Wherefore "mini-less" D&D assumptions?

[keterys]

Minis were extremely involved at the very advent of D&D, because well, that's where the roots of the game came from... but really weren't as crazy important until 3rd ed. You can play any edition of D&D without minis, but I sure wouldn't play either 3e or 4e by default without 'em. For a particularly RP moment where I thought the map and minis would distract, sure.

 

[The Shaman]

Of the editions of D&D that I've played (that would be 0e, 1e, and 3e, for those of you keeping score at home), I've played all three with and without minis, and my preference is to play with minis.

It's never been required, but I do enjoy that aspect of playing the game. That said, I think playing with minis on a grid sucks.

 

[MerricB]

Mostly, 3e/4e players in general seem just a whole lot more interested in that fiddly stuff. In the old game, we might sometimes "zoom in" our resolution beyond the pretty abstract default. Mostly, though, the first really big decision is whether to stand and fight -- and the next is what to do considering the consequences.

Oh my, yes. During a "Greyhawk Ruins" 3e campaign (which had a pretty high death count), the other players really started paying attention to what my cleric was doing. I had a much better survival sense than some of them.

I'm not quite sure if it's true in general of the 3e/4e players that they're more interested in the fiddly stuff than what early D&D was like in the day; if the bulk of players who still play AD&D are less interested in the fiddly stuff that just talks about those who remained with AD&D (rather than moving on to something else).

There is a fascinating tension in early D&D design between those interested in making it a good game and those interested in making it a good simulation - things like the weapon vs armour tables, the positioning of attackers vs. shield, the grappling table and so forth are extremely fiddly (and don't, IMO, add much to the game). I occasionally wonder how much Len Lakofka was on the simulationist side of things, because his Dragon articles tended towards the arcane.

Cheers!

 

[Ariosto]

For the AD&D game in which I'm playing now, we use models and a big laminated sheet of 5/8" (i.e., originally for 1/2" counters) hex paper -- when we're not using one of the DM's maps pre-drawn on lined paper. We don't actually have stuff conform to the grid, though, or use a constant scale. That particular DM typically draws out a strategic map (small scale, big area, so the figurines are like giants) that gets the most use. Sometimes an area gets blown up closer to model scale. Sometimes combatants are really spread out, but more often there are basically just two pretty compact formations.

 

[Ariosto]

There is a fascinating tension in early D&D design between those interested in making it a good game and those interested in making it a good simulation...

Well, the basic scale factors (such as the one-minute round) often do not lend themselves so well to some of the fancier stuff. The roots are really still in the Chainmail battle rules. There's simulation in the game, too; one just needs to bear in mind what it's modeling. It's not always very successful, but the individual moves and six-second rounds (dragging on for several minutes of real time) in other games have some problems as well.

Maybe it made a difference seeing D&D grow by accretion, almost every bit accompanied by a reminder that it was up to the DM what to use and what to discard.

It has just always seemed natural to me adapt the scales and other levels of detail to whatever matches our interest at the time. It's not necessary to get bogged down, every round of every combat, in a lot of minutia.

 

[Storminator]

I never played a session of D&D without minis until 3e. And then it was extremely rare that minis didn't hit the board (I distinctly remember exactly one combat - I hedge and say there might have been more).

In 1e we used minis all the time. We came to D&D from the Microgame Melee, so we were well versed in having a counter for your guy.

PS

 

[Voadam]

But in any combat with, say, 5 or 10 opponents, or in interesting terrain, I'm busting out those minis, for goodness sake, because I don't want to short change my fighters who invested in those cleave and tripping feats, and I don't want the wizard getting away with dropping fireballs with pinpoint "laser-guided bomb" accuracy and not have to worry about the party.

Weird, laser guided bomb accuracy for fireballs is guaranteed in most every edition. Its not like you have to roll and misses mean the targeting center drifts under the missile like weapon chart making your party more at risk. Even mini less you have to worry about the party and be careful enough to throw it further down the corridor far enough not to hit your first rank or consider whether you want to get the far half of the enemies swarming your fighter or all of them and include him in the area of effect. For cleaving fighters the description of who is swarming you is usually pretty obvious from descriptions IME.

 

[Mark]

When those of us moved from the original Chainmail rules to that new-fangled D&D game in 1974, we always used minis to keep track of the marching order and most often to also represent relative positions in battle. We would use a square grid for indoor conflicts and hexes for outdoors. When the wet-erase vinyl mats first arrived on the scene, we snapped them up right away. My first Gencon was in 1976 and I played in the D&D tourneys back then and on through the Eighties. Gygax and his cronies who often ran the convention games also used them in that manner (though battles that were quicker would often be closer to a hand wave than a tactical chess match). The assumption was always that minis were in use. This has been my experience through all editions at the vast majority of tables where I have played. The few where minis were not in use had to ignore certain aspects of the game and forego particular rules. It is definitely a different game without minis but, IMO, no more so than 4E is a different game from those before and 3.XE is a different game from those before and 2E was a different game from those before, etc. As it is posted, so it has been done.

 

[delericho]

One thing that's popped out to me in some of the edition "wars"/discussions has been the mention that 4E requires minis, with a seemingly unspoken assumption that previous versions never used them. Back when 3E was new, this would have been quite a shock to me, because the same claims were made about 3E back then;

I (almost) never used minis while playing 2nd Edition or Basic D&D. Indeed, I barely used them while playing 3e. That said, it was immediately obvious to me that 3e would benefit from the use of minis in a lot of cases.

When I moved to 3.5e, I felt the rules had reached a point where they basically required minis. Sure, the game could be run without them, but I always found this worked poorly. The assumption was now very much that groups would use minis, and the game lost a lot without them.

With 4e, the 'need' for minis does seem yet another step more advanced. Due to the importance of exact positioning, and the prevalence of powers that force movement of various sorts, I simply would not attempt to play 4e without the use of minis.

I do find this trend towards 'requiring' minis to be rather unfortunate. Of late, I've been leaning towards a much simpler style of gaming: simpler rules, fewer supplements, fewer game aides, and no minis - basically fewer 'fiddly bits' to distract from the imaginitive aspects of gaming.

 

[Desdichado]

3e definately assumed mini use. That was one of the few lingering complaints about it that I never could shake.

1e and 2e may (or may not; I honestly don't remember anymore) have assumed mini use, but certainly they were a lot less necessary.