I say we do a module that ends with what Gary had in mind for this whole story lines conclusion...could be epic!

Your videos are all among the best I've seen on D&D - I love how well versed you are in all the topics you attack. So sick of starting to watch other reviews and having the old "Well, I uh never actually played this module but ah I read part of it today and there are a few typos and um it looks kinda cool - love the retro artwork!" I love that your reviews offer such a deep understanding - really helps me. Sincere thanks for taking the time to make them.

Your reviews alone are worth watching, but your suggested improvements make these videos must-see!

The problems mentioned with the module didn't bother me back in the day because I didn't run modules in series. Being a young teen at the time, purchasing D&D modules was a "You have to pick one once in a while". So would have this ongoing campaign that I wrote myself, and if I purchased a module, the thing would just get altered and hammered into my personal storyline. I'm sure that's how most of us did it back then. I don't think that I owned a complete series of modules. My modules were all just.. random. Whichever had the coolest covers.

I've wondered about the connection between this module and the obsession some film makers have with giant robot spiders, myself

EXCELLENT! I listened to you review of the whole series. I was already familiar with all of it from playing and running the games in the early 1980's. I must say your ideas for fleshing out the stories and intrigue are wonderful!! It highlights why I'm a substandard DM, in that I lack imagination!! I will return to these reviews for ideas in the future! I have already shared them with some friends.

I'm glad you mentioned Eberron, I play Dungeons & Dragons Online where the setting is Eberron and there is a chain of quests that ties in with The Forgotten Realms, the Underdark, the Demonweb and of course Lolth.

I was a player when our group crashed through Q1 back in 1982 or 1983. As I never read the module I don't know how much it was changed, but I guess the DM didn't like the idea of a demon-goddess getting killed. He juiced her up, but our trump card was a plan by a few good deities supporting us to trap her in one of her mirrors. We just head to whittle her down enough to decide that a tactical retreat was called for - which made her step into the trap set by the other gods. As players, we never figured out a pattern or web, we just kept moving until we finally got to the end - maybe the DM just made sure we got to the climax.

i agree with your insight into this module. great job as always. i really enjoyed this video.

I just finished a year long campaign starting out with the temple of elemental evil and then going all the way through GDQ and ending with the Skein of the Death Mother (dragons foot) all of your videos and reviews have been a key part of my preparation. Thank you Cap!

Thanks for this being an old gamer from way back I have enjoyed your clips.

Getting a player group into a situation where they have to bargain with Lolth herself seems like a bad idea. They either are at a demon goddess's mercy or you do the Forgotten Realms thing, where you provide the players with PCs above level 100, have them obtain the Final Word and the Wand of Orcus, and enable them to destroy an avatar of Lolth. I mean even visiting Lolth's layer of the Abyss, to find out why she neither answers prayers or grants spells anymore is a terrible idea for mortal beings, even if they are among the most senior member's of the institutions they represent, including the clerigy of Lolth and the primary drow wizard college. Mind you, all of this happens in the FR where meeting a deity is something that just might happen, even if you try your best to avoid it. Making contact with Zagyg or Iuz, seems much more sensible and less deadly and is already something only Level 20+ PCs should attempt. I just don't see how Gary Gygax would have turned the finale into a sensible and satisfying ending, under the premise that the PCs would go into the Abyss and meet Lolth, there is no way this could have ended well.

I think hindsight is 20/20 with a lot of this early d&d stuff. Gygax is a bad module writer people say? Sure, maybe by modern standards, but they were making it up as they went back then. Module too brief? Printing costs money, and your profit margin goes down for every page beyond a point because you can’t just keep adding to the price. Gygax didn’t describe things consistently, or was too brief? Funny how we laud modern OSR modules for being brief and to the point. Sutherland took inspiration from a place mat? Its only mocked because we know it - how many other ideas were inspired by weird stuff? Hell I based an entire campaign on one Kate Bush song. It seems clear to me that Gygax wanted to be a module writer but also he had a company to run. ToEE took how long? His business partner, being a practical business person, no doubt wanted Gygax to delegate. I can see him telling Gary that having these module conclusions hanging out there is pissing off fans and impacting sales of other modules. Gary’s intro to this module, saying his plot was too close to ToEE sounds absolutely true- he later said that players would be able to free or further restrain a powerful entity in his version, which is exactly the same as ToEE. And Sutherland didn’t follow on the plot from the previous modules? I bet you anything he felt - or was told - that it would be bad form to usurp Gygax’s creations. I’m not saying this module is good. It’s not, not even when compared to others at the same time. But it isn’t all that worse than a lot of the other stuff. Good review. I agree with the review, I just think we often forget that these were pioneer days.

14:00 In most modern setting's, Loth's palace is powered by magic; in at least one, the engine is fueled by damned souls.

Got this in 1981 and the idea of killing a god was awesome at the time, as was Lolth’s steam ship. I didn’t notice that it was totally incoherent with the rest of the series until a few years later when I read them together more closely.

Just remembered this tidbit. I had the opportunity to purchase the back cover artwork of this module. It sold on eBay for less than $200. Aww...man!

I never realized how much our DM changed in this module. Lolth and her minions ambushed the heck out of us, and it was definitely trippier in the way you suggest it should be.

Even in CRPGs from the era that required mapping, I find that maps that are based on a gimmick become subservient to the gimmick itself rather that what is good for the game (such as a level actually being a crossword puzzle). The Demonweb map is in this category. Making it look like a spiderweb was more important than logic or fun.

I have never run any module as written, Demonweb Pits was no exception to this although I agree this one desperately needed to be altered to fall in line with the story that came before it. As far as your suggestion of removing or altering the mundane monsters on the web you can be assured that I certainly did back when I ran it in the 80's. There was so much awesome in this module in addition to the what were they thinking?

I remember starting this campaign with G1 on Christmas Eve 1980. We finished the Steading of the Hill Giant Chief that night. The adventures grew longer and longer over regular weekend sessions, until we finally slogged through Q1 the following summer. Were I to run it again, I would in all likelihood simply forgo Q1 entirely, and leave Lolth as simply the name of the deity of the local drow, and not a primary antagonist. Even then, G1-3/D1-3 would be quite a long, largely unrelieved run, a real test of player endurance to complete in one go, as presented. Fun? Sure! But hard to sustain, let me tell you, deferring player aspirations for their characters for *many* levels, and in an environment which doesn't exactly provide for the usual support mechanisms, like trainers (if you use them) and such. ='[.]'=

OMG, I haven't heard reference to ultravision in AGES!

Another great video as always. I've been waiting for someone to do a video review of this module for a long time. I've been working on a conversion of the series for a while, and Q1 always stuck out to me like a sore thumb.

Yeah, this adventure still ranks as one of my top fails of TSR. I detest the "web"; anyone wanting to see how such should be approached should research "the ways" that R. Jordan created in Wheel of Time series. My greatest repulsion of the adventure is the whole point of it: Lolth? What in the heck did she have to do with Eclavdra and the House of Eilservs plot to gain control of the surface world? Isn't Eclavdra/HoE actually foes of Lolth and her followers? What a hot stinky mess this whole plot is. However, you touch on this and, I always enjoy your reviews. Keep up the good work.

When I ran this, the party fought their way to Lolth, who used her Unholy Word, sending all the good characters back to the Prime Material Plane. However, even with her AC -10, the Chaotic Evil fighter and Neutral dwarf fighter had no problem whittling down her miserly 66 hit points. A demon lord or prince(ss) slain on his/her own plane is slain permanently, so really that was the end of Lolth. I should have offered the Chaotic Evil fighter the opportunity to claim that layer of the Abyss as his own to rule.

One suggestion after watching this video, could you review The Bloodstone Modules (including The Throne of Blodstone). Thanks!

Another great video man. I see some already mentioned Saltmarsh and Temple of Elemental Evil in requests. I would love to know your experiences with a module not mentioned as much. Cult of the Reptile God from the N series.

I'd love it if you re-worked this particular module like you recommend and make it available for download. :-)

Other modules I'd love to see reviewed.....The Temple of Elemental Evil and the Sinister secret of salt marsh series (U series). Great job as always!

Loth Ship has the same energy as Thanos Copter

This reminds me of Pools of Darkness from the Gold box series. I wonder if this is what it was based on when travelling to another plane...?

good video ,well done

Cpt, have you scene the D&D 3.5 book Expedition to the DemonWeb Pits ? It seams to wrectify many of the issues with this Mod. 🤗

Always looked at this module as a red headed step child

outstanding as usual. and...if time please bump up your review of "alignment" with examples

Funnily enough, before stumbling onto your amazing vids, I was planning writing up a modified version, creating a conclusion that is more inline with the series. Where the PCs would have to almost pick a side. The driving bad guy that wants to usurp Lolth and wage war on the world, or the Demon Queen who wants to keep her stranglehold over the Drow and maintain the power that all sacrifices provide.

700 Likes!! Woot! Well deserved!

Came here cuz I've been doing a multi year long camapign that has been leading to a confrontation with lolth in the demonweb pits. But it's a Spelljammer camapign and while the Spider ship makes 0 sense in the normal adventure background....it's gonna KILL in spelljammer lmao

Thanks a lot for reviewing this series. I went on eBay and grabbed monochromes of D1, D2 and D3 after watching this. No Q1 though, it sounds like a shitshow, although I dig Sutherland's design for the Abyss a lot.

That thumbnail before the video starts looks like Freddie Mercury 😂

What if the giant steam-spider was a Spelljammer? 👀

Talk to Lolth? Parley? Bargain? I can't think of any players back when this was written that would have ever considered any of those with a being such as that. It's one thing to run into intelligent humanoids that might make good allies or can at least be useful in some way. But when you run into the big bad there is no talking, only fighting.

I would make the web an web of like the souls of the people who dare travel the abyss and the material of the web is a wet sticky silk that if a character or monster broke with a sword they would make a saving throw to hold the ends of the silk together or something else. Or the doors could lead to other modules that would be tied to Loith

G'day, Cap. I was wondering if you could tell me the name of the music at the start of the intro. I know the music that makes up the second half but not the part at the beginning. I really enjoy it, it sounds epic and I'd like to try and find a copy of it. Thanks for any help, mate, and thanks for yet another great video.

I always assumed they nerfed the opposition in this module because the Abyss seriously fucks the PCs. Lots of items and spells don't work or don't work right. But yeah, I definitely agree that this module is a mixed bag.

I'll only touch on the double standard I think exists whenever somebody breaks down Sunderland's encounters versus Gary's, by reminding that the latter is guilty on more than one occasion of every offense we hit Sunderland with, and KZfaq and various RPG forums are filled to the brim with people who will call Gary out on same, and rightly so. I will also say that I am not sure Gary is the best source of truth, as - and I love him just as much as you guys do - he seems to have changed his stories frequently over the years, and much of what he said and did seemed to be designed to cover his butt, or to take more credit than was necessarily owed him. Like all of us, Gary Gygax was a complex, flawed human being. And he screwed up as much as he innovated. So let us not approach this with too much bias, either cognitive or confirmation-based. All that said, the thing I take most umbrage with, is the way the story of the towel or placemat, or whatever, is presented. It always seems to be presented as if inspiration is some definitive, stone-set thing where any idea worth chasing appears magically fully formed and realized, and in this light, Sunderland is somehow considered a lesser creator for drawing an idea from a simple source. In reality, inspiration is unpredictable, and the greatest of final concepts can often have the most humble of sources. It is either disingenuous or outrageously ignorant to harp on the humble beginning of the demonweb pit in this way. I can only think that anyone who does so, is himself an unimaginative creature who has rarely experienced inspiration firsthand. As for the ship, yes, that is incongruent (again, see above), but Steampunk, though it didn't yet have a name, had already been a thing since Jules Verne, in regard to the aesthetic of steam-powered machines and other such tech, with echoes down the line through H.G. Wells, TV shows like The Wild Wild West (you do know it was a TV show from the 1960s before it was a movie, right?), and various artworks from European artists contributing to such magazines as the precursor to Heavy Metal, Metal Hurlant.

The other prime worlds I had my players explore them all. I had create more too them

The ship looks more like a tick than a spider

Didn't they get rid of demons and devils after 1st edition due to public pressure? I stopped playing before 2nd came out.

Didn’t anyone at tsr considera reboot of this mod?

I hated the map for this! Thank goodness I didn't DM IT!!!!

"Reskinned Pit Fiend" excuse me, I think you mean "Reskinned Balor"

Is Tharizdun the Elder God?

Skein of the Death Mother??? Totally lacking in imagination. It turned Lolth's Spider Ship into a simple dungeon crawl. I guess some people cannot think outside the box.

When will be your next video?

A lot of these highly rated and legendary modules suck.