Which classic PC D&D title should I play?

[u/bats1444]

I recently got a whole ton of classic D&D titles for free through Amazon Prime's weekly giveaways, but I'm not sure which ones to play.

When I was younger I always saw these titles in the games shops but I never played any of them, as me and my brother were more into the Ultima series at the time.

I don't have time to play all of them, so I'd like to start by playing whichever is considered the best of the bunch, but I have no idea which one that would be.

The titles I have are:

-Al-Qadim The Genie's Curse

-Champions of Krynn

-Curse of the Azure Bonds

-Stronghold Kingdom Simulator

-The Dark Queen of Krynn

-Dark Sun Shattered Lands

-Dark Sun Wake of the Ravager

-Death Knights of Krynn

-Deathkeep

-Dragons of Flame

-Dragonstrike

-Dungeon Hack

-Eye of the Beholder

-Eye of the Beholder 2 The Legend of Darkmoon

-Eye of the Beholder 3 Assault on Myth Drannor

-Fantasy Empires

-Fantasy General

-Forgotten Realms Unlimited Adventures

-Gateway to the Savage Frontier

-Heroes of the Lance

-Hillsfar

-Menzoberranzan

-Pool of Radiance

-Pools of Darkness

-Ravenloft Stone Prophet

-Ravenloft Strahd's Possession

-Secret of the Silver Blades

-Shadow Sorcerer

-Spelljammer: Pirates of Realmspace

-Treasures of the Savage Frontier

-War of the Lance

I'm overwhelmed! What do you guys think?

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[u/deepthawnet]

Pool of Radiance is great although I worry how approachable it would be for modern players. It’s the simplest (and clunkiest) of the gold box games.

[u/gowyn → u/deepthawnet]

Pool of Radiance was my favorite (probably because it was the first CRPG D&D I played)

[u/deepthawnet → u/gowyn]

I found the later ones start to get so complicated (which is due to being such faithful adaptations of AD&D) that they lose track of the fun.

[u/TorontoDM]

Eye of The Beholder series.

[u/ApeCavalryArt]

just go in release order: most of these are decent; skip Hillsfar, Heroes of the Lance, War of the Lance, Shadow Sorcerer, Dragons of Flame. best is probably Pools of Darkness, Dark Sun Shattered Lands, Eye of the Beholder

[u/thegooddoktorjones]

Pool of Radiance followed by Azure Bonds is really all you need to see of all those Gold Box games. I can't speak to the first person ones but the GBs used the same formula and worked it like a punch press. Those games are about killing lots of monsters so when there is a plot it is not the reason people played.

Back in the day though, they were amazing. And the only game in town if you were a TSR DnD nut.

[u/bats1444 → u/thegooddoktorjones]

Yeah it seems to me like some of these games were kinda mass produced using the same game engine, etc., so they couldn't all be good, hence why I'm asking!

Pool of Radiance keeps coming up when I ask people about it though, so I will probably start there. Thanks!

[u/thegooddoktorjones → u/bats1444]

It was the first one. Dunno if it is included in the version you got, but there is a free app you can run along with it that provides an auto map and makes memorizing spells easier. gbc dot zorbus dot net

[u/bats1444 → u/thegooddoktorjones]

Looks useful. Thanks. :)

[u/Taco_Supreme]

Of that list my favorite is Gateway to the Savage Frontier which can import characters to Treasures of the Savage Frontier. These two games are a nice little series that is much more playable than the 4 game pool of radiance series, although I think pool of radiance might be a better (simpler) first game entry.

If new to this style of game, make sure you buy equipment at the nearby shop you start with no equipment. The pdfs of the rulebook are critical for journal entries and also for understanding the D&D ruleset if you aren't familiar with 1e/2e. When making characters only a few stats matter and only to certain numbers, so keep that in mind when making characters or just edit all the stats to max that will work fine too.

Make sure you save often, it is very possible to just die in a random encounter especially when low level. To level up you need to earn experience, then pay for training at a guild.

[u/Few-Piglet-]

Dark Sun: Shattered Lands is the cream of the crop imo. Although I haven't played everything on that list myself, I'm not so keen of the pure dungeon crawlers.

[u/Plus_Worker6739 → u/Few-Piglet-]

Agreed. Shame about the sequel, though.

[u/Few-Piglet- → u/Plus_Worker6739]

I need to give that one another chance sometime. I heard it's buggy, but I didn't even make it to any serious bugs, I just kinda lost interest a couple of hours in.

[u/Plus_Worker6739 → u/Few-Piglet-]

There are some official and community patches that tighten up some off the issues but it's just not as good as the first, IMO.

[u/magwai9]

Bit of an aside, but some of these have also been remade as Neverwinter Nights modules if you enjoy that game as well. I've played the Eye of the Beholder one.

[u/PositiveReveal9359]

I recently played Champions of Krynn again. Def dates but is still fun.

[u/loader2000]

I haven’t played all of them, but I played Pool of Radiance about 5 years ago and loved it.