AD&D/O.S.R.I.C: Creating XP Progression for Homebrewed Classes

[Hrothgar Rannúlfr]

Hi, everyone.

When creating a homebrewed class for AD&D or OSRIC (or converting a class version from a later edition to 1E), what is the best and most proper method of coming up with the right Experience Point progression for the class?

Thank you.

 

[Man in the Funny Hat]

Whatever you want. Seriously. It isn't as if the AD&D xp progression charts are masterpieces of design. In many cases they're AWFUL. Case in point: wizards. Huge xp wall to face at low levels when they can't do doodley squat and then much better progression at higher levels when they dominate the game. RIDICULOUS. They should have fast progression at low levels (truthfully they should be as fast or even faster than thieves) and MUCH slower progression at higher levels. THAT is a sensible approach to "balance".

What I did was to re-do all those charts from the ground up. They wound up heavily based on combat abilities but some overall subjective assessment certainly entered into it. Factors I included were the choice of weapons, the access to armor, better HD and more of them, better/worse to-hit, better/worse saving throws, powerful special abilities vs. weak and little-used abilities, spell use (not just having spells but the "power" of those spells and the number of spells the PC would be able to cast). I used the fighters as the baseline.

But that's a rather significant project. If you want a faster, but still reliable approach just take the xp chart from a class that you think is at least SIMILAR to your new class. If necessary make a few adjustments but you don't need to make it a complicated process if you don't want to.

 

[Hrothgar Rannúlfr]

Thank you, Man in the Funny Hat.

That's kind of what I was thinking and what I was afraid of. The Druid, to me, seems to advance incredibly fast. And, yes, I don't understand that Magic-User progression v. the Fighter, either.

Returning to AD&D style XP after so long with 3X and 5E, I actually expected 1E XP progression to somewhat match perceived class tiers in 3X (the more powerful the class, the slower the advancement), but that's not what I found. So, now that I'm working on a grand mishmash of editions, I was hoping to solve for some of it through the use of varied XP progressions like AD&D, but was surprised that the AD&D progressions don't seem to be solving for the power disparity between classes.

Do you have your reworked charts online so that I may view them?

 

[Man in the Funny Hat]

Do you have your reworked charts online so that I may view them?

http://home.earthlink.net/~duanevp/dnd/Building D&D/buildingdnd56.htm
Also includes some of the reasons behind the changes. Note that this does go along with some changes to the classes, but them is, IMHO, better charts even without any changes to the classes.

 

[Celebrim]

It's worth noting that the basic 1e AD&D classes are not balanced even factoring in the different rates of leveling. MitFH appropriately called out Wizards XP progression as not matching the actual utility of the levels, but that's just one instance. Suppose we take the two most core classes - Fighters and M-U - as being balanced, possibly after tweaking the rate of leveling. This still leaves us with all the following problems.

a) Level caps on demi-humans are appropriate, but generally too restrictive. This resulted in kludging by the time of Unearthed Arcana of new PC races with much more reasonable level caps.
b) Thieves are still vastly underpowered even taking into account their slightly faster level advancement. Assassins are oddballs, with a power that seems more suited to offscreen play, and Acrobats are basically as useless as thieves or more so. The higher level you go, the worse it gets. The more mature the 1e system gets, the worse this gets, as every other class gets laden with yet more and more powerful abilities (weapon specialization, NWP's, better and wider spell selection), but the thief gets basically nothing.
c) As frequently pointed on it Dragon magazine articles at the time, monks are a mess. Some solutions were published in Dragon.
d) Barbarians are overpowered at 1st level, but are gimped at high levels by their exceptionally slow rates of advancement.
e) Rangers are overpowered at 1st level.
e) Cavaliers and Paladin/Cavaliers especially are plain overpowered, and almost impossible to fix. If they are retained, almost every other non-spellcasting class needs additional boosts.
f) Weapon specialization is probably overpowered unless Cavaliers are allowed.
g) Bards as a prestige class are insanely powerful if you ever qualify for it.

In general, you should compare your class to an equal level fighter, and decide whether it is weaker or stronger.

 

[WheresMyD20]

I played for quite a while in a long-running high-level 1e campaign. Here are some observations:

1) Magic-Users are definitely not overpowered at high level. Magic Resistance is common among high level monsters and saving throws are very easy to make at high level. On top of that, even magic-users with high constitution are extremely fragile when it comes to hit points. I found that fighters are not only useful in combat, they're necessary.

2) High-level bards are basically just druids with less spellcasting ability and more hit points. Speaking of clerics, I found that they are far more useful than either druids or bards at high level.

3) Thieves are not a combat-oriented class. Multi-class or dual-class a thief with a fighter if you want to be able to fight effectively.

4) Single-class thieves are not terribly useful at high levels. The thief class in general works much better as part of a multi-class or dual-class with either fighter or magic-user. The Fighter/Magic-User/Thief triple-class, however, is spread too thin to be effective at high levels. The xp requirements for a triple-class are very high after name level and a triple-class character will lag way too far behind a single-class character.

5) The design of 1e is such that the classes are like positions on a sports team. Clerics, fighters, magic-users, and thieves all play a role on the team that can't be filled by any of the other three classes. Saying one is over- or under-powered compared to the other three is kinda missing the point. It's like saying a forward is over-powered compared to a goalkeeper. It's a bit nonsensical since you need both on the team and they fill different roles.

6) Sub-classes are usually less powerful than their associated base class. Paladins and rangers are the exception. They're a bit more powerful than plain fighters at high levels, but they have steeper xp requirements (which have a bigger impact after name level) and role-playing restrictions to deal with.

7) Unearthed Arcana should be handled with care. The new races and classes are problematic. The new spells and magic items are, for the most part, fine. The book is still worth having. However, the DM should carefully cherry pick the parts he'll allow in his campaign if he's going to use the book.

 

[Celebrim]

1) Magic-Users are definitely not overpowered at high level. Magic Resistance is common among high level monsters and saving throws are very easy to make at high level. On top of that, even magic-users with high constitution are extremely fragile when it comes to hit points. I found that fighters are not only useful in combat, they're necessary.

While I agree that fighters are extremely powerful in 1e, I don't agree with your assessment of M-U's. Only two things really kept them balanced. First, that they had only limited spell selection. Second, that they generally had so few hit points that they could be one shotted. Unearthed Arcana tended to address both problems quite well. And that's before we get to the fact that high level M-U's tended to be able to bypass spell resistance and saving throws with a bit of creativity.

High-level bards are basically just druids with less spellcasting ability and more hit points. Speaking of clerics, I found that they are far more useful than either druids or bards at high level.

Clerics are a quite potent class, but I think you are underestimating the Bard here. This is a fighter/thief/druid with potentially more HD than any other class in the game.

Thieves are not a combat-oriented class. Multi-class or dual-class a thief with a fighter if you want to be able to fight effectively.

Thieves aren't an anything oriented class. The class literally has no purpose. At low levels, you are an inadequate fighter. At high levels, you are completely overshadowed by spell-casters. Sure, you can multi-class or dual-class as one, but not to very much purpose except style points. The main problem with the triple class fighter/M-U/thief, is that anyone that could qualify for it will max out their fighter levels very early and there after be gimped in advancement. A typical elf would max out their fighter levels at something like 5th level. If you could take the fighters level up to at least 10th, then the glacial slow advancement in the less important levels after 10th would matter less.

5) The design of 1e is such that the classes are like positions on a sports team. Clerics, fighters, magic-users, and thieves all play a role on the team that can't be filled by any of the other three classes.

Thieves don't play a role of any utility. At best, they occasionally save a spellcasting class a spell slot, but rarely to the degree that you wouldn't prefer to have another spell-caster. This is why you pretty much always played something like a multi-class thief/M-U. At low levels, you wouldn't be as bored as a single class M-U, and at high levels you were a spellcaster only a level or two below what you'd be without the thief class.

Unearthed Arcana should be handled with care. The new races and classes are problematic. The new spells and magic items are, for the most part, fine. The book is still worth having. However, the DM should carefully cherry pick the parts he'll allow in his campaign if he's going to use the book.

There is almost nothing in the Unearthed Arcana that won't break the game hard in one fashion or another. Weapon specialization makes fighters overpowered. Access to new spells like Stoneskin makes M-U's overpowered. The cavalier is OP right out of the box, and combined with Paladin even more so as the Paladin is now generally better than the Fighter at both low and high level (somewhat mitigated by weapon specialization).

 

[dagger]

Most of what has been said about XP Tables, and classes being unbalanced is just opinions. So take it all as you will. At my table all the normal PHB classes seem balanced enough.

Another thing to balance Magic-Users that you forgot is the actual acquiring of the spells, which is controlled by the DM. In my 1e/2e games there are no spell fast food chains or unguarded spell books lying around. Also, wizards rarely allow others to copy spells from your spell books for various reasons.

Also with the way spell disruption works, it really can put a hurt on M-Us.

I disagree on the thief and fighter being overshadowed. If so, why do people keep running them into high levels at my table?

Again, at our table, we use the UA level limits and even then, beyond that you can continue to advance with double XP or Wishes.

We don't use classes from the UA (except Acrobat), and the spells are controlled by the DM. We do allow Weapon Spec, and have not seen it be overpowered.

 

[Celebrim]

Most of what has been said about XP Tables, and classes being unbalanced is just opinions. So take it all as you will.

My advice is that if you are planning to reengineer 1e AD&D, and if you are planning to add homebrew classes to 1e AD&D, you spend a lot of time reading old issues of Dragon magazine dating from the 1980's when people were actually playing and discussing AD&D. You'll get very detailed mathematical explanations of why some classes just don't work, and why some classes overshadow some others. Read letters to the editor. Read articles that attempt to fix the math. Then you'll actually have an informed opinion.

[quoteOne thing to balance Magic-Users that you forgot is the actual acquiring of the spells, which is controlled by the DM. In my 1e/2e games there are no spell fast food chains or unguarded spell books lying around. Also, wizards rarely allow others to copy spells from your spell books for various reasons.[/quote]

In 1e AD&D spellbooks were definitely some of the most important treasure you could acquire. Likewise, scrolls very often ended up copied into spellbooks. But the only way to really control this in the long run is not use NPC M-U's, because as soon as you do, you provide access to large numbers of spells via their spellbooks.

Also with the way spell disruption works, it really can put a hurt on M-Us.

This is certainly true, and is the reason that you can't really make an all M-U party. You have to have a front line of about 2 fighters per M-U.

I disagree on the thief and fighter being overshadowed. If so, why do people keep running them into high levels at my table?

Who said anything about the fighter being overshadowed? Arguably, the fighter and its subclasses are the most powerful in the 1e game. But I'm prepared to prove in detail that the thief has no role in a party beyond color or flavor.

Again, at our table, we use the UA level limits and even then, beyond that you can continue to advance with double XP or Wishes.

Which more or less concedes many of my points in and of itself.

We don't use classes from the UA (except Acrobat), and the spells are controlled by the DM.

Which more or less concedes another block of my points in and of itself.

We do allow Weapon Spec, and have not seen it be overpowered.

In general, a fighter of nth level with weapon specialization will defeat in single combat a thief of twice that level. They'll tend to also have better AC, more hit points, a better chance of hitting, and do more damage per attack. Weapon specialization just furthers skews any possibility of balance in this. But more to the point, weapon specialization tends to nearly double a fighter's expected damage compared to a fighter of the same level without weapon specialization. And in doing so, it ensures that a fighter of a given level instead of taking down a foe in 3-4 rounds, takes down that foe in 1-2 rounds. This is why I frequently say that once you add weapon specialization to the game, it's only a matter of time before the most important roll in combat is the initiative roll. Parties with cavaliers and weapon specialized fighters tend to just wreck monsters of equivalent level. Monsters in 1e AD&D have rather low hit points, and were balanced with certain expectations that did not include weapon specialization. To compensate, DMs generally start throwing monsters at the party that are above their expected level, and probably start cracking down hard on available equipment. But this results in just about everyone, excepting fighters with high CON scores, being glass cannons.

Is it fun? Sure, potentially. I played this way for about 15 years. But is it balanced? Ha!

 

[dagger]

It is balanced and that has been the experience at my table and others I have played at. Your experience maybe different. Its no different with 5e, people complain a feat, spell, or class is over/under-powered constantly on here, but its pretty subjective most of the time.

Lets just agree to disagree, but for the record in my experience, by the book or not, 1e is fine as is (tweaks or not).