The "I Didn't Comment in Another Thread" Thread

[RealAlHazred]

This whole meme that AD&D was this impossibly hard game where every PC had the half life of a mayfly is just so much nostalgia glasses.

"Nostalgia glasses"? I don't wear those! I have prescription rose-colored glasses!

 

[Bedrockgames]

This whole meme that AD&D was this impossibly hard game where every PC had the half life of a mayfly is just so much nostalgia glasses.

It is a vast oversimplification, I agree. But in key ways it was much more lethal than 3E and beyond (though each of those editions I think have their own areas where lethality can kick in). Early levels in AD&D definitely can be a lot more lethal than later editions I think (you just have more mages walking around with almost no HP), the GM wasn't as bound by things like the CR system, etc. But things like level drain, save versus death, etc all these random things that could kill or radically mess up your character were more prevalent. I also think there was a culture of play that was different (by the time 3E rolled around, the idea that you only allowed PCs to die when they did something stupid, which I remember encounter during 2E, had just become a more baseline assumption for many of the groups I was in). That said I don't think this is a strictly AD&D 1e thing. The lethality of the system was similar across 1 and 2e, but the culture of play changed a lot in the 90s to focus more on storylines, and I do remember that being when your character randomly dying was not always as accepted by every gaming group. My overall impression, and it would be interesting if someone actually tried to quantify this to see if it is accurate, is the D&D system has become more forgiving over time. However, it has always been a game where characters eventually have enough HP that they can soak up damage and dungeon crawl (when I have play tested new systems one thing I realized right away is how much that matters if you want dungeon crawls to be viable---at some point characters need sufficient health that they can have more than 1-3 encounters in a delve). So it isn't like classic D&D was this super gritty thing.

It has also come in waves as with anything. If you go outside D&D, or even just look at some D&D clones, there are games out there that boost the lethality.

 

[Ryujin]

It is a vast oversimplification, I agree. But in key ways it was much more lethal than 3E and beyond (though each of those editions I think have their own areas where lethality can kick in). Early levels in AD&D definitely can be a lot more lethal than later editions I think (you just have more mages walking around with almost no HP), the GM wasn't as bound by things like the CR system, etc. But things like level drain, save versus death, etc all these random things that could kill or radically mess up your character were more prevalent. I also think there was a culture of play that was different (by the time 3E rolled around, the idea that you only allowed PCs to die when they did something stupid, which I remember encounter during 2E, had just become a more baseline assumption for many of the groups I was in). That said I don't think this is a strictly AD&D 1e thing. The lethality of the system was similar across 1 and 2e, but the culture of play changed a lot in the 90s to focus more on storylines, and I do remember that being when your character randomly dying was not always as accepted by every gaming group. My overall impression, and it would be interesting if someone actually tried to quantify this to see if it is accurate, is the D&D system has become more forgiving over time. However, it has always been a game where characters eventually have enough HP that they can soak up damage and dungeon crawl (when I have play tested new systems one thing I realized right away is how much that matters if you want dungeon crawls to be viable---at some point characters need sufficient health that they can have more than 1-3 encounters in a delve). So it isn't like classic D&D was this super gritty thing.

It has also come in waves as with anything. If you go outside D&D, or even just look at some D&D clones, there are games out there that boost the lethality.

From the early 1e days I had a rabid dislike of "save or die." I wouldn't use it. If the party made a bad or outright stupid decision, that was one thing, but I didn't want an entire campaign to potentially turn on one die roll.

 

[Bedrockgames]

From the early 1e days I had a rabid dislike of "save or die." I wouldn't use it. If the party made a bad or outright stupid decision, that was one thing, but I didn't want an entire campaign to potentially turn on one die roll.

I think this actually gets at a pretty critical difference in peoples taste that shapes this a lot. For me I feel the opposite, I love that a campaign could turn in an unforeseen way from a single die roll. I don't think there is anything good or bad in either approach, but I do think how much that creates either more excitement for you or more frustration, is a big part of where that dividing line is

 

[RealAlHazred]

From the early 1e days I had a rabid dislike of "save or die." I wouldn't use it. If the party made a bad or outright stupid decision, that was one thing, but I didn't want an entire campaign to potentially turn on one die roll.

I don't know. I liked my Wandering Damage System!

 

[overgeeked]

From the early 1e days I had a rabid dislike of "save or die." I wouldn't use it. If the party made a bad or outright stupid decision, that was one thing, but I didn't want an entire campaign to potentially turn on one die roll.

The house rule we used was take half your max HP as damage instead of save or die. If you were below half already, welp, you’re dead.

 

[Gradine]

Hey so this Nimona flick is uh... pretty damn good

 

[CleverNickName]

Hey so this Nimona flick is uh... pretty damn good

We watched it last night. It's incredible.

 

[RealAlHazred]

I haven't actually run a game in over a year. I play semi-weekly, but running... I haven't done. So I'm going to scratch that itch by running a solo game for my wife, whose introduction to the tabletop hobby was startlingly recent (2010s). I was thinking of running her through Keep on the Borderlands, since it's an iconic adventure and one she'll be able to talk to other people about, and using OSE to do it.

So, since she's one PC, I'm thinking of shrinking the maps. @Dyson Logos has drawn Zath Gor Bastion as a miniature version of the Keep, and the Caves of Carnage as a miniature version of the Caves of Chaos. I was also thinking of naming the tavern in the Keep "Gavin's Inn" from the Willingham-drawn D&D comics advertisements of the 80s, although that would canonically be in Porttown, as the adventurers there are delving into Zenopus Castle. I don't know, maybe I'll put Zenopus Castle elsewhere on the frontier; I don't want to get too far ahead of myself*.

Anyway, what do other people think? Are there more references that should go in there? It'll just be me and my wife, so I'm shrinking things to keep them manageable.

* Too late.

 

[Malmuria]

From the early 1e days I had a rabid dislike of "save or die." I wouldn't use it. If the party made a bad or outright stupid decision, that was one thing, but I didn't want an entire campaign to potentially turn on one die roll.

I think it is ok if saves are used as perhaps originally intended, as like a last resort defense for something that would otherwise kill you. I believe Gygax had given the example of a knight in a story who survives a dragon's breath against all odds (@Snarf Zagyg I think relayed this example on these boards). But slowly more and more spells required saves.