Hi guys,

I just had a nice in-between session of the aforementioned adventure with the RC as rules base.
On a road-trip, I started GMing it, and while waiting for "our girls" this evening, we continued.

Some impressions:

Making characters is fast and hard. Ten minutes, everyone was statted, ten more minutes everyone was equiped and "spelled". the highest hitpoint account was 3.

In the car, we played w/o battlemat, which worked okay.
Today we played with Battlemat, and it actually sped things up, as I was mainly using it for drawing the dungeon as it was discovered at a much smaller scale.

The players, who are relative newbies to RPGs and only have played them on the Computer or with me as DM for a 3.5 campaign, where immedeately at their heels, as they weren't used to be so wimpy (the first level RC cleric doesn't even have spells). They started thinking outside of their character sheet:

using oil, mirrors, ten foot poles,
being slow and careful,
making  A-Team like  constructions to gain an edge,
hired mercenaries,
retreated and reformed their plans

Which I really liked.

The combats were very intense, as every hit could fell a character. They tried to sneak around and ambush small groups, trick them, lure them into  a trap etc. to fight them on their terms.

Ranged Combat was extremely effective, as we played it by the RAW: Move or Attack.

They loved the "try out the magic loot" dare game inherent to sipping at potions or trying out rings.

The thief player really grew accustomed to his character, even though we only had played 3 hours total. When he was stabbed by a goblin for his last two (he got lucky the first time, only 1 HP lost) HPs, we quickly opted for the optional rule, where you can be below zero, if you save vs death. "down and dying" so to say.

That's also the only complaint that I had: I am okay with characters being wimpy, but one hit and you are dead no matter what? That is too much for me, but the optional rule is really a great fix. And it's still deadly. But now this save vs. death is already viewed as being "softer" on the players, although in 50% of the cases the respective PC will be just as dead.

And by this, we can have all those amazing "stabilize him!", "get the wounded and flee!" moments.

Combat felt also very different because of my harsh implementation of the morale rules. Quickly the player hired mercs were running, as oftentimes the goblins would be.

All in all it all felt much more down to earth, gritty and deadly than my Age-of-Worms-"Fantasy-Superhero"-Extravaganza, wherein I am a player.

First Level RC definitely is a thinking man's game.

Great report

I'm thinking of doing Keep next, if we manage to finish Silver Princess this weekend. I also started writing up my own dungeon. I'm fairly certain they'll hit 2nd level soon, anyhow. At least the non-elves.

I noticed a couple of basic D&D adventures for free at Dragonsfoot too.

Great post.

You're spot on about the low hitpoints.  They're the greatest source of drama in low-level D&D.  I can still remember the games I played when I was a kid; my cleric had lower hitpoints than the party magic-user and was still expected to hang with the fighters.

I can only imagine how those memories would contrast with higher level adventures, when the PCs have armies and artifacts to fall back on.

I also noted that with the "move OR fight" rule, you have a lot of the tactical imlications of AOOs w/o any of the hassle.
Add to that the "5 foot" rule for archers, and you havethe general principles of  "zones of control", which AoOs also symbolize.

Ah, sweet nostalgia...

Keep on the Borderlands was my very first roleplaying experience. Myself and a friend bought the basic d&d set and this was thrown in with it.

I GMed it and my friend was the sole player. 'Cos it was deadly, that one player rolled up 8 characters! and being of a tender age, we were a bit silly with them. He rolled up 7 dwarves and a female Wizard called Snow White. (At least the dwarves weren't called Doc, Dozy etc).

I remember four Saturdays spent going through that baby and the monstrous battles had on the way.

By the end, only one of the characters came out alive. The mighty Dwarven warrior Groin! Happy days...

I'm totally dropping the "Keep" into my budding Iron Gauntlets campaign, as soon as I, uh, find my copy of the module.

"Forward...to the Caves of Chaos!"

Are you using the pdf version or a hard copy?  I have a few spare bucks and might download the pdf if it's a decent copy of the original.

I have both. But Hardcopy is way more practical.
The scanned version you get from Paizo suffers from bad text recognition: it's perfectly readable, but copy and paste will make you cringe.

I have priced B2's on eBay for a while, but the price ought not to be too high as it was probably the module with the single largest total print run in the 80's, possibly ever.

Ooops. Ma remarks wher directed at the RC. For Keep, I only own the pdf, and it`s okay. Those old adventures really work very good printed out. It`s just text anyway, and you use it and throw it away afterwards.

This way, you can just scribble into the room and monster descriptions.

Quote from: jrientsI have priced B2's on eBay for a while, but the price ought not to be too high as it was probably the module with the single largest total print run in the 80's, possibly ever.

I got a copy in my Basic Core Rules box waaaaay back, thought I lost it, found an unopened copy on eBay still in the shrink wrap for 10 bucks. Then two weeks later found my box set with all my old dungeon notes (from waaaaaaaaay back) and the module buried deep in a plastic tub in my garage. So now I have two.

It continues to deliver as being one of the funnest modules to run or play in, ever.

Quote from: One Horse Town;30692He rolled up 7 dwarves and a female Wizard called Snow White. (At least the dwarves weren't called Doc, Dozy etc).
The mighty Dwarven warrior Groin! Happy days...

I had 7 dwarves and a human female show up in my game, too. They weren't snow white & co, but its too obvious not to do at least once.
Adrian brought in his barbarian "GONAD! Son of Testiclese!!"
What does RC stand for?

Ace has brought me an all-new gaming group when our last one collapsed. I decided to start them all off at 1st level and try them at the Keep on the Borderlands. December is a bad month to start a game, with the holidays interfering. So far we've made it thru char-gen and introductions, but haven't even made it to the same map as Keep on the Borderlands yet.

When I created my game world, the plan was simple: Start with a blank map and then just plug in the modules, so when players walked off the map of one, they'd walk onto another. My central city has the Keep on one side, and the Termlane Forest (Dragon #57) on the other side.

"The Keep on the Borderlands is...here."
"The 'Borderlands' are in the middle of the Empire?"
"They've had that name for a long time..."