D&D General D&D Editions: Anybody Else Feel Like They Don't Fit In?

[Mannahnin]

I saw it much more when we started playing RuneQuest, but you can make an argument that most RQ characters are fighter-mages so there's rarely a crunchy middle to worry about in the first place, and we had six player groups more often than not.

Well, RuneQuest also has Strike Ranks, doesn't it? Which means longer weapons getting to hit first is baked into the core of the combat system? Whereas that's the rule in D&D only in 1E, and only in the single round when combatants close to melee.

Combine that with lower HP and a hit location system, and the advantage of reach weapons is substantial even in one on one combat, without any ranked formations involved.

If you're talking about the second-rank spear thing, the fact you saw it a lot doesn't mean it was typical over-all either; back in the OD&D days I played with a lot of different groups and don't think I saw it even once. Not everyone who played D&D were wargamers; in fact, as time went on, I'd suggest less and less were.

You don't have to be a wargamer to use those rules, though. It'll be more intuitive to wargamers who play ancients and medievals, but most of the folks I've played OSR games with over the past 15 years haven't been wargamers.

Depends on the table. IME "Player Skill vs. Character Skill" = Metagaming.

Can't agree. The bad kind of metagaming is acting on things your character couldn't possibly know (like when the PCs are split into different locations and unable to communicate).

Making decisions which are smart ones under the rules but not based on stuff your character couldn't possibly know is just good play. It is a game, after all. And policing things which are in the grey area of "characters might or might not be aware of this" is, IME, not worth the time and headaches. IMO you're getting into questionable territory if the DM is expecting the players to "play dumb".

 

[JohnSnow]

What's "appropriate" is whatever the group agrees to, or the GM enforces

Depends on the table. IME "Player Skill vs. Character Skill" = Metagaming.

Retainers were for more than that: they can carry treasure that the PCs would have to come back for

FWIW, Gary was so convinced that player skill could not be fully separated that he didn't think experienced players should ever share the table with complete newbies going on their first adventure, because the newbies would be robbed of the "voyage of discovery" that is the challenge of learning the game.

I'm not sure I agree with that, but it is one of the benefits of things like the "Arcana" skill. I'm an experienced player, but does my character know that trolls regenerate unless hit with fire or acid? I don't know: better roll for it.

And keep my freaking mouth shut if he doesn't.

 

[Mannahnin]

There's definitely a unique joy of discovery for newbies who've never played.

For the classic troll fire trope I'm normally happy to either A) rule that it's fine for players to use that knowledge if they know it, that it's part of common folk lore in game, or B) Re-skin the troll so the players don't necessarily recognize it and don't have to play dumb.

Both of those options are a lot more fun for me than making the players guess at how dumb they should be playing it, or when it's reasonable for their ignorant characters to guess and try fire or acid.

 

[JohnSnow]

Honestly, that's probably a much better way to play it. makes note

Not to mention that there would be something amazing to having experienced players encounter a troll, and try to make short work of it, only to discover it is impervious to fire, and they have to work out that it's vulnerable to frost damage (say).

 

[Micah Sweet]

I started in Basic (All New -> RC) and moved to 2e, and A LOT of things that I'm told were "common" in AD&D read like a whole different game than the one I played. We played 1 PC per player. Henchmen were rare, but DMPCs were common. Nobody used polearms, and we fought monsters as often as we fought orcs. We played the style of play 90s TSR pushed: story driven and character intensive. We just played it with rules derived from a game style created in the 70s and no longer en vogue. No wonder I don't feel anything for the OS movement: it doesn't match the game I played back in the day. It might as well be advocating for GURPs for all it resembles the AD&D I played, except in the archaic rules it held onto for compatibility.

I started with BECMI, when it was just me, and moved to 1e with my group when we all got together. New folks introduced to the group were made familiar with our 1e style. We didn't play with 100% of the rules, but we took the game seriously for we what we believed it was intended to do. When 2e came out, we treated it as more material for our existing system, and no one shifted their playstyle to the lip service 2e paid to the more narrative, Hickman-influenced style (although I loved and continued to love Dragonlance as narrative and adventure fodder). We kept our style through brief flirtations with 3e and 4e, and into 5e, right up until my best friend and our long-time DM passed away in 2018 and the group disintegrated. After that I found the OSR for myself and eventually Level Up for my new group.

 

[Doctor Futurity]

Not knowing about something doesn't make it rare or atypical. It's a well-known strategy on old-school forums like Dragonsfoot and The Piazza. As wargamers before becoming RPG players, it made sense to us and we didn't find it challenging. It couples very well with side initiative and it is a very efficient way to survive encounters against large numbers of humanoids, which are common in TSR modules.

It's called 'Skilled play' by Grognards.

I think you had to come from the wargamer side of it to know of (or think of) this strategy, or be aware it was documented somewhere in the rules. My groups from 1981-1989, and then with 2E from 1989 up until the last time I ran it in mid 2009 had never, ever heard of this, and this is the first time, here in this thread, I have ever heard of it. Everyone I ever gamed with (except at conventions) in the 80's and 90's were newer/younger or non-wargamer RPGers. I only ran into old grognard types (back when you had to be an older wargamer to count as a grognard, and not just an old guy who started gaming in the 70's or 80's like I am today) who could talk at length about how the original edition of the game wasn't even complete without some other wargame to add to it.

 

[Micah Sweet]

If you're talking about the second-rank spear thing, the fact you saw it a lot doesn't mean it was typical over-all either; back in the OD&D days I played with a lot of different groups and don't think I saw it even once. Not everyone who played D&D were wargamers; in fact, as time went on, I'd suggest less and less were.

Let's dispense with the "how many people agree with me and therefore make my opinion more valid" thing and just agree that there are different ways to play, regardless of intentions in different parts of the text, and there always have been. None of them are more objectively valid than the others (though some may be more or less facilitated by different versions of the rules), so arguing that some are more or less popular, historically or otherwise, is completely pointless.

 

[Micah Sweet]

I think the word is Red Shirt.

That is a narrative term, and not a required part of having or using henchmen and hirelings, nor should it be assumed as such.

 

[Theory of Games]

Well, RuneQuest also has Strike Ranks, doesn't it? Which means longer weapons getting to hit first is baked into the core of the combat system? Whereas that's the rule in D&D only in 1E, and only in the single round when combatants close to melee.

Combine that with lower HP and a hit location system, and the advantage of reach weapons is substantial even in one on one combat, without any ranked formations involved.


You don't have to be a wargamer to use those rules, though. It'll be more intuitive to wargamers who play ancients and medievals, but most of the folks I've played OSR games with over the past 15 years haven't been wargamers.


Can't agree. The bad kind of metagaming is acting on things your character couldn't possibly know (like when the PCs are split into different locations and unable to communicate).

Making decisions which are smart ones under the rules but not based on stuff your character couldn't possibly know is just good play. It is a game, after all. And policing things which are in the grey area of "characters might or might not be aware of this" is, IME, not worth the time and headaches. IMO you're getting into questionable territory if the DM is expecting the players to "play dumb".

Agreed. There's levels to it.

 

[Greg K]

There's definitely a unique joy of discovery for newbies who've never played.

For the classic troll fire trope I'm normally happy to either A) rule that it's fine for players to use that knowledge if they know it, that it's part of common folk lore in game, or B) Re-skin the troll so the players don't necessarily recognize it and don't have to play dumb.

Both of those options are a lot more fun for me than making the players guess at how dumb they should be playing it, or when it's reasonable for their ignorant characters to guess and try fire or acid.

I don't use the D&D troll. Trolls in my game are a variant of Ogre or Hill Giant and some of whom may turn to stone in sunlight.