D&D General The Renewing Charm of the Old School Play Experience

[pogre]

I am a fifth edition fan, but recently my 16-year-old son started an old school D&D campaign. My son is a grognard at heart and was excited to be back in the DM chair and so, I went along. We recruited a couple of more players via Zoom and my youngest boy jumped in to play as well. The short story is it has been a lot of fun and made me realize a lot of the charms of earlier editions.

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You had better not get attached to that character you are playing. Like a Quentin Tarantino movie, the minute you love that character - it’s gone. When your PC goes down you better believe the rest of your party is swarming over that gear. Even worse, if your fighter goes down and you have to skedaddle - you may want to avoid that room on the next delve, because that nasty goblin boss is going to be wearing that splint mail and carrying that shiny longsword!

Sure, we have dreams of that Nirvana of second level, and occasionally, a thief or cleric hits second level. And if a character hits the rarefied air of third level, and the player starts to gain confidence, the blade comes down on old Ned Stark’s neck.

My son is not an adversarial DM at all. He pulls no punches though. Rolls in the open for combat and there are death saves. It strikes me a lot of the things I hated about old school D&D are the things I love about old school D&D.

The constant threat of your character’s demise keeps you in the moment and makes the routine an adventure. The players have jumped into their characters' personas - even with their limited expected life spans. Negotiation is a necessary tactic and sometimes you even have to give up some of your hard won gold. Standoffs are more tense - you know you probably can take this group of gnolls, but you also know a character is probably going to fall.

Hirelings report to each other how they were treated and note who returns when delving with the party, and more importantly, who does not!

There is something freeing about bringing a back-up character to the game. Not because you are careless - quite the opposite - but, because you focus on the events.

Fifth edition can capture some of this playstyle, but to me, that’s not its design goal. This flavor is best experienced with old school rules

My years-long 5th edition campaign will not take a back seat to the old school rules. As I said, fifth edition is still my favorite. Even so, I would encourage you to give some old school gaming a new run. It’s true - I am fairly old, but it is not just nostalgia. There is something invigorating about the old school style of play!

 

[Fenris-77]

I've been reading Five Torches Deep lately and it's given me a real jones for some OSR action. I like 5TD because it's 5E compatible so I can use all the same resources I have but porting over an old school module (which is very much the plan) is also pretty trivial matter.

I think I may take 5TD and use it for a Midgard campaign.

 

[pogre]

We played tonight and my magic user was hit by two ghoul attacks! First, the DM rolled a 1 and a 2 for damage, Fortunately I have 4 hit points. Then, I made two consecutive paralyze saves. I then stabbed the undead fiend with my dagger - rolled a 4 and killed it!

Cheers all around!

 

[HJFudge]

Ah I do have fond memories of playing some really old school, high lethality dungeon delves in middle school with my friends.

The issue, of course, being that at the age and maturity level we all were, it invariably caused issues and we'd use whoever was GMing to try and 'cheat'.

I participated as an adult in a Old School 1st Edition style dungeon crawl last year, but I just couldn't get into it. I guess I'm just not into that style anymore! But I do enjoy reading about those who like it and their adventures

 

[Umbran]

Fifth edition can capture some of this playstyle, but to me, that’s not its design goal. This flavor is best experienced with old school rules

With respect, it doesn't take, "old school rules" to play a game with high lethality, which is most of what you speak of here. Just build every encounter in the "deadly" range, and you'll hit it just fine.

 

[pogre]

With respect, it doesn't take, "old school rules" to play a game with high lethality, which is most of what you speak of here. Just build every encounter in the "deadly" range, and you'll hit it just fine.

Fair enough. We can agree to disagree. I certainly have the occasional fatality in 5e, but the experience feels very different with the older rules to me.

 

[Parmandur]

I am a fifth edition fan, but recently my 16-year-old son started an old school D&D campaign. My son is a grognard at heart and was excited to be back in the DM chair and so, I went along. We recruited a couple of more players via Zoom and my youngest boy jumped in to play as well. The short story is it has been a lot of fun and made me realize a lot of the charms of earlier editions.

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​

You had better not get attached to that character you are playing. Like a Quentin Tarantino movie, the minute you love that character - it’s gone. When your PC goes down you better believe the rest of your party is swarming over that gear. Even worse, if your fighter goes down and you have to skedaddle - you may want to avoid that room on the next delve, because that nasty goblin boss is going to be wearing that splint mail and carrying that shiny longsword!

Sure, we have dreams of that Nirvana of second level, and occasionally, a thief or cleric hits second level. And if a character hits the rarefied air of third level, and the player starts to gain confidence, the blade comes down on old Ned Stark’s neck.

My son is not an adversarial DM at all. He pulls no punches though. Rolls in the open for combat and there are death saves. It strikes me a lot of the things I hated about old school D&D are the things I love about old school D&D.

The constant threat of your character’s demise keeps you in the moment and makes the routine an adventure. The players have jumped into their characters' personas - even with their limited expected life spans. Negotiation is a necessary tactic and sometimes you even have to give up some of your hard won gold. Standoffs are more tense - you know you probably can take this group of gnolls, but you also know a character is probably going to fall.

Hirelings report to each other how they were treated and note who returns when delving with the party, and more importantly, who does not!

There is something freeing about bringing a back-up character to the game. Not because you are careless - quite the opposite - but, because you focus on the events.

Fifth edition can capture some of this playstyle, but to me, that’s not its design goal. This flavor is best experienced with old school rules

My years-long 5th edition campaign will not take a back seat to the old school rules. As I said, fifth edition is still my favorite. Even so, I would encourage you to give some old school gaming a new run. It’s true - I am fairly old, but it is not just nostalgia. There is something invigorating about the old school style of play!

Introduce your son to Dungeon Crawl Classics: he'd have fun with it, methinks.

 

[Fenris-77]

My enjoyment of OSR play has a lot more components than higher lethality. There's something about the streamlined character builds, the dungeons, the slightly gonzo everything. It's not just 5e on hardcore mode, at least not for me anyway. I find I approach the whole game differently. Not better or worse, just different. What I like about D&D now isn't the same stuff I'd look for in an OSR game at all.

 

[Umbran]

There's something about the streamlined character builds

So, the Basic 5e rules don't give you a bunch of extra choices in build. Exact same mechanics, but with fewer choices available. Consider what happens if you trim down 5e classes - Paladins only have one Oath. There's only one fighter subclass available. Sorcerers, warlocks, and barbarians are removed. And so on.

the dungeons, the slightly gonzo everything.

What has this got to do with the rules of the game? That's adventure design, dude.

I find I approach the whole game differently.

You can blame that on the ruleset, if you like, but it may have much more to do with your past experience setting your expectations - this may be less about the actual game, and more about preconceived notions of what the game is "supposed to be".

And, to first approximation, it doesn't matter how and why you have the experience - what matters is that you get the experience you want. But, once you start talking about why, and trying to understand the experience, it pays to be thoughtful about where you assign responsibility for aspects of it.

 

[Fenris-77]

So, the Basic 5e rules don't give you a bunch of extra choices in build. Exact same mechanics, but with fewer choices available. Consider what happens if you trim down 5e classes - Paladins only have one Oath. There's only one fighter subclass available. Sorcerers, warlocks, and barbarians are removed. And so on.

Compared to the characters in, say, Five Torches Deep, they aren't streamlined in the way I meant.

What has this got to do with the rules of the game? That's adventure design, dude.

Sure, I could design gonzo dungeon crawls for 5E, but I don't. With the level of detail in 5E I tend to design adventures that use all the moving parts. Also, I feel like you're being a little aggressive here about suggesting that I don't understand basic stuff about the game.

You can blame that on the ruleset, if you like, but it may have much more to do with your past experience setting your expectations - this may be less about the actual game, and more about preconceived notions of what the game is "supposed to be".

Who's blaming anything on a rules set? I love 5E. I also love OSR play. They're different. It also has zero to do with "what the game is supposed to be", that's nonsense. The game isn't supposed to be anything but what we make of it at our individual tables, whatever that is. The fact that I enjoy stripped down OSR play isn't a critique of 5E, or any other style of play.

And, to first approximation, it doesn't matter how and why you have the experience - what matters is that you get the experience you want. But, once you start talking about why, and trying to understand the experience, it pays to be thoughtful about where you assign responsibility for aspects of it.

It feels like you're upset about something here, and I don't get why. I enjoy OSR style play. Why is it a bad thing that I try to put my finger on why? I'm not really sure what you're getting at, but what it feels like is that you're telling me I shouldn't enjoy something I obviously enjoy. That doesn't seem like you at all, so I'm going to guess that we have our wires crossed somewhere and you think I meant something somewhere above that I really don't. What is it about my 'assigning responsibility' that rubs your rhubarb the wrong way?