[EDITION WARZ] Selling Out D&D's Soul?

[Ourph]

Can others pipe in whether they played 1E where they when possible avoided monsters? Because that's just so .. not D&D

We absolutely play the game knowing certain monsters are treasure poor (the ones you would expect, like giant rats, spiders, vermin, etc. or other non-intelligent creatures) and focus on avoiding those creatures to reach the areas we know to be or suspect might be treasure rich. This is the central theme of Gary's advice to players in the AD&D books, i.e. - have a goal, make a plan, avoid distractions, know when to quit while you are ahead.

Going after XP in AD&D by killing monsters is a low payoff bet. To be worth any decent amount of XP a monster has to be really tough. Gaining treasure is the easy way to gain XP and figuring out how to get the most treasure for the least risk is part of being a good player.

To my groups, AD&D has always been a treasure-hunting game, very REH Conan-esque in it's roots. Our games are rarely about rescuing the kidnapped princess or destroying the evil overlord (unless there is cold, hard coin involved in doing so). The basic campaign profile is, you go out seeking treasure, you get in trouble, you fight your way out - wash, rinse, repeat as needed. It's worked for me for over 20 years of playing.

 

[Ridley's Cohort]

deleted

 

[PapersAndPaychecks]

That's not the AD&D I remember playing.

Mmm... I suspect your DM may not have been following the Treasure Types or the Appendix A guidelines on placement of treasure, then.

 

[Numion]

Mmm... I suspect your DM may not have been following the Treasure Types or the Appendix A guidelines on placement of treasure, then.

No, I think he was. I meant to say in my earlier post that we went after all the monsters we could in a given adventure (or otherwise - a lot of overseas travelling), even if there wasn't a great treasure to be had.

Besides, it's kinda metagamey to go after monsters with good treasure classes. "Hmm .. a giant spider is lousy on loot .. lets sidestep." I didn't know back then anything about treasure types. I just though maybe there was a previous adventurers carcass in the webs. We killed monsters, sometimes the loot was good, sometimes not. I wasn't in on the particulars.

 

[Ourph]

Besides, it's kinda metagamey to go after monsters with good treasure classes.

I don't think it's metagamey to believe that a bandit lair will probably contain more valuable loot than a nest of giant rats. Giant rats don't pillage towns or hold up trade caravans. In fact, "let's kill that monster in the corner room that has no treasure and isn't bothering us because we'll get more XP" seems way more metagamey than acknowledging that most unintelligent monsters don't make it a habit of collecting jewelry or currency.

 

[Numion]

I don't think it's metagamey to believe that a bandit lair will probably contain more valuable loot than a nest of giant rats. Giant rats don't pillage towns or hold up trade caravans. In fact, "let's kill that monster in the corner room that has no treasure and isn't bothering us because we'll get more XP" seems way more metagamey than acknowledging that most unintelligent monsters don't make it a habit of collecting jewelry or currency.

Well .. I didn't see it as metagamey. We killed all the monsters in a lair anyway - so they couldn't come behind us as we proceed. That's just basic dungeoneering 101. And fun

Besides, if you look at the 1E adventures, unintelligent monsters do seem to collect monty haulish amounts of loot. Just like everyone else in those adventures

 

[Lanefan]

That's not the AD&D I remember playing. You get the XPs where you can - we purposefully did get into fights we didn't need to. You know, the time honored tradition of clearing out dungeons (of monsters and treasure).

Can others pipe in whether they played 1E where they when possible avoided monsters? Because that's just so .. not D&D

Those times we were too busy fighting each other, we tended to tell the monsters to go away and leave us alone.

Some other times we'd avoid encounters (or, more often, leave them till later) would be if we were under a serious time crunch e.g. the Princess dies tomorrow if you don't find the antidote tonight, or if we thought the enemy beyond our capability to deal with and thus we'd better just sneak past, or if for whatever reason we didn't want to alert the enemy to our presence...yet.

But yes, our usual MO consisted pretty much of "kill 'em all and let the gods sort 'em out".

Lanefan

 

[Bregh]

We absolutely play the game knowing certain monsters are treasure poor (the ones you would expect, like giant rats, spiders, vermin, etc. or other non-intelligent creatures) and focus on avoiding those creatures to reach the areas we know to be or suspect might be treasure rich. This is the central theme of Gary's advice to players in the AD&D books, i.e. - have a goal, make a plan, avoid distractions, know when to quit while you are ahead.

Going after XP in AD&D by killing monsters is a low payoff bet. To be worth any decent amount of XP a monster has to be really tough. Gaining treasure is the easy way to gain XP and figuring out how to get the most treasure for the least risk is part of being a good player.

To my groups, AD&D has always been a treasure-hunting game, very REH Conan-esque in it's roots. Our games are rarely about rescuing the kidnapped princess or destroying the evil overlord (unless there is cold, hard coin involved in doing so). The basic campaign profile is, you go out seeking treasure, you get in trouble, you fight your way out - wash, rinse, repeat as needed. It's worked for me for over 20 years of playing.

This post mirrors my experiences in O/OA D&D pretty much exactly over the last 24 years.

As always, others MMV, but in this instance, at least, Ourph and I are on the same page.

My Players are generally disgruntled when ambushed or Surprised by non-treasure type monsters, will go out of their way to avoid these pointless, resource-draining encounters, and will resolve them as quickly as possible (including retreat).

Certainly not all such encounters are treasure-poor, and sometimes among the scattered remains of prior victims there's a juicy bit of loot to be garnered, but in general, Players have the (IMO proper) attitude that battles with various animals, spiders, bugs, and most other mindless critters is a waste of resources and a good way to wind up with nothing to show for it.

 

[I'm A Banana]

Oh, please, Mr, Umpire, give me one more strike! Striking out is not fuuuuunnn. Make the pitcher throw it slower!

Let's lower the basketball goal, 10 feet is too high - I can't dunk!

Wah, wah, wah.

It's wierd that I see this post so close to the post how "no one's advancing an elitist attitude!" Along with fairly pompous remarks on the "lowest common denominator," I think evidence that some people think that they're just *better* than others is pretty well-established.

I would argue that such an attitude is detrimental to the hobby because it excludes those who "aren't as good" in an attempt to preserve some icon of purity and justice. But D&D shouldn't be a country club where we can exclude "those types of people" that make us uncomfortable. It should be a game that everyone -- the whiny, the young, the selfish, the simplistic, the un-educated, the "unwashed masses" should be able to enjoy if they have the predeliciton. Turgid prose and perceptably unfair rules will drive people away from the game, as it has driven many away before.

Maybe I now understand why the thread is titled "Selling out D&Ds soul". Because the soul has always been, for me at least, about killing monsters, taking the loot, and leveling up. It was like that from the first days I started slinging dice. Now, our games have gotten more sophisticated, the plots have evolved, there is real roleplaying, consequences for actions other than loss of numbers on character sheet, etc .. but the core is still the same. Hows and whys have changed, but it's still about that. So, if someones tradition has been something entirely else (avoiding those sacks of exp.. um, monsters), it might indeed seem like the soul has been lost.

I think that, through extensive market research, WotC found your experience to be fairly representative of the typical experience.

And I think anyone who feels that "D&D's soul" is in save-or-die effects or wording that renders rules opaque is taking a very narrow view of the spirit of the game.

 

[Ourph]

Besides, if you look at the 1E adventures, unintelligent monsters do seem to collect monty haulish amounts of loot. Just like everyone else in those adventures

I'm not sure which adventures you're talking about. The ones I'm most familiar with (T1, B2, the G series, the A series) had the vast majority of treasure either in the possession of or placed by intelligent creatures.

T1 Village of Homlet Spoiler Alert!

The bandits in the moathouse in T1 have a large haul of treasure, whereas the giant toads in the moat and the giant spider in the tower have almost none and what they do have is very difficult to find. If you want to go around butchering every toad you kill you might occasionally find a gem, but the easiest, most obvious and least risky option is obviously to kill or drive off the bandits and take their treasure chests.