Against the Cult of the Reptile God

So, im starting a new campaign for a party made up of only 3 players, all of whom will be creating some pretty powerful characters, as I encourage my players to powergame. I would really like to run AtCotRG for this group because I think it has the potential to be the best D&D we've ever played. Specifically, I want to use the kidnaping of one player who would be charmed and secretly working against the others. My problem is in the math. If any one of my players gets kidnaped and charmed, they would role play it tot he best of their ability, and thus, I believe they would wait for the opportune time to turn against the other two. I doubt that they would want to play a campaign where they are serving a weird reptile god, so I think it would essentially be a TPK. I've thought about using a magic item that could allow the other players to uncharm the charmed player, but most of what I've come up with seems like it might not work or could ruin the twist. Does anyone have any ideas/suggestions for how I could make this work?

I got the OSE books (plus the D&D Rules Cyclopedia) a few months back, and grabbed a few classic adventures I'd always wanted to run (Reptile God, Secret of Bone Hill, etc). I assumed I could just run them on the fly, but I've heard differing opinions on each module. This one I've heard could particularly be harsh on B/X players.

B/X in general do I give the PC's an adjustment to AC before playing these adventures or is there something else?

Or should I use OSE Advanced, and should I ever get passed Level 14, find a way to apply those higher levels.

As the title says, and the first time I'll be playing/running The Black Hack. Any advice on running this module or TSR era modules in general?

Hello all!

Looking for some advice.

I'm running Against the cult of The Reptile God today for my players, I'm mostly all prepped and feel good about knowing who they might run into in the town. The only thing I'm slightly confused about is it seems very open ended at when/how players like The Elves or any of the non-cult members will trust the players or how the players will ever know who the cult members actually are. I know it specifically says the elves must know the players captured/attacked cult members before they tell them what they know. so How will my players ever get information and feel confident that who they are targeting is a cult member?

thanks!

**any other tips for running it would be appreciated :) **

Hello, guys. It rings a bell to me that Matt Colville made a video years ago in which he talked about using "Against the Cult of the Reptile God" as a prelude to "Night Below." I might be remembering it incorrectly, and he might have discussed the first module as part of a sandbox and simply threw hooks for "Night Below." Does anyone remember something similar or has connected the modules in some way inspired by Matt? Any ideas are welcome.

I've recently got into the Eberron setting and while the currently published Eberron modules seem a little lacklustre, adapting Against the Cult of the Reptile God seems like a treasure trove of pulp and noire moments. Going to a foreign, unfamiliar town with Shadow Over Innsmouth vibes and culminating in an Indiana Jones style lost temple in the jungle seems like it could be really fun, but I'm not very knowledgeable of the setting and I want to use the lore of Eberron to its fullest potential in this quest. Where could I set the adventure and what would be the best substitute/explanation for the naga and Yuan ti? Is there something that would be a better fit than a snake themed cult? I know this has come up before, but I wanted to respark discussion

Hey everyone, hope you're doing alright.

I've been running a monthly SWN game (soon to be twice monthly) and before playing I had decided that I wanted to run something akin to the classic hexcrawl, and to that end picked up a bunch of old AD&D, B/X, 2e, and even 3e modules to scatter around the map. Eventually we'll get to the usual SWN spacefaring shenanigans but the players are marooned for now.

What I was wanting help with in my title was making sure my conversion of the monolithic starter adventure to end all other starter adventures was as satisfying as the original experience. I already laid some of the groundwork, by making sure that Ramne was introduced earlier so his existence isn't a deus ex machina (mostly on the dim hope they'd head towards Orlane). Things are a bit easier, as I'm using the Codex of the Black Sun as a replacement for psionics. Their first adventure was "The Crucible of Freya", in which they investigated a village's missing hydroponics AI (the sci-fi equivalent of a magic cup that makes harvests more bountiful, as written in the adventure), and severed from the physical world an ancient Arcanist's mind that had been uploaded to a cloud computing network. So this isn't necessarily a hard sci-fi game despite my attempts at generally adhering to the laws of physics in most other areas, think something closer to Star Trek in tone and subject matter.

Anyway, at this point I've established pretty well that other "magical" or "otherworldly" beings can be managed by making them into AI (or Shadows, as I plan to make Explictica Defilus) and the existence of "wizards" isn't really of much consequence. The lizardmen, too, can just be space aliens - as the backdrop is something similar to the premise of Destiny: a long-term, drawn out invasion of Earth. All this being said, if there are any more experienced GMs here that have run the adventure I'd love to hear your advice and suggestions on how to convert the genre to sci-fi from fantasy!

Thanks for reading, and have a great day!

So for the new campaign I decided to take some of Matt's advice and use it from the beginning. This module is by far the best I've played either side of the screen, short and sweet but filled with great writing. I heavily enjoyed seeing how my players interacted with Orlane, and seeing how they dealt with a proper dungeon crawl, something my campaigns have always lacked. It was also very fun to read a module for an older edition of the game, its fascinating that even after all these years the players will still use boards of timber to cross piles of mud, even though it makes no actual difference to them. So if you're a DM wondering what to run next, pick up this module and give it a try I think it will give surprisingly good results.

Hi DCC brain-trust, is there a DCC adventure that has a similar premise to N1 - either directly inspired or just similar - adventure? Thanks in advance.

I’ve got a scan of the original that I bought on DM’s Guild awhile back but, compared to modern design and layout, the adventure is an absolute bear for me to use effectively at the table. I even struggle to meaningfully digest the contents without basically doing a full rewrite/layout.

Does there happen to be a, like. Remaster of this classic module in, really, any form? Something that brings it more in parity with, for example, OSE? Table usability and easy internalization is super important to me these days and I know I must not be the only one who struggles with the original module (though maybe?).

Thanks!

Terror by night! The village of Orlane is dying. Once a small and thriving community, Orlane has become a maze of locked doors and frightened faces. Strangers are shunned, trade has withered. Rumors flourish, growing wilder with each retelling. Terrified peasants flee their homes, abandoning their farms with no explanation. Others simply disappear. . .

Looking to host a game Sunday 8-11pm GMT.

I'm hosting the classic AD&D module "Against the Cult of the Reptile God" this Sunday. Its a module that mixes combat, exploration and an interesting mystery to solve.

Aiming for 4 players, but will still run if there is at least 3.

Each session will be about 3 hours. I expect it to take 3-4 sessions to complete the module. All the dates and times I am flexible on. We can discuss this more over discord.

New players welcome! We can go through the rules as you play.

Whilst I aspire to follow rules as written, the AD&D rulebook can be confusing sometimes and might just use a sensible alternative dice roll instead rather than interrupt the game too much.

The game will be over discord chat with theatre of the mind.

DM me and I will send a discord invite

Start with a level 1 character.

Here's a new version of the second level of AtCotRG Dungeon.

Did with Inkarnate, and it's my third map after doing the Goblin Tomb from a prior video and Level 1.

Here's a link to the source in case you want to add the furnishings directly on the map. (I did mine in Roll20).

Here's the link to Level 1

Hi all,

Really keen to run this after seeing Matt Colville talk about it

Having only dm'd adventures before for 5th edition. This module looks super deadly. What's a good way of prepping players who have only played 5e before so they don't get super put off?

Also are there any issues with running ad&d adventures for b/X rules?

EDIT: Also, any tips to making the Wizard not feel like a Deus ex Machina?

Here's a new version of the first level of AtCotRG Dungeon.

Did with Inkarnate, and it's my second map after doing the Goblin Tomb from a prior video.

Edit: Updated map with a couple of minor corrections. Here's a link to the source in case you want to add the furnishings directly on the map. (I did mine in Roll20).

I was intimidated by this adventure. It was so concerned about the pacing but it turned out I had nothing to worry about. Running for 6 brand spankin newbies. TL:DR at bottom.

They start in Villane. I have them roll to hear rumors. They here 4 out of 6. They get ambushed on the way to Orlane by the thieves guild which they handily dispatched and find a deadly poison. This foreshadows the insta death mechanic at the Golden Grain Inn.

They get to Orlane and I hand them a list of the 27 different locations they can visit. They ALL want to go to different places except 2 of them. In hindsight I should have made them split into groups because running 5 different interactions was a HUGE time sink.

They also ALL happened to pick people that suspected somthing was up with the Church. If I was a better DM I would have switched up what the townsfolk thought on the fly to give them some variety instead of everyone telling them somthing fishy is happening at the church.

However, before they had any of this info, the Paladin said "Somthing weird going on in town? I bet the church has somthing to do with it!" He goes there, gets rebuffed by Misha but is having none of it. He forces his way inside. Misha runs to the meditation chambers and alerts the monks. The Pally says he wants to make like the first track of Wu-Tang Clans groundbreaking album "36 Chambers" and "Bring the Ruckus!". I fight breaks out.

Naturally, Paladins allies want to help so they all decide that they are going to follow up on the church rumors, and discover their buddy is fighting. They kill the monks and search for Misha only to discover she has disappeared (she went out the secret passage in last meditation chamber). Players are all "WTF, where did she go?" and I ended the session to much groaning. Perfect.

Now, the thing is, from an outside perspective these Ratcatchers roll into town, hear some rumors and assault the local church. They don't really have any actual evidence. Misha and the monks just told them to leave. They are violating this sacred place. In truth, they are on the right path.

The Shire Reeve is also a cultist. Since they said they were being loud I was thinking about having him show up with his deputies and some other random cultists (maybe some non cultists too) and demand they surrender themselves to the Baronesses justice. "If you come peacefully I will beg leniency to the Baroness on your behalf! You might be spared the noose!" In reality he will manacle them and send them to Explixitus Defilus to be converted!

I highly doubt they will go for this. It will add some more interesting drama when they meet the family of the non Cultists they killed in the Reeves posse. Good idea? Or should I just let them continue to explore the temple?

TL;DR - Lessoons Learned and Questions.

• For the sake of time, I should have had them split into two groups. 3 at most for the purposes of exploring the town. If you have a group of 4 or less I wouldn't worry about it.

• PC's all went to places that suspected the church. A better DM would have switched up townsfolk opinions on the fly.

• Is it reasonable to have the Constable (a cultist) show up and demand they surrender. Is that plausible to happen so soon after they assault the church? How would he hear about it so fast?

• At the Golden Grain Inn there is a chest in the thieves Guild Leaders room. If I am reading the Module right it says it has a needle trap that out right kills anyone who cant disarm it or not use a key. This seems harsh and I am scared to use it because it's the first adventure. Should I tweak it or let what happens happens?

EDIT: Changed the first Lesson Learned wording to make the advice more clear.

Was inspired by Matt he always talks about against the cult of the reptile god so i really want to play it but i was kinda bumped with the map quality so i made my own. So far both inn's are done and now the village map. I tried to use the description in the adventure to make sure the houses match those, for instanse nr. 19 in adventure state it is cleary a hog farm with some chickens so i made sure there are hogs there.

Hope you like it!

5 Torches Deep Actual Play is a Youtube series where we play through adventures using the system called 5 Torches Deep. This is a Dungeons and Dragons lite ruleset that uses elements of 5e and focuses on an old school vibe where it concentrates on the dungeon delving and the value of your loot is your XP.

We have just released Episode 35:

5 Torches Deep Actual Play - Episode 35 - Against the Cult of the Reptile God

The party find themselves in a new area after working their way through The Hole In the Oak. This is the end dungeon of a module called 'Against the Cult of the Reptile God'. Let's see how they get on....

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Hope you enjoy!

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