D&D 2E Returning to 2nd Edition

Zardnaar · May 30, 2019

It does. It's also better than 1E as it has rules to support grittier games or make magic ritual based. Ritual magic originated in 2E not 4E.

We used elements of 3E in 2E as initially I tried fixing 3E by plugging in parts of AD&D. This was around 2010. For example I banned the magic item creation feats and used AD&D magic item creation rules.

Later I ran a 2E game as a one off but the 3E players enjoyed it. That turned into a new campaign. Kept doing that until 5E landed. 5E has it's own problems and after 5 years it's getting a bit boring. Getting sick of the encounter rules and whack a mole playstyle.

The Crimson Binome · May 31, 2019

dave2008 said:
LOL, - OK, you really are a fan of hyperbole.

Not really. I actually was motivated to write a book, primarily out of not wanting to subject anyone else to the horrors of 5E.

There are a lot of questionable design decisions in 5E.

Azzy · May 31, 2019

Enevhar Aldarion said:
Reading through threads like these makes me remember just how many house rules the groups I played in/Dmed for actually used back in the 80's and early 90's. lol

Right? And how many trules that just got ignored. "The rules for this are... nope."

Reynard · May 31, 2019

Azzy said:
Right? And how many trules that just got ignored. "The rules for this are... nope."

I think that why people have some weird negative memories of AD&D. It's actually a pretty complex system with a lot of interconnected parts. When people ignore some of those systems arbitrarily they end up creating unintended problems in other parts.

The easiest example is the book keeping associated with equipment. If you ignore encumbrance you end up with the Golf Bag problem and you neuter the resource management aspect. If you ignore spell components you overpower wizards. Etc.

Azzy · May 31, 2019

Reynard said:
I think that why people have some weird negative memories of AD&D. It's actually a pretty complex system with a lot of interconnected parts. When people ignore some of those systems arbitrarily they end up creating unintended problems in other parts.

The easiest example is the book keeping associated with equipment. If you ignore encumbrance you end up with the Golf Bag problem and you neuter the resource management aspect. If you ignore spell components you overpower wizards. Etc.

And then there are the stupid things like weapon vs Armor mods, gender-based ability score maximums, going into comas at negative hp, racial level limits, etc. AD&D needed to be hacked apart and reassembled based on each groups' preferences. Especially 1e. @e had its own list of foibles, too, but many of them were (thankfully) optional.

Zardnaar · May 31, 2019

Azzy said:
And then there are the stupid things like weapon vs Armor mods, gender-based ability score maximums, going into comas at negative hp, racial level limits, etc. AD&D needed to be hacked apart and reassembled based on each groups' preferences. Especially 1e. @e had its own list of foibles, too, but many of them were (thankfully) optional.

2E doesn't have gender based maximums. People throw shade at 2E via lumping things in from 1E.

2E isn't perfect, I don't expect everyone to like it but yeah it is different to 1E.

Tony Vargas · May 31, 2019

Azzy said:
And then there are the stupid things like weapon vs Armor mods

For every stupid thing, there's someone who liked it back in the day. I'm about the only one who liked that one. I think may I have a compatriot around here somewhere.

going into comas at negative hp, racial level limits

These weren't all bad, either.

mach1.9pants said:
And Fighter's saves became really good at higher levels, LFQW was def something introduced in 3E. Maybe Linear Fighters Doubling Wizards is true in older editions.

Heh. 3e did take casters off the hook when it came to Save DCs, that's for sure, if most dramatically for top-level spells, since DCs scaled with slot level instead of caster level. OTOH, in 1e, scaling - damage, range, duration, &c - of low-level spells by caster level was without limit; in 3e damage, at least, it ran up against caps based on spell level. In 5e, damage &c tends to scale with slot level - but save DCs scale with /character/ level ('Proficiency'), while 2/3rds of PC saves don't scale, at all.

So there's really LFQW going all through there, 1e/2e AD&D, 0D&D, 3e, or 5e, the exact formulae are a little different, but the fighter's is linear and the casters' as "quadratic" in one as another.

A linear magic-user, who's spell (he'd only know one) scaled damage (like fireball does) for instance, as in 1e (d6/level, no limit), would have a spell progression that looked like this:

Code:

level  Spells/day
1       1
2       1       
3       1
4       1
5       1
6       1
7       1
…

dave2008 · May 31, 2019

Saelorn said:
Not really. I actually was motivated to write a book, primarily out of not wanting to subject anyone else to the horrors of 5E.

But that is hyperbole. There are no "horrors" in 5e or any other edition of D&D or probably TTRPGs in general. There are real horror out there, D&D is not one of them. At least that is my opinion.

Saelorn said:
There are a lot of questionable design decisions in 5E.

Depends on your point of view. Every edition of D&D has things I don't like and that I change. However, I feel with 5e that, though I may not always like the decisions, I can usually understand why they did them. They are not questionable so to speak, I simply don't like them.

dave2008 · May 31, 2019

Saelorn said:
Not really. I actually was motivated to write a book, primarily out of not wanting to subject anyone else to the horrors of 5E.

PS, you kinda failed at that - it is insanely popular.

I think it is time to admit that what you like is not currently the mainstream (I know many of my tastes don't align with the mainstream). I like my games much more deadly and gritty than mainstream, but I feel I can easily do that in 5e so I am good to go. I also like epic level play, not so easy in 5e, but I'm working on that!

The Crimson Binome · May 31, 2019

dave2008 said:
PS, you kinda failed at that - it is insanely popular.

I think it is time to admit that what you like is not currently the mainstream (I know many of my tastes don't align with the mainstream). I like my games much more deadly and gritty than mainstream, but I feel I can easily do that in 5e so I am good to go. I also like epic level play, not so easy in 5e, but I'm working on that!

I succeeded at my goal, in that I don't have to subject anyone else to that. If other people want to subject themselves to it, of their own volition, then that's on them. I also don't mind if they put pineapple on their pizza, as long as it's not at my table.