THE ADVENTURERS' JOURNAL
Cellie's Journal
Cellie was a rogue from Urnst
who traveled to the Eastlands with a number of
companions. After a few short months away from the cities of the Heartlands,
though, she began wondering whether she had made a mistake. Cellie
hasn't been heard from lately, but only the foolish would count her out so
soon...
Chapter
1, The Veiled Society
Chapter 2, Keep on the Borderlands
Chapter 3, Lost Tower of Castanamir
Paddi's Journal
Paddi remains an irrepressible force in The Realm, wandering where whim and her companions take her,
always managing to walk out with a pouch of gemstones and a smile. With her
party of staunch friends, she has made a stir in the Westlands
akin to Cellie's wildest dreams…
Chapter
1, Journey to the Rock
Chapter 2, The Veiled Society
Chapter 3, Assault on Raven's Ruin
Chapter 4, Harvest of Chaos
Chapter 5, Harvest of Chaos
Chapter 6, Harvest of Chaos
PRINCE ARDANO SILVERBOW'S
JOURNAL OF CALIDIIRA
Cutting a
larger shadow than Paddi Whisperleaf
across The Southlands of the Realm is a hero with
nobility in his blood. His exploits are dutifully chronicled as well as Paddi's, Cellie's and Meliander's. Please, peruse these venerable pages with
caution and glean wisdom from them.
Entry 1,The Village of Daufin
Meliander's Journal
Meliander the Mage has made quite a name traveling about The
Realm in search of magic and secrets arcane. With the loss of a number of
adventuring companions, Meliander was forced to look
to the gnomes of the Southlands for aid in continuing the search for the magic
of Iggwilv and her fallen kingdom. Rumor has it that Meliander survived the expedition to Tsojcanth,
but all that exists to tell the tale is this journal entry and its cryptic post
script.
Lost Caverns of Tsojcanth
What People Are Saying About The
Realm
(Note
that all letters sent directly to my email account have been left anonymous.
Those posted in a public forum are signed as they were originally presented.
Thank you to everyone who has sent feedback on The Realm Project!!!)
Thank
you for all of your hard work and (many) generous contributions to the UA
community. The Realm campaign
is definitely one of UA's greatest treasures –a true
masterpiece.
P.S. BTW -- just curious if there are any new
developments re. "Legendary Descent"?
But after a long hiatus from UA, what I AM doing instead
of working on my design, is playing gamer6.dsn of
Ray's Realm campaign.
You know you
play too much UA when...
You have a
complete installation of UA at work, including the latest version of UAShell, all the editors, Ray's Realm designs, and the
working version of your nameless module for levels 1-15.
Only the best
conversions of AD&D modules around are on The Realm by Ray. If you liked
the old paper AD&D's you will love all his
games... there is Game00 - Game 38 + Game R1-R3 when he finishes, He is still
working on the last 10 but start downloading them now and you won't regreat it.
I have never
tried to alter wall sets until recently. Playing the Realm series made me see
what a powerful impact changing the walls could be.
I must
congratulate you for your Herculean efforts, Ray. I, among many others, have
truly enjoyed your work.
You know, I
really enjoy playing the realms modules for UA. It truly is the closest thing
I've found to the Gold Box games since the games themselves. And since I don't
get to play the pen-and-paper version of D&D anymore it is the closest
thing i've come to that as well.
I know the
artwork is not the best sometimes, but flash isn't always that important in
playing a game. Gameplay is consistently good
throughout the realms and that is what counts. I have d/l
everything you have so far and hope you continue to produce these gems and
jewels of the FRUA community.
The group I played
with when I was a kid tried to play the "
Keep up the good
work and good quality.
Just a brief
email to let u know I am enjoying the Realm. It was a pleasant surprise to log
on to GIGA the other day and find that you had released several new mods during the last year. I downloaded all of them, and am
starting a new campaign in the Southlands. The new introduction mod with the
quests is nicely done, although I haven't done any of the quests yet since I
wanted to jump right in with 'Skeletons'.
Okay. Who are
you and what have you done with Ray? It was... bright and... festive.
Not at all what we expect from the lich lord we've all come to know and love.
Tell the truth, Mr. Flopsy
Ears redesigned the page without you, right?
Seriously,
though. That's very cool. I loved the snow globes! And the top ten list was hysterical. :)
Love the
Adventures...keep'em coming
Hello, first I'd
like to say, your games are the best!!I played the Westlands about a year ago and was completely enchanted. I
can only remember a couple other games Ive enjoyed as
much... anyway recently I got all nostalgic about it so I came over to your
page and decided to start all over with the Southlands! :)
First of all I
would like to say that your "Realm" adventures, in my opinion, are
the best existing module series for FRUA. Your mod designs have literally
provided hours of dungeon crawl excitement. Your use of hacks, artwork, etc. is
always superb. Your implementations of mods such as
"Tales of Enchantment", "Prophecies of Brie", and (the most
recent mod I played) Baltron's Beacon would all, in my
mind, get 10s for their originality, quality, and design innovation. The hard
and wonderful mod design work of developers like you is definitely one thing
that helps FRUA live on, after 7+ years!
I really wish I
lived in the states and could meet up with some of you guys and play p&p games. Meanwhile, I play FRUA not to let the habit
down. Special thanks to the creators of the realm. It really makes me travel in
time (to my teenage).
I will still
keep reading your messages and once in a while give my opion.
looking forward to reading the updates for The Realm
which seems to be my only FRUA intrest left at the
moment
Keep up the
great work on transcribing those modules... for people like me who have no
group to play a pen&paper d&d
it is the closest I can get to it.
Keep up the
great work, I love it.
Hiya :) I've been enjoying the
wonderful Realm Campaign you've put together. Thanks for taking the time to put
those modules together. Takes my back to my pen and paper
days :)
There's one problem
though. I'm currently playing the last module from the Realm :( I was just
wondering if there will be anymore coming in the future?
Will you be doing the North/South/Final Diamond campaigns, or is it time to
move my party on to another mod?
Well, thanks
again for breathing new life into those old p&p mods. Great job..
You know, Ray,
you continue to astound me. Where in the world do you find the energy to keep
pumping these things out? And how in the world do you continually make them
such top quality in such a short amount of time?
Clue me in on
your secret, and then share some of that energy with the rest of us..
Just a note to say
WOW! I've played all the so called top designs for UA, and to be honest none of
them come near the feel I get in any of the designs you have put together.
Everything is wonderfully done, and I really do get the feel of a campaign,
something other designs truly lack. Keep up the good work!
Ray, the Realm really
looks great. I haven't even begun to look at the designs themselves, but your
web-site with all the information really shows promise. I just d/l what you have so far.
By the way, I agree
entirely with your assessment of the Find Traps spell. I don't know how you set
yours up, but I find placing first an event checking whether find traps is
active. If it is, the event will describe the trap and how it was avoided - if
possible. Set to if the first event doesn't happen, I put an event checking if
the party is searching. usually it will also describe
the trap, but likely less detailed than the first event. It also will present
whether text about the avoidance, if possible. Finally, set to happen if the
search event doesn't occur, I put the trap and its resulting events. Three events for the trap. Its not
a lot of work, and it makes the player happy when they chose correctly in
casting the spell.
Your comments on
searching in occupied locations are wise, and they have never really occurred
to me. However, in my latest design, you either are the guards in the city, and
need to search, or the city is text based and requires no searching. But I do
agree that people do not like the characters sneaking around the dungeon.
Can't wait to play
your mods! - Julian
Hi, I just wanted to
let you know that I've finished playing all of the Realm games you've written
so far, and to encourage you to keep on writing them! I own a lot of old
D&D and AD&D modules, but I never got the chance to play a lot of them
myself, either because I was the DM or just because my group never got around
to them, so it's great to have the opportunity to see what they look like from
the inside, so to speak. I was especially glad to see Tamoachan
converted, since this was one of my 2 or 3 favorite modules (along with Tomb of
Horrors and Dwellers of the Forbidden City, neither of which I saw listed on
your site...nudge nudge!) Well, I don't have any
detailed reviews written up at the moment, but I just wanted to let you know
what a good job you've done so far!
Looking forward to the
rest of the Realm…
Well... of the recent
modules "Blood and Tears" (by James Rand) and "When a Child
Cries" (by Catz) are probably the most notable.
Also, we shouldn't forget old masterpieces like "Harvest of Sorrows"
(by Dan Crawford) and "When Solitude Remains" (by Harri
Polsa). And, of course, Ray Dyer's whole Realm
project is quite remarkable.
-Tero
L.
I just wanted to say
good job with all the work you have done so far. It really is quite a project
you have taken on and your doing great. Just wanted you to
know.
If you're talking
about The Realm and the games by Ray Dyer, YES, they do live up to the
previews. (Except for Swamplight,
which I found a little disappointing because it was too short.)
The different
adventures all use the same (new) player character icons and hacked items, so
you can start out your party in one adventure and then transfer your characters
through all the others.
In addition, they all
have different frames and music, not to mention new walls, backgrounds, combat
art, etc. So you need UAShell to play them.
Nearly all of the
modules are based on the classic D&D and AD&D modules. His adaptation
of Keep on the Borderlands is probably the most faithful to the pen & paper
version I have seen.
I have completed all the
games in the Eastlands setting, and they are all
worth the time and effort to play. Thanks, Ray, for all the work; your efforts
are appreciated.
I've got a friend who
is just starting to play FRUA, and he's looking for AD&D type adventures.
Outside of my own, the Realm is the one of the few places I can send him
adventuring where I know he'll have a good time.
I've been playing your
'Realm' games lately, and figured that you might want to hear some feedback.
Generally speaking, they are quite good. Not exactly my kind of UA, but better
than 85% of the designs out there. All those hacks add some nice flavor, and I
must admit, that if these were done on vanilla UA, I wouldn't think so 'high'
(on my rather demanding standards...) of them.
Thought I'd drop you a
line and express my gratitude for the realm. Having been the DM for most of
these modules, I really enjoy getting to experience them as a player. You're
doing a great job, and have given me many hours of enjoyment (and my SO many
hours alone in bed as I try to finish just a little bit more).
Hello there,
First of all I must
say that i just love what you are doing with the
realms. It is almost incredible to see all the good text section you have
written for each of the games..
Now I would really like
to hear from you each time that you release a new part to your fabulous epic...
Keep up the good work
and see you next time...
I just wish you could
move FASTER! Great job so far......by the way, if there are any old mods that you don't have(pen and paper mods
that is) I'll see if I have them...I've got an impressive collection of old TSR
merchandise including old RPGA newsletters with mods
in them, Dragon mags, etc....
Hi,
First off I'd
like to say that I love your modules. I've played many in the past and must say
they are the first games since Pools of Radiance that brings back that same ol feel as POR did back in 88 or so. Thanks for taking the
time to create these masterpieces. I can't figure out why, but FRUA is the only
game I have played since it originally came out and gone for months even years
without playing it. Then one day I'd fire it back up and would play again for
months. This process must have happened at least 5 or 6 times since the game
first appeared for the PC. I love FRUA and just never get bored of it. I must
admit my last two instances of re-discovering the game was solely due to you
and your module conversions. Thanks a lot, they really
capture that original Goldbox feel. I hope you
continue to create such fine work :)
I've only recently begun playing the Realm
games because I was originally discouraged by the difficulty of Keep on the
Borderlands. I stuck with the game, however, and raised my first level party to
around level four. Here is a collective review of the first three games I
played, Keep on the Borderlands, the Lost Tower of Castanamir,
and Horror on the Hill, all by Ray Dyer.
The artwork of the Realm games is
generally of rather poor quality. The frames in Keep on the Borderlands and
Horror on the Hill are ugly recolors of the default;
Lost Tower of Castanimir has an excellent frame,
however. Many of the pics in Keep and especially
Horror on the Hill are very poor, eight-or-so-color atrocities. Some of the art, however is good; the pics of
the gnolls are nice scans, and I love the pic of the humanoids in game00. I hate the
"Intermission" pic seen when the party
rests. The wall, backdrop, and combat art, though, is
typically of good quality.
All of the Realm games feature excellent ckit and item hacks. From the death text
to the "Leave the Realm?"-type strings, and especially the
items, the hacks added to my enjoyment of the games. My favorite item was the
adder staff I found; it's been so useful against things like ogres.
Just wanted to say that I think your
modules in the Realm are wonderful...in fact they are the most entertaining UA
modules I have ever played!
i just started playing "the vieled
society" and it is awesome! i
plan on secret of saltmarsh next.my
wife had been playing various games on the internet, but now i have her hooked on your series.
even better than dwarven
clerics are gnomish mages!
Im hooked.
Im not sure wether I should
thankyou or give you a cursed long sword, for
creating the UA modules of the realm. Ive finished
the Eastlands and have almost completed the west
lands. I can't seem to get enough. Some great work on conversions!
I haven't touched UA for about 2 years and
needed some good mods to "inspire" me
again.
I have a problem though (2 actually)... I
haven't been able to download very effectively from your web pages and have
resorted to down loading from a frua module listing
with hundreds of mods. This could be the problem with
the issue I have. I am attempting to play the ravenloft
adventure (game21) but after the opening credits etc. when it goes into game
mode I get a "please insert disk 1 in drive A" error message. Could
you advise on a solution? I use CD rom for my UA so I
don't know where to go to fix this. Is there a problem with the mod (if so do
you have a patch) or is the problem with my system.
The other problem is that I am so addicted
to the realm that girlfriend, work, food etc... have
all taken a secondary role. Scary.. but
true. (In
:)
Thanks in advance.
I have been playing Ray's 'Realm' series
and am enjoying myself immensely!
I like the "follow me" equipment
so my PCS can jump betwixt mods w/out starting over
with inferior items or having them altered to some strange thing. :)
I am also impressed with the handling of
treasure... done with a combination of Character Inventory items, Quest-Items,
gemstones and jewelry, and 'converting' the base coinage found to a lump GP
value! Well done!
