Classic D&D Module discussion- B5- The Horror on the Hill

[jeffb]

I owned this back in the day. It was (along with B6) the last ofthe D&D modules I ever purchased before leaving RPGS for about 10 years*

But I never used B5

Who has used it?
Still use it?
Fave elements? Not so fave?
Discuss away.




*barring a whim purchase of DA1 Adventures in Blackmoor (and Unearthed Arcana) in 1986 while I was shopping in Toys R Us for a video game as a B-day present for someone.

[jeffb]

23 views and nobody ran this thing?

I don't know if that's an indication of it's worth, or nobody else ever bought it.

[Vile Traveller]

We moved on from modules to home-brew pretty early on - I remember playing in B4 and A1-4, and running X1 and the Giants series, but that was pretty much it as I recall.

Sorry, no help from me!

[Punkrabbitt]

The only B's I ever ran were 1 and 2. I also ran S2 and S3, G1 and G2, D1 and D2, and Q1. After that I did all homebrew until I ran a few Dark Sun adventures in the 90s

[jeffb]

Interesting. Having started in the OD&D phase and beginnings of Basic (Holmes) and AD&D period we mostly ran home-made stuff to start, and ran the occasional modules we could find (G series, S1, etc).

Once modules started becoming commonplace in bookstores (80/81), those became the focus and homebrew waned (too much work).

[tkdco2]

I never ran B5. I ran B1 and B2, although I never finished them.

[scottenkainen]

I've ran it several times in the distant past and played it once here on this board. I haven't considered running it in a long time, but that's only because I now own too many modules I've never ran.

My favorite part is that the module isn't railroad-y AT ALL. Much of it describes the abandoned monastery on the hill, but you have absolutely no reason to go there. A party could, in theory, explore the entire rest of the hill and skip the monastery altogether.

Not so fave is that the geography around the hill always seemed confusing to me. Why is it only accessible in the direction from Guido's Fort?

[jeffb]

Jun 2, 2020 17:23:10 GMT -6 scottenkainen said:

I've ran it several times in the distant past and played it once here on this board. I haven't considered running it in a long time, but that's only because I now own too many modules I've never ran.

My favorite part is that the module isn't railroad-y AT ALL. Much of it describes the abandoned monastery on the hill, but you have absolutely no reason to go there. A party could, in theory, explore the entire rest of the hill and skip the monastery altogether.

Not so fave is that the geography around the hill always seemed confusing to me. Why is it only accessible in the direction from Guido's Fort?

Thanks for the insight!

Frankly, I think the "Guido's Fort" bit was what turned me off from ever using it. It doesn't sound like D&D, it sounds like Little Italy or Da Bronx. Of course I could have changed it, but...

One of the positive things that I always got the impression of- There was ALOT of adventure material jammed into those 32 pages

[peelseel2]

I have run it several times. Out of all the B series module, it is my second favorite. First comes B2. I love modules like this, starting town on the edge of a wilderness, a small area to explore. No framework of story, just elements in the module you mix into a story. Both times I ran it with the same story framework. Guido's Fort was the classic western gold boom town, complete with a corrupt Nobleman who was recently given fief to the processing of the gold for the unnamed kingdom. He was trying very hard to take control of all the independent mines on the south side of the river. His doppleganger accomplice had killed the kingdom's representative to audit the happenings in the fief and taken his place. The nobleman has hired mercenaries to keep the locals under control. Rumors circulate that the hill across the river is also rife with gold, but the nobleman is trying to limit access to the hill until such a time as he can exploit it. Meanwhile, across the river on the hill a certain Hobgoblin "King" has noted the happenings on the other side of the river and is planning a full fledged invasion to seize the rich lands to the south. His preparations are underway.
All the while these happenings are being eye'd by the greediest of them all, a weak young Red Dragon with delusions of greatness, biding his time until he can come in when everyone is weak and take all the gold.

The part enters the scene having been hired by a rich dwarf to find out what happened to his nephews who disappeared while prospecting on the hill. In a missive they sent back they told of find of great potential on the hill. No correspondence has been forth coming since that last missive and he fears they are dead. The party is being paid extremely well, 5000 gp, to bring back his nephews, or their remains, or their killers in grain bags.

[Narmer]

Jul 7, 2020 7:18:24 GMT -6 peelseel2 said:

I have run it several times. Out of all the B series module, it is my second favorite. First comes B2. I love modules like this, starting town on the edge of a wilderness, a small area to explore. No framework of story, just elements in the module you mix into a story. Both times I ran it with the same story framework. Guido's Fort was the classic western gold boom town, complete with a corrupt Nobleman who was recently given fief to the processing of the gold for the unnamed kingdom. He was trying very hard to take control of all the independent mines on the south side of the river. His doppleganger accomplice had killed the kingdom's representative to audit the happenings in the fief and taken his place. The nobleman has hired mercenaries to keep the locals under control. Rumors circulate that the hill across the river is also rife with gold, but the nobleman is trying to limit access to the hill until such a time as he can exploit it. Meanwhile, across the river on the hill a certain Hobgoblin "King" has noted the happenings on the other side of the river and is planning a full fledged invasion to seize the rich lands to the south. His preparations are underway.
All the while these happenings are being eye'd by the greediest of them all, a weak young Red Dragon with delusions of greatness, biding his time until he can come in when everyone is weak and take all the gold.

The part enters the scene having been hired by a rich dwarf to find out what happened to his nephews who disappeared while prospecting on the hill. In a missive they sent back they told of find of great potential on the hill. No correspondence has been forth coming since that last missive and he fears they are dead. The party is being paid extremely well, 5000 gp, to bring back his nephews, or their remains, or their killers in grain bags.

Thanks for the great summary!

I don't care much for the name of the fort either.  Anyone have ideas for a good replacement name?

[tkdco2]

Fort Anthrax? *ducks*

[peelseel2]

Fort Dovic, home of the 19th Regiment "Hell's Rejects"?

Jun 3, 2020 5:58:23 GMT -6 jeffb said:

Frankly, I think the "Guido's Fort" bit was what turned me off from ever using it. It doesn't sound like D&D, it sounds like Little Italy or Da Bronx. Of course I could have changed it, but...

That is exactly my impression of the name.  I also thought of greed, money, & mobsters.  Then a 'story' started clicking.  I ended up keeping the name in the end even though I did not like it.

[paleologos]

I ran this a couple of years ago for my son and a group of his friends.

The first 4 sessions involved multiple forays to the Hill. There are so many little nooks and crannies, wandering monsters (including ogres carrying their bags with 1d6 100 gp) and such to keep the party occupied, permitting them to level up over time.

The giant horned chameleons in the trees, snatching up smaller characters with their tongues and carrying them off, screaming, never to be seen again...the ghouls creeping up to paralyze and carry off party sentries in the dead of the night...the jump-scare stirges, dive-bombing the party at random intervals...yes, there was plenty of horror on the Hill!

The ruins of the monastery took another couple of sessions. They then penetrated the 1st level of the dungeon, bypassing the central portion by way of the arena, and coming upon the Hobgoblin King unawares. One of the main differences between B5 and B2 is the lack of humanoid females and young. The goblinoids are sparsely scattered and poorly organized.

Falling through the chute to the 2nd level, they weren't fooled by the 2 octagon shaped rooms (one had a chute coming through the ceiling, for Pete's sake!) and made it through to the 3rd level fairly easily (although 1 PC died after sipping a potion of poison...) It was fun having them create their own map of the level - one of the players was happy to give it a shot.

The kobolds of the 3rd level are truly pretty weak, and the level is fairly small. A lot more could be done with it, but the wandering monsters helped spruce it up. The dragon - started out by charming one of the PC fighters, who tried to bring the rest of the party back. They used dispel magic to bring him back to his senses, and decided to pull one over on the dragon.

Returning with much of the rest of the party in tow, the player role-played that his fighter was still charmed, allowing him to get close enough to the dragon to strike it. The dragon made his surprise check, but the fighter won initiative and got a natural 20, knocking it down several hit points. He got a blast of dragon fire, but made his save, dropping to 2 hp.

A volley of magic missiles knocked the dragon down even further, as the other fighter (having drunk a potion of growth) took it on. The battle lasted a few more rounds, since at AC -1 it was really hard to hit, but eventually the halfling stabbed it with a shortsword +2 obtained from the kobold chief, slaying the beast! It could easily have gone the other way...

[magremore]

Jul 17, 2020 14:45:19 GMT -6 Narmer said:

Jul 7, 2020 7:18:24 GMT -6 peelseel2 said:

I have run it several times. Out of all the B series module, it is my second favorite. First comes B2. I love modules like this, starting town on the edge of a wilderness, a small area to explore. No framework of story, just elements in the module you mix into a story. Both times I ran it with the same story framework. Guido's Fort was the classic western gold boom town, complete with a corrupt Nobleman who was recently given fief to the processing of the gold for the unnamed kingdom. He was trying very hard to take control of all the independent mines on the south side of the river. His doppleganger accomplice had killed the kingdom's representative to audit the happenings in the fief and taken his place. The nobleman has hired mercenaries to keep the locals under control. Rumors circulate that the hill across the river is also rife with gold, but the nobleman is trying to limit access to the hill until such a time as he can exploit it. Meanwhile, across the river on the hill a certain Hobgoblin "King" has noted the happenings on the other side of the river and is planning a full fledged invasion to seize the rich lands to the south. His preparations are underway.
All the while these happenings are being eye'd by the greediest of them all, a weak young Red Dragon with delusions of greatness, biding his time until he can come in when everyone is weak and take all the gold.

The part enters the scene having been hired by a rich dwarf to find out what happened to his nephews who disappeared while prospecting on the hill. In a missive they sent back they told of find of great potential on the hill. No correspondence has been forth coming since that last missive and he fears they are dead. The party is being paid extremely well, 5000 gp, to bring back his nephews, or their remains, or their killers in grain bags.

Thanks for the great summary!

I don't care much for the name of the fort either.  Anyone have ideas for a good replacement name?

Trof S’odiug?

[Narmer]

Aug 7, 2020 15:58:26 GMT -6 magremore said:

Jul 17, 2020 14:45:19 GMT -6 Narmer said:

Thanks for the great summary!

I don't care much for the name of the fort either.  Anyone have ideas for a good replacement name?

Trof S’odiug?

[jeffb]

Fort Sodiug (sew-DEE-ugh) works for me!

Named after the human explorer who first discovered the region

[Narmer]

Widburgh

[machfront]

Jun 2, 2020 10:19:47 GMT -6 jeffb said:

Once modules started becoming commonplace in bookstores (80/81), those became the focus and homebrew waned (too much work).

Not to go too far afield and likely the subject for a separate thread, but I find this interesting as I’ve always considered modules (like published campaign settings) to be much more work than ‘my own thing’. Of course, it’s not as though I put in much work for such. I don’t plan or write much anything down really, but at least can retain my own ideas. When I go over a module or setting I feels as though I’m studying a text for which there is an exhaustive test over soon. No thanks. Heh
If I’m going to run someone else’s published adventure it’s going to have to be bare-bones and a few pages. 😆

[doublejig2]

I agree for the most part but would also point out that facility with published material is a skill that can be developed. Commitment here leads to surety in placing a published adventure in a larger campaign and campaign milieu.

[jeffb]

Aug 29, 2020 14:04:48 GMT -6 machfront said:

Jun 2, 2020 10:19:47 GMT -6 jeffb said:

Once modules started becoming commonplace in bookstores (80/81), those became the focus and homebrew waned (too much work).

Not to go too far afield and likely the subject for a separate thread, but I find this interesting as I’ve always considered modules (like published campaign settings) to be much more work than ‘my own thing’. Of course, it’s not as though I put in much work for such. I don’t plan or write much anything down really, but at least can retain my own ideas. When I go over a module or setting I feels as though I’m studying a text for which there is an exhaustive test over soon. No thanks. Heh
If I’m going to run someone else’s published adventure it’s going to have to be bare-bones and a few pages. 😆

It was pure lack of time and lack of interest after 3-4 years of doing it all ourselves. As we got older D&D was not the primary hobby of any of guys in our group. Videogames(Atari) had taken over a couple of the group as a main entertainment, I was Fishing or Hunting most of the year as well as playing guitar. One guy was a Comic addict and budding comic artist, etc. A couple were also in the Scouts. We became very busy. So modules were a welcome advancement- "Hey I just got this cool thing called XYZ, lets play saturday". It was much easier to familiarize and wing a published adventure. As we were not into long term campaign play with big overarching plots or mega dungeons, Instead running episodic games ala Conan, or Fafhrd and the Grey Mouser- having a plug and play "module" was perfect for us. Far less work than doing our own thing.

[machfront]

It’s been so long, I’ve forgotten how to tag folks’ user names. Heh
Jeff (and others), I’d actually like to continue this discussion.
Not sure if I should create a new thread myself and ask a mod to move these few posts over or ask a mod to start a new one (in General, I suppose).
Also no idea who the mod is here in this part of the forums? Rafe?

I’ll wait and see how best to proceed.


As far as the actual thread here....and what made my mind take a left turn was: though I don’t use modules for reasons stated, I own quite a number and Horror on the Hill always interested me but seemed a bit too complicated even as these things go for me. At least B2 is something I can almost get a handle on wherein, were it not for the huge complex (another stumbling block for me personally), I could use great swaths of. That is to say...B2 is likely something I could easily utilize in many respects and ignore the ‘dungeon’ as it actually is, if that makes sense.
I don’t get that feeling with other modules.
Hm.
I fear I’m not making myself too clear.
Maybe I can form my thoughts better if I skim over B5 in a bit and after some other responses to the thread.

[jeffb]

Tags are easy hover your mouse over a users name- then type that in your response to tag someone including the "@" (if you click on the name, you'll go to the user page, so just copy it, or type it)

machfront


Feel free to C&P anything I said and have at it with a new thread- might be better off in one of the general forums for the most views/traffic, though.

[paleologos]

B5 is more easily cannibalized than other modules, because the Monastery and the dungeons beneath it can easily be dropped into the outskirts of any PC home base (even up the road to the northeast on the wilderness map for B2, which is a fun location for it).

Guido's Fort and the whole Hill take up several pages, but are completely unnecessary and (unless the DM does a good job running encounters on The Hill) might cause players to lose enthusiasm for the game, since it takes so long to "get to the action".

[ratikranger]

Sept 6, 2020 7:25:32 GMT -6 paleologos said:

Guido's Fort and the whole Hill take up several pages, but are completely unnecessary and (unless the DM does a good job running encounters on The Hill) might cause players to lose enthusiasm for the game, since it takes so long to "get to the action".

This is what I remember, running around the hill having really strange encounters and getting really desperate to find the "meat" around these parts. I think we did eventually make it into the dungeon but we never actually "finished" the module. (I recall the DM being somewhat relieved that he didn't have to run the dragon encounter.) I really have to give it a look again, personally I've sort of stuck to B1-B4.

[Finarvyn]

Jun 2, 2020 8:00:14 GMT -6 Vile Traveller said:

We moved on from modules to home-brew pretty early on - I remember playing in B4 and A1-4, and running X1 and the Giants series, but that was pretty much it as I recall.

Sorry, no help from me!

I'm the opposite. Having started with OD&D, the only "modules" I owned were Judges Guild products. I knew of TSR modules and several of my friends ran them, but mostly I didn't discover them until the 1990's or later. I clicked on this thread because of the title, but I have no experience with the module.

[Dohojar]

This was the first adventure I ever owned. I remember getting my parents to buy it for me from a board game store that was in the mall way back in 84. I had only played D&D twice before that and was hooked on the game. I had no idea what I was getting when I asked for it. All I knew at the time was that it was for D&D and that I really liked the cover of the module. I remember sitting on a bench in the mall looking through it in total fascination while my mom was in some clothing store.

I had no idea that it was an adventure until I showed it to the friend who introduced me to D&D. He thought it was a cool adventure but informed me that I would need the red box set to run it. Guess what I asked for the next time my parents went to the mall (I was an only child so I was a bit spoiled).

I ran it a few times as a kid but I wasn't a good enough DM to do it justice. I usually just skipped over the hill section entirely and just plopped my players down just outside the monastery. There is a good discussion about it over on Dragonsfoot in this thread www.dragonsfoot.org/forums/viewtopic.php?f=11&t=85935 if you want some more input. Overall though, I think it is a great adventure.

I think once my players are done our current campaign, I may just use this adventure to start the next campaign I run but I will be converting it to 5e as that is the edition we play. And I will make them explore the hill before finding the monastery.

[Dohojar]

What I would really like to see is Goodman games re-release this adventure as part of their "Original Adventures Reincarnated" series. I would so buy that book.

[Desparil]

May 24, 2021 9:59:35 GMT -6 Dohojar said:

I think once my players are done our current campaign, I may just use this adventure to start the next campaign I run but I will be converting it to 5e as that is the edition we play. And I will make them explore the hill before finding the monastery.

I did exactly this a couple of years ago, I thought it ran pretty nicely in 5E. I was going to offer you a copy of my conversion notes, but I can't for the life of me find them - somehow I can only find my notes from B1, which I converted and used in that same campaign.

[Dohojar]

Thanks for the offer. Note are always helpful. Let me know if you find them.

Did you swap out the hobgoblins? And what level characters did you run through it. 5e Hobgoblins for a level 1-3 party would be a nasty fight. One I don't think the PC's could survive.

[Desparil]

May 25, 2021 18:54:01 GMT -6 Dohojar said:

Thanks for the offer. Note are always helpful. Let me know if you find them.

Did you swap out the hobgoblins? And what level characters did you run through it. 5e Hobgoblins for a level 1-3 party would be a nasty fight. One I don't think the PC's could survive.

I found a portion of my notes - it looks like I actually upscaled it for a 4th level party, so it might not be so helpful. I doubled a lot of random encounter numbers, as well as some fixed encounters that were already a little anemic in the original, or alternatively increased the potency by changing some or all creatures into higher CR variants like ghasts or a hobgoblin captain. The tougher groups, like the larger bands of hobgoblins, I'm assuming I converted in a pretty direct/straightforward manner, but a party with a few Shatter spells at their disposal and the reckless abandon of knowing a hobgoblin already escaped to warn the rest really evens the odds.

A few notes that might be useful to you despite this, though:
I gave the killer bees the 5E flying snake stats, plus the weakness of dying after a successful sting. The queen got the giant wasp stats.
For the Neanderthals, I like using the 5E gnoll or orc stats; tribal warrior would also work fine, but I wanted to give them a bit more "oomph."
Piranha birds I gave the blood hawk stat line.
The 5E berserker stat block is a bit much, even for a higher level party - at least in such numbers as they appear in B5. I used the thug stats instead.