Clint_L
Legend
Not necessarily a bad thing in 1e - then you have a back-up ready for when the outermost later gets blown up!
D&D General I'm a Fighter, not a Lover: Why the 1e Fighter was so Awesome
- Thread starter Snarf Zagyg
- Start date
Lanefan
Victoria Rules
Fair enough. It's a bit much, though, to expect them both to work at once.
Mannahnin
Scion of Murgen (He/Him)
One thing which actually helps is that there are only Cure Light at 1st and Cure Serious at 4th in the core rules. So even if you try to make a 1E Cleric a healbot he's forced to take other spells in his 2nd and 3rd level slots, and can get some utility and/or offense (like Hold Person, which we used to call the "cleric gun").
You can get even lower than that. Don't forget Cloak of Displacement (extra -2) and boots of speed situationally (another -2, dependent on DM's interpretation of what "in combat situations where movement of this sort is possible" means).
I deep-dived on this last year and found the lowest ACs generally possible in 1E to be -15 armored or -14 unarmored. Without a defender sword. Of course, those are assuming an 18 Dex and the best possible items, so would be exceedingly rare.
Absolutely.
One common error people make when trying to determine how much treasure or how many magic items are "standard" in old school D&D is just extrapolating from the tables. Gary specifically instructs us in OD&D that the most important treasures (consisting of "various magic items and large amounts of wealth in the form of gems and jewelry") are supposed to be "thoughtfully placed" on each dungeon level before doing random stocking of the remainder of the level using the tables.
In AD&D (see DMG 91-92) he gave conservative advice about not overdoing it and being too generous, but this has to be taken in context. First, as he and other TSR figures like Tim Kask and Frank Mentzer have written, they thought of AD&D functionally as a continuation of OD&D and wrote with the assumption that readers already knew the OD&D instructions. Second, AD&D codified and gave xp values for all magic items, as opposed to OD&D which only gave a handful of examples. So Gary was again giving this stingier advice with the assumption that PCs would be more reliably getting xp for items.
I saw people use the -10 limit as a house rule in 1E, but it didn't become an official rule until 2D, as far as I can determine.
Not generally. A robe IS clothing. Like pants and a shirt in one, but looser. People wearing robes (like priests or M-Us) routinely wouldn't be wearing them over other clothes, except their underwear. Though you might wear some kind of hose under your robes if it's particularly cold, similar to us wearing long underwear today.
Wearing a cloak over it, especially in cold weather or rain would be standard practice, just like wearing a cloak over whatever other day to day outfit you wear.
Last edited:
I saw that people were discussing the 1e armor classes. Very briefly (since I don't want to do a deep dive):
1. The "-10 is a best AC you can have" was a common house rule because the tables only went to -10. But it was a house rule, not the actual rule.
2. The actual rule is in the DMG p. 73.
Armor class below 10 is not possible except through cursed items. Armor class above 2 is easily possible due to magical bonuses and dexterity bonuses. To determine a "to hit" number not on the charts, project upwards by 1's (5% increments), repeating 20 six times before continuing with 21 (cf. MATRIX I.A.).
(Underline supplied by me). In other words, you can get better than a -10 AC, and extrapolate from the tables.
3. What is the best AC you can have in 1e (PHB+DMG only), other than, um, Invulnerable (Coat of Arnd)? This also does not include temporary bonuses (see. e.g., potion of invulnerability that gives, among other benefits, a +2 bonus to you AC for 5-20 rounds)
Start with Plate Mail and Shield. (AC 2)
Dexterity of 18 (-4 adjustment). (AC -2)
Plate +5 (AC -7)
Shield +5 (AC -12)
Dusty Rose Ioun Stone (AC -13)
Cloak of Displacement (AC -15) (although first attack misses)
If Movement is Possible
Boots of Speed (+2 AC)
If not, then +1 AC from Boots of Striding and Springing
Let's call it just +1. Then -16.
What about helms?
Helm of Brilliance (this specifically provides that it is armor of +2 value ... not just a helm of +2 value, but it could be argued that it falls under the helm rules)
I'd argue that the specific language (that this is armor of +2 value) applies, given the language of a different magic helm (that this is the same as a helm of AC 5). Call it AC -18.
Next, are you a Fighter or a Dual/Multi-class Fighter MU?
If a multi-class/dual class Fighter/Magic User
Wield a Staff of Power (+2 AC) for an AC of -20.
If just a fighter, then Sword +4 Defender (can apply up to +4 of the bonus to AC) for an AC between -18 and -22.
Unknowns?
Artifacts (Major Benign Powers of +2 to armor class when possessed, Minor Benign of +2 protection when held)
Finally, there are spells and temporary effects that can bring you lower. But only if you're like, into that. Not that I'm kink shaming. Whatever floats your boat!
1. The "-10 is a best AC you can have" was a common house rule because the tables only went to -10. But it was a house rule, not the actual rule.
2. The actual rule is in the DMG p. 73.
Armor class below 10 is not possible except through cursed items. Armor class above 2 is easily possible due to magical bonuses and dexterity bonuses. To determine a "to hit" number not on the charts, project upwards by 1's (5% increments), repeating 20 six times before continuing with 21 (cf. MATRIX I.A.).
(Underline supplied by me). In other words, you can get better than a -10 AC, and extrapolate from the tables.
3. What is the best AC you can have in 1e (PHB+DMG only), other than, um, Invulnerable (Coat of Arnd)? This also does not include temporary bonuses (see. e.g., potion of invulnerability that gives, among other benefits, a +2 bonus to you AC for 5-20 rounds)
Start with Plate Mail and Shield. (AC 2)
Dexterity of 18 (-4 adjustment). (AC -2)
Plate +5 (AC -7)
Shield +5 (AC -12)
Dusty Rose Ioun Stone (AC -13)
Cloak of Displacement (AC -15) (although first attack misses)
If Movement is Possible
Boots of Speed (+2 AC)
If not, then +1 AC from Boots of Striding and Springing
Let's call it just +1. Then -16.
What about helms?
Helm of Brilliance (this specifically provides that it is armor of +2 value ... not just a helm of +2 value, but it could be argued that it falls under the helm rules)
I'd argue that the specific language (that this is armor of +2 value) applies, given the language of a different magic helm (that this is the same as a helm of AC 5). Call it AC -18.
Next, are you a Fighter or a Dual/Multi-class Fighter MU?
If a multi-class/dual class Fighter/Magic User
Wield a Staff of Power (+2 AC) for an AC of -20.
If just a fighter, then Sword +4 Defender (can apply up to +4 of the bonus to AC) for an AC between -18 and -22.
Unknowns?
Artifacts (Major Benign Powers of +2 to armor class when possessed, Minor Benign of +2 protection when held)
Finally, there are spells and temporary effects that can bring you lower. But only if you're like, into that. Not that I'm kink shaming. Whatever floats your boat!
James Gasik
We don't talk about Pun-Pun
You couldn't prepare a lower level spell in a higher level slot? It's been awhile, but I thought you could, if you wanted to.
Also as far as 2nd level goes, I always prepared Aid there.
Mannahnin
Scion of Murgen (He/Him)
No such rules. In 3rd ed Clerics got the Spontaneous Casting rule where they can dump any prepared spell to cast a Cure (for good Clerics) or Inflict (for evil) spell of equal level or lower, though.
During 2E my groups starting using a Cure Moderate spell at 2nd level, though in retrospect that feels like a mistake, because it put even more of a healbot expectation on the Clerics.
James Gasik
We don't talk about Pun-Pun
How strange. It must be one of those house rules I picked up without realizing it. In a game I had a Magic-User who leveled up and got 2nd levels spells without having the opportunity to learn any, and the DM said I could memorize a 1st level spell using the 2nd level slot.
But checking the books, yeah, I can see now that the rules are silent about this sort of thing, outside of things like Rary's Mnemonic Enhancer.
mixmastashizz
Explorer
Unfortunately you missed the rule where MUs get a new spell when they level up as part of their training costs and downtime
James Gasik
We don't talk about Pun-Pun
Man, I wish I could go back in time! I had DM's insist I must find all spells, which is why I exclusively played specialists in 2e (who do automatically get new spells)! I'd love to shove that text under their noses, lol.Unfortunately you missed the rule where MUs get a new spell when they level up as part of their training costs and downtime
View attachment 416879
Then again, these were the same DM's who would probably assign me a "random", highly situation spell like Leomund's Trap, if I did, lol.
I did have one other time where putting spells in the wrong slots came up, when my spellbook got toasted and I was reduced to using a captured spellbook that was inexplicably missing an entire spell level...
Lanefan
Victoria Rules
That was a 3e thing, but may have come in late in 2e.
What never made sense to me was the progression of curing spells: Cure Light at 1st, Cure Serious at 4th, Cure Critical at 5th, and Heal at 6th. Moving Cure Serious to 3rd makes it far more logical because the level gap between each tier of curing then becomes a much smoother 4-4-3.
Silence and Spiritual Hammer were also staples at 2nd. I honestly can't remember the last time I saw Aid cast and may only have seen it used a half dozen times total in the 43 years I've been doing this.
Similar Threads
