Top Ten Reasons AD&D Is Fun

[Reynard]

What do you think of castles and crusades, OP?

I want to like C&C, because it's all new and shiny and stuff, but the fact is after reading through it and considering it a number of times now, I always come to the same conclusion: it tries to emulate the "1E feel" but doesn't really offer anything I can't get by simply pulling my 1E books off the shelf, other than being shiny and new. And, as I stated in the OP, with OSRIC, I can now get shiny new things for 1E.

I will throw in the caveat that I haven't had a chance to run or play C&C, and I reserve the right to fall madly in love with it should I get the opportunity.

 

[Harlekin]

Close.

"More fun" =/= "better"

At least, that's not the claim I'm making. "Good" implies some sort of objective measurement, which is, of course, impossible when discussing preferences for things like games. AD&D is a well designed game, but so are 2E, 3.x and 4E. 1E is, however, "more fun".

PS I am totally leaving out BECMI on purpose. That was the version I grew up with and nostalgia prevents me from making any clear judgment on its quality. I didn't discover AD&D until later, and shortly thereafter switched to the "shiny new" 2E (the game in with which I had both the most success and most experience) -- so nostalgia isn't really an issue with 1E. It's only been since realizing there was something just not quite clicking with 3E with me that I begin to really look at each edition individually and disocvered that 1E was, in fact, the "most fun" D&D edition.

"more" actually implies some objective measure, too.

 

[S'mon]

"7) The Simulation-Game Tightrope: While EGG states AD&D isn't a simulation in the introduction to the DMG, the game is chock full of what we'd call "simulationist" elements, ranging from monster frequency to castle construction costs to rules for disease. At the same time, there's a great deal of material built specifically for the "gamist" experience of play, largely informed by the wargaming roots. Combine these two and AD&D allows us to play a game that creates a world."

I agree strongly with this - it's an important reason why AD&D works so well. This was de-emphasised somewhat in 3e and pretty well eliminated from 4e. You can still play 3e like this, but the difficulty of rapid creation of 3e materials makes simulation much harder IME, while 4e seems to have abandoned simulation as a design goal. Contrary to threefold model and GNS theory, I think the creative tension between simulation and game is the heart of D&D's success.

Edit: I've been enjoying playing OSRIC and 1e AD&D online recently, but I prefer running Castles & Crusades using 1e materials; notably the 1e Monster Manual and Fiend Folio. C&C runs a lot more smoothly due to the unified 'Siege' mechanic, and I find the classes and races better balanced against each other. Eg it tends to produce ca 80% human parties, which was supposed to be the default in 1e but the design encourages mostly demihuman PCs at low-mid level. Another issue I have with 1e is that the random magic item tables tend to produce a lo of very powerful stuff, such that mid level PCs often have +5 weapons or vorpal swords. I think BECMI works better there, with its different item tables for each level tier. And I like C&C's "add level to roll" default, which makes higher level PC feels heroic but is not overwhelming within the 1-12 core level range.

Unlike some, I love the writing style of the 1e rulebooks. OSRIC does show how much clearer the presentation can be though; I think I would rather run OSRIC and keep the original books for reference.

 

[Korgoth]

Good points, OP. I particularly like the layered approach of the rules. In 3E the not entirely accurate but not entirely inaccurate stereotype is that if you change one rule, the entire edifice comes crashing down. Certainly in 1E and editions of the same provenance, if you change one thing, everything else is pretty much unaffected.

Compatibility is great, too. Say I want to run OD&D using a Classic module with the AD&D assassin class mixed in. Boom, done, no problem.

Of course, I'll say that OD&D tops them all in terms of flexibility. It's definitely a "build your own game" game. Whereas AD&D is the game that Gary ultimately built out of it.

 

[S'mon]

I will throw in the caveat that I haven't had a chance to run or play C&C, and I reserve the right to fall madly in love with it should I get the opportunity.

It runs a lot better than it reads, in my experience. As a sceptic I found you have to kinda let go and just trust the game, which can be difficult because the Troll Lords' writing style does not come over as very 'authoritative'. Also if you're a 3e-er you need to get out of a 3e mindset of square-counting, 5' steps, and Wizards spellcasting in melee.

But in practice when you run C&C as written I find the SIEGE mechanic works incredibly well - much better than you'd think seeing it written down, at least the way it appears in the C&C PHB. It handles a huge range of stuff that 1e handles with disparate subsystems and 3e handles with complex skills & feats rules; in a way that's very fast and easy to adjudicate.

 

[Aus_Snow]

OK, I will once again play the part and argue the case, even though I don't truly believe AD&D is simply 'more fun' than all the other D&D editions.

* Time required for chargen, also prep. Roll 'em up, write down the basics, and go.

* Gygaxian prose. Yeah, agreed. A strong 'voice' can make or break a book.

* Arcane, bizarre rules subsystems. And no, I don't mean stuff for arcane magic. Well, not just that anyway.

* Uncertainty. Yeah, agreed. Random craziness all over da shop. Can help with suspense and that stuff. Good.

* Strong 'simulationist' elements. Yeah, agreed. Weird and counter-intuitive though many of them are.

* Ease of use with cool materials from the same (and the earlier) era. You can just grab some wicked module, book on traps, whatever, and go.

* Faster combat, and resolution via game mechanics in general. This means you can move things along at a snappier rate, most likely meaning more things [per session] to explore, discover, solve, loot, kill, avoid, survive, etc.

* It's assumed that you make stuff up, rules-wise, which can be all kinds of wacky fun.

* Name levels. You can has titlez!

* Wandering prostitutes.

 

[avin]

Strangely, i´m suddenly thinking about that guy in Fallout 3 who´s telling you all the time how great the Enclave really is.

FO3? That game doesn't exist. Only FO1 and FO2 were made

You mean Oblivion with guns hehehe

 

[avin]

* Wandering prostitutes.

What??? Goodbye 4E, Pathfinder and 3.5, hello AD&D \o/

 

[JeffB]

I want to like C&C, because it's all new and shiny and stuff, but the fact is after reading through it and considering it a number of times now, I always come to the same conclusion: it tries to emulate the "1E feel" but doesn't really offer anything I can't get by simply pulling my 1E books off the shelf, other than being shiny and new.

Pretty much my conclusion as well (though I did run it for a brief time). A few minor tweaks to O/B/X/A D&D and I have something quite similar. Ultimately I think C&C sits too squarely on the fence-and I think thats a result of the "design by a committee" process. I know some C&C fans wil beg to differ (Hi Treebore! ), but that's the way *I* feel.

I fairly well agree with your initial post-though some of Gary''s AD&D subsystems were ridiculous- I much prefer the cleaner/tighter O/B/X and clones.

 

[Reynard]

"more" actually implies some objective measure, too.

No it doesn't. "More fun" implies a wholly subjective measure, because "fun" isn't objectively measurable. Nice attempt, though.