The mythical ideal of 1E?

[Darkwolf71]

Wonderful if your the kind who likes to read the DMG cover to cover. To me, it was a huge PitA to try and find a specific rule or make sense of it, esp during the game session.

I would've loved a DMG and DMG commentary system; here's the rule, heres GG's thoughts on it. But for the love of Jebus, trying to figure out encumbrance gave me a headache in my eye!

Cover to cover repeatedly, in fact. I suppose that made it easy for me and my group. I could tell you what book and just about what page to look on for almost any rule. Not so much the UA, but the PHB, DMG, and both Survival Guides I had down pretty well. I wish I had that kind of reading time today.

 

[ExploderWizard]

I see many people invoking a mystical ideal of 1E AD&D that seems to me far above the objective reality of how the game was actually played. Correct me if I'm wrong, but wasn't a lot of the small changes and refocusing of D&D that occured with the 2E revision a response to how most people played the game, and the most commonly used houserules? A lot of what 2E revised and/or discarded from 1E are included in this mystical ideal of 1E that gets brought up here. While the 2E revision alienated some people, the vast majority of D&D players happily converted. I think that fact gets lost in the cloud of 1E nostalgia sometimes.

Oh we converted alright. I remember all the excitement of the Dragon previews, and waiting impatiently for the books to come out. We read through the material and began a campaign right away. A few months later as we settled into the game certain things seemed to grate on our nerves. The removal of the assassin, monk, and half-orcs and converting all the cool demons and devils into fiends to make the game more "family friendly" kind of began to turn us off.

I guess we were looking for something new and 2E changed too much of the flavor we loved without giving us enough that was different for it to hold our attention long. After a year of play with the core rules and a few complete books, our group dropped 2E and started playing GURPS. We didn't revisit D&D until 3E.

 

[justanobody]

Cover to cover repeatedly, in fact. I suppose that made it easy for me and my group. I could tell you what book and just about what page to look on for almost any rule. Not so much the UA, but the PHB, DMG, and both Survival Guides I had down pretty well. I wish I had that kind of reading time today.

I still haven't been able to read the DMG or PHB cover to cover yet in all these years.

It was/is a bit like a college textbook with the fine type.

 

[pawsplay]

2e cleaned up a lot of miscellaneous rules issues. But it also removed the half-orc and the assassin, took away the bard's macho, introduced us for the first time to the "enchanter" (not to be confused with someone who enchants items) and his other specialist friends, and began a process of updating the cleric that ultimately led to the 3rd edition monstrosity.

A little of this, a little of that.

 

[jdrakeh]

(9) Removal of a lot of Gygaxian flavor, such as artifacts.

I did mention the removal of Gygaxian flavor, actually. The rest of that stuff, though? Not very significant for any of the dozens of folks that I played with. Without a doubt, for those folks, the lack of an Assassin and Half-Orc trumped everything on your list

 

[justanobody]

Strange. I have a few 2nd edition half-orcs and after checking the CD-ROM, I wonder how that happened. Guess I just used 1st edition ones and didn't notice and it didn't really matter that much.

Except for that 15 comiless on one of them, I still can't quite explain that one. Shows you how much I payed attention, or cared what races were listed in 2nd edition.

 

[Chainsaw]

See, I prefer most of 2e's rule changes, so I think it is very possible to play 2e with a 1e mindset (heck, you can use 1e modules as written in it). Then again, without turning this into edition warz, I think 3e and 4e can be played in a 1e style as well. Its all in how you DM and the tone set.

I hear you, everybody's different. It's just easier for me to get in 1E place when I'm using 1E materials. I tend to gravitate toward the spirit of what I'm reading.

 

[Fifth Element]

See, for me this was the biggest failure of 2e. I loved the way Gygax wrote the 1e books. It seems to me that each sucsessive edition has been written to a lower level of reading comprehension. 1e assumed you were capable of reading at college levels and as the kid who was always years beyond his peers in that area, I liked that.

That's fine for reading. But it's not so good for, y'know, actually playing the game. Having to look up a rule in the 1E DMG at the table is a major pain.

That's the great thing about more recent rulebooks. They're actually designed to be used to play the game, not to be read as books.

 

[T. Foster]

That's fine for reading. But it's not so good for, y'know, actually playing the game. Having to look up a rule in the 1E DMG at the table is a major pain.

That's the great thing about more recent rulebooks. They're actually designed to be used to play the game, not to be read as books.

Ah, but Gary's intention was that the DM would rarely (ideally never) actually look at the rulebook during play, and just have a good enough understanding of the rules and the reasoning behind them and the feel of game they were intended to evoke that he'd be able to make spot-judgment calls consistent with that spirit. The handful of charts and tables that need to be used in actual play were all included on the 1E DM Screen (or in the front & back of the DM Adventure Log); everything else in the DMG is either explanation or for use between sessions.

That's one of the ironies of the DMG, one of those things Matt Finch's Quick Primer for Old School Gaming calls a "Zen moment," towards understanding 1E AD&D -- Gygax presents a thick book chock full of very detailed rules, but he doesn't necessarily expect anyone to actually use them. The rules are there to help the DM grok the intended shape and feel of the game, but once he does he's expected to supplement or even supercede the written rules with his own judgment. That's the real meaning of the famous ALL CAPS afterword at the back of the DMG -- not that the DM should wantonly ignore and change the rules in the book to suit his fancy, but rather than once you "get" the feel and intent of the rules, that making a judgment call informed by those is just as good as, or better than, slavishly following the letter of the printed rules.

 

[Fifth Element]

Gygax presents a thick book chock full of very detailed rules, but he doesn't necessarily expect anyone to actually use them.

Which is fine, but some people like the rulebooks they buy to actually have rules they will use. Just imagine the messageboard uproar if the 4E designers had said "Here's a bunch of rules, but we don't expect you to use them. $35 please."