Reminiscing, Re:AD&D (Games 1 & 2 in progress in Playing the Game Forum....)

Leif · Jan 26, 2012

I've been reading my old AD&D 1E Players Handbook, Monster Manual, and DM Guide a lot for the past couple of days. It's making me nostalgic for the "bad" (?) old times when all races but humans had level limits and humans were forbidden to operate in more than one class at a time. And there were "to hit" adjustments for each weapon versus the various types of armor. And if you made it all the way to 9th ('name') level, you were a bad mo-fo and a Force to Be Reckoned With. Am I alone here?

Charles Dunwoody · Jan 26, 2012

You are not alone. AD&D is amazingly awesome. It is metal. It will never die.

Leif · Jan 26, 2012

Kravell said:
You are not alone. AD&D is amazingly awesome. It is metal. It will never die.

So how much interest would there be in starting up a play-by-post game of AD&D, do you think?

kitcik · Jan 26, 2012

There are several AD&D threads going. I would love to play in a campaign, but I don't enjoy anything but live. I have been looking at everyone's location, and so far no NYC other than me. So sad. Oh well, I am pretty busy anyway right now - but definitely inspired to try to start AD&D over the summer maybe.

Leif · Jan 26, 2012

Ahhhh! A lucky person who is able to have live games! Sadly, only one of my gaming friends still lives in town with me, and he is insanely busy with work and family. Play-By-Post is a weak and diluted substitute, but it has been the only viable way for me to play these past 10 or so years, except for one weekend each year when a gang of us gathers for a weekend of gaming.

Jacob Marley · Jan 26, 2012

I still play 1st Edition AD&D* a couple times a year with some friends from high school. I have three characters running around Greyhawk with their various henchmen fighting the good fight against Iuz, the Scarlet Brotherhood, and the Great Kingdom.

I'd certainly be willing to give an AD&D play-by-post game a try.

* We house-ruled our version pretty heavily (as did a lot of people). I'd still like to meet someone who actually used initiative correctly.

Leif · Jan 26, 2012

Our version was intensely house-ruled, too! Like in the last game of AD&D that I can really remember running, we ruled that magic-users could spontaneously cast any spell in their spellbooks for which they had an available slot remaining. And this was a good 10-12 years before the Sorcerer class.

I'd like to have a house-rule this time that all Cure ... Wounds spells add a bonus of the Cleric's caster level to the hp cured. That's one of the best innovations of 3.XE in my opinion. Possibly also add the Cleric's Wisdom bonus to the total, as a nod in the general direction of 4E?

Hmmm, this would increase the power of first level characters by quite a bit, if they could fight all day and get totally patched up by a few CLWs and keep on fighting.

Thanks JM! Let's see now, we need to start a player roster, hmm, kitcik has already declined [unless he wishes to reconsider?] so that leaves us with:

DM: Leif
Players:
1. Jacob Marley
2. Kravell?

steeldragons · Jan 26, 2012

Leif said:
So how much interest would there be in starting up a play-by-post game of AD&D, do you think?

I believe there would be tons.

Well, if I can be considered to be a ton.

Count me in, if I may. Though, admittedly, never played a PbP game before...well, there was the playtest for the early chapters of Zeitgeist...but that was the only time...and wasn't AD&D.

--SD

Charles Dunwoody · Jan 26, 2012

Jacob Marley said:
* We house-ruled our version pretty heavily (as did a lot of people). I'd still like to meet someone who actually used initiative correctly.

I tried to run AD&D using just the PH, DMG, and MM. Initiative was great. The magic-user had darts so he'd usually start things off first unless the monster had multiple attacks and wrap things up with two more shots. The thieves (three total, the first two died--both by poison spiders) used arrows so they had two attacks. Then the ranger would bring heavy metal death via his sword and the fury of his blows. And the cleric would jump in as needed--sling, morningstar, and CLW.

We had a tie and used speed factors to resolve it. Heck, we even used weapon versus armor type adjustments. It was all glorious, all the time.

I had two house rules: I secretly rolled 1st level hps and the player could choose their roll or mine. And I let the new character of a player whose other character died keep 10% of the XP they had earned in that adventure so far.

Charles Dunwoody · Jan 26, 2012

Leif said:
Our version was intensely house-ruled, too! Like in the last game of AD&D that I can really remember running, we ruled that magic-users could spontaneously cast any spell in their spellbooks for which they had an available slot remaining. And this was a good 10-12 years before the Sorcerer class.

I'd like to have a house-rule this time that all Cure ... Wounds spells add a bonus of the Cleric's caster level to the hp cured. That's one of the best innovations of 3.XE in my opinion. Possibly also add the Cleric's Wisdom bonus to the total, as a nod in the general direction of 4E?

Hmmm, this would increase the power of first level characters by quite a bit, if they could fight all day and get totally patched up by a few CLWs and keep on fighting.

Thanks JM! Let's see now, we need to start a player roster, hmm, kitcik has already declined [unless he wishes to reconsider?] so that leaves us with:

DM: Leif
Players:
1. Jacob Marley
2. Kravell?

I have an interest but I have limited time (I only game once every other week). I could likely pop in at lunch time (Eastern time) three times a week but otherwise I can't commit to being able to do more. Let me know how it shakes out, even if I don't play I'd enjoy reading along. I'll be the guy in the front banging his head, crushed up against the barricades, waving his lighter in one hand and forking the horns with the other, and breathing out PBR fumes as I sing along. Rock on, D&D, rock on.