Loved this the first time I played it. I've used elements of it ever since.

First of all, how vain must one be to review one's own product in order to avoid its poor rating from showing?

Second, this is a poor guide. It offers very little in way of substance and instead is just a very robotic, inconsiderate conversion. "Orcs in this cave? Just use the Orc statsblock for all of them!", ignoring the fact that some of the monsters in these caves have a higher HD than the base ones, mostly leaders. No tips are even given for such progression. Any DM can just see kobolds and use kobolds there. This isn't what a conversion guide needs. Nothing presented that would suggest "This leader of the bugbears fights as a higher HD monster... is there something in the monster manual that would fit such stats?".

Furthermore there is just a lack of care. Thouls and Ghouls are not the same thing so just telling someone to "use the ghouls" defeats the entire purpose of having Thouls in the first place. Similarly, giant gecko lizards and giant draco lizards operate differently, as do tiger beetles from fire beetles... So using only giant lizards for both lizards and giant fire beetles for both lizards just as much fails to factor in things like increasing difficulty challenges.

All in all, a very poor way to spend 2$. I don't know if all Classic Modules Today products are this poorly thought-out, but at the very least I recommend avoiding this author's contributions.

For the price what you get is a GREAT timesaver over converting the module yourself. I definitely recommend this product over trying to go it alone.

However, that said I must say the conversion feels a little barebones from a new GMs perspective. This is the first classic module I will be running and I am a relatively new GM and I still have lots of questions that I have to fill in the blanks for.

That said I don't think this product is going for a proper rebalalence to 5e mechanics and tries to stay as true to original module as possible. So for that I give it 5 stars as it delivers what it promises as long as you don't want more.

Although the concept of the conversions is very good in practice, the template format used is overly generic. As an example, all "kobolds" are treated as generic kobolds. This removes much of the flavor of "very large guard" kobolds, as well as the "kobold chieftain" (pg. 15 of the original module). These could easily use the DnD 5e wiki stats for "kobold warrior" and "kobold boss" respectively instead. Another standout is Green Slime, contributor recommends to treat as Ochre Jelly. Green Slime is listed on DMG pg. 105.

The bright spot of this conversion is the Notable NPCs. This is well done and informative.

Pages 7 and 8 of the conversion is repeated information from pages 4, 5, and 6 of the conversion. These "reference sheets" for the initial reference sheets are redundant and confusing. Again, this is not a fault of the contributor, it is the template.

Furthermore, the monster conversions themselves would be much more useful listed by module area and room number, rather than simply alphabetically. This is a problem of the conversion template itself, and not particular to this contributor.

Bear in mind that this module, B2: The Keep on the Borderlands, is widely considered one of the most iconic of the old school modules and is routinely listed in the top 15 modules of all time. That said, it (and other modules such as Ravenloft, Isle of Dread, Castle Amber, etc.) deserves a more thoughtful conversion.

Particularly modifying treasure awards in the conversions is also necessary. The amounts of treasure listed in the originals is massive due to the old mechanic of awarding xp for gp looted (and the much larger xp needs for level advancement). If DMs use the listed treasure values, they will quickly wreck the economy of thier own games.

In closing, the conversion idea is great, the execution however is bare bones, incomplete, and redundant. This is not a criticism of the contributor, it is a criticism of the universal template used. I would not recommend the Dungeon Masters Guild conversions in their current format for DMs who wish to use their classic modules. Strong overhauls to format and treasure would make these conversions a must have.

I thank the contributor for his effort to the NPCs. Again, well done.

-Craig

I'm actually rather impressed!

Again, to clarify as some seem to have been confused about this, this is NOT the whole Keep on the Borderlands module, it's just a conversion guide that requires you to have the original.

That said, it's really well done and has plenty of references and stat blocks that remove most of the difficulty of preparing this adventure on your own if you plan to move it to 5e.

For the price (1 UK pound, in my case) this is more than worth the money. I will definately get more of these if my players like the old modules :)

The title is misleading. It strongly implies it is the module, and only buried in the text does it mention it is a conversion guide. I will NEVER buy from this author, and I am profoundly disappointed in DMGuild. I wanted to buy PDFs of the adventures I enjoyed in my youth, to share with friends new to gaming.