Wings,Dungeons, Wilderness,& Death In UK5 Eye of the Serpent By Graeme Morris For Advanced Dungeons & Dragons First Edition For Your Old School Campaigns

"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?"





UK 5 is quite literally going to drop PC's straight into the middle of the setting & events of the Hardway mountains. Eye of the Serpent is a lower tier adventure that is meant to be a one on one adventure between between the dungeon master & the player. I have never used UK5 ever in that capacity, instead I've run this adventure straight out of the box as an introduction to the UK TSR series of adventures with the PC's being picked up and dropped off into the roc's nest. Also I modified the Rocs to be two headed creatures straight up as a sort of Celtic tribute to the Seventh Voyage of Sinbad From 1958 By Ray Harryhausen. Because of the unique arrangement of NPC's this adventure can be run for a larger group of players.

Because this is a lower tier adventure & the PC's have to survive against adventure elements & monsters of The Eye of the Serpent players quickly become invested in their characters.
The Eye of the Serpent is meant to showcase the PC abilities of Rangers, Druids, & Monks.
This is a work together or die sort of survival wilderness romp. How this works is tied directly into the wilderness adventure system that UK5 uses;"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."
UK 5 is a bit too rail road driven for my taste & I began using it as an introduction to the world setting of UK4 'When A Star Falls'. A sort of pseudo Celtic mythological world with overtones of Ray Harryhausen style Sword & Sorcery elements.



The events of UK5 could be placed within a unique Keltic landscape for Astonishing Swordsmen & Sorcerers of Hyperborea echoing some of the themes that Clark Ashton Smith set out. There's a lost other world aspect to this rather rail road style adventure with a great treasure in the offering. Again this adventure would have to take place within the confines of its own unique Keltic environs in Hyperborea.  The reason why many of the TSR UK adventure would have to take place within their own separate setting is the use of the Fiend Folio & Monster Manual II monsters; including several al-mi'raj, blood hawks, bullywugs, a denzelian, a gambado, giant bats, a needleman, a necrophidius, and haunting  poltergeist. But the necrophidius gives a Clark Ashton Smith Keltic cross point to mix UK 5 with Hyperborea. Its just the sort of thing to appear in some back water region of Hyperborea where the humans tribes of Keltics & Picts have taken over the region after the Hyperboreans have died out or gone extinct. Echoes of CAS's Zothique anyone? Like Zothique UK5's setting has to stand alone and slightly apart from Hyperborea


Diving back deeper into UK 5's background the Rocs have always reminded me of giant eagles are very present in Welsh & Celtic mythology. They remind me of Culhwch and Olwen tales.
"Culhwch and Olwen (Welsh: Culhwch ac Olwen) is a Welsh tale that survives in only two manuscripts about a hero connected with Arthur and his warriors: a complete version in the Red Book of Hergest, ca. 1400, and a fragmented version in the White Book of Rhydderch, ca. 1325. It is the longest of the surviving Welsh prose tales. Certain linguistic evidence indicates it took its present form by the 11th century"

There are deep connections with Arthurian legends & a possible connection with the treasure of UK 5 in the form of the Eye of the Serpent. This otherworldly connection has very dark & sinister overtones for Dark Albion with Chaos oriented fairyland forces suddenly coming alive with the conflicts of the War of The Roses.




For Lamentations of the Flame Princess UK5 is a prime introduction to the world of England of the coast. The forces of the module might need to modified and far more sinister background being spun for the eye of the serpent. But again this 'treasure' could easily be connected with the Cernunnos or horned god of Celtic mythology.  Cernunnos was a Celtic god of fertility, life, animals, wealth, and the underworld. It was also like all gods very alien & deadly to cross plus the connection with monks, rangers, & druids becomes even more heinous. See Clive Barker's Rawhead Rex story for some possible LoFP connections from the third volume of the Books of Blood. Avoid the cultclassic movie Rawhead Rex unless that's what your looking for in your LoFP game adventures



UK 5 Eye of The Serpent's wilderness system also offer's some unique encounters for players to keep adventure events moving. Modules are meant to be modified & tinkered to fit your home campaign settings, player's expectations, & offer hours of game play!
For now keep em rolling folks.

Commentary UK5 Eye of the Serpent By Graeme Morris For Advanced Dungeons & Dragons First Edition

"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?"

UK5: "Eye of the Serpent" (1984), by Graeme Morris, is the fifth UK line of adventures in the module series. This is a one on one style adventure aimed at putting one on one play & centers itself around the skills of rangers, druids, or monks giving a stake in the development of their  classes by dealing with the perils & hazards of Hardway Mountain. The module presents different paths to the dangers of the mountain allowing a dungeon master to vary the hazards making play unique to each player.


The 'one on one' format was something that the U.K. branch of TSR took from the parent company & updated this module's format as well as style of play. This is from the Drivethrurpg entry;"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."

The unique arrangement of the NPC allows this module's contents to be run for a larger party of PC's allowing this one on one to be used for group play as well as as a unique wilderness adventure. Because of its clever wilderness system this makes an interesting adventure to run as a back to back with new players of old school Advanced Dungeons & Dragons. While it has its detractors this adventure has the players getting quickly investigated in their low level PC's quickly & puts them squire in the action in my opinion as they get quickly tied into the adventure
Adventure has that the PC's (lvl 1-3) are captured by Rocs & deposited in their nest high in the mountain tops. It's up to the brave heroes escape down the mountain &  investigate the strange 'eye of the serpent' that can be see from the mountain top.

 
There is just enough plot to the adventure to hold the players interest as play continues with the PC's have to deal with hazards of the mountain & its environs. This is because of the flow chart style of the adventure paths in 'Eye of the Serpent'. It keeps the plot moving & gives a unique feel to the adventure whist having the PC's encounter the elements of U.K.5 which are specifically geared toward the druid, ranger, & monk classes. Because of the uniquely generic nature of U.K. 5 this is an adventure that can easily be placed within the confines of an Astonishing Swordsmen & Sorcerers of Hyperborea game.


The action here is going to most likely take place within the Norse or Keltic realms of Hyperborea on one of the border lands with the oceans of Hyperborea nearby. The rocs of the piece are going to be feeding upon cattle, ocean going sea serpents or other behemoths. This places the action in on of the more accessible mountains allowing the DM just enough elbow room  to place the action of Eye of the Serpent as needed. The rocs and some of the adventure elements can be tailored to place this adventure squarely within the sword & sorcery camp.By allowing DM's to add this adventure into the realm of Hyperborea this adventure can supplement a low level adventure specifically for the nature oriented classes of AS&SH. 

Even though UK5 Eye of the Serpent is a lower tier adventure there's enough here to expand the adventure into a full jump off point for a campaign by expanding the number of PC's. This creates an instant bonding experience & allows the DM & players to throw together a very unorthodox mix of player character types. Rocs are not picking as to their prey but getting that prey to work together is a challenge especially against the events of UK5 Eye of the Serpent.