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FYI, the 1980 Monster & Treasure Assortment isn’t just a compilation of the three 1977-78 products. It’s a revision with pretty significant differences in both monsters and treasures, changing the entrees to conform more with the upcoming B/X books. See here for a comprehensive list of the...

The biggest omission from that list is pretty easily Caverns of Thracia from Judges Guild. Already mentioned, I know, but figured I’d reiterate. Probably the greatest “big dungeon” ever published. Other good ones that maybe shouldn’t be on the list, but should definitely be in the honorable...

The more time you spend with the RC, the more you’ll find subtle changes and omissions from the BECM. Several of these I think were unintentional. Some of the class progression charts reflect an earlier printing of the Companion rules. The m-u version of the Wish spell seems to have been...

UA is very divisive in the 1e community. You’ll find a lot of people who say it’s worthless. You’ll find a lot of people who wouldn’t want to play 1e without. You’ll find pretty much nobody who adopts it whole hog, and even its most ardent defenders will admit that several of the additions need...

You asked for it... At some point between the publication of Chainmail miniature rules (1971) and the original Dungeons & Dragons rules (1974), the various armor types were assigned numbers 9 through 2. Nobody really remembers why those numbers were used. Supposedly it was from a naval warfare...

THAC0 was not introduced nor even mentioned in the B/X Moldvay/Cook rules. The B/X rules had the same repeating 20s that 1e did. The OD&D Monsters & Treasure Assortments from 1977 had an "attack value," which was what we might call a "THAC9" as it was the number to hit armor-less opponents...

How is it not exactly correct? The 1e DMG had the optional negative hit point rule, which was - at least in my experience - broadly adopted by most 1e players. 1e also had - as I stated in my previous post, but which you edited out - clerical healing spells available for first level clerics -...

Copying over my response from a similar thread on Dragonsfoot: Comparing RAW 1e to RAW B/X, the most obvious thing is that there's a lot more stuff in 1e. More characters, more races, more weapons, more armor, more equipment, more spells, more monsters, more magic items. Many, many players...

I'd award no xp. In "xp for gp" style play, advancement tends to go in fits and starts. It can go at a crawl until you hit a big score, and then "bam!" I don't mind it as DM because it tends to keep the players "on task."

This. If AC is basically just the column label at the top of the chart, it doesn’t matter... 9 to 2, 1 to 8, A to H, poop emoji to smiley face. Whatever. If you’re playing with some old guys like me for whom Plate and Shield has been AC 2 for 40 years, there’s no particular reason to change it...

I think there were two big issues involved in TSR’s actions in the 90s. The first was simply the newness of the Internet and a lack of understanding of what it was and the potential it had for bringing people with similar interests together. But the second bigger issue was that I think there...

Wow. I think this might be my first post in 10+ years. Long time lurking. But this is a subject that I love. While Baum is certainly a strain of American fantasy, as others have said, it is nowhere near the only one. There’s the Irving, Poe, Lovecraft, King strain of east coast horror that...

Good stuff. Related to not overwhelming the players with stuff is not overwhelming yourself as DM. You simply cannot prepare everything in your world before play. That's why communication with the players is so important. You need to know where their interests lie if you have to stay one...

Start with a brief campaign background. And I do mean brief, a half page of material at most. It may help if the group is all familiar with the campaign setting before hand. So if everyone knows the Forgotten Realms or Medieval France or Middle Earth or Westeros or whatever, they have a...

Iosue posted again, while I was writing... I'll catch up. Halflings: There's a couple missing items with halflings. Halflings' xp bonus is kind of unclear. To be a halfling, you must have a Dex of 9. The prime requisites are strength and dexterity. If you have one or the other above 13...

By my count, the OP is through page B9 of the rules. I'll try to keep up a bit but not pass him. Do we really need a mapper? I tend to stress the dungeon exploration theme and strongly encourage the party to map. I don't do it for them. If they get lost in the dungeon and can't find their...

I love the Moldvay Basic rules. One of the few places I think it could have been better is basically encapsulated by Holmes' quote. I wish the rules had been written more to make it clear that the 7 classes presented therein were "a good start" and that the DM and players could and/or should...

I think you're correct. The PHB (1978) was written when that rule was in transition. The Greyhawk Supp (1975) and the Holmes Basic rules (1977) both had the roll to learn every spell in the book when you can cast that spell level rule. By the time the DMG was out (1979), the roll to learn...

I'm not as familiar with 3e as others, but if things like "Detect Lie," Gems of True Seeing, and Potions of ESP don't exist in your campaign you might want to introduce them. Maybe local law enforcement calls in a Mage that specializes in catching magical thieves and he has a bevy of applicable...

More and more, I use a computer when preparing my adventures. However, when I'm done, I hit Ctrl-P and bring the dead trees to the table instead of the laptop.