D&D 2E What would you want in a 2e AD&D inspired RPG?

[Psikerlord#]

Because AD&D ability checks were based on rolling lower than your ability score. Latter-day D&D players can't seem to grasp this concept for some reason. If you have the minimum 3 Str, you might suck, but you still have a 15% chance of success (on a 1, 2, or 3). If you have a 18 Str, you might be a badass, but you still have a 10% chance of failure (on a 19 or 20). It was really a very elegant system (and I think better and faster than D20 DC checks). If you start allowing characters to have higher than 18 in an ability score, it starts to break the system.

To be clear, I'm not defending percentile strength. I don't actually like it, and I think it could be gotten rid of. Percentile strength was only ever intended for the Fighter class to help balance the class against the other warrior classes. It got abused over the years. A better rule would just be to give all Fighters a bonus to their damage adjustment.

As regards the OP, I think the reason there is no AD&D 2E OSR is because its a fairly strong system as originally published. Its well organised and well written, and well balanced in its way. It only starts to break when you layer on all the splat books and optional rules.

I really like the roll under system using a 3-18 stat range. In fact I am tinkering with a "low fantasy" OSR/d20 hybrid game based on this model (plus adv/disad, and/or minor modifiers such as +2). I much prefer it to the 5e DC 10-20ish range.

 

[Psikerlord#]

As for what I would like from a 2e-ish game, I voted for 1) roll under stats, 2) no percentile str 3) skills and 4) thief abilities on a d20.

 

[Man in the Funny Hat]

Although I can't believe that there's not an OSR D&D out there for everyone by now...

Thought I'd respond to this. There is not an OSR D&D out there for everyone because EVERYONE has slightly different takes on what they like/don't like, want/don't want, use/ignore. There will never be one version to rule them all. If anything, each new version only compounds the issue rather than uniting disparate players under a single banner. And old school isn't what you play anyway - it's how you play it (and that is to play it the way YOU want to play it rather than the way ANYONE ELSE wrote that it should be played, regardless of whether they may have even authored the game or not). You just can't write enough OSR's or new editions to please everyone no matter how we try.