The Temple of Elemental Evil - Publication History

Publication History

The adventure module The Village of Hommlet was a 24-page booklet designed by Gary Gygax, and published by TSR in 1979. The original printing featured an outer folder and a two-color cover; the book was reprinted in 1981 with a color cover. The Temple of Elemental Evil was originally intended to bear the module code T2 and serve as a true sequel to The Village of Hommlet. Gygax began writing T2 soon after the publication of T1, but often stopped to work on other products, such as The Lost Caverns of Tsojcanth (Gygax 1981). The T2 version was never completed, and no module bearing the codes T3 or T4 was ever independently published. Instead, the material for the sequel was combined in 1985 with the original T1 storyline and published as an integrated adventure bearing the module code T1-4.

The original printings of T1 featured monochrome cover art by David A. Trampier, who also contributed interior art along with David C. Sutherland III. The 1981 and subsequent printings of T1 featured a new color cover painting by Jeff Dee surrounded by a lime green border. The expanded T1-4 book from 1985 features cover art by Keith Parkinson and interior art by Jeff Butler, Clyde Caldwell, Jeff Easley, Larry Elmore, Parkinson, and Trampier.

T1-4 The Temple of Elemental Evil was written by Gary Gygax with Frank Mentzer, and published by TSR in 1985, incorporating T1 The Village of Hommlet. The module was a 128-page book with a 16-page map booklet, and featured a cover by Keith Parkinson and interior illustrations by Jeff Butler, Clyde Caldwell, Jeff Easley, Larry Elmore, and Dave Trampier. The module includes descriptions of two towns, the Temple itself, and four large dungeon levels.

Although initially written as a stand-alone series, T1-4 was made to dovetail into A1-4 Scourge of the Slave Lords when these two campaigns were revised in 1986 as supermodules. The combined campaign then culminates with the GDQ series, incorporating modules G1-G3 Against the Giants; D1-D3, which introduced D&D fans to drow elves for the first time; and finally Q1, Queen of the Demonweb Pits, in which the heroes fight against the spider demon Lolth herself. These last adventures were also combined and republished as a supermodule bearing the code GDQ1-7, Queen of the Spiders.

In 2001, Wizards of the Coast published a novel by Thomas M. Reid also bearing the title The Temple of Elemental Evil.

Wizards of the Coast also published a sequel to the T1-4 adventure in 2001, the 3rd Edition module Return to the Temple of Elemental Evil.

Wizards of the Coast published a remake of The Village of Hommlet adventure for Dungeons & Dragons 4th Edition and released it through the RPGA.