“Me miserable! Which way shall I fly Infinite wrath and infinite despair? Which way I fly is hell; myself am hell; And in the lowest deep a lower deep, Still threat’ning to devour me, opens wide, To which the hell I suffer seems a heaven.” ― John Milton, Paradise Lost Pt. III: Moil, the City that Waits. … More [Review] Return to the Tomb of Horrors Pt. II (AD&D 2e); Touch the Sun
[Adventure] Return to the Tomb of Horrors (1998) Bruce R. Cordell (TSR) Levels 13 – 16 TSR headquarters, Renton, 1998. Lorraine Williams and Gary Gygax are distant memories. Wizards Executives and men with clipboards and lab coats watch through plate glass as Monte Cook demonstrates yet another high level spell proficiency subsystem, quotes Monty Python … More [Review] Return to the Tomb of Horrors (AD&D 2e) Pt. I; Where Eagles Dare…
[Campaign Setting] College of Wizardry (1997) Bruce Cordell (TSR) “Gee Cordell, what do you wanna do tonight?” “The same thing we do every night Monte. Try to inject more High Fantasy tossfiddle into Dnd!” – Monte & the Cordell, intro, ep 1. “Monte & Cordell Inject High Fantasy tossfiddle into DnD” When I first read … More [Review] College of Wizardry (2e); Clowns to the left of me…
[Adventure] The Shattered Circle (1998) Bruce Cordell (TSR) Levels 1 – 3 A belated happy kingsday to everyone! By popular demand and in honor of his majesty King Willem van Oranje and my beloved Netherlands I am proud to present you with another review of late TSR Bruce Cordell. The Shattered Circle is easy to … More [Review] The Shattered Circle (2e); Signature Cordell
[Adventure] The Dancing Hut of Baba Yaga (1995) Lisa Smedman (TSR) Level 7 – 20 And we are back at it. After a harrowing descent into White Wolf Hell that cost me 35 sanity points, 2 experience levels, 3 points of permanent constitution and infected me with rabies, I stand before you a defeated man. … More [Review] The Dancing Hut of Baba Yaga (2e); Wheels within Wheels
[Sourcebook] The Sea Devils (1997) Skip Williams (TSR) Since the Illithiad gained me a boatload of unexpected entertainment and a newfound respect for Rpg-heavyweight and Moonglum to Cook’s Elric Bruce Cordell, I figured I might as well check out the rest of relatively short lived Monstrous Arcana Series, which provided one fluffsplat with three linked adventures … More [Review] The Sea Devils (2e); Epic level Orcs.
[Adventure] Dawn of the Overmind (1998) Bruce R. Cordell (TSR) Levels 8 – 10 A recent very interesting conversation with a fellow scholar of the questionable and divisive art of psychology recently informed me that if I am to generate more readers I should interpose my articles with imagery with captions and possibly some cat … More [Review] Dawn of the Overmind (2e); An epic, majestic finale that makes one remember just how high we can soar if we follow our dreams *sniff*
[Adventure] Masters of Eternal Night (1998) Bruce R. Cordell (TSR) Level 7 – 9 The second part of the Illithiad adventure trilogy (unofficial title) by Bruce Cordell takes place almost immediately after the first part, but this is where the similarities end. Part 1 was an investigation, this is a sort of wilderness trek with a … More [Review] Masters of Eternal Night (2e); A promising second act
[Adventure] A Darkness Gathering (1998) Bruce R. Cordell (TSR) Levels 7 – 9 My brief trip into 2e Land has galvanized my thirst for exploration, thus I have set out on a quest to find more good 2e (sssssshhhh, I know Return to the Tomb of Horrors exists). I began my expedition in a region … More [Review] A Darkness Gathering(2e); An inauspicious beginning
[Sourcebook] The Illithiad (1998) Bruce R. Cordell (TSR) Cruff: Additional rules so specialised or baroque that they serve no real purpose except to fill page space. Alternative term: Cruft. Flunch: Rules which simulate genre conventions in a fashion so poorly-concieved that they make you want to hide under the couch. Alternative term: Flinchers. – Some … More [Review] The Illithiad; Mind Flayer the Brain-eatening
Age of Dusk 