Keep on the Borderlands: A Classic Dungeons & Dragons Review
- Dungeoneers Guild Games
- 1 day ago
- 28 min read
Updated: 5 hours ago
A look into and beyond the realms of the Keep and the Caves of Chaos.
By R. Nelson Bailey
Introduction
Erol Otus’s evocative back-cover painting for Keep on the Borderlands captures the module’s central themes of adventure, exploration, and enchantment through luridly vivid imagery. The darkening silhouette of the Keep rises against the orange afterglow of a summer sunset. This moment suspended in time captures the twilight threshold between safety and peril, certainty and the unknown.
A small band of novice adventurers approaches their destination after a long journey. Their weapons, armor, and spells are new and untested. Each has their own reasons for venturing into danger, but a sense of awe and anticipation unites all. The sight of the Keep that dominates the hill inspires wonder and possibility, tempered by a sense of foreboding. The road ahead may lead to glory and riches, or to failure and death.
For countless players who first read or played this iconic Dungeons & Dragons module, that image resonated with their own experiences. Keep on the Borderlands went on to become one of the bestselling modules of all time. Most players of the 1980s likely encountered it, and for many, it served as their very first adventure. It opened a door into a world of possibility and peril, where enchantment and danger were inseparably entwined.
Part 1: Module Overview
What makes B2 Keep on the Borderlands remarkable is not its monsters, maps, or its story, but its deliberate openness. The module was designed as a framework for Dungeon Masters to build upon, not a finished tale to be consumed. That philosophy, so different from modern design, is its true enduring legacy. Keeping this in mind, let’s look at how the parts of the module are laid out.
The module is organized into two main parts. The first introduces the rules of Dungeons & Dragons and offers guidance on how to conduct an adventure. The second contains the adventure itself, subdivided into three sections: the Keep, which serves as the characters’ home base; a short stretch of wilderness between the Keep and the ravine where the caves lie; and the Caves of Chaos, where the majority of the adventure occurs.
“The KEEP is a microcosm, a world in miniature. Humankind and its allies have established strongholds—whether fortresses or organized countries.”
The Keep
The Keep dominates the surrounding countryside, standing as a fortress at the edge of the Realm. Curtain walls enclose its community, while guards atop the high towers watch ceaselessly for threats from the borderlands. Catapults and ballistae mounted along the walls deter all but the fiercest monsters from assailing this bastion of civilization and Law. The settlement is governed by the Castellan, who rules from the fortified inner ward. Common folk inhabit the outer bailey, while adventurers may enter the inner ward only with permission.
The outer “town” provides essential resources for adventurers: taverns, inns, stables, a bank, an armorer, and modest apartments. It functions as the party’s home base between forays into the wilds. Here, characters encounter non-player characters (NPCs), exchange stories, and gather rumors that ultimately direct them toward the Caves of Chaos.
The module leaves the Keep only lightly sketched, and the structure of events remains open. NPCs are described in the briefest strokes. For example, the Castellan is described more fully than anyone else in the Keep, yet even his portrait is spare: “He is a very clever fellow, but at times he can be too hasty in his decisions. His bravery and honesty are absolute. If a guest asks him any question, he will do his best to answer, providing that it does not compromise the security of the KEEP.” [1] That is as detailed as any NPC description gets.
The limited information provided functions merely as a framework, leaving it to the Dungeon Master to elaborate on this area and construct a narrative of their own design.
The Wilderness
The wilderness between the Keep and the Caves of Chaos contains four encounter sites: a lair of lizard men, the nest of giant black widow spiders, a camp of Chaotic human raiders, and the den of the “Mad Hermit.” The Hermit—once a thief, now driven to madness—resides in the hollow of a massive oak, accompanied by a fierce mountain lion. He greets adventurers with guile, seeking to mislead and entrap them whenever opportunity permits. Of all the wilderness encounters, his lair is the most memorable, embodying both the unpredictability and the menace that lurk just beyond the safety of the Keep.
The Caves of Chaos
Barely two miles from the Keep, a narrow ravine conceals the infamous Caves of Chaos, an enclave of danger and evil. Cave mouths pierce the rocky walls of the cul-de-sac, each opening into its own noisome dungeon complex. Some are warrens of humanoid tribes—kobolds, goblins, orcs, hobgoblins, and gnolls. Others harbor solitary horrors unaligned with any tribe. One leads to the Shrine of Evil Chaos, the ultimate stronghold of evil and the seat of the module’s chief villain: a sinister priest who commands legions of undead within his blighted halls.
The Caves of Chaos are structured as a sandbox dungeon. From the ravine floor, the entrances appear nearly identical, providing little indication of the dangers that lie within. Player characters may stumble into the relatively accessible kobold warren, or stride directly into the sinister shrine—the most perilous of all. The choice is theirs, and the danger remains absolute.
Beyond the Threshold
I can’t tell you exactly how I first came by a copy of Keep on the Borderlands. I didn’t buy it, so I must have gotten it from a friend—probably traded it for some Star Wars figures. What I do remember is the first time I read it.
It was a dark fall afternoon, almost certainly a weekend. The leaden clouds of an autumn storm bore a moody yellow-gray tinge. Wind and rain had knocked out the power across the neighborhood that day—no lights, no television, no radio. My sisters were heating dinner over the grill on the front porch. In the deepening shadows of twilight, I sat cross-legged on the wooden floor of my bedroom and opened the module for the first time.
As I began to read, time seemed to slow—or stop altogether. I was entranced; all that mattered was the now. Section after section—the Keep, the Wilderness, the Caves—drew me deeper, until my relationship with the world had irrevocably shifted. It was as if the enchantment within the module had cracked open the weakened veil of the mundane. I slipped through that dazzling threshold and crossed into the perils of the Realm. In that heightened moment, I discovered the Keep, the Caves of Chaos, the savage minotaur, and an entire world of adventure.
I was in those twilit borderlands.
Part 2: Mundane Lands & Enchanted Lands
The Module’s Milieu
The world depicted in Keep on the Borderlands is not radically different from our own. Descriptions of landscapes, architecture, occupations, and inhabitants could have been taken directly from a historical nonfiction work such as Life in a Medieval Village. The pseudo-medieval milieu of the Keep itself is firmly grounded in mundane history and daily life. It contains inns and stables, trade goods, working guards, a tavern, and a church. Here, you find no lizard man farmers or mind flayer travelers mingling with the common folk, nor are there merchants offering enchanted swords and wands in magic shops. Such details would appear vulgar, excessive, and incongruous within this setting.
There is a good reason to present the Keep’s ordinary world in this way: it heightens the sense of verisimilitude for both the Dungeon Master and the players. The fantastical elements of the ultramundane realm are instead positioned just beyond the borders of the everyday.
This deliberate juxtaposition elevates both the ordinary and the extraordinary, ensuring that neither is diminished through overuse. It helps the DM and players become fully immersed in the fabricated world of the Keep, allowing for a willing suspension of disbelief. This divide also foreshadows the mythic Law vs. Chaos conflict explored later, where the Keep embodies order and the Caves corruption.
Everyone’s Got a Backstory
The module never explains how the Keep was founded, nor does it clarify its purpose beyond guarding the Realm’s borderlands. Aside from its role as a bastion against the humanoids and monsters at the frontier, the Dungeon Master is given no further detail. The text likewise leaves unexplored the deeper nature of the Caves of Chaos or the larger designs of their inhabitants, beyond simple havoc and plunder.
This deliberate absence of backstory shapes B2 into a loosely episodic, almost picaresque, adventure. Origins are treated as incidental. The DM is free to invent these details or leave them blank, as they prefer.
Adventurers, The Exceptional Class
It is important to recognize that in Dungeons & Dragons, adventurers constitute an “exceptional class” of people. [2] They embody uncommon qualities—boldness, drive, will, ambition, and natural talent—that distinguish them from ordinary individuals and enable them to confront danger directly. Few people would willingly abandon family, friends, and home to seek peril. Therefore, adventurers are, by their very nature, a rare breed. Adventurers accumulate wealth and power on a scale common folk can scarcely imagine—sometimes even rivaling kings. Most importantly, they have one calling: to adventure. It is their vocation, their stock in trade. They are entrepreneurs of danger.
B2 Keep on the Borderlands is built squarely on this premise. It provides the stage upon which player characters take their first steps into the uncertain and perilous life of the adventurer.
Ten-Yen-Dave’s Review — Worst Module Ever (★☆☆☆☆)
What’s that, you say? Keep on the Borderlands? Oh, you mean that sloppy dungeon crawl that’s nothing but monster closets for murder-hobos. No compelling hooks, no story arcs, no in-depth villain backstory (“Before Strahd was a vampire, he worked as an insurance salesman”), no purple-prosed sidebars to dictate the mood, no boxed text to keep the DM from stammering through their lines—just a mess of encounters strung together with all the finesse of a shopping list.
Honestly, how did this even get published? TSR clearly wasn't doing its job. It’s lazy, uninspired, and downright insulting. If you want a real adventure, buy something with 400 pages of lore, 19 plot arcs, and a sidebar telling you how the goblin feels about his estranged cousin.
Verdict: Worst…module…ever. One star (but should less).
Part 3: We Adventure, We Explore
No Plot — No Problem
On the surface, Keep on the Borderlands appears surprisingly bland. Its setting and tone are largely neutral, touched only by occasional grim undertones. The module offers no slick premise—the caves are not a birthing pool for the “brides of Orcus”—and no novel design gimmick—they do not unfold like a Rubik’s Cube. Its monster roster is drawn entirely from the “Basic” D&D rulebook; there are no exotic villains such as shadowy drow sorcerers or “blood-rage gorgonizer” orcs. Likewise, it offers few new magical treasures and introduces no new character classes or races.
The module contains only two proper nouns: the Caves of Chaos and the Cave of the Unknown. Every other location and non-player character—even the central villain—is identified only by generic titles: the Keep, the Castellan, the Hermit, and so on. The Keep itself lies in the deliberately bland land of the “Realm.”
As for a prefabricated plot, Keep on the Borderlands has none at all. This skeletal approach was typical of the era and endured until the release of the module I6 Ravenloft in 1983. The looseness of the module and the sketchy details that make B2 readily customizable also make it endlessly replayable.
Taken together, these qualities might suggest a dull, uninspired module: faceless NPCs, generic monsters, and endless “monster closets” for the players to clear out. At first glance, this appears to be nothing more than lazy module design. But that assumption misses the point entirely. The lack of proper names, the reliance on basic monsters, and the absence of plot are deliberate choices. The text tells the Dungeon Master this explicitly:
“You will notice that the details are left in your hands. This allows you to personalize the scenario, and suit it to what you and your players will find most enjoyable.” [3]
The module demands the DM supply the missing details, shaping the Keep and its surroundings according to their own style. In doing so, it grants creative freedom—the chance to build a personal campaign setting rather than adopt a prefabricated one. TSR could easily have supplied those details and a rigid plotline—and eventually did in later modules. Instead, this module says to the DM: Here are your tools. Here’s a framework. Now build something of your own.
A Conversation Overheard in the Caves of Chaos Between Two Goblins
“Hey, Mugwump. You ever get feelin’ like stuff jus’ keeps repeatin’? Like life’s one big deja-what-you-call-it?”
“Eh… nah. Not really.”
“’Cause I do. Every night, same dream. You an’ me standin’ right here, guardin’ the cave. Then—BAM!—adventurers come rushin’ in, swingin’ steel.”
“You mean them human, elf, an’ dwarf guys? Always runnin’ ‘round, killin’ folks an’ grabbin’ loot?”
“Yeah, them. Anyhow, they bust in—like us goblins ever done nothin’ to ‘em. An’ every night, we die. Sometimes a sword in the gut. Sometimes an arrow in the eye. Sometimes a wizard makes us sleep an’ we don’t never wake. Brutal, I tell ya.”
“Sounds like you gotta quit swillin’ wine afore bed.”
“Maybe. Or maybe life’s just a joke. Some kinda game the universe plays on us. A bad joke. Same hell, over an’ over.”
Darkling Borderlands
While Otus’s rear cover painting evokes the enchantment, hope, and promise of the borderlands, Jim Roslof’s front cover reveals their grim reality. Three adventurers—a brawny warrior with a sword, a spear-wielding fighter, and an elven archer—struggle desperately against three hobgoblins amid rugged hills, likely near the Caves of Chaos. The archer’s arrow has already struck one foe, but the remaining two press the fighters hard.
Roslof frames this brutality within an unexpectedly delicate setting: pastel hues, a flowering tree of pink and purple blossoms, and a rolling landscape reminiscent of a Japanese ukiyo‑e woodblock print, perhaps even one by Hokusai. Here, violence collides with beauty, and death intrudes upon wonder. In this juxtaposition, the illustration reflects the module’s central duality, where enchantment and danger remain inseparably entwined.
Why Borderlands?
On the fringes of civilization, order frays and authority breaks down. Into this umbral space steps humankind’s reflection of evil—living in a grotesque parody of civilized life. Its authority is embodied in the Evil Priest, the closest thing the Caves possess to a ruling lord.
The Caves of Chaos function as the inversion of the Keep and of normal society. Only such a place could exist on the very edge of civilization, where the adventurers, unbound by allegiance to duke, prince, or governor, move as free agents. Here, they owe nothing to any higher order. This freedom allows them to act with impunity and affords the greatest flexibility of gameplay. In the borderlands, player characters may enter into any kind of adventure, unrestricted by the demands of a greater authority.
Monsters grow and fester on the borderlands. In myth and tale, the hero must always journey outward to confront them, for monsters do not thrive within sight of law, regulation, and the industry of a well-populated realm. It is in the wild places—at the lie on the edges of order—where corruption takes root, and where the adventurer must go to meet it.
The Deadly Caves
Make no mistake: Keep on the Borderlands is a deadly adventure. The foolish, the unprepared, and the untested will not last long. Like most early D&D modules, it does not hold the players’ hands or lead them safely through danger. Death lurks everywhere. A single sword stroke can quickly end the life of a character with fewer than ten hit points.
The hazards are many: a minotaur prowling a maze; an owlbear; a wight; a cave infested with three gray oozes (!); and a chamber packed with twenty skeletons and twenty zombies (!!). The pinnacle of danger is a medusa whose petrifying gaze can turn heroes to stone or whose venomous viper-hair can kill them instantly. This imprisoned monster in the Shrine of Evil Chaos serves as a dark inversion of the “damsel in distress in need of rescue" trope. The module is fair, but it does not balance all encounters to ensure victory. To survive, players must be clever and resourceful. Powers, abilities, and spells—scarce at low levels—are not enough. Ingenuity, caution, and a little luck are the true keys to survival.
Meet the Humanoids
The primary and most numerous adversaries in the module are evil humanoids who dwell in cramped quarters within the ravine that houses the Caves of Chaos. And when I say cramped, I mean it: the ravine is only about 200 feet at its widest, placing lair entrances practically within spitting distance of one another. While this arrangement may seem implausible, it serves a practical purpose of keeping the scenario easily accessible and straightforward.
The tribes include kobolds, goblins, hobgoblins, orcs, gnolls, and bugbears—each a classic Dungeons & Dragons foe. Every group occupies its own warren of tunnels and chambers, with one or more cave mouths opening into the ravine.
A theme of duality runs throughout Keep on the Borderlands. On one side stand the novice adventurers, full of hope and wonder; on the other lurks the brutal reality of the monsters. Above ground, the Keep symbolizes safety, structure, and refuge; below ground, the Caves of Chaos embody danger, confinement, and corruption. The humanoid tribes function as grotesque parodies of humanity, distorted reflections of the inhabitants of the Keep. Like humans, they have leaders and soldiers, kitchens and storerooms—yet they create nothing. They have no farmers, artisans, or merchants. Instead, they raid humanity and one another.
Bestial impulses and constant warfare dominate humanoid society. Alliances are fragile, hostilities pervasive: goblins and hobgoblins ally against the orcs and gnolls; the bugbears prey upon all; and every tribe victimizes the kobolds. As the module notes, clever adventurers may exploit these rivalries to their advantage, sowing discord and setting tribe against tribe. [4]
Humor in the Caves
Keep on the Borderlands tempers its grim realism with subtle elements of humor. These moments are woven naturally into the adventure, never breaking its tone. There are no offhand pop-culture references here—such things would be jarring and would disrupt the integrity of the module’s carefully constructed milieu. Instead, the humor arises from parody: the grotesque mimicry of human society by debased humanoids.
For example, the entrance to the hobgoblin lair bears a sign that reads, “Come in—we’d like to have you for dinner!” [5] This tongue-in-cheek threat recalls the ironic cannibalism of the Twilight Zone episode “To Serve Man.” Similarly, the orc lair greets visitors with a grisly display of severed heads, described with dark irony as “cheerful greetings.” [6] A sign outside the bugbear cave offers mock hospitality: “Safety, security and repose for all humanoids who enter—WELCOME! (Come in and report to the first guard on the left for a hot meal and bed assignment.)” [7]
The rumor table adds another comic touch with the misunderstood goblin war cry, “BREE-YARK.” Players are told it means “we surrender,” but in fact it is an insult roughly equivalent to “Hey, Rube!” [8]
These touches of black humor do not diminish the dangers of the Caves of Chaos, nor do they collapse into schlock or gratuitous callbacks to other D&D products. Instead, they remind players that even monsters possess a culture of their own—however brutal, ironic, or absurd.
A Tale of a Dissatisfied Player
“Another dungeon full of basic, vanilla orcs? (rolls eyes) I thought something called the ‘Caves of Chaos’ would have cooler monsters. My character, Blammo the Hexblade Saucier, Pact of the Blood-Forged Pan, didn’t spend ten years training under kenku master chef Boryar Dee to bash heads in a cave. He runs a Michelin-star trattoria in Waterdeep and earns double XP with his Culinary Duelist feat. Do these orcs even know béchamel from hollandaise?”
Part 4: Exploring the Borderland's Deeper Realms
The Eternal Struggle
Building on the idea of the Keep and the Caves as inverses of one another, we encounter the theme of the eternal struggle between Law and Chaos. Dungeons & Dragons borrowed the moral and ethical framework of Law, Chaos, and Neutrality from fantasy authors Poul Anderson and Michael Moorcock. In the original three-alignment system, Law and Chaos largely stand in for Good and Evil, and Keep on the Borderlands makes this starkly explicit.
The text repeatedly links Chaos with evil. The priest of the Shrine of Evil Chaos is described as both “chaotic and evil” [9] and a “servant of Chaos and evil.” [10] The module even uses the term “chaotic evil,” [11] despite the nine-point alignment system not yet being adopted in the “Basic” D&D game. The message is consistent: Chaos is equated with evil.
The adventure presents Good (Law), or civilization and progress, set against Evil (Chaos), or regression into savagery. The characters step into a world where the eternal conflict between Law and Chaos plays out on a local scale. The text warns:
“Always the forces of Chaos press upon its borders, seeking to enslave its populace, rape its riches, and steal its treasures.” [12]
This is not a world of moral relativism but one of stark, fairy-tale clarity: light against darkness, Law against Chaos.
J. R. R. Tolkien observed that evil, as the antithesis of good, has no power to create. Just as Melkor corrupted Elves into Orcs, evil can only steal, twist, and distort what is good. The Caves of Chaos reflect this same truth. The humanoids who dwell there are depicted as cannibals who kidnap, torture, and devour their captives, while their lairs reek with “horrible stenches” and are furnished with “worthless” refuse. The hobgoblin chief is described as a “great, ugly creature.” [13] Even the land itself shows the marks of corruption: vegetation grows in twisted, unnatural forms, and near the Shrine of Evil Chaos stands a copse of obscenely misshapen, withered trees—a visible emblem of Chaos’s triumph and the land’s moral rot.
Here, we cross fully into the realm of heroic and epic imagination. The characters become archetypes—timeless heroes, villains, and monsters locked in the eternal struggle. This is the imaginative landscape of Poul Anderson’s Three Hearts and Three Lions, where medieval romances come alive and heroes serve the cause of Good. In this world, monsters and villains have no motivations beyond the primal drives to hoard treasure, consume, and spread evil. Like Sauron, they are innately wicked.
The module refuses to explain away their wickedness with psychology, circumstance, or trivial motives. Does the Dungeon Master—or the players—truly need to know that the Evil Priest was bullied as a child and now seeks revenge, or that he is secretly plotting to open a roadside inn with his ill-gotten wealth? Such banalities are anathema to the heroic realms of epic and fairy tale. They strip away mythic vitality and replace it with the trivial and ordinary.
The evil in B2 Keep on the Borderlands is stark and ever-present—mythic in its archetypal force, corrupting rather than nuanced, implacable rather than sympathetic. The Caves of Chaos are those formless realms of darkness that press against the edges of reason—seas of filth and decaying ooze lapping endlessly at the fragile walls of civilization. In Dungeons & Dragons, adventurers may push back this darkness—vanquishing it, at least for a time. Yet the monsters always outnumber them. Sooner or later, the tide rises and engulfs the heroes. Evil suffers a setback, but never a final defeat. The adventurers may fall, but evil always returns. The Keep, and the borderlands around it, are never truly safe from the encroaching chaos and shadow.
Learning Your Craft, or B2 as Teacher
In addition to functioning as an adventure, Keep on the Borderlands also serves as a teaching module. It was designed to show novice Dungeon Masters how to run a game, a task that embodies one of the core principles of Dungeons & Dragons. The module also offers guidance for new players, though to a lesser degree. Published in 1980, it was originally included in the first edition of the Dungeons & Dragons “Basic” Set, edited by J. Eric Holmes. B2 replaced B1 In Search of the Unknown, which had fulfilled the same purpose. When the Moldvay-edited “Basic” Set replaced the Holmes version, the publishers continued to include B2. [14] However, it was removed from the Metzger-revised “Basic” Set in 1983 due to cost considerations. [15] The renown of Keep on the Borderlands arguably stems from its ubiquity, appearing in countless beginner sets.
Before the Dungeon Master even begins reading the module proper, the text provides extensive instruction on how to run an adventure. It explains how Armor Class works, how combat tables function, how movement is handled, and other related aspects. The DM’s role is laid out with clarity: as the mediator between the players and the game world, the DM describes what the characters see, hear, and even smell. The DM also gives voice to monsters and non-player characters.
The module notes that the Dungeon Master is the eyes and ears of the players. Their role is not only to adjudicate fairly, but to dispense information clearly. [16] A poor DM withholds or muddies descriptions, while a poor player fails to ask questions—a reminder that exploration depends as much on communication as on dice rolls. The DM must remain neutral, neither facilitating success nor thwarting it, but guiding the adventure through accurate information.
Because Dungeons & Dragons is played primarily through words, communication is emphasized as the DM’s most essential skill—far more important than improvisation, which many mistakenly assume to be the key prerequisite. Gary Gygax himself had no hesitation in labeling players (and by extension, DMs) as “superior” or “poor” depending on how well they engaged with the game.
In Dungeons & Dragons, the Dungeon Master is expected to act as a neutral arbiter. Their rulings must be fair—neither being a success facilitator nor a success thwarter. The module provides guidance about the nuts and bolts of play, such as tracking time and tallying experience points. Far less is said about subtler aspects of refereeing, such as balancing combat encounters, portraying monsters and NPCs, shaping narrative flow, and pacing the action. A short glossary at the back defines unfamiliar medieval terms such as ‘men-at-arms’ and ‘portcullis,’ helping beginners step more easily into the fantasy world.
The advice to players is broad but practical: stay organized, plan ahead, and rely not only on character abilities but also on your own ingenuity and creativity. Most importantly, players are reminded to cooperate with the DM—and to accept rulings gracefully, even when those rulings go against their characters.
Above all, the module emphasizes the DM’s central mandate: to serve as the creative authority at the table, defining the boundaries of play and sustaining the campaign.
The First Game
His name was Mike, and he had never played Dungeons & Dragons before. We were friends for some time, but he never showed any interest in playing the game. While we were holed up in my room delving into dungeons, he was usually out on the golf course. That day, though, he was with us—swilling soda, throwing dice, and laughing at terrible jokes.
Mike rolled up a fighter, the easiest class to start with. I was the DM, and the players began right outside the Caves of Chaos. After a brief deliberation, they chose to explore the ogre’s cave.
Once inside, they encountered this violent-tempered brute immediately. The ogre roared and began to charge the adventurers. Mike’s fighter stepped up and swung his two-handed sword. A hit! The rest of the party missed, and so did the ogre. Winning initiative again, the fighter struck once more. Another hit—and the monster collapsed in a bloody ruin.
Mike leapt from his chair, eyes wide, and shouted, “I killed an ogre!” I don’t think I’ve ever seen such pure enthusiasm from a player. That was the only time Mike ever played D&D, but it was an unforgettable experience.
The Shaper of the Cosmos, or the DM as Sub-Creator
Keep on the Borderlands teaches the Dungeon Master how to run an adventure, but it never dictates how play must unfold. This distinction is crucial: the module provides structure without prescribing outcomes. Its underlying message is simple: “This is your game; play it as you like.”
The Dungeon Master decides whether the plot is simple or complex, assigns names and personalities to non-player characters, and determines how monsters respond, what their motivations are, and which events shape the adventurers’ journey. Rather than impose a rigid storyline, B2 scatters narrative seeds: tavern rumors, a duplicitous cleric allied with Chaos, rivalries among the humanoid factions, and authority figures like the Castellan or Guildmaster—all left open-ended. These are starting points, not scripts, and prompts that the DM can expand or discard as they choose.
“The KEEP is only a small section of the world. You must build the towns and terrain which surround it. You must shape the societies, create the kingdoms, and populate the countryside with men and monsters.”
The module makes this philosophy explicit: it names the DM the “Shaper of the Cosmos” [17] and emphasizes that every campaign is “your interpretation of the many worlds of D&D.” [18] It urges DMs to “make whatever additions and changes you feel are necessary for your campaign,” [19] though warns that too many radical alterations may break the game. Here, Gygax’s philosophy is unmistakable: Dungeons & Dragons is a framework for imaginative sub-creation, not a prefabricated story.
Even its omissions are deliberate. Much of B2 is left sketchy so the DM can “personalize the scenario.” [20] The most striking example is the Cave of the Unknown, placed near the infamous Caves of Chaos but left completely blank—no descriptions, no maps, no encounters. It exists as a blank slate for the DM to take their turn designing a dungeon of their own. [21]
While nothing prevents someone from running B2 strictly “as is,” the text does not encourage it. The entire module is structured as a call to creativity—a training ground that urges DMs to take ownership of the world and make it their own.
This loose design reflects Gygax’s core philosophy at the time. As the Dungeon Masters Guide reminds us: “[Players] are playing the game the way you, their DM, imagines and creates it” [22] and “you build your campaign…to suit your personal tastes.” [23] When it comes to published modules, the rules emphasize the Dungeon Master’s role as co-creator: “This does not mean that you, as Dungeon Master, must surrender your creativity and become a mere script reader.” [24] The game does not merely invite creativity—it insists on it.
In this regard, a Dungeon Master is not merely a participant in the game but a sub-creator. This is J. R. R. Tolkien’s term for the divinely inspired act of fashioning a Secondary World. To experience such a world is to encounter what Tolkien called enchantment. The Secondary World is an imagined realm born of sub-creation—“artistic in desire and purpose.” [25] Like Middle-earth, it must be convincing if it is to succeed. Only then does enchantment enable one to enter that world fully and experience it as real.
Not everyone embraced this philosophy. When TSR released The World of Greyhawk Gazetteer in 1980—their first attempt at a published campaign setting—some criticized it as incomplete or vague. [26] But this, too, was intentional. Designer Lawrence Schick explained:
“We wanted to give DMs a push in the right direction without doing everything for them. We certainly don’t want to have everybody playing on carbon-copy worlds, doing the same things in every campaign. This imposes too many restrictions on the DM’s imagination. Our intent instead is to spur that imagination to its own creations.” [27]
In other words, the “gaps” in products like Keep on the Borderlands, Greyhawk, and other TSR modules at the time were features, not flaws—invitations for the Dungeon Master to assert creative authority.
The Nostalgia Trap
The 1999 Silver Anniversary remake/sequel, Return to the Keep on the Borderlands, marked a sharp break from the ethos of the original B2. It was part of TSR’s broader nostalgia strategy, repackaging beloved adventures and tying them to novels and branded products. [28] Where the original module empowered Dungeon Masters with frameworks and blank spaces to fill, Return stripped that away in favor of exhaustive detail and prefabricated lore. The remake demanded the DM to contribute little, leaving them with a prewritten experience instead of one shaped by their own interpretation and vision.
The contrast is clearest in their treatment of the Keep itself. In B2, its origins are left deliberately vague:
“Humankind and its allies have established strongholds—whether fortresses or organized countries—where the players’ characters will base themselves, interact with the society, and occasionally encounter foes of one sort or another. Surrounding these strongholds are lands which may be hostile to the bold adventurers.” [29]
That’s it: broad strokes, no names, no history. The DM knows only that the Castellan rules the Keep, but who he is, what its purpose might be, and how it relates to the wider world remain undefined.
By contrast, Return supplies the Keep with a proper name (Kendall Keep), a founder (Macsen Wledig), his motives, building strategies, retirement plan, and even his thoughts about keeping monsters around for “sport”:
“The Keep was founded some thirty years ago by Macsen Wledig, a successful adventurer who, having reached the stage in his career when he had begun to attract followers, decided to retire and build his own stronghold with the proceeds of his exploits. He chose an area on the fringe of civilized lands where he could carve out his own little fief. Having chosen a readily defensible spot not claimed by any lord, he proceeded to build a stronghold atop a low flat hill, not too far from an important trade route. He planned to drive all the monsters from the land, save for a few, which he intended to allow to skulk in odd corners, feeling that the occasional monster-hunt might prove good sport when he began to miss the old days of dungeon delving and deeds of valor. Then, peasants and freemen attracted by the protection of his fortress would settle nearby, and within a few years, he would have his own village at the heart of a region of well-defended farms and fields, the beginnings of his own barony.” [30]
Oof. That’s just the first of many dense paragraphs. Instead of evocative mystery, we get an overload of exposition and pseudo-historical minutiae.
The problem is not only one of style but of philosophy. Keep on the Borderlands left authority with the DM, who could decide whether the Keep was new or ancient, corrupt or virtuous, named or nameless. Return reclaims that authority, presenting a ‘correct’ version of the Keep. In doing so, it transforms the DM from a sub-creator into a tourist—a passive interpreter who is merely visiting someone else’s setting. What was once an invitation to imagine becomes an instruction manual, reducing the DM to little more than a text reader and player manager.
Anti-Canon vs. the Official Lore Syndrome
Keep on the Borderlands—and, by extension, early Dungeons & Dragons as a whole—emphasized freedom of imagination and creativity. The notion of the Dungeon Master as a sub-creator of a game without end, with no winners or losers, was profoundly radical and intensely appealing. D&D encouraged Dungeon Masters to shape their campaigns as they saw fit, to invent their own worlds and adventures, and, when drawing on a published module, to adapt and personalize it. There was no expectation that every DM would follow the same story.
At that time, D&D had no default world, no fixed pantheon of gods, no celebrity NPCs such as Elminster or Vecna, and almost no “official” lore. Each Dungeon Master was expected to supply the missing pieces, building their own mythology as they pleased. In many respects, early D&D was anti-commercial and anti-canon: it was a framework meant to foster creativity rather than impose it.
There was, however, an inherent problem: if every Dungeon Master built their own campaign, how could a company continue selling products? Moreover, a loose, “incomplete” game in which the player creates the world is also a high barrier to attracting new players. Dungeons & Dragons had to be complete, fleshed out, and user-friendly; otherwise, it would lack mass appeal. The tension was inevitable—a business must sustain itself after all. Beginning with Ravenloft and the Dragonlance module series, TSR shifted from “do it yourself” to “we did it for you.” This marked the rise of modules dense with lore, tightly scripted in advance, and bound to rigid narrative structures. Even the Forgotten Realms, once presented as a vast open canvas, was gradually overlaid—inch by inch—with canonized detail.
Modern adventure modules stand in stark contrast to Keep on the Borderlands. Where B2 empowered the Dungeon Master to build, imagine, and personalize, many contemporary products arrive preloaded with lore-heavy plots, predetermined arcs, and even dialogue for the DM to recite verbatim. Such a design sidelines the DM, reducing them to a facilitator of someone else’s vision.
The ethos of modern products reinforces this shift. Magic shops, wizard’s colleges, adventurer’s packs, and mass-produced tanglefoot bags do not fit naturally into the mythic fabric of the game—yet such conveniences have become commonplace in newer editions, catering to a hollow consumer lifestyle rather than an enchanted one. The gaming books themselves are often bloated with backstory, padded with exhaustive NPC notes, and layered with mechanical excess. This glut robs the game of its enchantment and diminishes the Dungeon Master's ability to shape the details with their own vision.
The trend began with the Silver Anniversary editions in the late 1990s and accelerated under Wizards of the Coast, when the commercial value of nostalgia was fully recognized. Adventures were rebooted, rehashed, and cannibalized—much like Hollywood’s endless recycling of familiar franchises. Instead of allowing beloved modules to rest, publishers squeezed them dry through branding, reuse, and repackaging. Interconnected lore, fully mapped continuity, fan service call-outs, and “member berries” replaced the mythic vitality of wonderment.
Large intellectual properties owned by corporations tend to revolve around prefabricated canon. Canon is the systematic cataloging of people, places, things, and ideas within a vast intellectual property. Only those in an official capacity may declare what is canon and who can alter it. Such a structure is rigid, permitting little or no alternative interpretation. It is a museum of other people's creative ideas.
Star Wars is a prime example. Every inch of its universe has been mapped, detailed, and populated by its creators. The stories are already written, the characters already known, their endings fixed long before the audience arrives. The audience's role is that of a passive observer, not an active participant.
By contrast, the original vision of D&D insists on incompleteness. Its gaps and vague spaces are not flaws but invitations to creativity. The Dungeon Master has an active role in shaping the campaign. Authority is not derived from canon but from absence, from the spaces deliberately left unfinished. The worlds are incomplete, waiting to be filled by the imagination of the DM and players.
Over the decades, however, canon and official lore have gradually overtaken the game. Where none once existed, the all-encompassing lore now breeds deference and submission, fostering the belief that Dungeon Masters and players alike must act within prescribed parameters or risk “doing it wrong.” In such a world, story becomes secondary to canon; everything is fleshed out, convenient, and ready for consumption—yet drained of imaginative vigor.
The original Keep on the Borderlands offers the antidote. All one needs is the module, the rulebook, and the imagination and effort to bring the world to life.
Conclusion
Rather than being a relic of Dungeons & Dragons’ past, Keep on the Borderlands continues to stand as a classic module. Its original purpose was to teach novice Dungeon Masters and players the game, but it has gone far beyond that narrow role. It reveals the possibilities and wonder of exploration and adventure, as seen in Otus’s evocative painting. Roslof’s cover art provides the counterpoint—the brutal reality awaiting adventurers, where the risk-takers face death around every corner.
Beyond the mechanics of play, B2 offers a world of enchantment where the eternal forces of Good are locked in opposition to Evil. This struggle plays out on the cosmic level—in the heavens amongst the gods—as much as it does on the micro scale in the Keep and Caves of Chaos.
The Dungeon Master plays an essential role in this setup. They must construct lands, characters, and monsters that challenge, excite, and entertain. As the “Shaper of the Cosmos,” the module encourages—nay, demands—that the DM exercise creativity and leave their own indelible stamp on the game. Keep on the Borderlands reminds us that D&D does not need to conform to someone else’s vision. While modules and sourcebooks have their place—prefabricated worlds save harried DMs precious time—the DM need not be over-reliant on them. Creativity and imagination are what the game is about, not overstuffed tomes that stifle the pleasure of creation.
If Otus shows us the wonder of beginnings and Roslof the perilous realities of adventure, the ending remains deliberately unseen. That great unknown is revealed only when the DM and players sit down at the table, with fresh character sheets in hand. The DM says: “Upon the horizon, lit by the orange afterglow of the setting sun, is the looming silhouette of the Keep—your party’s destination.”
Citations & Footnotes
[1] Gary Gygax, B2 Keep on the Borderlands (TSR, 1980), p. 12.
[2] Gygax, B2 Keep on the Borderlands, p. 6.
[3] Gygax, B2 Keep on the Borderlands, p. 2.
[4] Gygax, B2 Keep on the Borderlands, p. 14.
[5] Gygax, B2 Keep on the Borderlands, p. 17.
[6] Gygax, B2 Keep on the Borderlands, p. 15.
[7] Gygax, B2 Keep on the Borderlands, p. 19.
[8] Gygax, B2 Keep on the Borderlands, p. 16.
[9] Gygax, B2 Keep on the Borderlands, p. 9.
[10] Gygax, B2 Keep on the Borderlands, p. 22.
[11] Gygax, B2 Keep on the Borderlands, p. 22.
[12] Gygax, B2 Keep on the Borderlands, p. 6.
[13] Gygax, B2 Keep on the Borderlands, p. 18.
[14] J. Eric Holmes, “Basic D&D® points of view...,” Dragon, Issue 52 (Aug. 1981), p. 14.
[15] Frank Mentzer, “A New Game With a Familiar Name,” Dragon, Issue 77 (Sept. 1983), pp. 26-27.
[16] Gygax, B2 Keep on the Borderlands, p. 4.
[17] Gygax, B2 Keep on the Borderlands, p. 2.
[18] Gygax, B2 Keep on the Borderlands, p. 2.
[19] Gygax, B2 Keep on the Borderlands, p. 3.
[20] Gygax, B2 Keep on the Borderlands, p. 2.
[21] Return to the Keep on the Borderlands renames the “Cave of the Unknown”— the area left for the DM to develop — Quasqueton, thereby linking it to module B1 In Search of the Unknown, despite that module having nothing to do with B2.
[22] Gary Gygax, Advanced Dungeons & Dragons Dungeon Masters Guide (TSR, 1979), p. 9.
[23] Gygax, Dungeon Masters Guide, p. 7.
[24] Gary Gygax, G1–3 Against the Giants, (TSR, 1981), p. 2.
[25] J. R. R. Tolkien, “On Fairy-Stories” (Harper Collins, 2008), p. 368.
[26] Dragon, Issue 46, Feb. 1981, pp. 48–49.
[27] Lawrence Schick, “‘Grey’ Areas Were Made That Way” (Dragon, Issue 46, Feb. 1981), p. 50.
[28] Other titles include Against the Giants — The Liberation of Geoff, Return to White Plume Mountain, and Return to the Tomb of Horrors.
[29] Gygax, B2 Keep on the Borderlands, p. 2.
[30] John D. Rateliff, Return to the Keep on the Borderlands (TSR, 1999), p. 7.
Comments