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

[Man in the Funny Hat]

It ain't what you play - it's how you play it. However...

Edition X surely doesn't lend itself to playstyle Y as much as edition Z does. Can 5E be made as deadly as 0E? Sure. But 0E doesn't have to TRY to do that. It is that. Can 0E be LESS deadly like 5E is? Sure. But 5E doesn't have to TRY to do that - it already is.

Simply choosing to play a different version and attempting to deliberately explore how THAT version was played differently does not invalidate 5E nor say anything bad about 5E. The RPG world does NOT begin and end with 5E. No RPG in general, and no version of D&D rules in particular has an expiration date. Choosing to play a NON-5E game and discovering that there are different ways to play D&D and enjoy it without D&D being ALL 5E ALL THE TIME will threaten 5E not at all.

 

[Helldritch]

I too approach a game in 1ed quite differently than in 5ed. Both editions have their styles and I like both. Lethality in 1ed is way higher by default and design than in 5ed. Yes, a DM is responsible for the level of difficulty in any game and can make 5ed as deadly as 1ed in a pinch. But this requires a bit more work than just putting monsters in a room.

By design, character HPs constantly raise in 5ed with corresponding HD and Con bonuses. Not in 1ed. The difference between a 9th level fighter with 18 constitution and a 20th level fighter with 18 constitution hit point wise is only 33 hp. In fifth edition this is a difference of 110 hp! This is 3 times as much! And the same goes for the other classes that had a limited number of HD.

Casters have a lot less spell slots and versatility than in 1ed. On the other hand, the at will cantrips give them the possibility to be useful even when their allotted spell slots were spent.

I could go on and on and on but the point is, both editions are very different and offer a different feel to each participants.

 

[werecorpse]

I am a fifth edition fan, but recently my 16-year-old son started an old school D&D campaign....

I must have missed it. What game/edition are you talking about?

 

[Fenris-77]

I must have missed it. What game/edition are you talking about?

D&D, but he wasn't specific as to edition. I'm guessing 1E. Most of the OSR rules sets play pretty similarly (by design).

 

[Ralif Redhammer]

Yeah, I can old-school with the best of them, but I don't feel the need as a DM/GM to make my games hyper-deadly. Even when I was running 1e originally, that was the case.

Now, a good OSR game should feel like death waits around every turn. But, I find the threat to be more effective than the deed. If all your PCs die quickly and repeatedly, eventually you stop caring about them and that's when you start getting people making Ulfo VI, the human fighter, yet again. And that leads to a poorer game.

But I've been feeling a want to get back to some old-school play. After my current campaign concludes, I'm thinking about running DCC RPG, Labyrinth Lord, or some other OSR game. If my group agrees, that is.

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.

 

[Fenris-77]

But I've been feeling a want to get back to some old-school play. After my current campaign concludes, I'm thinking about running DCC RPG, Labyrinth Lord, or some other OSR game. If my group agrees, that is.

Five Torches Deep is awesome. It's compatible with both most OSR treatments and 5E material, in both cases with a very minimal amount of adjustment. I like being able to use my reams of 5E source material.

I think the hyper-deadly thing can be overplayed. I prefer to think of it as a higher index to clever play and a a removal of combat as options 1,2, and 3 for a given encounter. The threat of death certainly does make players approach things differently, that's for sure. How the DM uses that is probably the key.

 

[werecorpse]

I played some crazy monty haul 1st edition stuff back in the day. Girdle of storm giant strength & Hammer of Thunderbolts, a ring of multiple (not just 3 how passe) wishes, battling hundreds of ogre magi, a flying throne of the gods, killed Vecna, Kas, I think I even killed Satan who was hiding in the bottom of a storm giants cloud castle One time. We went to hell and back (killed tiamat) I got a ring that allowed me 6 actions a round and a staff that fired white fire (Thomas Covenant rip off). But I never got as crazy as some others I heard of. The ring of +200hp and the stone of taking 1/5th Damage? The gauntlets of annihilation (like a sphere but you could wear them). Wack a doo!
We also played a more low power game that went for about 15 years including multiple times during high school where we spent a whole week at a holiday house just us kids playing 18+ hours a day. The characters averaged about 2 levels a year and ended in the high teens (we slowed down at University) and we played many campaigns that never made it past 5th
But that wasn’t OSR. That was playing it the first time around.

now Im running 2 5e games one is 5years in and they are just 8th level, one is about 1 year in and they are 15th. Im very much in the game is what you make of it Camp.

 

[Snarf Zagyg]

Im very much in the game is what you make of it Camp.

It is certainly true that when the rules are ignored, the game can be whatever you wish. At a certain point, we are all playing Amber Diceless RPG, we just don't know it.

 

[Ralif Redhammer]

I've been hearing some good things about Five Torches Deep. Should probably pick it up at some point. I dug how they handled the classes (even if it doesn't have race-as class).

Five Torches Deep is awesome. It's compatible with both most OSR treatments and 5E material, in both cases with a very minimal amount of adjustment. I like being able to use my reams of 5E source material.

Same, definitely. I ran a few of them, to be honest. But when I look at old NPC item payloads, they can get pretty crazy by modern standards, too. A big part of advancement back then was getting all those fancy magic items. Maybe not The Sword of Atomic Annihilation, but really, back then we all had all sorts of homebrew magic items in varying levels of insanity.

I played some crazy monty haul 1st edition stuff back in the day. Girdle of storm giant strength & Hammer of Thunderbolts, a ring of multiple (not just 3 how passe) wishes, battling hundreds of ogre magi, a flying throne of the gods, killed Vecna, Kas, I think I even killed Satan who was hiding in the bottom of a storm giants cloud castle One time.

 

[Helldritch]

Magic Items were a lot more prevalent in 1ed (and OD&D) than in 5ed (but less so than 3.xed and 4ed). They were more or less required depending on the type of campaign but it is safe to assume that most high level characters could have between 5 to 10 each (depending on the quality of said items too).

I kinda like how 5ed handles magic items. Not too rare, but not way too common. It is in the middle ground between what players want and game balance. I do think they nailed it much better in 5ed than in any other edition.