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By 1986, the nature of AD&D adventure modules were changing, going from a location-based format, to more story-based. So, it makes sense that TSR would produce a new introductory adventure. Earlier modules dedicated to being a “first adventure” with DMs advice had been part of the Basic line, but that wasn’t really a barrier to using them with AD&D, and modules such as N1 Against the Cult of the Reptile God only misses dedicated DM-facing advice to be a “starter” adventure.

The new intro module, N4 Treasure Hunt, would be the most inventive of all of them. The cover mentions this is for levels 0-1, and this is—if anything—underselling the adventure. The PCs are all classless, “level 0” normal people, captured by pirates to be sold into slavery, and then shipwrecked on an island, left to overcome the one surviving captor, dodge other pirates, and survive. During all this, the DM takes notes of the things the players do, and near the end of the adventure they start hitting level 1, and get a class and alignment based on their actions.

The general format is classic TSR: A 48-page book with detached trifold cover. The third outer panel of the cover shows the general locale of the adventure, the Korinn Archipelago, while the internal panels have player’s maps that they will get during the adventure. The main booklet is actually on a slick glossy paper, so presentation is a little nicer than normal. The middle twelve pages are meant to be pulled out, and have tracking forms for the DM, some pre-made characters, and four pages of DM’s maps.

The initial two-page spread is a player’s introduction, and while it assumes you haven’t played AD&D, it does generally assume knowledge of character creation. (“Your Dungeon Master will tell you how to roll up your character’s abilities.” Since the DM is assumed to be new too, someone’s going to have to figure out what the primary characteristics are….) Don’t worry about class, money, or equipment, but it naturally recommends the use of secondary skills from the DMG, and then gives a third of a page description of the setting.

The next two page spread is for new DMs, gives the general plot, how the chapters are broken up, various class abilities that characters can freely attempt (generally, thief abilities, but also assassination and tracking), and how characters get to first level.

The first appendix is two pages giving advice about various things that could go wrong with the plot. This is the type of advice that any story-based adventure needs to have, and almost never does. It even freely admits that you can’t foresee everything, and encourages a flexible approach to problems (after having demonstrated how that works with some of the more likely problems). The second appendix is a further page about the Korinn Archipelago, and the back page is a listing of all the monsters that can be encountered, with checkboxes for their hitpoints to be marked off.

All this leaves twenty-six pages for the adventure itself. It moves fairly briskly from initial survival and freedom to bigger concerns. There are conversational bits basically discussing the adventure with the DM. (“Before launching into the third episode of the adventure, let’s look at the island as a whole.”) There are other pirates (generally orcs and goblins) on the island, and only a limited number of buildings available as shelter. Another nice touch is the players will encounter an old man who can draw decent maps of everything. These are given the module with a broad-leaf background, as that’s what he’s drawing on. They don’t really have the feel of been done on a rough, slick, surface, but that’s a minor point.

The adventure is also more involved than the initial setup might imply. I kind of worry that new players would be more concerned with what comes down to tomb looting in the second half than what is given. But, short of that, the adventure should flow very well. The biggest problem is that there is a “clock” to get off the island, and time tracking isn’t really emphasized in the module.

Greyhawk Adventures

The general idea of the 0-level adventure seen here was popular, and TSR got requests for more. More did eventually come, with Appendix 1 of Greyhawk Adventures giving more general rules for the idea. This version was even more flexible. 0-level characters in this system all start with 3 (!) in each attribute, and 3 HP. But, there is also a budget of points that can be applied to the attributes (and HP) at any point, so you can instantly boost an attribute up to pass a challenge. This can only be done once per week, but with a small group trading off who’s going to ‘step up’, that shouldn’t be a problem. It looks interesting, but I’ve never used the rules.

Forgotten Realms

The setting for the module is an extensive archipelago, which should be easy to drop into any setting as long as there’s a large sea or an ocean to place it in. And just a little while later this happened officially, with the setting being incorporated into the Forgotten Realms. Geographically, it’s a great fit, with the archipelago being added to one corner of the more extensive Moonshae Isles, and the goddess that appears in this module could even be the goddess of those islands. Past that, it’s a harder fit. There’s no sign of the Welsh/Norsemen model the Moonshaes use as a whole, and I don’t think there’s any known nearby orc pirates stipulated in the background here. (Though there are plenty of other pirates nearby, so that’s not a big deal.) This makes it the third Forgotten Realms adventure published (discounting Oriental Adventures materials, which would bump this back to fifth). The copyright says 1986, but my understanding is it came out in January 1987, a mere seven months before the boxed set.

Conclusion

This is a very well done adventure with a lot of good advice. Aaron Allston was a great writer, and it shows here. It’s also fairly quickly paced, with the deadline of two days to get off the island. The ‘see what you do’ and then award a class is an extremely inventive choice, and with the start is used to skip some of the initial choices that can take a while to get through (notably selecting equipment).

Presentation is great. In addition to the slightly better paper, Stephen Fabian has great art in here (including portraits of the pre-generated characters), and the maps are… mostly good. The one problem is the DM maps are black and light grey, and it’s too light on the map of the island, making it hard to see the elevation lines. The Easley cover is a spoiler, since it depicts the final escape from the island, but since that’s the obvious goal from the start, that’s not a big problem, and the destruction shown would just warn any players looking at that they will need to get out.

The main “failure” is that it is very much in the plotted adventure mode that took over in the mid-’80s. This adventure is small enough and has well done options so it should stay largely on track. But, if you prefer the older “location as adventure” mode, this not only is probably a bad choice for you, but may get players expecting the wrong things from you as DM. On the other hand, there’s only a few places of note on this island, and without the timetable, it is about a place, so it actually straddles the line a bit, and it might be worth using this to experiment with play styles a bit.