D&D General Why ya gotta be so Basic? Understanding the Resurgence of Moldvay's Basic

The simple structure of Moldvay/Cook has really left us with enough that modernization can be done quite well. Though there are tons of adaptations, I fell into Worlds Without Number and have enjoyed how it fit in Traveller skills into the system.
 

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True. I thought it was clear from the Retroclone timeline, but this is absolutely accurate.

And @Aldarc is also correct that in addition to the OSR movement, the people at the Forge (and elsewhere) were also re-examining Moldvay and discussing it as good design in the early 2000s as well.
For sure. I only added that clarification because a "resurgence" generally sounds recent without context.

And let's be honest, you can only expect people to read so deep into a Snarf essay. :)
 

Good piece!

In terms of comprehending B/X's significance, I think we might pause a little longer to appreciate the massive sales numbers Ben Riggs documented, and thus the ubiquity of the edition in the fad period (through 1983) and the years immediately thereafter.

While the popular sentiment for most of us was indeed to "graduate" to the "more grown-up" AD&D, between OWNING and having read B/X, and the incomprehensibility of many of AD&D's sub-systems, most notoriously initiative, a huge percentage of AD&D players, especially younger ones, were in practice kludging it with B/X. A fact many of them realized a couple of decades later when they came back to the older editions during the OSR movement. I think this has been a big element in the popularization of B/X within said movement. While AD&D was massively prominent in the early OSR, a huge share of the folks coming back re-examined AD&D and B/X and realized that the way they played back in the day was actually much more akin to B/X, just using expanded AD&D content.

On a related note, another reason for B/X's renewed popularity is simply Moldvay's tasteful and competent editing. Unlike AD&D, for example, B/X tells you right in the rules how long paralysis lasts, and gives PCs a way to fix it (by granting that capacity to Cure Light Wounds). Between this and other common situations like initiative, many OSR fans decided that B/X offered a better rules framework for their needs than AD&D.

And in the spirit of proper grognardism, a few quibbles with your post!

1. Let's also credit and acknowledge Steve Marsh, who co-wrote the Expert set with Zeb Cook.

2. Terminology-wise, the official (and IME dominant) nomenclature for the B/X and BECMI lines was "Dungeons & Dragons", as opposed to "Advanced Dungeons & Dragons" (the REAL game, for grown-ups). Not "Basic D&D", which would have been perhaps slightly clearer, if a misnomer for the Expert and later sets.

3. I'd argue that you've gotten a little bit of the chronology backwards. The OSR preceded and birthed retroclones. The OSR sprung up a year or two after 3E was released, first on message forums like Dragonsfoot (which started in 1999 in the wake of more fan-friendly WotC internet policies and quickly ballooned in popularity, with Gary Gygax participating in extensive Q&A threads, as he later did here on ENWorld), Knights & Knaves Alehouse, and Original D&D Discussion where entrenched never-left-AD&D grognards welcomed folks who had returned to D&D with 3E then decided it was too rules-heavy, and/or didn't scratch their nostalgic itch properly. The first uses of the acronym can be traced back to 2004 (coined by Trent Foster, IIRC), but the movement was already building for a couple of years by then. This movement, combined with the original books not being available for legal sale, created the demand which birthed the retroclones.

4. As a point of clarity, Labyrinth Lord is not a direct clone of B/X, but rather a mix of B/X and AD&D, immediately noticeable in the expanded armor and weapon options, Clerics getting a spell at 1st level, the level chart going to 20 and the spells to 9th. The main elements it keeps from B/X are race-as-class and simpler systems than AD&D.

5. The Moldvay Thief does suck, and is probably his biggest editorial failing. It's actually identical to the Menzter Thief in the first two sets of Mentzer, then the Companion set retroactively bones the Thief even more by errata'ing the advancement tables and re-jiggering the skill numbers. An error carried forward into the Rules Cyclopedia. A better choice, of course, would have been to give the Thief new capabilities at higher levels, as was teased in the Cook/Marsh Expert set.
 

Even then, "race as class" is something that you occasionally find in indie games like PbtA. For example, Fellowship (PbtA) includes playbooks like "the Dwarf," "the Elf," "the Halfling," and even "the Orc."
For sure. Even some modern games (like Shadow of the Weird Wizard) have something racial classes (see Weird Ancestries), but they're generally "in addition to" rather than "the only option". Dolmenwood, which is basically upgraded OSE applied to a specific setting, takes the same approach.
 

For sure. I only added that clarification because a "resurgence" generally sounds recent without context.

I mean, I recently cited a case from the '90s because it was recent. And then I was like ... oh.

And let's be honest, you can only expect people to read so deep into a Snarf essay. :)

One of these days, I am going to put all my banking information in the middle of one of my essays. That's the one place no one will ever find it!
 


I've always preferred B/X over BECMI. I suppose some is nostalgia because I started on B/X in '81, but even putting that aside, I much prefer the smaller books (Moldvay basic is half the size of Mentzer basic), and I prefer Willingham and Otus's art.
I had the weird situation of starting with Mentzer Basic and then getting a Cook/Marsh Expert set from Kay-Bee Toys, and thus experiencing a clash of aesthetics between Elmore's polished commercial art and Willingham and Otus's rawer, weirder stuff. Overall as a kid I preferred the detail and polish of Elmore, but there were some pieces by Otus in particular which were undeniably evocative and compelling.
 

Been playing OSE and god its just so simple (more or less) compared to modern games.

Frankly Shadowdark is probably the creme of the crop for "simple D&D" but it's not super supported without the DM doing some work (just toss the SD xp system and use whatever module you are playing IE D&Ds xp system)

but OSE / Basic just easy to run, easy to covert to anything 2E on down (really you dont have to change anything really).

OSE / Basic has been excellent.

Yeah I houseruled some stuff to make it more survivable. I did get tired of poison being a 1 shot kill for my players. Made healing magic work a tad different on a downed character. And yes have an KOed state before death. (bleeding below 0 and -4 is dead). Plus some other small tweeks.

So good and death is still a threat. Nice seeing the players treat the world/adventure as actually dangerous instead of just them overpower everything and walk around like they know they can win (and if they dont just rest for 1 hour).

Edit: and to add, my 5E players love it. "I feel like what I do matters." The Fighter is the Fighter and he shines when he's taking hits, kicking butt, and keepin the others safe. Not everyone being a shade of grey more or less.
 
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1. Let's also credit and acknowledge Steve Marsh, who co-wrote the Expert set with Zeb Cook.

So I never really think about Marsh, and did a quick bit of research. I knew about his early work, but what I did NOT know was that after that (his work with TSR and some Judge's Guild stuff) in the 70s and into the early '80s, he got a law degree and was a very successful litigator!

The more you know!

(And yes, he should receive more credit for that Expert set, but it's usually referred to as the Cook Expert, as in Moldvay/Cook, but maybe we should start saying Moldvay/Marsh)
 

So I never really think about Marsh, and did a quick bit of research. I knew about his early work, but what I did NOT know was that after that (his work with TSR and some Judge's Guild stuff) in the 70s and into the early '80s, he got a law degree and was a very successful litigator!

The more you know!

(And yes, he should receive more credit for that Expert set, but it's usually referred to as the Cook Expert, as in Moldvay/Cook, but maybe we should start saying Moldvay/Marsh)
I usually refer to Moldvay Basic and Cook/Marsh Expert when I remember, or just go with B/X if I'm being efficient.

Steve's cool, and I see him participate in a few of the old school FB groups.
 

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