What do people expect? I mean, really?

[Halaster Blackcloak]

WTF is wrong with people? As I noted in the developer area, I ran into an issue between the definitions of gates and teleports as they pertain to Undermountain. I was searching the use of the terms to see if I could clarify the matter (while waiting for my chocolate bar to kick in and get me into writing mode! ) when I came across this asinine post on a forum about Undermountain reviews. So while I wait for the chocolate to kick in, I'll share it and then respond to it to illustrate what I mean in the title of this post.

The original boxed set had beautiful poster-sized maps and lots of flavour to it, but in the end it amounted to little more than a big box of air. IIRC the text on the back of the box boasted "over 2000 rooms to explore!" Unfortunately, upon reading through the suspiciously thin booklet inside, one discovered that roughly 1850 of those rooms were completely undetailed, with no contents, monsters or treasure. The backstory and metaplot of the dungeon was likewise paper thin.

Essentially the box set was a fill-in-your-own dungeon with ready made maps and little else trying to pass itself off as a ready-to-run adventure. I bought it expecting something akin to the World's Largest Dungeon™ and ended up with some very expensive graph-paper instead. :\

Edit: I did end up running my players through it once, but it was fairly boring with only a handful of rooms having anything noteworthy in them. It amounted to little more than having the characters running around lost in a massive empty maze.

"...but in the end it amounted to little more than a big box of air." Really? A box of air?

So 72 developed rooms (hundreds if you count individual sub-rooms such as #42A, #42B, #42C, etc), dozens of developed Areas of Interest, 11 all new and very cool (and tough!) monsters, 7 double-sided dungeon dressing cards, an adventure booklet with 3 well developed scenarios, 7 well-developed NPCs and a smattering of others (less detailed) added throughout the dungeon, 27 new magic items, 10 new spells and shit loads of background info plus 3 full sized and well detailed poster maps is "a big box of air"? WTF kind of idiot calls that a "box of air"? I'm not being sensitive because I love Undermountain. People can criticize it all the want. They can say the "crazy wizard in a dungeon" aspect is not original (it's not). They can say that there are large areas of map undeveloped (there are). They can whine about the blue parchment paper background (as some other fool did) because well...I guess some people want to read plain paper, not the traditional parchment printing of the original Realms products.

But to say it's a box of air, wtf sort of idiot claims that? Then the writer goes on to describe the "suspiciously thin booklet" inside. It's 128 pages. Did he expect the Encyclopedia Britannica? Really?

Then he whines:

"...one discovered that roughly 1850 of those rooms were completely undetailed, with no contents, monsters or treasure."

And all I can think to say is:

Well, what the fuck did you expect, moron? I mean, really? Did you expect 2,000 room descriptions? Seriously? Because at even two generically and sparsely described rooms per page, that would amount to a 1,000 page book (just for the room descriptions)! For reference, using the 1E books, that would be the equivalent of the Dungeon Master's Guide, Players Handbook, Monster Manual I, Monster Manual II, Fiend Folio, Deities & Demigods and Manual of the Planes books combined (1,022 pages)! And you thought you'd fit those pages (a 4" thick pile of books) inside a 1" thick box set? And you thought you'd get all that for $20 (the original price of the box set)?

Seriously, what the hell do people expect? Are they really that stupid? I have yet to see one of the "but it's all blank maps" morons whine about Expedition to Barrier Peaks, which is essentially a booklet full of pictures, with a shit load of undeveloped rooms on the map and only 22 developed rooms.

I just cannot understand these complaints!

Then he whines:

"The backstory and metaplot of the dungeon was likewise paper thin."

Paper thin? There's a whole interesting history of Undermountain and tons of layers of sub-plots throughout. Then he mentions expecting the Worlds Largest Dungeon, which is essentially computer generated, uninspired maps throwing in every monster from the books with no serious plot or details of the rooms.

People are insane.

[McDeath]

Ah! You saw that review as well. I was going to post it but you beat me to it. Yeah, I was rolling my eyes at this dude's review. Perish the though he ever opened up B1.

He also fails to realize that the dungeon (like any actually if the DM wants to put effort into it) is designed for personal flavor. Fill up every room, fill up half, roll randomly, add to, subtract, leave it, or do whatever craziness you want.

Some people these days just seem to want a railroad choo-choo "adventure" done like a play/tv show in acts or stages. They want an end level megaboss like video games etc. Maybe they just want to read and "play" an adventure like a book going from room to room kill-la-kill until the End Boss is slain.



I guess some lack creativity. My only regret is I could only procure a used copy that was missing the monsters MC sheets. That was remedied via pdf (unless I'm mistsken and it actually had them). I paid $10 used so 1/2 price. I'm still considering buying extra map sheets (and probably will).

[Halaster Blackcloak]

I get that some people wanted more rooms developed. Would I have enjoyed it if they had detailed 100 rooms instead of 72? Sure, why not? It was all good material. But to expect 2,000 developed rooms - WTF are they thinking? I seriously wonder if those idiots actually expected that the product was going to detail 2,000 rooms. I doubt the 5E version detailed that many rooms, even though half of them had one-sentence descriptions!

What gets me though is how people complain that it's "empty". With all the hundreds of room descriptions and new magic items and NPCs and spells and maps and cards and new monsters and so on and so forth - the damned thing was loaded with really well done material! Empty? Empty would describe those crappy, poorly done Treasure Maps modules they released in 2E.

[McDeath]

If every room was detailed with a treasure, trap, encounter, or trick or something the box would have to be far larger and the price would have jumped. I couldgo either way but EVERY room having something leaves out the mystery of a "empty" room. I once had a group so confused about an EMPTY room they spent well over a game week in there. Rations, resources, etc wadted. But encouters did come from them camping (i mean, I was being reasonable). They wouldn't leave. Eventually, the complex of hobgoblins from a level below caught wind. Yeah, that party was overwhelmed and TPK'd. It was pretty hilarious tbh. Paranoia.

[Halaster Blackcloak]

McDeath wrote:

If every room was detailed with a treasure, trap, encounter, or trick or something the box would have to be far larger and the price would have jumped.

Absolutely. As I detailed, that would have resulted in a book of well over 1,000 pages. The equivalent of the 1E PHB, DMG, MMI, MMII, FF, D&DG, and MotP books combined. I just don't see how people could expect that.

I couldgo either way but EVERY room having something leaves out the mystery of a "empty" room.

I'd have hated it if they'd detailed every room! That leaves no space for creative fun. Undermountain serves perfectly as a playground for the DM's imagination. Over the years I've written hundreds of rooms for Undermountain. Just for Ruins of Undermountain III: The Deadly Levels I've written hundreds of rooms! Hell, I would love to one day design all the empty rooms for Levels 1-3! Talk about fun!

I once had a group so confused about an EMPTY room they spent well over a game week in there. Rations, resources, etc wadted. But encouters did come from them camping (i mean, I was being reasonable). They wouldn't leave. Eventually, the complex of hobgoblins from a level below caught wind. Yeah, that party was overwhelmed and TPK'd. It was pretty hilarious tbh. Paranoia.

Careful of easy rooms! God I gotta incorporate that idea into Levels 4-6!

[McDeath]

Makes me wonder if there is a Paranoia spell. There's Maze, Confusion, and probably other spells. It has been a while since I read each of the core 2e PHB spells (not to mention other sources for 1e/2e.