Product Description
Evil grows beneath the earth
Why should anyone travel the cracked cobblestones of the Old Road? The fortress that once cast its shadow across the road does so no longer — some whisper that the earth swallowed the fortress whole in an age long past. Four brave adventurers resolved to discover the truth and set off down the Old Road, but they never returned.
The Sunless Citadel is the first in a series of eight stand-alone adventures for the
Dungeons & Dragons game. This carefully crafted adventure, designed to challenge 1st-level
D&D heroes, follows a path to a mysterious dungeon where evil has taken root, and a terrible tree and its dark shepherd plot in darkness.
To use this adventure, a
Dungeon Master also needs the Player’s Handbook, the
Dungeon Master’s Guide, and the Monster Manual.
CD Harris @ 1:19 am
My group and I are all in our 30’s. We’re gamers from the old days who decided to give 3e a try. As the DM, I was very pleased with this module. My players were, too.
First, I was pressed for time before our first sitting and knew there was no chance I’d have time to read two new rulebooks *and* compose my first dungeon in 15+ years, so buying a ready-made adventure was a necessity, not a luxury.
Second, even if I’d had time, I wouldn’t have wanted to start off with a module of my own creation the first time out of the gate with the new rules. The odds were too high I’d make it just about any degree of difficulty other than the right one. So, again, a pre-made module seemed a good idea to get used to the new rules and give me an idea what to do to make my own later without making them either too easy or impossibly hard.
Third, I needed to be able to have a fairly easy time running a game with a new set of rules unfamilair to us all *and* running the adventure at the same time. This module was very nicely balanced, giving my players ample oportunitys to try out their various skills and included an abundance of rules tips and assistance for me.
In short, this module met all of my needs very nicely. It gave the characters a couple of decent hooks and some mysteries to solve, gave each of them several ways to be involved throughout, and allowed them to use a number of different gameplay approaches (rather than just hacking-and-slashing) so that it stayed interesting. Meanwhile it gave *me* lots of help and several interesting NPCs to play for them while still allowing me to do some creative DMing as I went. I was entirely satisfied and my players had a great time without ever feeling like they were being led by the nose or were on rails.
Also, because it’s nicely ambiguous about the larger questions and gameworld, I am able to integrate it seamlessly into the ideas I have for where I want to take their campaign. My only complaint would be that Oakhurst, as other have noted, seems like an afterthought. More detail there – especially the same kind of attention to NPC characterization that the dungeon itself has – would have been appreciated.
All I really hoped for when I bought this – the one option available for a brand-new set of characters – was an adequate starter module that would get my players and I back in the groove after all these years. What I got was considerably more. The gameplay (some fighting, some puzzle-solving, some diplomacy, some sleuthing) provided a nearly perfect start to my campaign and matched the tone I wanted to set exceptionally well. I would not hesitate to recommend it for others just starting with the new rules, whether they’re brand-new to gaming or old-timers coming back after a long hiatus.
Matthew T. Witten @ 2:30 am
Pretty well put together starter adventure for the 3rd Edition. You have to be careful with your players though, if they are of the “charge in and slay everything” (you KNOW who they are) they will run into some serious problems lest you resort to GM fudging. In a way that’s good though, as it forces and encourages a more professional approach to the dungeon (with their new characters).
The first time in my players made several nasty mistakes and ended up fighting at three to one odds. They chose to stay and fight and ended up with a total party wipeout (gotta love the new sorcerers). Well written, with some hooks that are easily avoided for the thinking man’s party, this adventure has just enough bite to be challenging and dangerous. All the things D&D should be. It fits nicely into any campaign world and the premise behind the citadel itself is quite good.
September @ 3:09 am
I am one of those people who hate to create their own D&D adventures, so the first thing I did when I decided I wanted to run a 3rd Edition game was purchase an adventure also. Since this was the only one available, this was the one I bought. After reading through it fully, I have to admit that I’m glad I bought it.
This adventure gives DMs the chance to explore the new rules — it offers suggestions of what skills a character can use. It lets each character have their moment. It’s very simple, yet it offers character options other than combat. (For example, at one point the characters can choose to be diplomatic with one group of creatures rather than battling through them.) It does a good job of giving characters the feeling that they can choose what to do next while limiting their options so that the DM is not overwhelmed.
I was a little disappointed by rule inconsistencies between the Player’s Handbook and the adventure rules, but I assume that’s because they were being designed concurrently. I was also disappointed that the town and its inhabitants weren’t detailed just a tad more. One last complaint is that the Adventure Hooks are weak and few. Overall, however, it’s worth buying.
Eric Graff @ 3:51 am
I’m a busy guy. I’ve got a job, a wife, a baby. This adds up to not a lot of time to plan adventures. Thank heaven for Wizards, who every few months, pump out a few more adventures for busy fellows like me.
Sunless is a dungeonhack. It’s got it all: magic, mystery, goofy characters (just wait until your players get to meet Meepo, or as my players called him “meatball”), vile enemies, and just a really messed-up bad guy at the climax (good thing there is no therapist NPC in D&D, otherwise we’d lose a lot of our best villains).
It’s a canned adventure, similar to Forge of Fury: the players have limited options on where to explore, until they progress through the plotline, eventually solving problems and gaining access to more and more sections of the dungeon. This works out well for light- hearted adventuring.
I recommend this adventure to all DM’s, it’s a great example of how to setup a D&D 3rd Ed. dungeonhack, but I feel that those DM’s that have more time to create their own adventures will find the plotline a bit stale in Sunless. Nonetheless, it’s really fun to play, with loads of kooky NPC’s to role-play and entertain your players with.
E. Evans @ 6:12 am
I have attempted over the years to design D&D adventures, so I have some idea how hard this adventure was to produce. Overall, this adventure is great. The cover art is wonderful and the line art inside evokes images of D&D days gone by. “Back to the Dungeon” looks like it will be a big success.
The Sunless Citadel gives you everything you need to start a D&D3E campaign: a skeletal town suitable for plopping in to any campaign world, villians worthy of recurrence and an interesting place to explore. Also, this is one of the few 1st level adventures I have read that is actually engaging.
This adventure has something for each character class and painstaking “how-tos” for the DM. I have not run the adventure yet because my players are currently in a homebrewed adventure (which sucks in comparrison to this). Oh, the possibilities…