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Dungeons & Dragons Waterdeep: Dungeon of the Mad Mage (Adventure Book, D&D Roleplaying Game)

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Description

Explore the mega-dungeon of Undermountain in this adventure for the world’s greatest roleplaying game. In the city of Waterdeep rests a tavern called the Yawning Portal, named after the gaping pit in its common room. At the bottom of this crumbling shaft is a labyrinthine dungeon shunned by all but the most daring adventurers. Known as Undermountain, this dungeon is the domain of the mad wizard Halaster Blackcloak. Long has the Mad Mage dwelt in these forlorn depths, seeding his lair with monsters, traps, and mysteries—to what end is a constant source of speculation and concern. • The follow up to Waterdeep: Dragon Heist, Dungeon of the Mad Mage takes adventurers deep into one of D&D's biggest dungeons. Each of Undermountain's twenty-three levels is an adventure setting unto itself, and the book includes a map for each one. • Waterdeep, known as the City of Splendors, is one of D&D’s most iconic locations. Also the setting for the board game Lords of Waterdeeep, it’s the jewel of the Sword Coast—a sprawling melting pot held together by firm laws and swift justice. • Dungeon of the Mad Mage is the second of two Dungeons & Dragons books set in Waterdeep. It picks up where the first, Dragon Heist,leaves off, taking characters of 5th level or higher all the way to 20th level. • In D&D, you and your friends coauthor you own legend. Guided by a Dungeon Master, you create characters and play their roles in a story, rolling dice and navigating maps as you unfold a tale as limitless as your imagination. • Dungeons & Dragons is the world’s greatest roleplaying game. Created in 1974, D&D transformed gaming culture by blending traditional fantasy with miniatures and wargaming. Read more


Publisher ‏ : ‎ Wizards of the Coast; Illustrated edition (November 20, 2018)


Language ‏ : ‎ English


Hardcover ‏ : ‎ 256 pages


ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 0786966262


ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 64


Reading age ‏ : ‎ 14 years and up


Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 10.6 ounces


Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 8.56 x 0.8 x 11.14 inches


Best Sellers Rank: #13,264 in Books (See Top 100 in Books) #46 in Dungeons & Dragons Game


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Top Amazon Reviews


  • Built-in Flexibility - Prepare to be Creative!
I wanted to learn how to build dungeons and stock with them encounters. I do not just mean monsters to fight or traps to avoid but a full adventure. So I looked to the professionals of the "world's greatest roleplaying game" and picked up the mega-dungeon known as Undermountain. This is a review for "Dungeon of the Mad Mage". Wow, this module is versatile. The flexibility written into this mega-dungeon is amazing. I was expecting something that was a one-size-fits all sort of thing. You know, something like the modules that Adventure's League DMs run: the players arrive for X reason, and then Y happens. Let the players react and then tell them to do Z. This book isn't written like that at all. In fact, it is so flexible it is less of a pre-written adventure and more like a pre-written setting that includes set-piece events for a DM to use or adapt for their own adventure. For instance, the first chapter provides adventure hooks for the party but acknowledges that players can have their own reasons for entering Undermountain. The players aren't locked into a particular quest or storyline. A DM could make up their own reason. This is an easy thing to do. I found myself coming up with several hooks for venturing to particular levels; hooks that didn't have anything to do with the specific adventure suggested but just the setting provided. The same chapter has this sidebar listing off possible motivations for Halaster Blackcloak, the Mad Mage himself, to tolerate the adventurers intruding in his lair. There are six in total, and they can change whenever the DM wants without explanation. As the book says, "he is the Mad Mage, after all". So the DM could make up some totally bonkers motivation, and that would be totally legit. If they don't want to include him, then they can leave Halaster in the background. The dungeon levels themselves are flexible. Each level map is created with tunnels that lead off the established area. These are marked as "tunnel leads to expanded dungeon". So the DM can add rooms and events if they want, or they can pretend those tunnels don't exist and treat the area as a solid wall. A list of wandering monsters is often provided that the DM can include if they want to shake up an existing room. Even if a player has read this book, they can still be surprised by these wandering creatures, or who may or may not appear. Finally, while each level is written with its own storyline, the book acknowledge multiple ways that the players could resolve it, or even ignore it. This is tacit encouragement for the DM to tweak things to fit their own narrative. I see the levels more as "template settings" than hard-coded adventures. Indeed, one doesn't even have to use them for Undermountain. Each level is designed to work within Undermountain. Of course, it is, because they are included in this book. However, they can take place elsewhere. A little tweaking of lore or re-flavoring of certain factions or items, and any given level can be its own stand-alone adventure. For example, there is no reason why Dweomercore, the school for evil mages, has to be inside Undermountain. It could be some isolated mansion in the woods, or part of an urban city with either a public reputation or secret existence. I do not mean that this flexibility is nothing but options. There is a concrete path to walk if you choose to walk it. A DM can run this adventure exactly as it is, no changes necessary, and it would still be a complete adventure. There are storylines, individual events, monster encounters, and treasures of all kinds already provided. Each level of the dungeon is supposed to be balanced to the party's level, and there's even a in-universe mechanic to prevent players from going to levels they may not be ready for (if the DM wants to use it). The experience gained from each level will help the party level up and be ready for the next one. As for being balanced treasure-wise, that is something I want to address. I don't really understand the value of the wealth-per-level thing. It sounds too rigid for storytelling. Why should the same dungeon contain more or less treasure for parties of different levels? It sounds like game-ism for the sake of game-ism. The treasure found in Undermountain makes a great deal of sense with its story. The majority of the treasure found here is from other people who have set up shop in Undermountain. The bandits, the Drow Houses, the Hobgoblin army, other adventuring parties (living or dead, but mostly dead) etc. are the ones with the treasure. This is because the player's party is not the first to go into Undermountain. Heck, the main entrance to Level One is basically a tourist attraction in the Yawning Portal tavern. Lots of adventurers have gone in and searched for loot. So the book mentions empty treasure chests, already-looted vaults, and other signs of previous adventuring parties. There is STILL treasure to be found, but it is going to be on deeper levels, in better hiding places, etc. I find this a fantastic thematic device. The artwork and maps and all that stuff look good too. I just don't want to go into detail about it. Rest assured that flipping between the map and the descriptions of the rooms keyed to the map is an easy thing to do. I did just that when I was reading through the book to get a sense for how the level was laid out. As a dungeon master, my reaction to reading even the first several levels was, "I want to play through this with someone." Trickster Eric Novels gives Dungeon of the Mad Mage an A+ ... show more
Reviewed in the United States on August 1, 2021 by BW

  • Good campaign, and good quality book. There are some things you should know though.
This is a great-quality copy of the Mad Mage campaign. If you are planning on running it, be prepared: This is a very large dungeon, and most battlemaps are not big enough for the bigger floors. If you do theatre of the mind, this won't be an issue. But you should either be ready to do a combination of computer and physical maps, TOTM and maps, just TOTM, or some other variation. Also, this campaign can be very difficult. Some of my newer players definitely find themselves a bit challenged at times, but it is teaching them the mechanics very fast, and it is totally doable if they at least know the basic mechanics and some good strategies. Make sure you let newer players know that they are going into the deep end: after all, they might be making it all the way to level 20 which brings about many challenges, but very powerful mechanics to go along with them. The only real weakness of this campaign is that the maps aren't as gorgeous as in some other DND Modules. They were clearly made on a computer. If you are using a battle map that you draw on, this is fine (and maybe even better!). But do know that if you go in expecting beautiful hand-drawn illustrations, that is not what you will find. I have been looking forward to running this campaign, and I will say that it has not disappointed us. Good luck and happy dming! ... show more
Reviewed in the United States on January 30, 2023 by Remy C

  • Abbreviated Guide for Undermountain Adventures
I was looking to start a D&D campaign in Waterdeep and had been searching around for maps and descriptions for the Undermountain dungeon beneath it and so was very happy when this D&D 5th edition source book came out. The Undermountain, referred to as “The Dungeon of The Mad Mage” in this book, was first detailed in three or four classic D&D 2nd edition boxed sets or source books, which covered 6 or so levels of this mega dungeon. This book published for use with 5th edition D&D goes further by giving an overview of 20+ levels of the Undermountain dungeon, the most comprehensive source book yet for this adventure location. The earlier (out-of-print) D&D materials describing the Undermountain were more detailed, as they each covered 3 or 4 levels or sub-levels of the Undermountain. But this book gives a good 11-15 page overview of all 20 levels and a full page black-and-white map of each, which are numbered for looking up the descriptions. That was just what I needed in trying to figure out the basics of what the Undermountain looks like. But with so many levels all in one book, the maps are not the full levels from the older editions. Comparing the maps in Dungeon of the Mad Mage with my Undermountain books from previous editions, the maps for the well known levels (The Dungeon Level, Arcane Chambers, Sargauth, Wyllowwood, Muriel’s Gauntlet, Skullport, and Trobriand’s Graveyard) fit within sections of the earlier maps without much adjusting. But other levels (The Twisted Caverns, The Lost Level, and The Troglodyte Warrens) have been revised so that they don’t have the same floor plans as earlier versions of these levels and cannot be used easily with earlier materials describing those levels, which was a disappointment to me and the reason I can’t give this book 5 stars. That said, this book does introduce many of the Undermountain’s deeper levels which either were not included or not detailed extensively in the earlier sources. So it still could be useful even for someone using the earlier D&D sources on the Undermountain. One critique that comes up about this adventure is that you don’t get the text boxes for DMs to read to their players and there isn’t a lot of details per level. But there is enough for a creative DM to flesh out the key areas of the Undermountain dungeon for their players to explore and build a campaign around. There is even 8 pages and maps showing the key locations of Skullport, the rough and tumble town that is under Waterdeep, which had a book of it’s own dedicated to it in 2nd edition of D&D. I always wanted to know what Skullport and the Undermountain looked like and this is the best overview of them out there. Don’t expect this to be an adventure with a major overhanging plot fully fleshed out for the DM to just drop players into. But if your campaign includes exploring of dungeons and old school delving for treasure, this book opens up this entire area below Waterdeep for your players to explore and for DMs to work into any D&D campaign. ... show more
Reviewed in the United States on December 25, 2019 by Mark Mark

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