OUT ON A LIMB

‘For the worse’

To the editor:
You stated in Cover to Cover of issue #46
that, “...you’ll find that the high quality of the
articles...hasn’t changed a bit.” Well, I think it
has, and for the worse. One of the reasons is
there wasn’t one useful D&D article! I hope
you live up to your policies! The article on the
new monster, Gaund, and the Sage Advice
column were the only exceptions. Mightier
Than the Pen was okay except it wasn’t concrete
enough.
 

One might ask, “What about The Temple of
Poseidon?” Two things ruined it. First, it
probably won’t be used in a campaign. Reading
through the letters in Out on a Limb, I see
that the majority of characters play at the 4th
and 5th levels, except for a few that play super
high (14th through 16th). And let’s say a DM
uses Greek mythology.
 

Second, it is a dungeon! I’m sick of dungeons
(as are my players). I’d like to see a
good wilderness adventure or a town adventure
instead.

The argument to the above is “What about
the ideas from it?” Ideas for 10th level characters,
hah! I can think of billions of monsters
and dungeons for that level. Compare the
number of creative monsters in the Monster
Manual of the first to third levels and the
eighth and tenth levels. There are about three
of four times the amount of higher level monsters
as compared to the lower level monsters.

The other long article was the story, The
Sorcerer’s Jewel. That was a good idea for a
story and Holmes is a good author, but one
thing ruined the story — it was a copy of a
D&D adventure. The only time a story about a
D&D adventure is good is when it’s humorous,
such as, for example, the The Day of the
Dwarf, which appeared in issue #42. An original
idea of what a swords and sorcery world
should be like is better than a copy of a game’s
idea.

[...]

Chris Meyer
Marigot, Dominica
West lndies
(Dragon #50)