OSR Taking the OSE Initiate Feat

[Argyle King]

After some discussion on the General forum (where DCC was being compared to OSE,) I decided to pick up a few materials. I felt that increasing my knowledge of the product -by actually looking at it and trying to understand it- would allow me to have a more educated opinion, rather than relying on a mix of second-hand knowledge from YouTube and whatever sunk-cost emotions the primal part of my brain may feel toward products I already own. So, I picked up the Classic Game Set.

To be completely honest, I did not expect to like the product. The previous discussion over on the General forum mostly centered around the layout of a few adventures, and I did not particularly care for the layout. To my surprise, I found that the layout (used in the set's booklets) was something that I liked. There is still a lot to digest, but I feel confident that, even from just a brief perusal of the material, that I could play the game and mostly know what I was doing. (I would need a little bit of help getting accustomed to Thac0 and different save categories that modern D&D has.)

But I do have questions:

• How compatible is OSE with OSRIC? While I have not (yet) played OSRIC, I did back the upcoming newer version. From a lot of what I have read online, both games share the same roots, so are said to be mostly compatible with minor adjustments. However, I am new to OSR games as whole, so I am still figuring things out.
• The quick rule of thumb is have see online is that DCC levels equal roughly 2 OSR levels. If you have done conversions to or from DCC, have you found that to be accurate?
• Does a critical hit on an attack roll do anything extra in OSE?

 

[amethal]

• How compatible is OSE with OSRIC? While I have not (yet) played OSRIC, I did back the upcoming newer version. From a lot of what I have read online, both games share the same roots, so are said to be mostly compatible with minor adjustments. However, I am new to OSR games as whole, so I am still figuring things out.

The history of D&D editions is quite complicated. I don't really know where to start with this, because I'm not sure what you know already. Apologies if I'm telling you stuff you already know.

OSE is based on the original D&D game, more specifically the "Moldvay" Basic and Expert sets, usually referred to as the B/X version. That was a bit before my time - I started on the next version, the "Mentzer" Version which is referred to as the BECMI version.

OSRIC is based on the 1st Edition of the Advanced Dungeons and Dragons game. TSR supported both product lines at the same time - the Advanced game did not replace the original game, and both games continued to evolve independently.

As I think was fairly common at the time, I started with D&D (in my case, BECMI) then moved on to AD&D. AD&D was way more complicated, but it was usual to ignore rules you didn't like (I didn't know anybody who used the weapon vs armour modifiers, or the weapon speed rules) and also to not realise where AD&D had changed some rules - for instance, I'm pretty sure we carried on using D&D initiative as we hadn't noticed it was done a bit differently in AD&D.

It was also very common for each DM to have their own house rules, and for players to be a bit vague as to what were the actual rules of the game as opposed to the way the DM liked to run things. In our case we hardly ever used the monster reaction rolls - we were children, we wanted to fight monsters, not negotiate with them - which is not the way you were supposed to play the game.

So whilst there are differences between the two games you can easily mix and match the rules (deliberately, or accidentally) and there should be no problem running adventures written for one system using the other. However, it might be easier just to pick the system you prefer and stick with it. Otherwise you might get as confused as we did, back in the day.

 

[Simon Miles]

How compatible is OSE with OSRIC?

Completely, as far as we have experienced as long as you use OSE Advanced - we produce products for both systems (as per the logos on the front of our products) and the only tweak we have to make is on AC to allow for the AAC that OSE Advanced uses and the old fashioned AC used in OSRIC. There might be some other differences in the deep-down nitty-gritty but these have not affected our gaming or publications at all.
Lastest pub cover included for illustration - available for Pay what you want (for free if you like, we're good with

that!) on www.dunrominuniversitypress.co.uk

 

[Mannahnin]

The history of D&D editions is quite complicated. I don't really know where to start with this, because I'm not sure what you know already. Apologies if I'm telling you stuff you already know.

OSE is based on the original D&D game, more specifically the "Moldvay" Basic and Expert sets, usually referred to as the B/X version. That was a bit before my time - I started on the next version, the "Mentzer" Version which is referred to as the BECMI version.

OSRIC is based on the 1st Edition of the Advanced Dungeons and Dragons game. TSR supported both product lines at the same time - the Advanced game did not replace the original game, and both games continued to evolve independently.

As I think was fairly common at the time, I started with D&D (in my case, BECMI) then moved on to AD&D. AD&D was way more complicated, but it was usual to ignore rules you didn't like (I didn't know anybody who used the weapon vs armour modifiers, or the weapon speed rules) and also to not realise where AD&D had changed some rules - for instance, I'm pretty sure we carried on using D&D initiative as we hadn't noticed it was done a bit differently in AD&D.

It was also very common for each DM to have their own house rules, and for players to be a bit vague as to what were the actual rules of the game as opposed to the way the DM liked to run things. In our case we hardly ever used the monster reaction rolls - we were children, we wanted to fight monsters, not negotiate with them - which is not the way you were supposed to play the game.

So whilst there are differences between the two games you can easily mix and match the rules (deliberately, or accidentally) and there should be no problem running adventures written for one system using the other. However, it might be easier just to pick the system you prefer and stick with it. Otherwise you might get as confused as we did, back in the day.

Good post! Although slight clarification- both B/X D&D (released in 1981) and AD&D 1st Edition (released in 1977-1979) derive from Original D&D (released 1974). (Like you I started with 1983-1985 BECMI in 1985 and didn't learn this history until years later).

OD&D accumulated additional rules and supplements from 1975-1977 until it was nearly as complex as AD&D; AD&D was introduced both to clean up/consolidate all the supplements and clarifications from OD&D and expand on those to make it a "more complete" game suitable for tournaments, and as a business maneuver to claim to be a different game from D&D so TSR could just put Gary's name on it and not pay royalties to Dave Arneson on it.

1981 B/X is simplified (introducing Race as Class for example) in many ways, to serve the dual purposes of being a good introductory set for newbies since the game exploded into national popular culture in late 1979 following the James Dallas Egbert III disappearance, and to differentiate it from AD&D to help support TSR's legal argument that they should be allowed to cut Arneson off from royalties on AD&D and just pay them to him on D&D.