Sing to me, O Muse, of BECMI!

[Cruentus]

Love it. My son actually fought the bandits, befriended the kobolds (the ones further inside, not the guards), and is cautiously neutral with the cleric. I did play it off as people were using the castle in passing, but I like your idea even better!

 

[Iosue]

What I loved about BECMI, but don't think it can really be replicated, was how it guided us to our game world in stages. I started playing when an older boy lent me (and later gave me) his copies of B/X. So when I started playing with my siblings and my friend, we started off in dungeons, as you do. At one point, my father saw the Red Box at the store and thought, "Oh, that's that game the kids are playing. Maybe they'll like this." And even though it was essentially the same rules, we were pretty happy to get a brand new set all our own.

Then when we got to 4th level, and started using the X-pert rules, we started exploring the wilderness. We could never find the Mentzer Expert Set until long after we didn't really need it anymore. First we started with the hex map included in the Expert Rules book, and then we started building beyond that. Our map started add new realms and kingdoms, and areas to adventure in. As our characters started reaching Name Level, I got the Companion Rules. And one of the big features of the Companion Rules was the Domain Rules. So it was like, okay, now our characters get to be the movers and shakers in the world, and we started fleshing out the political situation of our world: who was at war, who were allies, who were the Good, the Neutral, and the Chaotic realms, what the elves, dwarves, and halflings were doing, who governed magic, and so on. We made new characters who were the sons/daughters/apprentices of the original party, and who were now doing the dungeons and wilderness exploring in the world that our original party had carved out for them.

Then I got the Master Set, and I could see that now our adventures would revolve around world-shaking events and/or multi-dimensional adventuring...and that was pretty much when high school started, and we got together to play less and less, and the great Master Level adventure never got out of its embryonic stage as our days of playing D&D slowly came to an end...without any of us actually realizing it at the time. I never got the Immortal Set.

I won't say that the same kind of progression can't or won't happen with the Core Three set-up. I can only say I don't think it would have happened for us, necessarily. At least, not at ages 11-15. It was like the rules unleashed our creativity, but the staged nature of the different rule sets focused it.

 

[deganawida]

Ok, after a great deal of soul-searching and experimentation, I've concluded that I really like the overall Classic D&D moreso than AD&D (heresy, I know) and the d20 D&Ds. Further, I do believe that I prefer what I've seen of BECMI to what I've experienced with just B/X (nothing against B/X). I think I'll pick up some of the books when I get my next allowance*.

Next question: How hard are these to reference in actual play? I have read that there are some major differences (though only about 5%) between BECMI and RC. I have a PDF of RC, but it's pretty much just a reference book.

*After paying bills, giving my wife what she wants for her next sewing video, paying my daughters their allowance, and so forth, I get a hundred a month to blow on myself. Being the dad and sole income earner means that I put them and their needs and wishes ahead of my own. My wife and I argue about it sometimes because I will refuse it if we have something unexpected come up, which she doesn't think is fair. So, it's not really an allowance.

 

[CleverNickName]

Ok, after a great deal of soul-searching and experimentation, I've concluded that I really like the overall Classic D&D moreso than AD&D (heresy, I know) and the d20 D&Ds. Further, I do believe that I prefer what I've seen of BECMI to what I've experienced with just B/X (nothing against B/X). I think I'll pick up some of the books when I get my next allowance*.

Welcome, sibling!

Next question: How hard are these to reference in actual play? I have read that there are some major differences (though only about 5%) between BECMI and RC. I have a PDF of RC, but it's pretty much just a reference book.

True to its name, the Rules Cyclopedia was intended to be a reference book for seasoned BECM players, and not for newcomers. The RC feels like it was written for people who had been playing the four boxed sets for years, and wanted to have all of the different rules in one place. It's the most important RPG book on my shelf, but it isn't very user-friendly.

You'll find lots of different opinions about whether these changes are good or bad, but honestly? I've played a lot of the BECM edition and the RC over the decades, and I've never noticed a difference. The biggest difference that most people will point to between BECM and RC is the Thief's ability table...if you're playing a Thief, you'll want to take note.

 

[Voadam]

I have read that there are some major differences (though only about 5%) between BECMI and RC.

The big one I believe is that RC is essentially BECM and skips the I of Immortals entirely as a PC thing. BECMI has immortals as a boxed set stage of the game with a series of modules for immortal PCs. RC has a couple pages on immortals and how PCs can become one, but then says once they achieve it they should be retired from play to be NPCs.

 

[Ralif Redhammer]

Ok, after a great deal of soul-searching and experimentation, I've concluded that I really like the overall Classic D&D moreso than AD&D (heresy, I know) and the d20 D&Ds. Further, I do believe that I prefer what I've seen of BECMI to what I've experienced with just B/X (nothing against B/X). I think I'll pick up some of the books when I get my next allowance*.

I love them both, and both evoke a huge amount of nostalgia for me. But when I go back and look at both products, the Basic line does a better job at presenting D&D in an easy-to-understand, concise format.

 

[cbwjm]

The RC was how I learned to play DnD, I still love the book and I love the games that are BECMI/BX adjacent. Soon I'll be joining an OSE game, Maybe I'll play an elf, what class? That is the class!

 

[cavalier973]

Ok, after a great deal of soul-searching and experimentation, I've concluded that I really like the overall Classic D&D moreso than AD&D (heresy, I know) and the d20 D&Ds. Further, I do believe that I prefer what I've seen of BECMI to what I've experienced with just B/X (nothing against B/X). I think I'll pick up some of the books when I get my next allowance*.

Next question: How hard are these to reference in actual play? I have read that there are some major differences (though only about 5%) between BECMI and RC. I have a PDF of RC, but it's pretty much just a reference book.

*After paying bills, giving my wife what she wants for her next sewing video, paying my daughters their allowance, and so forth, I get a hundred a month to blow on myself. Being the dad and sole income earner means that I put them and their needs and wishes ahead of my own. My wife and I argue about it sometimes because I will refuse it if we have something unexpected come up, which she doesn't think is fair. So, it's not really an allowance.

The Mentzer Basic Player Book has several pages in the middle that have just about all the info that a player needs.

The DM will have to make his own charts, though. Not a big problem, really, since Basic only goes to level 3.

The Castle Mistamere adventure is pretty good; amusingly weird and potentially frustrating. “Bill the Fighter decided to take a nap on the bed in this room, and now we can’t wake him! Hmmm…maybe if we carry him to this other bed in this other room, he will wake up. Hey! It worked!” Who would think like that? Also, the talking box. If I were playing, I would probably waste everyone’s time trying every thing I could think of to get the box to talk again, or to get it open. But, nope. The box asks two questions, then is silent forever after.

The second level dungeon is laid out, but the DM populates it with monsters and treasure, with a few pieces of advice how to do so.

The third level, Bargle’s hideout/cave, is for the DM to design completely.

Changing subjects, It wasn’t until a much later edition that they included a DM screen. It’s called the “Combat Shield and Mini-adventure”, and the pdf is $2 at Dmsguild/drivethrurpg. The info on the screen for PCs only goes up to level 14 (xp, spell progression, etc.), except for the thief skills chart, which goes up to level 25.

Necrotic Gnome has referee screen inserts available is pdf on drivethrurpg for $6, or $12 if you want the physical cards. Since OSE is a B/X clone, the info will only cover up to level 14 for PCs.

I made my own DM screen:

 

[cavalier973]

For a hex crawl adventure, you might consider “The Evils of Illmire”.

There is a podcast, “3d6, Down the Line”, that has two campaigns using the OSE rules. The first is the Dolmenwood campaign, which is a hexcrawl, and uses several of Necrotic Gnome’s adventures, including “Winter’s Daughter”, and “The Ruined Abbey of St. Clewyd”, so, spoilers if you listen to it. They ended this campaign, and switched to
“The Halls of Arden Vul”, which is a megadungeon.

They follow the rules for timekeeping, resource management—including keeping track of how many turns their torch has been burning—having a mapper, and encumbrance (they use a house rule, where the character can carry a number of items equal to the character’s CON score). They also use a house rule for “death and dismemberment, which may come from Necrotic Gnome. When a character drops to zero hit points, a die is rolled and a chart consulted. Sometimes the character just dies, sometimes the character may lose a body part.

There is rarely a thief character; normally, the players just tell the DM what their characters are looking at or doing, and the DM rules whether the characters succeed, sometimes based on a die roll. There are some sessions where they don’t roll the dice at all.

 

[deganawida]

Well, tonight, after much deliberation and attempts at other D&D and non-D&D systems, I begin my BECMI campaign with my two daughters and my wife. I'm adapting the Aleena/Bargle adventure to cover the three of them.

Each of them wanted to play a specific race with a mundane adventuring goal, not a character class, and hate complexity more than I do (I actually enjoy it in some systems, just not D&D), so BECMI seemed the perfect choice.

The Mrs.: A kender seamstress looking for some special magical fabric to make the perfect gown. I'll wing kender from halfling and thief.

The Eldest: A gnome mailwoman delivering packages, and some are missing. Probably use Bruce Heard's revised gnome for this.

The Youngest: A goblin who a group of adventurers adopted, thinking she's just another adventurer, while the goblin just wants friends.

I'll be stealing some ideas from DCC (luck stat), Shadowdark (that system's roll-to-cast and goblin), AD&D 2nd Edition (kender and gnome stats), OSE for the screen, EDIT: 5e advantage/disadvantage, and also taking elements of the old computer game series Quest for Glory for how a paladin should be done. Thinking of making Bargle my own little Skeletor and paying homage to Masters of the Universe.

Should be fun. I'll post on how it goes.