Dungeons & Dragons: Basic Rules (1983) Quiz

Answer: She is killed by an evil magic-user.

In the solo adventure, you play a fighter exploring a cave near his/her hometown. Aleena is described as a beautiful young woman; she offers to heal your character's recently inflicted wounds and provides some basic information about characters and monsters that you are likely to meet.

She invites your character to join her in attacking the infamous magic-user Bargle, who is responsible for a host of heinous crimes in your neighborhood. In a shocking turn of events, Bargle kills her with a magic missile. Your character survives the encounter though, and if they are very lucky with their dice rolls, may have a chance to kill Bargle, although it is much more likely he will get away.

This rather brutal introduction to the game makes clear that adventuring involves danger and that even nice characters may die.

Although Aleena appears to have been originally intended as a one-off character, many players seem to have been heartbroken by her untimely demise, and she was later revived in a game supplement called "The Grand Duchy of Karameikos" published in 1987 that gives her a detailed backstory. Additionally, Aleena's death inspired the creation of "Kill Bargle Vol. 1: A dice game of bloody vengeance!" in 2008 by Jesse Walker.

Answer: The rust monster

In all versions of Dungeons & Dragons, when a character attacks a monster or vice versa, a die is rolled to determine if the attack is successful. Creatures that are harder to hit require higher die rolls. Hit points refer to how much damage a creature can take before it dies.

In the solo adventure, the goblins, giant rats, and skeletons were relatively easy for your character to attack and had low hit points, whereas your character was more difficult for them to attack, so they were not too difficult to dispose of.

The rust monster was another matter. In this adventure, it could attack your character more easily than you could attack it in return and had more hit points than your character. Although a rust monster's attack does not inflict any bodily damage, it does something potentially much more humiliating - it causes metal armor and weapons to immediately crumble into rust! If you dared to fight it, you could quickly lose your shield, then your suit of armor, which would make it even easier for the monster to attack and destroy your weapons, so you could end up with nothing left to fight with.

Although it could potentially be defeated with lucky die rolls, the odds of this happening were poor, so the smart thing to do would be to run away from it as soon as possible! (You could always return later and beat it to death with a wooden stick if so inclined!)

Answer: Finding treasure

In Dungeons & Dragons, characters can advance in levels, and thereby become more powerful, by gaining experience points. In this version of the game, characters earn many more experience points from treasure than killing monsters. The Players Manual explains that this encourages players to avoid combat when possible, as this is highly risky for their characters, especially those at the low levels covered in the Basic set. It states that characters might avoid having to fight and kill monsters by tricking them or using magic to calm them down. This system is in keeping with the rules of the original version of the game released in 1974, while later versions, such as Fifth Edition, no longer give experience points for finding treasure.

The Basic Set does not give rules for building strongholds or unarmed combat, which are detailed in the subsequent Expert set and Companion set, respectively.

Answer: Wights

A cleric is a kind of warrior attached to a religious order. From first level onwards, they can attempt to Turn certain kinds of undead creatures using the power of their faith. As they advance in levels, their Turning ability becomes stronger and they can attempt to apply it to increasingly more powerful undead creatures, although this may not always be successful.

A 1st level cleric can attempt to Turn, in ascending order of difficulty, skeletons, zombies, and ghouls. At 2nd level, they gain the ability to attempt to turn wights, which are undead spirits inhabiting the body of a dead human or demi-human and which have the frightening ability to drain a person's life energy with their touch. Wraiths and vampires are even more powerful undead creatures that can also drain life energy and may only be Turned from 3rd level and 6th level onwards, respectively.

Answer: Gnomes

In this version of Dungeons & Dragons, human characters belong to one of four classes (occupations), whereas each of the three demi-human races is treated as a character class in its own right. Like the previous version of the Basic rules written by Tom Moldvay in 1981, the 1983 version only included the Dwarf, Elf, and Halfling classes as player options for non-human characters.

Other humanoid races such as gnomes and half-orcs only appeared as non-player characters run by the dungeon master. In contrast, other versions of the game, such as Advanced Dungeons & Dragons (also known as 1st edition) allow players to choose from a broader range of non-human characters.

In later years, a number of official accessories compatible with the Basic rules set were released that also provided options for playing other races, for example, "Creature Crucible: Top Ballista" provides rules for using gnomes as player characters.

Answer: Yes

The Basic rules don't give magic-users a lot of options and they are quite weak at low levels. Normally, to use spells they have to memorize those that they have written in their spell book, and these are subject to level restrictions. However, if they are lucky enough to find a magic scroll, they can cast any spell contained therein, no matter what its level.

The only catch is that once a spell on a scroll is read out it immediately disappears, so they better make it count!

Answer: Climb walls

Even though one might initially expect that a professional thief would be really good at something like picking pockets without getting caught, at levels 1-3 their chances of doing this successfully on a given attempt are only 20-30%! Similarly, although they specialize in skills involving dexterity and stealth, their chances of successfully using special skills like opening locks, finding and removing traps, and hiding in shadows are even worse! I suppose at these levels they are still learning the tricks of their trade.

However, their ability to climb walls and other steep surfaces is highly developed early on, as their chances of doing these successfully range from 87-89% at levels 1-3.

Answer: Choice of Lawful, Neutral, and Chaotic only.

The original 1974 rules of Dungeons & Dragons listed only the three alignment options of Lawful, Neutral, and Chaotic, and both the 1981 Tom Moldvay and 1983 Frank Mentzer Basic rules sets used this simple system. Furthermore, both the Moldvay and Mentzer editions included an explanation that Lawful behavior is usually the same as that which is considered "good," chaotic behavior is usually the same as that which is considered "evil," while Neutral behavior may be either good or evil (or neither).

Interestingly, although Eric Holmes' 1977 version of the Basic rules was largely based on the original rules, he included five possible alignments, so that Lawful and Chaotic characters had to choose whether they were either good or evil, with Neutral characters being the equivalent of "True Neutral" in other versions of the rules, such as Advanced Dungeons & Dragons, that use nine different alignments.

Answer: Staff of healing

In the Basic rules, magic wands contain 1-10 charges; each use consumes a charge and when there are none left, the wand becomes useless. For example, a wand of paralyzation can be used to immobilize an enemy a predetermined number of times, after which it cannot be used again. On the other hand, two kinds of magic staffs are described that do not require charges and may be used indefinitely. One of these, the staff of healing, may be used to heal a person's wounds; it can be used once per day on each person, although it can be used to heal any number of persons, each day.

A rod of cancellation may only be used once; it drains any magic item it hits so that it becomes permanently non-magical. A potion can only be consumed once. For example, a potion of levitation grants the user the temporary ability to hover in the air. Just to keep players on their toes, some magic items may be cursed! Such curses are permanent and can only removed magically, usually with the help of a high-level cleric or magic-user. One of my favorites is the ring of weakness - once put on it cannot be removed without magical help and permanently reduces the character's strength to the lowest possible amount. Particularly bad news for fighters who rely on their strength for combat!

Answer: Harpies

The scenario for this adventure is that the ruined castle once belonged to a powerful magic-user who lived centuries ago and has been abandoned since his death. The adventurers have heard rumors of monsters lurking in the castle. Additionally, the town rulers have offered a large reward for the capture of Bargle, who killed Aleena the cleric in the solo adventure in the Players Manual. Only the first level of the castle is described in detail in the Dungeon Masters Rulebook.

There are two lower levels that the dungeon master is encouraged to stock with monsters and treasure as they see fit, as an exercise in designing a dungeon adventure. Suggestions are provided; for example, it is recommended that the third level include the lair of Bargle and his guards.

The first level is guarded by kobolds, humanoid creatures with dog-like heads, who have been instructed by Bargle to keep out intruders. Individually, the kobolds are fairly weak as they have few hit points and their armor is of poor quality, so they would not be too difficult for a party of adventurers to defeat.

A couple of rooms in level 1 are inhabited by zombies, who are somewhat more dangerous as they have more hit points and are therefore a bit harder to destroy. Another room contains a chimney in which is hiding a giant bat, which should also not give the adventurers too much trouble. Their biggest threat on this level is in the castle's dining room, in which are hiding two harpies, creatures that have the upper bodies of women and the lower bodies of birds, that have the magical ability to charm people with their singing, that is, hypnotically control people so the harpies can kill and eat them. Additionally, during combat, they can perform 3 attacks per round using their claws and a handheld weapon. Considering how dangerous they are, the Dungeon Masters Rulebook recommends that player characters should only be allowed to enter the dining room if they are at least 2nd level, as 1st level characters would be too weak to face them with much chance of success. Furthermore, the dining room contains another hazard in the form of dinner plates covered in yellow mold, which releases poisonous spores if disturbed that can cause unsuspecting player characters to choke to death. All part of the fun and entertainment!