W is for White Dragons

[over the course of the month of April, I shall be posting a topic for each letter of the alphabet, sequentially, for every day of the week except Sunday. Our topic for this year's #AtoZchallenge? Revamping the Grand Duchy of Karameikos in a way that doesn't disregard its B/X roots. I got behind by a couple days because of the Easter weekend, but I'm trying to catch up as quickly as possible]

W is for White Dragons. Well, white drakes, actually.

Okay, I'm just going to have to blaze through these last four. Apologies in advance.

I've written a bit about adventure module B3: Palace of the Silver Princess in a prior post, most of which was less than complimentary. Fine, sorry. While the adventure's not great, there's some background stuff in Moldvay's rewrite of the Jean Wells original version, that's rather interesting, such as:

Arik of the Hundred Eyes: an ancient, evil being worshipped as a god (there's a chaotic cleric in the module trying to break him out of his mystic prison).

Eyes of Arik: giant, magic rubies of uncertain powers, said to be the eyes of Arik.

Faerie: a "highly magical realm" inside which "time has little meaning." Faerie is a land of peace, harmony, and eternal happiness, populated by The Protectors (translucent green elf-like beings) and "certain High Elves" (whatever that means).

Knights of the White Drakes: a group of fighters that ride white dragons; both riders and mounts are dedicated to the destruction of evil.

"The Protectors"

Moldvay was writing (rather, re-writing) in 1981 and his adventure has a lot of what I'd call "B/X flavor;" it has a bunch of coloring outside the lines, draws heavily from pulp, and fictional sources, and doesn't attempt to make a whole lot of sense in terms of rules and regulations. Moldvay (author of the B/X Basic book) isn't afraid to take things "off the rails," and even though it's got a higher level of morality and "force" against players than I prefer, it's still neither a railroad, nor the codified vanilla fantasy of later publications.

Moldvay doesn't say anything about where the Valley of Haven is (other than it being a kingdom surrounded by "the Thunder Mountains") but Frank Mentzer's Expert set places it smack-dab in the middle of eastern Karameikos, at the southern end of the Altan Tepes mountains, just north of the eastern forests (home of the Vyalia elves). This he does without explanation and context, which is (I suppose) par for the course in some ways...but even without the geographical inconsistency (no valley, no Thunder Mountains), it's yet another slap in the face of Wells, who included a full map (illustrated by the author) of the region, clearly located northwest of the Principalities of Glantri and, yes, even including the Thunder Mountains. The map is one of several illustrations cut mysteriously from the rewrite, despite a total lack of anything that might be deemed "offensive;" maybe the town of "Dead Mule?"

Anyway, as I said in the earlier post on the subject of B3, I lack the time or inclination to re-write either module at the moment, but if I did, I'd probably remove it entirely from Karameikos, and put it where it's supposed to be (as its background...with a recent faerie disaster...makes absolutely no sense in the timeline of the Grand Duchy). However, I wouldn't mind re-purposing the "Castellan Keep" icon on the map (remember, I want to move the actual Keep on the Borderlands to the Duke's Road Keep) as the stronghold of the Knights of the White Drakes. Because fighters mounted on white dragons is kind of cool (and makes more sense in an area infested by Frost Giants).

Something like this.

Here's the thing about white dragons: in B/X they are NEUTRAL in alignment, neither chaotic, nor evil (as they are in AD&D and subsequent editions). That gives a lot of opportunity for interesting stuff, especially if Knights have zero allegiance to Duke Stefan, the conquering Thyatians, or the indigenous Traladarans. I see them more of an ancient, Druid-like order...and their idea of what constitutes "evil" may be very different from that of "civilized" Archduke. Dressed in antique white scale mail (forged from the carapace of their fallen brethren), the White Drake Brotherhood is half legendary, only venturing forth from their mountain lair when drawn by strange portents and celestial events. Sometimes they bring needed aid to communities threatened by monsters and ravenous humanoids, sometime they bring icy death and destruction to innocent villages who have somehow "upset the natural order."

Interesting that Sir Ellis the Strong (the one Knight detailed in B3) is only a 3rd level fighter...clearly there is something more than Name level status or prowess of arms that are necessary for indoctrination into their Order. Perhaps one must simply brave the giant-infested mountains and find the Knights' secret fortress. Perhaps it is a brotherhood bound by blood ties (and only a relative may heed the call). Perhaps only individuals of the correct psychic thought patterns may bond with their dragon mounts. Who knows...certainly the DM will need to decide on what, if any, road to initiation is available to player characters. However, Sir Ellis himself may be something of an apostate, leaving his fellow knights to marry a fairy princes, ritually blackening his armor to show his self-exile from their glacial stronghold.

All right. X is next.

Swords and Silver (Princesses)

Guy would probably do better
tossing the axe to a buddy.

B3: Palace of the Silver Princess was never an adventure module I owned or ran "back in the day." Certainly I remember it sitting on the toy shelf of the local Pay N' Save (back when you could buy D&D in such places...my own copy of Basic D&D was purchased at a J.C. Penny), but truth be told I never had any interest in it. Yes, the Erol Otus cover art is fantastically fiendish, but the simple statement on the front ("Introductory Module For Character Levels 1-3") resulted in an immediate hard pass on my end. After all, the characters in our campaign were way past 3rd level, and there was only one way they were going, baby.

Up. Of course.

[yes, we still played with character death and level drain, but in a world or wishes and resurrection, such inconveniences were petty concerns. No need to sack the Keep on the Borderlands when the party fighter was already sporting a rod of lordly might and the Invulnerable Coat of Arnd]

So it wasn't until this last week that I ever, finally, had a chance to sit down and read the thing, spurred in large part by (once again) GusL's brainstorm on how to re-skin the adventure. As I've blogged before, I dig on old fashioned fairy tales; that stuff was my bread and butter long before I acquired the title of Dungeon Master (someone really should give you a hat or something that says "DM" the first time you run a game). *AHEM* Anyway, the idea of a fairy tale castle for exploration (right after a "fairy tale apocalypse") is a pretty cool thing. Pretty darn inspiring, in my book.

Unfortunately, GusL's ideas are (*sigh*) a LOT better than the module itself. It's just not very good, and it would need more than a simple "re-skin" to make it work. Yeah, he probably wrote words to that effect in his blog post and I probably glossed over them in my enthusiasm...that happens. But there's just so much LAME in this thing. Worst of all is probably the module's assumption about the players' motivations and morality: why would they destroy the giant-ass ruby when they could simply loot and fence it? What if they decide NOT to fight the evil cleric or stop him from summoning his demon overlord? The adventure offers no explanation of the possibility...it doesn't hazard to entertain the possibility as a possibility.

The original Jean Wells (orange cover) copy of B3 is much more interesting and usable "out-o-the-box" if a little more standard: it's just a dungeon crawl through an ancient ruin. But there's a lot of other stuff going on (including a detailed wilderness outside the ruin) and no moralizing (the adventure module is explicit in the player characters option of joining with the evil cleric...should they so choose). It's still not great, and it leaves out the fairy tale aspect that was my impetus for checking out B3 in the first place, but it's a better adventure. Heck, it even provides the value of the ruby (10,000 g.p.) though this gem isn't linked to some imprisoned evil demigod; it's just loot.

There's actually a lot more loot in the original B3 adventure than in Moldvay's rewrite. The total amount of plunder one can take out of it is a bit more than 24,667 g.p. and probably more once the DM adds the suggested additions (there are a few "empty rooms" that DMs are expected to populate). This should be enough to get a party of eight PCs pretty close to 3rd level; quite a nice haul for a small, two level dungeon. By contrast, the green-covered re-issue version only yields a total of 9,776 g.p. which is pretty paltry for the recommended party size. However, if players are willing to fulfill the adventure's wishes of un-cursing the castle, each PC can expect to receive a 3,000 g.p. "bonus" as a reward from the Silver Princess herself...or 1,500 g.p. and a kick in the ass for those that chose to loot the Princess's belongings in the process. As I said, kind of lame...and disappointing.

Because, here's the thing I'm wondering: even if the treasure was good, even if the morality play wasn't there, even if the thing was an easy re-skin for a dark fairytale adventure, even if this were the case...

Would it matter? To the players? Really?

Same maps, more treasure.

To a DM, details matter. A coherent (or at least sensible) story/background matters because it helps the DM remember things (like how NPCs are motivated and how they interact and react). Evocative detail and memorable monsters matter because they provide inspiration for a DM's narration. Interesting treasure matters because it gives the DM things with which to poke and prod and goad the players.

But does this stuff matter to the players? Do the players look at a monster as anything more than a challenge with a particular set of special attacks, a certain number of hit points to be whittled down? Is treasure anything more than the way in which players keep score?

I suppose it does to a certain degree...players would get bored with boring same-old same-old after a while. If every encounter was a goblin, if every treasure was a chest of gold, if every magic item was just another +1 this or +2 that. But even so, even though it matters somewhat to players, these things don't matter so much as how they are presented by the DM. It doesn't matter nearly as much as how the DM runs the damn thing.

And, as a well-designed adventure can aid in a DM's running, I suppose me answer is that it matters quite a bit.

Neither version of B3 is particularly well-designed. I kind of like the ubues from the original (better than another clan of bugbears, for sure), but I dig the whole evil ruby/demon summoning thing from the later rewrite. I like the many new monsters and lack of moralizing in Wells's original, but I prefer the more original background of Moldvay's version (rather than yet another un-plundered ruin in need of exploration). I definitely lack the time to re-write either module in a way I'd find palatable...but then I also lack the time to come up with an original adventure of my own design. Certainly I'm not interested in working up a castle blueprint for a fairytale princess...but the maps in this module leave quite a bit to be desired. Maybe Strahd's castle would be a better re-skin for such an idea.

[sorry I didn't get to talking about swords. There's one noteworthy sword in B3: the lycanthrope chick's blade which is carved from a single gigantic ruby. Unfortunately, it has no attached value to it (even though it's potential loot...at least in the Moldvay re-write) so it might as well be, um...you know what? Never mind]