D&D General Lethality, AD&D, and 5e: Looking Back at the Deadliest Edition

[Thomas Shey]

I only used them very early on.

Yeah, but are you willing to suggest most people follow this? I know which way I'd bet.

 

[ECMO3]

Ask a typical player "Would you want to play a hard nitty gritty grim realism game with random character death Or a super silly easy dream game where your character is an immortal super self insert of you?" And, well, a LOT of players will go for that second option. The same way a LOT of parents think that "all games are Automatic Tie Scores" are a great idea as then their kid will "never loose".

And, for most, the illusion can work for a bit. The player can be in hundreds of games. Happily having their character hop around from encounter to encounter, under the safe comfort that not only will their character never die, but also that they will automatically "win" the game(that is "complete the quest/mission"). The player does not even really have to try much, and sure does not need to pay attention: they have already one. And for some, they could not be happier: they will happily tell you how they did every Adventure Path and killed every foe in the Monster Manual.

For most the illusion wears off after a bit. A game with no sense or chance of loss or defeat is not fun. With the automatic outcome of a "win for all" or a "tie" or "quest success", it can feel pointless to play. They thought it would be "so much fun" to play a "super human immortal character", but the fun wore off quick.

I play mostly RAW 5E, actually one of my DMs is even a little easier with potions as a bonus action. Since 2014 as a player I have personally had 3 PCs die and have seen another 2 party members die. As a DM I lost 1 PC and the character actually heroically died by intentionally diving into a portal to Elemental water to close it from the other side and save the rest of the party (and the world).

That is a lot less than died during the 80s playing 1E (both basic and AD&D), but the lower chance of death has not dulled my enthusiasm for 5E.

I remember one 1E campaign where I was DM (and an adult) and a girl, about 15, was playing a Drow Cleric/Magic User in a neighborhood game. They were around 13th level I think, I still remember her characters name - Silversun (wierd for a Drow, I know). Anyway she died as part of a TPK to a bunch of Erinyes. She started crying and I felt horrible, I felt like I had shot her dog or something. She did not complain at all nor ask me to bend the rules but she did cry for like an hour while everyone was rolling up new 1st level characters. Six months or so later the next party also got TPKed (a naga and an Army of Orcs if I remember correctly). Second time around she did a lot better.

Given the choice between the two, I much prefer the "easy mode" of 5E ..... and if you don't like it easy you can always play an Elemental Monk.

 

[Lanefan]

Yeah, but are you willing to suggest most people follow this? I know which way I'd bet.

Well, I'll scotch that bet just a little by saying that in 39 years of DMing 1e (or close) I have yet to use the DMG treasure tables.

 

[Zardnaar]

Yeah, but are you willing to suggest most people follow this? I know which way I'd bet.

No idea I suspect how most people play D&D over the editions bit not random treasure tables.

 

[jasper]

.....

Second was the drawbacks. In order to get powerful abilities, there would be concomitant drawbacks. You want to play a Paladin? Great- but you have to apply all the "strictures"- magic items restrictions, wealth restrictions, hireling restrictions, alignment restrictions, and most importantly, association restrictions. You want to play a demi-human with abilities baked in? Great, hope you're not expecting to advance all the levels (or get raised if you're an elf). And so on.

....

Drawbacks is what is MISSING from 5E. Even within 5e we when from Racial bonuses which were drawbacks to floating stats bumps. Drawbacks help make a character interesting. Hit the magic item count on a paladin watch Oofta sweat over the decision. Or watch Oofta try to tale jasper out the drawback.

 

[MNblockhead]

Matt Mercer has a lot of old school DM in how he runs his games. PC death is fairly frequent (the recent campaign came very close to a TPK not that long ago) and when players are raised it is a big deal in the plot - raising Laudna from the dead become its own story, he ruthlessly killed an unconscious Mollymauk, and there was no saving Vax'ildan back in the day. He's also hardcore about things like resource management - you will track those arrows and he doesn't care if you are level 20, you are still gonna track every copper spent on an ale.

Matt is one of those DMs who has an amazing memory for details. Whether it is the rules, NPC names (and voices), and even what is on the players character sheets. Yeah, he does it for a living, so probably spends more time in prep and review than most DMs, but it is still damn impressive.

 

[MNblockhead]

Back when we played AD&D, our house canon was that +1 and +2 items, which were ubiquitous, weren't actually magic at all, just really well crafted, giving them benefits that generic weapons lacked.

That's still what I do. For the most part, better to hit and more damage just means better made.

 

[MNblockhead]

One thing I notice is that even though "old school" D&D supposedly puts the DM in a much more authoritative position, I remember much more time spent arguing rules in the 80s. After a long break, coming back to the game with 5e, it feels like the DM has much more authority. For all the talk about collaboration and complaints I keep reading about overly entitled players, 5e seems to be played much less as game with rules than AD&D. Yes, it is partly because OD&D required you to fill in large gaps and AD&D rules were difficult to parse. But there was more of sense of game masters being referees and judges. "Rules lawyers" became a pejorative early on, but almost everyone I played with in 80s were rules lawyers to some extent. Challenging the DM on ruling now seems to be the height of poor gaming etiquette, which is a bit weird for a game when you think about it.

You wouldn't know that looking at D&D discussion threads, but in every game I've played at, whether convention games, AL games at my FLGS, or on-line games, since 2014, I can't recall a single instance of any debate over rules. It feels like a big cultural shift to me having jumped from the 80s to 2010s. I note this without any judgment either way. I enjoy both styles, though I tend to a bit more on the gamest side when I run D&D games, especially combat and am not only tolerant of some debate over the rules, I tend to rely a lot on my players to remind me of less-used rules and help adjudicate results.

Wondering whether others have the same experiences.

 

[Thomas Shey]

Well, I'll scotch that bet just a little by saying that in 39 years of DMing 1e (or close) I have yet to use the DMG treasure tables.

I accept your datapoint. But I'll note I know at least a dozen people for whom in OD&D at least, the opposite was very much not true.

I mean, seriously, why should it be a surprise that a lot of people, maybe the majority use tool that's presented as "Here's something for you to use"? Especially when they have hit the experience new? They might occasionally craft a treasure for a specific purpose, but, well, you could be putting together an awful lot of monster-and-treasure things in D&D, and I don't think its all that contraversial to say that random tables were an easy way to avoid the mental and temporal overhead on that, both on monster selection and treasure. Given that, what's going to set people's expectations other than those?

 

[Thomas Shey]

One thing I notice is that even though "old school" D&D supposedly puts the DM in a much more authoritative position, I remember much more time spent arguing rules in the 80s. After a long break, coming back to the game with 5e, it feels like the DM has much more authority. For all the talk about collaboration and complaints I keep reading about overly entitled players, 5e seems to be played much less as game with rules than AD&D. Yes, it is partly because OD&D required you to fill in large gaps and AD&D rules were difficult to parse. But there was more of sense of game masters being referees and judges. "Rules lawyers" became a pejorative early on, but almost everyone I played with in 80s were rules lawyers to some extent. Challenging the DM on ruling now seems to be the height of poor gaming etiquette, which is a bit weird for a game when you think about it.

I've seen the latter attitude for 40 odd years. I'm startled you missed it. I hit what I called "the divine right of GMs" pretty early on.

(Which didn't mean we didn't argue anyway, but there were absolutely large groups where it was clearly considered beyond the pale beyond very minor cases)

You wouldn't know that looking at D&D discussion threads, but in every game I've played at, whether convention games, AL games at my FLGS, or on-line games, since 2014, I can't recall a single instance of any debate over rules. It feels like a big cultural shift to me having jumped from the 80s to 2010s. I note this without any judgment either way. I enjoy both styles, though I tend to a bit more on the gamest side when I run D&D games, especially combat and am not only tolerant of some debate over the rules, I tend to rely a lot on my players to remind me of less-used rules and help adjudicate results.

Wondering whether others have the same experiences.

Not me. But then, its possible that people who seriously care about rules have tended to slide out of D&D in the 5e era.