Can you go home again?

[tx7321]

Q: "The mystery ,and excitement can only be had from a new game system, I fear. Not knowing what you are doing, and trying stuff because it 'should' work, was the best fun of my early D&D games."

Thats a problem for any game though. I remember when we figured out the best strategies for Risk, after that it was never really the same. Still with AD&D at least you have a complexity of rules that the DM can choose to use, and the DM keeps as much mystery behind the screen and in the charts that he can.

 

[Aus_Snow]

I find myself wanting to run a 1E or RCD&D game.

Then hey, do! Really, there's nothing to lose by doing so. . . that I can see, anyway.

The question, then, is: can one recapture that joy of the "first time"?

Yes, no, sort of and not quite. Also, maybe.

And: do we need the old games to do it?

Not in my experience, no. Definitely not. It's more a state of mind type thing, rather than ruleset thing, in my opinion.

It seems like every time I read one of the Gygax Q&A threads, or some other thread about the old skool -- a style I love and try to emulate with my 3E games -- I long for those days.

Again, then: go for it. My honest advice is: try it out again. This way you'll probably get closer to knowing for sure what's what.



edit --- though, if you want to (kind of. . .) do both 1e and 3e, you might want to try Castles & Crusades, I hear. I'm not affiliated - heck, I don't even run it at the moment. But it might be worth a look, is all.

 

[Kae'Yoss]

I am at home in 3rd edition!

I am suffering from a bit of nostalgia. I find myself wanting to run a 1E or RCD&D game. The one thing 3E doesn't provide is that sense of wnder and bemusement I remember from when I was a yung'un, fighting Bargle and the like. The question, then, is: can one recapture that joy of the "first time"? And: do we need the old games to do it?

Probably not. It won't be the good old days any more. The sense of wonder will be gone, since you now know everything.

You're grown older, and it's likely that things that greatly amused you back then will bore you now.

Plus, now that you're used to 3e's improvements, the older rulesets flaws will be all the more apparent.

It's the same for me and computer/video games: Sometimes I'll sit there fondly remembering some game I used to play when I was younger. I then hunt down the game, get it to run on my current systems, play - and am appalled! The graphics sucks compared to the eye-candy you get in games of that sort now (didn't I use to adore this game for its beauty?); the controls, adequate back then, are clunky now; the story isn't what I remember it to be, and the jokes aren't funny, just silly. And no matter how amazed I was back then about this plot twist or that revelation, I know it all by heart, I just sit there listening to the "secret" villain thinking how he'll betray me in 10 minutes, and how I'll kill him for that in 20.

The thing about nostalgia is that you usually only remember the good stuff. Your memory tends to forget the stuff that annoyed you, and what remains is the stuff you enjoyed.

You can always try and see if the magic will work again, but chances are that the sense of wonder will not come from something very old, but instead from something new (to you, at least).

Nostalgia is not something you suffer from. Embrace it wholeheartedly.

Go date older women

 

[Tetsubo]

I bought the game Castles & Crusades with the hope of "going home" again.

I traded the book in for store credit so that I could buy a new 3.5 book.

So, I'd say "No", you can't go home again. I think that 3.5 is just a better set of rules then 1E ever was...

 

[tx7321]

Reynard, the only way your going to find out is try it out. Do you still have your 1E PH, DMG and MM? If not you can pick them up on e-bay for a song (or download OSRIC for free). I'd start by just reading the PH...the races and character descriptions. If this starts to bring back the juices (as it did for me) your probably on the right path. Next, just drop the bomb and get your players to give it a couple of sessions.

Remember, AD&D is just a couple books, and as most books its timeless. As one who did "go back" the game doesn't feel more primitive or inferior to 3E (as the above poster suggests) just the opposite (for me anyway) I'm finally old enough to "get" some of it that flew over my head as a youth.

Remember, Gygax and Co. were in their late 30s or older creating a game for other 30 year olds. If anything were just old enough now to see what it was supposed to be like. And what it feels like is your finally playing D&D again, with all the bells and whistles of 3E and other D20s gone. And hey getting to be a real DM again with real power is fun fun fun! I no longer hate the tables, they are the key to that power.

PS as the other posters warned, know the difference between nostalgia, rose glasses and reality. AD&D as I stated earlier is just a game. It won't teleport you back to 1981, but it will remind you of what it was like. Enjoy it for what it is (a great game among other great games) not for what it was (a good chunk of your childhood).

 

[PapersAndPaychecks]

Faraer was absolutely right.

Yes, you can recapture some of that feeling.

No, you don't need the original ruleset -- but revisiting the old rules does help a lot.

 

[Umbran]

Hm. Interesting. I am of the school that thinks that you can experience some of the same old wonder, but that you don't get it most easily from gong back. Going back is going to comfort (which can be good, but isn't the same thing) - and the things you already know well don't produce a whole lot of wonderment, usually.

I think you recapture wonder by gong to something that is new, just as RPGs were new to you back then. A system you don't know, where the monsters, adventures, and probabilities aren't well-understood - that's how you get wonder. Try a new system, a new style, or a new genre, and you'll find wonder.

 

[Droogie]

I think you recapture wonder by gong to something that is new, just as RPGs were new to you back then. A system you don't know, where the monsters, adventures, and probabilities aren't well-understood - that's how you get wonder. Try a new system, a new style, or a new genre, and you'll find wonder.

This is excellent advice. Our DM is starting to burn out,and the enthusiasm at the table has been waning for months. So, I've picked up a copy of Mutants and Masterminds, and I plan on running it for a little while. Traveling down a different path is the best way to restore the excitement, rather than treading where you've been before.

 

[Piratecat]

A gaming system is not a marriage, and you are not inextricably tied to a particular rules set. Play what you want, when you want to play it. Feel like OD&D? Then go run a game, for cripes sake!

I try to do this myself. While my regular campaign is 3e, I run probably ten one-shots a year in other game systems. It keeps my imagination and excitement for gaming high, and keeps me from getting lazy.

 

[Imaro]

Hm. Interesting. I am of the school that thinks that you can experience some of the same old wonder, but that you don't get it most easily from gong back. Going back is going to comfort (which can be good, but isn't the same thing) - and the things you already know well don't produce a whole lot of wonderment, usually.

I think you recapture wonder by gong to something that is new, just as RPGs were new to you back then. A system you don't know, where the monsters, adventures, and probabilities aren't well-understood - that's how you get wonder. Try a new system, a new style, or a new genre, and you'll find wonder.

See for me the "wonderment" or nostalgia I feel for BD&D or AD&D has alot to do with asthetics, not necessarily just rules. I think I have over the past few years come to look at the artwork, layout, codified rules, Player empowerment, etc of 3.x as D&D. The nostalgia hit when I opened up C&C and pictures of character classes etc. looked like mythical archetypes, the monsters looked like something straight out of ancient legends and greek myths, The power was back in the DM's hands(He's actually running his own game again). Though the last one brings up an interesting side note.

I think AD&D facilitated DM control by people not understanding or implementing alot of the rules. While C&C does this by giving only a broad framework as a rules system. It's still the same effect though.

Anyway, yes I think you can get that feeling back, at least partially, if you've become increasingly familiar with D&D 3.x, since this is what you know now.