D&D 2E [2e] What made 2e great?

[RSKennan]

I know that it's probably the least favorite edition, at least in some quarters, but I will always love 2e. I'm thinking of doing a tribute game. Not quite a retro clone, but stand alone game that attempts to capture some of the feel, flavor, and magic of 2e. I'm not really doing professional game writing any more, so I'm not saying that I'll definitely do such a game, right now it's just an idea I want to talk about, which may or may not go further.

Those of you who have fond memories of the 2e era, what were the things that you liked? I'm not asking about political stuff like management decisions, etc- it's all about the game.

Thanks.

 

[krupintupple]

i cut my teeth on it, and i think that it'll always hold a special place for me. i've grown past it, but i don't think you can 'capture' that magic that most of us had as 14 year olds rolling die and playing the most obvious and thinly-veiled LOTR campaigns ever.

it'd be like asking a 30 year old married man, who (aside from his wife if he's smart) he remembers most out of his former lovers. he'll probably sheepishly mention a time when he was like 15 and had a makeout session with someone from chemistry class. he would probably have been sheeting sweat, nervous as hell, but on fire from the anticipation of the events that night: this memory would be burned in his mind forever - this is all hypothetical, not actually factual mind .

 

[Man in the Funny Hat]

It dropped, fixed or otherwise simplified many of the irrationally arcane aspects of 1E. That is, the stuff that not even Gygax used was dealt with. Everyone says, "the settings," but for me and mine we barely dabbled into the published settings continuing to stick with our own. The one exception would probably be a protracted foray I made into running Spelljammer (great fun - but woefully flawed system).

I could actually start to list the improvements over 1E but suffice it to say that it IS those improvements that made it great.

 

[Sparafucile]

It kept us occupied until 3rd edition came out.

Just kidding. . . I started playing in earnest with 2rd edition, and I always rememberd the wealth of boxed sets, settings, and flavor. It birthed Ravenloft, Dark Sun, PLanescape, and so on. . . 2nd was willing to really experiement with the genre.

3rd still rules with its myriad character options, but 2nd had 31 flavors.

 

[NewJeffCT]

I thought both 1E and 2E were a lot easier to prep for as a DM: nearly every orc & goblin were the same and it was easy to create a pretty good NPC on the fly. Heck, even a vampire was usually just a vampire (8 hit dice, 18/76 Strength)... now, in 3.5, it can be any race and any class through a template. While I love skills & feats and the flexibility of 3rd edition, it also makes prep time a lot more work for a DM.

 

[dougmander]

Backwards compatibility with 1e.
Fast character generation.
Relatively easy to run combats without using a grid or minis.
Awesome campaign settings.
Tons of take-it-or-leave-it splatbooks for every taste. (Loved the green historical reference books, anyone remember A Mighty Fortress?)

 

[billd91]

I really liked the green setting books too. I have the set and they were pretty awesome.

Things that made 2e great:

The most off-the-grid the game ever got - arcane miniature scale differences were banished but still before the heavy tactical focus of the PO and 3e books.

Fixed up surprise rules, which had gotten completely out of control.

Kits were a cool idea, not always well implemented. Al Qadim, I think, did a fantastic job of showing what kits could be.

Extremely backward compatible with 1e, very little conversion necessary

 

[Wolf72]

I agree with others ... I liked the ability to pick up a 1e adventure and do some easy conversions.

and going from 1e, 2e then 3e ... conversion were still easy.

My first time running 3e was with the 2e reprint of Against the Giants and the 3e PHB ... had a blast and was easy to do on the fly

 

[roguerouge]

I liked how important stats were early on. My thief with the kickin' physical scores was the match of any fighter in levels 1-4.

 

[RSKennan]

What do you guys think about the philosophy of 2e?

I think that 2e was very focused on the wonder of being able to experience a fantasy setting through a character. If you notice a lot of the color artwork was a single moment in time, with adventurers traveling or resting, almost reflecting on what they just survived or were on their way to.

I like that. I definitely like more action packed games, too, but in 2e, at least with my group, there was a lot more exploration of the little things than I've found in later editions. It might be a factor of having been new to gaming as krupintupple said, of course, but I wonder if the game pushed that at all.