Night Below is a boxed Dungeons & Dragons campaign adventure, written by Carl Sargent in 1995. Since it came out, it has been played by hundreds, maybe thousands of gamers world-wide. It is now considered a classic; it was reissued due to popular demand in 1999.
This site started as a preface to running my own Night Below campaign. Even before I bought it, I'd seen reviews such as Rick Swan's in Dragon #234 that all agreed that the adventure is a "hack-and-slash extravaganza". Sargent intended it to emphasize negotiation and diplomacy as well (bk I p 9). The reviews are right - the campaign is incomplete as it stands. Either that or I'm an incurable obsessive.
In this project I hope to collect all the suggestions and criticisms of Night Below on one website. This information is for DM eyes only. If you intend to play this campaign, please exit this site by the "back" button of your browser.
For specific suggestions on the three books, go here.
For details on encounters in the Underdark, go here.
For the timeline of major (and minor) events, go here.
For Aardy's article on conversion to 3rd Edition (up to first half of Book II), go here.
For a new optional encounter (tunnel-worms), go here.
For a new optional encounter (drow), go here.
For a new optional dungeon section (derro), go here.
For a new optional prestige class and metamagic feat (derro), go here.
For a new optional encounter (kuo-toa), go here.
For a new optional encounter (troll), go here.
For a new optional master glyph (-spoiler race-), go here.
For a discussion forum, go here.
Rick Swan labeled the first book in the box "the weakest of the three books". He blamed most of that on "the bland rural setting", and that it gave him a feeling that "it's all a warm-up". Most regular posters to rec.games.frp.dnd didn't mind the setting, but they seem to have agreed that the pace was a little slow in places and undernourished in general. Chris Anderson told me that if you play Book I as written, "you won't be able to get a larger sized party up to the levels necessary to deal with Book II." Remy called it 1/5 the adventure and dismissed it as "leading the characters around until they discover the dungeon entrance".
Jelenneth made little impact on players, as she disappears at the beginning and leaves few clues behind until the end. Anderson called her "too nebulous ...to care about" and in March 1999, Trent Knuckles called her "frustrating" (LydD2.304$RB4.714725@news2.randori.com)
Christian Walker also said at that time, "The above ground situation where the marsh was created by [spoiler] struck as damn lame. After finishing that portion of the quest, we all hung our heads in shame." (7bfnfv$b5@chronicle.concentric.net). Anderson gave specifics:
The New Mire is an extremely simple puzzle to solve. New roleplayers figure it out quickly, and the ending encounter leaves you a bit flat. Especially with the build-up of the tale told by the farmboy of blue flaming demons with iron boots.
The Ring of Elemental Command is way overpowered for a low-level party unless you actively use the rules about not revealing it's powers until a dm-contrived situation applies.
The whole Eelhold problems are too contrived for my taste. I avoided them.
Denakhan the Arch-Mage improved it by emphasizing role-playing, and he also added in a dark, evil cottage inhabited by a bone-thin humanoid in dark, tatty robes. (UrYC2.11023$iQ3.13142@news21.bellglobal.com)
In 5 July 1999, Jonathan Grant Bristow Jr posted: "They never remembered the names (I couldnt either)... The names are AWFUL, Tauster the mage is the worst, we went around calling him Toaster they dont have very many good names, most of them look like they came from the random name generators". He also said, "it took so long for us to get to the end of first book that we forgot what we were supposed to be doing... It is a lot of information for the players to remember." (3780D733.2C8E89DF@yahoo.com)
Rick Swan didn't think much of the poster maps. There is a "shortage of dead ends and multiple pathways - not to mention the absence of geysers, sinkholes, and other geologic obstacles". This is only truly relevant to Book II, where it can also be extended to the overall dungeon: "Night Below doesn't make for much of a maze". Alan Kohler found its linearity "constricting" (34846a58.0@newsread1.dircon.co.uk): "the setting the boxed set puts the characters in won't allow for much credible deviation" (61rvd9$b0g@mars.hyperk.com).
Book II has proven to be the section least popular among average players. Christian Walker, Remy, Chris Butcher, Alan Kohler - all deride it as a "hack fest". Even fans have described the atmosphere as oppressive and over-gory (see the campaign links below). It is certainly deadly, and restocking supplies down here is a problem; where's the marketplace? Aardy DeVarque emailed with what I think is the core issue: compared to Book I, Book II lags in NPC interaction, and lacks in comic relief.
Apparently that book serves to weed people out ("at the end of book two, most of us just don't care anymore" -Christian again) because there are few comments about Book III. SundanceKG did comment on the endgame 22 April, 2000: "the last 4 towers [of Domination] were extremely repetitive... it becomes a rehash of the City [of the Glass Pool] attacks" (20000422201121.10423.00001825@ng-cn1.aol.com)
Rick Swan generally liked the encounters; in fact, he viewed them as the strongest facet of the game. However, "sometimes Sargent simply plops a monster in a room, forcing the DM to come up with the monster's personality and tactics". Remy felt even more strongly that every encounter was picked out of the MM without any sense of aesthetics.
Remy also complained that "Everything in the campaign is explained with magic". Peter Miller and Steven Taylor noted that there was an awful lot of treasure flying around down here (4vrdjd$mt9@news.inforamp.net, 32231B56.40F4@interserv.com), so the latter "just reduced the amount of gold and added in some unrelated side adventures to make up for the intended xp".
Steven Taylor also wrote, "One of the plots integral to the storyline involves a serious, time-is-of-the-essense situation, but the main plot leaves it for long periods of time. You may get players rushing to fix this surface problem and getting themselves in too far too fast. In this game, that will probably equal dead PC's." (5ahs91$p73@juliana.sprynet.com)
No, it does not suck. If I thought it was unsalvageable, I wouldn't have spent so long compiling suggestions for it. The encounters are excellent, the monsters interact with a depth rarely seen in an RPG module, and the villains are very well-done. Night Below is also expandable; unlike D1-3, in Night Below a DM who knows what s/he is doing can detail dozens of additional, new caverns without leaving the strands of the plot. The atmosphere of some parts is nearly unparalleled. And Carl Sargent shows his experience in describing madness (Iuz the Evil) and underworld non-evil elves (The Shadow Elves). Only D3 and its sequel in Dead Gods can be compared to this in depth and atmosphere.
For character classes, the party should include a specialty priest, a mage, and some fighters. Rupert Boleyn (37e050bd.7519933@news.paradise.net.nz) adds:
Any thieves really should be multi-classed or have an insane Dex (so they can hit with a bow), because otherwise they won't have a whole lot to do. I'd have a ranger rather than a druid if you want a wilderness type character, because that way at least they won't feel too out of place later on.
Another point: If you look at the NPC's stats you'll notice that as a rule they are very good. This and other factors means that you can be very generous with starting PC's stats. However there is no need to give them better than normal starting cash/gear. They'll earn it quite quickly.
You could also make the druid a specialist in the Underdark. The Complete Druid's Handbook has one called the "Grey Druid".
As for non-human races, an elf is practically essential for Book II, and a gnome would be helpful. This should come as a relief to the players, because in Book I, demihumans won't be much trusted in rural Haranshire. The halflings and surface elves active in Night Below are slavers and thieves (I.52, II.35). Only one dwarf lives in a village (Old Grizzler of Milbourne) and although he's treated well, no-one much cares about him. Dwarves do better among the mining population, where (at least historically) dwarves like Old Grizzler have worked alongside men, and worked hard too (I.16).
It is standard for designers to recommend bounds for the level of the party, and Night Below is no exception - but as usual not in enough detail. The fifth-level merrie men who trashed the orcs of Book I will certainly find their match in the deepspawn of Book II. Accordingly the DM ought to plan out when he wants the party to hit certain obstacles.
Aardy DeVarque posted to the newsgroup: "Don't panic if the PCs gain a level per game session or two. The module is
designed to do that, and the built-in challenges are commensurate with that.
" His party had few problems up to the seventh level of experience. Then he wrote to me about the deepspawn. So that's one milestone: deepspawn, 7-8th lvl. Following that they went through the slime caverns, but nearly got trounced by the slaver party. Room 16, 9th lvl.
The Shadow Dragon is a PC killer if treated cavalierly. It killed one of Joost's party, which consisted of 6 7th-level PC's who had prepared themselves for Shadow Breath. Alan's group were higher level, but did not prepare, and came close to TPK.
Heather Lickliter's group has completed the adventure; it took them 3 years, over which time they passed over a number of NB hazards. I'm not sure which ones, since the blog started on the hither shore of Book III. I suspect they left out the Dark Isle, Szandur's Isle, and the optionals. I commend the players for their resourcefulness under pressure, and their DM for her quick reaction time to her players' ideas.
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Others have been down this road before. Some have tried and tested house rules. Some have even hit upon an atmosphere for the setting, which will help you when you are making up encounter and room descriptions. Of course, they all have spoilers, but then, if you are a player, you shouldn't be reading this far anyway...
in the area of the Great Dale, about half way between Uthmere and Bezentil around the 'D' of the word Dale on the large scale FR map from the boxed set". Dead. Moved from http://home.rmi.net/~stephenw/rpgs/pbem/anb/ around February 2000 and last updated 14 June 2001. At the hook horrors.
Dan Eveland reported in early September 2001 that this site takes up 50 double-sided sheets (100 pages!) when printed to PDF. Since it's not exactly map or illustration intensive, that makes it larger than any given one of the original books... Hopefully I've organised it well enough that you can dip into the sections you need without slogging through unnecessary rubbish.
17 Feb 2007: Li Mei wrote to send me the "These Bastards Must Die" song. Now I will store it here. 25 Feb 2005: Grassy Knoll wrote to update the link.
1 Oct 2003: Lily wrote informing me of a site-switch. Apparently this site is sending 90% of her site's traffic. I've received other e-mails, to which I have responded in kind. I'm flattered that this site is still getting read! 7 Oct: While my attention is back on this site, I noticed some useful feedback here and there; the "Suggestions" page has all that. 16 Oct: Heather's back. 13,25 Nov: thanks to Richard Finch and Jim Hoover for notifying me of two new sites.
6 Jan 2003: Heather wrote back saying her site isn't dead, it's just resting. Monty Python wisecracks aside, apparently the campaign is ongoing; maybe they're going to mop up the isles they bypassed last time, we'll see. I also found Saif's new domain, after years of searching, but it turned out to be a tombstone for his campaign, which is a shame. I've also done a number of updates thanks to some help provided on the forum (Scrub-approved as of August 2002!). And I've removed some monster conversions from the 3E page, now that Tome of Horrors is out.
4 May 2002: Heather's group has FINISHED BOOK III. Repeat: they have FINISHED NIGHT BELOW. A stunning achievement, rarely performed, and never before performed on the 'Web. Huzzah! 4 August: She (and others) deleted their sites. Bah. But Leslie White's back again...
6 October 2001: Two years of illumination! Today, Jess Heinig notified me of his NB site, so take a look. 10 November: new tunnel worm encounter. Influenced by a movie... muhahah... 29 March 2002: new link, to Lily's PBeM. 1 April: fixed a link in underdark1, added a link in the NB3e page. Thank you to Yeran and Darin for pointing these out :^)
10 June 2001: I couldn't leave well enough alone: I added some stuff to the Derro section. Take a look! 15 June: Stephen Wales emailed (thanks!) and assured me that his site wasn't dead, just moved. 24 June, 28 July: I read up more on derro and fixed its discussion here. 8 July: Illithid advice on this page. 1 August: link to new glyph. 4 August: Updated the links (thanks Mike Schupenberg, whose site had a bunch I'd missed), and also shuffled the information to create a new "general suggestions" page. 15 August: kuo-toa and troll encounters.
29 November 2000: Third Edition is finally here... and that means a new project on converting Night Below to it. Since I haven't yet made the switch, we're starting with Aardy DeVarque's comments in RGFD. 19 Feb 2001: linked to FR FAQ and made a Humour section. And many updates to 3E and the Underdark based on Aardy's play-testing.
16 October 2000: My God, can you believe this site's been up for over a year?? Anyway for this "anniverary update" I mused on: whence did Sunkenhome get its name, and how much do the quaggoths know about it? I also discussed the Evolution of the Derro Savant, just to bore you (again) with how Night Below is Sargent D&D, not Gygax D&D. And of course I had another peek around the links. Big Brother Is Watching. He Knows When You Update Your Site.
25 June 2000: Mostly to the links. I noted that the Broken Spire page is back, added a couple of links, and divided them all by campaign world. I also revamped the origins of the derro (Underdark section).
Finally, to everyone who cited my page on UseNet or wrote to me personally - THANK YOU !! I love you guys -
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