I liked the Adventure overall. I loved the adventure background and the adventures in the surrouding territory. The upper Caverns were good as well, the Greater Caverns and the Hollow of the Horn just felt bland to me. Tsojcanth's stat block didn't look quite right as I read through it. I didn't see anything wrong with it but it just didn't seem that skills and feats complemented the build up of him, as a 'Prince of Deception' he read more like a standard puffed up demon rather then a demon lord who'd been around forever and a day.
Despite these lapses I felt it was a good adventure if only to have a 3.5 version of an old classic I played 'back in the day.'
It was alright, but nothing special. I'll admit that even 'back in the day', I was never that fond of the "dungeon stocked with an unrelated pile of monsters" of this sort.. Lost Caverns, to me, was awesome because of the story that went with it more than the "adventure" itself.
I think they did a decent job of updating the 'adventure' here, but as I said, that was never what made Lost Caverns classic in my mind. They do have some of the typical crap that pisses me off about 3.5 era dungeons. For instance, making Drelnza a samurai with magical katana and wakizashi. I guess because its cool? I guess fighter with nifty feats and a bastard sword just doesn't cut it these days. I suppose I should be happy she's not a Samurai/Dervish/Weaponmaster/whatever multiclass that seems a common approach to modern villain design...
Anyway, I think they got that part of the work done respectably. The backstory, though, I found quite disappointing. Tsojcanth had to be a fraud and yet another cambion? Yawn. I'd've much rather done something much more interesting. I also didn't care for the idea that Iggwilv is a spent force, which seems wasteful of a truly great villainess. Not that I wanted to have her encountered in this adventure, but she didn't need to be used up in the backstory. The rest was just more of what we already had in the original, useful for those who didn't have Lost Caverns already.
Like Vormaerin, I do not think the original Lost Caverns of Tsojcanth is one of the great adventures because of its design. I will qualify that statement by reminding people that is was a tournament adventure. And, the need for convention goers to slay monsters to earn points trumped the need to think of reasons for the monsters to be there. Anyway, I think it is great because of its contribution of lore and monsters to the setting and the game.
I look at Iggwilv's Legacy from two perspectives. My general opinion is that I like it a lot as an old-fashioned dungeon tromp comparable to Goodman Games's Dungeon Crawl Classics series. It is great to throw down on the table and game with people who don't care who Iggwilv or Tsojcanth is. It is perfect for people with little or no Greyhawk knowledge who just wanna fight, cast their spells, grab treasure and move along. I like the updated maps and the addition of the Hollow of the Horn.
The avid Greyhawker in me has mixed feelings about Iggwilv's Legacy. I think the depth of deception perpetrated by Tsojcanth and that is stretches as far back in time in this case is interesting. I like the notion that someone is not who or what you think. But, I regret that it was done with Tsojcanth. It would have been nice to retain a good guy in the Flanaess's history. I appreciate the "it was all founded on a lie" concept, I wish it was not done with Tsojcanth.
Personally I think it was a perfectly decent dungeon crawl, but considering it's place in the overall shape of GH-lore, I think it should have been better.
From the first chapter, I thought this was going to be an unrelenting horror adventure, but once we got inside, things got a bit more 'normal'. Which is the last place an area like this should be. This was where the greatest demologist Oerth has ever seen screwed with things that were better left unscrewed to such an extent that their evil has become contagious!
Which is why I didn't like the friendly Pechs one little bit. I may wind up replacing them with demon worshiping cannibal nymphs or something like that. And some of the encounters will be mutated into something a bit more distrubing than a bog standard monster attack.
The last chapter did redeam the adventure somewhat. Golems made of teeth and getting trapped in a series of tunnels with a Lovecraftian monster? Much better!
So, not a bad adventure. It's just that some parts were scandalously average.
I was overall disappointed by the updated S4. I thought the opening was spectacular, especially with its connection to Heroes of Horror.
I expected the remaining parts to be presented in that vein. This wouldn't have upset me. I own S4 so the idea of reimagining the formerly published parts to form a smoothly flowing story of, how did somebody earlier describe, oh yes, "unrelenting horror" wouldn't have bothered me all that much.
Still, I had hope that part four would bookend nicely with part one. That would have preserved cannon for the cannonfiles amongst us while giving a nice, new zip to the adventure. Alias I was not as impressed by the final chapter as I had hoped. Some of the stuff was cool, but I found the ending encounter drab as I was hoping for some true Lovecraftian stuff to go with the opening.
Still, it was free. And I guess one shouldn't knock free...
My thoughts are along the vein of items/issues already presented so I will summarize them:
> Having not played the original module I cannot draw any conclusions unfortunately on that aspect.
> I therefore found the content quite enlightening and liked the directions followed with the named personaes.
> I was extremely disappointed with the e-version altogether: content, style and presentation. I am giving it some leeway as a first attempt although to me the publishing company should not have presented such a thing even as a test run of things to come. Especially when it comes to proofreading the doc for spelling or grammatical errors, the way it was broken down in different uploads, the lack of true e-doc features like bookmarks, etc.
> It also seemed to me like the three sections were kinda obviously separated making the concept of three different writers too obvious. Granted, there were no errors or wrong quotes and references between sections and yet the whole feeling I had after a couple careful reads was of discontinuity.
> Like some posters above the first part was my favorite and it probably also had to do with the background and lore portions there.
> I have some slight worry about the balance of the overall module versus the PCs levels and power and their modification while running it, especially adding in the wealth of magic offered for the taking. I can see that I will need to do some work into ensuring its balanced when I run it.
> All in all I think it was a good effort by all three of the authors, verging close (but never attaining it) to becoming a new greyhawk classic for me and the groups I enjoy it with in the future. My negative comments above can be easily classed as nit picking and hence I gave it a 4
I was impressed that there was a sincere and, IMHO, quite well done attempt to bridge the feel of old school 1st Ed. Greyhawk D&D with the 3.5 familiar to younger and hopefully new players.
I actually consider the fleshing out of the background characters and story line an improvement, very much in the spirit of Gygax tying in the Homlett/TOEE and Giants/Drow reprints.
We follwers of canon sometimes forget that most of the 1E Greyhawk adventures were stand alone modules loosely set in a Greyhawk universe, often retconned after the fact with varying degrees of success.
I am a huge fan of the original (check http://www.canonfire.com/cf/modules.php?name=Reviews&rop=showcontent&id=83 for a full review) but I was a little skeptical when I first read Iggwilv's Legacy. I liked most of the expanded BG (a lot of which was compiled from other sources) but did not find the idea of Tsojcanth's true nature to be terribly original. Like another post mentioned, the first chapter is very enticing and sets a good tone and the wilderness encounters are really well done. Once inside the caverns it becomes a fairly straight forward conversion.
I recently DM'd a group through Iggwilv's Legacy and it turned out better than I thought. Initially I thought a lot of the encounters were a little on the wimpy side for an 11th level adventure, so I beefed some of them up. What I failed to realize is that this a lot longer dungeon compared to most 3.5 dungeons, so the XP still adds up and the challenges will take their toll after a while. It also allows the PCs to continue adventuring for longer periods without rest. Regardless, I was bummed to see one of my favorite encounters, the formorian giants, replaced with ettins so I re-inserted the formorians. What better monster to use in caverns that have been tainted by evil? They gave the party a much tougher time but they prevailed in the end. The party waltzed through the rest of the lesser caverns, so I toughened up Chossos with the corrupted template. This was a miscalculation on my part as I overestimated the party. None of them were able to make the DC27 save against his petrification breath and it was a TPK. Oops. A word of caution: there are a whopping 6 different encounters that can petrify some or all of the party, and at least someone always rolls low.
After that we played out the rest of the dungeon as is (with new characters). All in all it was still a blast to play, and Iggwilv's hoard is still the best treasure I've ever seen. Drelnza put up a good fight, making her a samurai was a nice touch. The only part that wasn't much fun was the new level in chapter 4, the Hollow of the Horn. It got a little interesting when the party made it to Tsojcanth, but they and I were pretty bored with the rest of it. Ultimately unsatisfying and unnecessary.
So its still a good dungeon crawl, and the new material is hit and miss.
I've just read through it and am still chewing on it.
There are a number of nitpicky details I found annoying or troublesome, but there's no need here to beat a dead horse on the delve format--seemingly half-implemented in this piece.
Things I liked:
--the idea of the abyssal rift and applying the taint mechanic
--Iggwilv's homonculous lives, implying that she does too . . .
--3rd edition stats for the Lanthorn of Daoud
--the idea of a level below Drelzna's tomb--without that, the Lost Caverns doesn't seem to be the sort of place one of the world's most powerful wizards would use as a primary lair
Things I didn't like:
--The implicit assumption that the 1st edition Tsojcanth adventure never happened and that Drelzna sleeps in the caverns still, awaiting the first adventuring party to penetrate them. Why just convert the old module instead of setting a new adventure in the same spot?
--The backstory is good, but there's not much hint of a plot. What might motivate the PCs to keep slogging through this bewildering maze of caverns, aside from the chimerical treasure of the Witch-Queen Iggwilv, which has likely been plundered in the 100-odd years since she was last seen here. I guess I've gotten spoiled with all the good 3e Greyhawk material in the pages of Dungeon, and am no longer satisfied by a crawl that has no objective other than killing monsters and taking their stuff. At the very least, Drelzna is a vampire-samurai, and shouldn't be a one-hit wonder whom they meet, slay, and plunder. Potentially, she's a great villainess for a campaign arc--with accomplices, she might be plotting to do something nasty in Krestible or Schwartzenbruin, then retreat to her main stronghold. At the least, she should have some influence on the communities on the flanks of Iggwilv's Horn.
--The new levels of the dungeon seemed to me strangely under-developed for the stronghold of an epic level villain. Yeah, maybe all the magic was drained off in Iggy's death-match with Grazzy, but if you're not going to have a bunch of nasty magical wards and stuff, at least put in a bit more evidence that Iggy lived here. Ruined remnants of a great arcane library? Decorations appropriate to the world's foremost demonologist? A few more forlorn and neutered bound fiends and elementals?
Anyhow, I guess my critiques are from the point of view of someone trying to work this adventure into a larger campaign--I've got some ideas of how to remedy things--but I suspect I'll be reworking a lot more of this one than I will of the other published material I'm using in the campaign.
It is ironic that I, a long-time Greyhawk enthusiast/player/DM (since the 80s) am now running an adventure through the original Lost Caverns module. I have access to the updated version, and like some of the material provided therein, but as a self-admitted anachronist who far prefers the earlier gaming system and not a fan of the newer rules and regs (I will save this rant for another post), I try to borrow and blend a mixture of both modules to suit my personal needs. Although I am not preferential to a traditional dungeon crawl of hack and slash, and try to have a decent 'rationale' for filling a cavern full of deadly apex creatures (powerful summoning magicks alone could explain the concentration), I think the original Lost Caverns deserves its rightful place in the Gygaxian era of modules.
Currently, in my own plotline, the PCs (sponsored by the Archclericy of Veluna) are delving into the Lost Caverns against a rival group loyal to Iuz. Both groups are intent on destroying the other while summarily wresting the treasures of Iggwilv for their own designs. It has become a fierce, and deadly, cat and mouse game, with the Caverns set as a lethal backdrop.
Nevertheless, I think this adventure has more to offer than not, with some 'fleshing out' and creativity on the part of the DM (I have done that with all Greyhawk modules, including the entire Slavers saga, which became one of the better run campaigns to date). I guess it boils down to your own gaming personal style and if you prefer the newer system, or the older, more traditional one.
Lanthorn, it's finally time to post a bit here. I've been silent, just in case my players slipped over here and read things. I didn't want to give anything away.
I've been running this adventure in my online game for about 9 months now, though we had about a 4 month break. Hey, online play is sssllloowww...........
First, I have to thank Lanthorn. I used his posted campaign journal as the basis for my game. It takes place a few months after his party left for the caverns, and all contact was lost. How they were supposed to keep in contact with their church leaders I didn't really discuss. Anyway, this party is tasked with finding out what happened to the party in Lanthorn's game, find any of Iggwilv's treasures themselves, and keep the Iuzians from getting it. Lanthorn sent me full bios on all his heroes and villains, which gave me all the material I needed to move along. I only wish he had posted more briefs, because A) they were awesome to read, and B) I had to make up what happened after he left off. Still, it was great to base my game on his, and I think it turned out great.
So, I play a 2nd ed game, but I used a lot from this. I certainly used the maps, which had a better look in Maptools. I used google earth maps of the alps for my mountains, finding a section that matched the wilderness map of the original. This worked great, and I was able to get a lot of good pictures as visual aids, especially of the mountains. I think the grandeur of them really came across well. Plus, there's no doubt but that it looked better than the old hex map with symbols. :)
I used some of the encounters from both, and added my own. I think they did a good job in keeping to the original feel. I ignored a lot, since I use 2nd ed anyway, and I added lots of my own encounters. The wilderness stuff ended up taking much longer than the dungeon crawl, but since I'm a huge fan of wilderness adventures....
At the Horn of Iggwilv, I felt the adventure fell a bit short. For one thing, it could have been much bigger. It didn't have to be Undermountain, but it should have been more than two sections of caverns and a small extra finale. I added about 6 levels of caves, including an initial "worked dungeon" level, which made sense as the true "upper level" of Iggwilv's lair.
In addition to not making it big enough, and I know it was a small Dungeon adventure, it also lacked a more modern approach. As others have mentioned, the days of hacking and slashing through a bunch of otherwise unrelated encounters should be over. I expect more, and frankly, players should too. I did a lot to try and link things together in a more functional way.
I also added a lot of witchy stuff and inter-planer elements. I think the witch aspect could have been played up more. I really don't care for the way post 2nd ed stuff is all fluffed up, but that's just me. Sometimes simple is better. Ex: you should have seen my party run from the gas spores!
I didn't like the history either. I didn't like the Tsojcanth stuff, but I kept some of it. We haven't finished yet, and I admit I'm not 100% sure which way I'll go with that. However, I made a major change with Drelnza.
Instead of her being the guardian of the treasure, she WAS the treasure. That may not be the biggest revelation, but it never exactly made sense. Why would she still be there? 100 years and she still just sleeps on an uncomfortable alabaster slab? I mean, at least go find a bed! So, I changed her quite a bit. I will post that next.....
To finish what I was saying, I did not like Tsojcanth just being another cambion. It just didn't work for me. Iuz has such a unique history; why basically just repeat that for Tsojcanth? So, I did it slightly differently. Tsojcanth was just an ancient sorcerer who found an abyssal nexus here, of sorts. Greyhawk's full of places like that, and so why not here? Unfortunately, he wasn't as strong as he thought. He tried to summon and bind Graz'zt but failed. Graz'zt returned to the Abyss with a piece of Tsojcanth's soul, but the rest of Tsojcanth was stuck in his own magic, trapped in the Abyssal nexus, blocking it semi-open and causing the taint.
Gotta add, I really liked the Taint rules!
When Iggwilv found him, she learned everything she needed to know from the trapped sorcerer. That's how she learned Graz'zt's true name, as Tsojcanth hoped she would free him. She did not, but rather summoned Graz'zt herself. She made a deal with Graz'zt, offering the demon prince the rest of Tsojcanth in exchange for his help. Grudgingly, he accepted.
In this way, the basics of the story were kept, but Tsojcanth remained just a human.
Enter Drelnza. She is Iggwilv's daughter but from an unknown father. I felt it better to keep that part hidden, and in fact I haven't decided and may not. She is younger than Iuz by a few years, but she was beloved of Iggwilv who always called her her "Treasure." This caused intense jealousy within the young cambion.
While he went off to the Howling Hills to begin his conquest of the kingdom that would bear his name, Drelnza became Iggwilv's general. She had studied with her mother, as had Iuz, but it soon became clear her talents did not lie there. She switched her studies to martial arts, and quickly became an accomplished warrior and leader. Perhaps this was the reason for Iggwilv's love for her daughter; she held no fear of her. In the end, it is possible that Drelnza was the only good thing Iggwilv ever created, and the only person she ever truly loved.
But this love came at a price. Drelnza's ever-scheming brother could not stand her and her cherished place by his mother's side. So, true to form he devised a most devious end. During his time in Iuz, he had befriended an Exiled Aerdy mage/vampire named Maskaleyne. Maskalyne saw great promise in the young cambion, and ultimately joined Iuz whom he hoped would rise to wreck his own vengeance upon the Great Kingdom. In exchange for helping Maskaleyne, Iuz asked one thing, destroy his dreaded sister. The plot was thus set in motion.
Maskaleyne met Drelnza during her return from a triumphant campaign against Perrenlander rebels. She did not realize that when she thought she was falling for the handsome Aerdy who claimed to be an exiled prince of royal blood, the vile vampire was subtly using his powers to charm Drelnza. Soon, he had her under his total thrall, and before returning to the Horn of Iggwilv, he turned her. He then sent her into the Heart of the Horn, to free Tsojcanth.
What Iuz intended is not known, but certainly his plan backfired. Tsojcanth killed Drelnza, and was subsequently destroyed by Iggwilv (a little different) but not before her own power was weakened to the point that Graz'zt broke free. Iuz himself was hurt and disfigured in the coming fight, and he fled. Though Iggwilv prevailed, she she found an even worse defeat, for her prized "treasure" had been turned into a vampire, evilly corrupted by her no-good demon-spawned son. This would lead to the next phase of Iggwilv's plan, and the reason for the caverns themselves.
Last edited by ragnar on Sat Apr 09, 2016 7:53 am; edited 6 times in total
Iggwilv was going to leave Oerth, but she could not leave her daughter to this fate. Remembering her time in Ket centuries earlier, she returned to Lopolla and stole Daoud's Wondrous Lanthorn from the Vault of Daoud. With this, she planned to attempt to heal her daughter! She contructed the sherical chamber in the center of the Greater Caverns with this goal in mind. She kept her daughter in a state of stasis by using a magical candle (remember, old witch NPC had candle magic!) which would burn for 100 years and keep Drelnza asleep as long as it burned. The Lanthorn she hung above her, fueled with standard fuel of crushed gems which would also burn for 100 years. When burning like this, the lanthorn emitted a spell called Healing Rays, a spell taken from the Great Net Prayerbook and created by Francáois Menneteau. I substituted this for the Cure Light Woudns it's supposed to do, because it seemed...cooler. :) This spell cause a beam of healing sunlight to caress the target, healing 1d6 points of damage. Although normally the sun must be shining, so the spell cannot be used at night, under a cloudy cover, or underground, the magic of the lanthorn was, well, special! Further, it bathed Drelnza in its power to Remove Disease and Neutralize Poison. In addition, Iggwilv added one more feature. In a cavity inside the alabaster slab upon which Drelnza lay, she placed a Prison of Zagyg, within which she had captured a Xag-ya. I switched to the Xag-ya, so that I could have a Positive Energy being. She placed this into the alabaster slab which would focus the Positive Planar Energy which leaked through the Prison through a small hole in the slab, and directly into Drelnza's heart. Thus, the stage was set. In 100 years, or so Iggwilv thought, the combination of Lanthorn and Positive engergy would cure her daughter of her incurable affliction.
From this point, everything in the caverns, the monsters, the trick doors which I had lead to much bigger extra-dimensional traps, etc., all were there to protect Drelnza while the magical effects continued. I hadn't made up my mind if it would work, though I was leaning towards a yes. However, the real issue would be what happens when/if the party discovered Drelnza. Could they put everything together and figure out what was going on? Should they kill her, or should they leave her? I liked the moral dilemna as well as the possible long-term implications of a possible cure of vampirism, albeit not a very practical one! This played out well, and I will save the results for my campaign journals, when I get to posting them.
I don't think I would have put all this together as such without the Dungeon adventure. In fact, when I started I didn't have it. I was planning just a simple dungeon crawl, an opportunity to just go back to the old module and have some old-school fun. With this adventure, it all came together. Though I ignored all the post 2nd ed monster stuff that I don't really like, generally using the original creatures. For example, I kept piercers in the ceiling of the water cavern rather than silly, half-stone golem darkmantles. I just don't understand why that kind of stuff had to change, but I guess I'm just a traditionalist. I also hate the Designated Hitter rule! Obviously, I also did not use Drelnza being a samurai with samurai weapons. I pretty much agree with others here echoing their negative sentiments about that. For me, Drelnza was a 3rd level mage/10th level warrior/vampire. I basically use Ravenloft rules for my undead, and especially for vampires, so she was much cooler. Of course, I don't let vampires level drain by touch either; they have to actually bite like all other vampires in every genre; I never understood why that was left out of D&D. Anyway, she was (and is) potentially a very tough opponent. The big question would be, could she be an ally? Could she indeed be cured? What is a good party to do?
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