Gold Box Advanced Dungeons & Dragons games

[Darth Canoli]

What I mean is that you guys, who like a certain genre, jumping across genre to accuse other products of being inferior. How. Dare. You? By. What. Qualification?

I dont like puzzle games. Did you ever see I badmouth any puzzle game?

I only play RPG, and dont like 1st person shooter. Did I ever badmouth FPS games?

Why the hell do you think, you guys who like Drakensang which is quite different from NWN2, you have the right qualification, the right analytic mind, the right experience, to judge what a game like NWN2OC is?

No, seriously? You think you can? You think you have the abilities to do it? Seriously?

I don't know about everyone else but when I say NWN 2 is an irredeemable piece of shit, I mean the engine.

Sure, the OC isn't very good but with a good engine and better yet a goof TB one, it'd have been just fine...

 

[FriendlyMerchant]

The Ravenloft games are pretty good. They'd be good to look into .
Dark Sun games are pretty much some of the first top down proper D&D combat games. Also Dark Sun setting is a bonus.
Pretty much any D&D game made before BG1 and Icewind Dale are AD&D games.

 

[mondblut]

Hillsfar isn't a Gold Box game and didn't pretend to be

I know. But it's a part of the bundle OP was referring to while asking if it is safe to skip anything.

 

[Butter]

The Ravenloft games are pretty good. They'd be good to look into .
Dark Sun games are pretty much some of the first top down proper D&D combat games. Also Dark Sun setting is a bonus.
Pretty much any D&D game made before BG1 and Icewind Dale are AD&D games.

Aren't literally all D&D games prior to Bioware's NWN AD&D?

 

[FriendlyMerchant]

The Ravenloft games are pretty good. They'd be good to look into .
Dark Sun games are pretty much some of the first top down proper D&D combat games. Also Dark Sun setting is a bonus.
Pretty much any D&D game made before BG1 and Icewind Dale are AD&D games.

Aren't literally all D&D games prior to Bioware's NWN AD&D?

Yes. But it's expected most people would know about BG1+2 and Icewind Dale when it comes to AD&D games even if they didn't know about the older ones.

 

[mondblut]

Aren't literally all D&D games prior to Bioware's NWN AD&D?

No. Stronghold and Fantasy Empires are based off OD&D. So is Order of the Griffon and Warriors of the Eternal Sun.

 

[laclongquan]

Actually, I heard of Drakensang quite a few times before. NEVER has any urge to even try/demo it. So I doubt it's that similar to NWN2.

Did you know that quite a few players looking for a game similar to NWN2 for a decade? Even PK is advertised to be similar to it, it's not.

Drakensang is quite similar to Gothic, as in a niche game of a niche. Doesnt mean its gamers are qualified to judge other games though, because being in a niche cast doubt on your qualification~

It's a nwn clone using TDE system, what are you talking about?

Now that I see this abomination of a judgement, I cant help but reply to that. When I say you dont have qualifications, I actually mean you dont even know what you dont know.

When people say it's a NWN clone, I expect it's something in Faerun? Or at least in Toril-Abeir? in at least one of five Ages? Or hell, same universe like from up in Sigil down to Abyss and Nine Hells? You know? Same background?

But no, Drakensang River of time is in an entirely different universe, different background? Why the hell do you think it deserve to be called "a NWN clone"? Is it even worthy of that title?

The gold content of that tittle "a NWN clone" is higher than you know. And apparently Drakensang is not worthy of that title.

 

[rusty_shackleford]

When people say it's a NWN clone, I expect it's something in Faerun? Or at least in Toril-Abeir? in at least one of five Ages? Or hell, same universe like from up in Sigil down to Abyss and Nine Hells? You know? Same background?

...they're even both in generic kitchen sink fantasy fantasy universes that would be indistinguishable if you weren't told otherwise

 

[KeighnMcDeath]

But were they fun to play?

 

[Eisen]

pls play EoB1 and 2, you can skip the third one if ya want.

 

[laclongquan]

When people say it's a NWN clone, I expect it's something in Faerun? Or at least in Toril-Abeir? in at least one of five Ages? Or hell, same universe like from up in Sigil down to Abyss and Nine Hells? You know? Same background?

...they're even both in generic kitchen sink fantasy fantasy universes that would be indistinguishable if you weren't told otherwise

Generic or not they are not same universe, not same background. Drakensang can be called a NWN clone in its wet dream only.

 

[Cryomancer]

Here is a hot take : Dark Sun : Wake of the Ravager is the most underrated game in Codex.

It has a bit of bugs(way less than cyberbug 2077 and Bugthesda's titles), but has an amazing encounter design, atmosphere and gameplay.

 

[rusty_shackleford]

Hello! I am sorry if this topic was already opened. Site search gives me error on every inquiry.. (

So, i have found two games from the AD&D Forgotten Realms in Top 101 list. Pool of Radiance and Pool of Darkness. And i have a question: will i miss much if i won't play in other games of the series? On GOG there is huge collection of games in this series. Should i play them all to better understand the plot, the lore, game mechanics? Or is it totally OK to play only these two titles from the top-list?

Pool of Radiance is the single best Gold Box game, but the Dragonlance/Krynn trilogy is the superior series to the quartet of games that begins with PoR. Personally, I suggest playing PoR and Curse of the Azure Bonds before switching to Champions of Krynn (which finished #66 in the original poll), but Pool of Darkness has many fans on the Codex. Don't forget to utilize the Gold Box Companion for some quality-of-life improvements.

That gold box companion looks nice... but...

(...snip)

• Temporarily change demihuman race to human to avoid experience level limits.
• Optional level up without visiting training halls and without race-/game-related level limits.

(snip...)

The real issue is many of these games were too high level compared to what the system was designed for.
The demi-human limitation only seems awful because the system itself wasn't respected properly.

What would Gygax consider high level play, after all?
Well, let's say Tomb of Horrors, a module designed by Gygax for tournaments to defeat even the best characters. The revised AD&D edition was designed for players level 10 to 14.
Well, sorta. The earlier editions actually had no stated level range IIRC but the pregen characters generally matched that for humans.

 

[Zed Duke of Banville]

Some of the Gold Box games experience issues from being too high level from what the Gold Box engine itself was designed for. Pool of Radiance was designed for the lower character levels it is limited to, but the engine was barely changed in later games, and in the high-level games struggles to cope with powerful magical effects or that initiative becomes all-important to its combat system.

Gary Gygax, from the adventure modules he wrote for AD&D, preferred characters around levels 8-12. The highest-level adventure module written by Gygax was WG6 Isle of the Ape from 1985, where the average level for the six pre-generated characters is 16.5. The only two low-level modules written by Gygax were T1 The Village of Hommlet, which was intended from the beginning as the first part of a super-module (T1-4 The Temple of Elemental Evil) that would serve as a means of quickly raising new PCs to around 8th level, and the D&D module B2 The Keep on the Borderlands.

The original series of adventure modules (GDQ) ends with a party in the level range 10-14 traveling into another plane to confront Lolth the Queen of the Demonweb Pits (though it should be noted that party size was intended to be 8-10 PCs).

 

[Cryomancer]

What would Gygax consider high level play, after all?

That depends. Some people here thinks that lv 5 is mid level and lv 7 is high level and will argue that most of his games where low level(With no evidence like interviews), others will mention his modules which are mostly mid level modules.

I used to believe that an D&D CRPG adaptation needs to allow PC's to reach lv 20 but I was just too spoiled by 3e adaptations. Not even limiting by Golden Box.

• Dark Sun : Shattered Lands = lv = 3~9
• Dark Sun : Wake of The Ravager = lv 7~15
• BG1 : Lv = 1~8 (depending the class and 10 with expansion )
• BG2 : Lv 7~17 (class)
• BG2:ToB = lv 15~30 or 40 depending the class
• Ravenloft : Strahd possession : lv 5~13 (mage)
• Ravenloft : Stone prophet : lv 5~13 (14 if imported an save from the first game)
• Menzoberranzan : lv 5~13

As you can see, most AD&D games are what I consider "mid level".

 

[<3sRichardSimmons]

TIL that Doomclones weren’t actually Doomclones because they weren’t set in the same universe as Doom.

 

[KeighnMcDeath]

Probably should go over the levels of Goldbox as well.

Others:
Warriors of Eternal Sun 1-14/1-12/1-10/1-8 (depends on race/class)

Order of the Griffin.. 1-8

EOB 1 1-12
EOB 2. Up to 13
EOB 3. Up to 20
Dungeon Hack 1-20
Slayer 1-20
Death Keep 1-18?
Pirates of Realm Space 5-11