Your Experiences with DMGs? Forked Thread: 4e Has Less Raw Content: Fact!

[Connorsrpg]

I feel much the same as others.

1E was chock full of awesome. But I do wonder if a lot of that is nostalgia. I do LOVE lots of DM charts/tools, which it had and I write many myself.

2E. Nothing memorable at all from that book.

3E. Some OK charts, but basically a MI catalogue. I did like the 3.5 reorganisation and extra content, esp the sections on each terrain inc urban (good enc chart that).

3E DMG 2. Some great useful stuff there. Whole town to drop in, NPC charts and tools, flavour for MIs and the best advice regarding players ad styles I have read.

4E. As an experienced DM I found a lot of the advice stuff old hand (esp after the DMG 2 (3E). However, I do believe thsi stuff should be in the first DMG for the edition. Was hoping for more, but the more I read the more I like it. I love its support of DM winging. The tools in there are good, though creature design still confuses me a little. I like the monster role and encounter creation rules/ideas, the random encounter and dungeon parts at the back and sample hometown. Still wish it had more tools for immediate use, but I guess that is what future DMGs are for. Overall happy.

C

 

[S'mon]

Well I think the best GM's guide ever written consists of a few pages in Moldvay Basic D&D.

 

[ExploderWizard]

Well I think the best GM's guide ever written consists of a few pages in Moldvay Basic D&D.

Yup. Slap on the DM's section from the expert, companion, and masters set , include all monsters and magic items from these and sprinkle with some 1E DMG table goodness and you have an ultimate DMG and monster manual in book with fewer pages than a typical DMG by itself.

 

[Hussar]

ExploderW, I find that strange coming from you. After all, you have stated your distaste for the 4e Monster Manual since it does not include a lot of setting information. Yet, the Basic/Expert books contain almost nothing but combat stuff for the monsters they list. A monster's description is two paragraphs at the absolute most.

 

[The_Gneech]

Page 42 was quite good. The rest "about average." You'd get the same benefit from reading Robin's Laws of Good Gamemastering.

-The Gneech

 

[ExploderWizard]

ExploderW, I find that strange coming from you. After all, you have stated your distaste for the 4e Monster Manual since it does not include a lot of setting information. Yet, the Basic/Expert books contain almost nothing but combat stuff for the monsters they list. A monster's description is two paragraphs at the absolute most.

The basic game descriptions were very short on both fluff AND crunch.They described the monster and thats about it in most cases. If one were to take just the basic/expert monsters and give them the page count of the 4E MM you would have a lot more creature types and room for a lot more ecology/lore.

 

[jdrakeh]

I referenced the AD&D 1e DMG more than any other game book that I owned for a long while. Despite a few pargraphs of odd, contradictory, or useless advice, it's easily the best DMG for pure reading enjoyment in my opinion and the second best for useful content.

I never referenced (that I can recall) the AD&D 2e DMG, because my groups continued to use the AD&D 1e DMG (despite many of us owning the AD&D 2e DMG). It seemed to contain a lot of fairly useless information seemingly intended as filler. This is the 'low water mark' for DMGs in my opinion, as a useful resource. It's a slightly more enjoyable read than the 3x DMGs (see below).

I've only ever referenced the basic 3x DMGs (both of them) for the XP tables when balancing encounters. All of my magic items came from more inventive books like Relics & Rituals, as did the Prestige Classes and so forth. These DMGs were only slightly more useful to me than the AD&D 2e DMG was, though their technical approach to writing bored me to tears.

Ironically, I really liked the DMG II — I feel that this is what the basic 3x DMGs should have been.

I'm not even playing 4e (I'm waiting for reprints of the PHB and MM before I attempt it), but the 4e DMG is easily the most engaging DMG that I've read for years. It contains a lot of advice and more 'tips and tricks' style content than either the AD&D 2e or 3x DMGs did. Right now, for sheer joy of reading, I rank it just slightly lower than the AD&D 1e DMG. For useful content, it seems like it would serve me better than all previous DMGs.

 

[knightofround]

Yeah I'm gonna be a sheep and go with the 3E's DMGII being the best DMG. Its not that 4E's is bad, its just that the majority of its good bits are specific to 4E. As far as general DMing advice goes, DMGII takes the cake. But yeah 3E DMGI was only a magical item compendium. Oh, and a reference for hardness values.