Starting "Old SChool" gaming

[Remathilis]

The description for this 1e Thief function is:

When running 1e, I typically don't allow Thieves to use 'Find Traps' to locate large construction-type traps like pits and such. (Although dwarves have a relevant racial ability that can help them out.)

Other DMs prefer to leverage the DMG's note that "small or large traps" can be found to expand the scope of the function; I prefer the more focused scope, or an interpretation that allows Thieves to act on mechanical/clockwork-type traps where there is access to the mechanisms, regardless of size. More of a case-by-case judgment call. (Actually, I prefer the OD&D approach, where the Thief lacks a Find Traps ability -- it's limited to Remove Trap.)

See, I was coming here to recommend Basic Fantasy and I got caught seeing this.

I guess I'm one of those DMs who like the "Find Traps" ability of a thief. I ALWAYS allow a thief/rogue to find "traps" (be it spells/wards, pit-traps, or mechanical traps) and disarm them with the roll (or rolls). The only exception is natural hazards (quicksand, etc). It lets the thief feel empowered doing his job and doesn't get into the myriad of "what is a small-mechancal trap" arguments that make me want to roll my eyes. Let the thief do his job; steal, trapfind, sneak, and scout dammit! Don't play "Guess that I'm thinking" with the thief player who just wants to know is the dang hall gonna support his weight or not!

 

[Scribble]

Scribble, one could always go with Champions / Hero System if one really wanted more mechanically defined options with that whole sub-game and maximum flexibility compatible with such rules heaviness.

Again -- that is, relative to Hero System as well as to less comprehensively defined rules sets -- the advantage of 3e or 4e is one of more restrictions.

I still say it doesn't matter what rules system you're using, it just depends on the type of gamer you are.

If you look at old school D&D, and see that there are no rules for say, a wizard using a sword, one type of gamer will look at that rule set and think, "This sucks, my wizard can't ever use a sword."

Another type will look at it and think, "Of course, anyone can use a sword, I either just have to make rules for the wizard using the sword, or just let wizards use swords."

If you're the first type, you'll see the game as more restrictive, and not allowing you to customize as much as you'd like. If you're the second type, you'll probably see it as less restrictive.

I don't feel either way is the "better" way, just that if the game has a rule for something that means it's taken that option into account with it's number scheme (or at least it tried to.)

 

[Umbran]

I still say it doesn't matter what rules system you're using, it just depends on the type of gamer you are.

There are two kinds of people in the world - those who divide the world into two kinds of people, and those who don't.

There are two ways to look at rules. The first way is this: "If rules are restrictions, then everything that is not covered by the rules is permited."

....

The alternate approach is one I see from time to time put forth by proponents of modern gaming, and it is, "The rules are a set of permissions telling you what you can do."

Or, you know, there's the possibility that the world is not divided into polar opposites. I see a lot of this around these days. New/Old school. Things are always X, or always Y, and never in between.

When I play, we have rules. They describe a lot of stuff (or a little, depending on the game we are playing). Sometimes, as a DM, I allow stuff that's outside the rules, and sometimes I don't, as I feel that while the desired action is not strictly prohibited, it is not really consistent with the world the rules hold together.

Anecdotal, certainly, but it is my personal experience that few actually run the game at one pole or the other (whatever the current poles of discussion are). They wander around between. Practical common sense takes hold, and sometimes one sticks strongly to the rules, and sometimes one deviates from them, depending on local conditions, rather than upon what "school" or what "type of gamer" they are.

I've come to think of the Old/New School thing rather like I think of GNS and later Forge theory. It is a model. A framework that may be useful for purposes of thought and analysis. It is simplified for sake of clarity, an approximation that focuses on the subjects we want to consider - but that means that it is not generally directly applicable to the real world. The real world doesn't follow the model exactly.

 

[Ariosto]

There are two ways to look at rules.

There are two ways to look at the WotC resource-management game of "builds": either we're playing it, or we're not. If you are, but I am not, then what do you get?

 

[Treebore]

This pretty much sums up my thoughts on the issue. I use both die rolls and descriptive searching, depending on the situation.

Philotomy your website does not seem to be working.

 

[Celebrim]

Or, you know, there's the possibility that the world is not divided into polar opposites. I see a lot of this around these days. New/Old school. Things are always X, or always Y, and never in between.

You mean like...

that neither 'old school' nor 'new school' is inherently entirely one or the other and that, while it is possible to play it entirely one way or the other, in practice most people don't and have good reasons for doing so.

But on the other hand...

Sometimes, as a DM, I allow stuff that's outside the rules, and sometimes I don't, as I feel that while the desired action is not strictly prohibited, it is not really consistent with the world the rules hold together.

Your evidence doesn't address what you proport to refute. From the sound of it, you are a 'rules as restrictions' DM that allows things outside the rules. Just because you are a 'rules as restrictions' DM, doesn't mean that you allow players to cast 9th level spells at 1st level, or walk through walls (without some enabling ability), or whatever. Just because you are open to propositions not couched in the language of the rules doesn't imply that you let the character accomplish whatever they ask to do. Saying 'yes' has never meant letting the PC's do whatever they want.

Anecdotal, certainly, but it is my personal experience that few actually run the game at one pole or the other (whatever the current poles of discussion are).

If you don't know what the poles of discussion are, it would be better not to comment on them. I agree that for most topics, few people take anything to an illogical extreme, but quite often its not the illogical extreme that is being discussed.

They wander around between. Practical common sense takes hold, and sometimes one sticks strongly to the rules, and sometimes one deviates from them, depending on local conditions, rather than upon what "school" or what "type of gamer" they are.

I'm not sure what that means. However, I can say that I've dealt with players before that would have been outraged at any deviation from the rules that they could prove was a deviation, and I have heard from (on these boards) DMs that insist that its bad DMing to ever deviate from the letter of the rules. So perhaps there are more things under heaven and earth than exist in your reasonable moderate philosophy.

 

[Celebrim]

There are two ways to look at the WotC resource-management game of "builds": either we're playing it, or we're not. If you are, but I am not, then what do you get?

Usually, frustration.

 

[Ariosto]

Different "old school" DMs certainly did and do have different approaches. One might have a puzzle solved by dice-roll, especially for a character of exceptional intelligence and experience level; another might pose an analogous puzzle to the player. I detest "fudging", but have come across indications that the biggest names among the hobby's pioneers indulged in it on occasion. There are even "railroad conductors", story-driven or otherwise. And of course the D&D supplements and Dragon magazine issues of the 1970s and 1980s offer sometimes amazingly baroque house rules on one subject after another. (Sometimes simpler ones as well; I don't know who liked the unarmed-combat rules in the 1st ed. DMG, which Gary disavowed.)

The thing is that you've got a simpler starting point and a lot of freedom to do your own thing -- even if it's the opposite of someone else's thing -- without "playing the game wrong". A book from TSR is not in charge; the DM is in charge.

Sure, players unfamiliar with the AD&D "standard" rules might be at a disadvantage in tournaments, but that's not widely relevant.

I personally would not be inclined to run an old-style D&D game without magic. There goes half the PHB, and another big chunk of the DMG. What's the point of lugging the books then?

With 3e and 4e, a lot more seems "essential". Certainly the fans I've met see little point in parting with the weight of rules apparatus; and in any case I see little appeal in spending hundreds of dollars on material that's just going to gather dust. "Use it or lose it" at some point seems sensible.

I get plenty of use out of the Gygaxian DMG without bogging down my game in such continual look-ups of trivia as make up the central activity of a typical 3e or 4e session in my experience.

Not that I'm dead-set against that kind of thing. I happen to like Chivalry & Sorcery, which is famously rules-heavy.

It's just that C&S is not D&D.

 

[Raven Crowking]

Do you want me to go down the rathole of rhetorical technicalities with you? Because I will. The meat of my argument will be that your definition of "strawman" is not the only one extant, and by others those points do qualify. I figure we could take a week on that.

Truly? To what end, I wonder?

Calling something a "strawman" (or any other logical fallacy), when there is a logical fallacy involved, means that the opposing position is not rationally consistent. If there really is rational inconsistency, then anyone who continues to argue along irrational lines is being irrational. One can dismiss an irrational position as such.

So, if someone makes a claim that X is an irrational position because of logical fallacy Y, and logical fallacy Y does not apply, pointing out that logical fallacy Y doesn't apply is discrediting his argument on the only basis available, because the claim that X is irrational is based upon logic, and logical "jargon" either does, or does not, apply.

How about instead we not try to discredit his argument on the basis of whether he used a piece of internet jargon correctly, and instead concentrate on whether he's got a point despite the technicality.

How about instead we try to stop people who come in to threadcrap? This thread is about old school gaming, and coming in to question the value of the topic wouldn't be accepted if this was, say, about 4e D&D.

It is fine that you, or Hobo, don't believe in Old School gaming (as opposed to New School, or not opposed to anything -- there is only a false dichotomy if you falsely demand that there is a dichotomy to begin with). However, this is threadcrapping pure and simple.

It would be nice if non-WotC-D&D threadcrapping were dealt with as threadcrapping is in 4e threads.



RC

 

[Raven Crowking]

The perception check, whether the 3e version, or the many kludged pre-3e versions I've seen have always been weird to me. It just doesn't match my style of play.

RCFG uses Perception as a save, used to avoid surprise, locate secret doors, etc. It can also be used to search and spot things where there is a question as to whether or not the PCs see it. If the PCs look under the bed, they see the golden goblet, but if they are searching through the ogre's pile of mouldy bedding, do they notice that the stiff, dirty, mud-encrusted cloak is better than average?


RC