First Edition feel with 4E rules

[Zelligars Apprentice]

Partially in response to this thread, I wish to ask the assembled ENWorlders this: How could one create a game with the feel of AD&D 1e while still using the 4th edition rule set? Is it even possible?

 

[mattcolville]

Isn't that the exact same question as the post you linked to?

I've said this elsewhere, but I feel like the critical issue is one of motivation and I don't see a way to solve it without releasing a 4.5E.

In AD&D, PCs were cut from the Conan template. They were motivated by what I call "enlightened self-interest," by which I mean they wanted to go find bad guys, kill them, and take their stuff. They wanted to accumulate magic items and levels and go build a keep and eventually retire as a powerful landed noble, and then make new characters.

Characters in AD&D were just off the farm, they were barely more competent than an random peasant and that was part of the fun. A lot of your experience was your gear, which was commonplace. Lanterns and poles and chalk and pitons and rope.

D&D4 is like the exact opposite of this. Your character is already a hero, he's head and shoulders about random peasants. And he's got a hero's motivation, by which I mean he wants to go save the world and doesn't really care about accumulating magic items. That's by design, the overwhelming majority of his effectiveness in a fight is based on his Powers, not his Items, which confer regular, small bonuses.

I can't express to you how different I find these two styles of play.

 

[Bluenose]

Characters in AD&D were just off the farm, they were barely more competent than an random peasant and that was part of the fun. A lot of your experience was your gear, which was commonplace. Lanterns and poles and chalk and pitons and rope.

1st level fighters had a rank title in AD&D 1st edition. It was Veteran. He/she is better in combat than your typical kobold or goblin, and can hold his own with an orc. A single lucky hit can drop him.

D&D4 is like the exact opposite of this. Your character is already a hero, he's head and shoulders about random peasants. And he's got a hero's motivation, by which I mean he wants to go save the world and doesn't really care about accumulating magic items. That's by design, the overwhelming majority of his effectiveness in a fight is based on his Powers, not his Items, which confer regular, small bonuses.

1st level fighters in D&D 4th edition don't have a rank title. He/she is better in combat than your typical kobold or goblin, but probably not most orcs. He might even be able to take on a group of enemies, if they aren't very determined, and are minions. A single lucky hit probably can't drop him.

 

[Tequila Sunrise]

Take away everyone starting HP boost, remove all human traits and powers, and then arbitrarily limit every other race to attaining X level in Y class?

 

[Doug McCrae]

Flavor text all powers as magic items.

If you want the PCs not to feel like Big Damn Heroes, don't use minions.

If you want lots of quick fights, use lots of minion encounters, and follow all the anti-grind advice such as avoiding high level soldiers.

If you want to re-introduce insta-death, use lots of high level brutes.

If you want a dark, doomed feel, use lots of disease.

Use mega-dungeons, though these are more of an OD&D thing.

Use wandering monster tables.

Names of important NPCs are anagrams of your own.

 

[meomwt]

It's a shame that Clark Peterson has decided that 4E isn't for him, as if anyone could do it, he could.

That said:
First edition feel would put low-level 4E characters in fear of their lives, either by sweeping hordes of goblins against them, or ensuring their survival lay at the feet of a Wizard who had only one decent spell to cast, and had to hope it worked. At higher levels, combats should be fast and bloody, as the burgeoning power of the casters, coupled with the melee specialists' ability to sink massive damage, was enough to take care of all but demi-gods.

Role-playing encounters should be mixed with combat (about 60:40 in favour of combat), rather than the game being a long running series of fights. Magic items should be important, but not define a character (or, worse, overshadow him). Artifacts should be gloriously rare, and evil wizards' spellbooks torn apart in the search for new and arcane knowledge.

PC's and their opponents should be morally ambiguous rather than being cut out of black and white. And, sometimes, for the greater good, good characters have to choose to do bad things. And then atone for them.

 

[ExploderWizard]

I don't know about capturing any sort of "official" 1E feel but I am running my 4E Karameikos campaign much like others that I have run in other systems. Due to issues with the CB software blatantly being dissappointing for houserules I do the majority of adjustments on the DM end of things.

Some major changes:

Rituals are daily powers that rarely have a gp cost to cast. Most are also useable as standard actions. Daily keeps them from being spammed and low to zero costs keeps them from being treated as a waste of resources.
Rituals above 1st level are also not available for purchase. A 2nd and higher level ritual cannot be used unless it personally scribed by the owner. When such a ritual is copied it dissappears from the original source (which is why they are not for sale). This simulates the feel of lost spells and makes captured rituals into valuable treasure.

The monster builder makes customizing easy. Less hit points and much higher damage output makes for shorter more dangerous fights. I also fart in the general direction of encounter building guidelines. My party of 4th/5th level characters was attacked by level 10 elite ettin. It beat the snot out of them but they survived. 4E PC's are very durable and can take that kind of abuse.

 

[Doug McCrae]

In AD&D, PCs were cut from the Conan template. They were motivated by what I call "enlightened self-interest," by which I mean they wanted to go find bad guys, kill them, and take their stuff. They wanted to accumulate magic items and levels and go build a keep and eventually retire as a powerful landed noble, and then make new characters.

That's true. Consider also what Gary says in the 1e DMG about the ongoing campaign -

Furthermore, there must be some purpose to it all. There must be some backdrop against which adventures are carried out, and no matter how tenuous the strands, some web which connects the evil and good, the opposing powers, the rival states and various peoples. This need not be evident at first, but as play continues, hints should be given to players, and their characters should become involved in the interaction and struggle between these vaster entities.

Thus, characters begin as less than pawns, but as they progress in experience, each eventually realizes that he or she is a meaningful, if lowly, piece in the cosmic game being conducted. When this occurs, players then have a dual purpose to their play, for not only will their player characters and henchmen gain levels of experience, but their actions have meaning above and beyond that of personal aggrandizement.

The game starts like Conan, and ends as Conan too, with the PCs as rulers. But there's also some Tolkien, or even Moorcock, there at the end. Talk of 'pieces in a cosmic game' is particularly Moorcockian.

 

[Doug McCrae]

D&D4 is like the exact opposite of this. Your character is already a hero, he's head and shoulders about random peasants. And he's got a hero's motivation, by which I mean he wants to go save the world and doesn't really care about accumulating magic items. That's by design, the overwhelming majority of his effectiveness in a fight is based on his Powers, not his Items, which confer regular, small bonuses.

Unlike 3e, 4e doesn't give the stats of the typical peasant. He might be a level 1 minion, he might be a level 2 brute. In 4e, whether the PCs are heroes (in the sense of competence) is dependent upon whether the DM uses minions. He may choose not to.

Even though they are less significant than previous editions, the 4e player still wants magic items, and he still gets them when his character kills things and takes their stuff. He gets xp for killing things too. One could see 1e PCs as primarily robbers (most xp comes from gold) while 4e PCs are primarily killers. If anything it's a step down.

While the 4e PHB encourages good alignments, it leaves open the possibility of playing evil if the other players are doing likewise -

If you choose an alignment for your character, you should pick either good or lawful good. Unless your DM is running a campaign in which all the characters are evil or chaotic evil, playing an evil or chaotic evil character disrupts an adventuring party and, frankly, makes all the other players angry at you.

Compare with the advice in the 1e PHB, which takes a similarly 'anti-evil' tone -

Generally evil characters, particularly chaotic evil ones, are prone to be troublesome and hurtful to the party. They should accordingly be shunned when possible. Selfish neutrals are similar to evil characters, but their price is usually easier to meet, and it is therefore easier to integrate them into an expedition which will depend on co-operation for success.

The character of good alignment who is basically unco-operative - often acting as an evil or (selfish) neutral would - is another matter, for such players usually join under the pretense of being helpful and willing to act in the best interest of the party.

Undoubtedly the best way to take care of such players is to expel them from the group as soon as circumstances permit. Do this as often as is necessary to either change the player's mind about co-operation, or until he or she becomes tired of having their characters consigned to oblivion because of their attitude.

 

[NewJeffCT]

Isn't that the exact same question as the post you linked to?

I've said this elsewhere, but I feel like the critical issue is one of motivation and I don't see a way to solve it without releasing a 4.5E.

In AD&D, PCs were cut from the Conan template. They were motivated by what I call "enlightened self-interest," by which I mean they wanted to go find bad guys, kill them, and take their stuff. They wanted to accumulate magic items and levels and go build a keep and eventually retire as a powerful landed noble, and then make new characters.

Characters in AD&D were just off the farm, they were barely more competent than an random peasant and that was part of the fun. A lot of your experience was your gear, which was commonplace. Lanterns and poles and chalk and pitons and rope.

D&D4 is like the exact opposite of this. Your character is already a hero, he's head and shoulders about random peasants. And he's got a hero's motivation, by which I mean he wants to go save the world and doesn't really care about accumulating magic items. That's by design, the overwhelming majority of his effectiveness in a fight is based on his Powers, not his Items, which confer regular, small bonuses.

I can't express to you how different I find these two styles of play.

Excellent post, and you are correct on the differences. 1E changed over time as well, though.

I was a lot younger when I played 1E. By the time I got to college in the mid 80s, my game (and those I gamed with) had evolved to where the PCs were heroes who tried to save the world and where PCs were a cut or two above the peasants. Remember - they came up with the method of 9d6 for primary ability scores, followed by 8d6, 7d6, 6d6, 5d6 and 4d6 (I think there may have been 3d6 in there as well, as Comeliness was briefly in the game as a stat in 1E)

And, from what I saw, that became a pretty common method of playing in 1E days, as I attended some campus-wide D&D groups back then as well. People wanted the long-term campaign where they saved the world from the BBEG, as that was what fantasy literature is all about.