I will check. What is the content of this page that you describe?

Between the cardstock covers there are 56 pages which consists of an unnumbered title page, 41 pages (which are numbered 1-22 & 24-42) and 14 pages of maps, all bound into the book. This is the same for the four copies that have passed through my hands. How many pages are in your book?

Going full thread necromancer.  I picked this up and it arrived today.


** expired/removed eBay auction **


Probably paid a bit too much for it, but I couldn't help myself as it is almost certainly unique-ish manuscript. Just want to add this to the list of things that were/are out there from Mercury Games.

Probably not, but anyone have any other info on this?

dbartman wrote in non-TSR update on Mercury Games:Haven't seen that before - great snag!  The title was thoroughly butchered.

I wonder if it's a pre-release of the To the Aid of Dwarves module or part of the series?  Are you able to do a comparison?

I do not have a copy of To Aid of the Dwarves(or Lord Farrick's Keep & Lair of the Spider Mother either, lol), but based on Bill's description of the contents above this does not appear to be exactly that, although based on the Preface page, it's almost certainly related as both are most likely to be part of a/the series. The first line of the Preface pages say, "This module is number 4 in a series of 7 which will comprise Mercury Games 'Plains of Keil' series.

This adventures is fairly small in scale, with only 6 encounter locations in the larger exterior keep area and then 11 rooms in the Tomb.  Total page count is actually much larger than you might expect with 41 and then the 2 maps making the total product 43 pages. According to a "Map Key" at the  this copy is apparently missing the 2 "Plains of Keil" maps(one was supposed to be for the GM and one for the players) for what I am assuming is for the much larger general area where the Keep & Tomb are located.  Being that this a manuscript/pre-pub, not sure if they would have ever actually been included at this point, as this is supposed to be part of a larger series or that they were initially included and now they are just lost.

It has a pretty good amount of background info and also a XP calculation chart in the back for all the areas of the adventure. Overall, it's seems to be really well done.

grodog wrote in non-TSR update on Mercury Games:
I don’t recall this title, but the envelope exactly matches the prepub version of Lair of the Spider Mother that I had BITD (and IIRC now resides in Bill’s collection). I picked that up at the same conventions where I played “Treasure of the Dragon Queen” BITD.  

I’m definitely curious Brian if there’s any dwarf or skeleton artwork in the scenario?—my friend Alex did some pieces for them that never seem to have been published BITD.

Allan.

Unfortunately no, no art in this at all.  Outside of the two maps, it's all just straight text. A few charts and whatnot, but no artwork at all.

As an aside, I asked the seller where he came upon this and it sounds quite similar to your recollection of the one you had:

I am the original owner if you can believe it. I believe i got it at a D&D convention when I was 13 (now 57) i believe East con at glassboro college in NJ. Wizards of the coast were a new company & i think i got it from them.

Don't think it could be Wizards, as Wizards would not have been around quite yet, but everything else checks out pretty well.