AD&D First Edition inferior?

[Voneth]

What about the person who doesn't want to create or convert whole campaign settings, or who doesn't want to create new magic systems and all the rest? In other words, someone who doesn't want to be a quasi-game designer, but just a casual player?

Players don't design adventures, DMs do.

Okay first off, I am not disagreeing that the idea of "DND Lite" is a bad concept -- it intrigues me. But I am disagreeing that you need a C-note to play 3e as is and I don't think that your "casual DND (player? DM? make up your mind!)" example is the best argument for the need of a "DND Lite."

Okay ... now lets try this again. A causual Player or a Casual DM? You seem to be vacilating between the two when it suits your needs and when someone gives you an answer that covers the subject.

DMs:
I don't know of any "casual" DMs who only run one game session every four months.

And the only people I could think who would want a dungeon crawl on that infrequency would be better served with game that would provide maps, dice and figs in the box! Anything less wouldn't be a whole game in their eyes. I would point them to either MK Dugeons or Advanced Hero Quest, though those game can be expanded beyond $20 as well.

As for my semi-design stuff, I didn't have to do that. I could have been lazy and just used the PHB just fine. My point was that 3e gave me enough flexibiltiy on it's own that I wasn't locked into needing the DMG or MM to referee. And you really only need the MM, which is still under the $100. If you only run a game 4 times a year, what's the use of finding and using magic items anyway?

Players:
Play only 4 times a year, get a PHB, that's all you need.

 

[Voneth]

And the only people I could think who would want a dungeon crawl on that infrequency would be better served with game that would provide maps, dice and figs in the box! Anything less wouldn't be a whole game in their eyes. I would point them to either MK Dugeons or Advanced Hero Quest, though those game can be expanded beyond $20 as well.

*Snaps fingers*

Dragon strike! TSR did put out a "Hero Quest"/beginners DND game that sat on the shelf at Wal-Mart. It was a game with plastic figs, a reusable map, d20 dice sets, pregens and I think you could "level" up. It came with a video that set up the story.

Seeing as I am the only person to remember it, I think that says you will have an uphill battle convincing anyone that a beginners set or book will sell.

 

[reiella]

Heh I remember that, of course the only 'critters' I remember were the scorpion men. Was pretty fun, also of interesting note it was also sold on the shelves at Affes (US Military store type place thing).

 

[MeepoTheMighty]

Awww yeah, I remember that. Dragon Strike. Had the movie with the manscorpion and the dwarf and the elf. That was some cool stuff.

 

[ColonelHardisson]

There was also Dungeon, the D&D board game from way back. You could "level" up in it also. A very simple form of D&D. It didn't garner a lot of interest, seeing as how nobody else has mentioned it either.

 

[rounser]

I don't know these games, but I might venture that the boardgame format is too limited.

Pretty much everyone D&D gamerish around when it was released remembers the D&D basic red box. That sort of "unlimited possibilities" D&D Lite would be far better than the second-rate-Heroquest approach.

Perhaps...a single hardbound book, designed purely for running D&D off the cuff (and with fudging resources such as tables for random dungeon, town and NPC generators to support it, perhaps) compatible with d20 but without many of the 3E extras that add stat overhead....would rock.

It would also tap into the 12 year old audience who are more worried about making cool dungeon maps to run their friends through than the finer points of AoO and partial actions. Not sure how you'd attach dice to the book, though.

I'd buy it....one sale right there!

 

[ColonelHardisson]

I wouldn't mind seeing such a book - sounds like a job for the OGL!

Anyway...Teenagers From Outer Space had tiny "flea dice" bound into the book in a little plastic bag.

 

[rounser]

sounds like a job for the OGL!

Maybe. Without the D&D brand screaming at you from the cover, though, I predict that it would definitely flop.

Maybe give it a name like Dungeons & Dragons Apprentice, and stress that it's all you need to begin playing.

 

[Storm Raven]

What about a casual gamer who wants to play a few times each year? I don't think he'd want to pay $100.00 for something he'd take off the shelf once every three or four months.

Someone who plays a few times a year is unlikely to need anything more than the PHB. Anything else is probably more than they need, if the are DMing they probably aren't even going to do more than run prepackaged adevntures anyway, and most of those include all the information you need (stat blocs, descriptions and so on) that you might get from the DMG or MM. If they aren't DMing, they don't need more than the PHB anyway.

What the devil is wrong with WotC? Don't they realize that there are people who would like to give 3E a whirl but don't want to drop $100.00 for it? They don't want to print out reams from the SRD either. They just want to walk into a game store, pay $25, and walk out with a COMPLETE D&D game they can learn to play in a few hours.

Those people can either (a) buy the PHB and learn everything they need to know to play or , (b) use their friends' books when they need to reference something to see if they like the game.

 

[MerricB]

Wizards of the Coast gave people over a year to buy the books at the discounted price of $20 each, and in the first printing of the PHB were tables that gave sample monsters, magic items and XP tables from the later products. You could quite easily get the game for $20 and then expand your collection later. The Sunless Citadel was also printed (the first adventure) with full monster statistics.

Although I have very fond memories of the Moldvay Basic set, it could be said that it utterly failed as being something which you then moved up into AD&D from, because the systems were vastly different in approach, and indeed some rules were quite different!


AV has posted on these forums that he'd love to see a product that would introduce people to D&D with and that could make a profit; but most of their recent efforts in such a direction have failed.

Cheers!