As above Before TOA TOH prob would be my choice but now with TOA out,I'm not sure. Pls give you opions as to which of the modules you would pick. How mcuh mileage (session hours) is also a consideration, as is coolness.
This is a rough one for me to have voted on (though I did manage it hours before this post), and rougher still to comment on. But since comments are asked for, comments shall be given.
Hidden Shrine of Tamoachan: I've never run it, and don't think I ever will. I've used other adventures that originated as tournaments for conventions, and what makes them "good" for use as tournament material makes them a pain in my but as a DM. Every assumption they make is very fragile when it comes to bending them to fit into an ongoing campaign, and that puts me in the position of wondering "Why didn't I just write my own adventure to start with?" as I re-write, expand, alter, and omit various bits of the adventure to make it actually work for me.
White Plume Mountain: This is the one that got my vote, and that's primarily because I've never run or played it, not yet read it, and am not familiar enough with the author to know whether or not I like their style.
Against the Giants: I've run it, and I liked the idea of it. However, the execution leaves much to be desired for me... as do most of the rest of the adventures I've read that Gary Gygax wrote (Dungeonland and The Land Beyond the Magic Mirror being the prime examples of the exception to this rule). It took about 3 sessions of play for the party to cautiously clear the steading of the hill giants, going room-to-room as sneakily as they could, killing everything and looting like their lives were for nothing else. I think the only conversation that actually occurred in-character during that whole process basically boiled down to "Left, or right?" and was answered with "Let's stick with left every time, until we've gone everywhere."
Then, when the players moved on to the glacial rift, they had no more desire for the room-by-room slaughter-&-steal style of play... so I basically had no reason to even look at the adventure module itself. Moving forward to the hall of the fire giant king, the players felt emboldened by the ease with which they had made a suitable working relationship with the frost giants that they simply approached the hall openly, knocked upon the door, and asked politely for an audience with the king. Which, because of inserting these adventures into an ongoing campaign, resulted in a brief conversation with the king about how his supposed allies were actually manipulating him and his subjects to do their dirty work... so the party helped the fire giants kill off the drow that were visiting them, and proceeded on about their journey (that their goal was not "kill all the giants and loot everything in sight" so they didn't view anything as a missed opportunity or failure). Which meant again, that I really didn't even need to have the adventure module in the first place.
Tomb of Horrors: The entire point of this style of module is lost on me. If the DM wants characters dead, there is nothing the players can do to keep them alive, so the whole process of dreaming up a "killer" dungeon just sounds like the DM needs to find players they like spending time with better than the current ones, because I don't understand what motivation for "I, the DM, who can literally do anything I want within the game, shall deliberately and repeatedly slaughter all player characters who dare even attempt to enter this dungeon or find any success within it." could have besides trying to get the players to quit.
I mean, I get the idea of playing on "hard mode," and I even find it fun to do so (as long as the players have knowingly chosen a harder difficulty). But Tomb of Horrors, as written, goes beyond "hard" and into "if the players aren't literally cheating by knowing what is in the adventure, they are going to die unless the DM fudges in their favor." territory.
Of course, that's talking about the original version of the module... I haven't read the 5th edition version to see if it has sufficiently altered the design in the process of conversion to no longer be that way, but I also don't have any motivation to care if it is different because there are so many other adventures I could use which don't have any such baggage to them for me.
As above Before TOA TOH prob would be my choice but now with TOA out,I'm not sure. Pls give you opions as to which of the modules you would pick. How mcuh mileage (session hours) is also a consideration, as is coolness.
I voted for Against the Giants. I prefer the tomb in TOA than TOH. I feel like I am getting my jungle feels in TOA as well. I nearly voted WPM though.
This is a rough one for me to have voted on (though I did manage it hours before this post), and rougher still to comment on. But since comments are asked for, comments shall be given.
Hidden Shrine of Tamoachan: I've never run it, and don't think I ever will. I've used other adventures that originated as tournaments for conventions, and what makes them "good" for use as tournament material makes them a pain in my but as a DM. Every assumption they make is very fragile when it comes to bending them to fit into an ongoing campaign, and that puts me in the position of wondering "Why didn't I just write my own adventure to start with?" as I re-write, expand, alter, and omit various bits of the adventure to make it actually work for me.
White Plume Mountain: This is the one that got my vote, and that's primarily because I've never run or played it, not yet read it, and am not familiar enough with the author to know whether or not I like their style.
Against the Giants: I've run it, and I liked the idea of it. However, the execution leaves much to be desired for me... as do most of the rest of the adventures I've read that Gary Gygax wrote (Dungeonland and The Land Beyond the Magic Mirror being the prime examples of the exception to this rule). It took about 3 sessions of play for the party to cautiously clear the steading of the hill giants, going room-to-room as sneakily as they could, killing everything and looting like their lives were for nothing else. I think the only conversation that actually occurred in-character during that whole process basically boiled down to "Left, or right?" and was answered with "Let's stick with left every time, until we've gone everywhere."
Then, when the players moved on to the glacial rift, they had no more desire for the room-by-room slaughter-&-steal style of play... so I basically had no reason to even look at the adventure module itself. Moving forward to the hall of the fire giant king, the players felt emboldened by the ease with which they had made a suitable working relationship with the frost giants that they simply approached the hall openly, knocked upon the door, and asked politely for an audience with the king. Which, because of inserting these adventures into an ongoing campaign, resulted in a brief conversation with the king about how his supposed allies were actually manipulating him and his subjects to do their dirty work... so the party helped the fire giants kill off the drow that were visiting them, and proceeded on about their journey (that their goal was not "kill all the giants and loot everything in sight" so they didn't view anything as a missed opportunity or failure). Which meant again, that I really didn't even need to have the adventure module in the first place.
Tomb of Horrors: The entire point of this style of module is lost on me. If the DM wants characters dead, there is nothing the players can do to keep them alive, so the whole process of dreaming up a "killer" dungeon just sounds like the DM needs to find players they like spending time with better than the current ones, because I don't understand what motivation for "I, the DM, who can literally do anything I want within the game, shall deliberately and repeatedly slaughter all player characters who dare even attempt to enter this dungeon or find any success within it." could have besides trying to get the players to quit.
I mean, I get the idea of playing on "hard mode," and I even find it fun to do so (as long as the players have knowingly chosen a harder difficulty). But Tomb of Horrors, as written, goes beyond "hard" and into "if the players aren't literally cheating by knowing what is in the adventure, they are going to die unless the DM fudges in their favor." territory.
Of course, that's talking about the original version of the module... I haven't read the 5th edition version to see if it has sufficiently altered the design in the process of conversion to no longer be that way, but I also don't have any motivation to care if it is different because there are so many other adventures I could use which don't have any such baggage to them for me.