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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Ariosto" data-source="post: 4833957" data-attributes="member: 80487">First, lightness and heaviness are relative; there is no absolute, universal standard by which to decree, "That's not light; it's heavy!" Second, "rules lightness" can be judged in different aspects.I would call AD&D lighter than 3E/4E in terms of the average "rules footprint" in the sessions of play I have experienced. It's lighter than OD&D with all the elaborations from the supplements. The lesser amount of time spent handling rules helps keep the pace of action brisk.On the other hand, there's a LOT of stuff in the Dungeon Masters Guide; it addresses a great cornucopia of subjects. It may be a stretch to call some of that material "rules", but in any case very little of it is likely to be germane to a particular game session.Unless one understands that all those "rules" are optional, and that in choosing not to use them you were exercising the judgment proper to a Dungeon Master -- as explained in the Introduction and reinforced in the Afterword.The ease with which one can simplify or complicate, while keeping it recognizably Advanced D&D -- and Dungeons & Dragons even if one goes further -- is another measure of rules-lightness.I don't see that flexibility to such a degree in 4E. It is more truly an integrated system, the procedures and data more truly rules, both by design and in the prevailing view among players that I have seen. That systematic nature is clearly part of its appeal. As Gygax wrote in the DMG, "your players expect to play this game, not one made up on the spot," and "variation and difference are desirable, but both should be kept within the boundaries of the overall system." Those boundaries seem to me more quickly met in 4E, a design that much more assiduously, and thus more successfully, pursues the goal of uniformity from campaign to campaign.</blockquote>

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