A vision of a D&D retro-clone with new school elements

[ferratus]

I like 4e well enough for what it does, and I plan to keep playing it, but I've been getting a hankering for some nostalgic gaming from 1990. However, I've been looking over as many old-school style retro D&D-esque games as I can get my hands on and there just seems to be a disconnect between what I want and the rest of the retro community wants. I'm using 2e as my example because that's what I played when I was 12.

Likes from 2e D&D:

1. A single page character sheet
2. 5 minute leveling up and 10 minute character creation
3. Meeting your character through random generation rather than crafting a character.
4. Playing without minis.
5. Faster combat
6. Capped attack bonus and AC
7. Rolling for exceptional strength (I wish I rolled for all other 5 abilities)
8. Magical items that do not exist to fill an equipment slot, but instead change the way you play your character.
9. Classes for newbies and classes for more experienced players (though the "Points of Light" blog did make a convincing case for why advanced classes suck.)
10. Different weapon speeds and different attack bonuses for certain weapons against certain armour.
11. Racial ability requirements
12. Secondary Skills and NWP
13. Henchmen
14. Strongholds and Followers

Dislikes from 2e D&D

1. Descending AC
2. Class and level restrictions for certain races.
3. Most of the racial abilities
4. Less and more powerful classes depending on level
5. Thieves suck and bards suck harder.
6. Multi-classing and Dual-classing
7. The Schools of Magic
8. Level and Ability score draining
9. Resurrection Survival Rolls
10. Vancian spell system


Things I'd want to keep from 4e.

1. Racial abilities (though not the extra-planar and monstrous races)
2. Static Defenses to Ref/Fort/Will rather than saving throws
3. Conditions (unconscious, slowed, dominated, weakened etc)
4. Dungeoneering focused skill list (combined with NWP)
5. The Cosmology (Feywild, Shadowfell, Astral Sea, Elemental Chaos etc)
6. Healing Surges
7. Standard, move and minor actions
8. Philosophy of choosing unifying mechanics over subsystems
9. Players can survive two hits from an orc at 1st level.
10. Level progression rate.

Things I want to grab from prior editions:

1. Named Levels
2. XP based on succeeding at objectives and gaining treasure

So as you can see, the bulk of the retro community is (perhaps unsurprisingly) much more nostalgic than I am, or have an appreciation for the quirks of the rules of older editions than I do.

So given these preferences, I've started to think about what I would do for a retro game of my own design.

I decided building up from 2e would be the easiest, since I will not be using the object-oriented approach that 4e uses with feats and powers. Player choices will largely be restricted to class (subclass), race, and level in order to make rolling up a character before the game, and leveling up an existing character, much faster and easier.

The game itself will have 3 subsystems - magic, skills & talents, and weapon combat, but will be as internally consistent within each subsystem and between subsystems as possible. In my 2e clone, they will not go to the extent of 4e where weapon attacks and spells both use the powers system. However, attack spells will roll to hit just like weapon attacks do, and have their own casting times that are the same as weapon speeds.

So, given this brief overview of what I want from a blending of old and new school D&D, I'm turning to the community for advice. Should I indeed use 2e instead of 4e as the base to build on? What problems do you forsee with the design philosophies of my system? Does it pique your interest?

How would you combine old and new school elements if you like both?

 

[ExploderWizard]

How would you combine old and new school elements if you like both?

Its tricky[to rock a rhyme]or to maintain the flavor of either while including elements of both.

After chewing on similar questions for my own project I realized that I also enjoyed elements from other games that were missing in D&D completely!!

So, I decided to pick and choose elements I like from a number of games and try to meld them together into a blend that will give me the play experience I want.

It may be harder to get exactly what you are looking for by limiting your elements list to just 2E & 4E D&D.

 

[Raven Crowking]

RCFG:

Likes from 2e D&D:

1. A single page character sheet
2. 5 minute leveling up and 10 minute character creation CHECK
3. Meeting your character through random generation rather than crafting a character. Either/Or.
4. Playing without minis. CHECK
5. Faster combat CHECK
6. Capped attack bonus and AC CHECK
7. Rolling for exceptional strength (I wish I rolled for all other 5 abilities)
8. Magical items that do not exist to fill an equipment slot, but instead change the way you play your character. CHECK
9. Classes for newbies and classes for more experienced players (though the "Points of Light" blog did make a convincing case for why advanced classes suck.) CHECK
10. Different weapon speeds and different attack bonuses for certain weapons against certain armour. CHECK for the first
11. Racial ability requirements Not exactly
12. Secondary Skills and NWP Skill system
13. Henchmen CHECK
14. Strongholds and Followers CHECK

Dislikes from 2e D&D

1. Descending AC
2. Class and level restrictions for certain races. CHECK
3. Most of the racial abilities
4. Less and more powerful classes depending on level Potentially
5. Thieves suck and bards suck harder.
6. Multi-classing and Dual-classing 3e-style Multiclassing
7. The Schools of Magic CHECK sorta
8. Level and Ability score draining CHECK
9. Resurrection Survival Rolls Sorta CHECK
10. Vancian spell system CHECK


Things I'd want to keep from 4e.

1. Racial abilities (though not the extra-planar and monstrous races)
2. Static Defenses to Ref/Fort/Will rather than saving throws
3. Conditions (unconscious, slowed, dominated, weakened etc)
4. Dungeoneering focused skill list (combined with NWP)
5. The Cosmology (Feywild, Shadowfell, Astral Sea, Elemental Chaos etc)
6. Healing Surges Sorta CHECK
7. Standard, move and minor actions Actions, Reactions, Free Reactions
8. Philosophy of choosing unifying mechanics over subsystems
9. Players can survive two hits from an orc at 1st level. CHECK
10. Level progression rate.

Things I want to grab from prior editions:

1. Named Levels
2. XP based on succeeding at objectives and gaining treasure CHECK

RCFG is free, and almost all OGC. You may use it to go to town when creating your own game.


RC

 

[Aurumvorax]

It's better to have a strong foundation and build upon it. One of my complaints with 3E was the multitude of subsystems that didn't work properly and a plethora of later material that tried building on that weak foundation.

You listed more material you liked with 2E than you did with 4E so it makes sense to start with the former. Try not to think of the design as "Here's a laundry list I want to encorporate, now how do I do it?" Look at the process step-by-step and evaluate each addition.

You liked fast combat in 2E so why include actions? A round in 2E is equal to a whole minute so you can do a whole bunch of stuff like grab a potion, draw your sword, close in on your enemy and attack in a single round.

Level progression was based on the class' relative power. Clerics leveled up fast but their spells capped early. Wizards leveled up slow but became veritable power houses. Thieves might have "sucked" but they leveled up even faster and received experience from minor actions like finding gold and picking locks.

I'd work on each piece one at a time. For example, a good method of converting saves is through a formula [(20 - save) + 10]. Save vs. paralyzation/poison/death is fortitude, save vs. breath weapon is reflex, and save vs. spell is will. A fighter would therefor have a fortitude defense of 16 ((20 - 14) + 10).

 

[Jack7]

So, I decided to pick and choose elements I like from a number of games and try to meld them together into a blend that will give me the play experience I want.

It may be harder to get exactly what you are looking for by limiting your elements list to just 2E & 4E D&D.

I'm with EW. It's a good case.

 

[Roger]

some nostalgic gaming from 1990

You're making an old man sad, you whippersnapper.



Cheers,
Roger

 

[the Jester]

Thank god- a thread discussing the merits of the various editions without simply being an edition war thread!

I am working on what I call "D&D Jazz Edition," which will take the best of each edition (or at least, what I prefer) and smash 'em together into a usable system. The first thing I did was settle on certain design goals- something I'd recommend. Rather than saying "I like this aspect of 2e", I started with, "What do I want out of my ideal D&D system?" Some things I chose:

1. Everyone starts at 1st level, and mixed-level parties are viable.
2. Character creation in 15 minutes or less, even for a newbie.
3. Classes balanced at each level (like in 4e) rather than over the course of their career (like in 1e).
4. Meaningful differences between the races at all levels.

I have been working from there (although, to be honest, not super hard lately!).

 

[Gentlegamer]

The heart of "old school" is making the game the way you want it. You're already taken the first step into a larger world.

 

[arscott]

A lot of that sounds like Castles and Crusades--I haven't played the game myself, but I've heard good things about it on these boards.

 

[nedjer]

A lot of that sounds like Castles and Crusades--I haven't played the game myself, but I've heard good things about it on these boards.

The same but more so with Treasure RPG. Because it can be played with graphics the basic system is often not the first thing that gets looked at.

It's, at root, a 2D6 + optional modifiers for outcomes and zonal movement system. There are sheep roaming the Scottish Highlands that could be taught to play it and it's beyond fast to play if you stick to the 'startup' rules. Switch on the (everything's optional) alarms, equivalent of stunt points, monster clusters and bonuses without getting even close to 2e turn outcome times and gameplay gets pretty nail-biting/ intense.

There's a great many more features with set or framework scenarios for quick solo, GM or Team play, and . . . but these can mask the core simplicity of a system that is remarkably similar to much of what you seem to be aiming at. There are differences on specific points but sure shook up how I play.

I'll not blab on as plugs go in a different place but if you're into modding, patching or customising for faster, intense play it's worth a free download to check out the 'customise your mechanics' options, which might be applied to patch versions of AD&D and other systems.