I got to playtest Castles and Crusades!

[Olgar Shiverstone]

I'll be interested to see where this goes. The five saving throw system is definitely a poor throwback; I find the current save system much more elegant. I'm not a big fan of the "deadband" attribute scores, either -- IMO it tends to promote attribute creep. In BD&D/1E, you needed a 13/14+ to have a viable "above-average" ability score, and scores tended to creep into the 16+ range. In 3E, a 12 is a slightly above-average score with a small modifier, and makes playing lower-statted characters much more viable.

Dropping skills and feats in favor of a fixed progression seems like a pretty smart move to simplify the system. I wonder how this will comare to the system in the WOTC D&D Basic set to be released this fall?

 

[diaglo]

i can't wait either.

 

[dsfriii]

I can wait...They are just trying to reinvent 1ed. If I want to playe 1ed I would.

 

[The Mirrorball Man]

I think many people would be interested in a simpler, stripped-down version of D&D 3.5, but nostalgia for the sake of nostalgia is ridiculous. I'd like to buy "D&D 3.5 jr.", but I'm not interested in "AD&D 1e Millenium Edition".

 

[kengar]

I haven't followed the C&C thing too closely, but for a while over on the Dragonsfoot forums, it's been a fairly hot topic. What surprises me is that TLG is at the point where they are publicly demo-ing it. They've been pretty strict with the NDA's for the online testers, etc.

 

[Gray Mouser]

I can wait...They are just trying to reinvent 1ed. If I want to playe 1ed I would.

Yes, and the 1e crowd seems to be the primary target audience for C&C. However, by saying "if I wanted to play 1ed I would" you miss the point that it's an OOP game with no support apart from some fan sites on the internet.

Others have said this already, C&C seems to not be d20 compatible by design. From what I've read on the web the goal was to come up with rules from the OGL that would harken back to an earlier era. That being said, hopefully a good number of d20 fans will give it a try to see how they like it. Variety is, as they say, the spice of life (and I remember when every RPG had its own rules set - part of the fun was learning how to play each game!).

Gray Mouser

 

[mmadsen]

However, by saying "if I wanted to play 1ed I would" you miss the point that it's an OOP game with no support apart from some fan sites on the internet.

What does no support mean though? You can buy more AD&D supplements and adventure modules than you'll ever use.

 

[mmadsen]

Castles and Crusades, which takes its name from Gygax's original gaming society, promises to be a d20 lite system. Although it uses the basic d20 system, it strips it down to its bare bones and rebuilds it in a way that emulates 1e.

I have to add one more voice to the chorus: huh? AD&D and Lite do not go together. (Basic D&D and Lite might, but not AD&D and Lite.)

This will be good news for players who are nostalgic for the original D&D,who want simple character creation, or just want a rules lite game without having to worry about skill ranks, feats, or tactical combat options.

I can understand those goals; I can't understand what they came up with:

1. The attribute table was somewhat modified. It went from -3 to +3. Attributes falling in 9-12 were "dead scores" that didn't grant any bonus or penalty. As a consequence, most races had a +1/-1 racial modifier (as opposed to the +2/-2 of 3e)

2. The old six saving throw system is back. This is probably to emulate 1e AD&D.

3. Classes included Fighter, Knight, Paladin, Barbarian, Monk, Wizard, Cleric, Thief, and Rogue(?) (Apparently, thieves and rogues will be seperate classes, with rogues being more of a Jack-of-all-trades, and thieves being more "thief oriented")

4. There are no skill ranks or feats to worry about. Instead each class gets special skills on certain levels. Skills seem to be handled with simple ability check.

Why introduce complexity like that?

 

[Gray Mouser]

What does no support mean though? You can buy more AD&D supplements and adventure modules than you'll ever use.

No support means that I can't remember the last time a new 1e product was put out. With the advent of 2e in the late 80s things weren't so bad because there was a lot of overlap between the rule sets. With 3e and now 3.5? Forget it.

Are there a lot of 1e supplements? Sure. And you can track them down on ebay or buy a (poor) pdf file on svgames. But is there anything new and exciting coming out? Nope.

As for "more supplements and adventure modules than you'll ever use"; that's probably true. Of course some of them, like in every game, were prett bad. There are classic 1e modules (the A, G, and D series springs to mind as well as T1-4) but there are some pretty lame ones floating around, too.

The fact is there's no active support for 1e gamers by anyone other than 1e gamers. I'm frankly surprised at how good some of the fan-stuff is! But is WotC or any other company going to cater to that fan-base? Nope.

Go TLG!

Gray Mouser

 

[Krieg]

The fact is there's no active support for 1e gamers by anyone other than 1e gamers. I'm frankly surprised at how good some of the fan-stuff is! But is WotC or any other company going to cater to that fan-base? Nope.

Unless you count Kenzer Co & Hackmaster...which many of us do.

FWIW I still love & play AD&D rather than D20 at times, and I am definitely interested in seeing how C&C comes out. That being said, I'm not really sure how well "1E OGL" is going to fly. It's going to be interesting to see what happens...