I Think I Am Going About It Wrong

[HelloChristian]

I bought print copies of Labyrinth Lord and Swords and Wizardry. I've read and enjoyed them both. I've been looking for a rules-light fantasy system and I think one or both might be just what I am looking for. In order to see what other people are doing with these games, I've been following various blogs that focus on the "retro clones."

I think I may be doing it wrong.

Most of the bloggers I follow play these retro clones in an old school fashion. Their campaigns feature mega dungeons, random char gen, high PC mortality and lots of henchmen that can serve as a pool for replacement PCs. This is great and all, but it's not exactly my style.

I feel that 0e style games offer a great opportunity to focus on story and character development without having to deal with so many cumbersome rules. I feel like that may be an unpopular way of going about it, however.

Can you play Swords and Wizardry with a new school style? Or should I leave my story arc out of it and reach for the 10' pole?

 

[Jasperak]

Here is the disconnect with old- v. new-school games and play styles. The original games do not seem to have been built for specific styles like modern games have. You can play any style with the older games. It is just a question of how many house rules your DM/or you wish to use. Everyone here that has played pre-3e can testify to the large amounts of house rules in their games. For better or worse, newer games focus more about the style of game you are "supposed" to play as opposed to what you want to play.

The original games were originally designed as a toolkit to help you create the games you wanted to play.

Play new-style with old rules and I think you will be pleasantly surprised with how much TRUE freedom you have to create the game you want to play.

BTW, I like your "blog-zine" Iridia.

 

[scruffygrognard]

I bought print copies of Labyrinth Lord and Swords and Wizardry. I've read and enjoyed them both. I've been looking for a rules-light fantasy system and I think one or both might be just what I am looking for. In order to see what other people are doing with these games, I've been following various blogs that focus on the "retro clones."

I think I may be doing it wrong.

Most of the bloggers I follow play these retro clones in an old school fashion. Their campaigns feature mega dungeons, random char gen, high PC mortality and lots of henchmen that can serve as a pool for replacement PCs. This is great and all, but it's not exactly my style.

I feel that 0e style games offer a great opportunity to focus on story and character development without having to deal with so many cumbersome rules. I feel like that may be an unpopular way of going about it, however.

Can you play Swords and Wizardry with a new school style? Or should I leave my story arc out of it and reach for the 10' pole?

Having played AD&D, AD&D 2nd Edition, 3rd Edition, and 3.5 I found that (for whatever reason) 2nd Edition AD&D lent itself to the most story-driven D&D games I have run.

As a kid I played AD&D much like OD&D was intended (dungeon crawls with a minimal storyline, and a few henchmen along just in case things got really ugly). 3.X, for me, was too bogged down by its "there's a rule for EVERYTHING" mentality and by the fact that it really required system mastery to run and play smoothly.

Now that I'm playing C&C I'm trying to go back to my 2nd Edition-type games because, in retrospect, I think they were the best games I ever ran. Luckily C&C is rules lite and flexible enough to allow that.

I'm sure that you can accomplish the same thing (successfully running a story/character-based game) with Labyrinth Lords or Swords & Wizardry... so long as you tweak them in order to "make them your own".

 

[Clavis]

The beauty of "old school" rules sets is their flexibility Don't worry about any notions of "old school orthodoxy". I played both Classic and AD&D as plotless dungeon crawls, as vehicles for emotionally powerful character studies, as plot-driven epics, and as everything in-between. Those old rule sets allow for all those different play-styles, without breaking. As others have said, the games were made to be house-ruled, and you can rip-out large sections and replace them with rules of your own devising and the game will still run just fine. Add whole new systems if you like, or strip everything down to utter basics. Of course, the neo-old school play style (gritty, high-mortality, and without any real plot) really is fun, and the old rule sets support it beautifully. They also support plot-driven play just as well. In fact, I think the deadliness of combat (especially for low-level characters) encourages role-playing, if only because players who want to keep their characters alive quickly learn not to try to fight everything they encounter!

 

[HelloChristian]

Thanks everyone. You have confirmed my suspicions that the old style games can be played without the dungeon crawl orthodoxy. I really hope to get a game going sometime to test it all out.

Peace,
Christian

 

[Aus_Snow]

Sure, you can go story-mad with old skool games. Done just that with Dragon Warriors, occasionally. Not a bad alternative, by the way. But then again, I've heard good things about both the ones you mentioned, so yeah, it's all good.

'Spelunking & Spending' is just some folks' D&D. Needn't be yours. Hell, no.

 

[S'mon]

You can do anything with them. Swords & Wizardry is probably better for a more Swords & Sorcery feel, whereas Labyrinth Lord works well for Tolkienesque fantasy (note that a 10th level LL Elf Lord would be someone like Feanor, who contended with Morgoth).


Personally I like to give LL PCs +10 hit points and death at -10, this means they don't drop dead so easily and you get better character continuity which is good for a 'new style' approach - you can threaten your PCs with say a bandit ambush confident you won't kill them.

 

[Inferno!]

Having played AD&D, AD&D 2nd Edition, 3rd Edition, and 3.5 I found that (for whatever reason) 2nd Edition AD&D lent itself to the most story-driven D&D games I have run

Now that I'm playing C&C I'm trying to go back to my 2nd Edition-type games because, in retrospect, I think they were the best games I ever ran. Luckily C&C is rules lite and flexible enough to allow that.

I agree about 2e, though we certainly seem to be a minority! I'd be interested to see what you've done to C&C to help replicate the 2e feel. (If you're inclined to share, perhaps it should be in a forked thread).

 

[pawsplay]

The thing about old school games it that they didn't know they were old school. There were many elements present in older games that have since reappeared in newer games, but were not part of the design mainstream for many years.

 

[Umbran]

I think I may be doing it wrong.

Old school vs New school? Bah!

Are you and your group having fun?

If so, you aren't doing it wrong.