New D&D Game - The Temple of Elemental Evil

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Yeah I might get it when it comes out.

 

Greyhawk is a city on the world of Oerth, in a region called the Flanaess (named such becuase the original human inhabitants were the Flan peoples). It was the main setting for 1e modules until the TSR putsch that forced Gary Gygax out of power. While still a D&D world, it is generally less 'fantastical' than the Realms and far more concern was given to 'realism' issues.

The original Temple of Elemental Evil module existed in 4 parts and was designed to take characters from 1st to potentially 8th level. Its essentially the story of a rivalry between various demons and the rise, fall, and rebirth of a new religious sect.

It was later published in a single volume set and linked with the Slave Lords series and the Giants/Drow series into one very long campaign.

There is also one of those "Return to" rehashes put out for 3e, which I haven't read.

The basic module was very hard to do in a hack and slash mode, as the opposition was substantially more powerful than the players were likely to be. So it was very important to utilize friendly NPCs and to play the various bad guy factions off against each other. I have rather substantial doubts about the ability of a CRPG to do that sort of thing well, but its possible I suppose.

Anyway, its one of the classic oldies (my consolidated edition was copyrighted in 1985) and is pretty good. The GDQ series was much better though.

 

Stop it man.
You had me at the word 'realism'

 

What? Its still a fantasy world, but it tried to maintain a fairly 'realistic' tone. Somebody with a vague clue about how medieval/rennaissance europe worked was involved in the design. Its not down at the 'Harn' level, but you could actually imagine the world working that way.

You don't have massive international conspiracies run by private individuals, enormous cities aren't plopped down in the middle of nowhere, no one uses catoblepases as livestock, and you don't have a bunch of jumped up mortals claiming to be gods. Humans have different ethnicities and languages, really high level characters are far less commonplace, etc.

Whether you like that sort of thing is a matter of taste, obviously.

Btw, someone earlier asked about the gods of greyhawk. They are the ones discussed in the 3e PHB and there is a greyhawk equivalent of the FRCS (though I haven't looked at it to see how much they changed since 1e days).

 

I'm extremely excited..i've been hoping for a game based on "slave lords" for quite some time, so I'll take it as a consolation prize... Only thing better would be a "Dragonlance" game!(Where is it already??)

 

I found this link on gamespot's headlines page:
http://gamespot.com/gamespot/stories/previews/0,10869,2902161,00.html
It's a Q and A with the game's designer quite informative actually. I feel a bit better about the game so now I'll at least consider snagging it if it can live up to what the designer is saying it will consist of. Check out the link and post your thoughts.

 

The info in the Q&A really made me want to play the game until I saw this;

Nooooooooooooooooooooooooo!!!!
NoNoNo....please...dont't do it
I hate turn based combat - unless it's the type found in games like Civ or Warlords.
I suppose IWD/BG are really sort of turn based but you don't really notice it (maybe this is what he means - fingers crossed). Turn based gameplay is what stopped me from playing the otherwise very cool-looking Fallout series.

 

I hate to tell you Daniel but the lead designer at Troika worked on fallout. It will be turn based (thank god). DnD 3rd edition doesn't cross over well to pseudo turn based (which is what the infinity engine games were) and thats part of the reason they went turn based.

 

Don't be worried about the turn based thing IMO, D&D 3rd ed basically lends itself to turn based combat and it shouldn't spoil the game in anyway. I think it is the best way to do the game with the player controlling a party. In NWN you controlled one PC and it worked ok with real time combat, but the rules really require a turn based combat system like they had in PoR. As long as it's implemented weel that is .

 

Turn-based combat is making me look forward to it even more, as is the concept of multiple starting locations. Beyond the coolness of the concept itself, the multiple starting points gives me hope for another reason: it is good for nothing except roleplaying. The fact they are adding little things for no reason except to add to the immersiveness and ability to roleplay gives me high hopes for this game.

 

Too bad, I really like the way they did it in the IE games. This probably means I won't play it.

[ December 24, 2002, 17:41: Message edited by: Daniel ]

 

I guess i should start at the begining. First D&D 3rd edititon isn't really D&D, it's Ad&d. So into the murky past we go.... i started gaming in 1979 with D&D. It was open ended, no limits, fireball does d6 per level period, if your 30th level it does 30d6 (meaning that your ability to channel mystical forces has increased 30 times from first level) it was set in the world now found in the gazetters and maztica (sp?) called and put into the mystra boxed set. Well, while many loved these rules, gary is a hard core table top player(meaning minatures) and felt that there weren't enough restrictions in the game, too many open ended rules. He wanted two things, the first to codeify a set of rules that were the same no matter where you played, your house, your friends a gen con where ever it was the rules should be the same and second to bring the game more in line with fantasy novels like Lord of the Rings. Keep in mind, Gary was half of the team that came up with the D&D rules, he created chainmail on his own but D&D was done with another person. So AD&D was born and the world of Oearth and the central city of greyhawk and it's fight for freedom against the demon Iuz. He, in my opinion crippled most of the rules so that 20th level players were an anomily not a common occurance. Then he standardized the rules. That's what the Hardback books were about. About 10 years later, and many complaints, he did a revision ta da AD&D 2nd edition, more crippling and standardization rules. Keep in mind the original D&D game was still being supported by others. The greatest and last big rule supplement allowed your PC's to become immortals. Very fun. Anyway all through this TSR and Gary were arguing about the direction that AD&D should go. Keep in mind, Gary used to do articles like, Halberds and there effects in combat. He would compare all polearms (historically i might add) and convert it over to AD&D, so AD&D is really a more historical product than D&D. When TSR sold the biz to Wizards, Wizards decided to either a) confuse the hell out of everyone and just call the product D&D to get sales (my vote) or b) tried to consolidate all the products under one banner (bs if you consider the way the original D&D game unbalances the AD&D game). That's a fairly abriged version of the history of D&D. I prefer Mystra but i've played in grayhawk. I even had a D.M. who reenacted the War of Iuz. if anyone remembers the artifacts in the AD&D game, they came from grayhawk. Vecna and cuthbert were all from this world.

As to the game itself. I guess i'll have to see. I don't like fallout because it is a turn based game, it makes things bulky. I did however like NWN but that's personal taste, and like anything involving person taste it doesn't apply to anyone but me. So at this point i'm in "let's wait and see" mode.

Hope this helps.

 

Does the stupid Dungeons and Dragons Movie take place in Greyhawk?

 

Ah, a classic revived. I wish they'd do first edition rules, especially for ability and class stats, and of course magic spell damage (e.g., limiting of magic missile to 5d4 sucks). Might be cool if they brought back material spell components, too, to complicate the use of mages. Kind of annoying to bring back a great first edition work but bastardize it with second or third edition rules. Oh, well, third edition is what's on the shelves these days, so I guess they have to play to it.

 

I hope they have some dungeons like Durlag´s Tower and Spellbound, I just love those riddles

 

I am really looking forward to this game.

Is there any website that you could point me to, to give some idea about the greyhawk world?

 

Thanks very much.

Im saving up for the novel now