Close
Close
Advanced Search

UK5 Eye of the Serpent (1e)Click to magnify
Full‑size Preview
https://watermark.drivethrurpg.com/pdf_previews/17076-sample.pdf

UK5 Eye of the Serpent (1e)

ADD TO WISHLIST >
Selected Option:

Gazing down form the pinnacle of Hardway Mountain, who would not be drawn by the far-off glint of the Serpent's Eye? The descent will be hard, the mountains know neither mercy nor compassion. Many are the lessons to be learned, but fate has left you little choice - are you equal to the challenge?

"Eye of the Serpent" is a one-on-one wilderness adventure module for one player and one Dungeon Master, and has been designed to develop the specialist skills of a 1st-level druid, ranger, or monk character. It can also be used for a normal party of four to six 1st-level player characters.

The perils of Hardway Mountain are unchanging, but the routes between them are not. This module includes a unique route planning system with different of routes linking the encounters to challenge the abilities of druids, rangers, or monks. Alternately, Dungeon Masters can change the routings to create their own original and exciting adventures.

Product History

UK5: "Eye of the Serpent" (1984), by Graeme Morris, is the fifth UK-series adventure. The Acaeum reports that its original name was "Learning the Hard Way." It was published in 1984.

One-on-One Adventures. The idea of a one-on-one dungeon, with one GM and one player, dates back at least to "Quest for the Fazzlewood" (1978), a tournament run at Wintercon VII (1978). TSR revised and updated that adventure as O1: "The Gem and the Staff" in 1983. In 1984, TSR UK tried their hand at the format, publishing first UK5: "Eye of the Serpent" (1984), then O2: "Blade of Vengeance" (1984). TSR would later revisit the idea of one-on-one adventures in their eight-book "HHQ" series (1992-1995).

"Eye of the Serpent" is actually a somewhat unusual one-on-one adventure, for a few different reasons. First, it includes three more party members who are run as NPCs - which means that the adventure can be run for multiple players if desired. Second, it can be run for either for either druids, rangers, or monks (thanks to a very clever wilderness system), whereas all the other one-on-one adventures require a single specific class.

A Different Sort of Wilderness. Prior to "Eye of the Serpent," wilderness adventures fit into three broad categories. They appeared extensively in Expert Set (1981) modules, where they were hex crawls, just as Gary Gygax had suggested back in the original D&D (1974). In other product lines, adventures like B5: "Horror on the Hill" (1983) offered a hint of the wilderness by letting adventurers move through above-ground ruins, but they were really just a different sort of dungeon-like environment. More notably, adventures like N2: "The Forest Oracle" (1984) let players move through railroaded encounters in a wilderness environment.

UK5, though, does something quite different: It lays out its wilderness as a route-based flowchart, showing different ways to get from one encounter to another. (Cleverly, different routes are available for different classes, so that each of the three possible classes gets to meet up with some class-appropriate encounters.) The result is a lot more open than a railroaded wilderness (like N2), yet more constrained than a hex crawl (like X1). It's a beautiful compromise that surprisingly wasn't used more.

It should be noted that "Eye of the Serpent" does also include a hex map, to back up the route chart. Apparently the designers just couldn't get away from some things.

Sort of the UK Feel. Overall, "Eye of the Serpent" is the most atypical of Graeme Morris's UK adventures because it's not heavily plotted, not is it particularly fantastical. In fact, the whole goal of the adventure is just to get off a dangerous mountainside after you've been kidnapped by a roc.

As usual, there are numerous Fiend Folio (1981) monsters in this UK adventure, including several al-mi'raj, blood hawks, bullywugs, a denzelian, a gambado, giant bats, a needleman, a necrophidius, and the ever-popular poltergeist.

New Monsters. Ice and mist mephits appear for the first time, supplementing the fire, lava, smoke, and steam mephits seen in the Fiend Folio. All six mephits would reappear in Monstrous Compendium Fiend Folio Appendix (1992) and would be supplemented by numerous additional mephits in the Planescape Monstrous Compendium Appendix (1994). They've more recently been featured in 3e, but didn't appear as monsters in 4e.

About the Creators. This was Graeme Morris's last adventure in the UK series. However, it was far from his last work for TSR UK. The rest was instead mostly for Basic D&D, beginning with X8: "Drums on Fire Mountain" (1984).

As with some of Morris's early works, Tom Kirby helped on the storyline of this one. Meanwhile, the other star members of the TSR UK creative team, Phil Gallagher and Jim Bambra, both assisted in the production of the adventure. (They'd move up to authorship of the UK series with UK6 and UK7.)

About the Product Historian

The history of this product was researched and written by Shannon Appelcline, the author of Designers & Dragons - a history of the roleplaying industry told one company at a time. Please feel free to mail corrections, comments, and additions to shannon.appelcline@gmail.com.


We (Wizards) recognize that some of the legacy content available on this website does not reflect the values of the Dungeons & Dragons franchise today. Some older content may reflect ethnic, racial, and gender prejudice that were commonplace in American society at that time. These depictions were wrong then and are wrong today. This content is presented as it was originally created, because to do otherwise would be the same as claiming these prejudices never existed. Dungeons & Dragons teaches that diversity is a strength, and we strive to make our D&D products as welcoming and inclusive as possible. This part of our work will never end.

pixel_trans.gif
pixel_trans.gif
 
 Customers Who Bought this Title also Purchased
pixel_trans.gif
pixel_trans.gif
Reviews (2)
Discussions (3)
Customer avatar
Maurice L June 28, 2022 4:39 pm UTC
POD plox!
Customer avatar
Matt Y February 08, 2022 8:18 am UTC
Would love a POD option for this, please!
Customer avatar
Heath P December 05, 2021 12:04 am UTC
PURCHASER
Please make this available for POD.
Browse Categories
$ to $
 Follow Your Favorites!
NotificationsSign in to get custom notifications of new products!
 Recent History















Product Information
Platinum seller
Author(s)
Artist(s)
Pages
32
Edition
1.0
ISBN
0-88038-179-5
Publisher Stock #
TSR 9125
File Size:
6.25 MB
Format
Scanned image Click for more information
Scanned image
These products were created by scanning an original printed edition. Most older books are in scanned image format because original digital layout files never existed or were no longer available from the publisher.

For PDF download editions, each page has been run through Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software to attempt to decipher the printed text. The result of this OCR process is placed invisibly behind the picture of each scanned page, to allow for text searching. However, any text in a given book set on a graphical background or in handwritten fonts would most likely not be picked up by the OCR software, and is therefore not searchable. Also, a few larger books may be resampled to fit into the system, and may not have this searchable text background.

For printed books, we have performed high-resolution scans of an original hardcopy of the book. We essentially digitally re-master the book. Unfortunately, the resulting quality of these books is not as high. It's the problem of making a copy of a copy. The text is fine for reading, but illustration work starts to run dark, pixellating and/or losing shades of grey. Moiré patterns may develop in photos. We mark clearly which print titles come from scanned image books so that you can make an informed purchase decision about the quality of what you will receive.
pixel_trans.gif
Original electronic format
These ebooks were created from the original electronic layout files, and therefore are fully text searchable. Also, their file size tends to be smaller than scanned image books. Most newer books are in the original electronic format. Both download and print editions of such books should be high quality.
File Information
Watermarked PDF Click for more information
Watermarked PDF

These PDF files are digitally watermarked to signify that you are the owner. A small message is added to the bottom of each page of the PDF containing your name and the order number of your purchase.

Warning: If any files bearing your information are found being distributed illegally, then your account will be suspended and legal action may be taken against you.

Here is a sample of a page from a watermarked title:

File Last Updated:
March 19, 2013
This title was added to our catalog on March 19, 2013.