Can someone explain what "1st ed feel" is?

[Pielorinho]

Simple answer: The corridors are built that way for ritual signifigance. Help channel power for the Dark Ritual (tm).

You're, uh, you're not a big believer in Occam's razor, are you?

A very cool dungeon could be designed with twisty corridors that spelled out a rune. This wasn't one. I mapped it. Or, if it was a rune, it was a darned ugly one, not one that was fun to map.

If you take that very cool idea -- that a dungeon's paths map out a rune -- then it's an obvious cool corrollary that as players map the dungeon, they should begin to see the rune unfold on their map, and should feel a growing sense of horror about the fact that they're in one mammoth Evil Symbol.

Orcus, thanks for pointing out that this game has elves and dwarves in it. That hadn't occurred to me, and now that it has, I agree with you completely. My previous style of play was inferior; now that I see that plausibility of any sort isn't a reasonable expectation, I'll go buy lots and lots of your implausible product and play it till my fingers bleed.

Daniel
with a pre-coffee crank going on

 

[dcollins]

Now I myself never played 1st ed. Can someone explain what a "first edition feel" is?

A little late for me to enter this discussion, but there's an essay I wrote on basically this subject, online here: www.superdan.net/grtdnd/grtdnd1.html

 

[Neqroteqh]

"1st-edition feel" means "leaders" and "mappers."

Not Cool.

It means "declaring your actions" before rolling initiative.

Not Cool.

It means looking at that funny "AC vs. Weapon Type" table and ignoring it.

Not Cool.

It means wishing you were that thief trying to pry the demon-eye out of that big statue.

Cool.

It means wondering why those dead lizard-things were draped across that altar.

Cool. I always wondered that, myself.

It means flipping through Deities and Demigods and deciding which goddesses you wanted to do.

Cool. Is that what Elminster does in his spare time?

It means staring at the "Disease and Parasitic Infestation Table" and wondering when you could use it next.

Very Cool. I'm an evil DM, so....

It means TEMPLE OF ELEMENTAL EVIL!!!

Cool, but I like the new version better.

It means AGAINST THE GIANTS!!

Cool, but I like the new version better.

It means DESCENT INTO THE DEPTHS OF THE EARTH!! (and, yes, the corridors all bended at exactly 30-degree angles, to conform to the hex paper...)

Cool.

It means VAULT OF THE DROW!!!

Cool.

It means getting polymorphed into a pig, and then losing your character because the DM ruled that you now had the mind of a pig and didn't want to change back.

Cool.

It means thinking that 400 hit points was an awful lot of hit points.

It still is, isn't it? Even the baddest 20th level Barbarian probably only has a little over half that, after all!

It means advancing to 6th level and becoming a "Myrmidon" (whatever that is...)

Cool.

It means being thrilled because your Armor Class was zero.

Cool.

It means thinking "50 feet of rope," a "ten-foot pole," and "12 iron spikes" were things an adventurer simply couldn't do without.

Cool.

It means making a "Bend Bars/Lift Gates" roll.

Cool.

It means hoping that maybe, one day, you can be a "Grand Master of Flowers."

Cool.

It means wandering the land in search of an Archdruid to fight, because you couldn't get to 12th level without fighting him.

Cool.

It means carefully considering the subtle differences between a bec-de-corbin, mancatcher, ranseur, partisan, lucern hammer, guisarme, bill, bill-hook, bill-hook-guisarme, fauchard, fauchard-fork, awl pike, and fauchard-fork-guisarme-bill-hook-hammer, and finally deciding to buy a longsword.

Very Cool.

It means reading the description of the cacodemon spell and losing sanity points.

Hehe... Cool as well.

It means staring blankly at the new "Non-Weapon Proficiency" rules, and promptly ignoring them.

Eh... Not Cool.

It means being deathly afraid of "poison needles."

Yes!

1e, 2e, oD&D, Hackmaster, 3e, d20, Forgotten Realms, Greyhawk, Planescape, Dragonlance, Kalamar, Scarred Lands- It's all D&D to me!

 

[Orcus]

"Orcus, thanks for pointing out that this game has elves and dwarves in it. That hadn't occurred to me, and now that it has, I agree with you completely. My previous style of play was inferior; now that I see that plausibility of any sort isn't a reasonable expectation, I'll go buy lots and lots of your implausible product and play it till my fingers bleed."

My pleasure! I figured anyone actually hung up on corridors might need a little help with the basics.

Clark

 

[Orcus]

First edition feel is like the old definition of pornography: "I cant describe it, but I know it when I see it."

Clark

 

[diaglo]

First edition feel is like the old definition of pornography: "I cant describe it, but I know it when I see it."

Clark

and these guys will never get that.

 

[Psion]

I'm guessing, though, that people would rather eat broken glass than admit that old-school dungeons weren't always plausible. So maybe I should let it drop, eh?

Sort of like you would rather eat broken glass before you admit that you don't have a bead on all the possible reasons and motivations that cause one to make a curved corridor.

 

[Pielorinho]

Sort of like you would rather eat broken glass before you admit that you don't have a bead on all the possible reasons and motivations that cause one to make a curved corridor.

Had I ever complained about the corridors that curved, you might have a point. Indeed, if I hadn't explained three times already in this thread that curving corridors weren't the problem, you could at least claim that I was being vague about what I object to. At least the person that accused me of hating breeze-filled corridors could blame the vagaries of written English.

Interestingly, of all the people that have jumped on me for disliking illogically-designed dungeons, none have made the claim that 1E held plausibility to a high standard. Instead, they've claimed that 1E's plausibility was the DM's responsibility, not the writer's responsibility -- or they've conflated motivational plausibility with scientific plausibility and then accused me of being foolish for not realizing that the game lacked scientific plausibility. And then they've claimed that my one example of implausibility was really plausible, with a variety of explanations that would put a scandal-plagued politician to shame.

What nobody has mentioned yet is that obviously the mad cultists dug their tunnels with a strange gelatinous cube that was unable to rotate and was oriented along the cardinal directions and whose side faces could dissolve stone but whose bottom face couldn't, and who tended to wander off course as the mad cultists poked and prodded it in their efforts to get their passages dug.

That falls somewhere, in terms of likelihood, between "mad cultists were SO crazy that they dug their 10' wide, cardinal-directions, 90-degree angle passages in really long switchback patterns because they were crazy" and "a map designer decided it was most fun to map corridors that fit on graph paper but that didn't go straight from one room to the next."

Daniel
annoyed

 

[Henry]

Re: Can't we all just get along?

I am going to have to join the frey and give in to the temptation (along with everyone else here) to write the definitive post that will settle this. My question is why can't you just take the good points of whatever system you happen to be playing and make the most of it? If you didn't like the settings offered in 2nd Ed. then you certainly could have ignored them; there were still plenty of stand-alone modules to plug into your custom world. If you didn't like the lack of settings in 1st Ed. you certainly could have come up with your own.

Hi, Simon! Welcome to the Fray.

I think the original point of the thread was that someone didn't understand what separated a 1st edition campaign from a newer one (other than "the rules.") - The "feel" that is being described in Necromancer Games credo. I agree, take what is best from each style and blend them - it's the age-old idea. However, many people still seem to think (and this thread proves it) that 1st edition was about nothing more than beer-and-pretzels roleplaying. Despite pointing out numerous example of the "feel" we are referring to, many people seem to think "Diablo" when they think First Edition. It's enough to drive you to Cthulhu!!!

As I said before, all styles are viable, and by describing what made the old modules great we are not denigrating every single thing that has come since - we are pointing out that to many, many gamers out there, having a good adventure set-up with minimal "campaign flavor" involved, so as to insert as much or as little story as desired into the module, is a preferable thing.

Give me a good challenge over loads of boxed text and flavor any day. Atmosphere is easy for me; complex set-ups and challenges are what I am pressed for time for.

If the Temple of the Lobster God is well-designed and has many creative challenges inside, then I can drop it into any campaign I wish. If, however, the temple is decribed in detail by every 10' x 10' section, and I get the entire life history of the high priest, followed by the compiled exploits of his temple and deeds, along with an in-depth character study of WHY he is plotting someone's downfall, then I don't need it nor want it. I can make that myself, and my players are more interested in razing a temple of evil than in becoming its guidance counselor. Many 2nd edition modules had a similar problem - you become so embroiled in the politics of the situation, it left almost no room for actual heroics.

Personally I can think of no better descriptive trinity than Howard, Leiber, and Moorcock (except make it a quartet - Jack Vance). That's a good 1st edition stock reading list.

P.S. - Just to clear a point that Pielorhino made - consistency is important, this is true. However, having mysteries in a scenario are quite useful too. I sometimes in my group's adventure put things that make no sense whatsoever, just to (A) tick them off, (B) keep them guessing, (C) leave that sense of wonder in a game but putting something in there that may never be explained. However, if the dungeon has 100 cultists in it, and I only found enough bedding for 10 people, or if it had a dragon stuck in a 10' x 10' room, I would be concerned.

 

[diaglo]

1ed feel. each adventure was like Christmas Eve. sorry to the non-Christians out there.

anticipation. worry. excitement. thrills. chills.