White Plume Mountain

Special #S2

by Schick, E. Gary Gygax

An Adventure for Character Levels 5-10:This module contains background information, referee's notes, player aids, a complete map level, and a cutaway view of the mountain complex. WHITE PLUME MOUNTAIN is from the Special ("S") series; like others in this series, it is meant to stand on its own and is a complete ADVANCED DUNGEONS & DRAGONS adventure. The recommended number of players is four to ten, with levels ranging from fifth to tenth.White Plume Mountain has always been a subject of superstitious awe to the neighboring villagers. People still travel many miles to gaze upon this natural wonder, though few will approach it closely, as it is reputed to be the haunt of various demons & devils. The occasional disappearance of those who stray too close to the Plume reinforces this belief.Thirteen hundred years ago, the wizard Keraptis was searching for a suitable haven where he could indulge his eccentricities without fear of interference. He visited White Plume Mountain, going closer than most dared to, & discovered the system of old lava-tubes that riddle the cone & the underlying strata.With a little alteration, he thought, these would be perfect for his purposes. The area already had a bad reputation, & he could think of a few ways to make it worse. So, taking with him his fanatically loyal company of renegade gnomes, he disappeared below white Plume Mountain & vanished from the knowledge of men...

Genres: Role Playing Games, Fantasy, Gaming, Dungeons and Dragons, Games

12 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1979

Reviews

[Jason Koivu · Rating 4 out of 5]

* * * If you're going to be using this, you shouldn't be reading this, because spoilers abound! * * *

Like my stalker of an ex-girlfriend, White Plume Mountain was one crazy trap after another. This was one of those adventures for people that liked brain teasers. It was all about the tricks, traps, and noggin tappers.


This wacky river has Mr. Loincloth scratching his helmet!

In this intermediate level module for the Dungeons & Dragons game system, one wrong move could get you killed, so why enter a deathtrap? The compelling force meant to excite the players and drive them on further into the heart of a boobie-trapped volcano was the collection of three priceless magical weapons that had been stolen, secreted within the mountain, and surrounded by superstitious mystery.

Once inside the players would meet with riddling sphinxes and golems, hypnotically painted spinning cylinder tunnels, a metal heat field, a frictionless room, the necessity for Super Mario-esque platform jumping over liquid-hot magma, and numerous magical beasts protecting treasure.



The designers of this slim 16 page booklet really went for the atmosphere. There is a legend of the mountain's mystery at the back all done up in a scrolly font. There's plenty of pictures and diagrams to explain what might be mistaken on the map, as some of the rooms and traps were somewhat complex. The module included some great artwork as well. My cousin drew nipples on all of the females in my copy, which really added a touch of class...

Unrealistic and oddly geometrically laid out, this crazy-go-nuts dungeon is supposed to be the creation of a powerful wizard, who is - as far as I can tell - long dead. So why are all these intelligent beings sticking around in these horrible living conditions? STOP ASKING QUESTIONS! Just assume that they're still under his spell and get on with the fun!

Facts is facts, White Plume Mountain relied too much on blind faith or deus ex machina. Players are never fond of being told they can't do something, like use a spell that would easily get them out of a tough situation just "because." Even the simplest of explanations as to why they can't do something they normally can goes a long way in soothing their frustration. If the rest of this module wasn't as much fun as it is, it wouldn't have become such a classic.

[David Sarkies · Rating 4 out of 5]

An adventure into the heart of a volcano
20 October 2012

This was one of the first Advanced Dungeons and Dragons modules that I owned, namely because it was cheap. As a 13 year old with very thrifty parents, it was the only module in the ship that I could actually afford. It is one of those strange things that when you are a kid you must have everything as soon as possible (such as Commodore 64 games) yet twenty years down the track you suddenly discover that you have all those wonderful things that you wanted when you were a kid and suddenly they are not all that wonderful anymore.

Not that this module isn't wonderful, it is, though fitting it into a campaign can be tricky, but still quite fun. The one thing I remember is the large picture/map at the beginning with all of the dangers that surround White Plume Mountain. The adventure itself is set in the mountain, however I always wanted the players to encounter that skeletal dragon, or the hut of Thizgizzard the witch. That is when the Dungeon Master's imagination comes into play. Mind you, it would be a number of years before Ed Greenwood would develop the Draco-lich, and since that time a number of people have developed the area that surrounds the mountain (though unfortunately I cannot provide you with a link to any specific site because I don't know of one off the top of my head, though I'm sure I can Google it, it is just that at this point in time I am way to lazy to do so).

I guess this is the module that all Dungeons and Dragons adventures should be. It has a myriad of monsters, devious traps, and three powerful weapons to collect at the end. From what I can remember (and it isn't that I don't have easy access to the module, though I believe it is currently sitting in a folder 700km away from me, in a plastic sleeve so that its condition does not deteriorate too much) is that there is not really one big bag guy, but there is one big bad sword (read Stormbringer) that I suspect the good characters that you are supposed to play shouldn't be taking and running off to slay people with (and I always wondered about the sword, considering it was evil, so if it was evil, why would the players want it, unless they were evil as well).

Look, I could go in and criticise some of the more outlandish aspects of this module, but I won't simply because it is a classic. The more modern modules where we try to make the adventures more realistic, and treat them more like strategy games where we have to infiltrate some enemy base, or go on a Tolkeinesque quest are all well and good, but to sacrifice the variety of strange and wondrous creatures, and Super-Mario type traps sort of takes some of the life out of the game as a whole.

[Ken · Rating 4 out of 5]

If I were asked to run one D&D adventure to give someone a feel for the game, this would be the one I'd run. Known as the "funhouse" dungeon, the encounter variety is unparalleled. There's all kinds of problem solving here, from solving a sphinx's riddle to dealing with a frictionless floor to timing getting past geyser spouts that fire every 5 and 3 minutes. And no review of this module would be complete without discussing Blackrazor, a great homage to Elric's Stormbringer. The only reason it doesn't achieve 5 stars is because it is a bit too gimmicky in places, specifying that certain powers of the pcs "just won't work" to make the problem solving more challenging. I understand the intent behind that, but such tactics don't play well at the table.

[Christopher · Rating 5 out of 5]

I still remember as if it was yesterday:

"Round she is,
yet flat as a board,
Altar of the Lupine Lords,
Jewel on black velvet,
Pearl in the sea,
Unchanged but 'erchanging,
eternally..."

[Michael · Rating 3 out of 5]

7/21/2024: On this read-through, I think Lawrence Shick, the author of this module, probably did insufficient play-testing, as he demands at several points that players read his mind to solve the puzzles, and he doesn’t allow for the many creative solutions they will try that aren’t covered in his descriptions. One other thing – this is actually a VERY short module, when you look at it purely as text and maps. Fortunately, TSR padded it with illustrations from several of their best artists, which may actually have been the real reason I loved it as a kid. Jeff Dee gives us a color front cover in his usual superhero style, as well as a nice use of negative space in an interior depiction of a vampire. The back cover depiction of the magic sword and the interior depiction of the “final” boss is by Bill Willingham. Erol Otus has quite a number of pictures, each oozing with his grotesque dread (strangely the exception is his illustration of the new monster – which is specifically described as “grotesque” in the descriptive text). We also see the work of Dave Sutherland, David S. LaForce, Jim Roslof and supposedly Darlene (Pekul). If that last is true, it is unsigned, and I couldn’t recognize her style among the works here based on looking back at signed illustrations in the DMG, but maybe better art historians than I can clarify this.

Original review 6/26/2016: As I understand it, the “S” series of modules was intended for higher-level gaming, although today 5-10th level doesn’t seem all that high. S1 was written by Gary Gygax, apparently when he got mad at his players one night and decided to kill them all off just to show he was still the boss-man. This one is less mean-spirited, but still seems awfully tough to me for the levels (especially the lower levels) for which it is supposedly devised.

The basic structure of the adventure is a classic dungeon-crawl. The players are seeking three stolen magical weapons of great power (so great that it seems likely that most players will choose to keep them rather than return them to their rightful owners), which are hidden in a man-made cave inside of a volcano. The cave has three branches, at the end of each is one of the items, guarded by a really powerful monster. Along the way, there are various traps and lesser guardians to overcome, many of which require some cleverness in addition to brute force. The mountain is distant enough from the nearest town that it will be difficult for the players to extricate themselves for healing and spell recovery between sessions, although a generous DM will allow this.

Now, this is more or less my favorite format for a D&D adventure, and I was pretty fond of this module, one of the few I actually ran during my tenure as a DM. The problem is that it really was too demanding for my pre-pubescent players to get through without a lot of help from me. Older players might have been better about checking for traps or coming up with creative ways to deal with their armor magically heating up as they proceeded down a corridor, but mine just got frustrated. I think if I were a DM today, I would set a higher minimum level and make sure that my players were prepared by giving them some mental challenges to work through together as tests.

[Francisco · Rating 4 out of 5]

A really fun "funhouse" dungeon, this is just a small location with puzzles to solve and McGuffins to get in the shape of three amazing weapons, Wave, Whelm and Blackrazor which have become legendary in AD&D, even if Blackrazor is clearly a ripoff of Elric's Stormbringer from Moorcock's tales. This isn't really Schick's fault though as this was never meant to be published, it was just something he sent in to TSR to apply for a job as a kind of design portfolio. Well, TSR liked it so much that they published it without even letting him revise the adventure. It published in the S series, which clearly had the idea of publishing individual dungeons with S1 being The Tomb of Horrors. 

It is also the first adventure module published by TSR for AD&D that was not created by Gygax, the first of many, of course, but still significant because of that, there had been D&D modules like Mike Carr's In Search of the Unknown published by TSR before, but no AD&D modules. As you can imagine, seeing as this was kind of a showcase dungeon, there isn't much of a plot here, but what there is is a lot of fun rooms with puzzles to solve and monsters to defeat as well as unique loot to get. Schick also writes in an entertaining fashion, making this a really fun adventure to read.

[Michael · Rating 4 out of 5]

A fun but dangerous adventure. I liked that you had to use your head to figure out the puzzles rather than hack and slash your way through the adventure. I also wanted Blackrazor for myself.

[Ross Kitson · Rating 5 out of 5]

Review for expanded edition (1980) which had more illustrations.
By all accounts this quirky module was submitted by Lawrence Shick in hope of a job at TSR. For me it holds powerful nostalgia value as, when we were 13y old AD&D players, this was our go to adventure. Whether it was Blackrazor, (Stormbringer) or the utter bizarre nature of the adventure, or whether back in the day we just liked a good old dungeon held together by minimal logic I'm not sure. Yet love it we did, along with B2, X2, and Tiegel Manor.
With the slim premise of retrieving three mythical weapons (and in a campaign whose players would really give them back?) the PCs enter a single level dungeon and make their way through an iconic selection of traps and monsters existing solely to thwart them (Keraptis being cut from the same cloth as Acererak). With minimal dungeon ecology, it's a product of its time and v much what is now dubbed a fun house dungeon.
And what fun. Giant crabs in a puncturable bubble surrounded by boiling water. Inverted ziggurat full of tons of monsters. Rooms of darkness with lurking vampires. Traps of heating metal, frictionless floors, oil covered tunnels. Discs on chains above instant death lava. A strange halfling wonderfully illustrated by Bill Willingham.
Some awesome illustrations by Otus and Dee and many of the old guard (excepting Dave Trampier).
Allover, every bit the classic craziness I remembered. 5 stars.

[Marc · Rating 3 out of 5]

It's a fun read, but kind of a terrible adventure. The rooms are just death traps, and you're left wondering how this giant crab can survive, like does the ogre magi collect peasants from the country side and feed them to it? It seems like a lot of upkeep waiting for the day when an adventurer finally completes the Ultimate Ninja Warrior platforms of doom to get to the room where the giant crabs are kept.

Anyways, the back cover looks like a sweet metal album cover, and back in Jr. High I would stare at it and pretend I had a fantastic galaxy sword... Well, still do, except I don't have the module anymore.

[Jamie Perez · Rating 4 out of 5]

This one gets a little up-rated for nostalgia. I recently got to play through this one with some friends (the 5th edition update + some home brew adds and alterations) as a player. Luckily I remembered nothing of the mechanics or secrets and got to experience the memorable bits in a game setting. Once we wrapped, I had to go back and read the original — what a wild thing this is (at least within its context). I read / have the early 80s edition that boast added illustration and a full color cover but is still the original AD&D text.

[Ebbie · Rating 3 out of 5]

It's ok, though I wonder why it's in the S series. Maybe it will make sense after I read the last 2. Or maybe because it's a module where players have to use more wits? Unsure. To me, modules of this era where all a bit wacko in how much players had to think to get away from certain death.

Noteworthy: the heating-metal room, the water membrane room, the rotating cylinder corridor.

I also like the idea of a lair in a volcano, and how the environment informed the terrain and intricate traps in some of the rooms.

[Valuxiea · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great Classic Funhouse Adventure!

[Mindy · Rating 4 out of 5]

No pregenerated characters, but otherwise pretty deece.

[Messorem Animarum · Rating 5 out of 5]

An all-time classic funhouse dungeon! Perfect for old-school play. Highly recommended.

[Waldo Varjak · Rating 5 out of 5]

“The recommended number of players is four to ten, with levels ranging from fifth to tenth.” The first directive of the instruction is a throwback to the old days of how this game was understood to be played: players were expected to bring characters (of a certain level) along with them and not be themselves restricted to that certain level of their characters’ thinking/skill. This was a group game in the early days and the individuals of that group, which included the Dungeon Master, knew each other (or very soon did) by playing together. If you are coming from a paradigm of play that considers this player skill collaborative effort verboten, or if you prefer your group to play as a bunch of individuals rather than as a team of players, you may not understand or like this game. Many people do not, and are quite vocal about it.

I am doing this game review from memory dating back to 1982. There were five of us playing, without henchmen, plus the Dungeons Master whose word was rule. He was the oldest of us by at least 3 years. At the time this game was published and how it was intended to be played, his role included being a player to match his wits with us. This was a player engrossing game – as engrossing as actively reading an interactive novel. This game had yet to become the rules immersive piano roll it has become. The piano, then, still needed diceless player skill and the pooled common sense of a group to play the adventure module.

Players in AD&D 1e modules interact as adventurers. In this situation they are a bounty hunting force seeking three artifacts thought to be within a menagerie of death; a kind of Proving Grounds of the Mad Overload. What ultimately became of the designer of this menagerie and the stories of its denizens are entirely up to the wit and skill level of the Dungeon Master to fabricate, as is the history of each of the artifacts themselves. In many cases, the guardians are of animal intelligence and have to be overcome with brute force, and, it goes without saying at the time, simple player guile.

The adventure proper begins with the players facing a riddle.

"Round she is,
yet flat as a board,
Altar of the Lupine Lords,
Jewel on black velvet,
Pearl in the sea,
Unchanged but 'erchanging,
eternally..."

It’s not hard for me to guess the answer now I know it. But in typical AD&D 1e group fashion, we players put our heads together to figure it out and our designated caller told our collective answer to the Dungeon Master. I recall I was stumped completely, never having been too bright in the riddle department.

This adventure module and others like it from the era are full of such situations encouraging players to work as a unit. Some of it was as intellectually challenging (or not) as the riddle and others were a simple engineering challenge. The animals were a more tactical combat encounter. We did not use miniatures in this game but a simple map we drew from our initial observations. We players asked the Dungeon Master for information and he provided descriptions in reply, which we had to interpret as a group. That was a lot of work for our Dungeon Master but it yielded a great deal of fun for us, and we referenced many literary and film illustrations all the while drinking cola and downing chips. In the process, we players became better friends with one another through the camaraderie of our imagine travails. It is not like playing poker, as WotC (the company that bought the game many years after AD&D1e was first published and now continues to publish it) once described D&D.

White Plume Mountain is a high-risk adventure because the potential rewards are great. If your understanding of how to play this game includes limiting your own ability as a player with agency to mitigate risk, this game will be a frustrating exercise in railroading for you. My advice is to try a later, WotC published, iteration of D&D.

[Angus]

actually it is the Paul Kidd novel of the same name, but goodreads clearly considers that book below it to even include.

[Ian · Rating 4 out of 5]

Gonzo funhouse dungeon crawling top 10 things to do in D&D and WPM is the codifier. Must-run.

[Juho Pohjalainen · Rating 4 out of 5]

The quintessential funhouse dungeon. Very little in it makes any manner of sense, has any reason to exist the way it does, any reason for anyone to build it this way let alone to naturally become the way it did, but...