D&D General Playing OD&D (1974) in the Year of the Dragon (2024)

[CleverNickName]

For all my long history with the hobby--I've been playing since the late 1980s--I've never played the original 1974 version of Dungeons & Dragons. And that's about to change!

A bit of background:

I have three gaming groups--my "main" gaming group plays 5E D&D every Friday night over Roll20, my spouse's gaming group also plays 5E D&D every third Saturday, and my high-school gaming group is still rocking the red-box BECM game over Roll20 one a month. I'm a lucky moogle.

Well, next month I will be 50 years old. An important milestone, for sure! It seemed most appropriate that I, someone who was born in 1974, should celebrate the occasion by playing the game that was also "born" in 1974. And this is 2024, the Year of the Dragon...so playing Dungeons and Dragons is just too perfect. It feels like the stars have aligned. And so for my 50th Birthday party, I'm rolling out the white booklet and hosting an OD&D gaming session.

Follow along!

 

[CleverNickName]

The first thing I had to do was get a group together. So last weekend, I sent out an email to everyone in my "regular" 5E D&D gaming group. They were slow to respond, so I sent an email out to my high-school gaming group. (I didn't reach out to my spouse's gaming group because it's rude to poach another DM's players, even if the other DM is your spouse.)

When the responses came in, they were enthusiastic.

Aaron: "Hell yeah brother, let's dooooo iiiiiit!"
Brad: "Sounds fun, count me in."
Chuck: "For a one-shot? Yes. For longer? Also yes."
Derrik: "never played it but sounds fun. anything for your birthday."
Edward: (hasn't responded, he can take weeks to check email. It's a problem.)

So I purchased the white-box "books" (in PDF format; they aren't available in POD yet) from DriveThruRPG for like $10. Then I made arrangements with a local printing service in town, to print me up six hardcopies of that PDF in a booklet format. All told, it cost me about $45 to supply myself and all of my players a hardcopy of the OD&D rules.

 

[CleverNickName]

Got it scheduled!

It'll be held on the weekend of my birthday (the last weekend in April). Myself, my five regular players, and my spouse will be invited. We've taken to calling it The Grognard Party even though "grognards" aren't supposed to play 5E. I can't tell if it's a term of endearment, or mockery.

It's not a "costume party," at least not officially, but I'm asking the guests to wear clothing inspired by 1970s fashion...RayBan glasses, bell bottom pants, leisure suits, cowl-neck sweaters, boogie shoes, that sort of thing.

The plan is to have a nice dinner here at our house, complete with cake and ice cream. The meal will be as close to classic 1970s as I can manage: I'm thinking fondue, baked ziti, pineapple upside down cake...using vintage recipes if we can find them. There are a lot of terrible recipes from the 1970s that we'll be avoiding (I'm looking at you, mayonnaise salad.)

Music? You know it's gonna be disco, funk, and classic rock. Bee Gees, Stevie Wonder, Bread, The Jackson Five, Eagles, KC and the Sunshine Band. Brad is going to build a playlist on YouTube, and will sprinkle in a few news clips about Watergate, the Iran Hostage Crisis, and Apollo 13, maybe a few classic TV commercials for Coca-Cola, Alka-Seltzer, and so on. Really lean into the 1970s vibe.

But that's all window-dressing. The heart of the evening will be the gaming session.

Instead of using pregen characters, I am going to convert ("recreate" would be more apt) their 5E characters into their OD&D counterparts. It's a daunting task, because we have:

• An 11th level changeling artificer,
• A 12th level firbolg druid,
• A 13th level human gunslinger,
• A 13th level human bard,
• A 12th level goliath paladin,
• and a brand-new character of my spouse's creation.

And then I'm going to convert (again, "recreate" is probably more apt) the current adventure they are on. In the weeks leading up to my birthday, the heroes of the story are going to get thrown backward in time and have to stop a mad Wizard Magic-User from upsetting the timeline and preventing a powerful lich from being defeated.

I'm going to have to sit with this for a while. Stay tuned! (And post any conversion advice, notes, or experiences below...I've never played OD&D and I need all the help I can get.)

 

[overgeeked]

Sounds fun. Except for the disco.

You’d probably be better off having the 5E PCs’ minds inhabit the bodies of OD&D characters. Otherwise you’re going to need to custom build most of the character classes and races.

 

[CleverNickName]

Sounds fun. Except for the disco.

Why disco? Because that's the way, uh-huh uh-huh, I like it.

You’d probably be better off having the 5E PCs’ minds inhabit the bodies of OD&D characters. Otherwise you’re going to need to custom build most of the character classes and races.

That's a good idea, actually. I'll mull it over--I was really looking forward to showing the players what their characters could look like under the 1974 rules. (The popular belief is that OD&D is super-restrictive and can't 'handle' more modern character concepts. It's certainly not true in BECM, I wanted to test that thesis in OD&D.)

But if I use standard, by-the-book OD&D characters, it would free up some extra time for me to focus on the adventure. Hmm.

 

[overgeeked]

Why disco? Because that's the way, uh-huh uh-huh, I like it.

I hate disco.

That's a good idea, actually. I'll mull it over--I was really looking forward to showing the players what their characters could look like under the 1974 rules. (It's a popular misconception that OD&D is super-restrictive and can't 'handle' more modern character concepts. It's certainly not true in BECM, I wanted to test that thesis in OD&D.)

But if I use standard, by-the-book OD&D characters, it would free up some extra time for me to focus on the adventure. Hmm.

It absolutely can handle whatever you want to do with it. But you’ll have to design it yourself. In a version of the system you’re not that familiar with. In a month. On top of everything else.

If it were me, I’d stick with OD&D characters. I’d see the point of the exercise as playing OD&D on its own terms. Not seeing if I could jam 5E characters into OD&D.

 

[scruffygrognard]

Instead of using pregen characters, I am going to convert ("recreate" would be more apt) their 5E characters into their OD&D counterparts. It's a daunting task, because we have:

• An 11th level changeling artificer,
• A 12th level firbolg druid,
• A 13th level human gunslinger,
• A 13th level human bard,
• A 12th level goliath paladin,
• and a brand-new character of my spouse's creation.

That's a tall order for OD&D. Maybe something like:

• 9th level doppleganger wizard. Level adjusted due to doppleganger abilities.
• 9th level hairy hill giant druid. Level adjusted due to giant abilities.
• 13th level human fighter with two 6-shooters, like Murlynd in Gary's Greyhawk game.
• 13th level human bard. See The Strategic Review from February of 1976 for this class.
• 12th level human paladin with giant blood, so he's Large.

 

[scruffygrognard]

DOPPLEGANGERS: These are creatures with mutable form, able to shape themselves into the double of any person that they can observe. Dopplegangers are subject to neither Sleep nor Charm spells. They are also magic-resistant, saving against all forms of magical attack as if they were 10th level fighters.

 

[CleverNickName]

DOPPLEGANGERS: These are creatures with mutable form, able to shape themselves into the double of any person that they can observe. Dopplegangers are subject to neither Sleep nor Charm spells. They are also magic-resistant, saving against all forms of magical attack as if they were 10th level fighters.

This is brilliant. I was expecting to dig into the monster manual for half the party (especially the changeling), but this saves me a bit of time.

A lot of the Artificer abilities can be just wizard spells that have been reskinned, or described as coming from a wrench instead of a wand, that sort of thing. The player isn't going to have access to a lot of his favorite spells and abilities, but I'm okay with that. Same thing for the druid (which I'm imagining will be a cleric who worships Mother Nature.) I want this to still be OD&D 1974, not "5E with upside-down Armor Class."

 

[overgeeked]

This is brilliant. I was expecting to dig into the monster manual for half the party (especially the changeling), but this saves me a bit of time.

A lot of the Artificer abilities can be just wizard spells that have been reskinned, or described as coming from a wrench instead of a wand, that sort of thing. The player isn't going to have access to a lot of his favorite spells and abilities, but I'm okay with that. Same thing for the druid (which I'm imagining will be a cleric who worships Mother Nature.) I want this to still be OD&D 1974, not "5E with upside-down Armor Class."

The Eldritch Wizardry supplement has druids.