Meat Grinder/Killer Dungeon Adventures

[Bullgrit]

Has the "meat grinder" kind of adventure concept been discarded/lost with the current D&D edition? Have the new mechanics or the new culture stomped out the "killer dungeon" concept? Is this a good thing or a bad thing?

Meat grinder/killer dungeon = those adventures in which many PC deaths are expected, or at least probable.

Bullgrit

 

[Desdichado]

No, absolutely not. The Second Edition culture of the game ended meat-grinders, or at least reacted to the fact that meat-grinders were out of fashion and out of favor amongst gamers in general. So... late 80s? In the 3rd Edition era, experiments in meatgrinders made a tentative probing resurfacing act, but they never really came back in a big way, and I think most people who tried even relatively tame meatgrinders like Monte Cook's Return to the Temple of Elemental Evil were reminded strongly of why they gave them up years before.

By the time 4e came out, meatgrinders had been so completely off the radar of mainstream gamer culture that it's hard to make any kind of claim on the current edition having any impact on meatgrinders one way or another.

 

[ExploderWizard]

3E= Rappan Athuk man!!

21 Trolls & a jug of alchemy.

Awesome meatgrinder.

 

[Crothian]

Maybe what we need is a look at what modules are meatgrinders. Tome of Horros is the easy one. But what about the giant and drow series? The slavers? The Bloodstone modules? What exactly are we going to call meatgrinders?

2e did have Return to Tomb of Horrors, the Axe of the Dwarvish Lords, Paladin in Hell. I would call those meatgrinders and probably more. It seems the more generic setting modules were more meatgrinders and not the setting specific ones.

3e had its share. Wizards did not do a lot of modules but Necromancer and Goodman games had their shares of meat grinders.

 

[caudor]

I'm probably in the minority, but I never really liked meat-grinders much. I prefer challenging adventures with no insta-kill encounters. I understand why they are enjoyed by others, but they are just not my cup of tea.

 

[Janx]

I think I agree with Crothian.

As an anti-meatgrinder person, I could see thinking Hobo's summary as a plausible explanation of the history and my mindset.

But that doesn't mean it's accurate, it just reflects my opinion of meatgrinders.

So, going through the pile of modules, establishing what's traditionally considered a meat-grinder (which is in itself, an opinion) would probably answer Bullgrit's question.

 

[ExploderWizard]

I think there is a distinction to be made between a meatgrinder and a killer dungeon.

Tomb of Horrors: Classic killer dungeon. Lots of opportunity to have your character zapped like a moth on a buglight.

Isle of the Ape: Classic meatgrinder. An adventure designed to slowly chew up and spit out high level characters through sheer attrition.

Each of these types of adventures has a different feel but both are very deadly in thier own way.

 

[Desdichado]

Maybe what we need is a look at what modules are meatgrinders. Tome of Horros is the easy one. But what about the giant and drow series? The slavers? The Bloodstone modules? What exactly are we going to call meatgrinders?

2e did have Return to Tomb of Horrors, the Axe of the Dwarvish Lords, Paladin in Hell. I would call those meatgrinders and probably more. It seems the more generic setting modules were more meatgrinders and not the setting specific ones.

3e had its share. Wizards did not do a lot of modules but Necromancer and Goodman games had their shares of meat grinders.

Tomb of Horrors wasn't a meatgrinder, it was just an insane bunch of insta-kill DM gotcha moments strung together.

I think the meatgrinder was always a niche market, although at least at some times it went through various stages of idealization amongst the player base in general. It's been a long time since meatgrinders were commonly played or sold or published, in my experience.

I did forget about a few 2e generic adventures that could arguably be called meatgrinders. I still think that 2e was responding to the same market conditions that led to the popularity of White Wolf during the same time frame, though. And that market paradigm was (among other things) a rejection and swing away from anything resembling a meatgrinder. It was the heyday of the so-called Hickman Revolution in module design. The heyday of the meatgrinder, if there ever truly was such a thing, was sometime in the 80s, and they never really came back except as either nostalgia or niche pieces.

 

[Crothian]

Tomb of Horrors wasn't a meatgrinder, it was just an insane bunch of insta-kill DM gotcha moments strung together.

Fair enough, so what would you classify as some of the classic meat grinders?

 

[Alzrius]

I've been having this debate with several of my friends recently. They've indicated that they'd like me to run a Year of the Zombie campaign, but with lowered lethality. Specifically, they don't like the idea that being bitten by a zombie, even once, means that your character is irrevocably going to die (and zombify) in an hour or so.

Personally, I like the "meat grinder" concept, in that there's a very high chance of a PC of the appropriate level being killed during the adventure. I think that makes it all the more epic for those who survive and see it through to the end. It's those characters on those adventures that are legendary among your group, and are talked about for years afterward.