AD&D and the people who still play it

[Sanackranib]

In no ways was my intention to belittle the players of older versions of the game. I was just surprised to see a 2nd ed PHB . The reason I was surprised is that of all the players I know, we all switched pretty rapidly (I admit that I don't know THAT many gamers) when 3.0 came out.
Thanks for the site info, I'll check it out.
Game on! (in any edtion that you like)
Slim

took me almost a year to switch to 3.0 for much of the same reasons I'm not jumping right in to 3.5, I just have too much of the older editions
stuff to replace it all.

 

[jasper]

Magic Sim, until 3rd came I dm 2nd the reason I dm second and not first is some of my players did not have first edition books.
In first edition you had cookie cutter class which you had to use your imagnation to make it a character and it took 3 days to forever to get use to how each dm home ruled the system. But I enjoyed it. You had city modules with gods walking among you and for no reason people would attack you. And we enjoy it.
Then Second came out with more books, more worlds, and the complete splat books. Which when I first read one said this is a book for grunts who have no imagnation but want to play. And lots more modules with very interesting plot lines.
I am occassionaly playing in a first second hybrid which is enjoyable when everyone is paying attention and shows to the game.
I have both the 3 and 3.5 books enjoy them because very little rules conflicts but the dm of hybrid does not like because it a rules lawyer dream due being so many rules.

First, second third, basic, expert, old new it is not the edition which causes problems but the gamers who do. Good gamers can have fun with sock puppets and the trailer park gods version of d&d.

 

[Magic Slim]

Because I think it's funny (from the DND List 8/15/99):

Lol that was hellafunny

Slim

 

[The Serge]

I've played all three editions and OD&D. I prefer 3ed to the others because it's more mechanical, more of a game, and a game in which the rules reflect the flavor/role-playing. I'm 28. Don't know if I'm old yet.

As for the Monstrous Manual from 2ed, I think the Ecology piece was both good and bad. On the good side, it simplfied the process for many DMs. You didn't have to really draft too much of your own world because it was all right there. Great springboards were also available.

On the bad side, for people who like to "go by the book," the ecology was the end all, be all. Many DMs (like me) would be hesitant to change things only because they knew they would have to deal with whiny players who memorized the entire text and would want to argue with you over it. Removing that information allows for greater flexibility for the DM to design things as s/he sees fit.

 

[night_lord]

2nd edition

Well we have a guy in our group who was really big into 2nd edition. He bought the 3rd ed books, and kinda glanced them over but that's how far it went. His thing was that he knew the 2nd ed rules inside out and backwards and just didn't feel like taking the time to learn a new set of rules. Once I talked him and his wife into playing 3rd they came to like the 3rd edition rules better.

Another guy I knew had the same problem ( didn't want to learn new rules), also (from his small experience with 3rd ed.) he didn't like how fast you gained xp in 3rd ed.???? Apparently in the game he ran he liked his PCs to gain really slow (in his own words "play a year and get to third level" shudder). I never played much of 1st ed ( the DnD red and blue boxes is what I cut my teeth on). But he claimed ( remember this is him not me) that you gained XP really slow in 1st ed. and that's what he liked.

 

[Desdichado]

1e turned me off from D&D for years. Never touched 2e. 3e is a flexible and modular system that you can do pretty much anything with, and once d20 Call of Cthulhu came out, I was convinced that d20 was the only game I'd ever need again.

Now, I still play d20, but not so much D&D per se. Right now, I'm gearing up for d20 Star Wars and Mutants & Masterminds for use in a non-supers, gritty X-files type of game. d20 Modern is also da bomb, and if I play fantasy, I usually steal almost all new classes and a brand-spanking new magic system so it doesn't feel like D&D. And I like it!

 

[Welverin]

Lol that was hellafunny

Yep, that's why I've had the email saved for four years now and have to re-read it evey so often.

 

[Norfleet]

As for the Monstrous Manual from 2ed, I think the Ecology piece was both good and bad. On the good side, it simplfied the process for many DMs. You didn't have to really draft too much of your own world because it was all right there. Great springboards were also available.

On the bad side, for people who like to "go by the book," the ecology was the end all, be all. Many DMs (like me) would be hesitant to change things only because they knew they would have to deal with whiny players who memorized the entire text and would want to argue with you over it. Removing that information allows for greater flexibility for the DM to design things as s/he sees fit.

The ecology was the best part, and I'm generally a "by the book" sort of guy: Anything I change is outlined as clearly as if it was carved in stone, and becomes "the book". Of course, I'm a killer DM as well, and just because the players know everything about a monster's physical properties, doesn't mean they can do jack about it. I've wiped out high-level parties in 2E with a handful of kobolds in their home environment as outlined in the book. Just because you know what the stats are doesn't mean you have the slightest clue what the hell they really mean. It's like seeing the forest, but missing the trees.

 

[Thresher]

Our MONSTER MANUAL was BLACK & WHITE for Pete's sakes! We had to COLOR in
all those pictures! And we didn't know what color things were back then - we
HAD TO USE OUR IMAGINATIONS! God forbid if we used all our Red Crayon on our
dice! Then all of our monsters had Orange Eyes! And what kind of crazy
ecosystem was represented on the cover of that thing anyhow? They had every
monster in the food chain living together in perfect harmony! We had
Colorless Monsters that lived together peacefully - AND WE LIKED IT!!!

haha!
I wonder if he had the same copy of Unearthed Arcana I did back in 1991, back when I was a poor uni student snagged a copy for $4 in a 2nd hand bookstore... only to find some carpet rat had gone through it with a blue biro, red pencil and a yellow fluro marker.

It was kinda hard to take an Ultraloth seriously when it was bright yellow with red speed stripes and blue eyes

But it would still happily tear the arse out of PC's

I think 2E with its plethora of books, from the big book of elf munkins for every day of the week to gnomish plumbers and no real direction to improve the game system apart from one-upping the power level eventually made me stop playing D&D for a lot of years.
Still, for levels 1-16 it held together ok and we had a fair few fun adventures before canning it and playing games like Shadowrun, D6 Starwars, Dark Ages Vampire and SLA industries which where much better systems and probably still have a lead on the D20 system for long term playability.

Still, D20 seems to be the dominant system we use now and as much as I dislike it, though not as intensly as I dislike 2E, its somewhat here to stay so I'll get used to it like a benign tumor...
hmm maybe I'll run SLA again sometime soon and remind us of the true meaning of fear again...