perception of OD&D/AD&D as random deathtraps

[Olgar Shiverstone]

In my experience, the lethality in B/XD&D and 1E D&D was almost entirely due to save-or-die spells and random trap effects. Sometimes even the placement of traps was as randomly bizarre as treasure (and hanging in the corner is a dwarven thrower ...).

Now, many of those random/lethal effects you can chalk up to "don't do something stupid" -- drink from the fountain, pull the level, climb in to the demon's mouth. But save-or-die, particularly with poison was pretty bad. Heck, the example of play ni the BD&D rulebook is a perfect example: Black Dougal opens the chest, gets pricked by a poisoned needle, and drops dead (wisely, the party loots his body along with the chest).

I don't mean that as a criticism -- I found some of the random lethality, at least that associated with bad player choices, to add to the fun. So long as you weren't too attached to your character. One-roll-poison-death really sucked, though.

 

[Imp]

I agree with those who are saying that 3.5 is at least as lethal as 1e, difference being that it's the straight-up fights – or, more likely, the not-so-straight-up fights, since there's a tendency to plan out elaborate ambushes* – that'll kill you in 3.5, plus in 1e you eventually get a pretty decent cushion against the dying... save-or-dies are somewhat more frequent, but at high levels your chances are much better because DCs don't go up (much).

*there was advice in the 1e DMG about setting up intelligent encounters, but 3.5 has more rules to exploit dirty-fighting-wise... only so much you can do with 1e arrow slits.

 

[thedungeondelver]

I agree with those who are saying that 3.5 is at least as lethal as 1e, difference being that it's the straight-up fights – or, more likely, the not-so-straight-up fights, since there's a tendency to plan out elaborate ambushes* – that'll kill you in 3.5, plus in 1e you eventually get a pretty decent cushion against the dying... save-or-dies are somewhat more frequent, but at high levels your chances are much better because DCs don't go up (much).

*there was advice in the 1e DMG about setting up intelligent encounters, but 3.5 has more rules to exploit dirty-fighting-wise... only so much you can do with 1e arrow slits.

Hmm, I don't know about that; the DUNGEON MASTERS GUIDE goes on at length about monsters being fiendishly clever. Throw in some Witch Doctors and let a dispel magic fly at a party. Of course, monsters can use burning oil, set ambushes, retreat to better fighting positions, and use some pretty nasty weapons (the ranseur, for instance, can disarm opponents on a to-hit against AC8, for example).

Its all in the DM.

 

[Glyfair]

Then again, there's some old Dragon articles (and Glyfair can point to them) where the writer talks about going through literally hundreds of PC's. (OD&D I believe)

Here is my review of that issue covering that article.

"It's a Good Day to Die (Death Statistics of D&D Characters)" has the author listing the deaths in his campaign and attributing them to various sources. He says there were 600 deaths (including only PCs and their hirelings, not mercenaries and NPCs). The highest is goblinoid races with about 10% of the total, dragons coming second with about 7%.

There is actually quite a bit of discussion of that article in the thread.

 

[Jhaelen]

All of my experiences with 'random deathtraps' have been with homebrew adventures. Official adventures also sometimes had deathtraps, but they were typically not random (noteworthy exception being the Tomb of Horror).

It also depended a lot on the DM. With one DM I had about a dozen characters, never surviving until level 3. Another DM was quickly getting (in)famous for killing PCs when the mood struck him (which was only a question of time).
But I also remember two very fair DMs (both also using homebrew stuff, btw.) - luckily one of them was the first one I encountered, otherwise I'd probably pursue a different hobby now...

 

[Numion]

um... does the thief survive. yes. he didn't go down into the tunnel.

In other news, the farmer also survived. He didn't go adventuring

 

[Andre]

I'm curious where the perception that AD&D/OD&D is save or die (or, to use the logical next step to ehren37's stance, "just die") originated, and, perhaps more importantly, why it is so often broadly applied to all D&D game play before 2e.

First off, don't look at the modules. White box OD&D came first - modules came years later. A lot of people played before there were any modules, much less dozens (hundreds).

Take a look at the examples in the original rules. I believe there's one paragraph where Gygax describes how a party can - unwittingly - descend several dungeon levels. Since early dungeons were supposed to get deadlier the lower you went, you could easily end up with 2nd-level characters facing 6th-level monsters.

To all those who attribute the early killer dungeon style to "bad" GMing, remember - when the game first came out, no one knew how to GM. We muddled through, made every mistake possible (some more than once), and pretty much made it up as we went. And death wasn't always a big deal -certainly not if you were playing a character in his first adventure.

I still remember one GM and I discussing how to challenge high-level (11th-14th) characters and we realized that killing them wasn't it - the GM could easily kill them, they would raise dead, rinse and repeat. Challenges became more about the characters' goals - making the characters (players) work for what they wanted, not just killing them. (Which may show that we were finally learning how to GM properly)

I'm one of those grognards who remember going into lots of dungeons with 6-8 characters and coming out a hour later with two survivors. We rolled up replacement characters and did it all over again. It wasn't until characters reached about 6th level that deaths declined dramatically (though a TPK could still happen).

If you want to know where the idea of random death and destruction, "killer" dungeons, and such came from, just read the original three rulebooks.

 

[Andre]

BTW, I agree with those who say 3.x can be just as deadly. One the main reasons is that when the designers decided which cool bits to include, they included a lot of rules where success or failure can be determined by a single die roll. The problem is that characters will have far more opportunities to fail such rolls than the average monster. Over time, a character is virtually guaranteed to fail some of them - the law of averages and all that. Gygax wrote an article many years ago arguing against popular critical success/failure rules for that very reason.

 

[Korgoth]

If you want to know where the idea of random death and destruction, "killer" dungeons, and such came from, just read the original three rulebooks.

I consider your analysis to be inaccurate. Evidence:

"5. The combinations here are really vicious, and unless you're out to get your players it is not suggested for actual use."

And especially:

"The fear of "death", its risk each time, is one of the most stimulating parts of the game. It therefore behooves the campaign referee to include as many mystifying and dangerous areas as is consistent with a reasonable chance of survival (remembering that the monster population already threatens this survival). For example, there is no question that a player's character could easily be killed by falling into a pit thirty feet deep or into a shallow pit filled with poisoned spikes, and this is quite undesirable in most instances."

(emphasis added)

 

[gizmo33]

I consider your analysis to be inaccurate.

I think it could go either way. "Here's an example dungeon, but don't use it!" Yea, don't try this at home.