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Message: <blockquote data-quote="DarkCrisis" data-source="post: 9455175" data-attributes="member: 1788">If you get the reference, you have good taste.TLDR:  5E isn’t exactly wrong on survivablity.I've been running OSE IE Old school B/X with some modern flair for the last few months in a sort of sandbox style game.  It's been super awesome.  Most fun Ive had DMing in a long time.Easy to run and play.  It's D&D without all the chaff and bloat.... and yeah it's deadly.  A bit less so with some house rules for more HP and better saves etc etc.But stuff like instant death poison or a well rolled damage roll, it's still got claws.A month ago I'd have said that's just the way it is.  It's tough but fair (No save sleep spell is a good balancer) and the chance of death makes the successes all the sweeter.  Winning a battle or surviving a deadly trap by the skin of your teeth is such a good feeling.Yet.None of the original party remain.Usually this wouldnt be a big deal in the sandbox style.  The premise being "Go out and amass gold and glory."  Problem is, I gave them a specific quest at one point to save a party member who's life is on a timer.  No one is left alive to care except the cursed party member.  Which again not really a big deal as its all apart of the gold and glory thing.But I do feel bad that there is a lack of attachment to the characters.  Level 1-3 can be brutal especially for Wizards and the like.  I can see why a lot of campaigns start at 3 or better.My point:Reading some Dragonlance and Drizzt novels and you never worried about Drizzt or Tanis etc dying to a rando goblin or trap (lets not get to far into Tanis' BS death but the point stands).  These characters didn't start at 1, more like 3 (and they had awesome stats).  But yeah Raistlin or Regis survived their first few adventures.  OSE/BX Fighter, Elf, Thief, Cleric, Dwarf, Halfling, etc et etc did not.I usually rag on modern D&D for being to easy on the players.  And when I say this I say this as a DM that main runs published adventures.  The WotC official ones seem to want it to be easier than usual.  Ive run non-official published adventures and found those to be a good challenge for the players (though not always just due to baked in stuff like multi saves and going nova.5.5 looks to take that further but I had to walk through the fire to I guess really get it.Now Im not saying 5th ed has it right but there has to be a middle ground.  I'm looking forward to taking 5.5 for a spin and maybe figure out how to make the official adventures less of a cake walk.  Dragonlance, Planescape, and Vecna to name 3 I currently own.  Double the monsters? IDKOSE works pretty well and it's easy to house rule up and down.  Perhaps poison isn't almost always a death sentence?  Or perhaps just start at level 3 or 4?I get how "Your character is the one who survived to level 3" is in fact true and also "Living to level 3 is your character's back story" is also true.  A rite of passage and all that.Though I suppose on the flip side, OSE/BX characters are so simplified and easy to play compared to 5E making, understanding, and playing a whole new character is fairly simple. But yeah I want them to be Big Damn Heroes with some actual danger.Much to consider....</blockquote>

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