D&D General War- What's it Good For? How to Handle Rules Conflicts

[Remathilis]

Hmm… I’m surprised to hear the take that 2e was unplayable RAW. We played it RAW and I didn’t see major issues with it. We also had friends who played heavily homebrewed versions of 2e so I’m familiar with that to some extent, but I recall that most folks in my main play group disliked such heavy homebrewery and we almost never reached for it ourselves. I don’t have experience with 1e or Basic, etc, so can’t compare. We did use various splatbooks for 2e though, and sure we could tell it was not that balanced, but that didn’t bother us. We also ran some (though not that many) standard published adventures and didn’t need to tweak them much. In contrast, some 5e adventures feel not that polished (especially story-wise, the crunch is fine I guess), even though 5e is by and large much easier to learn and better balanced than 2e. Anyway, your mileage may vary I guess, but I thought I would throw my data point into the mix…

For the record, I don't find 2e RAW unplayable. Cook did a good job of including some BX sensibilities to it, mostly in streamlining the more out there classes (ranger and bard) and fixing the surprise and initiative systems. There are a few whiffs (the sphere system for Priests mess up spell access royally) and it kept too many legacy bad ideas (downwards AC, exceptional strength) but overall it's a decent compromise between 1e's wilder design ideas and BX simplicity. Which of course means it gets zero love in retrospect. Basic is beloved for its very easy play loop and low power design. 1e is loved for it's gonzo subsystems and general aesthetics. 2e is a compromise of both with the spirit of neither. Its beloved for its settings, but not it's rules. (And as you said, everything outside of the core was broken either one way or the other).

To use Ye Olde Food Analogy: Basic is comfort food: hearty, reliable and a little bland. 1e is like some wild spicy food that tastes great but is gonna give you ulcers. 2e is like tacos at home too spicy to be comfort food, too boring to the wild and spicy. Most people will stick with hearty reliable or opt for tasty Poor Life Choices , but very few want a mix of both.

 

[Emerikol]

I think DMs should settle game rules in advance if there is debate and the issue is a known issue. If not, the DM should resolve a rule as fast as possible within the bounds of fairness. For a character, the rules book exists only as some broad wisdom about how the world works. There is not real rulebook that cannot be doubted for a character. So when a player quotes a rule to me, I always say "Are you going to believe your own two eyes and what is happening or are you going to rely on that musty tome you found in the library?" This is especially true of monsters and abilities. For things characters could go in their backyard and test, of course the rule stands if not changed prior to the start of the game.

I find this very similar to modern day science. If you can test it rigorously it is highly likely to at least be very useful if not true. Whereas if it is built on theories that cannot be well tested then it is less reliable. Not useless but less reliable.

So that is how knowledge works in my games.

 

[Silam]

I think DMs should settle game rules in advance if there is debate and the issue is a known issue. If not, the DM should resolve a rule as fast as possible within the bounds of fairness. For a character, the rules book exists only as some broad wisdom about how the world works. There is not real rulebook that cannot be doubted for a character. So when a player quotes a rule to me, I always say "Are you going to believe your own two eyes and what is happening or are you going to rely on that musty tome you found in the library?" This is especially true of monsters and abilities. For things characters could go in their backyard and test, of course the rule stands if not changed prior to the start of the game.

I find this very similar to modern day science. If you can test it rigorously it is highly likely to at least be very useful if not true. Whereas if it is built on theories that cannot be well tested then it is less reliable. Not useless but less reliable.

So that is how knowledge works in my games.

But what does testing mean in this context? Is the "test" whether the player would "believe their own two eyes" if XYZ happened to their character? So it's about verisimilitude then? Or do you have something else in mind?

 

[Emerikol]

But what does testing mean in this context? Is the "test" whether the player would "believe their own two eyes" if XYZ happened to their character? So it's about verisimilitude then? Or do you have something else in mind?

Let's use an extreme example. Suppose a player believes a troll will be especially susceptible to fire but for whatever reason the troll is not burning an better or perhaps even worse than a normal human. If the player say, "Hey I thought trolls were vulnerable to fire", I would then respond as above. This "troll" is not burning. You gonna believe your eyes (what your character is seeing) or some must tome?

 

[Mannahnin]

Hmm… I’m surprised to hear the take that 2e was unplayable RAW. We played it RAW and I didn’t see major issues with it. We also had friends who played heavily homebrewed versions of 2e so I’m familiar with that to some extent, but I recall that most folks in my main play group disliked such heavy homebrewery and we almost never reached for it ourselves. I don’t have experience with 1e or Basic, etc, so can’t compare. We did use various splatbooks for 2e though, and sure we could tell it was not that balanced, but that didn’t bother us.

I don't think I've ever heard anyone say that 2e is unplayable RAW. IME most folks make at least a couple of house rules, but it's much more clearly written and designed than 1e. Zeb Cook and company made a concerted effort to clean up AD&D and make it actually playable from reading the books.

Saying that 1E is unplayable RAW, OTOH, is an extremely common opinion.

99.99% of people who say they played it "by the book" correct themselves when they go back and re-read the DMG and realize that they ignored half the rules, and the remaining .01% who claim they followed it to the letter, when you ask about details it inevitably turns out that they still omit stuff (like, say, potion onset times, or the unarmed combat rules, or the helmet rule), and implement house rules to reconcile things like the various conflicting special surprise rule modifiers for various classes and races which have no clarification in the text.

 

[VashVet]

Hmm… I’m surprised to hear the take that 2e was unplayable RAW. We played it RAW and I didn’t see major issues with it. We also had friends who played heavily homebrewed versions of 2e so I’m familiar with that to some extent, but I recall that most folks in my main play group disliked such heavy homebrewery and we almost never reached for it ourselves.

You know, people say the darnedest things.
The only significant truth to AD&D (both 1e and 2e) being unplayable RAW is that the people who played with ALL the rules RAW are vanishingly rare.

My memory of 2e wasn’t that it was unplayable, but that there were so many optional rules that RAW was still a highly variable thing from table to table.

 

[Mannahnin]

True enough. It did have a bunch. Some were IME pretty universal. More generous ability score generation than 3d6, use of critical hits, use of death at -10, for example. I don't think I ever saw a 2e table which didn't use all three of those.

 

[Silam]

True enough. It did have a bunch. Some were IME pretty universal. More generous ability score generation than 3d6, use of critical hits, use of death at -10, for example. I don't think I ever saw a 2e table which didn't use all three of those.

We definitely had all three of those going on… but was death at -10 not the default? I thought it was (and that proves the point being made I guess)

 

[Mannahnin]

We definitely had all three of those going on… but was death at -10 not the default? I thought it was (and that proves the point being made I guess)

It was not. You're absolutely right about how common use of the optional rule was, though, IME.

In all but one version of D&D prior to 2000 the official rule was death at 0 hp.

AD&D 1E had a more complex rule that stated if a character was dropped to EXACTLY 0 (or, optionally, dropped by a hit taking them as low as -3), instead of dying immediately they would bleed at 1hp per round and finally die at -10 if not stabilized or given magical healing before that point.

In practice, I think, I lot of folks simplified this rule and ignored the qualifying restriction of being knocked to exactly 0 (or to between 0 and -3) and just turned it into "you're not dead until you hit -10, and you bleed 1hp per round once knocked to 0 or below unless damage takes you straight to or past -10".

2E AD&D included the simplified version as its Hovering On Death's Door optional rule (DMG p75), but like every other TSR version apart from 1E, its official rule was death at 0 hp.

As a fun historical side note, the 1991 D&D Rules Cyclopedia introduced the first optional rule for death saves when at 0 hp. RC p266:

Keeping Characters Alive

If you decide to get rid of the resurrection spells, you can also adopt another rule to make it a little harder for characters to die.

For instance, when a character is reduced to 0 hit points or below in combat (or from death spells), he's not yet dead. He's unconscious and mortally wounded; if left untended, he will die.

He must make a saving throw vs. death ray every turn. He makes the first roll on the round he drops to 0 hit point; he makes another every round he takes additional damage, and every 10 minutes (one turn) in addition. If he ever fails a roll, he's dead.

If he keeps making his rolls until reached by a healing cleric, someone with the Healing general skill, or someone with a healing potion to get to him, he can be saved. If the healers can heal him up to 1 hit point or more, or the Healing skill roll is made at a penalty of -5 (regardless of whether it heals him up to positive hit point or not), then the character is alive. He's critically wounded—but he'll survive.

 

[Milieu]

There are a few whiffs (the sphere system for Priests mess up spell access royally)

Man, I loved Priests of a Specific Mythoi/Specialty Priests. I mean, they weren't balanced at all, but they were cool.