How would you go about converting from BECMI/1e to v3.5?

[Knightfall]

Okay, so I want to use a lot of older adventures (both BECMI and 1e) with unique NPCs in my homebrewed campaign, World of Kulan. While I have no problems converting old 2e material to 3rd Edition, I don't really understand all the differences between BECMI and 1e from 2e. I guess all I really need are some guidelines as how to convert those two older editions to 2e. After that, it should be easy for me to go from 2e to 3e.

So...

How would you go about converting from BECMI/1e to v3.5?

Cheers!

Knightfall

 

[Treebore]

Okay, so I want to use a lot of older adventures (both BECMI and 1e) with unique NPCs in my homebrewed campaign, World of Kulan. While I have no problems converting old 2e material to 3rd Edition, I don't really understand all the differences between BECMI and 1e from 2e. I guess all I really need are some guidelines as how to convert those two older editions to 2e. After that, it should be easy for me to go from 2e to 3e.

So...

How would you go about converting from BECMI/1e to v3.5?

Cheers!

Knightfall

Um, when I decided I liked the idea of using my 1E/2E/Rules Cyclopedia with my 3E I switched to using C&C as my core system. Now I even get to use what I like out of 4E too.

Now if you want to convert everything to 3E, with full and accurate write ups of skills, feats, etc... its going to be a lot of work. Games with lots of detailed rules always take a lot of work.

One trick I used to use when I was converting old stuff to 3E was to write up a general template of each class, each with the same skills and feats. Then I would copy/paste it for the new PC or NPC and edit out, and in, any skills and feat changes I needed.

Edit: IF you use this template idea write it up for around 12th level, since it makes it easier to scale up and down from there. IE lower level you usually delete feats and change skill numbers, scaling up you usually add feats and scale up skill numbers, etc...

Fortunately for you most, if not all, monsters are already in the 3E MM's, especially if you also own the Tomes of Horror by Necromancer Games. Or at the very least you'll find very usable alternatives.

After that you just have to convert traps, which is pretty pointless with how easy it is to find them in 3E, and then disarm them.

From there you may have to decide on certain DC's, but those are probably easy enough to do on the fly.

 

[Knightfall]

Um, when I decided I liked the idea of using my 1E/2E/Rules Cyclopedia with my 3E I switched to using C&C as my core system. Now I even get to use what I like out of 4E too.

Now if you want to convert everything to 3E, with full and accurate write ups of skills, feats, etc... its going to be a lot of work. Games with lots of detailed rules always take a lot of work.

I'm not sure if I want to do 100% accurate write ups but it is an idea I might want to toy with at a later date. I'm more interested in the idea of eyeballing it, but I want Ability Scores and Class Levels to be as accurate as possible.

Note that I still haven't been able to find the BECMI RC, and I don't have any of the 1e core rulebooks. I do have access to OSRIC, however.

One trick I used to use when I was converting old stuff to 3E was to write up a general template of each class, each with the same skills and feats. Then I would copy/paste it for the new PC or NPC and edit out, and in, any skills and feat changes I needed.

Edit: IF you use this template idea write it up for around 12th level, since it makes it easier to scale up and down from there. IE lower level you usually delete feats and change skill numbers, scaling up you usually add feats and scale up skill numbers, etc...

Would you have an example that you'd be willing to share? I'm assuming the templates you are suggesting are based on the old classes, correct? Or am I missing the point?

Fortunately for you most, if not all, monsters are already in the 3E MM's, especially if you also own the Tomes of Horror by Necromancer Games. Or at the very least you'll find very usable alternatives.

After that you just have to convert traps, which is pretty pointless with how easy it is to find them in 3E, and then disarm them.

From there you may have to decide on certain DC's, but those are probably easy enough to do on the fly.

I do have the 3.5 version of Tome of Horrors and Tome of Horrors II. I'm not concerned with converting traps.

 

[Treebore]

"Would you have an example that you'd be willing to share? I'm assuming the templates you are suggesting are based on the old classes, correct? Or am I missing the point?"

I wrote them up as 3E classes, since the old classes pretty much all have a 3E equivelant, or PrC to use to make them equivalent.

As to the templates, they are on my old, non working, Sony Laptop. So are all my conversions from old to 3E D&D. The loss didn't really bug me since I had already switched over to C&C and didn't need any of that any longer.

Besides, I imagine you have 3E PDF's of modules. If you do, see if they have classes close to level 12 written up and copy those as your templates.

Another thing I remembered, convert the monsters first, you'll likely need to scale up the old PC's to be able to handle the new CL's of the 3E versions of those old monsters. They have been powered up a lot in many cases, especially from BECMI and 1E. Not so much with 2E, but still a noticeable degree.

 

[Andre]

Another thing I remembered, convert the monsters first, you'll likely need to scale up the old PC's to be able to handle the new CL's of the 3E versions of those old monsters. They have been powered up a lot in many cases, especially from BECMI and 1E. Not so much with 2E, but still a noticeable degree.

This is a huge issue. Running old school modules as is almost always requires re-writing the 3E creature write ups to power them down (or, more rarely, up). Many monster write ups changed significantly between editions. One of the most glaring is giants. 1E hill giants were roughly equal to an 8th level fighter. Then 2E added 50% more hit dice. Then 3E added Con bonuses to hit points. Result: the classic giant modules cannot be run in 3E for characters of the original levels.

My fix was to re-write the giants with their original hit dice, and reducing their Str and Con scores to boot. They were still stronger than their 1E versions, but not as much as before.

OTOH, some monsters can be weaker in 3E. Any 1E monsters with poison, save or die, likely has weaker poison in 3E. That's a good thing, IMO, but it does change the dynamic when those creatures are used.

 

[Knightfall]

I wrote them up as 3E classes, since the old classes pretty much all have a 3E equivelant, or PrC to use to make them equivalent.

As to the templates, they are on my old, non working, Sony Laptop. So are all my conversions from old to 3E D&D. The loss didn't really bug me since I had already switched over to C&C and didn't need any of that any longer.

Too bad.

Besides, I imagine you have 3E PDF's of modules. If you do, see if they have classes close to level 12 written up and copy those as your templates.

I have access to the old FREE 3e modules. The ones that WotC made available online as PDFs. I'll take a look at those.

Another thing I remembered, convert the monsters first, you'll likely need to scale up the old PC's to be able to handle the new CL's of the 3E versions of those old monsters. They have been powered up a lot in many cases, especially from BECMI and 1E. Not so much with 2E, but still a noticeable degree.

When it comes to monsters, I'm thinking that the converted monsters will determine the basis for how I'll run any old school modules. More than likely I'd scale up how high the PCs (and NPCs) would have to be.

 

[Knightfall]

This is a huge issue. Running old school modules as is almost always requires re-writing the 3E creature write ups to power them down (or, more rarely, up). Many monster write ups changed significantly between editions. One of the most glaring is giants. 1E hill giants were roughly equal to an 8th level fighter. Then 2E added 50% more hit dice. Then 3E added Con bonuses to hit points. Result: the classic giant modules cannot be run in 3E for characters of the original levels.

My fix was to re-write the giants with their original hit dice, and reducing their Str and Con scores to boot. They were still stronger than their 1E versions, but not as much as before.

OTOH, some monsters can be weaker in 3E. Any 1E monsters with poison, save or die, likely has weaker poison in 3E. That's a good thing, IMO, but it does change the dynamic when those creatures are used.

I'm likely to go the other way. I want to stick as close to the v.3.5 monster power levels as possible. PCs and NPCs will have to be tougher, as a result.

The first module that I'm looking to run in a v.3.5 game is The Forgotten Temple of Tharizdun. (There are a lot of monsters in that module.) I'm planning on chaning quite a bit, however. (The whole gnome setup is going to be discarded.) I'll likely make some of the monsters pseudonatural as per the 3e template.

 

[Odhanan]

I would rebuild the encounters from scratch, personally.

There are basically too many differences between Mentzer D&D and 3rd edition. Either a creature/NPC translates directly from one to the other (an orc becomes an orc, a 4th level fighting man becomes a 4th level fighter), or one has to rebuild the character from the ground up (a 5th level Halfling would become a fighter or rogue hafling, a 6th level Elf would become a fighter/wizard, for instance). Plus there's the concept of neatly scaled Challenge Ratings which doesn't really relate to older designs where it was more a matter for players to decide which encounters to confront and which to avoid, basically.

 

[Treebore]

I would rebuild the encounters from scratch, personally.

There are basically too many differences between Mentzer D&D and 3rd edition. Either a creature/NPC translates directly from one to the other (an orc becomes an orc, a 4th level fighting man becomes a 4th level fighter), or one has to rebuild the character from the ground up (a 5th level Halfling would become a fighter or rogue hafling, a 6th level Elf would become a fighter/wizard, for instance). Plus there's the concept of neatly scaled Challenge Ratings which doesn't really relate to older designs where it was more a matter for players to decide which encounters to confront and which to avoid, basically.

True, which is why I had the PC/NPC templates, because I pretty much always had to scale them up to be able to face the 3E versions of the monsters, or to be an NPC capable of challenging 3E PC's.

like Strahd used to be a Vampire and a 10 level Mage. In 3E he had to be amped up a lot to present a challenge, and we still killed him even though we were only 6th level. Several of us died, one of us 2 or 3 times, but we had scrolls of Raise Dead and 2 clerics in the party. I forge what levels they made him, but if you have the 3E RAvenloft you can look it up.

When I converted it for me to run back in 2003 I upped Strahd to be a CR 23.
He won, just like he always has. He didn't get beat until my 2008 C&C October games. 3 different groups ran on 3 different nights. 2 of the groups actually defeated Strahd. They all played extremely well, though. Darn well, including the ones who lost. Even in the groups who won several died. In the one group 4 out of 6 died before they took Strahd down. The group who lost literally came within 5 feet of winning too. Some excellent play during those games.

Anyways, the point is everything used from those editions will likely have to be levelled up to some degree, or different monsters used. Now the first level modules, and even those up to 5th level, usually didn't need much level changing, but from about 6th level on the changes needed become greater and greater. All depending on the monsters used, and how much they changed in 3E.

 

[S'mon]

My fix was to re-write the giants with their original hit dice, and reducing their Str and Con scores to boot. They were still stronger than their 1E versions, but not as much as before.

Me too - eg for Steading of the Hill Giant Chief:

hill giant hd 8+8 AC 18 (tch 9 ff 18) hp 44 STR 21 DEX 10 CON 13 INT 6 WIS 8 CHA 10 Great Club ATT+10 dam: 2d8+7 space/reach 10' CR: 4

4 of these make a suitable challenge for an 8th level party.

If you just do a straight conversion of the monsters, you get encounters suitable for a ca 12th level party. But a 12th level party also has a lot of magical resources that can easily short-circuit the scenario as written. Furthermore D1-D2 convert as suitable for a much lower level party than do G1-3.