D&D 1E Inch/Foot notation in 1E Monster Manual

[fjw70]

One note is the 1" is always 10 feet when used for spell area of effects whether indoors or outdoors.

 

[styopa]

How very gamist of Gygax.

Yeah, crazy!

It's almost like he derived the RPG rules from, I dunno, tabletop gaming with miniatures? How bizarre is that?

 

[pemerton]

The inch notation is meant to represent tens of feet indoors in 1E and tens of yards outdoors.

Continuing to use the Banshee as an example, it's speed being 15", would then be read as 15 feet in a dungeon, and 15 yards outdoors?

The 1" corresponds to 10s of feet/yards - so 150 feet per unit of time in a dungeon, 150 yards outdoors.

One note is the 1" is always 10 feet when used for spell area of effects whether indoors or outdoors.

I was going to post this too!

So the banshee's wail is always a 30' radius AoE, even outdoors. The upgrading of feet to yards applies only to spell and missile ranges, and to movement rates, but not to AoEs.

(In 2nd ed AD&D, spells got the upgrade even indoors/underground - in the PHB for that edition, the ranges that in the 1st ed PHB were all listed in inches are listed in 10s of yards.)

 

[Nikosandros]

The real question is: what's the movement rate of a necromancer?

On a more serious note, I've always found the movement rates in 1e ridiculously slow. I understand armor, encumbrance, bad footing and lighting in a dungeon, but even in combat it's more of a crawl than real movement...

 

[Man in the Funny Hat]

This is an area that's frequently handwaived, but BTB it's an indicator of SCALED measurement. I think I have this right...

When measuring raw distances rather than movement rates (and barring possible typos) the conversion goes like this:

• Where it says feet (3') it means feet.
• For indoor scale, where it says inches (3") the distance is in tens of feet (3"=30', or 30 feet).
• For outdoor scale where it says inches (3") the distance is triple in tens of feet (3"= 90', or 90 feet).

Where measuring movement rate in inches rather than just measuring distance:

• The number of feet the character can move per segment in combat (i.e. 12" = 12' per segment, or 120' per round).
• The number of 10's of feet the character can move per segment while fleeing/pursuing (i.e. 12" = 120' per segment, or 1200' per round). [No mapping possible.]
• 1/5 of the number of feet the character can move while following a known route or map through a dungeon (i.e. 12" = 60' per segment, or 600' per round). [It is 5x as fast as movement during combat.]
• 10 times the number of feet the character can move while mapping (i.e. 12" = 1.2' per segment, 12' per round, or 120' per turn). [Mapping takes 10x as long as combat movement.]
• The number of miles the character can move per half-day of overland travel across open terrain (i.e. 12" = 12 miles per half-day, or 24 miles per day).

Note: that last one doesn't fit with the overland movement rates given in the DMG which are determined as a function of ruggedness of terrain and weight of burden being carried, not a direct multiplier of foot speed. The PH measurement is perhaps reasonable enough (based on the type of armor you're wearing and weight/encumbrance), but the DMG numbers are probably more realistic for overalnd movement and should probably be considered to supersede the PH in any case.