{"id":10105,"date":"2025-12-06T07:11:00","date_gmt":"2025-12-06T12:11:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/tenfootpole.org\/ironspike\/?p=10105"},"modified":"2025-11-13T07:20:05","modified_gmt":"2025-11-13T12:20:05","slug":"into-the-hidden-halls","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/tenfootpole.org\/ironspike\/?p=10105","title":{"rendered":"Into the Hidden Halls"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\"\"<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
By Morgan Davie
Taleturn
Moldvay
Levels 1-3<\/pre>\n\n\n\n
Atop a lonely sheer-sided plateau stands a Keep, an outpost against the chaos that creeps in nearby caves. Few know that another fortress lies abandoned and hidden within the stony mount itself. Strange wonders and forgotten treasures lie within, waiting to be claimed by brave adventurers. Dare YOU enter the hidden halls?.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
This twenty page adventure features a four level dungeon with about eighty rooms that is entered through BELOW the Keep on the Borderlands. Coinage is abstracted and the writing is not evocative. There\u2019s an interesting concept or two, but otherwise this is cramped and bland. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Looks like the guildhall in the Keep on the Borderlands has a secret. Literally. They\u2019ve found a secret door in their basement. For 10% of the take they\u2019ll let you through it. Inside you find four levels of underground dungeon with about 20-25 rooms per level. Turns out this place used to be a fortress of chaos! <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Oh, hey, you\u2019re not finding treasure though. I mean, you\u2019re not finding treasure you can level with. You\u2019ll find a potion or scroll or something here or there. But, as for that sweet sweet lucre that drives all adventurers and the level titles they want, well: \u201c22. Secret store. Behind this secret door is a small treasure hoard: three potions of healing, two potions of invisibility, two sacks worth of silver coins, and two gems.\u201d Yeah. Two sacks worth of silver coins and two gems. No values. Not anywhere. It\u2019s all abstracted away like that. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
I find this super puzzling. This IS the core of Moldvay. Gold=XP. Maybe B\/X and 1e, both learn hard core to the GAME side of the spectrum. You ARE looking for gold so that you can level. It\u2019s you against the game world with the DM as judge. You win D&D every time you don\u2019t die and get some more progress towards your next level. It\u2019s a fucking GAME and the points are laid in Gold, literally. You can roleplay. You can have fun. You SHOULD do those things. But the gold’s the thing. That\u2019s a core reason I like B\/X, the more game-like and carefree nature of it. It might be similar to a 5e adventure that pays TOO much attention to coinage. Hey, that\u2019s not what you do in 5e. Gold is a plot device. If you need a lot of it then I would expect it, but, otherwise, what is core to B\/X becomes part of a victorian laundry list in 5e. It\u2019s just so jarring to see the main point being abstracted here. \u201cPut in some treasure.\u201d Uh. Ok. Isn\u2019t that the designers job? DOn\u2019t they have the chore of putting smaller treasures in and then locating the larger treasures in lairs? Don\u2019t they have the job of not putting the hoard in the first room? Of making the layout of the map make sense in relation to the contents of the map? Fuck it man. Who cares anymore, I guess.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Let us, however, ignore the rather small and simplistic maps. Forward! To adventure!<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\"\"<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
What you’re looking at is nearly a column of text describing room one in the dungeon. This is the basement room of the guildhall and the entrance to the hidden halls. And it’s got trap and door porn in it. This is nearly a column of text to handle two secret doors in a room with a basin. Which are also bland in description if not in effect. Shaking their fists, magical blade, that’s great. I’m not sure, though, that this is the sort of entrance to the mythic underworld I was looking for. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
\"\"<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
Never fear though, we follow that up with rooms three and four. Rotted. Fungus. Beetle-men. No, I don’t know what they look like. “Stats as fire beetles.” So, yeah. I’d like to point out at this point that B2 was not the end all be all of design. It’s been fifty years. I think we can do a little better. There is a huge place in D&D for “monster wants to eat you, better stab it.” And there’s no place in D&D for an overwrought encounter. But there is a place in the middle where everything works together, the encounter, hack or no, has enough in it for the DM to riff on, both in creature and environment. “Fungus and wrecked doors” does not a description make. Nor does “fire-beetle men”, presumably just standing there waiting to die and have their glands ripped out? Hmmm, come to think of it, I love the idea of giant throbbing diamond-forehead men.  Enough diamonds growing out of their foreheads to level. Sitting in a circle playing games and singing songs. “How the fuck did these dudes live even this long?!” As your DM I make no judgment upon you, PC’s, but simply delight in glee at the reaction to the situation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Ok, so, anyway. Here’s a trap: “The area in front of the false door is a drop-away floor (a dungeon trap). When triggered, everyone within ten feet of the door is dropped into a chute that deposits them into the pool in level two area 14.” It’s a trap? Yeah, it’s a trap. As delighted as I am to see a reappearance of a chute trap (Only desperate Angband players can realize the full horror of a chute trap) I think it could be handled better. And room title. I like room titles. I think they provide a good framing for the room ahead, getting the DMs head in the right place for the description to come. When they are done well. But not when done blandly. “Safe room” “hidden treasure” “old shapes.” These are somewhat abstracted summaries of the room. Rather, provide a vibe for the room. But not here.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
It’s not the worse thing ever written. It’s just bland, minimalistic, and padded out all at the same time. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
This is Pay What You Want at DriveThru with a suggested price of $3.50. There is no preview. Sucker.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
https:\/\/www.drivethrurpg.com\/en\/product\/537478\/mb1-into-the-hidden-halls?1892600<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
By Morgan DavieTaleturnMoldvayLevels 1-3 Atop a lonely sheer-sided plateau stands a Keep, an outpost against the chaos that creeps in nearby caves. Few know that another fortress lies abandoned and hidden within the stony mount itself. Strange wonders and forgotten … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":10095,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-10105","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-reviews"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/tenfootpole.org\/ironspike\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/mb1.png","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/tenfootpole.org\/ironspike\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10105","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/tenfootpole.org\/ironspike\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/tenfootpole.org\/ironspike\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tenfootpole.org\/ironspike\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tenfootpole.org\/ironspike\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=10105"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/tenfootpole.org\/ironspike\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10105\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10109,"href":"https:\/\/tenfootpole.org\/ironspike\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10105\/revisions\/10109"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tenfootpole.org\/ironspike\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/10095"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/tenfootpole.org\/ironspike\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=10105"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tenfootpole.org\/ironspike\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=10105"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tenfootpole.org\/ironspike\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=10105"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}