Yes, I was a D&D nerd in High School.
Written: Jan 19 '04
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Product Rating:
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Pros: Gary Gygax at his prime!
Cons: They don't make the rules this simple any more!
The Bottom Line: It won't get you any girls or make you any money, but it is a lot of fun.
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| Abraxmed's Full Review: Dungeon Module B2: The Keep on the Borderlands Boo... |
I was thinking about titling the review something to the affect of how we used to summon demons in my basement. You know after we painted pentagrams on the floor with chickens blood! In case you are wondering that stuff doesn't happen. Well it does, but Dungeons & Dragons(D&D) has nothing to do with it. The game actually promotes being the "Good Guy." Where most of the rumors about Satanic Worship comes from was the first edition Advanced Rules. There were a lot of demons and undead creatures that could be used. And if an uninformed parent(I really had to hold back from using the word ignorant, but I wanted to!) flips through the books it could appear Satanic. But it all comes back to the point that your characters are supposed to kill the demons, not serve them. That disclaimer out of the way, let's go forward shall we?
I really wanted to do a review on the old basic rules set, but I couldn't find one on epinions. So the next best thing is Keep on the Borderlands by THE MAN, Gary Gygax. For those that don't know, he created D&D. It is also largely due to him that those rules, with all the demons in them, got made. He is the hardcore D&D freek's hero. Unfortunately he no longer has much to do with D&D anymore, other than going to conventions. He made a few rules sets for other games, but nothing much came of them. He was the hack and slash master of the game. And Keep on the Borderlands is one of this classics, if not THE classic.
OK, so if D&D isn't Satanic Worship, what is it? I'm glad you asked, I was about to bring that up! Basically you make a character, pretend you are an actor. You create their personality, what they wear, how they talk and how they fight. The only difference between an actor in a fantasy movie(other than skill) and someone who plays D&D(and the fact that one pays to play and the other gets paid) is that the story isn't as scripted in D&D and there are rules that govern actions. What I mean by that is that if you want you character to climb a wall, or punch someone there are rules that determine if you are successful. This is accomplished by rolling dice. Think of Risk dice, but add more colors, sides to the dice and more dice in general! The players can have their characters do whatever they want, within reason. They can't break the rules and are held in check by the Dungeon Master(DM). The DM is the director, and in later versions of the AD&D 2nd edition, the lawyer/judge of the game. He interprets the rules and tells the overall story, that the characters interact with.
There are usually from 2 to 8 players, counting the DM. If you have a skilled DM, 6-8 is preferable, but for inexperienced DM's it is better to keep the number lower. The more players the more variety and color comes into the world and the story that is being told.
Now playing D&D never got me any dates. And it probably hurt my social life in High School, but that doesn't make it any less fun! It certainly helps your creativity and skills as a story teller. I'd also imagine that it could help actors, but I wouldn't know about that, I have too much stage fright. You also will be labeled a geek, people who play D&D have about as much weight in the social hierachy as the chess club.
Yeah, so what is Keep on the Borderlands all about? Fine rush me! As I briefly mentioned, above, Gary Gygax aka THE MAN, liked to write hack and slash adventures. Well this brings up a few questions. Like what is hack and slash, but more importantly what is an adventure? Adventures are like scenes in a play. A campaign is the largest unit in D&D, think of it like a play. There can be more than one campaign in a world, but they usually don't over lap, unless there are different groups of players on the same world. So you can have sequall campaigns and sometimes they affect each other directly, sometimes they don't. Anyway you can buy modules(books) that have adventures in them. This can help if you DM hasn't had time to make his own, or is just feeling lazy. Also if you are playing on one of the preconstructed worlds, these take place on them. This takes a little modifying when you aren't on one of the premade worlds.
Hack and slash. Sorry that paragraph was getting a little long and I wanted to break it up a little. So where was I? Hack and slash, that's right, that sounds exciting doesn't it? Well it can be, or it can be repedative and boring. Gygax wrote the hardest and bloodiest adventures ever. When he was in charge your characters had to earn their way through. After the Satanism scare they went to very roleplaying intensive adventures. They would have a lot to do with problem solving and character interaction. Those can be fun too, but a mix is the best. Anyway Keep on the Borderlands is just about a Keep, that's a medieval fortress but not quite a castle, that is getting attack by monsters. You are supposed to help. You characters battle the evil hordes and thus befriend the lord of the Keep. There really isn't that much to it, but this adventure is widely known in old school D&D players. For what it was it was done well. It got straight to the point and wasn't much if any dull points.
Though perhaps not as fast paced as Magic: The Gathering it is less expensive Not that D&D isn't expensive. There are always new and updated rules to buy. Though the inter net is a good way around that. D&D is THE classic role playing game. There are plenty of others to choose from, but people always seem to like D&D or its successors AD&D first, second and third edition. I have always found fatal flaws in other games, like GURPS, that have good ideas but aren't carried out well. Gygax did a great job in creating a solid rules set, that has been added to with mixed results. Now remember that you can play with just Keep on the Borderlands. You have to buy the basic rules set. You can find them online if you search hard enough, there should be plenty on Ebay. This adventure is just a supplement not a stand alone!
Recommended:
Yes
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Abraxmed
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Member: Abraxmed
Location: Virginia Beach, VA
Reviews written: 78
Trusted by: 23 members
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