Review: Fighter's Challenge (HHQ1, no spoilers)

HHQ1 Fighter's Challenge
AD&D 2nd Edition
by John Terra (1992)

Fighter's Challenge is a neat little module, nominally designed for 1 warrior PC (Single or multiclassed) of levels 2-4. It includes a town with enough details to use as a home base, a minimally railroaded plot (just one scene to get the PC involved), and several side-quests related to the town and major plot. There's a little bit of mystery, some town and site-based interaction, plus some combat. The mood is one of heroic fantasy, but it could easily fit more mercenary style of play. It isn't full-on whimsical, but it does have some fairy-tale and/or humorous elements to it (not wierd fantasy or sword-and-sorcery really). It is low on the magic-ren-fair scale, but there are a number of magic items and magical beasts to fight.

The module's strengths are its relatively coherent main plot, and you can actually run it as the cover seems to intend: a single player of level 2-4, though if I ran it a second time I'd give the player enough XP to be 4th level as a single-class fighter rather than third (my player ended up as a gnome fighter/illusionist 2/2). This module could easily be run with a normal party of adventurers as well.

When I say it isn't too railroady, I mean it does have a number of set encounters along many of the paths the PCs will take, but there are certainly multiple paths to take to get to the end and I like it. There are even some factions among enemies which can be manipulated, though the breadth of enemies which can be encountered is reminiscent of the Mos Eisely Cantina: lots of big names and maybe too varied to might tight narrative sense.

On the coherent main plot, there is a backstory but it isn't too laborious. It does include a needless element that has a really cool scene at the end (page 22), and is a little cheesy, but it makes sense in a light-hearted D&D game where you're looting for treasure: not spectacular but I've seen worse.

As with all things, the module has a few weaknesses. In order to support a fighter-style for a one-on-one adventuer, there are a lot of possible hirelings. The town description flat-out gives four would-be adventurers, a couple other possible adjunct adventurers are encountered during the main plot (two for sure, possibly 3-4 others), as well as in the side quests (another 3, if my tally is near accurate). And the player will need them. There are a few creatures with less than a hit die, but there are a number of them with 5+ hit dice (some with dangerously low AC). Ditch a few of the potential hirelings if you have more than one PC (though I'd keep Coryn). I'm not a big fan of hirelings, so the adventure fails in the sense that one PC can do it alone. My PC lost 2 hirelings and went down himself a couple times.

Another weakness is the lack of a good overview. Sure, its a second-edition module so you start with a page or two of backstory, but a few of the encounters/subquests--5, 10, 11, and 12 on the map--just don't seem to have much to connect them to the story. 5 is at least in the realm of (the PC could accidentally get here), but 10-12 need some additional hook. The lair of one key antagonist isn't clearly marked on a map, nor is an escape tunnel's location marked or clearly described, which makes it a little hard to imagine where these most logically go. One of them (page 22) fixes a potentially major plot hole (of the: just go around type) and this should have been pointed out. Grognards might point out that its the DM's job to fill in these gaps, but you expect a little more when the module has a backstory. The major side quests do fit the main plot line, but you wouldn't know it cause they're just labeled as side quests. Then there's a few elements which tie together marvelously but it isn't spelled out as clearly as possible (I'm thinking the enemy on page 15 hilariously fits with one piece of information you learn from an NPC on page 11, towards the top of page 19 is a nifty assist on getting out, etc.).

There are a few typos but only one I noticed was confusing  (a reference to a trio and a duo in the same box on page 29). The maps give a vague impression of what's where, but their scale doesn't quite mesh with some text in the adventure. This is apparent from a few other slight railroady elements (it takes X amount of time to get to a location on page 29 regardless of how the PCs do it?) but if you play it a little loose that isn't the worst.

Not a criticism specific to this module, but the stat blocks in older editions can be maddening: for the hirelings things like strength and dexterity bonuses aren't noted, nor is weapon damage. For antagonists, special attacks aren't spelled out. If you're new to running older adventures, throw some post-its in those pages of the Monstrous Manual.

There is a lot of magic treasure to be found, some of it generic. I have no idea how a single-classed warrior PC is supposed to really find and identify mode of it (ok, there is a bard hireling but identify spells are also expensive, not to mention detecting magic in the first place.). Much of the non-magic treasure is pleasantly unique, or at least described.

Overall, I was impressed with this module. It has a few really good encounters and ideas, some of them gonzo enough for the grognard crowd, but they'll think the magic-ren-fair level is too high. My player did every reasonable side-quest, and it took us about 16 hours of play. If you're prepping the module, you'll want enough time to make a list of all the possible hirelings and their combat stats for reference during play, consider making a quick flowchart of how the side quests and main path fit together, and look up the antagonists in the Monstrous Manual as needed (particularly special attacks, weaknesses, and powers).

One-on-One D&D: I did it.

So. After waking up the other day with a yearning for some D&D and a willing friend, I made the one-on-one D&D happen. I'm going to save the review-type comments on Fighter's Challenge for a latter post (or repeat the ones I make here), but I do want to reflect on how it went: both running AD&D 2nd edition, one-on-one, and the specific module. So here's my list of things that I just thought about while reflecting on the game I ran. Its a spew reflection, not a well-thought Colonel Gentleman list.

First, I did something I'm not usually that comfortable with, because the module kinda demanded it. I did the voices. And doing this almost always pulls me away from the more grimdark mood that I tend to yearn for. But I think it worked. Light-hearted D&D is usually how things turn out anyway, since I used to play with someone known for naming his characters after brand-names of condoms or boner drugs. There were too many NPCs in the module for my taste and many stuck around, but I think it worked well overall and probably enhanced the game. But I decided right away that I'd do voices and try to make the NPCs distinct, so I think it worked. The module was light-hearted itself, so matching my tone with the module and the player definitely helped.

Second, one-on-one D&D is tiring. I definitely took the opportunity to refresh my drink a few times just so I could get a little break. When I ran a 4e Dark Sun game, I had enough time during the player turns to look through my massive pile of printed out monsters and traps to adjust the current and upcoming encounters on the fly, but one-on-one you don't have any of that group discussion time or PC turn downtime. You're everything the one player interacts with the whole time. Plan for some breaks. I even let us go off on a few tangents during the game about D&D rules or work and such. I suppose playing three nights in a row (about 16 hours!) didn't help me feeling a little exhausted. I know I star-wiped or montaged through a couple scenes the last night.

On Simpler Games

Sometimes, I've wondered what kind of person really prefers a simpler game with few character options? I think I've met two of those people in the past two days. One is my friend S. This is the third AD&D character I've seen him make. Since it was for a one-on-one game, I figured there'd be no problem bringing out all the crazy supposedly overpowered Skills & Powers nonsense. He chose a by-the-book Gnome Fighter/Illusionist. I even have the Wizard's Spell Compendium with me (4 volulmes) and he just took spells from the Player's Handbook. I suppose they were familiar options, and enough options for him.

Crazy thing is, the second person who might prefer a simpler game with fewer character options is me.

Module Formatting: Can we have a Y2K update please?

On a lark, I've purchased HHQ1 Fighter's Challenge. This is a one-on-one adventure that I convinced my friend S. to play. Well, I asked him which of the four classes he'd be more interested in, and selected the module based on his "Fighter. Maybe wizard." response.

I should give the module a proper review here once I'm done with it, but it is actually much better than I expected. But what gets me a bit is the format of things, and these formats haven't changed all that much since the dawn of time (ok, 4e stuff did change the formats a bit). I've been looking at a lot of different modules in the past year, a few older than I am, a few from my time with AD&D 2nd Edition, and a few more recent. But they all seem to have similar problems which technology could help with.

My first complaint (because we love complaining) is the maps. Maps are always made for the DM, but it'd be great to be able to share them with the PCs (or PC, in this case). First, there's almost always just one version of the map, which is complete with things like "--> to wererat's lair" or the like. You really don't want to risk showing a map with secret doors or whatnot to the PCs. My friend S used to blow the maps up for his 4e games so you could actually put minis on them. He said there was the expected loss of resolution, but some maps if he couldn't easily photoshop some words or secret door symbols... he just had to wing it and presumably draw the map instead or otherwise claim there wasn't a good map for the encounter.

Alignment in 5th Edition: Throwing out the 4e baby with the bathwater?

Now that we have the Basic D&D rules online, I see they have the familiar old alignment system, though alignment doesn't seem to have any mechanical effects. I think this is a little mistake, though I'm going to call it a missed opportunity rather than a tragedy.

See, the 4e notion of unaligned is missing, replaced with boring neutrality. There's no real benefit to being aligned with any cosmic force, and now effects like protection from evil will only really affect undead and demons.

So what might have been the better solution? Keep unaligned and make aligned creatures rarer.

Solo and Lone Hero D&D Adventures? A party of one...

I woke up this morning wondering if there were many solo D&D adventures. I'm talking about one-on-one or head-to-head style one player and the DM type adventures. Turns out there were, though finding them wasn't the easiest. There are also apparently a number of solo-as-in-D&D-solitaire adventures: I suspect the first 7-ish on the list are really D&D solitaire, and the others are head-to-head, one-on-one, or lone-hero ones. But here's the list I've found:

Actual solo/solitaire D&D modules:

• Ghost of Lion Castle (BSOLO)
• Mystery of the Snow Pearls (CM5, red viewer)*
• Blizzard Pass (MSOL1, invisible ink)*
• Maze of the Riddling Minotaur (MSOL2, Invisible Ink)*
• Midnight on Dagger Alley (MV1, red viewer)*
• Lathan's Gold (XSOLO)
• Thunderdelve Mountain (XS2)

One player + DM modules:

• The Gem and the Staff (O1, Thief 8)
• Blade of Vengeance (O2, Elf 7)
• Eye of the Serpent (UK5, Ranger/Druid/Monk + 3NPCs)
• Fighter's Challenge (HHQ1)
• Wizard's Challenge (HHQ2)
• Thief's Challenge (HHQ3)
• Cleric's Challenge (HHQ4)
• Fighter's Challenge II (HHQ5)
• Wizard's Challenge II (HHQ6)
• Thief's Challenge II: Beacon Point (HHQ7)
• Cleric's Challenge II (HHQ8)

The ones marked with an asterisk look like bad options: they use either a gimmicky red plasic "magic viewer" or an invisible-ink revealing marker, and also aren't on dndclassics.com. Not all the others are on D&D Classics either: the modules in italics do seem to be available in pdf format though. So not all of these are really out there as options, but maybe the BSOLO and XSOLOs will show up eventually, though I suspect these are really solitaire adventures (Cover images are easy to find online, but not the back cover or first page where you'd find this info). The gimmicky ones might be harder to track down and/or missing the vital gimmicky component on the second hand market. Obvious potential problems if things are already revealed or marked up or just plain inaccessible.

Some of these predictably use a pre-generated character (not uncommon for older D&D modules, especially coming from tournament play), or a small set of classes (e.g. Wizard's Challenge, etc.). 

Given the HHQ series in AD&D 2nd Edition, there's actually a reasonable looking array of these adventures on paper. Unfortunately, the reviews of these things are sparse and nonexistent, and most people who are even proficient reviewers for old school modules might not have much experience with solo adventures.

As far as I can tell this is a comprehensive list of published TSR adventures. Since the wikipedia List of Dungeons and Dragons Modules doesn't go past the year 2000, there may be 3rd or 4th edition stuff. I know there was one truly solo 4e adventure in the D&D Insider nonsense: as in one player without a DM. The 4e Red Box apparently had a couple "solo" adventures which seem to be to get the DM to learn the rules, and there's a Dragon magazine followup solo adventure to those ones. But there could be some later edition stuff or Dungeon adventures that I missed.

Expeditious Retreat Press published a number of 3.5/Pathfinder one-on-one adventures. It looks like the compendium updated the 3.5 adventures to Pathfinder, and they seem like the next reasonable place to look for one-PC D&D.

Also, there may be some modules/adventures like Beyond the Crystal Cave which have very little emphasis on combat: this type of module could essentially be a solo module too, but I'd have to look into it in detail.

[Update: a bit more info in part 2. Also check out the comments below.]

Revisiting D&D Schools of Magic

As I've been thinking that a D&D style game is hindered by overly generic classes (the exception being a game with only a small number of classes: maybe 3-5), and doing away with the generic Wizard or Magic-User might open up a few more doors. Replacing the generic class with the specialty versions prevents one class from stealing the thunder of its subclasses, and allows multiple of those types of characters to coexist a little better in play, I think. The natural D&D thing to replace the standard Wizard with is thematic specialist Wizards. But a few seem a bit off.

One issue, in Second and Third edition, the schools are somewhat poorly defined. Transmutation is a heinously powerful school, and Abjuration is horribly ignored. There's no contesting that an Abjurer has a terrible selection of generally useless spells (they don't even get all the defensive ones!) and Transmutation has a strange abundance where things like Burning Hands could just as well be evocation. Conjuration, too, in 3rd edition gets a strange set of ranged touch attack spells which could easily fit into evocation. This didn't matter so much in first edition where schools were largely story-based (until Dragonlance Adventures came along and divvied them up between the different orders of High Sorcery).

Another issue is reversible spells: spells that summon things are clearly conjuration/summoning, but spells to dismiss them are abjuration. Two sides of the same coin should be maybe combined into one school, no? I suppose this is just another instance of schools being poorly defined.

Yet another issue is schools are only slightly relevant. Pathfinder almost neuters the idea of an opposition school for specialists by just forcing the wizard to learn the spell as one level higher. The Illusionist can still cast Animate Dead, it just is harder. So the specialty goes from a meaningful choice to a thematic choice. Any wizard can basically cast any spell. First edition Illusionists simply cast a slightly different set of spells that normal Magic-Users had, and while not exactly weaker, they were overshadowed by the generalist Magic-User.

So what would the fix look like for a game with a healthy set of classes but without a generic ones? I think you could still use a generic Wizard (who's intelligence and prolonged study grants magical mastery) but require a specialty: no generalists allowed. Second, give a smaller set of coherent specialists. For example, a Binder or Conjurer would focus on various protection-from-X spells, wards, summon monster spells, and a few others like maybe Charm Person and Hold Person. A thematic and coherent set. An Enchanter or Beguiler might focus on charms, illusions, and people-based transmutations (think Bulls Strength or Polymorph Other).  A Necromancer would have their traditional suite of spells (death spells, animating and controlling and destroying undead, fear and some curses). An Elementalist could take the role of the war wizard and evoker throwing around fireballs and lightning bolts. An artificer or alchemist would enchant items, change and create physical items, and other genuine transmutation spells.

This set-up just did away with the abjurer (mostly by giving his spells to the conjurer) and the illusionist (by folding him into the Enchanter). I'd also throw tighten up some of the definitions and probably allow some subschools to be shared (people-based transmutations could belong to an Enchanter or an Alchemist, Fear or Curses could be had by an Enchanter or Necromancer, etc.). By properly subsetting schools into more thematic lists, a given wizard could slowly grow in mastery of his own specialty and possibly sacrificing a little depth for the breadth of choosing spells from outside his specialty list. I think it'll work as long as each class has 3-4 clearly thematic subschools.

So what would this look like? Assume you chose Enchanter: