying before active adventuring, instead of starting at the dungeon entrance as with Mistamir. But yet again, the "mini-sandbox" is an example of the miscommunication between old grognards and younger players; we loved our sandboxes, but rarely did that mean a sandbox campaign encompassing the whole world as one big sandbox for PCs to roam aimlessly.
Great review! Gotta admit, I was always one of those "Why do they all live together" people, so when I ran it 35 years ago, I split the caves up into different locations: kobolds in one spot on the map, orcs in another, etc. I had them all working for the Cult too, but giving each monster tribe a unique setting was fun!
I ran it today, using OD&D Moldvay rules, for a group of 7 players with only one who's played D&D only half a dozen times. It was so cool to see the awe of new players experiencing it. With the lairs, I exaggerated the distance to give them more breathing room. They all had their moments to shine, and I fudged a few things like maximum number of attackers in a confined space, so that nobody was left out.
The ultimate sandbox module, played it many times, converted it to 1E AD&D, placed it in Greyhawk, and fleshed it out a lot to make the Keep more interesting.
In 1981 when I was 10, my best friend ran this module. I remember it fondly. During the mad hermit encounter, the NPC cleric that our characters hired betrayed us! We were so screwed. Another memory I have is when we finally reached the caves, we entered the kobold lair and my friends character fell into that pit trap at the entrance and died. The kobolds were now alerted and overwhelmed the rest of the party. I created about 4-5 characters playing that module. Good times.
2nd time watching this video. There are loads of videos out there on running The Keep on the Borderlands, but this is definitely one of the most useful - packed full of great tips and ideas. Plus your energy and enthusiasm are really infectious! A couple of thoughts: The gathering army of chaos thread really holds it all together. I’d use the idea that it’s essentially a military outpost to take the baby orcs etc out of the adventure, saving that moral dilemma. Love the idea that the castellan is in on it. That would explain why no military support has come to thwart the growing threat. Maybe he’s been sending out messengers to ask for help, but tipping off the forces of evil to intercept them. Perhaps they’re among the prisoners in the caves and have guessed what’s happened. All the while the castellan publicly wrings his hands and bemoans the way that his superiors seem to have abandoned the inhabitants of the keep to their fate. Because at first glance, it does seem odd that no military expedition has been sent to clear out the caves. I don’t have a problem with the lack of names. Last time I went to the pub, to a shop or spoke to a security guard, I had no idea what their name was.
Fun; I'm just converting the recent Goodman Games 5e updates back to OSE for my upcoming campaign! They add new stuff for B1-2 but only stat it for 5e.
The aforementioned party of 15 happened to pick cave “I” first (Minotaur labyrinth). After giving a description dripping with warnings and the initial effects of the confusion spell, they party went for it anyway and became hopelessly lost. By the end they had pretty much cleaned out the cave out. The battle with the Minotaur was particular exciting, lasting something like 15 rounds (it was surrounded and could not flee). Despite being a big baddie, the Minotaur’s THAC0 is 13 . It ended up having trouble hitting the best armored characters who fronted the attack, so only a couple died in the battle.
Watched this months ago when I began running this module. Totally gives some great ideas! 8 months in and we're getting close to the end. I created my own storyline to give purpose to the players and they've been fully invested. I'm hoping you give us some more content. Your videos are top notch!
Awesome review and retrospective (I got the feels when you opened the module and zoomed in on that 1980's TSR font that was used in so many of their RPGs). 😂 This module was a real challenge for beginning players and if you survived you felt like you really accomplished something. I played it as a DM once and a PC twice many years ago...and not ashamed to say I got my ass handed to me. As a DM I had the cult and their goblinoid henchmen conquer all the caves before my party got there. When they arrived they found Kobold and Orc remains/skeletons in Caves A-C (even poisoned orc corpses still sitting at their banquet table). This set a mood of dread while going a little easy on the PC's for the first encounters. That way they could concentrate on uncovering traps and searching for clues and loot. It also solved the story problem of these enemies living in such close proximity. Anyways your videos have helped me and others fall in love with the B/X world all over again. My 12-year old niece and nephew have asked me to teach them to play after watching OSR UA-cam videos. Can't wait to DM this again after 40 years!
Fantastic coverage of this module! I've been soaking up all the big time UA-cam reviews of it, and when I saw you spent twice as much time on this module than the others, I had to check it out, and I'm glad I did!
Ok, first of : I think this video format is awesome and you should review more modules and give advices to run them. About B2 : I read it last year thanks to dmsguild POD version, and I was quite disapointed by it. I thought that the keep was very well designed in itself, but I disliked the caves of chaos. It felt like an uninteresting dungeon way too hard for a 1st level group. So I chose to run B1 instead, and it was a very important piece of my current ongoing campaign (it really sparked my imagination contrary to B2). But now that I know how you run the caves, I better understand the appeal of the module, and I kinda want to try and run it myself ! I guess it is going to join the unending list of modules that I want to run and probably will never have the time to ! So thanks for the review ;)
Really great overview - as someone who began with that module in the early eighties, I was lost in nostalgia there. Thanks to lockdown, this week I'm running my first adventure for years using my original copy of B2. Some great tips from you. Thanks!
I’ve run B2 many times. Never had a party smaller than 6 characters, though not always with 6+ players (most I ever had was 8). Parties that first enter the Caves of Chaos have ranged up to as as many as 15 characters, which is perfectly normal for B2 (6-9 player characters, 2-5 men-at-arms hierlings, one 2nd-3rd level “expert treasure hunter”). The rules are designed for this, and party size can grow much larger with additional hierlings (9 average charisma characters can have up to 36). Another 4-14 NPCs can also be temporarily gained from the Keep for special missions if you play your cards right.
Thanks for the description, would've liked if there was an additional mention of all the women and children in the lairs who don't fight... While there is a time and a place for a moral dillema like that especially in other editions, I wanna lead this module for some kids and I think it would be really unbefitting, so I'm going to remove them all, except the women who are equipped to fight. You've also given me some neat ideas, lovely review.
It was my first module too. I found it devoid of flavour but mostly the nature of the module is this: Fight, fight, fight, trap, fight, fight. Boring. Sandbox? Yes. Start in the lower caves? Not if it's a sandbox. Here's a play-through of starting in the upper levels. Enter cave, die. Sure, drop some tips to your players but doing so takes away their agency. As for the wilderness; the encounter with the hermit? Right...Other wilderness encounter? Fight, fight, fight. I think the love for this module is two-fold; firstly, as you say, everyone has it; secondly, tied to the first point, nostalgia. I've played this with 10 players. TPK; there's no way this is a first level adventure. I agree, any adventure is improved ten fold by making it your own and adding your own personality but with this one, there is a LOT of work required. Good video. Love the enthusiasm and the complete look at the book. We don't agree of course But I loved the exploration of the module. What I would say about the adventure is that it gives the reader some great ideas about how to and how not to, run a game and write a scenario.
I'm glad you enjoyed the video, even if ultimately we disagree :) I can absolutely see your points, but by the same token, I do believe this is a satisfying module and can be run successfully, even for first level players. I think it just comes down to taste and preference, we can't all like the same things :) If we did, life would be boring :)
ABSOLUTELY LOVE KoTB!! Been running this module or using parts of it since the 80s and still find new hooks and plots every time. Also really easy to use it for AD&D characters, and in fact I was just sitting here thinking that I might run a campaign for a full party of first level paladins who are on a quest to retrieve a holy relic stolen by the Cult of Evil Chaos. It's a great module, cannot recommend it enough
Great review. Brought back lots of memories. I remember the Keep being so useful overall that I tended to think of it more as a resource than a module. What with all the tables, pre rolled NPCs and monster listings I tended to use it often but I only ever ran the actual module once. Great stuff. Thanks for posting!
We run this a the start for a huge campaign that spanned against the slavers and the full against the demon queen. In our game, the drunk priest was a huge ally and the castelan's wife was a drow spy/traitor! The campaign was so cool
That sounds amazing! One of my favorite aspects of this module is that it is a mini-sandbox, making it almost infinitely adaptable, and virtually guarantees a unique experience every time you play through it! :)
So, I believe that Juce has a Patreon tier level ($10 I believe) that will get you into the game I'm running right now on his channel. If you aren't interested in that, hit me up on Twitter at @rollstats and we can discuss. Thanks!
Cool, I am slowly setting this up on Roll20, set up most of the battle maps and now creating all the monsters listed in the game. Getting all the hints and help I can gather....love your passion and insight of the BX games...
@@RollStats It was the first Module I DM'ed. It was so memorable I still remember the players names and their characters classes. It was January or 1979.
Extremely Awesome, Amazing & Wonderful Video by you Sir. Your Love for This Module & Dungeons & Dragons in general is very Infectious & endearing. It's wonderful. You come across as the nicest guy in the universe!! 👽👻😉😉
I got forever DM'd pretty early on (long story but I embraced it and here I still am)) but B2 is special to me because I didn't DM it initially. I got play characters through it, more than once! Eventually ran as DM a couple years later and it's a truly excellent starter in so many ways. In my new and hopefully final world build I've repurposed a lot of old modules fully or partially and this one will be, depending on what the players do, a potential starter area. Edited for flavor, non-greyhawk plotlines and some other stuff. If a shrewd grognard thinks about it they'll recognize the skeleton 8>D
@@RollStats You got it man! I'm watching the stream of this game and Juce recommended your page! Here's to hoping you do Castle Amber one day! That's my favorite.
Dropping hints or warnings is not rail-roading; not allowing them to ignoring well-placed hint would be, though you really can't just make them do as you want (PCs being the one thing DMs don't control).
Fantastic review! I just checked my copies of B2 KEEP ON THE BORDERLANDS on the Acaeum website, and I have a legit, near-mint 1st printing and a 3rd printing in my collection! Apparently some pieces of artwork were taken out and/or were altered in later editions. My original has a kind of wonky looking Minotaur with a skull on page 20, and the 3rd printing has a Bill Willingham Minotaur that looks a bit more menacing. Very interesting! I never noticed before. Back around '81, I borrowed B2 from a friend. I didn't know anything about RPG games, so I kept asking him where the game board was! LOL! When he told me that it was a "module," I had no idea what he was talking about. I thought that the map inside the cover was somehow the gaming board! I started reading the module back then with no previous notion of what a role playing game was, and at the tender age of 11, I couldn't make heads or tails of things. I thought, "Wow. I guess you have to be some kind of scientist to figure out these crazy rules! lol. Years later in the mid-80s, I played in my very first AD&D game, and recounted the tale to my DM. He laughed at me thinking that it was a board game like Monopoly, but a few years into gaming, he gave me his copy of B2! One of my DMs has gone onto becoming a writer of sci-fi, horror and fantasy novels. Another one went onto creating the RPG game, DEADLANDS: THE WEIRD WEST. I went onto becoming an RPG illustrator, a kids book illustrator, comic book artist, and I'm currently doing packaging artwork for action figures. I credit D&D for helping us develop a great love for fantasy, and helping all of us to explore our imaginations. I can tell by your videos that you'd be a DM after my own heart! I watched several of your videos, and I couldn't help thinking, "This guy gets it!" Thank you for the great video review! Consider me subscribed!
PS: I always play hobgoblins as being rather vicious, cowardly, and cruel, but I put a spin on things in my AD&D campaign. When anyone who speaks goblinoid successfully translates what a goblin or Hobgoblin is saying to each other, I make my Hobgoblins sound like British aristocrats. LOL. Let's say that a thief (who speaks goblinoid) successfully sneaks behind a couple of Hobgoblin guards might hear a conversation that might go something like this: "Gerald. I hate to be a bit of a bother, but do you happen to spy those horrid human ruffians out there in the brush?" "Do I ever! Do I ever! I'm afraid things are not looking good, old boy! I should think that we might be just a trifle outnumbered! I shant say that I am admiring our odds if things come to a skirmish. No, I shant say that, Nigel!" "Oh dear! Our odds at a victory seem rather bleak then? And I was SO looking forward to taking a nice human or elf skin back to my beloved Cora! Her birth celebration is coming up you know, and I can't very well bring her yet another Gnome heart, Gerald! Whatever should I do?" "For now, old bean, let's worry about those brush ruffians!" "Quite!" lol. Players always love a bit of humor.
Let me know if someone ends up getting a B/X game together, I would always be interested so long as I am available. Also, if there is a discord someone should hit me with the link!
I'd always make it that the temple attracted the monsters and used them as fodder vs the keep. Then they raised them as zombies. Then the priest fled with the eye of arik to the palace of the silver princess
Yeah maybe the Minotaur is the last “hold-out” of the original caves before the cult of chaos started taking over. The cult has failed to convert the Minotaur and they can’t kill it because it’s just too tough. So perhaps clever players might be able to forge an unholy alliance with the Minotaur to clear out the Caves of Chaos! 😄💕😄
Yep, my first ever module in the 1981 boxed set.. I recently modded this for NWN, and there are plenty of hooks. I made the Bailiff the traitor. Also, I had bandits fill the vacuum (per the mod) as soon as the shrine was defeated. Great vid!
Good stuff... I started with the Holmes edition, that's what my dad gave me. After that, I got that box set. I've never really played either though.. I'd love to.. just so I can say I have.
Awesome! One of my favorite episodes. I've been a subscriber when you took your break back in the days of yore... I'm a huge fan of The Keep and Caves of Chaos. Like you, I started in the 80's, it was my first set, first adventure, and I have ran it dozens of times. I have added many names, details, sude adventures. Is it really available as PoD again? Drive thru had it awhile back as PoD but took it down. Thanks for the video!
Thanks, man! I'm so glad you enjoyed it, and I really appreciate you hanging in there with me through the hiatus! I just checked, and it looks like it is only available as a PDF at this point. Sorry about that! Hopefully, they bring it back as POD again! Really, man! Thanks for hanging in there with me! I promise you won't regret it! I have tons of ideas for new videos rolling out! Stay tuned!
Excellent video of an excellent product and an extremely fun module. I learn of your channel from DravenSwiftbow another great D&D content creator. Subbed and liked!
Love your enthusiasm, mate! I'm prepping to run the Goodman Games version of this (and In Search of the Unknown) this coming weekend and your excitement for the module is infectious. Can't wait!
Hahahahahahahaha oh man... How much time do you have? If I had a dollar for every time a lazy DM who didn't want to actually run their game used the "I don't want to railroad my players" excuse, I would be filming these videos on a beach in the Bahamas! :)
I think railroading is when you cancel out player choice. I believe you should tell them at the start of the game, that there will be TPK level encounters, and that their decisions matter (ie: tell them the rules of the game, so they can make informed decisions). So you could entice them to go to the Kobold Cave, have rumors at the keep that the lower caves are safer, and if they try to enter the Minotaur cave, describe it as especially foreboding. However, if the players insist on pressing their luck in the Minotaur Cave anyway, and they die, they knew the risks, and lost fair and square. If through good planning, they win, they will forever crow about that time they beat the "impossible encounter". If you tell them "No -- you enter the Kobold Caves", or teleport them there against their will (even if they remain unaware), that's where the railroading kicks in. It's the equivalent of playing chess with someone, and after they move a piece, you pick up the piece and move it somewhere else for them because "it's a better move". If the player's move is nullified, then what's the point of playing a game? I do think that secretly nullifying their moves to lead them to a really cool encounter might seem like a good idea, but it requires the DM to lie to the players. Nobody likes being lied to. Eventually they'll find out, and you run the risk of them resenting it, however politely. They could also start questioning all of their other choices in the campaign, and wonder if any of them actually mattered.
An ideia for the minotaur, should the players gain some renown by eliminating some threats, the spys of the temple may try to fool htem to get rid of the minotaur luring them to the big threat, of course I would give them ample opportunities to suspect something fishy is going on. Maybe the players even ally with the minotaur, promising they will leave him alone should he help against the temple, I think is a rare opportunity for double crossing and some RP
Like many, I cut my teeth as a player on this module. Now that I’m the forever DM, I’ve run it a few times in B/Ex but I’d love to get the Goodman version and run some 5e players through it.
It really is a great book! It's definitely worth picking up! Also, I feel ya on the forever DM part! I feel like once you begin to DM, especially if you're any good at it. That's it! You are now the permanent DM! Hahahahaha!
I really enjoyed your review. Thank you! When you were DM with the BECMI playthrough of this module around 2020 with D Swiftbow, DM Drake and the Master the Game crew, you read NPC monologs at the begging of each session which I liked. They gave the characters important clues in a fun way. Were these monologs from the module or did you make these up? If you made these yourself, did you have them before you started session 1, or did you make them as you went along based on what the characters had done and what the players needed to hear?
Looking forward to playing bx with you someday. The group wants to do tomb of horrors. I'd probably rather play something that isn't instant death but that's what the group wants. This module seems pretty cool.
Ya know, I feel like a ton of people played through this module using AD&D! And I can't tell you how happy I am to hear that you've got your Rules Cyclopedia. You're gonna start referring to it as "my preciousssss" too! Hahahahaha
Great review my man. I too was utterly enchanted when I first opened the Moldvay box. Your box and books seem to be in A1 condition. Are they the originals?
Using soe inspiration from how I liked to run Hommlett: 1) There are two political factions, the Duke's Men, and the Baron's Men; each is a noble back in civilization trying to slowly take over the Keep politically. Every NPC of the Keep works for one of those two. This political tension is what has created the political paralysis of the Keep, and why they are loosing control of the area. The NPCs will use the party in this political intrigue, hiring the party for missions they want kept secret from the others. 2) Up the religious tension. The Church of St.Cuthbert is the official religion of the Keep, but many people are loosing faith in Cuthbert and turning to the worship of the Druids. The Church of Cuthbert is becoming more and more extreme, the church has appointed an Inquisitor NPC, and the Druids are sympathetic to the Bandits because they also worhip the Old Ways. 3) dark secrets. The Mad Hermit, and the Bandits know the following: 100 years ago this land was peaceful and humans, demihumans and monsters all lived in harmony under the Druids, Cuthbert was a greedy warlord who led a mercenary force into the land and began slaughtering people, demihumans and monsters. when the Druids were killed the people left turned to Chaos to fight back and led an army from the Caves of Chaos. The Bandits are the remains of those slaughtered hill tribes, 4) The Greed of Men; An NPC is actually working with the Bandits, passing them information to aid their raids. Mounting evil; A new chaos cult has formed in the Caves and is building a new monster army. They have not yet recruited the human Bandits, or the Lizard Men but are starting to mount pressure on them to join their chaos army (or die). The cult has however infiltrated the Keep. One of the major NPCs is actually a chaos worshipper who is trying to destabilize the Keep from within, and recruit more people secretly into the cult. Whodunit; While the Party is there one of the major NPCs is assassinated
@@RollStats It's a model I would use that works on lots of the old classics like Keep on the Borderlands, and Secret of Bone Hill. You can even tweak it to the natives on Isle of Dread, the factions o fonsters in the Lost City, etc.
Still trying to decide if I want to get and og copy or the reprint. I did get an og of Isle of Dread, but it would be about a 1/3 of the cost to get a reprint.
This is an excellent review! Love your insights. I would agree with your comments about railroading. What's important is the sense of agency. In my experience, most players want to feel that they have agency, and that their decisions have an affect on the world around them. Otherwise, you're just narrating a story to an audience. Whether they actually have agency or not is beside the point. But I would also add that some, and I stress _some_, players enjoy a high-risk, high mortality-rate game. Rolling up a new fist-level because your last one died horribly (and hopefully, entertainingly), would be considered an enjoyable feature of a campaign by some players. So some DMs may consciously allow their players to "poke the bugbear" if they know that their players would enjoy the potential resulting carnage. And that's one of the finer arts of good DMing -- make sure you communicate with players about what you and they expect in terms of tone and content (humor, genre, mortality rate, etc.) for a game / session / campaign. Well done, sir! Glad to have found your channel, and happy to subscribe!
about naming,,, when i first DMed it i was only 11 back in 81. i did not think of naming anyone. it was not till i was 15 or 16 till i started to name NPC's from modules. so it is not a bad thing not to name someone who just started. it is a learning process
It's certainly not a bad thing to have NPC's named in a module, agreed. But, by the same token, the fact that the NPC's weren't named certainly doesn't ruin the experience, and moreover, I do believe that the NPC's not being named wasn't a bug, rather it was a feature. I believe Gugax didn't name the NPC's purposely so that you could take B2 and drop it into your world seamlessly. I think the biggest selling point of a module... Is to actually be modular :)
@@RollStats i agree it is easier to place in my world. it was back then i did not know what i was doing and took the book literally with names and such.
@@GeneBateman1970 Yeah, valid! DM'ing is a skill for sure, and like any skill, you get better the more experience you have. No one began the game as an expert player or DM. Hell, I've been doing it for 35 years and I still learn new stuff all the time. :)
While I certainly understand and appreciate the struggle with dyslexia, from a very personal perspective. I'm not sure why THAC0 would be any better or worse? Dyslexia is a struggle whether you use descending AC or ascending AC :)
@@RollStats In my case, "up" is counting and thus easier than "down." That being said it wasn't as bad in the "Basic" versions simply because the character sheets had a chart at the bottom so you could just glance and see what A.C. you hit.
@@RollStats you're cool, yeah and dyslexia is a general term and always tailored to the user ;). Boxed text could be confusing for me also, but it was a mass market product so it is the way it is, still love it warts and all.
Hi Bill. I just found out, through Master the Game, that you're in Chicago. I'm in Chicago too, near Foster and Pulaski, and would love to meet up with you sometime. I wrote a book too, a D&D fantasy novel, that I think you'll enjoy, and I also narrated it here on my channel, so I'm hoping you'll see this comment and get back to me, though Master the Game says you don't come on here anymore. Well here's hoping that you see this and we can meet up. Hope so : )
Just speaking for me, but if I pick up on the idea that the DM is in any way "on my side," it drains away a lot of tension. Using your example of obviously trying to draw my attention to one cave as my character's approaching another, that immediately lets me know that I have a potent advantage against any threats encountered. That's not really a welcome advantage in my case, though. I much prefer the impartial referee model for allowing me to feel like I truly earn whatever I get (good or bad).
I hope I get a chance to play B/X one day. its a little antiquated (race as class, 1 spell a day starting out, thac0 ect) but it has a simplicity that's hard to match
You should definitely play B/X at least once! You have to give it a shot! It is the elegance and simplicity of the game that makes it so appealing! Try it, and let me know what you think! :)
It's still my favorite version. Doesn't take long to make a character and players don't spend several minutes every turn trying to figure out what 'power' to pull out of their ass. The light rules speeds the gameplay up and keeps the game moving.
Yeah I agree. It's not antiquated at all and the framework for the rules and math is solid and well thought out. The beauty of it is that it lets you fill in the blanks and bend the story and rules to your liking while keeping the pace moving. You can have a hell of a lot of adventure and story in just a 2-hour game without getting "lost in the sauce".
Nice video! Regarding the various monster factions living in close quarters, you could have a chart that randomly determines whether fights between them have broken out as the party approaches. Sort of like in the Lord of the Rings where Sam is able to storm the tower because the different orc factions are brawling.
Matt may have played this, but I )Justin) have never had the opportunity to play or run this game... so maybe I should leave to not hear spoilers haha.
i remember the caves of chaos , as a player but have do not remember the caves of the unknown. idk, if we skipped it or our dm didnt include it. i played though this mod. but want to know what was in there. i want a spoiler, lol. please.
Well the Cave of the Unknown was purposely left out so your DM could design their own dungeon for it and perhaps start it as a 2nd adventure. Honestly there was already a lot of work and prepping the DM had to do in this module so I think most of them left it out. I bet RollStats has got a plan for it though. 😅
I appreciate your passion, but this module sounds pretty icky. It's basically a huge lair of goblinoids. And, I think, they do seem to be politely waiting to die. If they were really massing a force, then their should be some sense of leadership. After the first few caves get taken down, the rest of them should form up a possee and seek justice.
It's essentially an introductory module, created to teach newbie DM's how to handle dungeon crawls. With that said, I will say I've played and run through it countless times, and it is a ton of fun. Bear in mind I'm speaking through the lens of nostalgia though :)
@@RollStats OK, but compare it to a module like "Night of the Walking Dead" with was one of my first and favorites. www.drivethrurpg.com/product/17493/RQ1-Night-of-the-Walking-Dead-2e?affiliate_id=384230 It opens with a great hook that immediately involves the party in the horrific affairs of this local hamlet. The tension builds to the end with the final cinematic showdown with the BBEG.
@@MrRourk I'm sure it is, it doesn't just sound legit, it sounds effective. But, as I've said before, I'm not a big tactical player, I don't generally play the game as zero sum. I'm more of a story guy, and that story just isn't mine. I tend to prefer playing a hero :)
I appreciate your attitude about 'railroading' (about 24 minutes in). That is exactly how I see my role as a DM. Here is my own take: canonfire.com/cf/modules.php?name=Forums&file=viewtopic&t=5218
Of course it’s not railroading. A 1st level party running into a Minotaur or Owlbear is probably dead, then your players will loose interest fast if they are getting slaughtered all the time.
You can say that the minotaur is being groomed by the temple to be there army's commander
Yes definitely! That works out pretty well! Thanks, man!
Your happiness and excitement is so contagious
Thanks! :) I get pretty excited about RPG's!
First D&D module I ever played.
Likewise!
"THAC0 wasn't that hard. Don't be afraid of THAC0. Try using it"
Did we just become best friends???
Yesssss I love it when someone tells it like it is on THac0 lol. My dad ran the Keep for my buddies and I, back in the mid ‘90s. The Mad Hermit lived on forever in infamy, probably the most defining encounter of D&D for me.
Hey thanks! THAC0 wasn't all that hard! I think most folks who complain about it never actually even played with it. And yesssssss, the Mad Hermit is fantastic!
If you played in the very early '80's you would have started with that, if you started after 1983 you started with Frank Mentzer's Castle Mistamir (from the Metzer Basic Set DMG), but may have come across the module separately or simply the Caves of Chaos in the "In Search of Adventure" compilation. One great advantage of Keep though is the keep itself; giving a home base, tavern, place to gather roomers, and chance for roleplaying before active adventuring, instead of starting at the dungeon entrance as with Mistamir.
But yet again, the "mini-sandbox" is an example of the miscommunication between old grognards and younger players; we loved our sandboxes, but rarely did that mean a sandbox campaign encompassing the whole world as one big sandbox for PCs to roam aimlessly.
Good points :)
Great review! Gotta admit, I was always one of those "Why do they all live together" people, so when I ran it 35 years ago, I split the caves up into different locations: kobolds in one spot on the map, orcs in another, etc. I had them all working for the Cult too, but giving each monster tribe a unique setting was fun!
I ran it today, using OD&D Moldvay rules, for a group of 7 players with only one who's played D&D only half a dozen times. It was so cool to see the awe of new players experiencing it. With the lairs, I exaggerated the distance to give them more breathing room. They all had their moments to shine, and I fudged a few things like maximum number of attackers in a confined space, so that nobody was left out.
The ultimate sandbox module, played it many times, converted it to 1E AD&D, placed it in Greyhawk, and fleshed it out a lot to make the Keep more interesting.
Awesome!
In 1981 when I was 10, my best friend ran this module. I remember it fondly. During the mad hermit encounter, the NPC cleric that our characters hired betrayed us! We were so screwed. Another memory I have is when we finally reached the caves, we entered the kobold lair and my friends character fell into that pit trap at the entrance and died. The kobolds were now alerted and overwhelmed the rest of the party. I created about 4-5 characters playing that module. Good times.
2nd time watching this video. There are loads of videos out there on running The Keep on the Borderlands, but this is definitely one of the most useful - packed full of great tips and ideas. Plus your energy and enthusiasm are really infectious!
A couple of thoughts:
The gathering army of chaos thread really holds it all together. I’d use the idea that it’s essentially a military outpost to take the baby orcs etc out of the adventure, saving that moral dilemma.
Love the idea that the castellan is in on it. That would explain why no military support has come to thwart the growing threat. Maybe he’s been sending out messengers to ask for help, but tipping off the forces of evil to intercept them. Perhaps they’re among the prisoners in the caves and have guessed what’s happened. All the while the castellan publicly wrings his hands and bemoans the way that his superiors seem to have abandoned the inhabitants of the keep to their fate. Because at first glance, it does seem odd that no military expedition has been sent to clear out the caves.
I don’t have a problem with the lack of names. Last time I went to the pub, to a shop or spoke to a security guard, I had no idea what their name was.
Getting up the gumption to run this with my OSE books--really great stuff!
Fun; I'm just converting the recent Goodman Games 5e updates back to OSE for my upcoming campaign! They add new stuff for B1-2 but only stat it for 5e.
Awesome! Be sure to let me know how it goes! :)
The aforementioned party of 15 happened to pick cave “I” first (Minotaur labyrinth). After giving a description dripping with warnings and the initial effects of the confusion spell, they party went for it anyway and became hopelessly lost. By the end they had pretty much cleaned out the cave out. The battle with the Minotaur was particular exciting, lasting something like 15 rounds (it was surrounded and could not flee). Despite being a big baddie, the Minotaur’s THAC0 is 13 . It ended up having trouble hitting the best armored characters who fronted the attack, so only a couple died in the battle.
Man that brings back memories !
Right?!? Going through the process of creating this video brought back so many fun memories! Old school is the BEST school! :)
Watched this months ago when I began running this module. Totally gives some great ideas! 8 months in and we're getting close to the end. I created my own storyline to give purpose to the players and they've been fully invested. I'm hoping you give us some more content. Your videos are top notch!
Love this module. I am looking forward to running my kids through it at some point.
Have fun!
Your enthusiasm is freaking contagious.
Awesome review and retrospective (I got the feels when you opened the module and zoomed in on that 1980's TSR font that was used in so many of their RPGs). 😂 This module was a real challenge for beginning players and if you survived you felt like you really accomplished something. I played it as a DM once and a PC twice many years ago...and not ashamed to say I got my ass handed to me.
As a DM I had the cult and their goblinoid henchmen conquer all the caves before my party got there. When they arrived they found Kobold and Orc remains/skeletons in Caves A-C (even poisoned orc corpses still sitting at their banquet table). This set a mood of dread while going a little easy on the PC's for the first encounters. That way they could concentrate on uncovering traps and searching for clues and loot. It also solved the story problem of these enemies living in such close proximity. Anyways your videos have helped me and others fall in love with the B/X world all over again. My 12-year old niece and nephew have asked me to teach them to play after watching OSR UA-cam videos. Can't wait to DM this again after 40 years!
Thanks, I'm glad you enjoyed it! I'm planning on rolling out a new set of reviews and tips videos for classic D&D modules, so stay tuned! :)
Fantastic coverage of this module! I've been soaking up all the big time UA-cam reviews of it, and when I saw you spent twice as much time on this module than the others, I had to check it out, and I'm glad I did!
I'm not sure why, but your voice and enthusiams makes me happy!
Fantastic review and excellent coverage over all of it. Your enthusiasm is infectious. Hope you come back to making videos.
Ok, first of : I think this video format is awesome and you should review more modules and give advices to run them.
About B2 : I read it last year thanks to dmsguild POD version, and I was quite disapointed by it. I thought that the keep was very well designed in itself, but I disliked the caves of chaos. It felt like an uninteresting dungeon way too hard for a 1st level group. So I chose to run B1 instead, and it was a very important piece of my current ongoing campaign (it really sparked my imagination contrary to B2). But now that I know how you run the caves, I better understand the appeal of the module, and I kinda want to try and run it myself ! I guess it is going to join the unending list of modules that I want to run and probably will never have the time to ! So thanks for the review ;)
Thanks so much! I'm glad you enjoyed the review, and found the advice useful. I'm planning a review of B1 shortly so stay tuned! :)
Really great overview - as someone who began with that module in the early eighties, I was lost in nostalgia there. Thanks to lockdown, this week I'm running my first adventure for years using my original copy of B2. Some great tips from you. Thanks!
Glad you enjoyed it!
I’ve run B2 many times. Never had a party smaller than 6 characters, though not always with 6+ players (most I ever had was 8). Parties that first enter the Caves of Chaos have ranged up to as as many as 15 characters, which is perfectly normal for B2 (6-9 player characters, 2-5 men-at-arms hierlings, one 2nd-3rd level “expert treasure hunter”). The rules are designed for this, and party size can grow much larger with additional hierlings (9 average charisma characters can have up to 36). Another 4-14 NPCs can also be temporarily gained from the Keep for special missions if you play your cards right.
Thanks for the description, would've liked if there was an additional mention of all the women and children in the lairs who don't fight... While there is a time and a place for a moral dillema like that especially in other editions, I wanna lead this module for some kids and I think it would be really unbefitting, so I'm going to remove them all, except the women who are equipped to fight. You've also given me some neat ideas, lovely review.
It was my first module too. I found it devoid of flavour but mostly the nature of the module is this: Fight, fight, fight, trap, fight, fight. Boring. Sandbox? Yes. Start in the lower caves? Not if it's a sandbox. Here's a play-through of starting in the upper levels. Enter cave, die. Sure, drop some tips to your players but doing so takes away their agency. As for the wilderness; the encounter with the hermit? Right...Other wilderness encounter? Fight, fight, fight. I think the love for this module is two-fold; firstly, as you say, everyone has it; secondly, tied to the first point, nostalgia. I've played this with 10 players. TPK; there's no way this is a first level adventure. I agree, any adventure is improved ten fold by making it your own and adding your own personality but with this one, there is a LOT of work required. Good video. Love the enthusiasm and the complete look at the book. We don't agree of course But I loved the exploration of the module. What I would say about the adventure is that it gives the reader some great ideas about how to and how not to, run a game and write a scenario.
I'm glad you enjoyed the video, even if ultimately we disagree :) I can absolutely see your points, but by the same token, I do believe this is a satisfying module and can be run successfully, even for first level players. I think it just comes down to taste and preference, we can't all like the same things :) If we did, life would be boring :)
ABSOLUTELY LOVE KoTB!! Been running this module or using parts of it since the 80s and still find new hooks and plots every time. Also really easy to use it for AD&D characters, and in fact I was just sitting here thinking that I might run a campaign for a full party of first level paladins who are on a quest to retrieve a holy relic stolen by the Cult of Evil Chaos.
It's a great module, cannot recommend it enough
Great review. Brought back lots of memories.
I remember the Keep being so useful overall that I tended to think of it more as a resource than a module. What with all the tables, pre rolled NPCs and monster listings I tended to use it often but I only ever ran the actual module once.
Great stuff. Thanks for posting!
Glad you enjoyed it!
We run this a the start for a huge campaign that spanned against the slavers and the full against the demon queen. In our game, the drunk priest was a huge ally and the castelan's wife was a drow spy/traitor! The campaign was so cool
That sounds amazing! One of my favorite aspects of this module is that it is a mini-sandbox, making it almost infinitely adaptable, and virtually guarantees a unique experience every time you play through it! :)
I have never played B2. I hope to someday.
So, I believe that Juce has a Patreon tier level ($10 I believe) that will get you into the game I'm running right now on his channel. If you aren't interested in that, hit me up on Twitter at @rollstats and we can discuss. Thanks!
Same here.
Cool, I am slowly setting this up on Roll20, set up most of the battle maps and now creating all the monsters listed in the game. Getting all the hints and help I can gather....love your passion and insight of the BX games...
Have fun!
Will it be an open game, or just your group? Would love to play.
@@jameswight6259 I'll keep you posted, it may be a bit and it will be an open game. My group are 5e players.
@suanniiq Cool. Thanks. Brilliant!
Truly a classic and a must for everyone running B/X or 1E for the first time.
I couldn't agree more! It is a rite of passage! :)
@@RollStats It was the first Module I DM'ed. It was so memorable I still remember the players names and their characters classes. It was January or 1979.
@@THAC0Factor Nice! It was the first module I DM'ed as well! Just doing the video brought back so many memories! It really is a great module!
I played through and ran this module multiple times back in the 80s. I also picked up the 25th Anniversary Return and ran that as well.
It really is a great module! One of my favorites :)
@@RollStats Like you, it was my introduction to D&D. I have run a my sons through it as well.
Extremely Awesome, Amazing & Wonderful Video by you Sir. Your Love for This Module & Dungeons & Dragons in general is very Infectious & endearing. It's wonderful. You come across as the nicest guy in the universe!! 👽👻😉😉
I got forever DM'd pretty early on (long story but I embraced it and here I still am)) but B2 is special to me because I didn't DM it initially. I got play characters through it, more than once! Eventually ran as DM a couple years later and it's a truly excellent starter in so many ways. In my new and hopefully final world build I've repurposed a lot of old modules fully or partially and this one will be, depending on what the players do, a potential starter area. Edited for flavor, non-greyhawk plotlines and some other stuff. If a shrewd grognard thinks about it they'll recognize the skeleton 8>D
Loved this video. You explain these older mods well as well as giving DMs ways to make them make more sense.
You're an inspiration to any aspiring DM!
Wow! That is high praise! Thank you so much, and while I'm not sure I deserve it, I certainly appreciate it!
@@RollStats You got it man! I'm watching the stream of this game and Juce recommended your page!
Here's to hoping you do Castle Amber one day! That's my favorite.
Dropping hints or warnings is not rail-roading; not allowing them to ignoring well-placed hint would be, though you really can't just make them do as you want (PCs being the one thing DMs don't control).
Valid!
Fantastic review! I just checked my copies of B2 KEEP ON THE BORDERLANDS on the Acaeum website, and I have a legit, near-mint 1st printing and a 3rd printing in my collection! Apparently some pieces of artwork were taken out and/or were altered in later editions. My original has a kind of wonky looking Minotaur with a skull on page 20, and the 3rd printing has a Bill Willingham Minotaur that looks a bit more menacing. Very interesting! I never noticed before. Back around '81, I borrowed B2 from a friend. I didn't know anything about RPG games, so I kept asking him where the game board was! LOL! When he told me that it was a "module," I had no idea what he was talking about. I thought that the map inside the cover was somehow the gaming board! I started reading the module back then with no previous notion of what a role playing game was, and at the tender age of 11, I couldn't make heads or tails of things. I thought, "Wow. I guess you have to be some kind of scientist to figure out these crazy rules! lol. Years later in the mid-80s, I played in my very first AD&D game, and recounted the tale to my DM. He laughed at me thinking that it was a board game like Monopoly, but a few years into gaming, he gave me his copy of B2! One of my DMs has gone onto becoming a writer of sci-fi, horror and fantasy novels. Another one went onto creating the RPG game, DEADLANDS: THE WEIRD WEST. I went onto becoming an RPG illustrator, a kids book illustrator, comic book artist, and I'm currently doing packaging artwork for action figures. I credit D&D for helping us develop a great love for fantasy, and helping all of us to explore our imaginations. I can tell by your videos that you'd be a DM after my own heart! I watched several of your videos, and I couldn't help thinking, "This guy gets it!" Thank you for the great video review! Consider me subscribed!
PS: I always play hobgoblins as being rather vicious, cowardly, and cruel, but I put a spin on things in my AD&D campaign. When anyone who speaks goblinoid successfully translates what a goblin or Hobgoblin is saying to each other, I make my Hobgoblins sound like British aristocrats. LOL. Let's say that a thief (who speaks goblinoid) successfully sneaks behind a couple of Hobgoblin guards might hear a conversation that might go something like this:
"Gerald. I hate to be a bit of a bother, but do you happen to spy those horrid human ruffians out there in the brush?"
"Do I ever! Do I ever! I'm afraid things are not looking good, old boy! I should think that we might be just a trifle outnumbered! I shant say that I am admiring our odds if things come to a skirmish. No, I shant say that, Nigel!"
"Oh dear! Our odds at a victory seem rather bleak then? And I was SO looking forward to taking a nice human or elf skin back to my beloved Cora! Her birth celebration is coming up you know, and I can't very well bring her yet another Gnome heart, Gerald! Whatever should I do?"
"For now, old bean, let's worry about those brush ruffians!"
"Quite!"
lol. Players always love a bit of humor.
Thank you so much for sharing, and welcome to the community! What a great back story!
Let me know if someone ends up getting a B/X game together, I would always be interested so long as I am available. Also, if there is a discord someone should hit me with the link!
Oh there is going to be a B/X campaign if it kills me :)
Great video Bill!
Thanks Shannon!
Keep on the Borderlands is an amazing adventure. Any new DM would be well served to cut their teeth here.
Agreed!
Stumbled onto this video and am so glad I did. Great content and delivery. Just subscribed!
So glad to have you here! I'm glad you enjoyed the video! Welcome to the stat roller community! :)
Running it on Sunday and adding hooks. Two groups, two different starts.
Nice!
I’m converting B2 to a different system, and this video has done a lot to inspire me on what to do with it.
Thank you ouo/
I'd always make it that the temple attracted the monsters and used them as fodder vs the keep. Then they raised them as zombies. Then the priest fled with the eye of arik to the palace of the silver princess
Hey man. Hit me up so we can discuss getting the B/X campaign rolling. Shoot me a PM. Game on, brother!
YESSSSSSS! I'm trying to get Dave over at @DravenSwiftbow to play as well! He's got some scheduling issues, but I'm gonna keep bugging him :)
@@RollStats would you like me to run it? Would you prefer to instead?
@@questwise4077 Dude! If you are offering to run, I'll take it! It would be an honor to sit at your virtual table!
@@RollStats I'll start working up some ideas. 😉
@@questwise4077 YES! I can't wait man!
Yeah maybe the Minotaur is the last “hold-out” of the original caves before the cult of chaos started taking over. The cult has failed to convert the Minotaur and they can’t kill it because it’s just too tough. So perhaps clever players might be able to forge an unholy alliance with the Minotaur to clear out the Caves of Chaos! 😄💕😄
Yep, my first ever module in the 1981 boxed set.. I recently modded this for NWN, and there are plenty of hooks. I made the Bailiff the traitor. Also, I had bandits fill the vacuum (per the mod) as soon as the shrine was defeated. Great vid!
Thanks! I'm glad you enjoyed it!
What a great review and summary! Bringing my son into BX, and starting with B1 but hoping it leads to B2
Really useful review. I’ve always wanted to play/run this since I first had just a little taster of it way back in 1981.
Thanks, I'm glad you enjoyed it!
Good stuff... I started with the Holmes edition, that's what my dad gave me. After that, I got that box set. I've never really played either though.. I'd love to.. just so I can say I have.
Very cool!
I have an ancient and treasured copy in my hand and am having a huge nostalgia-fest right now. :)
Nice!
Bill awesome video!! I can't wait to play some B/X D&D
Thanks! I'm glad you enjoyed it! And I know you're going to love B/X!
@@RollStats I going to order the rules cyclopedia tomorrow.
@@ITSACRITICAL Nice! You're going to love it!
Great review mate. I appreciate all the tips and ideas you added!
Hope you come back. Miss your channel.
Really nice content. Thanks!
Hey, thank you! I'm glad you liked it!
Awesome! One of my favorite episodes. I've been a subscriber when you took your break back in the days of yore...
I'm a huge fan of The Keep and Caves of Chaos. Like you, I started in the 80's, it was my first set, first adventure, and I have ran it dozens of times. I have added many names, details, sude adventures. Is it really available as PoD again? Drive thru had it awhile back as PoD but took it down. Thanks for the video!
Thanks, man! I'm so glad you enjoyed it, and I really appreciate you hanging in there with me through the hiatus! I just checked, and it looks like it is only available as a PDF at this point. Sorry about that! Hopefully, they bring it back as POD again! Really, man! Thanks for hanging in there with me! I promise you won't regret it! I have tons of ideas for new videos rolling out! Stay tuned!
Excellent video of an excellent product and an extremely fun module. I learn of your channel from DravenSwiftbow another great D&D content creator. Subbed and liked!
Hey, thank you so much! I'm glad you enjoyed the video, and I'm glad to have you here! DravenSwiftbow is my absolute FAVORITE UA-cam channel!
Love your enthusiasm, mate! I'm prepping to run the Goodman Games version of this (and In Search of the Unknown) this coming weekend and your excitement for the module is infectious. Can't wait!
You definitely have to come back and tell me how it goes! I can't wait to hear about it!
Great review! Glad I found it.
"IT ISN'T RAILROADING!!!"
Bro, who hurt you?
Hahahahahahahaha oh man... How much time do you have? If I had a dollar for every time a lazy DM who didn't want to actually run their game used the "I don't want to railroad my players" excuse, I would be filming these videos on a beach in the Bahamas! :)
I think railroading is when you cancel out player choice. I believe you should tell them at the start of the game, that there will be TPK level encounters, and that their decisions matter (ie: tell them the rules of the game, so they can make informed decisions). So you could entice them to go to the Kobold Cave, have rumors at the keep that the lower caves are safer, and if they try to enter the Minotaur cave, describe it as especially foreboding. However, if the players insist on pressing their luck in the Minotaur Cave anyway, and they die, they knew the risks, and lost fair and square. If through good planning, they win, they will forever crow about that time they beat the "impossible encounter".
If you tell them "No -- you enter the Kobold Caves", or teleport them there against their will (even if they remain unaware), that's where the railroading kicks in. It's the equivalent of playing chess with someone, and after they move a piece, you pick up the piece and move it somewhere else for them because "it's a better move". If the player's move is nullified, then what's the point of playing a game?
I do think that secretly nullifying their moves to lead them to a really cool encounter might seem like a good idea, but it requires the DM to lie to the players. Nobody likes being lied to. Eventually they'll find out, and you run the risk of them resenting it, however politely. They could also start questioning all of their other choices in the campaign, and wonder if any of them actually mattered.
I intend to use this as a foundation for a Sellswords & Spellslingers-campaign. :)
An ideia for the minotaur, should the players gain some renown by eliminating some threats, the spys of the temple may try to fool htem to get rid of the minotaur luring them to the big threat, of course I would give them ample opportunities to suspect something fishy is going on. Maybe the players even ally with the minotaur, promising they will leave him alone should he help against the temple, I think is a rare opportunity for double crossing and some RP
Like many, I cut my teeth as a player on this module. Now that I’m the forever DM, I’ve run it a few times in B/Ex but I’d love to get the Goodman version and run some 5e players through it.
It really is a great book! It's definitely worth picking up! Also, I feel ya on the forever DM part! I feel like once you begin to DM, especially if you're any good at it. That's it! You are now the permanent DM! Hahahahaha!
I really enjoyed your review. Thank you! When you were DM with the BECMI playthrough of this module around 2020 with D Swiftbow, DM Drake and the Master the Game crew, you read NPC monologs at the begging of each session which I liked. They gave the characters important clues in a fun way. Were these monologs from the module or did you make these up? If you made these yourself, did you have them before you started session 1, or did you make them as you went along based on what the characters had done and what the players needed to hear?
Looking forward to playing bx with you someday. The group wants to do tomb of horrors. I'd probably rather play something that isn't instant death but that's what the group wants. This module seems pretty cool.
Thanks, man! When are you kicking off Tomb of Horrors? I want in! I don't usually get to play, I generally have to run, so I'm down man! Let me know!
Cujos running it so I'm in.
@@Zeros_Hobbies Nice! What are you playing? What's your character?
Id like to see your opinions on "B5 The Horror on The Hill" since you like B2 so much!
Oddly enough I've only ever played AD&D. In saying that my cyclopedia is ready!
Ya know, I feel like a ton of people played through this module using AD&D! And I can't tell you how happy I am to hear that you've got your Rules Cyclopedia. You're gonna start referring to it as "my preciousssss" too! Hahahahaha
Great review my man. I too was utterly enchanted when I first opened the Moldvay box. Your box and books seem to be in A1 condition. Are they the originals?
Excellent... Thank you.
I am so glad you enjoyed it!
Using soe inspiration from how I liked to run Hommlett: 1) There are two political factions, the Duke's Men, and the Baron's Men; each is a noble back in civilization trying to slowly take over the Keep politically. Every NPC of the Keep works for one of those two. This political tension is what has created the political paralysis of the Keep, and why they are loosing control of the area. The NPCs will use the party in this political intrigue, hiring the party for missions they want kept secret from the others. 2) Up the religious tension. The Church of St.Cuthbert is the official religion of the Keep, but many people are loosing faith in Cuthbert and turning to the worship of the Druids. The Church of Cuthbert is becoming more and more extreme, the church has appointed an Inquisitor NPC, and the Druids are sympathetic to the Bandits because they also worhip the Old Ways. 3) dark secrets. The Mad Hermit, and the Bandits know the following: 100 years ago this land was peaceful and humans, demihumans and monsters all lived in harmony under the Druids, Cuthbert was a greedy warlord who led a mercenary force into the land and began slaughtering people, demihumans and monsters. when the Druids were killed the people left turned to Chaos to fight back and led an army from the Caves of Chaos. The Bandits are the remains of those slaughtered hill tribes, 4) The Greed of Men; An NPC is actually working with the Bandits, passing them information to aid their raids. Mounting evil; A new chaos cult has formed in the Caves and is building a new monster army. They have not yet recruited the human Bandits, or the Lizard Men but are starting to mount pressure on them to join their chaos army (or die). The cult has however infiltrated the Keep. One of the major NPCs is actually a chaos worshipper who is trying to destabilize the Keep from within, and recruit more people secretly into the cult. Whodunit; While the Party is there one of the major NPCs is assassinated
This sounds amazing!
@@RollStats It's a model I would use that works on lots of the old classics like Keep on the Borderlands, and Secret of Bone Hill. You can even tweak it to the natives on Isle of Dread, the factions o fonsters in the Lost City, etc.
@@williamozier918 I'm definitely going to use it! Thanks for sharing!
Still trying to decide if I want to get and og copy or the reprint. I did get an og of Isle of Dread, but it would be about a 1/3 of the cost to get a reprint.
This is an excellent review! Love your insights. I would agree with your comments about railroading. What's important is the sense of agency. In my experience, most players want to feel that they have agency, and that their decisions have an affect on the world around them. Otherwise, you're just narrating a story to an audience. Whether they actually have agency or not is beside the point. But I would also add that some, and I stress _some_, players enjoy a high-risk, high mortality-rate game. Rolling up a new fist-level because your last one died horribly (and hopefully, entertainingly), would be considered an enjoyable feature of a campaign by some players. So some DMs may consciously allow their players to "poke the bugbear" if they know that their players would enjoy the potential resulting carnage. And that's one of the finer arts of good DMing -- make sure you communicate with players about what you and they expect in terms of tone and content (humor, genre, mortality rate, etc.) for a game / session / campaign.
Well done, sir! Glad to have found your channel, and happy to subscribe!
Thanks so much! Glad to have you here!
My introduction to D&D thanks to my cousin Michael!
It is hands down my favorite version of D&D!
about naming,,, when i first DMed it i was only 11 back in 81. i did not think of naming anyone. it was not till i was 15 or 16 till i started to name NPC's from modules. so it is not a bad thing not to name someone who just started. it is a learning process
It's certainly not a bad thing to have NPC's named in a module, agreed. But, by the same token, the fact that the NPC's weren't named certainly doesn't ruin the experience, and moreover, I do believe that the NPC's not being named wasn't a bug, rather it was a feature. I believe Gugax didn't name the NPC's purposely so that you could take B2 and drop it into your world seamlessly. I think the biggest selling point of a module... Is to actually be modular :)
@@RollStats i agree it is easier to place in my world. it was back then i did not know what i was doing and took the book literally with names and such.
@@GeneBateman1970 Yeah, valid! DM'ing is a skill for sure, and like any skill, you get better the more experience you have. No one began the game as an expert player or DM. Hell, I've been doing it for 35 years and I still learn new stuff all the time. :)
Excellent review! Would like to see one on B1.
Thanks, man! I'm glad you enjoyed it! A B1 review and walkthrough will be rolling out soon, so stay tuned!
For those of us that had even a small amount of dyslexia, THAC0 was a special kind of hell.
While I certainly understand and appreciate the struggle with dyslexia, from a very personal perspective. I'm not sure why THAC0 would be any better or worse? Dyslexia is a struggle whether you use descending AC or ascending AC :)
@@RollStats In my case, "up" is counting and thus easier than "down." That being said it wasn't as bad in the "Basic" versions simply because the character sheets had a chart at the bottom so you could just glance and see what A.C. you hit.
@@Shards-of-Narsil Ahhhh valid! I only asked because I too am dyslexic, and honestly, THAC0 was never as bad for me as the boxed text was. :)
@@RollStats you're cool, yeah and dyslexia is a general term and always tailored to the user ;). Boxed text could be confusing for me also, but it was a mass market product so it is the way it is, still love it warts and all.
@@Shards-of-Narsil Me too! :)
Nice review!
Hi Bill. I just found out, through Master the Game, that you're in Chicago. I'm in Chicago too, near Foster and Pulaski, and would love to meet up with you sometime. I wrote a book too, a D&D fantasy novel, that I think you'll enjoy, and I also narrated it here on my channel, so I'm hoping you'll see this comment and get back to me, though Master the Game says you don't come on here anymore. Well here's hoping that you see this and we can meet up. Hope so : )
Just speaking for me, but if I pick up on the idea that the DM is in any way "on my side," it drains away a lot of tension. Using your example of obviously trying to draw my attention to one cave as my character's approaching another, that immediately lets me know that I have a potent advantage against any threats encountered. That's not really a welcome advantage in my case, though. I much prefer the impartial referee model for allowing me to feel like I truly earn whatever I get (good or bad).
When running for 4 players do you recommend encouraging them to pay for some hirelings? Especially since that style is not very common 5e.
While the Minotaur is out of place, I think the Medusa in room 64 wins as the most unreasonably placed monster... No warnings at all for PC's.
Awesome video
I hope I get a chance to play B/X one day. its a little antiquated (race as class, 1 spell a day starting out, thac0 ect) but it has a simplicity that's hard to match
You should definitely play B/X at least once! You have to give it a shot! It is the elegance and simplicity of the game that makes it so appealing! Try it, and let me know what you think! :)
It's still my favorite version. Doesn't take long to make a character and players don't spend several minutes every turn trying to figure out what 'power' to pull out of their ass.
The light rules speeds the gameplay up and keeps the game moving.
Yeah I agree. It's not antiquated at all and the framework for the rules and math is solid and well thought out. The beauty of it is that it lets you fill in the blanks and bend the story and rules to your liking while keeping the pace moving. You can have a hell of a lot of adventure and story in just a 2-hour game without getting "lost in the sauce".
Anyone know if this guy is still around? I haven'ts seen him most anything in years. I hope he is okay.
Cool review
Never ran In That that module
Thanks! I'm glad you enjoyed it! You should definitely check out Dungeon Module B2, it is a classic!
Nice video! Regarding the various monster factions living in close quarters, you could have a chart that randomly determines whether fights between them have broken out as the party approaches. Sort of like in the Lord of the Rings where Sam is able to storm the tower because the different orc factions are brawling.
That is a fantastic idea!
Matt may have played this, but I )Justin) have never had the opportunity to play or run this game... so maybe I should leave to not hear spoilers haha.
Oh man! If you haven't played this you should! It is an amazing piece of D&D history!
i remember the caves of chaos , as a player but have do not remember the caves of the unknown. idk, if we skipped it or our dm didnt include it. i played though this mod. but want to know what was in there. i want a spoiler, lol. please.
It's on the list!
Well the Cave of the Unknown was purposely left out so your DM could design their own dungeon for it and perhaps start it as a 2nd adventure. Honestly there was already a lot of work and prepping the DM had to do in this module so I think most of them left it out. I bet RollStats has got a plan for it though. 😅
Anyone know the best way to find an open B/X game online?
I am always down to play some B/X. Hit me up and we'll see if we can put something together!
To give this a new spin.... Game of Thrones the Night King and the White Walkers eventually make their way south of the Wall.
No
I appreciate your passion, but this module sounds pretty icky. It's basically a huge lair of goblinoids. And, I think, they do seem to be politely waiting to die.
If they were really massing a force, then their should be some sense of leadership. After the first few caves get taken down, the rest of them should form up a possee and seek justice.
It's essentially an introductory module, created to teach newbie DM's how to handle dungeon crawls. With that said, I will say I've played and run through it countless times, and it is a ton of fun. Bear in mind I'm speaking through the lens of nostalgia though :)
@@RollStats OK, but compare it to a module like "Night of the Walking Dead" with was one of my first and favorites.
www.drivethrurpg.com/product/17493/RQ1-Night-of-the-Walking-Dead-2e?affiliate_id=384230
It opens with a great hook that immediately involves the party in the horrific affairs of this local hamlet. The tension builds to the end with the final cinematic showdown with the BBEG.
Is there a noticeable difference between B/X and BECMI?
So, I think it depends on who you ask. But, in my opinion, yes, most definitely!
@@RollStats like what?
@@krunchyfrogg Ha! I'm afraid a comment wouldn't do that topic justice. I tell ya what. Maybe I'll do a video comparing B/X, BECMI, and Holmes basic?
@@RollStats sounds good to me.
They’re all closer than AD&D and AD&D 2e are IMO.
@@krunchyfrogg B/X and BECMI maybe, but I think Holmes Basic is a vastly different game.
Don't waste time fighting the dungeon. Beat the keep! Recruit the monsters and take the keep.
Hahahahaha! That is also an option :) If you can't beat them, join them!
@@RollStats this is a legit tactic. Several blogs on groups that have done this.
@@MrRourk I'm sure it is, it doesn't just sound legit, it sounds effective. But, as I've said before, I'm not a big tactical player, I don't generally play the game as zero sum. I'm more of a story guy, and that story just isn't mine. I tend to prefer playing a hero :)
@@RollStats here is a bit on the subject bxblackrazor.blogspot.com/2011/08/secret-of-keep-on-borderlands.html?m=1
Do u run an online game? Would love to join one
Dear Lord! I wish I could bottle up you good mood and drink some of it!!! lolol.
Man I feel the same reminds me of Tolkien. They are under control of a Master
I appreciate your attitude about 'railroading' (about 24 minutes in). That is exactly how I see my role as a DM.
Here is my own take: canonfire.com/cf/modules.php?name=Forums&file=viewtopic&t=5218
Thanks so much! :)
Of course it’s not railroading. A 1st level party running into a Minotaur or Owlbear is probably dead, then your players will loose interest fast if they are getting slaughtered all the time.
Exactly!