Shadowdark Finally Played Shadowdark

[Bill Zebub]

Oh, and as for the "reasonable chance of success" at rolls to attempt things....what is "reasonable"? 50%. 75%. 90%? Whatever the percentage is, I would much rather come up with a clever plan that avoids rolling dice at all.

 

[TiQuinn]

"Combat is a Fail State" is a classic maxim of the OSR which was never meant to be taken 100% literally. Gus wrote a good analysis and explication of it on his blog, along with six other major OSR maxims. Some combat is expected. Trying other approaches before fighting where possible and using smart tactics to stack the odds in your favor are also expected.

7 Maxims of the OSR

Back in the aughts and the 2010’s, a decade ago now, there was a movement in older RPGs that I was part of - the “ Old School Renaissance ” ...

alldeadgenerations.blogspot.com

Gus' article is fantastic, and is an amazing counterpoint to the idea that these maxims are written in stone and clearly define what is or is not an OSR game.

 

[Retros_x]

Where I quibble with Shadowdark specifically is that its presentation of the rules is brief, often to a fault. While that's part of its allure to some, it's also confusing to those who expect a bit more description.

That is a fair point. The SD rules are quite brief especially on expectations and how the game is actually supposed to run and kinda expect people to already know OSR principles.

"Combat is a Fail State" is a classic maxim of the OSR which was never meant to be taken 100% literally. Gus wrote a good analysis and explication of it on his blog, along with six other major OSR maxims. Some combat is expected. Trying other approaches before fighting where possible and using smart tactics to stack the odds in your favor are also expected.

Of course its not to take 100% literally (especially at higher levels you also can just win some easy fights), but its a good point to show the difference to 5e, where players expect to get presented fair and balanced fights and that they can "clear" a dungeon through killing everything. It is also the main reason why encounters in OSR dungeons often don't have the non-combat options and solutions spelled out, because it is assumed that players always can try different approaches.

 

[TiQuinn]

Yeah, again, I think that idea has been both exaggerated and misconstrued. Of course combat is a huge part of OSR. It's just that the goal is to minimize simply taking turns rolling dice with monsters and trusting RNG to save you. And for that to work, the players have to trust the GM to adjudicate for the fun of the whole table.

Neither of those things are assumed by a lot of 5e players.

I have no issue with that. In the end, all I'm saying is sometimes you just want to lob the head off a damn orc. Shadowdark does let you do that.

(Dang. my gif isn't giffing. You get the picture )

 

[TiQuinn]

Avoidance or trying to get in advantageous situation is exactly that. Its stated by most OSR creators in their blogs and products. Here an excerpt from Shadowdark: "Battles are fast and deadly. Being clever is crucial for survival."

The implication is clear: If you run into every combat, you will die.

I would argue that if that's truly the implication, the designer would be better served by not having a fighter class.

 

[SpellObjectEnthusiast]

So in order to play Shadowdark do I need a primer on what most modern OSR games do? Has someone contacted Kelsey Dionne to say she should really include a citation of the 7 maxims on OSR play? Maybe there should be an OSR license that includes that text if all OSR games agree on this point?

There is ample guidance in the shadowdark rulebook to explain the playstyle in the GMing chapter.

 

[TiQuinn]

There is ample guidance in the shadowdark rulebook to explain the playstyle in the GMing chapter.

There's also plenty of rules variations in the book that allow others to change the game to accommodate other styles of play.

 

[TwoSix]

"Combat is a Fail State" is a classic maxim of the OSR which was never meant to be taken 100% literally. Gus wrote a good analysis and explication of it on his blog, along with six other major OSR maxims. Some combat is expected. Trying other approaches before fighting where possible and using smart tactics to stack the odds in your favor are also expected.

7 Maxims of the OSR

Back in the aughts and the 2010’s, a decade ago now, there was a movement in older RPGs that I was part of - the “ Old School Renaissance ” ...

alldeadgenerations.blogspot.com

Exactly. “Combat is a fail state” is just a pithy phrase to capture the idea that fights shouldn’t be entered just for the fighting; the goal should generally be to bypass the encounter or use environmental effects to give the PCs a marked advantage as much as possible.

The “fail state” is approaching enemies of possibly equal or greater strength in unbiased combat.

 

[mamba]

Yeah that is comparing PCs to monsters, not to other people.

I don’t know, it feels like it means both monsters and regular NPCs, certainly the ‘You're not supposed to have a reasonable chance for a check’ is not in comparison to monsters

In how many great fantasy stories is the 'hero' actually physically superior to the monsters, as opposed to more clever and more prepared?

in most stories those monsters are not the 1HD kind (‘1HD monsters are supposed to have a 50/50 shot of their damage roll killing you’).

 

[overgeeked]

OSR play is a totally different thing that the play that happened in the ‘70s and ‘80s, from my understanding. Same system, very different concepts.

As someone who played that way back in the 1980s, that's a bit of modern mythology. While it's true that some groups did not play this way, it's false that no groups played this way.