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I mean, I don't mind grouping up stories set in modern-like areas in a fantasy world as falling under the umbrella of "urban fantasy" (although strict genre definitions are pretty meaningless). But it's definitely an meaningful distinction from other stories set on Earth. The idea that if I...

I was unable to choose between them, so I compromised with a 1d15+1d5.

September of ‘78. I remember the bulk of the 80s, but I would consider the 90s my actual formative period.

Yep, totally right. I’ll go back and edit. I also forgot descending AC.

This is just my personal aesthetic sense, but I think you can fork AD&D pretty far and still maintain the “feel” as long as you maintain: -The stat progression and their baked-in oddities. -Gestalt multiclassing, with racial class and level limits. -Uneven XP tables with geometric progression...

Great minds and all that. :)

Heroism is reactive; villainy is proactive.

For me, it isn't about the imprimatur of the WotC trademark. It's about the fact that what WotC releases has greater reach than an identical product released by a smaller company. It will shift conversations and discussion far more than a release by a 3pp. I'm on record as saying there is a...

People into old versions of D&D are nerds, news at 11. :)

The general reason is that broader gaming culture (the type that plays primarily D&D and little else) has shifted into prioritizing player empowerment over the definition and visualizations of their character. At its core, the game isn't asking for players to accept radical, unasked for...

Yea, I'm really not feeling the pull of having a high level cavalier just become a fighter. I really don't like the way it positions a fighter as a "baseline" and the cavalier and paladin are just "fighter+". This is your project, of course, but if I was redoing AD&D, I'd just make a "fallen X...

Dual-classing is a thing in 1e, right, like it is in 2e? Even in 2e, I never really understood why you couldn't just change the class to "Ex-Paladin" or "Ex-Cavalier", lose all the special abilities that derive from their supernatural or elevated standing, and simply make the character...

I'm used to even-numbered rounds as a 2e kid. Putting on my tinkering hat, I can see arguments for letting the player choose between getting their first attack in rounds 1 and 4, OR rounds 2 and 3 (either all the time or per-encounter). Or maybe something tied to initiative results that...

I agree with all this, but I can also think of attributes where that's not true. If you put, say, height (using adult male height for the US as the data set) , on a similar bell curve, the gap between a 9 and 12 would only be maybe 2 inches, whereas an 18 could represent height anywhere from...

Forgive my ignorance, but I grew up on AD&D 2e, and never really got into 1e; how does weapon specialization in 1e compare to 2e? I remember in 2e, specialization gave you +1/+2 and an extra attack every 2 rounds (from 1/1 to 3/2, or 3/2 to 2/1); you could also get mastery at higher levels to...

5e has been out for a dozen years; I don't mind running or playing it now and again, but I'm really bored with discussing it here on ENWorld.

It isn’t linear; you pick all of the options at the start and then push the button to generate the character. If you’re using the standard builder, there’s an implied order, but you can switch between sections freely.

Yea, I'm surprised to see the toggle between the editions so obvious, as well as having the older options supported with their own splash pages. What really impressed me is that when I used a 2024 race and a 2014 background (neither of which have stat increases), it defaulted to the Tasha's...

I'm impressed it handles mixing 5e and 5.5e options so well. It let me use a 2014 class and a 2014 race with a 2024 background, and had no problem handling it.

To be clear, I'm strongly against "checks to see if a character knows something" in general. If a player asks for info, I tell them the information their character would know, based on their overall character concept. The only time I require a check, normally, is when the information is...