OSR Why B/X?

[cbwjm]

A few times we mixed things up and ran it more integrated than the books suggest. Go in initiative order through the phases. Winning side moves, losing side moves. Winning side missile, losing side missile. Keeps people more engaged throughout, generally.

For the longest time that's how I thought it worked, not sure if that was just how I remembered it now or how I did it at the time, but I only realised that the right way was winning initiative does everything first when someone else brought it up elsewhere.

 

[Geekrampage]

A few times we mixed things up and ran it more integrated than the books suggest. Go in initiative order through the phases. Winning side moves, losing side moves. Winning side missile, losing side missile. Keeps people more engaged throughout, generally.

That's an optional rule in OSE. We talked about it but my players were like "Uh, no thanks!"

 

[Andvari]

A few times we mixed things up and ran it more integrated than the books suggest. Go in initiative order through the phases. Winning side moves, losing side moves. Winning side missile, losing side missile. Keeps people more engaged throughout, generally.

That’s how Swords & Wizardry does it. The division into phases also make much more sense this way.

 

[Yora]

Players making their turns when they are ready, rather than at a specific point in the queue is what speeds combat up significantly.
Combat turns in a fixed order leads to players not paying attention because they know its 5 to 10 minutes until there's anything to do. And then they are surprised when their turn comes up and need another 3 minutes to understand the current situation in which they have to make a choice.

When everyone is thinking at the same time instead of in sequence, the whole amount of thinking time goes down a lot. And when everyone knows that they have to make a decision right after the GM moved the enemies, they also pay attention. Reducing the time to analyse the situation as well.

 

[Aldarc]

There was an earlier answer that said that B/X is raw fantasy before its codification. I’m gonna go with another answer for why B/X: because it’s really when D&D is codified as a game. B/X delivers a fairly solid game experience when you play it as per the rules, such as following the dungeon-crawl play procedures. It’s pretty clear. I think that this is ultimately why a fairly large swath of the OSR scene - particularly those without actual play experience of B/X during its heyday - picked it as the golden child. It combined simplicity with clear, codified game procedures. These codified game procedures in B/X are also what have inspired many OSR or OSR inspired games that have ventured away from B/X too.

 

[Yora]

What even are the alternative? AD&D is a bloated mess and OD&D is incomprehensible.

And while it makes decent efforts to teach the game to completely new people, BECMI's organization makes it much less useful as a source code document for creating your own hacks.
It also has the cutesy children game aesthetic, which I think puts many people off.

 

[Mannahnin]

Its actually pretty quick.

It usually goes like this:

Before initiative: any spells being cast?
Each side rolls 1d6 initiative.
Side with initiative:
1. All characters check morale (NPCs only)
2. All characters move (advance or withdraw only, no fancy maneuvers)
3. All characters resolve missile fire
4. All characters resolve spell casting
5. All characters resolve melee attacks
Side without initiative repeats 1-5 above.
On a tied initiative, all characters (PC and NPC) go through 1-5 together

It tends to sound like this:

"Movement phase - GO! Okay, everybody where they want to be? Missile phase - GO!" and everyone rolls to attack and I apply damage. Then I say: "No spells. Melee phase - GO!" and everyone rolls to attack and I apply damage.

The only time it gets bogged down is with tied initiative. Then I have to proceed through each phase, character by character with the NPCs/monsters mixed in. I could just move monsters at the same time as player characters in one big group, but it can become chaotic, so I proceed down the list alphabetically or however characters are ordered in Foundry.

This is almost exactly how I see it done, but do you not also have retreats and fighting withdrawals declared at the same time as spells?

 

[Geekrampage]

This is almost exactly how I see it done, but do you not also have retreats and fighting withdrawals declared at the same time as spells?

Yes, spells and defensive movement should be declared before initiative is rolled.

In practice, I forget to ask about spells or defensive retreats before initiative ALL THE TIME! It's become kind of a running joke, actually.

Me: pushes "Next Round" button on Foundry, initiative is rolled. Immediately: "EXPLETIVE! Any spells or whatever?"

 

[Jack Daniel]

I will say this, however. Whenever I ask a rule question about B/X/OSE on the OSE Facebook group, I will get answers quoting rules from every edition all over the map. It seems no one on the OSE FB group actually plays OSE RAW. People start quoting rules from AD&D, Rules Cyclopedia, Mentzer, or rules that just don't exist but everyone THINKS they exist because that's always been the way they played.

Well, that's because "B/X" doesn't actually exist. It's not a discrete "edition" of D&D, not in the sense that we use "edition" nowadays to mean a complete, iterated version of an RPG. The D&D game as it was published 1974–1996 is more of a continuum than a series.

 

[Parmandur]

Well, that's because "B/X" doesn't actually exist. It's not a discrete "edition" of D&D, not in the sense that we use "edition" nowadays to mean a complete, iterated version of an RPG. The D&D game as it was published 1974–1996 is more of a continuum than a series.

No, Basic had multiple Editions, distinct from OD&D:

• Holmes
• Moldvay
• Mentzer
• Black Box
• Rules Cyclopedia

Sure, they were fairly conservative Editiom changes, but so are Call of Cthulu's and they are on 7E.