sauromatian wrote:When did Vikings ever attack Normans? I'm not saying it didn't happen, I just can't think of any incidents.

Hrm, I'm not sure they did, but I'm no history buff.  

When I think of "Normans", I think of the Battle of Hastings (1066).  Surely they existed before that in France, but not in England.  Most Vikings raids stopped between 1000 and 1100 AD, if I remember correctly.

Wikipedia seems to suggest the Normans were essentially the descendants of the Vikings, for what it's worth.  The etymology makes sense.

deimos3428 wrote:Wikipedia seems to suggest the Normans were essentially the descendants of the Vikings, for what it's worth.  The etymology makes sense.

Our knowledge of the fittings of a Viking ship [square striped sail, shields hung along the sides] comes from the Bayeux Tapestry depiction of Norman ships. In 1066 they fought in alliance with the king of Norway's Viking army. After that the Viking era ends because they essentially won.

A Viking raid on Normans would be a fratricidal affair. Plenty of that in history, so it can't be ruled out, but I'm curious as to what the designer of this scenario had in mind.

JZavoda wrote: the Rus viking's who conquered the area and gave it their name.

I've heard two theories on that- one, that Rus is a Finnish word meaning Swede, which became applied to the Scandinavians who went east & eventually became the name of the country. The Scands themselves referred to Russia as Gardarike.

Second theory is that Russia comes from the Roxolani, a Sarmatian tribe which settled the area from the east. The 16th century queen of Ottoman Sultan Sulyman the Great was known to Turks as 'Roxolani' meaning 'the Russian woman.' This was long after the nomadic tribe had faded from view, indicating the name had remained as a name of the country Russia.

I am pretty sure that the Vikings (depending upon the time and location, the term could be used sometimes to describe people from a particular part of Scandinavia, or more generally to refer to sea pirates/raiders), raided all along a large part of the European coastline in the 9th and 10th centuries.  This includes what we now call Northern France (they even sailed up the Seine at least once to attack Paris).

red_bus wrote:This includes what we now call Northern France (they even sailed up the Seine at least once to attack Paris).

Yes, here's a timeline:
http://209.85.207.104/search?q=cache:10 ... ent=safari

The questions is, did vikings attack their own settled kinsmen, the viking-descended Normans?

Badmike wrote:
Great choice man.  Mud Sorcerer's Tomb is the proof that all the best 2E adventures were in Dungeon magazine and not as stand alone modules.  This along with many others (Kingdom of the Ghouls, Siege of Kraty's Freehold, House of Cards) are better than 95% of the stuff published during those years, and stand up against any of the classics.  It has a great old school feel and is pretty much the spiritual successor to Tomb of Horrors. I'd love to be playing in that one, as I've never gotten a chance to run it or play in it, and I will feel disappointed if you don't TPK the entire group!!!

Mike B.

Yeah, it's a real gem of an adventure.  I didn't buy many of the Dungeon or Dragon magazines back in the day, but there were a few issues that contained adventures for levels 9+ that really caught my eye.  Mud Sorcerer's Tomb was one such Dungeon adventure.  I too never had the opportunity to inflict it on my players.  

About those other Dungeon adventures (Kingdom of the Ghouls, Siege of Kraty's Freehold, House of Cards, and any other good ones), do you have the issue numbers handy?  I might see about tracking down copies of the mags if I had issue numbers to work with.

tacojohn4547

Doh!  I found the answer to my question above faster than I thought I could.  

Here are the issue numbers for those specific Dungeon addy's:

Issue # 70  Kingdom of the Ghouls (for Levels 9-15)
Issue # 33  Siege of Kraty's Freehold (for Levels 1-4)
Issue # 19  House of Cards  (for Levels 9-12)

Any other great ones from Dungeon that are "must haves"?

tacojohn4547 wrote:Doh!  I found the answer to my question above faster than I thought I could.  

Here are the issue numbers for those specific Dungeon addy's:

Issue # 70  Kingdom of the Ghouls (for Levels 9-15)
Issue # 33  Siege of Kraty's Freehold (for Levels 1-4)
Issue # 19  House of Cards  (for Levels 9-12)

Any other great ones from Dungeon that are "must haves"?

Ah, lists.  I am a Dungeon magazine adventure affionado.  Here are my top adventures:

1.  Mud Sorceror's Tomb (#37):  Worthy successor to Tomb of Horrors
2.  Siege of Kraty's Freehold (#33): Really well done low level adventure against a superior force...the low level characters are trapped in an isolated freehold surrounded by an orc horde, and have to use their wits to defeat the larger force.
3.  Kingdom of the Ghouls(#70):  Should have been a boxed set, or at the very least a published module.  Baur invisions a dark, gloomy, and evil underdark ruled by powerful ghoul lords very reminiscent of something from Lovecraft or Clark Ashton Smith.  A great campaign!
4.  House of Cards (#19): The best use of a Deck of Many Things ever!  They are used as guardian traps of a lair, and the characters have to either figure a way past them or take their chances and draw them....
5.  Shards of the Day (#60):  A very good underdark adventure that can easily be placed into any underdark campaign (a lot of the scenarios would work well as encounter areas in the D1-3 series). I really liked the cut out sections you could place together randomly to form the cavern the adventure takes place in!
6.  Land of Men With Tails (#56): My favorite of David Howery's jungle adventures, but they are all really good.
7.  The Forgotten Man (#75):  In my mind this is perhaps the best plotline of almost any Dungeon magazine adventure, with equal combat and roleplaying.  I just thought the writing was really strong in this one.
8.  Ancient Blood (#20): Really good arctic adventure combining myth with reality as characters have to investigate a frozen Frost Giant fortress.
9.  Secrets of the Towers (#10): Less an adventure than a series of adventure "hooks" as the characters explore a series of teleportation towers that cross whatever world they are on, and lead to various dangers of different levels, the kind of hook you can use throughout an entire campaign
10.  Thunder Under Needlespire (#24): I  have always wanted to run this one, a high level adventure with some really nasty villains and a really bad ass final monster

I've run dozens of Dungeon mag adventures.  It's a really good source.  Not in the top tier but good solid adventures are: Crypt of Istaris, The Dark Conventicle, Moor-Tomb Map, Elephant's Graveyard, The Leopard Men, Rose for Talakara, The Inheiritance, And a Dozen Eggs, Thiondar's Legacy, Deadly Treasure, Nbod's Room, Grotto of the Queen, Priestly Secrets, Into the Nest of Vipers, Mertylmane's Road, The Winter Tapestry, The Scar, Khazefryn.  All of these I've listed are pretty much better than anything TSR released in "module" form during the 2E era.

Mike B.

Kingofpain89 wrote:
My personal favorite.  

You'll be seeing it as soon as we get the Norvik campaign up and running again!!!!

Mike B.

Awesome post there Mike. I need to pick up all of those!