I guess I really do prefer simplicity

[Man in the Funny Hat]

That's kinda strange, because it was tournament play that has shaped many, many peoples' experiences with 1e. It's an oft-repeated saying that 1e is basically all about the modules - and most of the classics were written for tournament use.

Well there is something of a point there, but again in reading the rules we played at home and what Gary and others were telling us in "unofficial" publications, they were not expecting us to follow those modules in any particularly precise fashion. Tournament-born or not it was expected that those modules would be added to or modified to suit our own tastes and needs. We didn't run them as if it WERE a tournament because the rules really weren't intended for that.

2nd Edition certainly didn't make any changes that would have made the game more compatible with tournament play. The Players Option books certainly didn't either. I don't recall a "Tournament Rules" supplement ever being published by TSR. No, tournament rules and rules for Organized Play were added on and not intrinsic to the games design. I don't think you can say the same about 3E and 4E.

And I wouldn't say that tournament play shaped "many, many" peoples experiences with 1E. There weren't all that many Cons or tournaments to go to even if people knew about them. If they did it was an even smaller subset who ever attended. I'd say that tournament play shaped A FEW peoples experiences. Most experiences with 1E were at home and influenced primarily by the DM who was as UNlikely to have ever seen or played in a tournament as the people who introduced HIM to the game.

I'd suggest that what made those modules so memorable was NOT that they were written for and used in tournaments but because they were perforce adapted heavily to each individual campaign, its setting, its NPC's and monsters, its players and the specific makeup of its PC party. And I'd further suggest that it was the "minimalist" rules of 1E, and (compared to today's publications) the SPARTAN content of modules that encouraged and enabled such heavy adaptation.

 

[Ariosto]

it doesn't require vague and unspecified 'house rule'

Yes! As I have repeatedly stated, THAT IS THE DIFFERENCE. Old-style D&D does not require precise and specified 'corporate official rules'. Your "wonderful feature" is our "frustrating kludge", and vice-versa, because the designs are means to different ends, different games, different experiences.

 

[Ariosto]

I designed an RPG of unwieldy complexity. It started in extreme simplicity: a single sheet of notebook paper. We had some excellent adventures with that one-page "rule book", basically a "d20 system" without all the special-case rules, in 1981-82. You got + factors to write down, but in whatever you wanted (subject to GM approval) rather than from a set list. It was sort of like Talislanta with a "points system" instead of templates. There was no spell list, either; describe what you want to do, roll and add an appropriate magic factor, and do it if you roll high enough.

Over the years, though, I kept adding elaborations for their own sake. The magic system especially got weighed down with pages of specific effects and difficulty factors. Characteristics/skills, of course, got similarly formalized. Combat procedures and equipment ratings multiplied like rabbits. By the last time I actually ran it, in '85, it was definitely heavy. A couple of years later, I considered a revision to slim it down. I had consciously tried to keep things modular, but there were too many interdependencies and balances.

 

[Hairfoot]

The game that I played had no more than four class options: fighting man, magic user, and possibly thief and cleric. We didn't use proficiencies, if the rules even mentioned them

This seems to be a sticking point: you're thinking that a lack of rules for specific activities mean they can't be attempted in the game. On the contrary, it means that no action is off-limits due to there being rules for some and not others.

I got completely wrapped up in character building for about 2 years after 3e was released. I loved exploring the options and possibilities, but after a while I realised that the mechanics were dominating the invention of a character more than the concept. The fear of creating a suboptimal PC meant that I was making the choices that yielded the best bonuses and then back-filling to justify the metagaming. I felt a bit fraudulent. People will argue the contrary, but I think that's an unavoidable consequence of complex character systems.

Let's try this again: How do you give those two characters mechanical individualism.

Through mechanics, obviously, because it's only relevant in combat. The basics of character backstory and player roleplaying provide the diversity for other situations.

What do newer combat rules do, really? In 4E, you can multiply weapon damage, move an enemy to your advantage, or get a bonus to hit under particular circumstances. Why can't that be done in OD&D? Because the rules don't dictate a method? Thank god for that! Once a ruleset includes a specific effect on a battlemat, more rules need to be implemented to balance the result of that, then more rules, and more rules, until you've got three huge books and a mountain of mathematics to wade through in order to play a game of, ostensibly, carefree high adventure.

If you pop over to Dragonsfoot or the S&W boards, you'll see 1001 threads suggesting different ways to implement thief skills, professions, combat manoeuvres, and all the other subsystem rules that are part and parcel of new D&D. To a lot of people that indicates a hopelessly broken and incomplete game. For me, it's a smorgasboard of options I can choose to use or not.

What I like most is that if I import, say, a simple, broad profession system for characters to indicate their areas of expertise, I'm not then bound to a fine-grained network of skill/feat rules that come into play every time a PC scratches his bum. Likewise, if a PC wants to leap from a balcony onto a chandelier, swing across a ballroom and fly sword-first into the bandit lord, I can do that with a couple of rolls and doubled damage dice, without needing to consider what it means for battlemat positioning, AoOs, marking, and all the other corollaries of a complex system.

I can't speak for all groups, but IME a retro-D&D group will try out and negotiate mechanics for common incidents until a consensus is reached, and then tweak or introduce things as they go along. And that's where the magic happens: when the game can rocket along with minimal rules, maximum individuality and tons of adventure.

I can see why such a process seems horrifying to some gamers - it was to me at one point - but, hey, I've been playing games for over 25 years. I don't need to be spoon-fed creativity or burdened with number-crunching.

Because when my fighter encounters an unknown artifact or whatever, I want to back my fluff up. If my fighter doesn't have some kind of significant bonus to whatever knowledge roll the DM calls for, my description means jack squat. Because the next fighter has the exact same stats and the exact same chance to know about the artifact. (Okay maybe mine has a couple more points of Int, whoopdie doo.) Where's my individuality now?

I have to ask how much "fluff" this fighter has. Why is he reliant on numerical differences to distinguish him from the next guy? Where's the description and flavour from the player?

My understanding is that a player character is a person in a fantasy world. Presumably this fighter was born and grew to adulthood, has ambitions, goals and a history. Creating these details is not only fundamental to making a D&D character (in any edition), but recent editions have made PCs less vulnerable precisely so that players can invest in detailed character backgrounds without fearing they'll die in their first encounter.

If the player and DM know who this character is and where he's come from, why do they need an abstract set of numbers to judge what he knows about an artifact? And if it all comes down to the bonuses, isn't this fighter just a sterile playing piece composed of numbers and a plastic figurine?

I don't actually believe that's the kind of hollow character you're thinking of, but it reinforces the whole point: OD&D gives the character over to the player's imagination, while complex rulesets make creativity captive to mathematics.

And yeah, of course the DM can rule that my fighter knows about the unknown artificat just because I describe him as an academic, but then why are we playing a game with rules at all?

That begs the question: why play a roleplaying game at all if the plan is to deal with everything by rolling dice and adding bonuses? Why not play Mordheim instead?

What sort of academic is the fighter? What's his area of expertise? These are the interesting questions for me. I want to know what he's likely to know, then as DM I can decide if it's reasonable for him to know about the artifact. A roll isn't out of the question, but it's not a first resort. I want to know who the fighter is that he'd know about the artifact, not merely that he put points into a skill for a bonus, with no descriptive basis, and therefore deserves the info.

And let's not forget that DMs will always fudge die rolls if it suits their portrayal of the campaign. If you're playing 4E, 3E or Pathfinder, I can pretty much guarantee you that your knowledge rolls aren't being run by the book whenever they might reveal details the DM wants to remain hidden.



Ultimately, every player knows what he or she likes. It's great if rules-intensive, miniature-heavy game systems gives someone the game experience they most enjoy, but it doesn't follow that open-ended, rules-light systems therefore don't provide the game experience I like. But that seems to be the argument.

I like a lot of adventure in a single session. I want the party to be able to negotiate the wilderness, find the ancient temple, fight off cultists, descend into the catacombs, survive fiendish traps, defeat the Kobold King, play around recklessly with a box of unlabeled potions, find the artifact, debate whether to destroy or sell it, flee to the surface from the collapsing dungeon, painfully decide how much loot to carry, make it back through the jungle and receive the ale-laden gratitude of the villagers.

In newer editions, most of those elements become sideshows to the two lengthy sessions of combat. At one time I liked that, but not any more. If I want to play a miniatures skirmish I'll break out Mordheim or F.A.D., because an emphasis on combat mechanics makes fighting a much stronger focus of the game than I want it to be.


A final couple of questions, Tequila Sunrise:

1. What was the circumstance that you played OD&D under? Was it an experienced group? How long was the campaign?

2. Which game systems have you played most, and for how long? Not just D&D.

 

[Lanefan]

Let's try this again: How do you give those two characters mechanical individualism. Can the howling barbarian mechanically do anything that the swashbuckler can't do, and vice versa? They can both howl, they can both pick up a buckler and swash it, whatever that means -- great, I can create as much individuality playing WoW characters.

No you can't.

Your WoW character can't gonzo across the room via swinging on the chandelier before swashing his buckle in someone's face and catching the swooning damsel in his arms. Nor can her howl be heard as she heedlessly charges at the center of the enemy line, foaming at the mouth (and I bet a WoW character can't do *that*!) and ready to kill for the gods or to all too soon join them.

Individuality does not come from mechanics. Please repeat: individuality does not come from mechanics.

Mechanics are merely the fiddly things (some say nuisances) that allow combat and danger to be a playable part of the game. Individuality comes from the personality - the (dare I say it) character - you as the player put behind those mechanics, for all the times when those mechanics aren't in use.
If everything else is working, it shouldn't matter a tinker's damn that the swashbuckler and the barbarian are using the exact same to-hit matrix, because in the game they'll look, sound, and feel very different assuming they're played well.

Far less interesting is the reverse, where two very mechanically-different characters cannot be told apart when the dice are not rolling.

Lan-"hanging from the chandelier foaming at the mouth"-efan

 

[Ariosto]

To a lot of people that indicates a hopelessly broken and incomplete game. For me, it's a smorgasboard of options I can choose to use or not.

I agree, although at some (debatable) point of bolting on chrome -- or, more significantly, of changing basics -- you end up playing "Warlock" or "Arduin" or "Palladium" or "A Better Name Than Catacombs & Catoblepas". The "dialect" so departs from the common tongue of D&D that communication requires translation; it takes on a separate identity.

The big advantage is modularity. To a degree, that arises naturally when people are making parts without any coordination; call it lucky if they mesh at all! That's how D&D grew before Gygax selected and synthesized for AD&D, and even the growth of that through two editions was more "organic" than systematic. The publication history was a sort of microcosm of the process of development going on across the hobby.

I can see why such a process seems horrifying to some gamers - it was to me at one point - but, hey, I've been playing games for over 25 years.

Most of my group has been playing D&D a bit longer than that. We've been doing other things than playing games as well, of course, and that life experience tells.

We're comfortable assuming that adventurers are fit and capable of doing competently whatever seems appropriate for adventurers to do. There's just no demand for making sure that Pirate Jenny is +x better at climbing and dancing and swimming and swabbing, or takes a -x penalty when riding or using weapons other than a limited few. If there were, then we could do it just that simply; we're not in competition with one another to accumulate such minutia, so we don't need rules for such a contest.

When a factor seems important, we're not at a loss to assess it. If there's no consensus, we're not into arguing either; the DM sets a chance, we roll, and we get on with the game.

 

[Wik]

Mechanics are merely the fiddly things (some say nuisances) that allow combat and danger to be a playable part of the game. Individuality comes from the personality - the (dare I say it) character - you as the player put behind those mechanics, for all the times when those mechanics aren't in use.

If everything else is working, it shouldn't matter a tinker's damn that the swashbuckler and the barbarian are using the exact same to-hit matrix, because in the game they'll look, sound, and feel very different assuming they're played well.

Far less interesting is the reverse, where two very mechanically-different characters cannot be told apart when the dice are not rolling.

Amen, Bruthah!

Geez, now I've got a hankering for some old-school gaming! Or, at the very least, introduce my players to the d6 system... most of them respond pretty well to it, and I think the others will like it after they give it a shot.

 

[Tequila Sunrise]

I have to ask how much "fluff" this fighter has. Why is he reliant on numerical differences to distinguish him from the next guy? Where's the description and flavour from the player?

Far less interesting is the reverse, where two very mechanically-different characters cannot be told apart when the dice are not rolling.

*sigh* Really? You really think I somehow missed RP 101? I think I've been very patient through this discussion, but it's wearing thin. Fine, let's take a character that I played a few years back, by the name of Finn MacCool. In brief, Finn was born into a noble house. As a child he narrowly escaped the destruction of his House, which resulted in him having a phobia of death and an obsession with seeking out immortality. Fostered in secret by a loyal warrior, Finn learned the only profession available to him: that of a warrior. Having an aristocratic background and a preference for words over swords, he learned to speak charmingly as well as how to fight.

Now, can we stop going off on these insulting tangents about the validity of fluff that's irrelevant to the discussion?

Yes! As I have repeatedly stated, THAT IS THE DIFFERENCE. Old-style D&D does not require precise and specified 'corporate official rules'. Your "wonderful feature" is our "frustrating kludge", and vice-versa, because the designs are means to different ends, different games, different experiences.

If you like inventing house rules on the spot every time a player wants his character to be something other than Fighting Man #2430, and every time he wants to do something other than make a basic attack roll, by all means the earlier editions are for you. I call it limited, but you of course don't have to live by my word.

This seems to be a sticking point: you're thinking that a lack of rules for specific activities mean they can't be attempted in the game.

Know what I did playing my very first 4e game? Wrote up an NPC cleric, refluffed as a bard, in about fifteen minutes. Know what I let a player do during last Sunday's 4e game, that 4e rules explicitly forbids? Moving through an enemy space. So no, I'm not trapped in the 'rules don't cover it, so can't be done' mindset. I'm focusing on mechanical options/rules because that's where I see the lack in earlier editions. Or more precisely, considering all the 2e splats I used to have, in roughly balanced mechanical options.

I can't speak for all groups, but IME a retro-D&D group will try out and negotiate mechanics for common incidents until a consensus is reached, and then tweak or introduce things as they go along. And that's where the magic happens: when the game can rocket along with minimal rules, maximum individuality and tons of adventure.

You know that democracy (aka consensus) is the slowest and least efficient form of government, bar none, right?

I don't actually believe that's the kind of hollow character you're thinking of, but it reinforces the whole point: OD&D gives the character over to the player's imagination, while complex rulesets make creativity captive to mathematics.

Only in the same way that our id is captive to cultural norms. A fuller rule set says 'You can be good at a few things of your choice. Use them to flesh out your character.' It provides you with a basic set of shared assumptions, a springboard for ideas while at the same time stifling the 'I'm good at everything!' syndrome. Now, if you like to throw all of that to the wind, that's cool too. I knew two brothers growing up whose parents didn't teach them how to eat with utensils because they didn't believe in rules, so the brothers just ended up learning when they visited friends.

That begs the question: why play a roleplaying game at all if the plan is to deal with everything by rolling dice and adding bonuses? Why not play Mordheim instead?

Why play an rp game if you're going to leave so much up to narration?

A final couple of questions, Tequila Sunrise:

1. What was the circumstance that you played OD&D under? Was it an experienced group? How long was the campaign?

2. Which game systems have you played most, and for how long? Not just D&D.

1. I played a single session with a married couple who have the game and are fond of older editions. It ended with me (or the other character?) being teleported to who-knows-where by a randomly generated scroll. I may very well play again, if they can find time away from their kids.

2. Other than D&D, I've played a month or two of pbp Exalted, which I'm actually using for the setting of my new D&D game. I ended up quitting because I just don't do well with the pbp format. Other than that, I played V:tM with a ST who didn't believe in rolling dice. Ever. Yeah, that lasted exactly one session.

No you can't.

Your WoW character can't gonzo across the room via swinging on the chandelier before swashing his buckle in someone's face and catching the swooning damsel in his arms. Nor can her howl be heard as she heedlessly charges at the center of the enemy line, foaming at the mouth (and I bet a WoW character can't do *that*!) and ready to kill for the gods or to all too soon join them.

I can type all that into the chat log or shout it to other players if we're using skype or whatever, so in fact my WoW character can yell and foam at the mouth as well as my D&D character can. (In fact there's an argument that you only have to imagine the flying spittle, while in D&D you have to imagine everything.)

I can also say that my WoW character can swing from a chandelier and do crazy stunts, just as I can say my D&D character can, but in WoW there are no rules for it so describing it means jack squat. There are also no rules for it in older D&D editions; so you have to depend on the DM letting you. That's a step up from WoW, but a step down from having actual guidelines and rules for such a stunt IMO.

Individuality does not come from mechanics. Please repeat: individuality does not come from mechanics.

Please repeat: Patronizing other posters demonstrates a distinct lack of class. Individuality comes from description and rules.

 

[Lanefan]

*sigh* Really? You really think I somehow missed RP 101? I think I've been very patient through this discussion, but it's wearing thin. Fine, let's take a character that I played a few years back, by the name of Finn MacCool. In brief, Finn was born into a noble house. As a child he narrowly escaped the destruction of his House, which resulted in him having a phobia of death and an obsession with seeking out immortality. Fostered in secret by a loyal warrior, Finn learned the only profession available to him: that of a warrior. Having an aristocratic background and a preference for words over swords, he learned to speak charmingly as well as how to fight.

Now, can we stop going off on these insulting tangents about the validity of fluff that's irrelevant to the discussion?

Except it's not irrelevant to the discussion: it *is* the discussion.

Finn sounds like a grand character. My question remains, though: why does he need *mechanical* support for his personality and history beyond simple choice of weapon and armour (being an aristocrat, for example, I can easily see him favouring rapier and dirk, and eschewing heavy armour for other less obvious yet more effective forms of protection); a choice which you can make as a player in any edition the game has ever had.

You know that democracy (aka consensus) is the slowest and least efficient form of government, bar none, right?

Of course.

It's also the most effective means of decision making, due to the greater buy-in that those people who participated in the process tend to have. A fine example is the rule-set we use for our games - much of it was informally hammered out over gallons of tea in the early 1980's by players and DMs alike. That system is still going strong today mostly due to the buy-in from those who helped design it.

Lan-"democracy and consensus are different breeds of decision-making"-efan

 

[Ariosto]

Eventually, one may consider that, as Brigadier Young and Lt. Col. Lawford put it, "It is the need to have every detail consistent that is the bête noir of the professional war-gamer. It leads him to compile regulations that resemble Acts of Parliament in bulk, and which are only marginally more intelligible."

It is easy to multiply cases lacking specific rules. "Is that an English sparrow or an African sparrow?"

It was for this reason, as well as to facilitate limiting the information available to players, that the position of Game Master was created for the Prussian Kriegsspiel. Hobby war-games adopted it, and D&D held it essential.

OD&D provides methods for the most common and important activities requiring special rules. A certain amount of common sense is assumed, and the knowledge of the participants certainly exceeds the capacity of any book.

Handbooks of guidelines are fine, if the Game Master needs them. It does not follow that his own guidelines are inferior to someone else's. It certainly is not likely that someone not at all informed of the situation at hand should be better acquainted with its particulars.

Considering the limits of what we typically do know, I have found that the good old six-sider yields a pretty handy range of odds. One might arbitrarily choose some other spread, but there really is not usually a rational warrant of accuracy for much greater precision. (Another DM favors the twelve-sider.)

Nor is there, in my experience, usually much dispute over such an assessment. Is an outcome effectively automatic? Is it overwhelmingly probable (5:1), more likely than not (2:1), or as likely as not (1:1)? (It's easy to insert 3:2, 3:1 and 4:1, especially with other dice.)

For chances that vary by class and level, we have the saving throws.