How did you play back in the day? - forked from Q's Leveling Comparisons

[Raven Crowking]

This is a pretty low characterization of Ariosto, Hussar.

Having participated in the same thread, I would say that Ariosto claimed that mega-dungeons were a normal part of play, which means "not unusual", although he may well have expected the practice to be more widespread than your poll would indicate.

I also didn't mega-dungeon in my 1e days, not having picked up the habit until 2e. But I certainly knew what a mega-dungeon was, and I would not have been surprised to find another DM running a campaign centered on one.


RC

 

[Hussar]

This is a pretty low characterization of Ariosto, Hussar.

Having participated in the same thread, I would say that Ariosto claimed that mega-dungeons were a normal part of play, which means "not unusual", although he may well have expected the practice to be more widespread than your poll would indicate.

I also didn't mega-dungeon in my 1e days, not having picked up the habit until 2e. But I certainly knew what a mega-dungeon was, and I would not have been surprised to find another DM running a campaign centered on one.


RC

Well, maybe, maybe not.

However, even if I take your more charitable version, his claims are still pretty far off. Less than 10% is "unusual" by most people's standards. I may not have been surprised to find a DM running one either, but, then again, looking at the response, I probably should have been.

 

[Korgoth]

I think this proves that the mega-dungeon was far from common, let alone the "norm" in AD&D play.

I don't think this poll proves anything of the sort. Your assertion may be partly or even wholly correct, but it isn't supported by the poll which is too flawed to prove anything other than that you can word a poll so poorly as to render it useless.

You go from asking what people "mostly" did to then saying that megadungeons were rare. That's an utter fallacy. They might have been rarer than hen's teeth, but you're not entitled to claim that based on the above poll.

 

[Hussar]

I don't think this poll proves anything of the sort. Your assertion may be partly or even wholly correct, but it isn't supported by the poll which is too flawed to prove anything other than that you can word a poll so poorly as to render it useless.

You go from asking what people "mostly" did to then saying that megadungeons were rare. That's an utter fallacy. They might have been rarer than hen's teeth, but you're not entitled to claim that based on the above poll.

Hang on. Please, after all the bitching about me misinterpreting other people, please don't put words in my mouth. I did not say that megadungeons were rare. I SAID that they weren't the norm.

How would you phrase the questions then?

The assertion was that mega-dungeon play was the "norm". Now, my definition of "norm" usually means something along the lines of "common" or "usual" or "done more than not much". Perhaps your definition is different. I don't know.

I asked what people mostly played. If mega-dungeons were the norm, don't you think more than 10% of people would have said that they mostly played mega-dungeons? I mean, if I asked people if they usually put ketchup on french fries (something I would call a norm in Canada), and only 10% of people said yes, wouldn't that mean that people didn't usually put ketchup on french fries?

I asked if respondants mostly played in either mega-dungeons, serial adventures, or something else. Since only a very small minority of people responded that they mostly played in mega-dungeons, how would you be able to turn that information to mean that mega-dungeons were the norm?

This is what I'm failing to see. "Mostly" is something that you do when it's a norm. I mostly wear pants to work. I mostly drive on the left side of the road. I mostly enjoy a beer after work. These, for me are all norms.

If only 10% of people mostly played in mega dungeons, how can you say that it is a norm of behavior?

 

[Hussar]

The problem is, what Hussar said was that 3% played in megadungeons and 97% didn't.

I could do that, too. Here's a poll:

Do you still beat your wife
() Yes
() No

With that poll I can prove that 100% of EN Worlders beat their wives.

Going back over the thread, now I see what you did.

Sorry, reread what I wrote. NOWHERE did I state that 3% played in mega-dungeons. What I DID say was that, at the time 3%, which has now climbed to 10, of people responded that they mostly played in mega-dungeons.

Again, my point isn't about the rarity of the mega-dungeon. You said that you played in 1 mega dungeon and several serials. Would you characterize your experience as mostly mega-dungeons? Would you characterize your experience to say that the mega-dungeon was a standard method of play?

You are claiming something that I am not saying. I never stated that mega-dungeons were never played. I ONLY stated that they are not the norm.

 

[Invisible Stalker]

I was all over the ballpark when I got AD&D in 1982.

Solo Modules, both as written and reworked to use again

Module series

Homebrewed dungeons, perhaps a couple of which could be described as "mega." The Cave of the Unknown would have been my first try at a mega dungeon.

However, within a couple of years I was mostly going the sandbox route which is my preferred style today.


Now if I could only send my DDM minis back in time...

 

[Doug McCrae]

If Ariosto is thinking "OD&D and first couple of years of 1e - the context in which it was written"

But he can't be, because he's responding to Quasqueton's analysis of treasure/levelling speed in the AD&D modules. Quasq is talking about the module period of AD&D. Ariosto's point about mega-dungeons being normative is true only of OD&D and Holmes BD&D. So he's definitely wrong and I pronounce Hussar to have won the internet.

 

[Mythmere1]

I voted megadungeon, because that's what we played earliest, and probably most (influenced by the Holmes book). But we also began serialized adventures with G1 later on, and then sandbox-style once Greyhawk came out (we kind of suddenly put the sandbox idea together when we had Greyhawk on top of the FFC).

In general, the characters remained the same, but they moved from one DM to another, one module or megadungeon to another, and didn't inhabit any sort of real campaign world until about 1981 or so (with GH).

EDIT - if GH came out in 1983, then it was 1983.

 

[Korgoth]

As I type this, it's 3% played in Castle Greyhawk style mega dungeons and 97% didn't. Unless there is a radical reversal, I'm gonna say that I've made my point.

...

 

[The Hound]

.... So he's definitely wrong and I pronounce Hussar to have won the internet.

Does that mean that we have to pay Hussar every month now, instead of our service providers?