It might be fair to describe this narrative adjudication approach as an "old school style" even within the context of 5e. But to be fair, this is something 5e intentionally designs for.
Part of the 5E design was to roll back some of the 'new' crunch of 3/4 E.
The point is that the NS adjudication is built around the skills and ability scores...on the character sheet.
Rather than OS play which can be a raw 1d6 dice roll, a coin flip a level check, a skill check, or a narrative ruling at any given time. You can declare an action and have NO IDEA what the DM will choose nor have an idea how good you are at it.
I give this the Old School Approval.
The difference between this and OSR is even a rogue built to portray the same character might not always be able to roll to pick a lock; they still need to go through the process of describing the action, because to an OSR fan that's the fun part.
Agreed.
In other words, the "old school" players are comfortable with what I call "DM-based resolution." The "new school" players are more comfortable with "rulebook-based resolution." They prefer hard, mechanical points-of-contact with the game. If the situation does not lend itself to a specific rule or mechanic, they want to confirm how the DM will adjudicate it before they commit to the action.
Agreed.
While no doubt both styles have existed throughout the game's history, I believe the rules (specifically 3.x and 4e) were explicitly designed with rulebook-based resolution in mind, while the pre-2000 rules were explicitly designed with DM-based resolution in mind, and so this is a valid distinction.
True.
So I guess I'd phrase it as, "The story is about us, and how the adventure relates to our characters." Old school in-character play is like a genealogical or anthology story, where we follow the torch as it passes from bearer to bearer; the individual bearers are far less relevant than the torch itself. New school in-character play is like a TV show with a core cast, where we get deeply invested in these characters and what they're doing.
Doctor Who might be the best example of an Old School type show.....no character stays on the show for more then a couple years...and this includes The Doctor.
The Session Zero is very much New School. Everyone sitting down to talk about the game and....well, I'd need someone else to finish this thought as I have no idea.
We don't have a 'zero' in Old School. We have a pre game. And I can tell you how this works. The DM picks or creates the game, setting, rule changes, house rules and anything else they want. Often independently of the players. Players can makes suggestions or ask the DM for things...but everything is at the DM's whim and will. The DM must approve anything the players want.
Sometimes a DM will run a Focused game....like the game is set on a sunken island so players must make underwater characters. This is often the default for NS.
Most often though, players are free to make any character they want..as an Old School game is Unlimited. That will have the group of characters traveling the world and multiverse....and very, very, very often will find one of more characters a "fish out of water" as often as they "fit in snug".
The default OS campaign will be the endless adventure of the small group of hardy heroes and last for years in real life.
Most Old School DMs also don't give out much lore for "free". In the Old School game, you play the game to find out lore. A OS DM often only gives out scraps. The default for most OS games is the characters...and the players...are clueless about the world/setting/lore. Though plenty of OS DMs are fine with characters/players knowing the more general background lore.
