D&D 5E How Old-School is 5th Edition? Can it even do Old-School?

[Yora]

I admittedly don't know very much about 5th edition. I only ran one campaign in 2020 that went for 19 games, which actually was both the best and the longest campaign I've ever run in my 20 years as GM. But I didn't exactly enjoy the mechanical aspects of running this system. But my players, who mostly were GMs themselves with a lot more experience with the system than me, said the things I disliked most about it don't have to be that way if you run the game differently. One of my main issues was that there's much too few encounters for players to try out the new toys they got for this level before they get more new toys at the next level, and that I felt pressured to artificially create situations where they can use all those shiny combat powers they got. And admittedly, simply reducing the amount of XP that characters get for encounters should help with that quite well. So now, a year later, I am considering giving the game another chance by tailoring it more to my gamemastering style.

Now all the way back since 5th edition came out, I remember there being discussions about how much old-school D&D influences are in 5th edition, and over all the years I've seen self-proclaimed old-school DMs say that they are quite happy with 5th edition, and that it does a decent job at working with their campaign styles. I even vaguely remembering some talk recently about whether 5th edition made old-school D&D obsolete. I don't know how those arguments went and if it was a rhetorical question (remember: "If any headline ends with a question mark, the answer is always no."), but apparently people considered that a topic at least debating.

But now sitting down again with the PHB and going over the rules for character abilities, I am really not seeing where that idea could come from. It's not quite as complex as 3rd edition was. But you still got these huge amounts of hit points, automatically healing all damage at a long rest, only a few encounters needed to level up. People talking about how every 1st level character is assumed to have at least an 18 in its main stat, but better a 20. Battlemasters with a full page of maneuvers in the PHB, and rogues being assumed to do sneak attack on all attacks. I don't know how to draw a line between what's old-school or not, but all of this really doesn't feel like it to me.

I think I could make this game work as something that is appealing to me, by creating my own custom XP award system to roughly double the time to level up, using the slow rest variant that requires a week of rest to regain spells, enforcing food and water mechanics, overhauling Encumbrance, hard-capping the game at 10th level, porting in the wandering monster mechanics and monster reaction rules from older games, and so on. But would that even still be running 5th edition or rather some custom homebrew abomination?

I guess this question is primarily directed at people who consider 5th edition to be a system that works reasonably well enough for a more old-school style campaign. What exactly is it about the mechanics that has a certain old-school ring to it, or makes it suitable to be used for such a purpose?

 

[DND_Reborn]

Sure, I think 5E can get a bit of old-school feel. How much you want to change is up to you, but as you know some simple things are:

1. Limit PCs to 18 maximum ability scores, not 20s.

2. Make things like Smite and Sneak Attack declared before the attack is made. If the attack misses, the use is lost.

3. Make prepared spell casters actually prepare "per use" instead of "for any number of uses if you have slots".

4. Delay leveling as much as you want. Either change XP values, or don't bother with XP at all and just level PCs when players feel they are ready to move on.

5. Reducing healing and making the game more gritty using variant ideas in the DMG helps, too.

6. Reduce HP by capping HD around level 9, or by removing CON bonus to HP per level.

7. To counter #3, boost ACs if you want more of the old-school whiffing a lot. An option I used for a while which worked well instead of boosting AC was to have all attacks made with the "disadvantage mechanic", but not ACTUALLY "disadvantage, and make all saves with the "advantage mechanic", but not ACTUALLY advantage.

I am sure there is more but I need to eat, so I'll be back.

 

[Umbran]

I guess this question is primarily directed at people who consider 5th edition to be a system that works reasonably well enough for a more old-school style campaign. What exactly is it about the mechanics that has a certain old-school ring to it, or makes it suitable to be used for such a purpose?

You may want to define what YOU mean when you say "old school", because that term means different things to different people.

 

[Mannahnin]

I tend to concur that 5E can definitely be tweaked to work MORE old-school with some relatively simple house rules.

The game itself has a whole lot of PC powers and options, which inherently fights against Old School to some extent. In the TSR days, most PC power advancement came from spells and magic items. in 5E there are a bunch more abilities inherent to the characters, and fewer magic items are expected.

IME when folks talk about 5E supporting old school play, what they're often referring to is the relative mechanical simplicity compared to 3E and Pathfinder, the reliance on DM judgement calls, and the extensive use of the simple core mechanic- "D20 roll high, add ability and/or Proficiency mod, DM sets the DC" to resolve actions.

That being said, some simple tweaks to make it work more like an old school version include:

1. The Gritty Realism rules, ie: a Short Rest is overnight, a Long Rest takes a week.
2. Healer's Kit Dependency, ie: you can't just spend hit dice unless someone bandages you.
3. Slower level progression. Either use milestones or simply halve or quarter the xp given by monsters.
4. Morale rules for monsters.

 

[Yora]

You may want to define what YOU mean when you say "old school", because that term means different things to different people.

Then we'd be talking about something like how to make the game like I want it. What I am interested in is what other people mean when they see oldschool aspects in 5th edition.

 

[payn]

It's odd to me to be talking about old school and lots of abilities between levels. Combat was far less frequent in old school D&D and trying to spread levels out to encourage more of it doesn't seem very old school. I wouldnt say anything in particular about 5E design makes it good for old shcool. The thing I find useful about 5E is its pretty easy to ignore some of the less oldschool things about it. You can push 5E in a lot of directions and the base rules dont lock down play as much as other modern iterations have or do.

 

[Oofta]

I'm not sure there is one "old school" style of games. I grew up in the old school era, but the games we played don't sound a whole lot like what a bunch of people describe. The game has pretty much always been what you made it, 5E supports the type of game I've pretty much always run fairly well.

There are a lot of optional rules and I've implemented some of the "gritty" rules, but not others such as lingering wounds for example because we never did that back in the day either. So without further definition it's kind of hard to answer the question.

 

[5atbu]

If you want a grittier, harder game with slower progression, then look to the DMG and turn on all the options mentioned previously, plus the Morale rules.


That will give you what you want, as long as you are happy that a lot of progression will come from class progression not items collection.

You might decide that skill checks are not for you, or that you don't want Inspiration, or that the whole bonds, flaws stuff is irrelevant to you and your game.

Why 5e is good for that is that you will still be playing 5e, and your game will be quite understandable to another 5e player once you explain which options you have chosen from the DMG.

Another DM may deploy a different set of options, have a different flavour game, and yet still share the same core game mechanics as you.

5e is a very sound simple core that each table can modulate.

If, however, OSR means a retro clone of BECMI or AD&D 1e or 2e, then you may be better with such a retro clone.

 

[Charlaquin]

I admittedly don't know very much about 5th edition. I only ran one campaign in 2020 that went for 19 games, which actually was both the best and the longest campaign I've ever run in my 20 years as GM. But I didn't exactly enjoy the mechanical aspects of running this system. But my players, who mostly were GMs themselves with a lot more experience with the system than me, said the things I disliked most about it don't have to be that way if you run the game differently. One of my main issues was that there's much too few encounters for players to try out the new toys they got for this level before they get more new toys at the next level, and that I felt pressured to artificially create situations where they can use all those shiny combat powers they got. And admittedly, simply reducing the amount of XP that characters get for encounters should help with that quite well. So now, a year later, I am considering giving the game another chance by tailoring it more to my gamemastering style.

Note that the first few levels go by very quickly by design - 1st and 2nd level are kind of tutorial levels, meant to go by in about a session each (or, rather, after about 6 medium encounters). After that, progression slows down to about every 10-15 medium encounters (or about every other session if you follow the 6-8 encounter day guideline). So it’s possible your experience was colored by the fact that the early levels go by faster.

Now all the way back since 5th edition came out, I remember there being discussions about how much old-school D&D influences are in 5th edition, and over all the years I've seen self-proclaimed old-school DMs say that they are quite happy with 5th edition, and that it does a decent job at working with their campaign styles. I even vaguely remembering some talk recently about whether 5th edition made old-school D&D obsolete. I don't know how those arguments went and if it was a rhetorical question (remember: "If any headline ends with a question mark, the answer is always no."), but apparently people considered that a topic at least debating.

The main thing that I think people mean when they say 5e is old-school is a shift in design philosophy away from codifying everything to unify the experience between tables, and back towards DM empowerment and rulings over rules.

But now sitting down again with the PHB and going over the rules for character abilities, I am really not seeing where that idea could come from. It's not quite as complex as 3rd edition was. But you still got these huge amounts of hit points, automatically healing all damage at a long rest, only a few encounters needed to level up.

Yeah, if that’s what separates old school from new school to you, I don’t imagine 5e would feel very old school.

People talking about how every 1st level character is assumed to have at least an 18 in its main stat, but better a 20.

This one is not correct at all. It’s impossible to get above a 17 at first level with point buy or the standard array, and while it’s possible to get a starting 18 or 20 with rolled stats, it is definitely not the expectation. If you look closely at the math, starting with a 16 or 17 in your primary ability is the baseline assumption, though it’s definitely not essential.

Battlemasters with a full page of maneuvers in the PHB, and rogues being assumed to do sneak attack on all attacks. I don't know how to draw a line between what's old-school or not, but all of this really doesn't feel like it to me.

Battlemaster is one subclass of fighter. Players who want a simple fighter have other subclass options, like the Champion in the PHB and plenty of others in supplement books. As for rogues being assumed to get sneak attack every round (not every attack; that’s impossible since you can only sneak attack once per turn), that’s what’s needed for them to keep up with other classes in terms of average damage per round. I get the impression that everyone being able to keep up in average damage per round is not something you would care much about, in which case it’s not necessary for rogues to get sneak attack every round at all.

I think I could make this game work as something that is appealing to me, by creating my own custom XP award system to roughly double the time to level up, using the slow rest variant that requires a week of rest to regain spells, enforcing food and water mechanics,

Food and water mechanics already exist in 5e.

overhauling Encumbrance,

Have you looked at the variant encumbrance rules in the PHB?

hard-capping the game at 10th level,

Fair, most 5e campaigns end by around then anyway according to D&D Beyond data.

porting in the wandering monster mechanics and monster reaction rules from older games,

You know these exist in 5e, right?

and so on. But would that even still be running 5th edition or rather some custom homebrew abomination?

Seems like the main thing you’d be tweaking is XP and level progression, which is a pretty common thing to tweak. I think most 5e DMs don’t even use XP any more (sadly).

 

[Umbran]

Then we'd be talking about something like how to make the game like I want it. What I am interested in is what other people mean when they see oldschool aspects in 5th edition.

Well, that's still a "define 'old school'" discussion, but sticking 5e between you and the answer as a filter.

It's odd to me to be talking about old school and lots of abilities between levels. Combat was far less frequent in old school D&D and trying to spread levels out to encourage more of it doesn't seem very old school.

I'm not sure there is one "old school" style of games.

I'm with Oofta here - what payn describes above is definitely not my experience with 1e, for example. We were in combats constantly.

Which makes "tell me what old school stuff you see in 5e" a weird approach, because if you talk to payn and me, you'll get completely different answers.