Re-Reading 1e

[Obryn]

Well, as I mentioned in another thread, I'm planning to run a 1e/OSRIC game shortly. In preparation, I've brought my 1e books out of storage, and I'm having a blast paging through them.

Right now, I'm a 4on. Previously, I've been a 3etard. As far as "pure" editions go, I've run 2e, 3e, and 4e. Growing up, I ran 1e - but it was a mutant 1e, mixed in with BECMI. These books aren't new to me at all - but I'm trying to approach them as if they were, put aside my assumptions, and dive right in.

Some observations... None of these are unique, but I'm bored, so thought I'd make a post.

(1) I'm having a great time with this, and it doesn't feel like it's all nostalgia. I'm reading 1e, and it's successfully fueling my enthusiasm. You know what I'm talking about, if you're on the site - I'm reading the game, and I can't wait to run it. Every edition of D&D has had this effect on me, and it's impressive that 1e is doing a good job at this.

(2) I'm glad I already mostly know how to play. Gary was a wonderful and energetic author, and his voice is clear in every paragraph, but holy cow is the 1e DMG a mess. It's organized by stream of consciousness, near as I can tell, and it's very difficult to find exactly what I'm looking for. OSRIC has been a great help with this.

(3) The game's a bit schizophrenic at times. Gary's ongoing lectures describe over and over how abstract combat is, how much stuff happens during a 1-minute round, and why you get saving throws vs. poison.

On the other side of the coin, there's stuff like the incredibly detailed surprise and initiative rules, where timing is very complex; and things like the weapon vs. AC table (which, imho, isn't nearly as bad as it seems.)

(4) Some stuff is insanely detailed and complex, in my opinion moreso than anything in any other D&D editions. Unarmed combat is one of these areas. Really, it's absurdly complex. Thankfully, this is very easy to houserule.

(5) I'm looking forward to running ToEE.

-O

 

[justanobody]

(5) I'm looking forward to running ToEE.

May I just say good luck, and you're mean!

 

[Delta]

(3) The game's a bit schizophrenic at times. Gary's ongoing lectures describe over and over how abstract combat is, how much stuff happens during a 1-minute round, and why you get saving throws vs. poison.

On the other side of the coin, there's stuff like the incredibly detailed surprise and initiative rules, where timing is very complex; and things like the weapon vs. AC table (which, imho, isn't nearly as bad as it seems.)

(4) Some stuff is insanely detailed and complex, in my opinion moreso than anything in any other D&D editions. Unarmed combat is one of these areas. Really, it's absurdly complex. Thankfully, this is very easy to houserule.

I think you've seen my house rules -- I'll say it again, the initiative rules in the DMG are inherently contradictory. You have just got to streamline them, because it's not logically possible to follow exactly what's written there. There's an exceedingly beautiful system to be had if you extract the two key ideas out of it.

Later in life I learned, "Gary said a whole lot of different things". But I have seen him disown at various times everything in your #3 and #4 bullets. A common defense of his is that he was "forced" into including complicated initiative, weapon vs. AC, and unarmed combat rules by certain contingents of wargaming fans. At the least I've seen him sort-of-sneer at people who used those particular rules. So, at least on certain days, Gary himself would agree with you.

Note that there's a replacement unarmed combat rules in 1E Unearthed Arcana. I use the ultra-simple "System I" there myself.

 

[jdrakeh]

You know, it's weird — I can read Gygax's writing in old game books all day long and enjoy it, but I just tried to re-read all of the Gord the Rogue novels and got exactly one page into City of Hawks before I found myself wanting to burn it. The commitment to re-read the Gord series died in less than three minutes.

 

[thedungeondelver]

(2) I'm glad I already mostly know how to play. Gary was a wonderful and energetic author, and his voice is clear in every paragraph, but holy cow is the 1e DMG a mess. It's organized by stream of consciousness, near as I can tell, and it's very difficult to find exactly what I'm looking for. OSRIC has been a great help with this.

Not really. If you take a step back and look at the table of contents and the table of contents for the charts, I think you'll find the order of it flows a bit better. Once upon a time I took the rather mighty task of personally reorganizing the DUNGEON MASTERS GUIDE (courtesy of OCR'ed PDF and MS Word) to my own personal tastes and can I tell you something? It unravels, and not in a good way, when you do that.

But with that said, it does take a little (a lot) of reading through to get the flow of the book to grok that entirely.

(3) The game's a bit schizophrenic at times. Gary's ongoing lectures describe over and over how abstract combat is, how much stuff happens during a 1-minute round, and why you get saving throws vs. poison.

On the other side of the coin, there's stuff like the incredibly detailed surprise and initiative rules, where timing is very complex; and things like the weapon vs. AC table (which, imho, isn't nearly as bad as it seems.)

Agreed on weapon-v-AC, and on surprise and initiative. People have killed more innocent electrons trying to create the definitive "answer" to surprise and initiative as laid out in the DUNGEON MASTERS GUIDE and ultimately I found that the best "answer" is the one that seems most logically consistent for you. It doesn't make other parts of the system break down; as long as you're paying mind to a few key points, just do what feels right with respect to it ("it" being again, surprise and initiative).

(4) Some stuff is insanely detailed and complex, in my opinion moreso than anything in any other D&D editions. Unarmed combat is one of these areas. Really, it's absurdly complex. Thankfully, this is very easy to houserule.

UNEARTHED ARCANA may well be of some help here. The two replacement systems they detail are much easier. Curse you Al Hammack!

(5) I'm looking forward to running ToEE.

-O

Running it now. The only thing else I have to add is: if the adventurers go poking around underneath the bandit's hideout in the tower and blunder onto level three before they're ready for it, stick it in up to the hilt and break it off.

Other than that, enjoy!

 

[Grimstaff]

holy cow is the 1e DMG a mess. It's organized by stream of consciousness, near as I can tell, and it's very difficult to find exactly what I'm looking for.

Fortunately, the 1E DMG has what's possibly the most comprehensive index of any D&D publication.

 

[Obryn]

You know, it's weird — I can read Gygax's writing in old game books all day long and enjoy it, but I just tried to re-read all of the Gord the Rogue novels and got exactly one page into City of Hawks before I found myself wanting to burn it. The commitment to re-read the Gord series died in less than three minutes.

You know, it's funny - I just finished re-reading those a few months back.

Sea of Death is actually not a bad book, IMHO. It's a perfectly decent swords & sorcery book... of course, I read them right after finishing up Vance's Dying Earth series, so maybe I was primed for it.

I greatly enjoyed City of Hawks... Maybe it's nostalgia speaking, but I found it to be a perfectly okay story. You just have to get over the first few pages and wait for Gary to put down the thesaurus for a few pages. Where the books got kinda intolerable, IMHO, was in Dance of Demons where Gord and Gellor make Drizzt, Elminster, and every other godlike NPC ever created look like a Commoner. (His writing style also degraded, IMHO - lots more beginning-of-City-of-Hawks Gary and not enough Sea-of-Death Gary.) I kinda took it in perspective to get through it all; I needed to think, "No, these are not mortals; they're gods now." Nevertheless... yeah.

-O

 

[Obryn]

Later in life I learned, "Gary said a whole lot of different things". But I have seen him disown at various times everything in your #3 and #4 bullets. A common defense of his is that he was "forced" into including complicated initiative, weapon vs. AC, and unarmed combat rules by certain contingents of wargaming fans. At the least I've seen him sort-of-sneer at people who used those particular rules. So, at least on certain days, Gary himself would agree with you.

Right. And I've heard that, too. And I would believe it if I hadn't read and run Mythus.

Note that there's replacement unarmed combat rules in 1E Unearthed Arcana. I use the ultra-simple "System I" there myself.

I'll be going with the OSRIC version, should it come up.

Fortunately, the 1E DMG has what's possibly the most comprehensive index of any D&D publication.

It's very good - but organized kinda funny, to my mind. And it's not quite as comprehensive as I want. I was trying to find Spell Resistance yesterday and came up empty.

-O

 

[Obryn]

Running it now. The only thing else I have to add is: if the adventurers go poking around underneath the bandit's hideout in the tower and blunder onto level three before they're ready for it, stick it in up to the hilt and break it off.

Other than that, enjoy!

Oh, I plan on it. I've warned my players re: character death. Everyone's rolling up 2 characters to start with, and more if we have time. Those are going into a collective pool, so we have a ready supply of characters laying around.

-O

 

[jdrakeh]

I greatly enjoyed City of Hawks... Maybe it's nostalgia speaking, but I found it to be a perfectly okay story.

Maybe I'll give it another try later this week and just skip the first five or six pages