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Andorax
Still here? Wow.
(4/16/03 6:44 am)
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Temple of Elemental Evil: The Novel
Anyone else read this one? I just completed it last night. There's some consistancy problems between the novel and RttToEE (unsurprisingly), but for those DMs who wish to hand out one (or more) copies of the novel as "history", here are the significant differences I can find:
1) Hommlet...basically the same. No problems here.
2) Moathouse. Only one significant variation. Lareth did not die here in the Novel. Not a big deal imho, the Novel history doesn't hurt anything.
3) Nulb. The heroes never passed through here, so it never gets mentioned. Y'Day's name was never spoken.
4) The Temple itself:
Lareth was killed at the Temple in the Novel, and then rose as some sort of evil spider-like undead thing (as far as I can tell, the closest equivalent would be to slap the Drider and Shadow templates, in that order, on him).
Falrinth was killed, as was his assassin-buddy Smigal Redhand.
Hedrack was left in a collapsing room, and *presumed* killed. No problems here at all.
When the Orb of Golden Death was smashed, the gems fell out and shattered on the floor.
Elmo was killed. Neither Otis nor Y'Day had anything to do with the adventure.
Thrommel was rescued, and returned home. He returned to a nation on the verge of civil war, and called upon the PCs to join him as a "next adventure" in the epilogue.
IF you want for the novel Temple of Elemental Evil to be "official" campaign background, here are the changes to RttToEE I would recommend.
First, the changes that go on "behind the scenes":
Hedrack, as he was about to be crushed, was covered in a Wall of Force. At this time, Tharizdun spoke to him as he lay there broken and shattered, revealed the "truth" about the Temple, converted him to his own worship. Hedrack dragged himself over to the elemental power gems, and found the Fire Gem still intact somehow. The others "dissolved" from their shards (only to reform in the Nodes, and later find their way to the Fire Node in the hands of a certain Demon).
Hedrack was instructed by Tharizdun to Resurrect Lareth, though why was never revealed. Since he had been "killed" again as an undead, he's eligible for it. Driven by hatred and resentment, he wandered off to Nulb and "disappeared".
Next, the changes that are "outright and up front":
Elmo is dead. Upset over his death, Otis decides to take up his role as a guardsman, and eventually as Captain. Replace all references to Elmo as references to Otis, who resents Y'Day for not being able to raise Elmo (too late returning from Nulb).
Plus, as an added bonus, by having Otis being the guardsman, you avoid the sniggers of gamers with young kids.
Finally, one thing that must be changed in the novel:
Tear out the Epilogue. Thrommel never made it home. He was ambushed and "vanished" once again. You just CANNOT reconsile the happy ending of the novel with the background of RttToEE. Your only other choice is to eliminate Thrommel from the Outer Fane entirely.
Anyone else who has read this, I would strongly encourage you to speak up. What'd I miss? What could I have improved upon?
"Whadda ya mean, Orcs get levels too?!?" |
blakwind
Here for a while
(4/16/03 3:17 pm)
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Re: Temple of Elemental Evil: The Novel
I used the novel in my campaign about a year ago. Over all, I'd say that the results were mixed.
The novel in question is called The Temple of Elemental Evil, by Thomas M. Reid, published by Wizards of the Coast in 2001. It's part of WotC's Greyhawk Classics series that novelizes first edition D&D adventures such as Against the Giants, White Plume Mountain, Descent into the Depths of the Earth, Queen of the Demonweb Pits, Keep on the Borderlands, and The Tomb of Horrors. Each book tells the tale of a group of adventurers completing that particular TSR module -- in this case, Gary Gygax's T1-4, The Temple of Elemental Evil.
The writing style and production values of The Temple of Elemental Evil novel are similar to those of other WotC novels. If you've read a few, you know what I mean.
In my campaign, I decided that one character had third-hand knowledge of the events around the second rising of the temple. Before starting the adventure, I gave the novel and some other background notes to that character's player, and told him to use it as character knowledge. Later, when the group arrived in Hommlet on another quest, that player spun his own version of the tale, in-game and in-character. Moved by curiosity but not really expecting trouble, the characters decided to make a brief side trek to visit the famous moathouse where it had all started so many years ago.
Pros:
- The novel provides lots of juicy historical details about the second rise and fall of the temple.
- It builds atmosphere. The scenes at the Inn of the Welcome Wench are particularly evocative.
- It describes many RttToEE NPCs, including some residents of Hommlet, major villains such as Hedrack and Lareth, Prince Thrommel, and some of the NPCs residing in the recovered temple.
- It partially explains the motivations and relationship between Iuz, Lolth, and Zuggtmoy, at least as they were understood at the time.
- It introduces the orb of golden death, and recounts its destruction.
- It introduces the locations of Hommlet, the moathouse, Nulb (though only briefly), and the ruined temple. It rewards clever players with a few minor site-based details, such as the tunnel into the moathouse and the secret door in the well of the ruined temple.
- It provides an unconventional way to prime to players with info.
- It's a very fast and easy read.
Cons:
- As Andorax pointed out, many events in the novel depart significantly from the history assumed by Monte's adventure. It's tragic to me that WotC was unable to align these two projects.
- Lareth becomes horribly disfigured early in the novel, weakening the shock and surprise when the characters encounter him in Nulb.
- The epilogue, in particular, is completely irreconcilable with Monte's adventure.
- The novel hasn't exactly received great reviews. For what it's worth, the customer reviews at Amazon average 1.5 stars and 3 stars out of 5 at the Canadian and U.S. sites, respectively.
As a DM, you need to either fix the novel or change the adventure. Andorax has provided some great suggestions for altering the adventure to fit the history of the novel. I took the other tack for my campaign.
I made the novel fit my version of the adventure as follows:
1) I dropped hints that cast doubt on the omniscience of the character's sources. The story was already second-hand, so perhaps some details had been embellished. Perhaps some elements were merely speculation, and others were intentionally falsified for some reason.
2) I provided a list of (mostly) campaign-specific revisions to the text. Since my campaign isn't set in Greyhawk, I changed Iuz to my campaign's epic bad guy, revised the participants at Emridy Meadows to match my geography, and so on. At the same time, I surreptitiously slipped in some minor story element revisions.
3) I made it obvious early in the adventure that some things that the characters observed just didn't line up with the novel – Elmo was alive but Otis was dead, they couldn't find the tunnel to the moathouse where they expected it to be, and so on. Clearly, the character's sources had made mistakes.
4) Later, some of the Hommlet NPCs provided their own first-hand accounts of some of their exploits, particularly the slaying of Lareth the Beautiful at the moathouse. The details conflicted with those of the novel. Elmo's version and Y'Dey's version also differed significantly from one another! After ten years and a few hits on the head, I guess that the details get a bit fuzzy.
Looking back, I'm glad that I introduced the adventure the way that I did, however, it definitely required a lot of work on my part. I'm disappointed that WotC missed the opportunity to align these two projects, both of which were published the same year. Imagine if Reid's novel was perfectly in synch with Monte's assumed back-story, "as the locals know it"?  If wishes were fishes…
Edit: spelling and typos
Edited by: blakwind at: 4/16/03 8:07:19 pm
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 Monte Cook
Was here before any y'all
(4/16/03 8:51 pm)
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ezSupporter
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Re: Temple of Elemental Evil: The Novel
Quote:
It's tragic to me that WotC was unable to align these two projects.
You're telling me. Encouraged the differences would be more like it.
Monte
http://www.montecook.com |
Andorax
Still here? Wow.
(4/17/03 6:26 am)
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Re: Temple of Elemental Evil: The Novel
Sorry to hear that, Monte. I simply presumed that they weren't able to align them due to schedules (that they were in development at or near the same time is more than hinted at...there's an ad for RttToEE "coming soon" in the back of the novel even).
In any event, between myself and blakwind (thanks, btw) we have both avenues fairly well covered: converting the module to match the novel, and vice-versa.
One thing I really did enjoy about the novel was getting more "into" the personalities of the NPCs involved. Had I read it a couple months earlier, Hedrack would have had a slave girl or two in his quarters, nasty ankle-box included, when my party had reached the Outer Fane.
Also, although it does give away a few things which I count as minor (the secret way into the Temple, for example), it does not give away anything particularly key, imho. The biggest "giveaways" of the novel are some of the powers of the Orb (which the Orb is happy to volunteer to it's bearer anyways) and the tentacle-trapped curtain in the Greater Temple.
The Nodes are only mentioned offhand and are never explored. The coverage of the areas is spotty at best, and any amount of "knowledge" PCs might glean from the novel is utterly overwhelmed by the whole "Hey, that's COOL" factor.
Finally, the "history" from the novel syncs no worse than it would if it had been "played through" by the players themselves. It's a wonderful way to get all of the "value" of having played the adventure as a group, without the time investment (and conversion to 3E) that it would take.
"Whadda ya mean, Orcs get levels too?!?" |
 Infiniti2000
A guitar
(5/22/03 5:39 am)
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ezSupporter
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Re: Temple of Elemental Evil: The Novel
Sorry for the delayed response, but I just finished reading it myself. I agree with all the comments above. The only thing I'll add is that the best part of the book is the interplay between Hedrack and Iuz and Hedrack and Zuggtmoy. It's a great dialog between them and will help any DM get more into the Hedrack character, especially with those little boxes and slave girls. You better believe they will exist IMC. 
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Calendil
A song from the sixties
(5/22/03 7:23 am)
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Re: Temple of Elemental Evil: The Novel
From what I understand, WoTC encouraged differences in all the novels and the original products so as not to give players the ability to read the novel and then predict the flow of the adventure as the DM plays it. The novels, as well, are young-adult oriented from what I could tell and seem to lack the serious dramatic tensions that often play about in both higher-end Fantasy material and the actual modules as they've been played.
I just took it in stride and loved it just because it's Greyhawk. Some characters were vaguely interesting.
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The guy from Belgium
A song from the sixties
(5/22/03 7:35 am)
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Re: Temple of Elemental Evil: The Novel
on a semi-related note
i just got my ands on the novel "keep on the borderlands"
and "tomb of horrors"
can't wait to read through them
both are greyhawk, which i hope will give me a better insight in the whole greyhawk thing, since after RttToEE, i'll be writing my own stories located in greyhawk 
Philip
http://users.pandora.be/Philip/dnd |
deafdungeonmasterRIT
A robot with powers
(5/22/03 3:42 pm)
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Hmmm
Out of curosity.. how does Hedrack behave in that novel?
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Siobharek 
A guitar
(5/22/03 11:13 pm)
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ezSupporter
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Re: Hmmm
Pretty much like he's being portrayed by the majoirty of posters here. He's efficient, intelligent, and very ambitious. And he likes keeping slave girls. Some of his descriptions made me think of Gecko from "Wall Street". He does have a "ruthless CEO" thing going, I think.
And then of course, he gets crushed horribly as the temple collapses. Heh.
Siobharek
...it is a tale
Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,
Signifying nothing. |
Andorax
A guitar
(5/23/03 6:57 am)
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Re: Hmmm
Actually, Siobharek, we never see Hedrack "getting all pasty". The good guys leave the room while he's still begging for his life.
Hence my suggestion in my first post that he has a visit from "big T" in proxy (possably via one of the DDs), gets filled in on "the big picture", and starts his service for the ToAC.
"Whadda ya mean, Orcs get levels too?!?" |
Thomas M Reid
A cup of coffee
(5/23/03 8:08 am)
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Re: Temple of Elemental Evil: The Novel
Quote:
You're telling me. Encouraged the differences would be more like it.
Hey, all! I heard from a friend of mine that this discussion had popped up recently, and I wanted to come see what was being said and offer any information I could if it would help. Let me first say that, as an old-school Greyhawk fan from way back in the very early days of the setting, I approached the writing of the novel as someone who did, in fact, play through it nearly two decades ago. In fact, most of what you read in the novel is taken from our old gaming sessions, and the characters are based on our company of adventurers.
I lost a lot of interest in Greyhawk as a setting in later years, because of some of the changes that were being implemented, and I quit paying as much attention to it as a result. Thus, there are a number of things that I can't tell you with clarity about the "current" state of things. So take what follows with that in mind.
I cannot speak with complete knowledge of what Monte's marching orders were, but from my end, one of the problems that came up as he and I approached these two products was the issue of some of those previously mentioned intervening occurances in the Greyhawk campaign setting as a whole. From my perspective, Iuz was the main adversary in the scheme of things in that region of the Flanness, and he continued to be so after the ending of the original adventure (T1-4). All of the Greyhawk supplements that were released after the From the Ashes box supported this, including Greyhawk Wars, the premise of which was a major war between Iuz and his allies and the various good lands. That was the balance of power when I was fond of Greyhawk, and I wanted to preserve that in my own writing, if for no other reason than that's what I cared about.
However, in the intervening years (and the development of 3E), the people in charge of the setting shifted the focus of power in order to "freshen things up a bit." Correct me if I'm wrong, but wasn't one of the changes that got introduced to the WotC-version of Greyhawk the death of Iuz (again, I stopped paying as much attention, because I didn't care for where things were going, so I don't have the more recent knowledge base)? So Monte was faced with the task of writing a sequel in a setting that no longer had the main adversary. Even so, I also know that he had gone back to some of the original material and saw the hints of Tharizdun's influence in Gygax's writing and wanted to draw on that, so it worked out well in the end, and he created a fantastic adventure.
Of course, the other problem, as some of you have already pointed out, was one of timing. The fact is, the RttToEE adventure had been on the schedule for quite some time when I approached the Book Dept. and proposed a novelization of Monte's adventure, and Monte had already been hard at work on it for a few months. Books came back to me with permission to instead novelize the original adventure, in keeping with the line's theme. I happily accepted, and Monte and I did converse on more than one occasion about where we could make things fit together.
In the end, though, we both realized that the two adventures were going to be significantly different enough that only tiny, cosmetic features could be made consistent (such as who lived and died from the original to the return). He was already very thoroughly immersed in the adventure he was designing, and I already had the story I wanted to write in my head, and we knew that it wouldn't be that hard for DMs to fudge the few tiny details (as you've already posted, above) that would not make sense, so we agreed not to worry about those inconsistencies and went on with our separate work.
Monte may have more to say on this from his point of view, especially regarding what he was encouraged to do with the adventure, but from my perspective as the author, I simply wanted to write about the Greyhawk that I remembered with fondness from c. 1985. So I did.
Thomas
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Andorax
A guitar
(5/23/03 8:18 am)
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Re: Temple of Elemental Evil: The Novel
Hey, thanks for coming...and thanks as well for a great novel! My wife and I thoroughly enjoyed it, and as I mentioned above, it doesn't take all *that* much to bring the two together (the Return and the novel).
I think the thing I'm most excited about is that it can provide the background of having played through it...a wealth of detail impossible without having played it oneself...that either the DM alone can draw upon, or that the players can read for themselves and know of as "history, as the locals retell it".
And oh, if only I'd read this BEFORE my PCs had reached Hedrack. Next time, though...next time.
"Whadda ya mean, Orcs get levels too?!?" |
Infiniti2000
A guitar
(5/23/03 8:47 am)
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ezSupporter
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Re: Temple of Elemental Evil: The Novel
Well, it's not too late for some of us, Andorax. Anyway, since you are entertaining questions, Thomas, what's the deal with Lareth's transformation? Can you provide some idea of what you intended him to be? Andorax suggested some combination of shadow and drider.
Thomas, off-topic, while I have your ear for a second, thanks for a great set of beholder adventures! 
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Siobharek
A guitar
(5/23/03 2:50 pm)
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ezSupporter
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Re: Temple of Elemental Evil: The Novel
Just a quick thank you to Thomas for stopping by. Monte's boards really attract the best and the brightest in roleplaying, and they all prove to be universally good guys (gals - sorry, Sue). And I thoroughly enjoyed the book as well. Just like I played the adventure, too.
Siobharek
...it is a tale
Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,
Signifying nothing. |
TheOutlands
A robot with powers
(5/23/03 6:34 pm)
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Re: Temple of Elemental Evil: The Novel
This novel is pretty much the only D&D novel I own - my daughter has some DragonLance and a Ravenloft or two, tho. I actually bought Monte's adventure because of the poster-map in Dragon. I decided I needed the Hommlet info from the module. Then, I saw the novel - so I bought it, too.
Now, yesterday, my group starts rumblings of "why not run RttToEE for us?" So, today I start reading the module/campaign and the boards. You remind me, "Oh, yeah - I have the novel, too!" Excellent - that should help me "set the tone" a bit better.
In my reading of the adventure, this is the *third* expedition against the ToEE? What does the novel follow/replicate? The second ("all-adventurer assaults") efforts against the Temple? A "variant third" expedition?
BTW - I liked seeing the Wizard "level-up" in-play via the extra Magic Missile in his spell. Would you believe that and the slave-girls are the two things that actually stick in my mind from the novels?
I've got other play-related questions, but I'll do them on a different thread. I remember enjoying the novel, believing it was the only shot *I* would have at the Temple...
...and now I'm going to *run* it!
--Michael<br>
http://outlands.tripod.com<br>
homesteading, survival, self-reliance, and a whole lot more
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Siobharek
A guitar
(5/24/03 3:06 am)
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ezSupporter
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Re: Temple of Elemental Evil: The Novel
This is indeed the third assault on the temple. The first was only moderately succesful: The forces of good had to lock Zzuggtmoy up rather than eradicating her. The second is basically what's described in the novel. The third is, well, the Return.
Siobharek
...it is a tale
Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,
Signifying nothing. |
TheOutlands
A robot with powers
(5/24/03 6:25 am)
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Re: Temple of Elemental Evil: The Novel
Ok - so I could hand the novel off to the new player as part of his background. He's playing a Necromancer (that should be interesting, given the setting) and could have found a diary or such (ie: the novel).
--Michael<br>
http://outlands.tripod.com<br>
homesteading, survival, self-reliance, and a whole lot more
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madfox
A guitar
(5/25/03 11:39 pm)
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Re: Temple of Elemental Evil: The Novel
Side note - Iuz is not killed in Greyhawk I think you are mixing Ivid the Undying with Iuz, the former did die or to be more precise, is presumed to have died. Ivid's empire crummbled and the capitol changed into a very dangerous unapproachable ruin. Now we have a much more subtle villain in that region. Personally I prefer villains that most people consider to be friends anyway
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Thomas M Reid
A cup of coffee
(5/26/03 11:02 am)
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Re: Temple of Elemental Evil: The Novel
Quote:
Side note - Iuz is not killed in Greyhawk
Yeah, after I posted that, I knew I had gotten it wrong, but for the life of me, I know another major player was elminated from the pantheon. Perhaps it is Lolth I'm thinking of, and maybe the official setting doesn't have her killed, but a lot of people treat her as dead due to the events in the novelization of Queen of the Demonweb Pits.
Ultimately, it doesn't really matter; my point was still that the focus of the setting when T1-4 was written was far different than when RttToEE was written. Monte did an outstanding job of creating an adventure that fit well within the context of the current Greyhawk setting, but I felt the need to write the novel to fit how the setting felt 20 years ago. Anyone who played through it back then (the adventure was released in 1985) and then read my novel should have gotten a strong sense of nostalgia. That was the point of the novel line, after all.
Thomas
P.S. Thanks for the compliments on the Beholder adventures! I'm glad you enjoyed them.
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Kenmis
A song from the sixties
(5/26/03 1:43 pm)
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Preservation
Any way we can keep this thread around for a bit? I'd like to show it to my players, but we've prolly got anothe 4 months or so of game left in RttToEE.
Thanks!
Kenmis
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ZansForCans 
A trophy
(5/26/03 7:54 pm)
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Re: Preservation
All recent threads on this board are automatically being archived at my site: zans.clanplaid.net/ . Check out Page 21. It's read-only, of course. Maybe by then there will be a better way to browse it than the growingly unwieldy massive list
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