"Railroading" is just a pejorative term for...

[Jacob Marley]

Now, you show me where I said that 1e has no tactical considerations.

Um...

So, IMO, there are pretty much no tactical considerations in the AD&D rules set.

 

[Raven Crowking]

Now, you show me where I said that 1e has no tactical considerations. At worst, I said that the tactical considerations were the purview of the DM.

You mean apart from "Since I'm being told that older editions contained all sorts of rules for tactical play, let's see an example."? If you were not arguing that 1e didn't have rules for tactical play, I wonder why you are questioning what you are told.

The extremely strong implication of questioning every statement that tactical options exist in 1e is that you do not believe that they do. When you continue despite being given evidence to the contrary, the extremely strong implication is that you believe that the opinion (that there are no or few tactical options in 1e) is correct regardless of the evidence that it is not.

EDIT: And, of course, Jacob Marley has pointed out the exact quote.

I mean, heck, The Shaman lists choosing a target as a major tactical consideration in 1e. And that's not even mechanically relevant. Choosing one target over another has zero mechanical impact.

Not only does it have a demonstrable mechanical impact in 1e, it has a demonstrative mechanical impact in every edition. It probably has a demonstrative mechanical impact in every rpg.

Consider: Even when all opponents are exactly the same, it often makes sense for PCs to concentrate fire on one or two targets, rather than choose targets at random. That way, they have a greater potential to reduce the amount of damage they receive. In 1e, in fact, there are several creatures who offer an advantage when one targets specific body parts. This might be the eye stalks of a beholder, or avoiding the better AC of a lion's mane.

You guys can jump up and down about how much I'm defaming 1ed, but, please, at least read what I wrote first.

No one is jumping up and down.

But The Shaman is right when he says that 1e offers tactical options, and he is right when he says that how you played it around your tables is not how the game was written. That you failed to avail yourselves of the rules does not reflect upon the rules themselves.

In a number of threads, I have noted that your posting has been much more even-handed of late. I have been happy to have opportunity to XP you for it, and I have been happy to point it out in at least one thread.

I am the pot calling the kettle black, I am sure, but I'd just like to give you the opportunity to come back from the Dark Side on this topic. Tactical options exist in 1e. That is an objective fact. If you didn't use them, that will surely colour your experience of 1e, much like not using skill challenges will change what 4e feels like.

But your experience is not an artifact of the rules; it is an artifact of a failure to use the rules available.


RC

 

[Hussar]

Pemerton - appologies for derailing the thread. My total bad for making a comment about the Edition that Shalt Not Be Criticised. I'll bow out now since it appears that people are incapable of discussing the post and not the poster. Heck, how much time do people have on their hands when they're dragging up stuff I wrote FOUR years ago?

RC - Well, again, we seem to be speaking different languages. Choosing a target (which really doesn't have ANY mechanical impact in ANY edition. What bonus or penalty do I gain for choosing to attack opponent A rather than B?) and choosing your armor don't really seem to be tactical choices to me, but, hey, what do I know. If the list that The Shaman put forward is the best example of tactical options in AD&D, I'll stand by my point that AD&D doesn't exactly present you with a whole lot of tactical options.

But, again, it's a case where I made the mistake of criticising the Edition that Shalt Not Be Criticised. So, I'll talk to you guys in a few months.

 

[Raven Crowking]

My total bad for making a comment about the Edition that Shalt Not Be Criticised.

So, it is the edition, and not the content of the post? Despite the fact that neither The Shaman nor I are regularly running 1e (and I haven't run 1e since 2e came out)?



Methinks the poster protests too much.

Choosing a target (which really doesn't have ANY mechanical impact in ANY edition. What bonus or penalty do I gain for choosing to attack opponent A rather than B?)

There are three PCs and three opponents. Each opponent does an average 6 points of damage per round, and takes an average of three hits to fall.

Assuming all attacks hit, and if the PCs go first each round:

If each PC targets a seperate opponent, each PC will take an average of 12 points of damage before the opponents fall, or 36 points total.

If the PCs all target the same opponent, the first falls without causing any damage on the first round, the second falls without causing any damage on the second round, and the third falls without causing any damage on the third round. The damage taken by the PCs is 12 + 6, or 18....a clear mechanical difference over taking 36 points.

As an experiment, have your monsters all start targetting one PC first, then the next after the first falls, and then the next. And then tell the players that there is no mechanical difference. I dare you.

and choosing your armor don't really seem to be tactical choices to me

And, thankfully, no one made that claim, and you have already been told the same more than once.

So, Strawman the 1st is that this is about defending an edition, and Strawman the 2nd is about choosing armour.

The fact that choosing opponents is a tactical decision seems to be something you just fail to grasp. Sorry, but in this case, right and wrong are not subjective. The best thing you can do is show a little grace in accepting that.

Trying to make your error into some kind of faux edition warring is.......weak sauce.


RC

 

[Presto2112]

An old DM of mine taught me a neat trick which amounts to the following:

If you want the PCs to go to New York, and the PCs train actually goes to Chicago, then you move New York to Chicago, but make them think they're still in Chicago.

 

[Nagol]

An old DM of mine taught me a neat trick which amounts to the following:

If you want the PCs to go to New York, and the PCs train actually goes to Chicago, then you move New York to Chicago, but make them think they're still in Chicago.

That's the technique known as Schrödinger’s Map.

 

[The Shaman]

An old DM of mine taught me a neat trick which amounts to the following:

If you want the PCs to go to New York, and the PCs train actually goes to Chicago, then you move New York to Chicago, but make them think they're still in Chicago.

This "neat trick" means that if the adventurers wanted to go to Chicago, or Denver, or Kansas City, and end up in New York no matter what, then the players' decisions were ignored by the referee.

That's pretty much the exact opposite of the atmosphere I'm looking for, as a player and especially as a referee.

 

[Lanefan]

Well, Ariosto, I don't know about you, but, I generally say that an adventure and a scenario are pretty much synonymous.

Hmmm...tough call. I guess I've always seen "adventure" as meaning something fairly well-defined, as in a module; while "scenario" can be more, or less, or the same as a single adventure.

Take Village of Hommlet. There's two distinct scenarios in there - the village and the dungeon - but it's all one interconnected adventure.

Or worse, take Night's Dark Terror. There's about 6 different scenarios in that one...

But sometimes a relatively small but distinct adventure can occur within a larger scenario. An example might be where the scenario is a journey from town to and through adventure A but the party gets sidetracked into minor adventure B en route, then keeps going.

One feature of typical published D&D adventures that I find irritating is the plot hook that seems to presuppose both (i) that the campaign is a traditional exploration campaign and (ii) that the players are happy to be more-or-less led by the GM in respect of a good chunk of that exploration (ie are happy to bite the GM's plot hooks). This combination of presuppositions seems a bit incoherent to me.

Which might be why I very rarely if ever use plot hooks as written (PHAW?) but instead lead in to the adventure in whatever way(s) make sense in the game world at the time.

That said, if they don't bite those hooks they won't get to that adventure; and if they don't bite any hooks they're probably going to get mighty bored.

As for encounters always being level-appropriate, there's more than one way to look at it.

One supposes the DM is going to run *adventures* that are at least vaguely level-appropriate, and thus encounters within those should mostly take care of themselves.

But encounters in the greater world? That's another question entirely, and having some encounters now and then that are wildly off-level is nothing more or less than realistic. And "level-inappropriate" can go both ways: a couple of times in the past I've had foolhardy groups of 0th and 1st level bandits try and hold up high-level magic-laden parties, mostly for the amusement value for all involved...

A 1e game, 7th-9th level party of about 9 characters with gobs of magic and wealth, capable of taking on just about anything, are somewhat lost deep in woods known to be dangerous. One (1) solitary 1/2-HD dumb-like-post Kobold steps into the path in front of them, levels a crossbow at the leader, and says "Stand and deliver!" in a high squeaky voice.

The terrified party scatters to the four winds, except one Dwarf who charges the Kobold and (amazingly) manages to fall into the Kobold's small and badly-covered pit trap!

Once the players realized it was a mere Kobold and the gales of laughter subsided, they regrouped, killed it, and moved on...

Lan-"for just a moment, that Kobold had more impact than a fleet of Giants"-efan

 

[Lanefan]

Moving to flank? Without any spacial representations, how exactly do you "move to flank" away from a shield. Of course this also ignores the fact that almost no monsters USE a shield, nor do they have a dex modifier.

You make sure you're the second person to melee with the foe, and state you're attacking the foe's weapon side as the shield is already occupied defending against the first guy. 1e does have rules for how many opponents each different size of shield can defend against...

As for monsters, while they don't have Dex. modifiers quite a few do have parts that are softer/easier to hit/more vulnerable than other parts; so the general principle remains pretty much the same.

So, IMO, there are pretty much no tactical considerations in the AD&D rules set.

I'd say it's more that the strategy/tactics come in *before* the dice start flying, in terms of how you set the battle up to your best advantage (assuming you've a chance to do so). Then, all the dice rolling determines whether your tactics are any good.

Lan-"the best strategy is charge; the best tactic is charge screaming"-efan

 

[pemerton]

Or worse, take Night's Dark Terror. There's about 6 different scenarios in that one...

The module that keeps on giving! My PCs are now at 10th level, having started in at 1st, and we haven't got to Threshhold yet (admittedly I've been pretty liberal in my interpretation and expansion of the module, including detours via half of Thunderspire Labyrinth, plus the witches encounter I posted about here).

Anyway, I would describe that as a module containing many adventures/scenarios. I don't really distinguish between the latter two terms.

As for encounters always being level-appropriate, there's more than one way to look at it.

One supposes the DM is going to run *adventures* that are at least vaguely level-appropriate, and thus encounters within those should mostly take care of themselves.

But encounters in the greater world? That's another question entirely, and having some encounters now and then that are wildly off-level is nothing more or less than realistic.

When it comes to this sort of thing I don't do realism. But in my other thread that I'm trying to cross-promote I talk about my first deliberate use of level-inappropriate combats in 4e (too low, not too high) as part of an exploration-style session. (I also talk about The Rule of the Ming Vase in 4e. So maybe there's some old-school hope for me yet!)