About Professor DM's Video On Hommlet
Where I Take Serious Issue With His Viewpoints And Attitude...
About a week ago, a Youtuber going by the name “Professor DM” released a video outlining his thoughts about that old classic AD&D module The Village of Hommlet.
I’ve seen his vids from time to time and none of them really grabbed my attention. However, this one did make me take note, and it drove me to address his comments here and also talk about why I think he said some of the things he said.
To start things off, a little background on Professor DM: his name is Dan Masters, and he’s written what he calls “an OSR hack” called Deathbringer. I haven’t seen the product and probably never will, but it supposedly alters any OSR style rules to give it a “grimdark” feeling.
You know that’s the thing now, right? Cool.
I did see some pics on his Facebook page of his product, and it looks like he just boiled game rules down to a very fundamental level so that it looks like those fantasy board games from Milton Bradley and others.
A check on RPG Geek shows him as the author of four works and one Knock article… all from 2022 and later, so either this list is incomplete or he’s late to the OSR party… as many are.
Moving on, let’s take a look at some of his comments as he reviews Hommlet, and later address them. In no particular order:
1. He notices that the module is only 16 pages long and pales in comparison to modern layout.
2. He complains that the introductory background section is a wall of text and too long. He himself could summarize it in just a couple of paragraphs.
3. He notes that most of the NPCs in town are not named, but their wealth is listed down to the last coin. He suspects this scenario was set up this way because Gary Gygax thought the party would be killing these people and taking their swag.
4. He thinks there are no adventure hooks and notes that there are no rumors.
5. He thinks too much attention was paid to the Inn of the Welcome Wench and especially the Inn menu.
6. According to him, there’s no map showing where the moat house is relative to the town.
7. He’s concerned about the number of giant animals in and around the moat house and demands explanation as to why they’re so big.
8. He thinks there’s no logical reason for the bandits to be in the moat house.
9. He says that Lareth’s chamber is just a room at the end of a corridor.
10. That 10th level assassin worries him and he thinks it’s “sandbagging” the PCs.
There are other points he makes, but let’s settle for these ten.
And here’s what I think:
1. It’s 16 pages long because it’s packed with information and details. That “wall of text” trope? It was there to inform the DM as well as the players. Modern layouts are filled with busy art and have entirely too much space in them in order to expand the page count.
2. The introduction tells you all you need to know about the scenario. And yeah, it does require a little reading.
3. Names are easy to invent on the fly. Barron Gostlegooster. Look, I did it no problem. Easy. Now… if you think for a second that a 1st level party is going to murder hobo through this town, then think again. Go back and check so many of the NPCs. A great deal of them are leveled characters… many of them retired… and could handle the PC party no problem.
Here’s a little story: I once played in this adventure as an assassin pretending to be a thief. I decided I was going to break into the church and take out the two clerics there. Why? I didn’t like their smug faces. These are Terjon (6th level cleric) and his aide Calmert (3rd level). Terjon caught me, I lost the initiative, and he dropped me with a Command spell to sleep. End of that PC.
There’s Elmo the Ranger, Burne and Rufus from the tower, Jaroo the Druid, and most of the men in this town are militia. Why Dan would even consider PCs attempting to cut through this town like a death wind is beyond me.
4. No adventure hooks? Hey, remember that wall of text at the beginning that he complained about? There are your hooks. That’s how the party knows what’s up in Hommlet. There are also plenty of NPCs in the Inn and around town who can be pumped for information which may or may not be true. You don’t need a ready made list of rumors. It’s called role playing.
5. The Inn is detailed because that’s where the PCs stay and converse with others. It’s detailed because they will be eating and sleeping there. The Inn, as stated, is famous for its well stocked menu. It’s a place for the PCs to interact and be seen (more on that later). Again, it’s called role playing.
6. There’s literally a map showing where the moat house is in relation to the town, as well as details describing how far away it is. The map shows the branch trail off the main road, and the module tells us the moat house is about two miles away.
7. There are giant animals here because a) they’re listed as monsters available in the Monster Manual, and b) the moat house is in an isolated, marshy area where they are the apex predators… so they eat well, and those frogs will eat the PCs if they’re allowed. So, yeah… they’re going to be big. Anyone who has lived near river bottoms like I have know that rattlers can get enormous in such an environment. Additionally, the moat house description describes its former master as “a vile cleric of damnation” so who knows what evil aura still lingers there? The villagers certainly avoid the place for that reason.
8. There’s every reason for the bandits to be hiding in the moat house. Where are they supposed to stay? In the Inn? They’ve started raiding along these well-traveled roads so hard that the villagers sent word to the Viscount of Verbobonc for help. That’s why the PCs are there. It’s all in that wall of text description at the beginning that Dan thinks should be summed up in a couple of paragraphs.
9. So, if I read the actual description given with the dungeon, I note that there are six guardsmen and one sergeant in one room, twelve guardsmen and 2 sergeants in the next room along with a 4th level fighter… all of which the party will have to cut through before they can get to Lareth in his lair. The DM should intelligently use them. That’s assuming Lareth stays in there; the description details how they will engage the party, and Lareth will definitely join the fight out in the main rooms if he feels he should. His lair is a headquarters from which he commands his evil forces… not just a room at the end of a corridor.
10. About that assassin… Dan misses the point, and by now I suspect he might have a reading comprehension problem. No big deal… lots of people do. The module states that inquiries will be made about Lareth’s death, and if the party makes it known they did it… you know, in that role playing stuff in the Inn?… and starts displaying his impressive bling, then the temple will send a high level assassin to take them out. Terjon and Jaroo will side with the PCs should this occur. The assassin is a result and consequence of role playing, not a “sandbagging” of the players for accomplishing a mighty deed.
That’s assuming, of course, the Temple actually finds out Lareth was killed; people get eaten by giant frogs every day…
To sum it up: now, all of this sounds like just details, but they point to a larger conclusion… Dan Masters doesn’t understand how the module works and how a DM was supposed to use the information provided in order to run a game. I don’t know how old he is; I suspect he’s slightly younger than I am (I’m 57), and he presents a very ragged copy of the module that’s stapled together with half the map missing. He claims to have run it twice inside of five years or so, so he should get it. Either he doesn’t, and those games were probably boring, or he really does but he’s denigrating the product for other reasons.
Here’s what I think: apparently he’s late to the OSR publishing game. I’m jaded about that sort of thing, since I was at ground zero for the OSR movement almost 20 years ago, but I suspect he (and some others) can’t let go of the 5E mindset, so they’re attempting to shift the window of what OSR means and how it plays to a more “modern style” instead of learning how OS games like AD&D actually work.
So, the traditional milestones of OSR play need to vanish to make room for the new stuff.
I’m not linking his video here because I’m not giving him the traffic, but if you watch it he’s obviously pimping his Deathbringer hack and his appearance at some con with other OSR luminaries (of which I care nothing about; Jeff Dee would be the only one I’d want to actually sit down and talk with).
Oh, and he’s got some kind of Deathbringer dice too. He also has an eBay page that’s nothing but other people’s stuff. In the end, he’s just making money off other people’s stuff… that’s what most of the OSR is about these days… and he’s denigrating the work of a writer who was, quite frankly, smarter and more creative than he is, and who threw away better rules concepts than many OSR designers are publishing today.
Dan does make two very good points in his video: 1) Dee’s cover art rocks, and is instrumental in my vision of AD&D, and 2) there was entirely too much time between the publication of Village of Hommlet and Temple of Elemental Evil.
In the end, I’m not sure what motivated Dan Masters… aka Professor DM… to make this video. Others commented to me that he’s often used clickbait titles because the Youtube algorithm keeps burying him.
If that’s so, I’d take that as a hint.
I’m opening comments on this post, because I’d love to hear what anyone has to say about this. Keep it civil. Snarky is okay. Savage sarcasm will be rewarded.