Ondath
Hero
So, as someone who's expressed his distaste for D&D's new direction multiple times in the forums, I'm starting to think of formally expanding my horizons. Dropping D&D 5E/One D&D as my main game and using someone else as my default. One option I've been considering was OSR games (OSE in particular), since it seems like I like quite a decent part of its design philosophy. I ran an OSE oneshot and read a few different rulebooks and blog posts to see if I could grok the philosophy, but some things still feel off.
To be fair, I started playing long after old school games had died down, around 3.5/Pathfinder era. I also skipped all of 4E and the rise of OSR as a movement, and I was pretty smitten with 5E when it first came out. So I'm a bit of an outsider to OSR-verse, but given the variety of games available, I'm hoping there might be a specific ruleset for the style of play I have in mind, which is slightly more modern than what most retroclones offer. I was hoping people interested in OSR could point me in the right direction, or at least offer some ways I could hack existing rulesets to better suit my needs.
Now, here's what I like about the OSR philosophy:
As the last point makes it clear, I'm not entirely sold on OSR's approach to everything. Notably, I'd like to keep the following features from more "modern" games, if possible:
I really appreciate any pointers you might send my way!
To be fair, I started playing long after old school games had died down, around 3.5/Pathfinder era. I also skipped all of 4E and the rise of OSR as a movement, and I was pretty smitten with 5E when it first came out. So I'm a bit of an outsider to OSR-verse, but given the variety of games available, I'm hoping there might be a specific ruleset for the style of play I have in mind, which is slightly more modern than what most retroclones offer. I was hoping people interested in OSR could point me in the right direction, or at least offer some ways I could hack existing rulesets to better suit my needs.
Now, here's what I like about the OSR philosophy:
- Simulationism First: What I've always liked about D&D was the possibility to create a fantastic world with its own logic that made sense. Most OSR games (owing to an assumption of Gygaxian naturalism) seem to put verisimilitude first: If it wouldn't make sense for a wizard to cast spells in armour, they don't. If a poison would kill you instantly, you only get one save against it. The rules also work well with a style of DMing where the random tables lay out the internal logic of the world you're in, and the DM produces the results neutrally by rolling on random tables or applying the invisible rulebooks in his head (if you're going through Orcish territory, you are likely to run into a warband with 10d12 orcs, even if this isn't balanced!).
- Emergent Storytelling: This is tied to the simulationist approach, but I think D&D's real value comes from the moments that can only come out of an emergent story that naturally came together from various game mechanics. Other media (be they video games or movies or simple stories) can do preset narratives quite well (maybe even better than TTRPGs), but D&D's collaborative storytelling is unique in that none of the participants really know what the end result will be, but they know the end result will make sense because it will have followed the game's (and as a result, the game world's) rules. You can get unique stories like "Do you remember the time when we planted one of the beans from the Bag of Beans to Silvanesti and used the pyramid that sprouted out of it to lure Cyan Bloodbane?". I think OSR's style is uniquely fitting for such emergent storytelling. This also means "letting the dice fall where they may", and allowing players to suffer the consequences of their actions (but also reap the rewards of making the world a better place).
- Rules-Light/Actual Natural Language Rules: One of the reasons I never bothered with 4E was how it offered a game where the fiction didn't matter and only the strict rules interactions (which were presented in video-game like terminology) yielded results. I liked 5E's claim of having a natural language to explain the rules, but then realised the rules were being interpreted more and more in a strict fashion. It wasn't until I saw OSE's rules that I saw what real natural language rules look like, and I really want to run a similar system where things are explained clearly without needless abstraction.
- Making Resource Management/Exploration Actually Meaningful (at least some of the time): I always tried to homebrew rules to make encumberance or supplies or light sources matter in 5E, until I realised that the game has those mechanics only as vestigial remains from old editions, and that dungeon crawling and inventory management really shine in OSR games. I'd like logistics to be a meaningful challenge for some extent of the game at least (counting how many torches you'll need might get boring when you're high level, but in early levels I definitely want the OSR-style dungeon crawling experience).
- Focus on Player Intentions Over Character Skill: I know this isn't how OSR usually phrases it (I believe the normal saying goes "Player Ingenuity Over Character Ability"), but there's a reason I phrase it this way: I like that OSR tries to get players to look beyond their character sheets and think more like someone actually living in the world. I like that it rewards players when they explain their intentions clearly and when those intentions lead to smart play. That said, I'm not necessarily a fan of putting player skill over character skill, while still valuing players' intentions over anything their character sheet says. Does that make sense?
As the last point makes it clear, I'm not entirely sold on OSR's approach to everything. Notably, I'd like to keep the following features from more "modern" games, if possible:
- Assuming the PCs are competent: While we should encourage players to think like they actually live in the world, they don't. I don't want to require the players to describe everything they're doing with meticulous details to avoid a "gotcha" moment where the DM punishes them for something their character would've known better (I'm not saying this is how OSR works, but there does seem to be a group of people who like to play in a more adversarial fashion).
- A Unified Game Mechanic: I just like how everything is "1d20 + ability + proficiency, compare with the DC" in 5E. I find the stiched-together nature of subsystems upon subsystems of OSR games to be rather unhelpful. It certainly turns off my gaming groups.
- More High-Level Adventures: From what I understand, most OSR games stick to the sweet spot of levels 1-10, where the players are either nobodies trying to survive a deadly world or competent mortals who still can't fight epic-level threats. With that said, I actually do like modern games' epic scope where you can travel to other planes or be an equal match to apocalyptic threats. Most OSR games seem to consider that you get a stronghold and retire after your name level. I'd like the option to face bigger threats as epic heroes instead.
- As Little Biological Determinism As Possible: While I understand that racial ability scores and racial level limits (even race-as-class) are a core part of the playstyle OSR is recreating, I'd honestly prefer something like Level Up's heritages and culture where races are more about the supernatural traits you get but don't limit what your character can do. OSE Advanced Fantasy's optional rules for removing level limits (and giving humans extra traits to balance it out) were a step towards what I had in mind, for instance.
- More Balanced Character Options (within the limits of the game world's logic): While I like simulationism, I'd like player options to be balanced between each other within the limits of the world's internal logic. I know that OSR style games balance different character options through different means (different level progressions for Magic-Users and Fighters etc.), but if possible I'd instead prefer the game to make the two options equally useful in an all-things-considered way, where one option roughly contributes equally to others when you considers all pillars of the game, and better options are not balanced by making them harder to get. I'm okay with some power variation between different PCs, but if one character gets to bend the rules of reality at level 9 and the other gets a couple of guys calling him "m'lord", that doesn't seem fair.
- Not Supporting Politically Icky Groups: Again, I don't think this is a problem endemic to OSR, but there seem to be some groups using old-school gaming as a shield for their vile views, and I'd rather not support them as much as possible. I'm writing this mostly because I've had issues with this before: I used to use Adventurer Conqueror King's domain generation system a lot when designing my homebrew world, but upon learning the creator associating with particularly gruesome people, I really didn't want to touch those rules again.
I really appreciate any pointers you might send my way!