Those poison saving throws were very tense. Hated fighting poison monsters , one hit and missed saving throw that was it, below lvl 5. It got slightly less tense after that if you had a lvl cleric with cure poison, IIRC , or a scroll/potion of the same.
@none none E.G.G. who created AD&D, played quite strict and cut-throat apparently. His campaigns made use of hirelings and henchmen to allow low level PCs to rise up and not get killed so easily. I respect that about 1E. It's more realistic and rewarding when the DM doesn't have to coddle the PCs in order to make the game work.
@@jh1859 Big Difference between cut throat and a dick GM. I think it is just different from table to table. As long as the party is having fun, then that is the most important thing. Of course I have always had a rule... I may be nice to you guys, but fuck around with your character and you will find out. Got to make it a challenge as well as fun.
Gary Gygax designed well realized modules that slaughtered player characters like they were Confederates at Pickett's charge. While it was quite edgy and exciting to know your whole party could be wiped at any moment, it was also pretty tough to develop any personality in your cannon fodder of the moment. I think this might have been because he was a war gamer first. Thanks for making these wonderful videos. They take me back.
We did have a series of first level fighter henchmen called in series Tom Dick and Harry and then Larry Curly and Mo. I believe Larry might have made it to third level. I think the henchman were earning half experience points back in original D&D. Not much personality.
Yeah, when you survived and leveled up, it was a real accomplishment. Especially if you started with a 1st level Mage. "OK, you got two hit points, a dagger, the worst ability to hit with the dagger, no armor, and one spell: "magic missile", that can do up to 4 points of damage but might only do 1 point. Go get 'em, tiger."
I ran the 25th Anniversary Edition about 2 years ago for a new, younger group of players and they loved it. They got really involved with a number of NPCs in town which made things so much easier on me with regards to giving them leads and such. They sold the golden dragon egg to the evil merchant that occasionally travels into town, not having figured out who he is. A year later, long after we had finished the module, there was a gold dragon terrorizing the countryside and the merchant was using it to make money. Boy were they surprised.
Oh, that's classic! 😄It's been at least thirty years since I played Keep on the Borderlands. I don't think we ever found the Gold Dragon egg. We came across the Minotaur once, and it did not end well. Funny enough, my current 5e group is (I think) close to finishing Icewind Dale and we found a Silver Dragon egg. My rogue-assassin (who's a total fop) has already called 'dibs' on it, stating that he is going to raise the dragon and call him Steve...or Stephanie if it's a girl!
I can remember replaying this as evil characters. The DM changed up everything, so it would be fresh. We did actual role playing and made deals with the denizens of the caves. We ended up robbing the Keep and letting our monster buddies in to the Keep to wipe out the guards for us. We used some cows for cover at one point. The end game was us double crossing and attacking the depleted monster ranks. It was more fun, than playing good characters.
Never drank Mountain Dew. It was super sweet but that by itself wasn't enough. One time I was visiting friends in the US, I asked about what the attraction was. one of them said "Um.... highest caffeine content in a pop"... I said "Really? Up North of the 49th, for a long time, maybe still, caffeine could only be in colas." My American friend looked at me and said "What the he**???!!!! What sort of a Communist country do you come from?". It was a hilarious moment. I had no idea there was caffeine in Mountain Dew in the US. If I needed caffeine, it was Coke (Classic).
Yet another amazing breakdown of old school D&D that I was too young to ever have a chance to try and lived in an area too sparsely populated to be able to get a game going with anyone other than my brother. Thanks for sharing this, I look forward to many more!
I just found your channel and watched all your videos. You have ridiculous production values and great content. I can see why it takes a while to make these.
Oh wow, it's awesome to have family into the same hobbies as you. Glad you could give her that treat of nostalgia! Out of curiosity, where did you set it on Eberron? Monsters and cultures are very different there so I think it's one of the most interesting places to run it with its moral quandaries. Interest in old modules got me thinking of remixing the flavor to run in areas that my game is set in and here is what I've come up with so far: Setting: *Placing it on the border between Karrnath (For the Keep) and the Mror Holds (For the Caves of Chaos), with the wilderness encounters/discoveries being influenced by the Icewood's Madstone (The Mad Hermit) and Lake Dark's Undead. *The keep is lorded by a Knightly Order of Karrnath from a nearby city/town (Whatever order you choose will change its flavor, items, and services). The party may be veterans from the Last War looking for new work, Mercenaries hired for the help, agents of King Kaius, Rekkenmark cadets on an expedition, diplomats/agents from nearby regions/factions with an interest in the area, etc... *The Caves of Chaos were recently created by a manifest Zone to Kythri, the Churning Chaos. This makes it more likely for its inhabitants to act on impulse and has transmogrified the cave into new twisted passages, opening up the divisions between enemies and passages to The Realm Below (Explaining how they've "co-existed" for this long). Rumors of great discoveries and treasure in these passages alongside calls for aid and disappearances has brought many factions at play here. *Caves of the Unknown can be the Realm Below, where dwarves and aberrations are locked in war, or a demiplane within Khyber to one of the Overlords or a Daelkyr. Factions: *Jhorash'Tal Orcs as the Orcs, a tribe of barbarians vengeful to the dwarves that drove them out ages ago. *Dwarves as the Goblinoids and the main inhabitants and explorers of the Mror Holds, with different clans having different dispositions and occassionally sabotaging each other for riches. Their primary concerns are Riches, the conflict with the Jhorash'Tal Orcs, and the Realm Below. On the latter, some hope that this Cave can lead them to turn the tide of the War Below with the forces of Dyrrn for their ancestral home. Whether it be as a secret flank to surprise them, to gain magical weapons and artifacts, or to find aberrations for the creation of Symbionts. *The Emerald Claw as the Gnolls, allying with the Orcs and reaping the benefits of the dead in the conflict for their necromantic projects and for the wheels of war to turn again. Them being an ex-knightly order makes them a source of infamy to Karrnath and a foil to the Knightly Order of the players. Their influence reaches as a worldwide campaign front, with Lake Dark and the Madstone both being of interest to them. *Mind Flayers/Other Aberrations of Dyrrn, as the Bugbears, luring off creatures into their sickening experiments. Perhaps they created the rumors through mind seeding to lead the dwarves into a trap. The motives of both them and their creators are incomprehensible to mortals and inhumane. *Githzerai as the Kobolds, pulled from their refuge in Kythri, they are once again hiding from the Mind Flayers that once ruled over them. With their psionic abilities and interplanar abilities, they are able to hide and navigate the caves expertly, but what they most want to do is to go home or flee their predicament. *Cults of the Dragon Below to either an Overlord or Daelkyr for Cult in The Shrine of Chaos. The catalysts of the Kythri manifest zone's tranmogrification. Those being whatever BBEG you wanna use for later. Bonus if they allied with one of the faction your players were most interested in taking down or on the opposite end, the one that they most trusted. *Each faction can attempt to convince the players to help them or mislead them to do so (In the case of Mind Flayers/Emerald Claw).
@@JazzyBassy I set it in the Mournland ^^ The kobolds were the original ones here and are bigger thanks to mutations by the grey mist. The big scary chaos alter was put their by cultists of the dragon below that were killed by gatekeepers (I made them the orc tribes). Some of the orcs were bewitched by the artifacts of evil chaos and became cultists themselves and now the uncharmed group is trying to both save their friends (by either cure or death) and protect themselves. The goblinkin are newer arrivals. They are mercenaries from Darguun working for a wealthy benefactor. That wealthy benefactor is an Inspired from Sarlona who’d heard of the altar and wants to use its curse evil spreading curse to further the goals of the Dreaming Dark. This inspired and his closest lieutenants take the place of the cultists in that topmost floor by the altar room in the original adventure. The Minotaur was simply an avid explorer who came across the altar herself a while ago and became a cultist of belashyrra. She is not inherently violent but will slay intruders if she thinks they mean her harm. If she does so she takes their eyes out and puts them on her horns or makes things out of them.
I played this in 2nd edition, rolled up a Monk, getting killed in one of our first random encounters by a giant black widow spider by failing his poison save. As a DM, I had a enterprising party that after making a few successful runs of the goblin and orc caves buy a wagon, a couple horse and hired some henchmen/flunkies to mind the wagon to haul off all their loot. It got really silly when they cleared out the evil temple section and hired more people to remove all the tiles and inlays of the altar area. Better times.
I once saw some players in Tomb of Horrors trick retainers into setting off the traps. Told them that all they were doing was carrying torches for the party.
Wow, this brings back memories. My group played this module as first level losers back in 1979 shortly after it was released. This was the beginning of my love for gaming.
YES! DO IT! I've ran it in 1st, 2nd, and 3rd editions. I hope to run it again in 5e in the next year or two. It honestly works well with any edition with very little tweaking, so 5e shouldn't be a problem.
@@shayulghul Though it might require a bit of finesse when using the old monsters. For example, while the Caves of Chaos seem geared towards a low level party, the Medusa in 5e is a CR6 monster. Between that and her petrification, she may be a bit more than the party can handle.
ToEE is one of my favorite module's from the 80's. I have used (stole) the Village of Hamlett in multiple games, it's a great model to use for a village setting.
This was my first module back in the day. It literally stayed part of the game for years returning as the base of operations ultimately having a larger city build up around it.
When you keep in mind that a lot of this stuff was designed with a greymarch type campaign in mind, it makes sense how deadly it is. Tbh modern d&d is a little strange insofar as every PC is some kind of superhero aristocrat even at low levels and by high levels you are somehow just a deity flat out
I can remember receiving the Basic (Moldvay) set in 1981 for my birthday. That set the tone for how I DM to this very day...half-prepared and continually improvising. The artistic styles of Bill Willingham and Jeff Dee influenced my art style too, so it's a win win.
I think many of did that. Our group adventured with this many times, with the DM changing and evolving the caves, the keep and the area as we leveled up.
Ah this was funny enough the second adventure I ever DM'd. When I got my set of Basic Edition D&D it came with three modules in that package. One was this, Keep on the Borderlands. The second was perhaps my favorite adventure module of all time, Isle of Dread. The third was Tomb of Horrors, and what i decided to run for my first adventure. Put the players in front of it, gave them a deck of many things for each of them to draw from, and said "Have at it". By comparison no one considered Keep on the Borderlands to be insanely difficult even at its worst hose moments.
I ran this shortly after the 5e monster manual came out, as just a straight conversion to 5e. It does feel a bit dated, and the prep (or improv) required in the keep is not to be underestimated, should players be inclined towards heavy roleplay. I did appreciate that the caves have enough sheer numbers of enemies to require either diplomacy, sneaky tactics, or hirelings (not simple hack-and-slash roll-play).
The 'Temple Of Elemental Evil' PC game was great with the Circle Of Eight megamod, fixing issues and adding more. Best representation of D&D 3.x rules in a digital game. Too bad Troika tanked. Despite their RPGs' buginess, they made some greats.
This was the only module we had at first, there was no internet to download other modules or much advice and examples for designing your own. As all of us wanted to play we rotated Dungeon Master, picking the cave we were going to enter next and the chosen DM would read up just on that cave. We spent very little time in the keep, it was just a place to buy, sell and rest.
DM'd this for several new campaigns. Was a great introduction for noobs. My current group (5) are between 58-65 years, all have been playing since early 80's with one group or another, we used to have a large circle of friends and some parties numbering 12 or more players. Over the years we now have only 2 groups, who never play together. Us and the "Young" guys now in their 50s, using their own House Rules and such. But we still have a Mapper and a separate Records Keeper. Play a mix of 2-3.5 rules.
I got the 1981 Basic set for Christmas from an older cousin when I was in 8th grade, and had no idea what it was. But when I started reading the stuff in the books, I was enchanted!!! The Keep on the Borderlands was included and it the first adventure I tried to run for people, and I did a terrible job. But it taught me what I needed to know forever! To this day I still make a town with stores, and on session zero the players bring their new characters into the town and talk to people at the shops. The shops don't necessarily have everything in the Player's Handbook. A 5e player once got mad at me because battle axes were not available in the town!!! But, I love the rumor table and the idea of some hermit (either a friend or foe) out in the woods, and a humanoid faction moving into the woods near the city and attacking people. Between The Keep on the Borderland and The Isle of Dread in the Expert set (where I learned how to do a hex crawl), I had all the fundamentals for being a sandbox, open world DM!!! All I had to do was refine it as I went on and made my own sandbox campaigns later. I eventually figured out that what you have to do is generate home brew rules and fluff that allow you to make the fantasy lit that I like to read come to life and embed the characters in a world with strong consequences, good or bad, for their choices. I think every DM would benefit from running The Keep on the Borderlands & Isle of Dread, esp. because 5e books just don't give the DM the tools they need ...the 5e books only make it harder on the DM by adding more and more unnecessary player options.
My older wss our dm for a l9ng time. This module made me cry baby tears many times. I agree with you about 5e. They don't want you making your own adventures. That keeps you coming back to them at every turn. My opinion is that homemade adventures are sometimes the most fulfilling for everyone involved. They can get personal too.
This was the module that came with my basic set, and was the first module I ever ran. I pored over every detail, so much so that I remembered most of the details you mentioned here 40 years later. Thanks for the flashback!
This was the module that made players into combat vets, or shell shocked them into making better decisions using tactics. The entrance you choose either made you or killed you.
Don’t ever leave me like that again, I beg of you. Fr though I was having an anxiety episode going on like 7 hours and I saw this video and it made my day immediately better. You are great.
Welcome back! I had to double check to see if this was the channel I remembered it was. Hope you're doing well and whatever held you up has been solved. I need to get back to watching the rest of your videos!
one of my all time favorites, we played this for a month of weekends i think. Sadly my best friend who DM'd this for us is has now passed on, but it was a blast and i still have the original copy.
My very first character (a fighter) died in one of the orc areas. DM rolled max damage and we both agreed that the Orc's blade slipped into the small gap between my character's helmet and armor, decapitating him, so when we came back later (me with another character), we 'discovered" a head, still wearing his helmet, right where he fell. It's been more than twenty years since that happened, but I've never forgotten that first death. Thank you for the unexpected surge of pure nostalgia!
So unless I am completely wrong here, the 4th edition version of keep in the boarder lands, actually takes place in 4e's default setting which despite common misconception is not the Forgotten Realms but the Nentir Vale, sometimes called Points of Light. It takes place in the Chaos Scar, which is in-between the Ogrefist Hills and the Witchlight Fens, just south west of Fallcrest the starting town for 4e.
Exactly! I recently ran that 4e module - it was good beer-and-pretzels fun. It was designed for D&D Encounters (the 4e version of the Adventurers League), so it's very linear. I've always been curious about the famous original, though.
@@ernestvanophuizen461 I've only gotten to run half of it. But my experience was similar once I told my players to think of it as a narrative based dungeon, they had a lot of fun with it. Also it's always fun to meet a fellow 4e player in the wild.
Great review! Keep on the Borderlands is the first module I ran for my children and wife. They did it in this order: Travel to the Keep on a caravan, learning that the road beyond was interdicted, linking up with five NPCs (two Clerics, a Halfling, and two 0-level fighters), Scouring the Countryside (spiders, lizardmen, bandits, then hermit), then Cave of the Unknown (I made it an abandoned, ancient Dwarven mine that had been invaded a very long time ago by...something fell and no longer present), then the Caves of Chaos. As they had a Ranger in the party, it was not difficult for the party to suss out a partial plan of who lived where from footprints (though not all of the caves were so revealed). They took it in this order: Goblins (and the back room of the Hobgoblins), return to the Keep, Hobgoblins, return to the Keep and level up (they had ingratiated themselves with the Advisor and Castellan). Further exploration of the Cave of the Unknown, return to the Keep Bugbears and Minotaur, Retreat to the Keep and level up (exchanging much of the magic and treasure gained to do so) First foray into the Shrine of Evil Chaos and Gnolls (via the back door!), retreat back through the Shrine of Evil Chaos to the Keep Orc Caves, Shrine of Evil Chaos. The campaign took about two months of game time and some fifteen sessions, and ran much like a skirmish back and forth, with maneuverings and strategems. Not all of the monsters were slain--some were allowed to flee with their lives--typically the females and young. The Kobolds read the writing on the wall and departed. The Owlbear was never encountered. Nor was the wight who departed the crypts to report on the destruction to higher authorities. This is THE introductory module. If you flesh its content out with some of the excellent suggestions you can find on the internet, and treat the Caves of Chaos as a living ecosystem that reacts and adapts and has hooks into other parts of the game setting, it can be the foundation of a great campaign (I made the evil cleric a Baron's younger, ambitious son gone bad and an adherent of Iuz). Allowing the party to level up during the campaign is a choice--not everyone will like this, but I used the AD&D EXP rules and it was a good way to drain away their treasure and magic items because training fees are EXPENSIVE.
Wow, that's a blast from the past lol. Takes me back to my Commodore 64 days. I didn't have the friends that were really interested in D&D, but I loved reading all the rule books and modules. The Keep on the Borderlands has a big place in my heart.
How to fit, "The Keep On the Borderlands" into Spelljammer: Your spelljammer suffers a catastrophic and mysterious failure. Despite your best efforts a crash landing was inevitable. From your ship's suprisingly stable and well hidden mountain perch you are able to see multiple landmarks in the distance...
In Simple D&D, chaos and evil are the same thing. In Simple D&D's starter module, there's a place called "the Shrine of Evil Chaos." So, alternative name: "Shrine of Evil Evil."
In 1983, as a freshman in high school, I brought this module into school and a senior there told me he'd played with Ernie and Gary Gygax for years, even helping Gary flesh out much of this module. He expressed surprise at the map of the caves saying something like "I didn't know Gary used my map. That's pretty cool." No telling which parts of that story if any were true.
So good, we played on a extra large chalk board, with block walls and the lead figurines. This module took several hours and every minute was enjoyed. The movies never matched our imaginations until the lord of the rings came out in the early two thousands. Great post, thanks.
I don't remember whether it said so in the module or not, but I've always wondered why those claiming the monsters being in proximity was unrealistic hadn't figured that the clerics in the final cave were keeping them in line so they could be used as an army of chaos. That's how I always interpreted the situation. Of course, last time I ran this module the party somehow managed to take out the clerics first, and everything did erupt into violence as soon as the various tribes found out!
I ran that a lot as an introduction to D&D for so many. In one campaign the player gave up before reaching the priest and his plans came to fruition and the more experienced players had to deal to the evil power base that the Keep had become.
Two things: 1. Love your videos. No one gives Pre-5e D&D the love it deserves quite like you 2. After the OGL scandal, My group went back to 4e for nostalgia. We did Keep on the Shadowfell as an introduction, and I noticed Winterhaven kind of looks like the Keep on the Borderlands. And since KotB is basically 8 Dungeons in One, and 4e is the ultimate edition for Dungeon Crawling, I did a conversion for it and it fits PERFECTLY in Nentir Vale (4e's default Setting).
Nice video. I often listen to reviews like this as I work. Today was one of those days, I happened to switch by view back to the video for a moment and was pleasantly surprised to see my Neverwinter Nights handle (ENoa4) and mod on screen. You had some footage of the Keep on the Borderlands conversion I did for Neverwinter Nights 2. What a nice treat! Thank you. Keep the great videos coming. Thanks again for the blast from the past, I never expected to see something I worked on flash past. It made my day.
These are walkthru's are great! Thank You. Time Travel and other spells can allow any 5E player to travel into these older modules. These can be very remote places in time/space that the characters can remotely observe or actually travel to. Example, a 5E player wants the original version of Mordenkainen's Sword, they can time travel back to Greyhawk and get a copy. Eventually planar characters will have done this and catalogued all prime material plane spells, and they will be for sale in Sigil. Prime Material player's and DM's often forget this.
Check out Goodman Games’ “Into the Borderlands”. A 5e interpretation of both the Keep and Quasqueton, tying the two together, and expanding certain pieces of them both.
I picked up Goodman Games' version and highly recommend it. It has the original Into the Unknown and Keep on the Borderlands as well as an update for running them in 5e. It also includes a lot of the history of the modules and full-color pages of the cover art. It's really nice to use to get a party through the lower levels of play and I was able to easily adapt it to my campaign setting.
I don't think it's worth it at all. It's awkward and poorly designed, in places adhering stupidly to the original module (nobody wears anything but leather armor, chainmail and plate) and in other places just throwing in so much lore and plot it runs counter to the simplicity of the original Keep. And for whatever reason, turning the original Lawful elf of the Keep into a Chaotic Evil douchenozzle who's the only character from the original module given a name and development, again sticking out against the simplicity of the rest of the module.
I've been a player in B2 in a Dungeon Crawl Classics game and run it myself with adaptations for 5E. It was incredibly fun. The PCs captured a bugbear and were going to torture it to death but it revealed it was just a simple, (relatively) peaceful bugbear and all he really wanted out of life was to eat slugs and do his own thing. He was coerced by the Chaos priests to be their slave. The PCs did a total 180 and made it their mission to defeat the priest and free their new friend (now "Hugbear"). Sadly, they had already killed all the others of his kind, but when he was freed he joined them as a henchman, albeit one they had to keep hidden from civilized NPCs. It was awesome. Also, I love your channel and I'm glad to see a new video! Keep it up!
I remember playing this back around 1980. My buddies and I were new to the game and didn't know what we were doing. We got slaughtered again and again. Never did see 75% of the caves. But it was fun anyway. Even today it would be tough. Unless the characters are 3rd level I wouldn't recommend it.
A teen tried to run this for me when I was 12 but I didn't know what I was supposed to do. From your comment and watching this video it sounds like you should try to level up in the keep then put together a group of NPCs to go to the cave. Is that likely?
The most played module, because it's the one we all had. 😊Given the fatality rates of Basic D&D, I don't recall us ever even finding the Shrine of Chaos. We all got smoked by the Mad Hermit in one adventure, and the Minotaur in another. Good times! 😄
It is the one adventure to Rule Them All. Superb simplicity. Absolutely timeless. You could print a 1,000-page collection of adventures spanning 40+ years. No two accounts would be the same. I never thought the ogre had herpes but our mule ran off anyway.
So I'm running Kingmaker for my DnD 5e group, think its hilarious that the Mad Hermit from here is exactly the same as the Mad Hermit encounter in the Rivers Run Red book. Really cool, thinking of running this for my group after we finish.
I know I played this the most simply because it was included with the box set. I was very young when I started D&D but after a couple years I came up with the same conclusion that the caves of chaos was a highly implausible scenario. I further didn't really get too moralistic at that age and simply cleared out cave after cave until it was done, so I kind of took care the problem. The other basic modules had the same issue that the AD&D modules didn't seem to, but it's great fun for a kid's imagination. I further envisioned this as the central base of operation with the other basic modules of the time picking up at the end of the borders of good ol' B2 here - B1 In Search if the Unknown as the Cave of the Unknown, B3 Palace of the Silver Princess to the North, B4 The Lost City to the South, B5 The Horror on the Hill to the East and Journey to the Rock to the West. I later added 4 of the other basic modules to the northeast, northwest, etc., Including and placed it in the center of the world when I moved to the Expert Edition. In the end before switching to AD&D I managed to take over the Keep from the "evil" Castellan who (per my DM) noticed I had amassed quite a fortune and made plans to bump me off and steal it. But eventually it became too small of a scale before I moved my more qdvanced characters on to other realms. But once in a while I still would like to start another character, and work it through these ranks.
I reckon this module is more enjoyable if the DM gives a bit of an intro talk about: there are some very dangerous things in this adventure, so relying on brute force could result in PC deaths; sometimes you might only survive by dropping some food or treasure for the monsters and running away; looking for clues of what is around is wise; scouting ahead could be wise; you don’t have to fight every monster you encounter - you might enjoy the game more and be more successful if you try to be creative, using tactics to your advantage (e.g. setting up ambushes, fighting large groups of enemies at bottlenecks, etc.), talking & negotiating with those you encounter, taking prisoners and interrogating them, etc..
Finally a video that shows my copy of the Basic set with the yellow B1 module. 😛 At the time it was a bit confusing, TSR was publishing the Basic/Expert sets and also AD&D books -- two versions of the same game. Thankfully it didn't matter that much and we could play with either set of rules anyway. When the Gary Gygax Players Handbook and DM's Guide were published that was it, we stopped reading the Basic rules. Exciting times.
Played this with my younger brother with our dad as the DM. It was fun haviny my familiar wreak house on the Lizardmen after they kidnapped a man's wife and child. And my brother's ranger becoming a GOD of Archery. And the NPC cleric, Roland, that joined us from the very beginning to heal us. ... Said cleric nearly dying from a bear-type monster when we set up camp on a animal trail... Bear-Hugs are scary!
I had the 1983 basic set that had a built-in DIY game after they phased out inclusion of this module, but the local hobby store had "The Keep on the Borderlands" module on their sale bin for $1, so I picked it up. With some minor adjustments, I kept using it after switching to the First Edition AD&D rules.
I believe as you approach the caves the first canonical foe was a mad hermit and if you killed him he had some silver and I think a potion of healing. There's also a " pleasant glade" and if the party were to rest there everyone got additional hit points ( like 2 or 3) because it had healing powers. Have you done an " Isle of dread" yet? What's great about that one is the party has to negotiate to get a ship to take them and I believe the final boss is a Red dragon. . What a great game d and d is.
Dam these guys got a high level cleric on call, cause these guys are back from the dead! Glad to see your all back! Can't wait to see what you guys put out!
I and everyone else would like to thank you for keeping up this video series. We all appreciate the quality and interesting subjects and topics. Something about the history of D&D, exploring through it, and delving into some of the obscurity, and especially the intrigue surrounding game design in older or rarer versions of D&D and its modules, and the history of modules throughout editions...It has always been enjoyable and a great exploration. As somebody who has been working on a TTRPG design for some time now, I have found returning to your videos and simply listening to the step by step evolution and contemplation you give on the mechanics and there existence has been inspiring and provisional for meditation on our work. Thank you. Thank you for not disappearing for good on us. We look forward to more exploration of this game that you have all given greatly to us.
I actually played that with my friends back in Highschool, It had been bought a long time before by my uncle and left with my mom after one try, thanks for making me remember those days and the fun I had with my friends back then.
I ran multiple parties through this back in the day when I first started playing D&D. I recently picked up the re-mastered edition from Goodman Games which brings it forward into the 5th edition world without any other significant changes to the module. While it's fun to be nostalgic, I think most players today would expect something more well rounded. For example Gygax's human-centric design sticks out big time in the Keep as the only non-human NPC is an elf of dubious morals and background. I've been working on converting it for use on a VTT and updating / changing some things to be more diverse and fun for the players. I think it still holds up as an initial exposure to D&D gaming and am planning to try to run it for some new players who want to explore what D&D is like.
I came by to check on your channel when an older video was recommended by the algorithm only to see you haven't uploaded in 8 months. Hope you're alright!
A good use of this as an opening for a larger game would be that the cult's undead, and perhaps summoned demons (so cult of Orcus would be a good option) has displaced the monsters forcing them all in close quarters. The uptick in monster aggressoin also being a reason the Keep needs more people to help man it.
The 'Keep' can be played in waves. Easy caves cleared the first season of play. More caves uncovered as stronger creatures move in to be dealt with in future seasons. Players base out of the keep and deal with the caves occasionally, Similar to yearly maintenance of any home, with more adventure. Part of the Gygax living world idea, makes a lot more sense than six opposing races living on top of each other.
This is the best review of this module I've seen so far. You go into some detail of what makes the encounters interesting and the conflict that is going on. I'm disappointed to see that there is not detailed advice for how to role play NPC's or creatures. I don't understand why it seems every edition of the game the creators don't seem to think it is necessary to help out DM's who are not good at improv or coming up with compelling reasons for the NPC's and monsters to be doing what they're doing and how.
Going through all your videos containing anything AD&D! Was a fanatical player of this great RPG long before those three letters were used. Watching your videos brought back fond memories of those glory days. Can I make an appeal? Spelljammer was my all time favorite AD&D addition. It tied the entire franchise together in a unique way and added a setting that was unlike anything TSR ever made, in my opinion. Any chance you could do a walkthrough on that? You did your homework well, and all the histories of these old modules and books are spot on. I appreciate your work, and thanks for reminding me how this great game got started. Keep these videos coming!
I've run this adventure three times as a GM through my life. Once as a teen in the 80's, later in my late twenties and finally at my current campaign when I had passed 40. I love the variety of it and you can customize nearly everything in it. ^_^
Not sure of others' experiences, but when I bought the boxed edition of the Basic Rules, along with the starter dice, Keep on the Borderlands came with it. Maybe this is why it is possibly the most played module published. It was "free" and came with the Basic D&D Rules Box Set. Most modules at the time were between 8 and 12 dollars at the time, and in 1980, that was a lot of money for a 13 year old kid. (I wish I knew where it disappeared to...)
I just ran my group through both Into the Unknown and Keep on the Borderlands. Great little modules that are super-easy to blend into a campaign and to customize. These modules are still going strong 40 years on.
"In D&D basic you didn't get death saving throws, you just got new character sheets." Not bad.
It made your choices more important as the consequences were actually severe. Modern DMs are too lenient.
Those poison saving throws were very tense. Hated fighting poison monsters , one hit and missed saving throw that was it, below lvl 5. It got slightly less tense after that if you had a lvl cleric with cure poison, IIRC , or a scroll/potion of the same.
@none none E.G.G. who created AD&D, played quite strict and cut-throat apparently. His campaigns made use of hirelings and henchmen to allow low level PCs to rise up and not get killed so easily. I respect that about 1E. It's more realistic and rewarding when the DM doesn't have to coddle the PCs in order to make the game work.
If you role played well enough actually......especially besting the moderator or moderators in dice rolling..
@@jh1859 Big Difference between cut throat and a dick GM. I think it is just different from table to table. As long as the party is having fun, then that is the most important thing. Of course I have always had a rule... I may be nice to you guys, but fuck around with your character and you will find out. Got to make it a challenge as well as fun.
Gary Gygax designed well realized modules that slaughtered player characters like they were Confederates at Pickett's charge. While it was quite edgy and exciting to know your whole party could be wiped at any moment, it was also pretty tough to develop any personality in your cannon fodder of the moment. I think this might have been because he was a war gamer first. Thanks for making these wonderful videos. They take me back.
We did have a series of first level fighter henchmen called in series Tom Dick and Harry and then Larry Curly and Mo. I believe Larry might have made it to third level. I think the henchman were earning half experience points back in original D&D. Not much personality.
Yep.. cannon fodder and the ones that survived became beloved characters.
@@swirvinbirds1971 Good Ole Larry.
Yeah, when you survived and leveled up, it was a real accomplishment. Especially if you started with a 1st level Mage. "OK, you got two hit points, a dagger, the worst ability to hit with the dagger, no armor, and one spell: "magic missile", that can do up to 4 points of damage but might only do 1 point. Go get 'em, tiger."
@@biffstrong1079we had that too. One was named Fred the door opener.
Actually a very challenging module for Levels 1-3. Takes me back to the early 80s!
Holy shit, yesterday I was like "I think they died..." and here we are.
man, I was the exact same!
My dad ran the Hermit + Mountain Lion as my first session with him. My siblings and I were all young at the time.
I ran the 25th Anniversary Edition about 2 years ago for a new, younger group of players and they loved it. They got really involved with a number of NPCs in town which made things so much easier on me with regards to giving them leads and such. They sold the golden dragon egg to the evil merchant that occasionally travels into town, not having figured out who he is.
A year later, long after we had finished the module, there was a gold dragon terrorizing the countryside and the merchant was using it to make money. Boy were they surprised.
Oh, that's classic! 😄It's been at least thirty years since I played Keep on the Borderlands. I don't think we ever found the Gold Dragon egg. We came across the Minotaur once, and it did not end well. Funny enough, my current 5e group is (I think) close to finishing Icewind Dale and we found a Silver Dragon egg. My rogue-assassin (who's a total fop) has already called 'dibs' on it, stating that he is going to raise the dragon and call him Steve...or Stephanie if it's a girl!
*THE RETURN OF THE KING*
Not for long.
@@Barquevious_Jackson indeed
I can remember replaying this as evil characters. The DM changed up everything, so it would be fresh. We did actual role playing and made deals with the denizens of the caves. We ended up robbing the Keep and letting our monster buddies in to the Keep to wipe out the guards for us. We used some cows for cover at one point. The end game was us double crossing and attacking the depleted monster ranks. It was more fun, than playing good characters.
Great video! I'm old school enough to have played this puppy back in the eighties. Ah memories. Mt. Dew, potato chips and death by minotaur. Classic.
What, not Doritos?
The Doritos dust got all over the dice
Never drank Mountain Dew. It was super sweet but that by itself wasn't enough. One time I was visiting friends in the US, I asked about what the attraction was. one of them said "Um.... highest caffeine content in a pop"... I said "Really? Up North of the 49th, for a long time, maybe still, caffeine could only be in colas." My American friend looked at me and said "What the he**???!!!! What sort of a Communist country do you come from?". It was a hilarious moment. I had no idea there was caffeine in Mountain Dew in the US. If I needed caffeine, it was Coke (Classic).
@@gilbertkohl6991 Cheetos were the worst! 😄
@@TheMinecraftACMan Did even we have doritos in the 1980's? I remember Hickory sticks and Cheesies being terrible choices at the gaming table.
Remember, we can't die unless you destroy our coffins!
The dark powers make sure to never let you leave your domain of dread, know only as "RUclips".
@@navidryanrouf441 The dark lord Al Gorithm knows all. He's a master of Scrying and Necromancy. Some say he can even turn hatred into gold.
Yet another amazing breakdown of old school D&D that I was too young to ever have a chance to try and lived in an area too sparsely populated to be able to get a game going with anyone other than my brother. Thanks for sharing this, I look forward to many more!
I just found your channel and watched all your videos. You have ridiculous production values and great content. I can see why it takes a while to make these.
@@That-Google-Guy first module i played.
My mom played this adventure in the 80s and to get her back into dnd I ran it for her again and we set it in Eberron ^^
Omg. Rare and double rare. A lady who liked dnd, and gave birth to a daughter who also likes it!
👍👍👍
How cool is that!!
@@bloodySunday77 so cool! She plays a multiclass warlock sorceress and eldritch blast is her favorite spell 😁
Oh wow, it's awesome to have family into the same hobbies as you. Glad you could give her that treat of nostalgia!
Out of curiosity, where did you set it on Eberron? Monsters and cultures are very different there so I think it's one of the most interesting places to run it with its moral quandaries.
Interest in old modules got me thinking of remixing the flavor to run in areas that my game is set in and here is what I've come up with so far:
Setting:
*Placing it on the border between Karrnath (For the Keep) and the Mror Holds (For the Caves of Chaos), with the wilderness encounters/discoveries being influenced by the Icewood's Madstone (The Mad Hermit) and Lake Dark's Undead.
*The keep is lorded by a Knightly Order of Karrnath from a nearby city/town (Whatever order you choose will change its flavor, items, and services). The party may be veterans from the Last War looking for new work, Mercenaries hired for the help, agents of King Kaius, Rekkenmark cadets on an expedition, diplomats/agents from nearby regions/factions with an interest in the area, etc...
*The Caves of Chaos were recently created by a manifest Zone to Kythri, the Churning Chaos. This makes it more likely for its inhabitants to act on impulse and has transmogrified the cave into new twisted passages, opening up the divisions between enemies and passages to The Realm Below (Explaining how they've "co-existed" for this long). Rumors of great discoveries and treasure in these passages alongside calls for aid and disappearances has brought many factions at play here.
*Caves of the Unknown can be the Realm Below, where dwarves and aberrations are locked in war, or a demiplane within Khyber to one of the Overlords or a Daelkyr.
Factions:
*Jhorash'Tal Orcs as the Orcs, a tribe of barbarians vengeful to the dwarves that drove them out ages ago.
*Dwarves as the Goblinoids and the main inhabitants and explorers of the Mror Holds, with different clans having different dispositions and occassionally sabotaging each other for riches. Their primary concerns are Riches, the conflict with the Jhorash'Tal Orcs, and the Realm Below. On the latter, some hope that this Cave can lead them to turn the tide of the War Below with the forces of Dyrrn for their ancestral home. Whether it be as a secret flank to surprise them, to gain magical weapons and artifacts, or to find aberrations for the creation of Symbionts.
*The Emerald Claw as the Gnolls, allying with the Orcs and reaping the benefits of the dead in the conflict for their necromantic projects and for the wheels of war to turn again. Them being an ex-knightly order makes them a source of infamy to Karrnath and a foil to the Knightly Order of the players. Their influence reaches as a worldwide campaign front, with Lake Dark and the Madstone both being of interest to them.
*Mind Flayers/Other Aberrations of Dyrrn, as the Bugbears, luring off creatures into their sickening experiments. Perhaps they created the rumors through mind seeding to lead the dwarves into a trap. The motives of both them and their creators are incomprehensible to mortals and inhumane.
*Githzerai as the Kobolds, pulled from their refuge in Kythri, they are once again hiding from the Mind Flayers that once ruled over them. With their psionic abilities and interplanar abilities, they are able to hide and navigate the caves expertly, but what they most want to do is to go home or flee their predicament.
*Cults of the Dragon Below to either an Overlord or Daelkyr for Cult in The Shrine of Chaos. The catalysts of the Kythri manifest zone's tranmogrification. Those being whatever BBEG you wanna use for later. Bonus if they allied with one of the faction your players were most interested in taking down or on the opposite end, the one that they most trusted.
*Each faction can attempt to convince the players to help them or mislead them to do so (In the case of Mind Flayers/Emerald Claw).
@@JazzyBassy I set it in the Mournland ^^
The kobolds were the original ones here and are bigger thanks to mutations by the grey mist. The big scary chaos alter was put their by cultists of the dragon below that were killed by gatekeepers (I made them the orc tribes). Some of the orcs were bewitched by the artifacts of evil chaos and became cultists themselves and now the uncharmed group is trying to both save their friends (by either cure or death) and protect themselves.
The goblinkin are newer arrivals. They are mercenaries from Darguun working for a wealthy benefactor.
That wealthy benefactor is an Inspired from Sarlona who’d heard of the altar and wants to use its curse evil spreading curse to further the goals of the Dreaming Dark. This inspired and his closest lieutenants take the place of the cultists in that topmost floor by the altar room in the original adventure.
The Minotaur was simply an avid explorer who came across the altar herself a while ago and became a cultist of belashyrra. She is not inherently violent but will slay intruders if she thinks they mean her harm. If she does so she takes their eyes out and puts them on her horns or makes things out of them.
I played this in 2nd edition, rolled up a Monk, getting killed in one of our first random encounters by a giant black widow spider by failing his poison save. As a DM, I had a enterprising party that after making a few successful runs of the goblin and orc caves buy a wagon, a couple horse and hired some henchmen/flunkies to mind the wagon to haul off all their loot. It got really silly when they cleared out the evil temple section and hired more people to remove all the tiles and inlays of the altar area.
Better times.
I once saw some players in Tomb of Horrors trick retainers into setting off the traps. Told them that all they were doing was carrying torches for the party.
😂😂😂😂
Wow, this brings back memories. My group played this module as first level losers back in 1979 shortly after it was released. This was the beginning of my love for gaming.
I remember learning the value of healing potions and that running away was always an option.
I still have my Temple of Elemental Evil game module from the 80s and have been wanting to try and play it with modern rules.
YES! DO IT! I've ran it in 1st, 2nd, and 3rd editions. I hope to run it again in 5e in the next year or two. It honestly works well with any edition with very little tweaking, so 5e shouldn't be a problem.
@@shayulghul Agreed.
@@shayulghul Though it might require a bit of finesse when using the old monsters. For example, while the Caves of Chaos seem geared towards a low level party, the Medusa in 5e is a CR6 monster. Between that and her petrification, she may be a bit more than the party can handle.
@@Bluecho4 Like I said, you still have to tweak it a little, but it works well in any edition.
ToEE is one of my favorite module's from the 80's. I have used (stole) the Village of Hamlett in multiple games, it's a great model to use for a village setting.
This was the very first adventure I played when I got into D&D many, many, heavy sign, many years ago.
This was my first module back in the day. It literally stayed part of the game for years returning as the base of operations ultimately having a larger city build up around it.
Glad to see another upload from you, i really enjoy how you present these old adventures.
Dm it All is the best!
When you keep in mind that a lot of this stuff was designed with a greymarch type campaign in mind, it makes sense how deadly it is. Tbh modern d&d is a little strange insofar as every PC is some kind of superhero aristocrat even at low levels and by high levels you are somehow just a deity flat out
I can remember receiving the Basic (Moldvay) set in 1981 for my birthday. That set the tone for how I DM to this very day...half-prepared and continually improvising. The artistic styles of Bill Willingham and Jeff Dee influenced my art style too, so it's a win win.
So, this was like the Super Mario Bros/Duck Hunt NES cartridge, but for D&D. Neat!
I love the Keep and Caves and have used it at least a dozen times, adding my own details, side quests, and more
I think many of did that. Our group adventured with this many times, with the DM changing and evolving the caves, the keep and the area as we leveled up.
Ah this was funny enough the second adventure I ever DM'd. When I got my set of Basic Edition D&D it came with three modules in that package. One was this, Keep on the Borderlands. The second was perhaps my favorite adventure module of all time, Isle of Dread. The third was Tomb of Horrors, and what i decided to run for my first adventure. Put the players in front of it, gave them a deck of many things for each of them to draw from, and said "Have at it".
By comparison no one considered Keep on the Borderlands to be insanely difficult even at its worst hose moments.
I ran this shortly after the 5e monster manual came out, as just a straight conversion to 5e. It does feel a bit dated, and the prep (or improv) required in the keep is not to be underestimated, should players be inclined towards heavy roleplay. I did appreciate that the caves have enough sheer numbers of enemies to require either diplomacy, sneaky tactics, or hirelings (not simple hack-and-slash roll-play).
Did you run this in person or online? Trying to find the online HD map for the caves of chaos
Holy moly! You are alive! That's great!
The 'Temple Of Elemental Evil' PC game was great with the Circle Of Eight megamod, fixing issues and adding more. Best representation of D&D 3.x rules in a digital game.
Too bad Troika tanked. Despite their RPGs' buginess, they made some greats.
This was the only module we had at first, there was no internet to download other modules or much advice and examples for designing your own. As all of us wanted to play we rotated Dungeon Master, picking the cave we were going to enter next and the chosen DM would read up just on that cave. We spent very little time in the keep, it was just a place to buy, sell and rest.
To my mind, Keep On The Borderlands is the best module name, ever.
DM'd this for several new campaigns. Was a great introduction for noobs. My current group (5) are between 58-65 years, all have been playing since early 80's with one group or another, we used to have a large circle of friends and some parties numbering 12 or more players. Over the years we now have only 2 groups, who never play together. Us and the "Young" guys now in their 50s, using their own House Rules and such. But we still have a Mapper and a separate Records Keeper. Play a mix of 2-3.5 rules.
I got the 1981 Basic set for Christmas from an older cousin when I was in 8th grade, and had no idea what it was. But when I started reading the stuff in the books, I was enchanted!!! The Keep on the Borderlands was included and it the first adventure I tried to run for people, and I did a terrible job. But it taught me what I needed to know forever! To this day I still make a town with stores, and on session zero the players bring their new characters into the town and talk to people at the shops. The shops don't necessarily have everything in the Player's Handbook. A 5e player once got mad at me because battle axes were not available in the town!!! But, I love the rumor table and the idea of some hermit (either a friend or foe) out in the woods, and a humanoid faction moving into the woods near the city and attacking people. Between The Keep on the Borderland and The Isle of Dread in the Expert set (where I learned how to do a hex crawl), I had all the fundamentals for being a sandbox, open world DM!!! All I had to do was refine it as I went on and made my own sandbox campaigns later. I eventually figured out that what you have to do is generate home brew rules and fluff that allow you to make the fantasy lit that I like to read come to life and embed the characters in a world with strong consequences, good or bad, for their choices. I think every DM would benefit from running The Keep on the Borderlands & Isle of Dread, esp. because 5e books just don't give the DM the tools they need ...the 5e books only make it harder on the DM by adding more and more unnecessary player options.
My older wss our dm for a l9ng time. This module made me cry baby tears many times. I agree with you about 5e. They don't want you making your own adventures. That keeps you coming back to them at every turn. My opinion is that homemade adventures are sometimes the most fulfilling for everyone involved. They can get personal too.
This was the module that came with my basic set, and was the first module I ever ran. I pored over every detail, so much so that I remembered most of the details you mentioned here 40 years later. Thanks for the flashback!
aahhh, it's back! Some of the best D&D content on the RUclips
5:47 Sometimes it's the meaningless details that give a little world like this meaning.
This was the module that made players into combat vets, or shell shocked them into making better decisions using tactics. The entrance you choose either made you or killed you.
Don’t ever leave me like that again, I beg of you.
Fr though I was having an anxiety episode going on like 7 hours and I saw this video and it made my day immediately better. You are great.
Meditate 🤸
This was one of my favorite adventures. Why? No idea, that was about 40 years ago. Probably because my cousin was a good DM. Thanks for the nostalgia!
DDO did a great job translating Borderlands. And it's going to serve as the gateway to more Classic modules, with Saltmarsh coming soon.
They are back! My day has improve!
Welcome back! I had to double check to see if this was the channel I remembered it was. Hope you're doing well and whatever held you up has been solved. I need to get back to watching the rest of your videos!
one of my all time favorites, we played this for a month of weekends i think. Sadly my best friend who DM'd this for us is has now passed on, but it was a blast and i still have the original copy.
You cannot place Keep at the Borderlands in Ravenloft, it doesn't....
Wayne June: Ruin has come to our family...
Opulent and imperial...
You just made it even better.
My very first character (a fighter) died in one of the orc areas. DM rolled max damage and we both agreed that the Orc's blade slipped into the small gap between my character's helmet and armor, decapitating him, so when we came back later (me with another character), we 'discovered" a head, still wearing his helmet, right where he fell.
It's been more than twenty years since that happened, but I've never forgotten that first death.
Thank you for the unexpected surge of pure nostalgia!
I have never played the module, but I used the Keep as part of an adventure.
I played keep on the border lands at the teenager. After that we went to Castle amber
So unless I am completely wrong here, the 4th edition version of keep in the boarder lands, actually takes place in 4e's default setting which despite common misconception is not the Forgotten Realms but the Nentir Vale, sometimes called Points of Light. It takes place in the Chaos Scar, which is in-between the Ogrefist Hills and the Witchlight Fens, just south west of Fallcrest the starting town for 4e.
Exactly!
I recently ran that 4e module - it was good beer-and-pretzels fun. It was designed for D&D Encounters (the 4e version of the Adventurers League), so it's very linear. I've always been curious about the famous original, though.
@@ernestvanophuizen461 I've only gotten to run half of it. But my experience was similar once I told my players to think of it as a narrative based dungeon, they had a lot of fun with it. Also it's always fun to meet a fellow 4e player in the wild.
Great review! Keep on the Borderlands is the first module I ran for my children and wife. They did it in this order: Travel to the Keep on a caravan, learning that the road beyond was interdicted, linking up with five NPCs (two Clerics, a Halfling, and two 0-level fighters), Scouring the Countryside (spiders, lizardmen, bandits, then hermit), then Cave of the Unknown (I made it an abandoned, ancient Dwarven mine that had been invaded a very long time ago by...something fell and no longer present), then the Caves of Chaos.
As they had a Ranger in the party, it was not difficult for the party to suss out a partial plan of who lived where from footprints (though not all of the caves were so revealed). They took it in this order:
Goblins (and the back room of the Hobgoblins), return to the Keep, Hobgoblins, return to the Keep and level up (they had ingratiated themselves with the Advisor and Castellan).
Further exploration of the Cave of the Unknown, return to the Keep
Bugbears and Minotaur, Retreat to the Keep and level up (exchanging much of the magic and treasure gained to do so)
First foray into the Shrine of Evil Chaos and Gnolls (via the back door!), retreat back through the Shrine of Evil Chaos to the Keep
Orc Caves, Shrine of Evil Chaos.
The campaign took about two months of game time and some fifteen sessions, and ran much like a skirmish back and forth, with maneuverings and strategems. Not all of the monsters were slain--some were allowed to flee with their lives--typically the females and young. The Kobolds read the writing on the wall and departed. The Owlbear was never encountered. Nor was the wight who departed the crypts to report on the destruction to higher authorities.
This is THE introductory module. If you flesh its content out with some of the excellent suggestions you can find on the internet, and treat the Caves of Chaos as a living ecosystem that reacts and adapts and has hooks into other parts of the game setting, it can be the foundation of a great campaign (I made the evil cleric a Baron's younger, ambitious son gone bad and an adherent of Iuz).
Allowing the party to level up during the campaign is a choice--not everyone will like this, but I used the AD&D EXP rules and it was a good way to drain away their treasure and magic items because training fees are EXPENSIVE.
Wow, that's a blast from the past lol. Takes me back to my Commodore 64 days. I didn't have the friends that were really interested in D&D, but I loved reading all the rule books and modules. The Keep on the Borderlands has a big place in my heart.
How to fit, "The Keep On the Borderlands" into Spelljammer: Your spelljammer suffers a catastrophic and mysterious failure. Despite your best efforts a crash landing was inevitable. From your ship's suprisingly stable and well hidden mountain perch you are able to see multiple landmarks in the distance...
In Simple D&D, chaos and evil are the same thing.
In Simple D&D's starter module, there's a place called "the Shrine of Evil Chaos."
So, alternative name: "Shrine of Evil Evil."
In 1983, as a freshman in high school, I brought this module into school and a senior there told me he'd played with Ernie and Gary Gygax for years, even helping Gary flesh out much of this module. He expressed surprise at the map of the caves saying something like "I didn't know Gary used my map. That's pretty cool."
No telling which parts of that story if any were true.
Keep On The Borderlands, Gary's only contribution to Mystara. I think anyway
"Kid Killing Quandary", an alliterative that occurs rarely - except in D&D, where it's surprisingly common.
Love the channel y’all help me use older adventures as formats for my current dming planning , really do appreciate it !
So good, we played on a extra large chalk board, with block walls and the lead figurines. This module took several hours and every minute was enjoyed. The movies never matched our imaginations until the lord of the rings came out in the early two thousands. Great post, thanks.
I don't remember whether it said so in the module or not, but I've always wondered why those claiming the monsters being in proximity was unrealistic hadn't figured that the clerics in the final cave were keeping them in line so they could be used as an army of chaos. That's how I always interpreted the situation.
Of course, last time I ran this module the party somehow managed to take out the clerics first, and everything did erupt into violence as soon as the various tribes found out!
"Back then, one party member was designated as the party mapper....."
I feel so old.
I ran that a lot as an introduction to D&D for so many.
In one campaign the player gave up before reaching the priest and his plans came to fruition and the more experienced players had to deal to the evil power base that the Keep had become.
I love this video idea. Castle Amber and White Plume Mountain are great options for this type of video too
Two things:
1. Love your videos. No one gives Pre-5e D&D the love it deserves quite like you
2. After the OGL scandal, My group went back to 4e for nostalgia. We did Keep on the Shadowfell as an introduction, and I noticed Winterhaven kind of looks like the Keep on the Borderlands. And since KotB is basically 8 Dungeons in One, and 4e is the ultimate edition for Dungeon Crawling, I did a conversion for it and it fits PERFECTLY in Nentir Vale (4e's default Setting).
Read first part of title and two piped into my head. Keep on Borderlands and Ravenloft.
Need a console version of Keep.
Nice video. I often listen to reviews like this as I work. Today was one of those days, I happened to switch by view back to the video for a moment and was pleasantly surprised to see my Neverwinter Nights handle (ENoa4) and mod on screen. You had some footage of the Keep on the Borderlands conversion I did for Neverwinter Nights 2. What a nice treat! Thank you. Keep the great videos coming. Thanks again for the blast from the past, I never expected to see something I worked on flash past. It made my day.
These are walkthru's are great! Thank You. Time Travel and other spells can allow any 5E player to travel into these older modules. These can be very remote places in time/space that the characters can remotely observe or actually travel to. Example, a 5E player wants the original version of Mordenkainen's Sword, they can time travel back to Greyhawk and get a copy. Eventually planar characters will have done this and catalogued all prime material plane spells, and they will be for sale in Sigil. Prime Material player's and DM's often forget this.
The algorithm LOVES this video. It just won’t leave my feed. Everywhere I go, it follows me like a lovelorn Beholder.
Check out Goodman Games’ “Into the Borderlands”. A 5e interpretation of both the Keep and Quasqueton, tying the two together, and expanding certain pieces of them both.
I picked up Goodman Games' version and highly recommend it. It has the original Into the Unknown and Keep on the Borderlands as well as an update for running them in 5e. It also includes a lot of the history of the modules and full-color pages of the cover art. It's really nice to use to get a party through the lower levels of play and I was able to easily adapt it to my campaign setting.
I don't think it's worth it at all. It's awkward and poorly designed, in places adhering stupidly to the original module (nobody wears anything but leather armor, chainmail and plate) and in other places just throwing in so much lore and plot it runs counter to the simplicity of the original Keep. And for whatever reason, turning the original Lawful elf of the Keep into a Chaotic Evil douchenozzle who's the only character from the original module given a name and development, again sticking out against the simplicity of the rest of the module.
This module always has a special place in my heart
I've been a player in B2 in a Dungeon Crawl Classics game and run it myself with adaptations for 5E. It was incredibly fun. The PCs captured a bugbear and were going to torture it to death but it revealed it was just a simple, (relatively) peaceful bugbear and all he really wanted out of life was to eat slugs and do his own thing. He was coerced by the Chaos priests to be their slave. The PCs did a total 180 and made it their mission to defeat the priest and free their new friend (now "Hugbear"). Sadly, they had already killed all the others of his kind, but when he was freed he joined them as a henchman, albeit one they had to keep hidden from civilized NPCs.
It was awesome.
Also, I love your channel and I'm glad to see a new video! Keep it up!
I remember playing this back around 1980. My buddies and I were new to the game and didn't know what we were doing. We got slaughtered again and again. Never did see 75% of the caves. But it was fun anyway.
Even today it would be tough. Unless the characters are 3rd level I wouldn't recommend it.
A teen tried to run this for me when I was 12 but I didn't know what I was supposed to do. From your comment and watching this video it sounds like you should try to level up in the keep then put together a group of NPCs to go to the cave. Is that likely?
The most played module, because it's the one we all had. 😊Given the fatality rates of Basic D&D, I don't recall us ever even finding the Shrine of Chaos. We all got smoked by the Mad Hermit in one adventure, and the Minotaur in another. Good times! 😄
I first ran this in 1979 for me sister and best friends. Blast from the past. I still have the box set.
It is the one adventure to Rule Them All. Superb simplicity. Absolutely timeless. You could print a 1,000-page collection of adventures spanning 40+ years. No two accounts would be the same. I never thought the ogre had herpes but our mule ran off anyway.
I WAS WORRIED ABOUT YOUR HEALTH
SO GLAD YOU'RE BACK
So I'm running Kingmaker for my DnD 5e group, think its hilarious that the Mad Hermit from here is exactly the same as the Mad Hermit encounter in the Rivers Run Red book. Really cool, thinking of running this for my group after we finish.
I know I played this the most simply because it was included with the box set. I was very young when I started D&D but after a couple years I came up with the same conclusion that the caves of chaos was a highly implausible scenario. I further didn't really get too moralistic at that age and simply cleared out cave after cave until it was done, so I kind of took care the problem. The other basic modules had the same issue that the AD&D modules didn't seem to, but it's great fun for a kid's imagination.
I further envisioned this as the central base of operation with the other basic modules of the time picking up at the end of the borders of good ol' B2 here - B1 In Search if the Unknown as the Cave of the Unknown, B3 Palace of the Silver Princess to the North, B4 The Lost City to the South, B5 The Horror on the Hill to the East and Journey to the Rock to the West. I later added 4 of the other basic modules to the northeast, northwest, etc., Including and placed it in the center of the world when I moved to the Expert Edition.
In the end before switching to AD&D I managed to take over the Keep from the "evil" Castellan who (per my DM) noticed I had amassed quite a fortune and made plans to bump me off and steal it. But eventually it became too small of a scale before I moved my more qdvanced characters on to other realms. But once in a while I still would like to start another character, and work it through these ranks.
I reckon this module is more enjoyable if the DM gives a bit of an intro talk about: there are some very dangerous things in this adventure, so relying on brute force could result in PC deaths; sometimes you might only survive by dropping some food or treasure for the monsters and running away; looking for clues of what is around is wise; scouting ahead could be wise;
you don’t have to fight every monster you encounter - you might enjoy the game more and be more successful if you try to be creative, using tactics to your advantage (e.g. setting up ambushes, fighting large groups of enemies at bottlenecks, etc.), talking & negotiating with those you encounter, taking prisoners and interrogating them, etc..
Finally a video that shows my copy of the Basic set with the yellow B1 module. 😛
At the time it was a bit confusing, TSR was publishing the Basic/Expert sets and also AD&D books -- two versions of the same game. Thankfully it didn't matter that much and we could play with either set of rules anyway. When the Gary Gygax Players Handbook and DM's Guide were published that was it, we stopped reading the Basic rules. Exciting times.
Played this with my younger brother with our dad as the DM. It was fun haviny my familiar wreak house on the Lizardmen after they kidnapped a man's wife and child. And my brother's ranger becoming a GOD of Archery. And the NPC cleric, Roland, that joined us from the very beginning to heal us.
... Said cleric nearly dying from a bear-type monster when we set up camp on a animal trail... Bear-Hugs are scary!
I had the 1983 basic set that had a built-in DIY game after they phased out inclusion of this module, but the local hobby store had "The Keep on the Borderlands" module on their sale bin for $1, so I picked it up. With some minor adjustments, I kept using it after switching to the First Edition AD&D rules.
Devote themselves to the dark masters of the shrine"... Well, that escalated fast.
I believe as you approach the caves the first canonical foe was a mad hermit and if you killed him he had some silver and I think a potion of healing. There's also a " pleasant glade" and if the party were to rest there everyone got additional hit points ( like 2 or 3) because it had healing powers. Have you done an " Isle of dread" yet? What's great about that one is the party has to negotiate to get a ship to take them and I believe the final boss is a Red dragon. . What a great game d and d is.
Dam these guys got a high level cleric on call, cause these guys are back from the dead! Glad to see your all back! Can't wait to see what you guys put out!
I and everyone else would like to thank you for keeping up this video series. We all appreciate the quality and interesting subjects and topics. Something about the history of D&D, exploring through it, and delving into some of the obscurity, and especially the intrigue surrounding game design in older or rarer versions of D&D and its modules, and the history of modules throughout editions...It has always been enjoyable and a great exploration.
As somebody who has been working on a TTRPG design for some time now, I have found returning to your videos and simply listening to the step by step evolution and contemplation you give on the mechanics and there existence has been inspiring and provisional for meditation on our work. Thank you.
Thank you for not disappearing for good on us. We look forward to more exploration of this game that you have all given greatly to us.
I actually played that with my friends back in Highschool, It had been bought a long time before by my uncle and left with my mom after one try, thanks for making me remember those days and the fun I had with my friends back then.
I ran multiple parties through this back in the day when I first started playing D&D. I recently picked up the re-mastered edition from Goodman Games which brings it forward into the 5th edition world without any other significant changes to the module. While it's fun to be nostalgic, I think most players today would expect something more well rounded. For example Gygax's human-centric design sticks out big time in the Keep as the only non-human NPC is an elf of dubious morals and background. I've been working on converting it for use on a VTT and updating / changing some things to be more diverse and fun for the players. I think it still holds up as an initial exposure to D&D gaming and am planning to try to run it for some new players who want to explore what D&D is like.
I still remember my first game of D&D playing Borderlands in my lunch hour with pals at school. Almost 40 years ago and it feels like yesterday.
4:36 Dungeon Keeper!... My favorite Bullfrog video game title!
I came by to check on your channel when an older video was recommended by the algorithm only to see you haven't uploaded in 8 months. Hope you're alright!
A good use of this as an opening for a larger game would be that the cult's undead, and perhaps summoned demons (so cult of Orcus would be a good option) has displaced the monsters forcing them all in close quarters. The uptick in monster aggressoin also being a reason the Keep needs more people to help man it.
The 'Keep' can be played in waves. Easy caves cleared the first season of play. More caves uncovered as stronger creatures move in to be dealt with in future seasons. Players base out of the keep and deal with the caves occasionally, Similar to yearly maintenance of any home, with more adventure. Part of the Gygax living world idea, makes a lot more sense than six opposing races living on top of each other.
The Cave of the Unknown can be where the DM places the caves used in “B1 In Search of the Unknown”.
This is the best review of this module I've seen so far. You go into some detail of what makes the encounters interesting and the conflict that is going on. I'm disappointed to see that there is not detailed advice for how to role play NPC's or creatures. I don't understand why it seems every edition of the game the creators don't seem to think it is necessary to help out DM's who are not good at improv or coming up with compelling reasons for the NPC's and monsters to be doing what they're doing and how.
Going through all your videos containing anything AD&D! Was a fanatical player of this great RPG long before those three letters were used. Watching your videos brought back fond memories of those glory days. Can I make an appeal? Spelljammer was my all time favorite AD&D addition. It tied the entire franchise together in a unique way and added a setting that was unlike anything TSR ever made, in my opinion. Any chance you could do a walkthrough on that? You did your homework well, and all the histories of these old modules and books are spot on. I appreciate your work, and thanks for reminding me how this great game got started. Keep these videos coming!
I forget how punishingly brutal Gygax modules could be. "You opened the wrong door. ... You're now dead."
I've run this adventure three times as a GM through my life. Once as a teen in the 80's, later in my late twenties and finally at my current campaign when I had passed 40. I love the variety of it and you can customize nearly everything in it. ^_^
it is good to see your return, and i can see the quality of your video's have gone up, welcome back DM it all
Keep on the borderlands was the seminal D7D adventure, because it shipped with the basic D&D set for many years. It was my first, for sure.
Not sure of others' experiences, but when I bought the boxed edition of the Basic Rules, along with the starter dice, Keep on the Borderlands came with it. Maybe this is why it is possibly the most played module published. It was "free" and came with the Basic D&D Rules Box Set. Most modules at the time were between 8 and 12 dollars at the time, and in 1980, that was a lot of money for a 13 year old kid. (I wish I knew where it disappeared to...)
I just ran my group through both Into the Unknown and Keep on the Borderlands. Great little modules that are super-easy to blend into a campaign and to customize. These modules are still going strong 40 years on.
Love it…played it when it as new! Great memories.
Enjoying your videos. Appreciate the short intro and clear presentation voice without goofy sound effects. Old school D&D forever.
This was the module that came with my first D&D box set. We played the heck out of this back in 1979-81.