D&D 2E On AD&D 2E

[Willie the Duck]

I think whether you think 2e or 3e had the larger optimized to non-optimized span depends on what you experienced and what you consider outliers to be excluded from the lines of best fit, etc.

• If your 2e experience was group 1 playing with a swashbuckler or savage fighter kit and a PosM from Complete Priests and group 2 playing double-longsword-wielding Myrmidon (or 18/00 strength TWF dart-specialist in a no-magic-requiring-enemies campaign) and Priest of Faerun PosM, you would say that the 2e might have had the bigger span (and if you include spellfire wielders or some of the alternate magic systems from the PO series, well then all bets are off).
• If your 3e experience was group 1 with 1-20 fighters using all their many feats to pick up weapon focus and specialization in both longsword and bow alongside rangers, bards, and maybe a (decadent-feeling) mystic theurge and then group 2 has hulking hurlers and early-entry double-caster PrCs (double-9th level spells by 20th level) and so on, you might consider 3e the more expansive (with pun-pun obviously being the data point which wrecks the analysis).

Regarding social climate, I don't think it works specifically in one way. The 2e era there was certainly less online activity where people could pick up someone else's ideas, but it also meant that there were fewer instances where you would post your idea and someone else would point out the flaws, lambast it as Cheeze, or whatnot.

 

[Bedrockgames]

I think you are generalizing your 3d6 in order Ravenloft experience social to be closer to a baseline AD&D social climate than high power and optimization models of AD&D and I think that is a personal experience bias.

It was the default method in the 2e PHB though. Definitely that could vary by setting for things like Darksun, but it wasn't limited to Ravenloft

 

[Bedrockgames]

D&D was a huge variety of playstyles that varied a lot between groups and products.

This I 100% agree with. I am not saying every group played the same. But I am saying my experience in the 90s generally, and with 2E in particular, was leaning more into characterization (and optimization still being more widely frowned upon than it was in the 2000s).

2e Dark Sun by the book could have starting humans with 20s in ability scores and everyone having a psionic wild talent guaranteed. Look at 1e Unearthed Arcana Human rolls stat generation method. Unearthed Arcana double specialization, cavaliers who improved their physical stats every level, underdark racial options with lots of powers and defenses.

Sure, I am not talking about AD&D in general (though I would still say it's harder to min max AD&D than 3E). I am talking about the 2E era, which has some crucial differences.

Dragon magazine classes. I know my brother and I looked through the 2e Legends and Lore and Forgotten Realms adventures specifically scanning the potentials of the different specialty priests. I didn't own Complete Elves but I heard about Bladesinging. I mostly avoided playing thieves in B/X, 1e, and 2e because of their mechanical and combat crappiness (I played a few but not many).

Again though these were all optional. If you open up all the options from Dragon magazine, of course you are going to find wonky combos. The difference is, during 3E the default assumption was much friendlier to players selection what ever options they wanted. In 2E, there were options but the expectation was they would be heavily vetted by the GM. And 2E had a much, much more restrictive multiclassing system. 3E opened up class dipping, had prestige classes, added in things like feats and it had a more potent skill system. These all allowed for a much more robust level of optimization. And if the GM couldn't keep up with the optimization, it made it very difficult to throw anything challenging at them. That wasn't nearly the same issue in 2E.

I think there are plenty of groups who would have been into collaborating on power optimization and builds if forums had been as accessible a thing at the time.

Sure, and especially if you throw in later books like skills and powers, you can get some crazy stuff. But the overall mood of that time was different. You didn't have wish lists, you didn't have the crazy builds you can get in 3E.

Certainly enough for a bustling community to have developed.

I think you could have built a community around it. But I also think it would have been more work, it wouldn't have been as effective, and you would have had to contend more with the GM not allowing options.

 

[Voadam]

It was the default method in the 2e PHB though. Definitely that could vary by setting for things like Darksun, but it wasn't limited to Ravenloft

It was also only one of six core methods printed in the Player's Handbook.

Page 18 of the revised PH:

Let’s first see how to generate ability scores for your character, after which definitions of each ability will be given.
The six ability scores are determined randomly by rolling six-sided dice to obtain a score from 3 to 18. There are several methods for rolling up these scores.

Alternative Dice-Rolling Methods
Method I creates characters whose ability scores are usually between 9 and 12. If you would rather play a character of truly heroic proportions, ask your DM if he allows players to use optional methods for rolling up characters. These optional methods are designed to produce above-average characters.

 

[Bedrockgames]

It was also only one of six core methods printed in the Player's Handbook.

Page 18 of the revised PH:

Let’s first see how to generate ability scores for your character, after which definitions of each ability will be given.
The six ability scores are determined randomly by rolling six-sided dice to obtain a score from 3 to 18. There are several methods for rolling up these scores.

Alternative Dice-Rolling Methods
Method I creates characters whose ability scores are usually between 9 and 12. If you would rather play a character of truly heroic proportions, ask your DM if he allows players to use optional methods for rolling up characters. These optional methods are designed to produce above-average characters.

I realize that but importantly those are labeled "Alternative Dice-Rolling Methods" and 3d6 in order is presented as the first and default method:

One of the great things about 2E was all the options. So I am not saying people didn't use the other methods. But I think it is significant that this was the default

 

[Willie the Duck]

One of the great things about 2E was all the options. So I am not saying people didn't use the other methods. But I think it is significant that this was the default

Why? What do you think that changes?

 

[Bedrockgames]

Why? What do you think that changes?

I think it is important because people are more likely to use the default method, and it is an indication from the designers that this is the expected way to generate ability scores. Again, people clearly used other methods. But this was certainly the one I encountered the most (I know a lot of 2E players for example who were surprised when they went back to 1E that it didn't use that method).

 

[James Gasik]

I don't know. I mean, 5e's default method is rolling, and most people seem to prefer point-buy. I don't think it's possible to find a consensus on how many people used Method I, but given the high stats most characters I saw had, I'm pretty sure it wasn't all that popular, lol.

One thing you keep saying about 2e is all these books were optional, thus preventing a CharOp mindset from coming into play. But so were all the 3e books! No DM was forced to use Magic of Arcanum, Tome of Battle, or Complete Adventurer, just as no DM was forced to use The Complete Sha'ir's Handbook or any Dragon Magazine content.

The main difference, as I see it, between the community that built up around the two editions was not only the internet, but the mindset of the role of the player and the DM.

In 2e, the DM was still considered the absolute authority, who no doubt had reams of house rules, and their own curated list of what was "kosher" for their tables.

In the year 2000, you had a lot of new players and a lot of old players who now had a forum to share their stories of DM power gone horribly wrong, and this mindset of "trust the rules, not the DM" began to appear, where in the TSR era, you couldn't trust the rules because there was simply too much vagueness that required a DM to sort out.

Random Example: The Complete Book of Humanoids doesn't allow Centaurs to be Priests, but Monster Mythology has a writeup for specialty Priests of Skerrit, the God of Centaurs. Paging the DM!

With all the effort put into balancing the game, surely what WotC was giving us could be trusted! Nothing is wrong with any of their player options! Surely if you gave players assumed wealth and magic items and used the CR system, nothing could go wrong!

Ah, how innocent we were. But it was an attractive illusion, since you could aim the rulebooks at stingy, recalcitrant DM's and tell them they were doing it wrong, a far cry from Gary's rants that if you were to give players a fair shake, they would utterly destroy your game world!

And of course, by the time we knew better, we were invested in the system, and, thanks to the OGL, the system was everywhere even if you wanted to change games, lol!

Sure, WotC eventually fessed up, but their solution to that was to sell us more books! Who didn't love getting errata to Polymorph in Complete Arcane or rebalanced magic items in the Magic Item Compendium? And of course, things like the Tome of Battle broke the community in half "wut, you mean martials are supposed to be good? Blasphemy!".

But I digress. Optimization was certainly there (anyone who has played Pool of Radiance or Baldur's Gate I knows), but there was a limit on what the DM would put up with, and it wasn't like most people had a plethora of other groups they could play with. Plus, people who scoured rulebooks for cool new options were NERDS, amirite?

 

[cbwjm]

I honestly never played at a table in 2e that even considered Method I, it's something I always associated with Basic D&D (and I'm not even sure how prevalent it was in that version of the game).

4d6k3 and arrange as you like was my 2e group's preferred method (no idea which of the many methods this was). When we played BECMI it was 3d6 in order, but that game had a system where you could reduce some stats to raise your prerequisite which helped a bit.

 

[cbwjm]

I think it is important because people are more likely to use the default method, and it is an indication from the designers that this is the expected way to generate ability scores. Again, people clearly used other methods. But this was certainly the one I encountered the most (I know a lot of 2E players for example who were surprised when they went back to 1E that it didn't use that method).

I've always felt that the reason 4d6k3 became the default for 3e was due to how many people were using it. I believe there was a playtest for 3e, maybe that was a question asked.

 

[cbwjm]

The 2e Forgotten Realms has a lot of dual options specialty priest options. The specialty priests in Forgotten Realms Adventures are different from the ones in Faiths & Avatars. The Egyptian ones in Powers & Pantheons are different from the ones in Legends & Lore. The individual FR ones that are overlapped with Legends & Lore ones (Tyr, Oghma, Silvanus, etc.) get their own FR versions. The demihuman gods in Demihuman Deities get different specialty priest mechanics from the ones in Monster Mythology.

Yeah, I know they're different overall but the similarities between them can allow players and DMs to make informed decisions by using the latest information in the books. What's interesting to note from the FR is that all priests of Isis are priest/wizards, so you could be a cleric/mage, mystic/mage, or specialist priest/mage; able to replace mage with specialist wizard (so long as it wasn't necromancer).

 

[Micah Sweet]

I don't know. I mean, 5e's default method is rolling, and most people seem to prefer point-buy. I don't think it's possible to find a consensus on how many people used Method I, but given the high stats most characters I saw had, I'm pretty sure it wasn't all that popular, lol.

One thing you keep saying about 2e is all these books were optional, thus preventing a CharOp mindset from coming into play. But so were all the 3e books! No DM was forced to use Magic of Arcanum, Tome of Battle, or Complete Adventurer, just as no DM was forced to use The Complete Sha'ir's Handbook or any Dragon Magazine content.

The main difference, as I see it, between the community that built up around the two editions was not only the internet, but the mindset of the role of the player and the DM.

In 2e, the DM was still considered the absolute authority, who no doubt had reams of house rules, and their own curated list of what was "kosher" for their tables.

In the year 2000, you had a lot of new players and a lot of old players who now had a forum to share their stories of DM power gone horribly wrong, and this mindset of "trust the rules, not the DM" began to appear, where in the TSR era, you couldn't trust the rules because there was simply too much vagueness that required a DM to sort out.

Random Example: The Complete Book of Humanoids doesn't allow Centaurs to be Priests, but Monster Mythology has a writeup for specialty Priests of Skerrit, the God of Centaurs. Paging the DM!

With all the effort put into balancing the game, surely what WotC was giving us could be trusted! Nothing is wrong with any of their player options! Surely if you gave players assumed wealth and magic items and used the CR system, nothing could go wrong!

Ah, how innocent we were. But it was an attractive illusion, since you could aim the rulebooks at stingy, recalcitrant DM's and tell them they were doing it wrong, a far cry from Gary's rants that if you were to give players a fair shake, they would utterly destroy your game world!

And of course, by the time we knew better, we were invested in the system, and, thanks to the OGL, the system was everywhere even if you wanted to change games, lol!

Sure, WotC eventually fessed up, but their solution to that was to sell us more books! Who didn't love getting errata to Polymorph in Complete Arcane or rebalanced magic items in the Magic Item Compendium? And of course, things like the Tome of Battle broke the community in half "wut, you mean martials are supposed to be good? Blasphemy!".

But I digress. Optimization was certainly there (anyone who has played Pool of Radiance or Baldur's Gate I knows), but there was a limit on what the DM would put up with, and it wasn't like most people had a plethora of other groups they could play with. Plus, people who scoured rulebooks for cool new options were NERDS, amirite?

A lot of people on forums seem to prefer point buy. I really don't know how well that translates to the far greater number of players who don't post.

 

[Bedrockgames]

4d6k3 and arrange as you like was my 2e group's preferred method (no idea which of the many methods this was). When we played BECMI it was 3d6 in order, but that game had a system where you could reduce some stats to raise your prerequisite which helped a bit.

The k3 is throwing me off, but did you use 4d6 drop the lowest and then assign as you wanted? That is method V in 2E (and it was method I in First edition)

 

[Voadam]

4d6k3 and arrange as you like was my 2e group's preferred method (no idea which of the many methods this was). When we played BECMI it was 3d6 in order, but that game had a system where you could reduce some stats to raise your prerequisite which helped a bit.

4d6K3 and arrange as you want is Method V in 2e, Method I in 1e.

 

[Bedrockgames]

A lot of people on forums seem to prefer point buy. I really don't know how well that translates to the far greater number of players who don't post.

This stuff is very hard to gauge. I do find a lot of online opinions tend to be more consensus oriented than offline.

 

[cbwjm]

The k3 is throwing me off, but did you use 4d6 drop the lowest and then assign as you wanted? That is method V in 2E (and it was method I in First edition)

Yeah sorry, Legend of the 5 rings used k as a shorthand notation for keep and I kind of picked it up. so 4d6k(eep)3 is the same as 4d6 drop the lowest.

 

[James Gasik]

A lot of people on forums seem to prefer point buy. I really don't know how well that translates to the far greater number of players who don't post.

That's a fair point, but I've run into some live 5e games where the DM's were nervous about die rolling making the characters possibly too strong, so it's not just forum goers.

 

[James Gasik]

Somehow my group landed on 4d6k3 (I too have played L5R!) but rerolled any result of 1. I have no idea who started it, but I've introduced it to 3e and Pathfinder groups and it seems pretty popular.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Somehow my group landed on 4d6k3 (I too have played L5R!) but rerolled any result of 1. I have no idea who started it, but I've introduced it to 3e and Pathfinder groups and it seems pretty popular.

It would produce a pretty high average, so I would very much expect it to be popular.

 

[Mannahnin]

Every group I ever played 2E with (over maybe 7 or 8 years of consistent play?) used more generous rolling methods than 3d6 in order. Finally settling on 4d6 drop lowest, three sets, pick one and arrange to taste.

IME everyone concluded from looking at the ability bonus tables that designating 3d6 in order as the default was an error; the tables were rationalized updates of Gygax's tables from 1E, in 1E 4d6 drop the lowest was method 1, and in the 1978 PH Gary outright told us that a PC should have at least two scores of 15 or better to be viable. The character gen example with Rath in the 2E PH seemed decidedly unheroic and unappealing.

What the Numbers Mean

Now that you have finished creating the ability scores for your character, stop and take a look at them. What does all this mean?

Suppose you decide to name your character "Rath" and you rolled the following ability scores for him:

Strength 8
Dexterity 14
Constitution 13
Intelligence 13
Wisdom 7
Charisma 6

Rath has strengths and weaknesses, but it is up to you to interpret what the numbers mean. Here are just two different ways these numbers could be interpreted.

1) Although Rath is in good health (Con 13), he's not very strong (Str 8) because he's just plain lazy--he never wanted to exercise as a youth and now it's too late. His low Wisdom and Charisma scores (7, 6) show that he lacks the common sense to apply himself properly and projects a slothful, "I'm not going to bother" attitude (which tends to irritate others). Fortunately, Rath's natural wit (Int 13) and Dexterity (14) keep him from being a total loss.

Thus, you might play Rath as an irritating, smart-alecky twerp forever ducking just out of range of those who want to squash him.

2) Rath has several good points--he has studied hard (Int 13) and practiced his manual skills (Dex 14). Unfortunately, his Strength is low (8) from a lack of exercise (all those hours spent reading books). Despite that, Rath's health is still good (Con 13). His low Wisdom and Charisma (7, 6) are a result of his lack of contact and involvement with people outside the realm of academics.

Looking at the scores this way, you could play Rath as a kindly, naive, and shy professorial type who's a good tinkerer, always fiddling with new ideas and inventions.

Obviously, Rath's ability scores (often called "stats") are not the greatest in the world. Yet it is possible to turn these "disappointing" stats into a character who is both interesting and fun to play. Too often players become obsessed with "good" stats. These players immediately give up on a character if he doesn't have a majority of above-average scores. There are even those who feel a character is hopeless if he does not have at least one ability of 17 or higher! Needless to say, these players would never consider playing a character with an ability score of 6 or 7.

In truth, Rath's survivability has a lot less to do with his ability scores than with your desire to role-play him. If you give up on him, of course he won't survive! But if you take an interest in the character and role-play him well, then even a character with the lowest possible scores can present a fun, challenging, and all-around exciting time. Does he have a Charisma of 5? Why? Maybe he's got an ugly scar. His table manners could be atrocious. He might mean well but always manage to say the wrong thing at the wrong time. He could be bluntly honest to the point of rudeness, something not likely to endear him to most people. His Dexterity is a 3? Why? Is he naturally clumsy or blind as a bat?

Don't give up on a character just because he has a low score. Instead, view it as an opportunity to role-play, to create a unique and entertaining personality in the game. Not only will you have fun creating that personality, but other players and the DM will have fun reacting to him.

While there's the core of a good sentiment there, certainly, about embracing characters who have a weakness or two and not obsessing over high stats, these are not inspiring characters. They are decidedly at odds with the messages implicitly communicated by the tables immediately preceding them, and they don't seem like the sorts who would go on the adventures TSR published.

And the statistical reality is that in a group of a half dozen players rolling 3d6 down the line, usually one or two are going to get a couple or few high scores, one or two are going to get garbage, and the rest of the group pretty average numbers. The disparity between the folks who naturally roll up a hero and those who roll up a spear-carrier or a Rath is not a recipe for fun.

3d6 down the line (with allowances for re-rolling "hopeless characters") was functional in OD&D and B/X or BECMI, all of which allowed swapping ability score points in increase your Prime Requisite. But AD&D was never designed around it.

I always guessed that the default in 2E was driven by misguided reader mail input, "hardcore" purist players sounding off.