What makes an Old School Renaissance FEEL like an OSR game?

[Man in the Funny Hat]

Old School is not what you play but how you play it.

As for "New School" trying to have a rule for everything and that being a big difference I say that is NOT the case. Old Schoolers frequently love having gobs of rules too. It think the divide started when the actual design of the game started to emphasize the idea that players and their characters would succeed most often by some solution found WITHIN the rules, where up to that point the idea had been that successful play derived from the players themselves and they had no expectation that the game rules would be providing them with no more than occasional tools for succeeding; succeeding at avoiding traps, interacting with NPC's, solving mysteries, exploring the world, or even defeating tough enemies in combat.

I'd actually have to point the finger at 3E. It made the mistake of assuming that simply enjoying having lots of rules meant that the fun was derived from that. It made "Rules Mastery" a core conceit of the design of the game. Old Schoolers still enjoy having lots of rules, perhaps even "a rule for everything", but they didn't want rules to be given that position of dominance over gameplay, which up to then had been in the hands of the DM and the players themselves. When you play newer editions with that Old School approach to the game then, as noted, the rule set that is being played doesn't make as big a difference - it's the approach of how you USE those rules in play that matters.

But that's just me, and what do I know?

 

[Yora]

If someone advertises for players in their "old-school style" campaign, prospective players can reasonably expect the game to prioritize player immersion by greater reliance on player skill, fast play, and DM rulings.

That's what I consider the received wisdom about old school play. Is this true to the spirit of pre-2000 rpgs? Yeah, I think so, mostly--but it's important to keep in mind that that was a big era, and it's not like there was just one monolithic play style then, either.

That shift also mostly applies to just D&D. Other games didn't really adopt the tactical wargame approach and many that were released later didn't either.

 

[dd.stevenson]

That shift also mostly applies to just D&D. Other games didn't really adopt the tactical wargame approach and many that were released later didn't either.

I don't follow. My post didn't mention tactical wargames, or shifts.

 

[Quickleaf]

That's a good insight.

There's probably a technique that can be used to ensure these skill usages don't replace description and roleplay in favour of bypassing play.

One technique, which also fits the list of what is common among OSR feeling games, is that the referee is the one who calls for rolls. While Tunnels & Trolls did have players able to call for some rolls, largely even there those player called rolls were done in response to other rolls previously called for by the referee. Generally though, a roll is only valid or even relevant if it's called for by the GM. So a player can't just say "I convince him to join my side: Diplmoacy roll, 23" and bypass the conversation or dialogue.

The restriction on when (or if) players call for skill checks is a good example. It seems like there was a spectrum since 2e leading up to 3e and then into 4e of increasingly shifting the decision of when to make a skill check from the DM's side to the Player's side.

To some extent maybe that's a good thing? It creates a common language (hopefully one not full of game jargon!) for players and DMs. You want to jump over the pit? OK, we both know how that gets resolved, so go ahead and make that Athletics or Jump check. I mean, there are no reasons I can think of when it would make sense for the DM to say, "No, you cannot make a check to jump this pit." It just doesn't make sense, because the Athletics or Jump skill very clearly maps to a character ability.

However, things like Bluff, Diplomacy, History, Insight, and Perception are less clearly mapped to exclusively character skill, and involve player skill....or more precisely, player creativity.

Maybe that's the driving point I'm trying to make: Player Creativity should be inspired & rewarded, and skills that involve ambiguous character vs. player skill should resolve that tension by designing toward the goal of inspiring & rewarding Player Creativity. From my observation of 4e, while I love the game, caused player creativity to diminish due to the extreme definition of character abilities and the unclear methods for improvising (yes they're there, but you need to work to find them).

That's why I think the Apocalypse World / Dungeon World system of asking questions for Lore and Perception/Insight type skills is such a great idea. Those questions just spark creativity! And can lead to players dreading/imagining how to fill in the blanks, so while the setting authority still rests with the GM, the players are getting much more engaged with it because they have to choose which questions to ask (rather than just rolling a d20).

Another example of a great idea is Rich Burlew's d20 Diplomacy hack. By making the check difficulty dependent on player creativity in regards to figuring out how to entice an NPC with an offer, it inspires and rewards players to think about their approach to using Diplomacy.

Many folks talk about player skill vs. character skill being a difference between Old School and New School games as if they were oil & water, and while that trend may be there I think it washed over a more important commonality & distinction:

Both types of games want to encourage and reward player creativity. It is just HOW they do that's different. Old School game do it by, essentially, constantly threatening your character and encouraging & rewarding you to avoid the lethal rules entirely. New School Games do it by encouraging & rewarding you to master the rules.

All IMO here, but I am interested in rules that are little less "stick" without devolving into "entitlement / systems mastery". I like to think that ideas like Rich Burlew's Diplomacy skill and Dungeon World's Questions offer a way for the system to actually encourage players to work within a framework (without having to be an exhaustive system!) that encourages & rewards player creativity and improvisation.

 

[Umbran]

OSR feel?

For me it simply comes down to this: the game plays faster. Everything else is group dynamics.

I have never seen the design of a set of rules contribute to my getting the feel of playing I had in the "old school" days.

That being said, in retrospect, I don't think the game played all that much faster, for me. We still has single fights that dragged on forever back then.

So, group dynamics, being somewhat new to the game, and playing frequently - for me, those are what marks "old school" most strongly. YMMV

 

[howandwhy99]

OSR games are any games that came out of the blogging revolution of gamers who like the 1000s of games from the 70s to the 90s which aren't represented in game design much anymore.

Personally I see old school games to be about playing the games as games and being like wargames hidden behind GM screens, but there is definitely a wide span of beliefs about what makes those old games old school.

 

[nnms]

It think the divide started when the actual design of the game started to emphasize the idea that players and their characters would succeed most often by some solution found WITHIN the rules, where up to that point the idea had been that successful play derived from the players themselves and they had no expectation that the game rules would be providing them with no more than occasional tools for succeeding; succeeding at avoiding traps, interacting with NPC's, solving mysteries, exploring the world, or even defeating tough enemies in combat.

If the rules themselves emphasized rules as a source for success, then the rules obviously are very capable of impacting play and are not just occasional tools, even when they fade into the background. I would say earlier games seem like occasional tools more because the entirety of them work together to resolve things based on the described fiction and not references to other rules.

They actually are in use all the time because the rules are what tell you what the job of the various participants of the game are and what they should do, including describing things, having dialogue and applying various resolution mechanics. I think it's the constant pointing at the content of the description that makes old school games seem like they are only occasional rather than always in effect. They're always there, but they hide by diverting your attention back to the content of the fiction/description rather than to another rule.

I don't know if that makes sense, but basically I count the procedures of play that the rule book directs you to undertake as being the rules of the game. Including the part about the referee describing the situation and referencing the shared game state in fictional terms using real language rather than mathematical or symbolic rules terms.

Think about when a new player transitions from just describing what the character does and relies on other participants (likely the GM) to tell him/her what to roll and the point when they start to actually know how a given system works and starts proactively rolling the right dice and going through the game procedures outlined in the rules. They're certainly not treating the rules as occasional tools for success, but as part of the larger procedure.

I really don't think you can run D&D 4E in an old school way because as soon as you do, you've modified things to stop pointing back to the rules (power use and the hit, miss and effect lines) and back to the fiction and thus you're no longer playing 4E. You need to abandon the procedures of play of the game in order to run it as if it were an older game.

Basically if you take a modern game that is not old school in its approach and run it as if it was an old school game, you'll be cutting out the procedures of play from that game and replacing them with procedures for previous games. So if I say to myself that it's not the rules, but how you run it, what I'm actually doing is creating a hybrid game where the rules and procedures of old school games replace the rules and procedures I don't feel are old school. In short, I'd be playing my own home brew hybrid game that is an old school version of a non old school game.

 

[ExploderWizard]

There isn't a universal "old school" method that would apply to every OSR type game. First, one would need to determine what kind of OSR game experience to replicate. Old D&D? Traveler? Runequest? The Fantasy Trip?

Once you know the general feel and type of game that you want, more specific information can be sought.

 

[jacksonmalloy]

There isn't a universal "old school" method that would apply to every OSR type game. First, one would need to determine what kind of OSR game experience to replicate. Old D&D? Traveler? Runequest? The Fantasy Trip?

Once you know the general feel and type of game that you want, more specific information can be sought.

I guess for me, it would have to be old D&D - I can't really claim an edition, as we sort of mish-mashed all of the pre 3e editions together when we played, picking what we liked from each. That is part of what I came here for, however. I want to understand what other people think about the OSR vibe and how to evoke it from their own experiences. It would be easy enough to try to retroclone AD&D, but ultimately what I want is to figure out how other people perceive it, what they enjoyed about it, what they hated about it, what gets them passionate for it -- what it means to them -- and if I am lucky, distill that to its alchemical essence and use it to create something new.

 

[nnms]

Here's an exercise that might help break things down even further. It requires actually playing a short session.

Pick a simple game. The Cthulhu Dark game would work great as it's truly simple. As would Moldvay Basic D&D. Or failing that pick a game you know really well in terms of rules but doesn't require the individual player to have rules mastery. You want one of the many games where people can describe what their character's do in normal language. Fast character generation would also be ideal as why spend half an hour on a character for a short learning experience exercise session? Though I suppose there's no reason you just couldn't take an existing game and do this for part of a session.

Now have someone else run a short scenario. They're in charge of the setting content, the foes and monsters, the NPCs, etc., just like GM, referee or DM traditionally is. However, they're not in charge of the rules. At all. You are. Whenever the GM would normally go to the dice or ask for a roll, he instead asks you to implement the rules system.

And you are also a normal player. So make characters if you need to.

Then play as normal. You'll need to listen very carefully to how the guy taking care of the adventure content is describing things in the world. He might have stats for various monsters, but you're going to need to decide on the difficulty of various tasks and handle the implementation of the rules system when it is needed. You'll need to pay attention to description and how everything is perceived and ask questions. Basically the GM's description and communication needs to be good enough that you can handle the rules completely while meeting everyone at the table's expectations of what makes sense given the described situation.

The times I've done this I've noticed a few different effects:

1) You really see how everything connects back to the act of description. You need to clearly communicate with one another and the rules implementation needs to make sense based on what is described rather than what the GM thinks it's like in his/her head but hasn't fully explained.

2) System usage will diminish to only being used when it's needed. If another player and the GM are going back and forth describing the situation, there won't be "I guess we're supposed to roll something here" coming up as often. The rules will become more and more about resolving that which is actually uncertain and important.

3) You'll start to have a very keen sense on what is important to the other participants and what they want to be uncertain. They'll be dramatic build ups where the possible consequences are mounting and then you'll implement the system to resolve things. You'll also get a sense when things are not important or are routine and no one really has a stake in the results either way.

4) The GM will get a good bit of exercise with his description muscles. He doesn't have to describe it just well enough so that it makes sense to himself, but to you.

4a) All rules use will be based on your understanding of someone else's description rather than on system elements. You won't have the monster's stats in front of you. You'll have to rely on the description of the monster and the various stats the GM uses as you ask him to (just like when you ask a player to make a roll for something and use a number on his character sheet).