OD&D So where did Basic D&D end up?

Where did it end up? Still available in the most recent ruleset, brought back to life in 5e after two decades of being in the void. Yes, I’m talking about how 5e does in fact have an official basic version.

lowkey13 said:

No. I mean- not really.

There are two "basics" to start with- there is the Holmes Basic and there is Basic.

Holmes Basic is kinda sorta what you're talking about- a re-write of OD&D; it was written knowing that AD&D was going to be released, and it was an introduction for players to D&D. So it served a number of different purposes; a streamlining of the multiple different OD&D rules, an introduction to the game (levels 1-3), krogerfeedback.com and a "Basic" version of AD&D.

Now we get the confusion, and for that you can thank the enmity, aka the Gygax / Arneson lawsuits. There's a lot there, but the gist of it is that this caused a schism in the game with the idea that there were, in fact, two different games (a basic game with more Arneson input and a more advanced or expert game, aka AD&D).

So the original "Basic" was just OD&D streamlined, but the Moldvay/Cook B/X was different; it wasn't just a beginner's game- it was a different strain of D&D entirely.

And from there you get the Mentzer BECMI and the Rules Cyclopedia; but the confusion is usually twofold-

the conflation of the Holmes "Basic" with the other basics (they are similar in some aspects, but certainly not the same); and

the use of the word "Basic" to describe the first three levels of what is essentially a different system ("D&D" as opposed to "AD&D").

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The original purpose of Basic D&D was a simple introduction for new/young gamers. After they played levels 1-3, they'd have an idea of how the game worked and could transition into either OD&D or AD&D. However, many people liked the simple format of Basic, so they created Expert as a way to allow people to continue that format for more levels. Eventually it expanded out with Companion, Master, and finally Immortal, becoming a product line of its own, and realistically replacing OD&D.

Joyce559 said:

The original purpose of Basic D&D was a simple introduction for new/young gamers. After they played levels 1-3, they'd have an idea of how the game worked and could transition into either OD&D or AD&D. However, many people liked the simple format of Basic, so they created Expert as a way to allow people to continue that format for more levels. Eventually it expanded out with Companion, Master, and finally Immortal, becoming a product line of its own, and realistically replacing OD&D.

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You’re doing exactly what lowkey13 warned about in his post. You’re conflating Holmes basic with Moldvay basic. When OD&D was out, there was only Holmes basic. Written the same time Gary was writing AD&D. When Moldvay came out, it was a separate product line and OD&D was not in print anymore, so players did not go from Moldvay basic to OD&D after level 3. Expert was part of Moldvay b/X. And that’s it. Then Mentzer came out with BECMI a couple years later. Holmes, Moldvay, and Mentzer are all separate versions, and are not interchangeable as being the same. Either way, people liking the format of basic wasn’t the reason why they came out with the Moldvay version. Lowkey13 mentions this with the rift between Gygax and Arneson

Off the top of my head, so I may be off but I don’t think so...

1974: OD&D (pretty much required Chainmail rules)
1977: Holmes basic, stand alone game with all rules in the box
1978-9: AD&D
1981: Moldvay basic/expert
1983: Mentzer BECMI
1989: 2e

I think what you may be referring to is that in some of the Gazetteers for Mystara for BECMI has alternate race as class options for elves, dwarves etc... I don't remember the exact details, though I do seem to remember a cleric dwarf on the Dwarves of Rockholme book for example. These would be the last class additions to basic that I can think of.

The RC is the official end product of the BECMI line, as in it conglomerates everything you need to play through levels 1-36 in one volume.

In it, many of the 7 classes have been expanded, or other classes brought in. [Original 7 classes with race as class were the Fighter, Cleric, Thief, Wizard, Elf, Dwarf, and Halfling]. In the RC it brought in other classes that were introduced in later sets (the Paladin, the Avenger, the Knight, the Druid, and the Mystic].

This was further expanded upon in the Gazetteers. In these, you had various other options. Most of the Demi-Humans only had limited advancement in class (Elf was 10, Dwarf 12, Halfling 8, with the added bonus of +1 level for HP or spells with a wish) with combat advancement in being able to hit better with various XP levels being utilized.. In these Gazetteers they had the option for a Dwarf Cleric if one wished, but it was still limited to level 12. They also had an Elf which could go up to...I think it's level 20 (I have the books, but I'd have to get out of my chair and go look them up and I'm too lazy to do it currently). The Elf though, would need to choose whether it wanted to advance as a Fighter or a Wizard. The Halfling was more unique and given a class called the Master. It could go up to level 36 I think, but it was limited to their local area until after they hit at least A class in combat.

So, in total, the classes (off the top of my head, I think there were also one or two others, possibly one for Orcs? as well) that I've listed thus far would be

Avenger
Cleric
Druid
Dwarf
Dwarf Cleric
Elf
Elf Fighter
Elf Wizard
Fighter
Halfling
Knight
Halfling Master
Mystic
Paladin
Thief
Wizard

So 16 classes right there (and as I said, I think I'm missing a few) which is getting up there with at least the basic options Humans would have had in AD&D (actually a little more than mere humans).

GreyLord said:

In the RC it brought in other classes that were introduced in later sets (the Paladin, the Avenger, the Knight, the Druid, and the Mystic.

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Yeah - the Companion Set added all of those except the last (which came in in the Master Set). But the Druid was more like a "prestige class" - at or after level 9 your Cleric could choose to be a Druid (if Neutral). The Knight, Avenger and Paladin were more like Fighter subclasses that you picked at level 9 - you could choose to just take the benefits of a 9th level fighter from the Expert set (get some land, raise a castle, etc.) or you could be a "traveling fighter" and swear allegiance to an alignment philosophy (Paladin, Avenger) or a lord (Knight) and gain a bunch of benefits and new restrictions. It was an interesting setup.

GreyLord said:

So, in total, the classes (off the top of my head, I think there were also one or two others, possibly one for Orcs? as well) that I've listed thus far would be

Avenger
Cleric
Druid
Dwarf
Dwarf Cleric
Elf
Elf Fighter
Elf Wizard
Fighter
Halfling
Knight
Halfling Master
Mystic
Paladin
Thief
Wizard

So 16 classes right there (and as I said, I think I'm missing a few) which is getting up there with at least the basic options Humans would have had in AD&D (actually a little more than mere humans).

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There were so many more - the gazetteer series loved to introduce new variant classes. There was a Merchant class in the Darokin GAZ, and in the Dawn of the Emperor's boxed set there was a "Forrester" class that was for humans who studied under the elves (basically giving them Elf progression as humans - a way to be a fighter/magic-user that wasn't an Elf, or alternatively a way to get something like a Ranger in BECMI) and a "Rake" class that was a Thief variant - more of a swashbuckling burglar than a backstabber.

GAZ 10 was about a nation of monsters, and it introduced what was basically a variant fighter class for every major humanoid race (goblins, hobgoblins, orcs, ogres, bugbears, kobolds and even trolls) along with a system for creating your own progressions for other monster races if you wanted. They also added a set of rules for modifying the progression for a clerical or magic-user version of the classes (kind of like an Elf in that they kept the fighter progression of the base class but also gained some limited spellcasting abilities ). GAZ 10 was a supplement that really played with the assumptions of D&D.

Then there was the PC series. The PC supplements were all about playing with the assumptions of the game like GAZ10 did, but dialed up to 11. They exploded the number of monster races - one entire supplement of were-creatures, another of undersea creatures, another of fairy creatures, and one of a collection arranged on the theme of "flying creatures" that also included the first playable gnome class in BECMI D&D (a tinker gnome of course - at the time the Dragonlance archetype for gnomes was firmly embedded). A few dozen different classes came from that.

And that's not all of them - I found this list at Pandius that showed me a few that I'd forgotten even existed (like the Dervish and the various Ethengar specialized classes - a lot of them shouldn't have been necessary, and would have been kits in 2e, but BECMI wasn't set up with a framework for kits and so they just added new classes instead.)

Well, if you count the classes in Dragon magazine, it doesn’t come close to AD&D lol

The stuff you heard that "Basic D&D became like Advanced D&D" might have been a from a misinterpretation of the fact that TSR started releasing Mystara boxed sets and supplements for use with 2nd Edition AD&D rules in '94? (that's the year the Karameikos boxed set was released, anyway.) So anyone who read those books without realizing that they were actually written for use with the AD&D rules instead of Basic might have misunderstood and thought that they were written for Basic, but Basic had been changed to look like AD&D.

That's my hypothesis, anyway.

GreyLord said:

The RC is the official end product of the BECMI line, as in it conglomerates everything you need to play through levels 1-36 in one volume.

In it, many of the 7 classes have been expanded, or other classes brought in. [Original 7 classes with race as class were the Fighter, Cleric, Thief, Wizard, Elf, Dwarf, and Halfling]. In the RC it brought in other classes that were introduced in later sets (the Paladin, the Avenger, the Knight, the Druid, and the Mystic].

This was further expanded upon in the Gazetteers. In these, you had various other options. Most of the Demi-Humans only had limited advancement in class (Elf was 10, Dwarf 12, Halfling 8, with the added bonus of +1 level for HP or spells with a wish) with combat advancement in being able to hit better with various XP levels being utilized.. In these Gazetteers they had the option for a Dwarf Cleric if one wished, but it was still limited to level 12. They also had an Elf which could go up to...I think it's level 20 (I have the books, but I'd have to get out of my chair and go look them up and I'm too lazy to do it currently). The Elf though, would need to choose whether it wanted to advance as a Fighter or a Wizard. The Halfling was more unique and given a class called the Master. It could go up to level 36 I think, but it was limited to their local area until after they hit at least A class in combat.

So, in total, the classes (off the top of my head, I think there were also one or two others, possibly one for Orcs? as well) that I've listed thus far would be

Avenger
Cleric
Druid
Dwarf
Dwarf Cleric
Elf
Elf Fighter
Elf Wizard
Fighter
Halfling
Knight
Halfling Master
Mystic
Paladin
Thief
Wizard

So 16 classes right there (and as I said, I think I'm missing a few) which is getting up there with at least the basic options Humans would have had in AD&D (actually a little more than mere humans).

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Damn knew about some of them, only used the RC and Emirates of Ylaruam in the 90's. It's all I had.