D&D General Matt Colville: "50 years later we're still arguing about what D&D even is!"

Good insight and I agree there is source material for that sort of thing. I'd even argue Conan is that way. I'm not anti-DCC as I have bought nearly all of their old school modules written before the DCC game. I just don't care for the unpredictability that runs to the core of DCC's approach to magic. I can see for sure why some like it.
Yeah, it's definitely a matter of taste.

DCC may want that but why do they ALL seem to want this? Are they all that concerned with the pulp fiction, because that particular connection has never been what drove me to D&D in any of its editions.
What's "all"? IME in the OSR for the past 15 years DCC is an outlier in that regard. Low Fantasy Gaming (now renamed Tales of Argosa) does it too, and 5 Torches Deep, but until Shadowdark came along IME it was pretty rare. The current most popular game in the OSR scene is still OSE, right? Which uses pure B/X mechanics (except OSE Advanced, making new B/X-style mechanics for expanded content modeled on AD&D).

Some other old games back in the day did it (GURPS magic required skill checks, each spell being its own skill), but it was never part of D&D, so most retroclones don't do it at all.

Yep that is him. The savior of modern gaming if you ask me. I'll buy him a coffee if I ever meet him.
Same.
 

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Yeah, what is up with that? That seems like something that OSR games have really glommed on to that I'm never felt was a major part of the game. Wish and Limited Wish were the two spells where there felt like there was a gotcha involved, and the game has actually kept that intact through the editions (even if Limited Wish has gone away).
Because a lot of the OSR initial principles (formulated in the mid '00s) were formed in direct opposition to the then-dominant 3e paradigm of controlled character building done at the metagame level.

A focus on diegetic elements, produced randomly, was the direct antithesis to those prominent concepts.
 

Yeah, what is up with that? That seems like something that OSR games have really glommed on to that I'm never felt was a major part of the game. Wish and Limited Wish were the two spells where there felt like there was a gotcha involved, and the game has actually kept that intact through the editions (even if Limited Wish has gone away).
Could part of it be that AD&D "hid" some of the magic rules in the DMG, leading to magic from the player's perspective occasionally doing weird things?
 

What other games are that way? All the real clones are D&D straight down the line. C&C is definitely not that way. I'm not saying there are no games other than DCC as I am not all knowing about all games. There are a lot that are not that way though.
Off the top of my head

Into the Odd
Electric Bastionland (and soon Mythic)
Ultraviolet Grasslands
Yoon-Suin
Troika!

A lot of the leading lights of the NSR really like the random, gonzo elements of OSR.
 



Off the top of my head

Into the Odd
Electric Bastionland (and soon Mythic)
Ultraviolet Grasslands
Yoon-Suin
Troika!

A lot of the leading lights of the NSR really like the random, gonzo elements of OSR.
I haven't played any of those yet; maybe this is what I was missing. Just remembered that the GLOG also makes magic more random and risky.
 

Because a lot of the OSR initial principles (formulated in the mid '00s) were formed in direct opposition to the then-dominant 3e paradigm of controlled character building done at the metagame level.

A focus on diegetic elements, produced randomly, was the direct antithesis to those prominent concepts.
This is probably part of it.

Could part of it be that AD&D "hid" some of the magic rules in the DMG, leading to magic from the player's perspective occasionally doing weird things?
Yeah, AD&D "hiding" a bunch of additional details about how particular spells really worked in the DMG was also probably an effort to maintain some mystery in magic. Of course, it was a naive and misguided attempt, predicated on the mistaken idea that players wouldn't just get their own copies of the book. Gary's warnings of dire punishments for trespass are pretty humorous in retrospect.
 

Yeah, AD&D "hiding" a bunch of additional details about how particular spells really worked in the DMG was also probably an effort to maintain some mystery in magic. Of course, it was a naive and misguided attempt, predicated on the mistaken idea that players wouldn't just get their own copies of the book. Gary's warnings of dire punishments for trespass are pretty humorous in retrospect.

I think it was more "here's things I have thought of in the last two years since I wrote the PH that I think are relevant." Mostly they are just specific use cases. Mostly.

Things like blinding with light seem like stuff that has come up in a game with player creativity and he made a ruling on it.

Some are just retcons though adding in new stuff like detect magic showing school of magic that there really is no need to hide from the PCs in the spell description. Or permanency only draining con 5% of the time for making magic items.

I think the hiding aspects of magic part came about as a result of the commentary and development of further rulings, not an intention when the spells were originally written.

It seems of a piece with hidden aspects of stuff like thief abilities being revealed only in the DMG such as new limitations on when a backstab works.
 

Yeah, it's definitely a matter of taste.


What's "all"? IME in the OSR for the past 15 years DCC is an outlier in that regard. Low Fantasy Gaming (now renamed Tales of Argosa) does it too, and 5 Torches Deep, but until Shadowdark came along IME it was pretty rare. The current most popular game in the OSR scene is still OSE, right? Which uses pure B/X mechanics (except OSE Advanced, making new B/X-style mechanics for expanded content modeled on AD&D).

Some other old games back in the day did it (GURPS magic required skill checks, each spell being its own skill), but it was never part of D&D, so most retroclones don't do it at all.


Same.
I think you are including just a check for failure in some of those examples. I think DCC goes a lot farther. You pretty much have to chance to blow yourself up with every spell cast it seems.
 

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