D&D General Younger Players Telling Us how Old School Gamers Played

[S'mon]

I have not watched the video in question but have watched others by the same bloke and he is a Critter and I really doubt he is pushing an agenda here. I think I am going to have to watch the video.

He's definitely not a BrOSR type, he just found this rule/idea recently and thought it was cool. It would be a shame if people cast "game time = real time" as anathema simply because they didn't like some of its adherents. In particular circumstances, it can be a very good approach for minimising book keeping stress especially in a multi-group or open table, open world campaign. It has very little relevance to post Dragonlance 'AP' style play.

 

[Bedrockgames]

The self-labeled "BrOSR" folks (not the Brazilian OSR folks who originated that label, but the absolute idiots who co-opted it to mean "Bro" + "OSR" as, in "we One True Alpha Fans of D&D" folks). I assumed that the video maker is amongst their ranks (or at least sympathetic) because these folks are singularly obsessed with the rule in question to a pathological degree. This may have been unfair of me, but in point of fact, I've never seen anybody outside of that sphere claim that the "game time equals real-time" rule was ever popular, influential, or a cornerstone of common D&D play. This is pretty much the main pillar of the BrOSR folks, with the arguments I mention in the quoted post (i.e. One True Way, etc, etc) being extensions of that.

[Edit: Yeah, he doesn't seem to be one of the dyed in the wool BrOSR guys yet, but he's definitely on the path re: attributing this rule as a once common, influential, and popular cornerstone of D&D play, it seems.]

I wouldn't knock the mechanic simply because this group or that group has latched onto it. I am still trying to understand what the BroSR is exactly, but this is an approach to time I've adopted here and there well before any online discussions, and I am sure there are other people out there using it for all kinds of reasons. I don't particularly care for one-true-wayism when it comes to gaming. The way I see it is if there is a tool that people might find useful, that can be great to talk about and share. It need not be the one solution to everything though. Every campaign is going to have its own needs. This is something I've found useful for specific types of campaigns, but it isn't something I use the majority of the time.

 

[S'mon]

I am still trying to understand what the BroSR is exactly

Jeffro Johnson & his AD&D players and adherents. Jeffro has associated with Vox Day, who is pretty Far Right and not a nice guy (IMO, YMMV etc). Jeffro wrote a book Appendix N, and has a somewhat well known blog What Is the #BrOSR? He takes a very "GYGAX WAS THE ONE TRUE GOD OF D&D" approach, and has some useful insights IME, if you take it all with a big grain of salt. Very much at the anti-Woke/right-wing end of the RPG political scale, so unpopular here, and objectively I'd say he was definitely pretty abrasive but not really a bad guy per se.

 

[Bedrockgames]

Jeffro Johnson & his AD&D players and adherents. Jeffro has associated with Vox Day, who is pretty Far Right and not a nice guy (IMO, YMMV etc). Jeffro wrote a book Appendix N, and has a somewhat well known blog What Is the #BrOSR? He takes a very "GYGAX WAS THE ONE TRUE GOD OF D&D" approach, and has some useful insights IME, if you take it all with a big grain of salt. Very much at the anti-Woke/right-wing end of the RPG political scale, so unpopular here, and objectively I'd say he was definitely pretty abrasive but not really a bad guy per se.

That clarifies a bit. I've heard the BrOSR mentioned and heard of that guy but haven't really understood the context. I would say, its a shame if people are associating this mechanic with a particular political point of view or an abrasive view of the OSR, because it really is a wonderful tool if used in the right circumstances (and there isn't anything inherently political about the mechanic itself).

Also while I think there are points on the history people might quibble about in the questing beast video (which someone posted upthread), he does a very good job of explaining where and why real time can be of use (he also does a good job of explaining ways you can use it).

 

[Charlaquin]

There were tons of rules in 1e that were effectively optional, and seldom used. For example, go look at the zillions of rules about weapons that were often cheerfully ignored.

The "real time" thing really only made sense in the context of groups of very devoted players who could run day or weekend-long sessions that didn't end until the objective was complete, and that met very frequently, like weekly. A player might be absent here or there, but the campaign was one story that maintained its own momentum. That's basically what Gygax did with his Lake Geneva group for a few years as the game was developing, so a lot of those ideas were brought in as rules that were really "rules." It just wasn't feasible for most groups, even if you wanted to run a real time campaign.

We'd be mid-battle and Eric would have to leave because his mom needed to pick him up early, and then Steve was getting a ride with him and...we'll just pick it up next session. Obviously we weren't going to say that a week had passed in the middle of the fight. The "real time" rule was only ever an "optional, and maybe in an ideal world" kind of rule.

Everyone understood this.

I think in order for a real-time rule to work, you pretty much also need to end each session back in town (a common feature of West Marches, which I think is part of why this idea appeals to the same people who enjoy that type of play). That would also require either for everyone to commit to keeping the session going for as long as it takes to get back to town, or for there to be some kind of retreat rule, where if you’re still not back in town by the end of the session, you can resolve the whole process of retreating from the dungeon and making the trek back to town in just a few rolls.

 

[Bedrockgames]

I think in order for a real-time rule to work, you pretty much also need to end each session back in town (a common feature of West Marches, which I think is part of why this idea appeals to the same people who enjoy that type of play). That would also require either for everyone to commit to keeping the session going for as long as it takes to get back to town, or for there to be some kind of retreat rule, where if you’re still not back in town by the end of the session, you can resolve the whole process of retreating from the dungeon and making the trek back to town in just a few rolls.

Something I have found can work, if you are willing to hand wave, if the session ends in the middle of an adventure or dungeon, is just say the party makes it back to their home base or that they somehow manage to survive a week wherever they happen to be (I tend to lean on the former). Again it is going to boil down to specifics. I've had modern monster hunts for example where the players were in a forest in the north east tracking a ghost and being attacked, and when the session ended, I just had them go back to their hotel between sessions. But then, I am not too hung up on handwaving these things. It can be an issue if those details really matter to you.

 

[overgeeked]

Hmm. I don't think this is a point of difference though. At least I've not seen any indication they differed on this.

We know how Dave Arneson was when he created fantasy RPGs as a hobby and ran games from people who played with him, see Secrets of Blackmoor. We know how Gygax was when he ran games from people who played with him and all his writings on how D&D should be run. Rob Kuntz wrote a book called "Dave Arneson's True Genius" about how Arneson created an open system with his invention and how Gary Gygax systematized that open system, turning it into a closed system. To simplify it, it's the difference between a "rulings not rules" mindset and a "rules for everything" mindset. This is a repetition of history as the same thing happened in early wargaming, only the rigid and closed system came first, followed by the free and open system, see Kriegsspiel. Free Kriegsspiel is where Wesley got the idea that eventually sparked Arneson to create tabletop fantasy RPGs.

 

[Charlaquin]

Something I have found can work, if you are willing to hand wave, if the session ends in the middle of an adventure or dungeon, is just say the party makes it back to their home base or that they somehow manage to survive a week wherever they happen to be (I tend to lean on the former). Again it is going to boil down to specifics. I've had modern monster hunts for example where the players were in a forest in the north east tracking a ghost and being attacked, and when the session ended, I just had them go back to their hotel between sessions. But then, I am not too hung up on handwaving these things. It can be an issue if those details really matter to you.

Yeah, resolving the retreat without rolling any dice is also a perfectly viable option, if the group is cool with that.

 

[overgeeked]

Jeffro Johnson & his AD&D players and adherents. Jeffro has associated with Vox Day, who is pretty Far Right and not a nice guy (IMO, YMMV etc). Jeffro wrote a book Appendix N, and has a somewhat well known blog What Is the #BrOSR? He takes a very "GYGAX WAS THE ONE TRUE GOD OF D&D" approach, and has some useful insights IME, if you take it all with a big grain of salt. Very much at the anti-Woke/right-wing end of the RPG political scale, so unpopular here, and objectively I'd say he was definitely pretty abrasive but not really a bad guy per se.

Appendix N is published by Castalia House, the same ultra-right wing racist and sexist people who did the Sad Puppies and Rabid Puppies nonsense with the Hugo Award a few years back.

 

[S'mon]

Appendix N is published by Castalia House, the same ultra-right wing racist and sexist people who did the Sad Puppies and Rabid Puppies nonsense with the Hugo Award a few years back.

Vox Day, yup.