A newbie's (to EN World) thoughts
I started gaming about 6 months before 2e came out. I switched over initially, and then kept the parts I liked. I eventually ditched 2e (and lost the love for it) for a few reasons.
The FR grey box was the first campaign set I ever bought. I loved it. Then they completely obliterated it with the time of troubles. At first, I just said "ahh...it never happened". I felt a little cheated, as money isn't easy to come by when you're 15 for an expansive gaming budget, but my older brothers had all used homebrews and I was prepared to largely do the same. But the cheated feeling increased as the product quality declined. The horde boxed set was a complete waste of my money, imo. Then came the final blows when I bought the undermountain and myth drannor sets and found out that they were very partially completed - much time and sweat would have to put in to actually use them without railroading PC's into only the finished areas.
The aspect of 2e being the first version of "PC&D" already mentioned, where the "evil" was de-emphasized at the same time that the heroic was encouraged...didn't make much sense to me. I liked the demons, et al. It was just a turnoff.
The splatbooks, also previously mentioned. Yes, they were optional. No, I didn't actually run into losing players over them. But after a couple of players bought books they could never use, it got to the point where they only wanted to buy something if I went to Barnes and Noble with them to look it over before they parted with cash. I understood - I was already tired of wasting my own money too, but I wasn't going to warp my campaign because someone spent $15.
A lot of the actual rules in 2e weren't that bad. We used 2e initiative, weapon speeds, etc. But the classes were all first edition. I think that's part of why it just doesn't get the respect of others. A combination of leaving negative tastes in many mouths on both sides of the fence, DMs and players.
I've noticed a lot about the "feel" of 1e being discussed. As someone who has been trying to get a gaming group together again after a decade long absence from the hobby, I'll offer my opinions (opinions only, I realize). I don't understand why its hard to quantify what people are referring to here.
During my absence, my only link to the hobby were computer games. Baldurs Gate, et al. But when NN came out I was discussing it with a very occasional player from my last group, someone who was only interested in power-gaming. He was brimming with enthusiasm for the new game, and when I asked what he liked about it, he said that he could take his first level in thief (rogue now, I know), his second in monk, I think, and then more levels in wizard. Or maybe fighter was in there. I seem to remember him saying he had to take his 4th level in fighter for some reason. I was like...what?? Oh, and yeah, he was doing this as a dwarf...he could finally be an ultimate badass like he always wanted to be ingame (not that I mind people becoming powerful in my games, but for him it was more about lording over other characters than anything else).
Now at the time I just left him to his merry way (after all, to each their own), while I scratched my head about what had happened to the game I had loved to play where this type of approach was suddenly being encouraged. But I wasn't actively playing anymore, so it didn't really matter.
In the last few months however, I finally completed my grad degree and now have a lot more time on my hands, so I started thinking about starting a group up again as I found my materials in my last move and had kept them handy. My nephew, who has never played himself (early 20's) but has heard a lot of fond "war stories" from his dad and I had some friends who were playing the new system, so I went to watch a couple of sessions (diff players and DM's in each) to check it out before spending any money on them. My anecdotal experiences were more akin to the descriptions of the detractors of 3e than the supporters. Combat took forever and this was not high level. Yeah, roll+modifiers check against target, but the modifiers part of the equation were many. Each feat came with modifiers, and people had multiple feats there were only occasionally active. Skills provided other modifiers. One of the two groups actually had everyone bring a calculator to help speed up the process! So it seems like the equation might be simple, but the second componet is in itself an equation of much greater complexity than the whole, and this is where it bods down. Also, everyone was power gaming. I didn't see anyone who had played a single class during his career (think most people in both groups were between 7-10th level). Most had two classes, some had three. Each main class was futher subdivided into prestige classes. I was told no one played half elves any more because they now sucked for bonuses. This wasn't the AD&D I grew up with, this was NN ported over to a pen and paper game - not just the rules, but the mind set...and I had always seen computer games and played a wholly different way than P&P games because they were limited in the "soft" parts of gaming.
Now I also realize that this experience is not what most people in this thread are claiming to have in their games. But I would postulate that the hard-core gamer who is going to go to forums is NOT the average gamer, and is not what is most likely to be encountered as applying to enter a typical game. Just like most gamers never go to a Con, etc.
To try and stop the rambling, I'll offer these as examples of the lost "feel" of the game. You HAD to work together in old AD&D. It seems like now any 2-3 characters can duplicate the basics of a 5-6 person party before, but no one is a true archtype anymore. Everyone takes just enough levels (2-3 from what I saw) to get 75-90% of the benefit of a whole class. Thus, the complaint.
Another thing (to continue my ramble for a bit) that I find interesting in applying my newfound business degree to how the D&D game is sold now that ties into the above, is that on an intrinsic level it is now marketed to the players instead of the DM. While on one hand, everything is still declared optional, it is rendered meaningless when book after book is marketed based upon "new skills-new feats- new classes!". How is the DM supposed to keep up with all of the material to rule on whether it is permissable before the player has already bought it? How much money are we as DM's supposed to spend? And given how my old players didn't like buying a splatbook that cost half as much as the core books and find out that it was "wasted", how are they going to feel when they are paying the same amount as a core book and it is ruled out? There is, I think, a tremendously greater amount of pressure on the DM to not rule out these things if he wants to keep a stable player core in the campaign than in the past, whatever is said in the first page of the DM's guide. That philosophy is discounted by the actions of their business plan.
All of these are reasons why I said "forget it, I'm sticking with what I've already bought". This is not said from a holier than thou attitude! I am glad people find enjoyment in this new edition. I just don't think some of the pro-3e arguments are valid. So you only have 4 saving throw categories now. So what? Even back when there were 5, you wrote you number on your character sheet once, and changed it rarely. How difficult was it to look at it and say "my target is 12"? Combat was the same. Everyone had their THACO written on the sheet, permanent modifiers for that weapon factored in. There might be one situational modifier assigned by the DM at the time of roll. It took 5 seconds in my games. No one ever had to break out a calculator like I saw in my sit-in. No combat lasted more than 10-15 minutes, even for epic battles. In the new edition it seems like the target number changes from round to round.
The other gripe I have is that while many gamers here have said that they could come back to D&D from other systems because of the changes, at least during your absence from the game you HAD a supported system that was meeting your desires. WotC is not allowing the other camp to do the same. I've looked into C&C and its not the same game I played. Railroading players in an adventure is considered bad DM'ing by most, but apparently railroading gamers is OK. I would be curious if back in the days of 1e-2e if AD&D were able to take whatever gaming system people had migrated too and put it off limits (buying it out and burying it, etc) whenever it posed a sales threat, if it would have met with such little out-cry. And frankly, I don't understand it from a business sense. I have been directed to fan sites such as DF since my attempted return to gaming. As a subsidiary to Hasbro I would think the parent company would understand that older gamers could pay more per item for "nostalgia goodies", and even if they didn't want to be hassled with creating it, could at least license it out to the people who still love it and make more money on the side. They aren't cannabalising when the target customer strongly dislikes what they are offering now. It seems somewhat that the system I want to play again is not being supported out of spite, whatever the official word is.
Oh, and on the lack of a "spot" in 1e-2e, remember that the average ability at first level was 10-25% for HiS and MS in 1E, maybe up to 40-50% if all beginning points were dumped there in 2E. From my understanding its routine for it to now start at 70-85%. The "spot" was built in to the lower chance of success, I would think.
thanks for giving me a chance to post here. I hope that everyone realizes that my words are not directed against anyone. We all should play what we want! That my old game has changed beyond my recognition is not the fault of any of the good posters here, after all!
