2e Boxed Sets (Forked Thread: When did I stop being WotC's target audience?)

[Psion]

This deserves a fork:

Forked from: When did I stop being WotC's target audience?

Holy crap. Seventy?! Wow. And here I am with only, what. . . 3? Eesh. Plus some 1e, a couple for 3e. . . it is high time I went hunting for more boxiness, methinks. Boxy goodness, w00t!

I love the ones with stuff in them. Like, non-booklet stuff. Maps, counters, whatever. Love it.

I still keep my small selection of 2e boxed sets close at hand for gaming, and still use them today. Some weren't so great (I understand I didn't miss much by missing things like the Horde boxed set.)

But I have some awesome boxed set stuff:

Planescape Planes of Law/Chaos/Conflict. Packed with great concepts for adventuring sites, imaginative takes on the outer planes, maps, and concept art.

Spelljammer: Okay, I've come to think Spelljammer has real weaknesses as a setting... but it was a neat little sandbox. On top of the books, it has a map of the rock of Bral (a fantasy outpost on an asteroid), and pictures and maps of all the cool little spelljammer ships.

Blood War: Another Planescape boxed set that pulled back the curtains on fiends and their eternal conflict. It even had a comic on it. Honestly, though, it probably didn't deserve to be a boxed set.

Kara Tur: Not a big FR fan, but I was a big 1e OA fan; it was nice fleshing out the setting.

Council of Wyrms: Yeah, the product that gave us half dragons. But they were cool then. Still, the idea of actually playing dragons was a heady one, but I can see it wouldn't have staying power.

Return to the Tomb of Horrors: Cool little boxed set that even had a reprint of the original in it. Had old style "this is what you see" booklet in it.

Night Below: This adventure had 3 booklets in the set; I always found #2 really weak. But I manage to salvage much of it. I like the little event sets.

Ruins of Undermountain: Still one of my favorite boxed sets and super-dungeons. I loved the huge fold out maps (though in truth, they are a little impractical... hard to hid behind your GM screen), and it also had some cool little dressing/encounter cards.

Ruins of Undermountain II: Not as good as ROU, the maps aren't as nice. But it added some neat concepts to ROU.

Rod of 7 Parts: Another adventure boxed set with booklets and a creature book. Probably didn't need to be a boxed set, but a fun epic adventure. Unlike RttToH, I actually got to run this one!

So, what boxed sets do you have in your collection? What's cool (or not) about them?

 

[DaveMage]

There were 10 or so box sets for Al-Qadim, mostly adventures, which were pretty cool.

However, other than the Planescape ones (which I love), my favorites include Undermountain and Return to the Tomb of Horrors.

 

[Crothian]

Dark Sun and Al Quidem had a lot of box sets for them. I have a number of them. I have all the Planscape box sets except Plans of Conflict. I have Return to Tome of Horros, Rod of Seven Parts, and Council of Wyrms. I have a number of them for Spell Jammer and Birthright as well. I think I have one of the Ravenloft Box Sets. There are a lot of them, and they are in boxes.

 

[Psion]

Ooh... yeah, forgot several adventures.

And Dark Sun and Ravenloft.

 

[DaveMage]

And Mystara (which went 2E)
And Red Steel
And Grayhawk (City Box Set, Wars!, and From the Ashes)
And a ton of FR box sets (including Ruins of Myth Drannor, Lots of Regional Box Sets)

 

[Voadam]

City of Greyhawk: had a thousand NPCs and described urban areas I got mileage out of it when my PCs went to the city. It also had a set of great one page cardstock adventures that I used a bunch of.

From the Ashes: Greyhawk reboot to a darker evil overflowing age. I liked the great kingdom undead fiefs, the fiends on the loose from the active and conquering Iuz and the depth it devoted to fleshing out the GH pantheon.

I picked up two spelljammer boxed sets post 3e, brought back fond memories from when I played in that setting and flew a hammership. Nothing like a flying shark ship to carry your mercenary PCs around in fearsome style.

Ravenloft the original black box boxed set. Evocative gothic horror mish-mash D&D with amazing cool art. Meshed well with my DMing style and I loved it, ran long campaigns there.

Forbidden Lore was a fun ravenloft follow up with the Tarokka deck and egyptian dice divination game and extra setting tidbits.

Castle Forlorn was eh for me.

I forget if any of Mayfair Games' Role-aids boxed sets were 2e or if they were 1e, close enough for government work.

I loved the whole Demons line including the boxed set Demons II and the archangels one.

Similarly To Hell and Back had fun little settings like Dante's Inferno Hell.

Archmagic provided cool 10th level magic spell rules and epic feeling high level spell effects.

Basic D&D's Hollow World setting was a cool mish-mash of lost cultures.

I refered to my planescape pdfs often in my high level 3.5 game I ran.

Those are the ones that come to mind off the top of my head.

 

[Psion]

Forbidden Lore was a fun ravenloft follow up with the Tarokka deck and egyptian dice divination game and extra setting tidbits.

That's a favorite too. I was actually considering breaking that out for Halloween.

I forget if any of Mayfair Games' Role-aids boxed sets were 2e or if they were 1e, close enough for government work.

They were 2e. I only have the demons one. Really, in retrospect, the Demons set/series didn't do much for me.

 

[DaveMage]

Ok, here we go - I'll try to list all 2E box sets:

Core
Deck of Priest Spells
Deck of Wizard Spells (I think - I don't own this one)
Night Below (Adventure)
Dragon Mountain (Adventure)
Rod of Seven Parts (Adventure)
Return to the Tomb of Horrors (Adventure)
Castles (3-D buildings)
Dungeons of Mystery (3-D Buildings)
Cities of Mystery (3-D buildings)
Strongholds (3-D Buildings)
Introduction to Advanced Dungeons and Dragons
Tale of the Comet (Adventure)

Al-Qadim
Land of Fate
City of Delights
Golden Voyages
Assassin Mountain
A Dozen and One Adventures
Secrets of the Lamp
Ruined Kingdoms
Corsairs of the Great Sea
Caravans
Cities of Bone

Birthright
Campaign Setting
Cities of the Sun
Havens of the Great Bay
Naval Battle Rules
The Rjurik Highlands

Dark Sun
Campaign Setting
City by the Silt Sea
The Ivory Triangle
Revised Campaign Setting
Mind Lords of the Last Sea

Dragonlance
Tales of the Lance
Dwarven Kingdoms of Krynn

Forgotten Realms
The Ruins of Undermountain
The Ruins of Undermountain II
City of Splendors
Arcane Age
Forgotten Realms Campaign Setting
Menzoberranzan
Maztica
The Horde
The Ruins of Myth Drannor
Empires of the Shining Sea
Lands of Intrigue
Elminster's Ecologies
Spellbound
The North

Lankhmar
Rules and Campaign Setting

Planescape
Campaign Box Set
Planes of Law
Planes of Chaos
Planes of Conflict
Hellbound
Player's Primer to the Outlands

Ravenloft
Campaign Box Set
Forbidden Lore
Campaign Setting (Revision)
Masque of the Red Death
Castles Forlorn
The Nightmare Lands
Bleak House
Requiem: The Grim Harvest
A light in the Belfry

Spelljammer
AD&D Adventures in Space
The Legend of Spelljammer
War Captain's Companion
The Astromundi Cluster

Also, 5 Mystara and 2 Red Steel - I'll update later.

 

[Artifact]

A few favorites:


Forgotten Realms Campaign Setting

• City of Splendors

I regret never picking up Ruins of Undermountain but I really like City of Splendors (the most in-depth look at Waterdeep—ever). I had Cityscape Ruins of Myth Drannor, and Ruins of Undermountain II but have lost them over the years.


Spelljammer "Adventures in Space"

• Legend of the Spelljammer

I had Astromundi Cluster and War Captain's ?? at one time but have lost them over time. SJ is one of my favorite "mega" settings of all time.


Ravenloft (original release)

• Forbidden Lore
• Masque of the Red Death
• Requiem: The Grim Harvest
• Nightmare Lands

I enjoy Masque of the Red Death more than the core RL setting. Nightmare Lands is one of my favorite boxed sets of all time (rules for nightmares and stuff ).

Council of Wyrms
Dragon Mountain
Red Steel
Tales of the Comet
Return to the Tomb of Horrors

For being chock full of kobolds, Dragon Mountain was murderously hard. Playing dragons (even half-dragons) in Council of Wyrms was a blast. Tales of the Comet was unique (for me) in that it used D&D rules in a fantasy setting. As for Tomb of Horrors, the facsimile is just that, an exact copy of the original (I have one); also, a killer adventure (classic Gygax ).


Planescape Campaign Setting

• Planes of Chaos
• Planes of Law
• Planes of Conflict
• Hellbound: Blood War

Still remember when the gamestore clerk called and left this message: "Just calling to confirm, your game
is in." He didn't want to say "hell" (as in Hellbound) over the phone .


Mystra Camapign Setting

• Karameikos: Kingdom of Adventure
• Glantri: Kingdom of Magic

A favorite setting of mine from the D&D Basic days. Never quite captured the same feel as the "Known World" though.

 

[Psion]

Ok, here we go - I'll try to list all 2E box sets:

You also need to opine on which are cool.