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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Celtavian" data-source="post: 6778626" data-attributes="member: 5834">You must have played your casters very poorly. I found it quite easy to stay out of combat. Once you get invisibility, you generally walked around invisible to ensure the enemy couldn't engage you. Spell durations were much, much longer in 1E and 2E than 5E. And many spells were much more potent. So not even sure why you think it is equally easy to stay out of combat. Not to mention the extremely potent magic items you could get in 1E and 2E which had no attunement. Caster power was factually immense in 1E and 2E. That is why they leveled slower. You bring up haste like that was what casters used. There were all types of spells in 1E and 2E that were extremely powerful. Stoneskin being one which pretty much made you immune to physical attacks for a long, long time. Fly which lasted a long, long time and once cast couldn't be broken by failing a concentration check. Then there were the save or die or save or suck spells. There was also the power of direct damage spells, which did significant damage given the much lower hit points of 1E and 2E. How well you play a caster most assuredly does decide how often you end up in battle. Mastery of different spell combinations and creative casting keeps you out of battle. It's been a long, long time since I played 1E and 2E. I do recall quite well that I was a highly effective caster player. Spells were quite potent, especially in 2E when additional books came out. It was only slow leveling that kept casters in check. Once you found a huge gold piece award if you were using gold for advancement, you caught up and were quite potent. More so than 5E, maybe not as much as 3E due to metamagic. High level 1E and 2E casters were forces to be reckoned with, especially if you knew what you were doing. 1E/2E casters could run back and cast. Just because you have to take a possible hit was meaningless, especially if you had stoneskin or mirror image up. There was no concentration check. Once the guy hit you running off, you cast your spell and were good to go. I did it all the time. Unless the guy was some powerful fighter with immense attacks, it was very easy to do. You are confused as to how concentration applies in this situation. Concentration spells in 5E make it so that getting hit in battle causes you to have to make a concentration check or lose the spell. No such rule existed in 1E/2E. The only way they could disrupt your spell was to hit you while casting the spell. If you ran back out of their range and they use their attack to hit you, you can cast your spell. Once it's up, nothing but another caster can bring it down. As I said, I played a lot of casters in 1E and 2E. 2E I remember better than 1E. And high level casters in 2E were immensely powerful. More powerful than a caster in 5E could hope to be. You sure do not recall the 1E and 2E magic system other than this "If you run back, you get hit." So what? It wasn't a free attack. You didn't get extra attacks when you fled or fell back. You get your attack sequence if you still have it during the round. If you used up all your attacks, sorry for you. If the caster were casting a 1 or 3 segment spell and you went slower, once again, sorry for you. Many defensive spells were quick cast low segment spells. So you could erect a defense and get ready to blow off some bigger stuff.I'm looking over this old 1E game. Ah, the memories. 20d6 fireballs. Unlimited duration invisibility. Long duration fly spells. haste targets equal to your level and it ages you. Save or die spells. I do miss those sometimes. Time Stop was uber powerful too. I think 1E was the edition where direct damage was its most potent compared to what you were fighting.</blockquote>

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