D&D 2E Edition Experience - Did/Do you Play AD&D 2E? How Was/Is It?

[teitan]

My group started with 1st Edition but we moved to a 1E/2E hybrid in 89. We kept the Barbarian and Thief/Acrobat from 1E UA for a couple years. I still reference the 1E DMs guide to this day. I DM'd 2E until about 4 years ago when we switched to 5E. As a DM I have never liked 5E and as a group we finally decided this week to return to 2E once the world heals up and we get back to the table. It's just a better fit for our play style.

While D&D might be seeing growth never seen before in players, 2E was definitely the golden era for creativity. Ravenloft, Dark Sun, Dragonlance, Planescape, and Spelljammer were huge successes. Both Greyhawk and Forgotten Realms were in production with FR seeing huge expansions.

The bloat came in the end with the endless Complete Books and beyond. Some of it was decent, most of it cannot have been playtested. A lot of garbage came in the end as they were pushing towards 3E.

2nd Edition with hand picked/limited content from the Player's Option + Complete books is an amazing game and definitely fills our needs.

Yeah but the Complete Books started coming out shortly after the edition launched so the bloat started early. I recall the only ones worth their salt were the four core, Thief, Wizard, Fighter and Cleric. Outside of that they seemed to start ramping up in power creep, especially with the races books. I know we had the Complete Dwarf in 91 or 92? Elves followed not long after.

 

[Mepher]

The Thief and Fighter were the only two Complete books I owned and we used them. It wasn't until decades later that I saw the other Complete books and saw how poorly some were written. I did own the Player's Option books when they released but never really used them. I plan to explore them more now.

 

[teitan]

I found the Player's Option books to be questionable myself. Sometimes changing the game way too much for my tastes, I was always a core kind of guy. I had the same issue with later 3.5 (2005 onward). The proto-3e mini rules were interesting and I never got the chance to use them until 3e came out. I felt like after the last wave of 2e that 3e was a breath of fresh air but as it wore on I was pining for the simpler days of 1e or 2e. Sometimes feel that way with 5e.

 

[R_J_K75]

My group started with 1st Edition but we moved to a 1E/2E hybrid in 89.

For our group they integrated pretty seamlessly. I don't remember running into problems introducing anything from 1E or Dragon Magazine from the 1E era into our 2E game.

 

[teitan]

For our group they integrated pretty seamlessly. I don't remember running into problems introducing anything from 1E or Dragon Magazine from the 1E era into our 2E game.

yeah there weren’t a lot of issues. if you had the Monster Manuals and Fiend Folio, even the LBB and supplements you didn’t need toget the Compendium! All the important stats and such remained the same. Biggest change to core was THAC0 and initiative making more sense. Then you get into the supplements.

 

[BryonD]

I liked it a lot. One of the main things I recall liking about was growth of fully realized worlds. Certainly Greyhawk was just one big name of the various early D&D settings. And no knock against them. But it was during the 2E era that I started really feeling like a campaign setting was immense with many living elements that would carry on without regard to the PCs unless the PCs choose to get involved.

The system was really just a tweaking of what was, at first, the only system I had every really played. It was fine. At first it was more than fine, because it was "the game". But I remember running GURPS as early as 1990 and running an AD&D 2E game in 1993 and wishing the group would try something else. The industry "woke up" during this time and while D&D grew very well as a narrative platform, the mechanics were stuck one step back down the evolution path.
It was still fun. You could tell great stories and roll dice, cheer at 20s and moan over 1s. It worked.
But I don't want to play it now.
But I still gave it the highest rating here because that is still true. I just like newer stuff even more.

 

[cbwjm]

I seem to recall from an old dragon magazine I read once that the only reason there weren't sweeping changes to 2e, such as an ascending AC, was due to TSR wanting to keep it backwards compatible.

 

[Longspeak]

I transitioned into 2nd edition when it came out, and at first I loved it. But 2nd edition was also what ultimately sent me looking for other games to play. I was still young, not super experienced. With the three core books... well, two books and a massive binder... I had a lot of fun. But right away, I had some issues.

I was heavy into Forgotten Realms at the time. The transition screwed the setting up, and I wasn't experienced enough to simply reject the metaplot (at I was able to do later with Mage editions). It made me feel at the time I'd wasted all that money (and as a college student working babysitting jobs and minimum wage fast food jobs, it was a LOT of money) on supplements that were now worthless. Then came all the Complete xxx books, with hundreds of new options, and I felt obliged to let players pick and choose from among all these official sources, but it was all too much.

Now, what? 30 years later? A lot more experienced. But at the time, the growth in complexity sent me looking elsewhere. I began to branch into White Wolf (Vampire was kinda interesting, Werewolf was okay, and then Mage blew me away!), into what today would be call indie (Legendary Lives, anyone?), and back to my shelves for gems from prior days like Star Wars and The Fantasy Trip. I cast about for games with interesting rulesets, and left D&D behind entirely. Those books ended up in a box and later sold at my convention's local auction.

(Ironically, I ended up falling in love with a WotC game, Everway, only to have WotC throw the game under the bus so they could buy D&D. )

That marks the last of my serious D&D days until about 18 months ago when I came back for 5th Edition.

 

[JustinCase]

My first real D&D experience was with 2nd edition. Which is funny, because I started playing in the time that 4th edition was out, but well, my DM played 2e and therefore so did I.

It was very enjoyable, and I fell in love with D&D. I created a dwarven fighter on the assumption that it would be an easy starting class, and it was. His personality grew naturally during the game, and I eventually created a backstory about him being an artist really but forced to be a warrior, who had suffered from a blinding illness in the past that now manifests as poor eyesight (i.e. constantly rolling poorly for perception). I really connected with another player, both IC and OOC, who is now my wife IRL.

Once I discovered 3.5 through another group, though, I loved that system a lot more, and now 5e is my favourite edition. I still like 2e despite its drawbacks, however; I am even in a 2nd edition PbP game here on ENworld currently.

 

[CleverNickName]

I found the Player's Option books to be questionable myself. Sometimes changing the game way too much for my tastes, I was always a core kind of guy.

I've heard that from a few people. I've heard them described as an early "Unearthed Arcana": tons of options of varying levels of quality and balance.