D&D: A Look Inside ‘The Lost City: Quests from the Infinite Staircase’ Preview
D&D’s next big book Quests from the Infinite Staircase revives a lot of classic adventures, including, as you’ll see, The Lost City.
The Lost City is one of D&D’s more expansive modules. It was originally designed as an adventure meant to introduce both new players and novice Dungeon Masters experience in fleshing out adventures. One of the biggest features of The Lost City are the parts of the map that are left blank, ready for the DM to fill in and flesh out.
This was by design. Tom Moldvay, who developed the D&D “Basic Set” as well as the “Expert Set” wrote the module to include options for both sets of rules.
As far as adventures go, it’s a pretty good dungeon crawl; the Lost City is big and warrants exploration from both players and DMs. But, will that sense of “make this yours” carry through in the remastered version? Or will WotC fill in the blank spaces. We get an idea in a new teaser video, released today.
WotC Previews The Lost City – A Pyramid Full of a City Full of Adventure
One of the standout parts of the Lost City is the adventure’s approach to both exploration and roleplay. It isn’t just a dungeon full of monsters to encounter and kill/sneak past. It’s a weird, living city full of masked inhabitants.
These are the remnants of the people who once dwelt in the ancient ruined city of Cynidicea. They wear masks to show their devotion to various things, and as you might gather from the video, there are multiple factions here. There are three groups dedicated to the gods of Cynidicea. But there is also a fourth faction.
This group of cultists worships an entity known as Zargon.
Zargon was responsible for the city’s destruction. Zargon’s cult has grown, and some of the worshippers of the other ancient gods are dedicated to overthrowing his followers. But more importantly, Zargon, if you believe the rumors, can’t be killed.
Though, it’s worth pointing out, he does have a stat block. So. I think the age old saying applies. If it has stats, we can kill it. Either way, you’ll be able to see for yourself soon enough in The Lost City!
Quests from the Infinite Staircase is due out July 16th!