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qlawdat
2009-04-05, 10:21 AM
The group I normally DM for has been talking about 2nd edition, and the good old times. It has been probably six years since i have even cracked open a 2nd edition anything and I honestly don't know how hard it will be to go back to it. We mostly play 3.5 with some 4th edition thrown in. Does anyone have any first hand experience of switching to an older edition. Any one want to refresh me on some of the rules that I am sure to forget about? Any help would be very much appreciated.

Kurald Galain
2009-04-05, 10:39 AM
Any one want to refresh me on some of the rules that I am sure to forget about?
The point of 2E is that the rules are much more relaxed. Unlike 3E, which waxes into detail about the minutiae of everything, and 4E, which assumes that every turn you will only use the Powers listed on your sheet, you can essentially try whatever you want. Of course, it requires a flexible DM to handle all that.

The core books assume no miniatures or game board. This means they're more flexible, but also that players might not exactly know the position of the monsters they're fighting (then again, since it's less of a tactical game, they don't necessarily want to).

Also, 2E is not particularly balanced, but then most players I know (and for that matter, every system I know other than D&D) don't think that play balance is such a big deal in the first place.

Oracle_Hunter
2009-04-05, 11:57 AM
Ah, funny you should ask.

Recently, I had a burst of nostalgia and I went back to my AD&D books to give them a once-over. While Kurald Galain's points are well taken, the biggest change is actually in the "goal" of the game.
In 3E/4E, the game assumes you will survive until the end of the campaign. Every level brings new and important bonuses, it is difficult to actually "go down" in any character ability permanently, and it is almost always possible to be revived. Adventures are constructed to be risky, but also to have few "or die" situations - the well-prepared and crafty will survive.

2E, on the other hand, expects you to die at any moment. The difference from level to level is generally small, characters can easily lose ability points or levels permanently, and most adventures are like running through Castle Heterodyne. (http://www.girlgeniusonline.com/comic.php?date=20070725) Rather than character-building, the game focuses on providing exciting moment-to-moment situations - there are no fancy PrCs or PPs to qualify for later on; only the stories you produce matter. No matter how well-prepared or crafty you are, you can always die, and die permanently, by the roll of a die.
This change of aesthetic is a bigger hurdle than any mechanical change between the systems. If you drop a bunch of 3E/4E players into a AD&D game unprepped, they will be aghast at how unimportant their levels are, and how easily it is for them to die for no good reason.

If you've prepped your players with that, the next thing you have to do is figure out what rules you are using. A casual glance through the PHB will reveal multiple variations on the rules - there really isn't a "default" set to use. So fire up a Word Document and start listing the rules you are using; I say Word because you'll want to print out a copy for your players to refer to. After awhile, everyone will get used to your system, but it'll be handy to have a reference to start off with.

Finally, as a DM you will be spending a lot more time doing things by eye rather than by table. Write your adventures first as narratives, and then figure out what challenges should be in the way. "Building an encounter" is usually no more than picking monsters out of the MM and then eyeballing them to see if they are "too hard." Particularly at low levels, you'll want to also write in avenues for your players to avoid combat - most 1st level PC can be dropped by a max-damage longsword hit; and by dropped I mean dead.

Starscream
2009-04-05, 12:13 PM
I got my start with 2E, and I have to say that both previous posters have it exactly right. The rules are much more relaxed, but the atmosphere is much more deadly. The last time I played a 2E campaign the DM specifically warned us not to get too attached to our characters, because death could come at any minute.

And yeah, there are balance issues, but there always have been and always will be, so just don't let the players abuse the rules (or lack thereof) too badly and you'll have fun.

Oracle_Hunter
2009-04-05, 12:21 PM
And yeah, there are balance issues, but there always have been and always will be, so just don't let the players abuse the rules (or lack thereof) too badly and you'll have fun.

Heh, that's not the kind of balance we're talking about.

There is very little in AD&D for a player to abuse (Dart Fighters excepted) largely because the rules are so loose. The balance issues here are entirely DM-side; monsters are not designed to fit nicely into "level appropriate encounters," most powerful spells have a good chance of killing the caster (Polymorphs, for example), and there are few PC-accessible "or die" abilities, but many monster-side ones. At worst the broken stuff appears at very high levels and usually benefit NPCs more than PCs (e.g. Dragons using Wish).

Ascension
2009-04-05, 12:55 PM
I like how many of the classes have a built in Leadership-esque ability to attract followers. While I've only read 2E, never played it, I imagine that gradually amassing an army as you level would really give you the feeling of being the sort of epic hero stupidly MAD Bards sing three rounds before combat about.

LibraryOgre
2009-04-05, 01:00 PM
Just to add a bit to Oracle Hunter's "The game is not about character building." I think it is a bit more accurate to say that the game is not about character building. 3rd level is going to let you use another weapon without a penalty, and show aptitude in another skill, not hit a second person after you've killed someone. With the basic game, character creation can take about 15-20 minutes for someone who is very new, and a lot of that is going to be writing things down. It takes longer if you include things like kits or Skills and Powers, but the basic game is VERY easy for people to get into and make a competent character. 3.x, and to a lesser degree 4e, require a lot of choices at 1st level, and it's a lot easier to pick things that are suboptimal... and suboptimal is a bigger deal.

Matthew
2009-04-05, 01:10 PM
We get a fair number of second edition returnees over at Dragonsfoot (http://www.dragonsfoot.org/forums/viewforum.php?f=2) from month to month. A couple just in the last few days, as it goes. Usually it is just a case of reconditioning themselves to the game paradigm, and most seem to feel that the transition is relatively pain free (even something of a relief, according to some). The guys who post are mainly game masters, so we do not usually hear much first hand from the players, but most anecdotes are along the lines of "they love the freedom" or "except one guy who keeps trying to play as though it is D20/3e", but the latter case is fairly rare.

The initiative system is usually quite controversial, because AD&D is set up to handle it multiple ways (not that it bothers to explain many of them), and the idea of true simultaneous action seems to be a bit too much for a lot of them, so they tend to use the "turn by turn" version.

Proficiencies are another area of variable discussion; I have noticed a tendency for returning game masters to start out with proficiencies and then decide to dump them later on.

Anyway, good luck, and should you decide to make the leap, then welcome back to Advanced Dungeons & Dragons.

Chronos
2009-04-05, 01:21 PM
On the other hand, the simplicity comes at the cost of a lack of customizability, at least mechanically. My tenth level fighter can do pretty much exactly the same things as any other tenth level fighter in the world, and the only real difference is that whichever one has the higher ability scores can do those exact things better.

Another difference is that 2nd edition does not assume the magic-mart economy where characters can buy pretty much whatever magical equipment they want, if they have the money for it. In fact, the rule books don't even list prices for any of the items: If the players do manage to get into some situation where they can buy or sell magic items, the price is completely negotiable. This has its benefits and drawbacks: On the minus side, it makes it hard to calibrate how much loot the players should have, so there are vast differences between DMs with regard to how generous they are. On the one hand, you'll see some campaigns where the players are still excited to find a +1 sword at level 10, and on the other hand, you'll have "Santa Clause DMs" who give out things like a Rod of Lordly Might at first level.

On the plus side, though, if you do have a good DM, it lets him exert much more control over what the players should and shouldn't have, and maintain a sort of economic balance. In second edition, if you slew a powerful dragon, you'd end up with wealth beyond your wildest dreams, but it wouldn't actually disrupt the game balance any, because there's only so much you can practically spend that wealth on. In 3rd edition, by contrast, dragon hoards have been seriously cut back, since otherwise you could spend that vast wealth to become far more powerful than you should be.

LordZarth
2009-04-05, 01:23 PM
Well, I wouldn't say that "unlike 3e and 4e", 2e allows you to do anything. 3e also allows you to do anything.

The difference is, 3e allows you to do everything because it's got rules for everything. 2e trivializes rules.

Morty
2009-04-05, 01:29 PM
Well, personally speaking, I'd certainly give AD&D a try - provided I can get the books, which might be hard - but the simplicity in character creation is what drives me away a bit. That, and 1st level mages apparently suck even worse than in 3rd edition. And monster races are unplayable with core rulebooks.

bosssmiley
2009-04-05, 02:39 PM
Well, personally speaking, I'd certainly give AD&D a try - provided I can get the books, which might be hard

OSRIC (http://www.knights-n-knaves.com/osric/) - free OGL AD&D. You can also get loads of 2E stuff cheap at paizo and rpgnow.


but the simplicity in character creation is what drives me away a bit. That, and 1st level mages apparently suck even worse than in 3rd edition. And monster races are unplayable with core rulebooks.

You just need to recalibrate your expectations in light of the different system. All the things you've mentioned are actually features, not bugs. :smallwink:

Chargen in <5 minutes? Yes please! Leaves more time for play.
Squishy wizards who are actually squishy? That'll do nicely sir.
Monsters are monstrous? Yep, fits the Appendix N inspirational material (http://www.orbitfiles.com/download/id3203196838.html).

Lapak
2009-04-05, 02:53 PM
OSRIC (http://www.knights-n-knaves.com/osric/) - free OGL AD&D. You can also get loads of 2E stuff cheap at paizo and rpgnow. It should be noted that OSRIC is actually modeled on / a straight-up port of 1E, not 2E. That said, the two editions are much closer to each other than any other two; using characters and monsters from one in the other is not that much work. I used 1st edition adventures with my 2nd edition group all the time, and it was maybe 5 minutes of work per module to make 'em go.

Morty
2009-04-05, 02:55 PM
OSRIC (http://www.knights-n-knaves.com/osric/) - free OGL AD&D. You can also get loads of 2E stuff cheap at paizo and rpgnow.

Hm, that's cool.


You just need to recalibrate your expectations in light of the different system. All the things you've mentioned are actually features, not bugs. :smallwink:

Right. They are features. But they're features that drive me away. So I see no real difference here.


Chargen in <5 minutes? Yes please! Leaves more time for play.

I don't mind character creation taking long if it means I have a good choice in picking character's abilities.


Squishy wizards who are actually squishy? That'll do nicely sir.

Low-level 3ed wizards are squishy enough. In AD&D, if the games on Infinity Engine are any indication, a 1st level mage casts one spell and then shoots ineffectually with a sling. I don't mind wizards not being broken to hell on high levels, but I'd like my character to have some real impact on low levels too.


Monsters are monstrous? Yep, fits the Appendix N inspirational material (http://www.orbitfiles.com/download/id3203196838.html).

Yeah, D&D's philosophy in which monstrous humanoids are only there so that the Heroic Heroes of Goodness can stomp them into ground for loot, XP and glory does have strong roots in classic fantasy. Doesn't mean I have to like it.

Thane of Fife
2009-04-05, 03:04 PM
Low-level 3ed wizards are squishy enough. In AD&D, if the games on Infinity Engine are any indication, a 1st level mage casts one spell and then shoots ineffectually with a sling. I don't mind wizards not being broken to hell on high levels, but I'd like my character to have some real impact on low levels too.

Well, at low levels he's got as good a chance to hit as pretty much anyone else, so it isn't really that ineffective. And beating people with a quarterstaff works, too.

Narmoth
2009-04-05, 03:17 PM
On CR:

There's a few easy ways to see if a monster is to tough for the players to take on:
1. Do you wan't to give out this amount on xp on 1 combat encounter? If no, then they probably shouldn't meet the monster, as it will teared them apart and eat the pieces.
I find that 1/10 of the xp requirement for the lvl is a good cap. This is powerfull monsters that present a serious challenge
2. How much dmg can the monster do in an average round? If the dmg is enough to kill a player, you probably shouldn't send it on the group. Remember to calculate in the chance of the monster hitting in the average dmg
3. Thac0: it shouldn't really be lower (that's better attack bonus) than the groups lvl + 1 to +3. A lvl 3 group shouldn't encounter a monster with Thac0 lower than 14.

On treasure tables. Mostly, they're not great. Just decide before the encounter starts what the monster is carrying, and what you'd like to revard the characters with

Kurald Galain
2009-04-05, 04:15 PM
On the other hand, the simplicity comes at the cost of a lack of customizability, at least mechanically.
True enough, because 2E is not about mechanics. However, a number of optional rules exist to make more mechanical customizability, including secondary skills, proficiencies (both in the core book), kits, various maneuvers or specs from the fighter's handbook, and the point-buy things from the last generation of splatbooks.



Another difference is that 2nd edition does not assume the magic-mart economy where characters can buy pretty much whatever magical equipment they want, if they have the money for it.
Yes. This is a matter of philosophy: if you are given random items, you'll end up finding creative uses for them. Whereas if you can buy whatever you want, then 90% of characters will want (and buy) the exact same items, thus reducing the very same mechanic customizability you were talking about. Especially if your players read internet forums, they'll pretty much end up wanting the exact same stuff as is listed in the Guides for their class.



In AD&D, if the games on Infinity Engine are any indication, a 1st level mage casts one spell and then shoots ineffectually with a sling.
That's because at 1st level, you're not supposed to be in combat (because, you know, it could get you killed). There are other ways to get XP than by bashing goblin brains in, after all. If this bothers you, play on level 4 and the problem goes away. This is comparable with many other RPGs (e.g. vampire, ctulhu, shadowrun) where your characters have a strong incentive to avoid fights (and instead sneak, or talk, or bribe) because fights can get you killed.



Yeah, D&D's philosophy in which monstrous humanoids are only there so that the Heroic Heroes of Goodness can stomp them into ground for loot, XP and glory does have strong roots in classic fantasy. Doesn't mean I have to like it.
I can name you numerous 2E settings that don't use that particular cliche (and numerous non-2E settings that do). So I fail to see your point here.

Sebastian
2009-04-05, 04:15 PM
I got my start with 2E, and I have to say that both previous posters have it exactly right. The rules are much more relaxed, but the atmosphere is much more deadly. The last time I played a 2E campaign the DM specifically warned us not to get too attached to our characters, because death could come at any minute.


On the plus side, to create a new character in 2nd edition you need around 5 minutes, and the longer part is probably thinking what character you'd like.

Chronos
2009-04-05, 05:13 PM
True enough, because 2E is not about mechanics. However, a number of optional rules exist to make more mechanical customizability, including secondary skills, proficiencies (both in the core book), kits, various maneuvers or specs from the fighter's handbook, and the point-buy things from the last generation of splatbooks.Yeah, but the core options there don't make nearly as much difference as any of the character-customizations in 3e. Even just at first level using core only, a 3.5 wizard has 113 different ways to choose his schools, while a 2e wizard has 9 (or 1, if he's anything other than human), and a cleric has 229 different choices of domains, a choice that didn't even exist in 2e. And the 2e splatbooks bring things up to about the same level as core 3.x, but then you have to consider all of the many 3.x splatbooks for a fair comparison.

qlawdat
2009-04-05, 05:18 PM
Lies all lies, it will always take longer than five minutes to make a character because I need at least ten minutes just figuring out a name that doesnt suck. Hmm, well lots of good thoughts. I don't know how much my group really wants to play 2nd edition and how much of it is looking back on the good old days. I didn't DM a whole lot of 2nd edition so I don't know how much a shock it will be. I am hearing many people say that it frees the DM up a lot, I don't know how constrained I have ever felt by any of the games I have run, but that just might be my style of gaming.

Oracle_Hunter
2009-04-05, 11:23 PM
Well, here's a fun campaign I've been meaning to run (but I've been short on time)

I dub it the "City of Heroes" Campaign. Allow me to explain:

BACKSTORY
Out at the far reaches of The Kingdom sits a decent sized town which is a magnet for adventurers. It was built using a nearby Green Dragon's treasure horde by the Fighter and his wife, the Wizard. Originally the town was rather small - just a keep and some supporting farmland - but that did not last. The party's Cleric and Thief decided to return to civilization to better spend their share of the treasure, and in the course of their dealings word got around about the Green Dragon's treasure and other adventurers started showing up, trying to find similar wealth.

Well, eventually the Thief returned having "gone legit" with a merchant company that supplies would-be adventurers with gear and the Cleric came back with a slew of followers and a writ to establish a Grand Church in town. Everyone got along pretty well in this bustling burg until another group of adventurers came out of the mountains bearing artifacts from a forgotten civilization. That sparked a "gold rush" as adventurers came from all over the kingdom to try and find more lost treasures and make it rich, quick.

As with any Boom Town, normal people started arriving to set up inns, taverns, and brothels to service the buzzing adventurers. Other parties made their names slaying fearsome beasts or recovering amazing treasure and set up their own shops and guilds in town. Soon, it became known as the City of Heroes.

LOGIC
2E is a highly lethal game, and it can become difficult to reasonably "add in" new party members when the old ones are eaten by grues. Also, it has a strong feel for the classic "explore and loot" sort of adventures that I've found more difficult to recreate in 3E/4E. So I construct a city located by many, many adventure hooks and filled it with potential replacement characters.

To add to the "old school" field, I'm also using the "3d6, six times in order" approach. This speeds up character creation and should make the players less attached to every 1st level character they roll up. And yes, every new recruit will be 1st level - it's not as big a problem as in 3E/4E and they should level quickly.

By having a static staging place, you can also get the PCs hooked into the setting; they can develop relationships with NPCs, work their way up in Guilds, and maybe even get in good with the Founding Party. And it also gives the possibility of in-town adventures to break up constant dungeon-crawling.

Ideally, this would be a semi-sandbox game. Yes, the PCs have to stay in the City of Heroes, but you construct the entire landscape outside to include known Points of Interest and various dungeons which the PCs can learn about in taverns, through Guilds, or by paid guides. Of course the wilderness should be swarming with monsters, bandits, and evil-types out to exploit the Forgotten Lore towards evil ends.

SAMPLE ADVENTURES
- Most adventurers new to the City make a journey to the Font of Knowledge for their first quest. The Font is a magical fountain installed in a shrine to an unknown deity that grants insight, visions, and foresight to those who drink from it. Unfortunately, anyone who drinks from the Font can never experience its effects again, and the water loses potency as soon as it leaves the shrine, so there has been no attempt to permanently seize the area by any major power. It is located a goodly distance from town and requires traveling through goblin country to reach.
This is a classic orientation adventure, and it includes a Magical Fountain, one of my favorite types of mystic artifact. The obvious reward is a drink from the Font which can provide XP (obvious), one-shot magical ability (a premonition of danger later on) or plot hooks (a vision of fabulous treasure, and knowledge of how to get there. Of course, the effects of the Font should be determined by a d% table, with a 00 resulting in being Geas'd by the Shrine Goddess to perform some great task :smallbiggrin:

- In order to be inducted into the Pathfinder's Guild (a Guild devoted to knowledge of the surrounding area), you must go to The Shadow Mirror - an underground lake with magic properties - and retrieve a Pearl of Night from the Guardian. The journey there is over difficult terrain and requires passing through The Deepwarrens, a cave system that is a notorious breeding ground for monsters.
The Pathfinder's Guild sells these Pearls of Night to the Wizard's Council (a mystic organization that liaises with the Founding Wizard) who uses them to activate a large artifact an earlier party found but never identified. By activating it, the Council hopes to fully understand its purpose and how to control it - but that is an adventure for another time.

If you join the Pathfinder's Guild you can get access to a wide variety of maps and journals made by previous Guild members that can warn of potential hazards and point to otherwise inaccessible points of interest. Very helpful.

The Church has long been trying to stamp out The Cultists who are constantly pillaging the ruins in an attempt to find powerful Forbidden Lore. The Church knows this is dangerous because they have already found (and used) the powerful Staff of Bones to create and control a sizable number of undead; in the process they also released some terrifying creatures that rampaged through the mountains (and the City!) until warriors killed many of them and drove the others into hiding. As an acolyte of the Church, the Keeper of Novices has asked you (and your party) to investigate reports of Cult activity in a known ruins and to stop whatever it is they're trying to do.
It's always nice to have an Evil Cult running around, and if you do have any Church-members in your party, they can be offered missions like to this build a relationship with the Church and, maybe, even rise to a position of prominence.

Now, admittedly this is a pretty Beer & Pretzels world, but it has a lot of scope for the sort of high-heroics and grand tales that befit an AD&D campaign. Plus, you can build on any of the early adventures you run to develop more meaningful campaign arcs if you desire.

It seems like so much fun, I'd figure someone should run it, if I can't... yet :smallwink:

Kurald Galain
2009-04-06, 12:24 AM
Yeah, but the core options there don't make nearly as much difference as any of the character-customizations in 3e. Even just at first level using core only, a 3.5 wizard has 113 different ways to choose his schools, while a 2e wizard has 9 (or 1, if he's anything other than human), and a cleric has 229 different choices of domains, a choice that didn't even exist in 2e.
Yeah, but that's just throwing numbers around to muddle the issue. Really, stating that a 1st-level human character in 3E can have N (N - 1) build options where N is the number of feats in existence is not at all helpful. Do you want to count the permutations possible for the 6 ability scores? I thought not.

Oracle_Hunter
2009-04-06, 12:33 AM
Yeah, but that's just throwing numbers around to muddle the issue. Really, stating that a 1st-level human character in 3E can have N (N - 1) build options where N is the number of feats in existence is not at all helpful. Do you want to count the permutations possible for the 6 ability scores? I thought not.

I actually agree with you here: numbers do muddy this issue.

Mainly that's because permutations on classes were either handled with kits (racial or class based) or through homebrew. In fact, "Priests of Specific Mythoi" were the "Domain Clerics" of AD&D - there just weren't any depicted in the PHB. These guys were designed to be endlessly customizable since the DM was encouraged to think up nifty powers and other things to make these guys special. Hell, the Druid was the suggested template for these priests!

Still, I will agree that 2E did not have as many mechanical permutations of characters as 3E/4E do; but then again, mechanical diversity wasn't the point. As noted above, characters were what you made of them, not the sum of your powers. It didn't really matter whether you could ubercharge someone to death or trip-poke them instead - what mattered was when you made that DEX check to land on the back of the Giant in order to deliver a mighty backstab that slew him :smallamused:

Chronos
2009-04-06, 01:20 AM
I didn't mean to imply that the mechanical customizability of 3rd edition made it better, per se, than second edition, just pointing out that it's there. Overall, I'd say that if you have a sufficiently good DM, the flexibility of 2nd makes it a better game, but for a DM of lesser skill, the more extensive rules of 3rd provide a useful crutch.


Mainly that's because permutations on classes were either handled with kits (racial or class based) or through homebrew. In fact, "Priests of Specific Mythoi" were the "Domain Clerics" of AD&D - there just weren't any depicted in the PHB. These guys were designed to be endlessly customizable since the DM was encouraged to think up nifty powers and other things to make these guys special. Hell, the Druid was the suggested template for these priests!While 2nd edition did encourage homebrew for things like this, I'm not sure one can really judge a game by the homebrew that's cooked up for it. Ultimately, I'm paying $30 a book for something; I don't want the book to just tell me to do everything myself. And of course, you could have a D&D group that plays by the houserule that they use World of Darkness rules for everything, or the like.

Oracle_Hunter
2009-04-06, 01:24 AM
While 2nd edition did encourage homebrew for things like this, I'm not sure one can really judge a game by the homebrew that's cooked up for it. Ultimately, I'm paying $30 a book for something; I don't want the book to just tell me to do everything myself. And of course, you could have a D&D group that plays by the houserule that they use World of Darkness rules for everything, or the like.

Oh, quite fair. Of course, most of the world books did include descriptions of their Priests of Specific Mythoi, so TSR wasn't completely throwing its hands into the air.

But then again, there are something like 4 different ways to deal with initiative in the PHB. AD&D was a lot about tuning the game to how you like it - which is a lot more work than most folks want to put into running a game. That's why you have the sharp division between "system games" and "freeform games" these days :smallbiggrin:

Porthos
2009-04-06, 03:25 AM
About 1e/2e and lethality, I want to agree and yet disagree. Yes, the ideas of Killer DMs and No Save Dungeon Traps came out of 1e/2e, but it's up to the DM whether or not he decides to spring them on the players. While there are undeniably more ways to creatively squish a character in 1e/2e, I've also been in extremely long running campaigns in that system where people were encouraged to focus on their characters as opposed to wondering whether or not the character would go kersplooie in five seconds.

As always, it depends on the DM. Trust me when I say that it's just as easy to run into a "Killer DM" in 3e as it is in 2e. :smalltongue:

As for character choices, that's what the Players Options (and the various Complete Books) books were for. :smalltongue:

All that being said, I would say that 1e/2e/PO is demonstrably unfairer than 3e/3.5e. A lot of people claim that 3e/3.5e is more "balanced" than 1e/2e/PO, and perhaps they're right. But as a person who played both systems for a VERY long time, the thing that stands out to me is that many of the "Your Character Dies/Has Something Horrible Happen To Him For No Good Reason And No There's Nothing You Can Do About It" thingys were ripped out of the game as it transitioned from TSR to WotC.

Your character dies and all you have on hand is a Druid? Play the Roulette Wheel of Reincarnation and see what happens bucko.
Your character dies and you want to try to bring him back? Roll d100 and see if he survives or not. Same goes for if some major juju happens to him.
Your character is going to run into level-draining undead over and over and over again in a campaign? Might as well just suck it up and expect to be lvl 3-6 for the whole campaign (let's just say that Negative Energy Protection wasn't exactly "all that" in 1e/2e/PO - and that level draining sucked hard in previous editions.... no pun intended).
What's that? You found a item you think is magical? You suuuure you want to pick it up?
[2e/PO only] What's that? You want to be a Priest? Better choose your god real carefully then.

Never mind the class/race restrictions. Or other various things that weren't seen as "fair" by various players.

I could go on and on and on about all of the little things here and there.

I will absolutely agree, however, on the "free-formness" about 1e/2e/PO. It was much less "rules-heavy". Unfortunately, some of the rules that they did have didn't quite flow together as 3e/3.5 did. What I mean by that is 3e/3.5e was (in theory at least) supposed to flow out of the d20 system (which was built from the ground up as a game system to be as "modular" and mathematically simple as possible), and adhere to certain guidelines in "rule-creation". Now whether they succeeded or not is of course up to debate.

But 1e/2e was much more a fly-by-the-seat-of-the-pants type thing. Which worked fine in individual settings. But made for awful kludges when you tried to combine "worlds" (i.e. Birthright and Planescape, to name two at random). Never mind the fact that the basic ruleset itself was at times rather clunky and mashed together.

1e/2e had many many great things going for it, but self-consistent inherent game/rule design wasn't one of them. :smallwink:

Course considering it was one of the first RPGs out there, and that it was made up as they went along, it's rather amazing that the game holds up as excellently as it does. My caveats not withstanding, there are many great things, rule wise, about the system. It's just that every once in a while I run into things that make my teeth grind, both as a player and as a DM.

Still, it is a good (and under the right conditions, great to fantastic) system to run a campaign. Just set aside a lot of the preconceptions of 3e/3.5e at the door when you do so and you should be fine. :smallsmile:

Ethdred
2009-04-06, 07:36 AM
Overall, I'd say that if you have a sufficiently good DM, the flexibility of 2nd makes it a better game, but for a DM of lesser skill, the more extensive rules of 3rd provide a useful crutch.

I think that's the key point - 1/2E are only as good as the DM. And the people who had rubbish DMs probably aren't hanging around on forums like this these days, as they wouldn't have stuck with the game.

One big thing I don't like about 3E is the fact that magic items are now liquid assets, and fairly interchangeable. My DM used to come up with all sorts of interesting and unique magic items, which really gave a distinct flavour to the characters who owned them - I had a wizard who was swathed in a cloak of living fire, which is cool whichever way you look at it. But once we translated those characters to 3E, and started counting WBL, you suddenly realised that all these special abilities that could only be used once in a blue moon were 'costing' you a fortune and preventing you from getting a +2 weapon.

Another thing (I'm on a roll now) is the paradigm that's been invented of all parties being 4 characters. Most 1/2E modules were for 6-10 characters, but could also be run with fewer. There was never this idea that you had to have one of each character 'type'. Now I see all this angst on the forums about 'no-one wants to play the healer' or 'I've got five friends, how do I handle this'.

There's a lot I like about 3E, but I'm in a negative mood right now :)

hamlet
2009-04-06, 08:31 AM
A point that I haven't seen mentioned here: AD&D (either 1e or 2e) reward good play, not good character building.

You have to use your brain and your wits more than your character abilities. Yes, you should know how to use those too, but they are often far less important than knowing, as a player, when to pack up your rucksack and walk out of the dungeon for the day and being able to think your way through things rather than dice your way through them.

Kurald Galain
2009-04-06, 08:36 AM
A point that I haven't seen mentioned here: AD&D (either 1e or 2e) reward good play, not good character building.
True enough. Also, unlike later editions, they explicitly award XP for good ideas, as well as good roleplaying.

Morty
2009-04-06, 08:45 AM
That's because at 1st level, you're not supposed to be in combat (because, you know, it could get you killed). There are other ways to get XP than by bashing goblin brains in, after all. If this bothers you, play on level 4 and the problem goes away. This is comparable with many other RPGs (e.g. vampire, ctulhu, shadowrun) where your characters have a strong incentive to avoid fights (and instead sneak, or talk, or bribe) because fights can get you killed.

Hm. Good point. Looks like the Infinity Engine games threw the party into fights too early.


I can name you numerous 2E settings that don't use that particular cliche (and numerous non-2E settings that do). So I fail to see your point here.

I'm not saying that 2ed uses that cliche much more than any other edition. I have no way of knowing that anyway. But if I'm not mistaken, monstrous humanoids don't get playable stats, do they? My response to bosssmiley's post was my usual reaction the "duh, greenskins are cannon fodder 'cause <insert fantasy author here> said so" argument.

Kurald Galain
2009-04-06, 08:58 AM
Hm. Good point. Looks like the Infinity Engine games threw the party into fights too early.
Ah yes. I gave up on Baldur's Gate because those friggin' kobolds kept killing me.


But if I'm not mistaken, monstrous humanoids don't get playable stats, do they?
Not in the PHB, no. I've never read the Monstrous Manual so I can't comment on that; but they eventually got the Complete Book of Humanoids, which featured about a dozen of them worked out as PC races.

On the other hand, the most common low-level way of resurrection was via the Reincarnate spell, which randomly brought you back as e.g. a goblin, or perhaps a squirrel. Given the philosophy of 2E, I believe the designers expected you to continue playing as that.

wormwood
2009-04-06, 09:32 AM
One thing I'd like to mention about game balance is that I always felt things balanced out over the course of the campaign in 2ed. A wizard really, truly sucked at low levels but in the end he was godly. A barbarian was a killing machine at low levels but slowly planed out in power toward the end. So, no, the classes weren't even close to balanced at any given level but I think everyone got a taste of power somewhere along the way.

Hyku
2009-04-06, 09:50 AM
The biggest thing I have run into with converting a player base to 2e (from 3.0 or 3.5) has been the idea of levels and class balance...

I have met a lot of DMs that fudge the level structure in 2e and normally it has disaterous results. The power curve in 2e is pretty linear and there was no attempt to balance it against all class archtypes.

**Disclaimer** I have no access to the books at work and google is not my friend today, so mathletes please look not at the exact numbers just the idea they represent.

Certain classes leveled much faster and this will generally cause melee/skill classes to be 2-4 levels above your casters. As well other classes that had just more inherent power, but in game limiters to their advancement. This really made the GM control the access to real power for the characters. eg Druids actually had epic level quests just to advance past certain points in leveling, and otherwise would be stopped from continuing as a Druid. High level casting components were supposed to be incredibly rare and memorizing spells took days for mid level casters.... days...

The lack of real stat progression and the rolling method also really placed hard caps on the more powerful classes as suboptimal stats prevent leveling beyond certain points.

The very basis of rolling a character and carrying him to godly powers just doesnt flow easily for the majority of classes. This is by far the biggest challenge I have found with converted players who expect a simple linear progression and the biggest hiccup to be ensuring they take the feats in the exact proper way for ultimate power! If you do decide to tackle 2e: Welcome to the wonderful world of setpiece 2e! It is a scary challenging world, filled with exciment, death, challenges, death and serious consequences to your actions! But in the end when you kill that dragon and claim its hoard, you will be honestly rewarded with unimaginable wealth!

Dr_Horrible
2009-04-06, 10:11 AM
One thing I'd like to mention about game balance is that I always felt things balanced out over the course of the campaign in 2ed. A wizard really, truly sucked at low levels but in the end he was godly. A barbarian was a killing machine at low levels but slowly planed out in power toward the end. So, no, the classes weren't even close to balanced at any given level but I think everyone got a taste of power somewhere along the way.

That's a fine thing to say in theory, but it actually doesn't work at all.

1) No one ever play from level 1-17 or whatever. So if you are playing a Wizard in a campaign that goes from level 1-6, you suck the whole time. If you start at a higher level, you just pick Wizard because it's awesome.

2) Even if Hypothetically you were playing the whole range, your character might be permanently defeated. Better to start with a party of all Barbarians (well not really, but you know what I mean). And then at level 9 when you almost TPK, half of you can switch to Wizards without ever having to actually play through the Magic Missile + Slingshot phase.

Kurald Galain
2009-04-06, 10:23 AM
1) No one ever play from level 1-17 or whatever. So if you are playing a Wizard in a campaign that goes from level 1-6, you suck the whole time.

Except, of course, that you don't. Let me reiterate, if you want to fight four encounters' worth of enemies per day, 2E is NOT the game for you. And certainly not at low level. If, on the other hand, you play a campaign focused on travel, or intrigue, or anything else that isn't plain combat wombat, you'll find that utility magic is awesome even at low level. The mistake you're making is that (like in pretty much every RPG except for 3E, 4E and Hackmaster) the point is not to fight all the time.


If you start at a higher level, you just pick Wizard because it's awesome.
Also, note that high-level wizards in 2E are significantly less awesome than their 3E counterpart, primarily because 3E removed any and all limitations, made HP-attacks much less effective, and made save-or-lose effects much more effecteive.

Dr_Horrible
2009-04-06, 10:32 AM
Except, of course, that you don't. Let me reiterate, if you want to fight four encounters' worth of enemies per day, 2E is NOT the game for you. And certainly not at low level. If, on the other hand, you play a campaign focused on travel, or intrigue, or anything else that isn't plain combat wombat, you'll find that utility magic is awesome even at low level. The mistake you're making is that (like in pretty much every RPG except for 3E, 4E and Hackmaster) the point is not to fight all the time.

Except of course that I'm specifically objecting to the idea of "balance over time" and so if the characters aren't balanced over time, but are balanced in some different way, that has nothing to do with what I'm talking about.

We get it. You love 2e. You don't have to vehemently disagree with anyone who criticizes anything that might possibly be about 2e.


Also, note that high-level wizards in 2E are significantly less awesome than their 3E counterpart, primarily because 3E removed any and all limitations, made HP-attacks much less effective, and made save-or-lose effects much more effecteive.

I am well aware of the differences between 2e and 3e/3.5. I am also talking about the concept of balance over time. Which has little to do with the degrees of awesome, as long as the classes are noticeably better or worse then each other at different points.

ericgrau
2009-04-06, 10:42 AM
Lies all lies, it will always take longer than five minutes to make a character because I need at least ten minutes just figuring out a name that doesnt suck. Hmm, well lots of good thoughts. I don't know how much my group really wants to play 2nd edition and how much of it is looking back on the good old days. I didn't DM a whole lot of 2nd edition so I don't know how much a shock it will be. I am hearing many people say that it frees the DM up a lot, I don't know how constrained I have ever felt by any of the games I have run, but that just might be my style of gaming.
google "list of rpg character names"

LibraryOgre
2009-04-06, 10:54 AM
Also, note that high-level wizards in 2E are significantly less awesome than their 3E counterpart, primarily because 3E removed any and all limitations, made HP-attacks much less effective, and made save-or-lose effects much more effecteive.

One of the more significant changes, IMO, that "broke" a lot of AD&D's worlds was the change in preparation time for spells. When it takes 9 hours to completely recharge a high-level wizard's entire spell repertoire, then, yeah, it's kinda weird that Khelben and Elminster aren't doing more to run the world.

However, when it takes 10mins/spell/spell level, it's a lot harder to run the world. It can take DAYS of constant study for a high-level wizard to recover after blowing everything. Teleporting in, killing everything, then teleporting out, takes a lot of energy and is going to require a long to recover from... a long time in which you are very vulnerable to retaliation.

hamlet
2009-04-06, 11:00 AM
Yeah, but Elminster broke half the rules anyway, so why not that one?

I'm not sure what bothered me most about that guy: that he was obviously a pimped out stupid character, or that he was an author avatar who had, to keep it family friendly, knocked boots with most of the lady goddesses in the entire multi-verse.

Hyku
2009-04-06, 11:34 AM
That's a fine thing to say in theory, but it actually doesn't work at all.

1) No one ever play from level 1-17 or whatever. So if you are playing a Wizard in a campaign that goes from level 1-6, you suck the whole time. If you start at a higher level, you just pick Wizard because it's awesome.

2) Even if Hypothetically you were playing the whole range, your character might be permanently defeated. Better to start with a party of all Barbarians (well not really, but you know what I mean). And then at level 9 when you almost TPK, half of you can switch to Wizards without ever having to actually play through the Magic Missile + Slingshot phase.


The challenge is that you are thinking in a 3.5 world... The 9th level barbarian would only have acrued enough exp to have a level 6 wizard, and then to advance him you have to have the dice gods grant you a high enough main stat to allow you to cast anything significant.

Not to mention the aformentioned leveling cap artificially put in place by the mechanics, IE there is only one lvl 17+ druid in the world and all Druids advancing past lvl 9 (Exact levels defeat me, but gist is correct from the PHB) have to travel to the sacred grove and pass votes/tests etc...

Lastly as a wizard you do not ever move past the sling phase... ever... High level spells had negative side effects, huge costs on time consuming material components and dumping all your slots on anything but the BBEG left you months of study to gain anything back on a campaign...

Comparing straight levels can't work because the exp requirements are different on each class! There was also severe limitations put in place on classes who were handed stronger powers. In the end I think it did strike a solid balance as your party has to be invested in each other just as much as their own character to succeed. Sure by the end of of a long campaign the wizard had the power to unleash devestation on a cosmic level but he always needed his companions help to recover, unlocking the later Druid levels generally required a epic side campaign in and of itself involving the entire party... So when they got access to the more powerful parts of the class it was in large part due to their friends.

2e is largley about a group of characters supporting each other in a world where the deck is stacked against them. They must actively help each other and support the team to ensure success.

Dr_Horrible
2009-04-06, 12:34 PM
The challenge is that you are thinking in a 3.5 world... The 9th level barbarian would only have acrued enough exp to have a level 6 wizard, and then to advance him you have to have the dice gods grant you a high enough main stat to allow you to cast anything significant.

No, I'm not thinking in terms of 3.5. If your 9th level Barbarian dies, and you want to come in as a level 6 Wizard you can, and thus skip the sucking stage and get right to being decent.

Yes, 2e's system of having people with the same experience be different levels is retarded. But that doesn't change the balance focus except to note that you compare two characters with the same experience total to determine which one is more powerful at a given "time."

And as for stats, I'm not sure what you mean. Either you play with bull**** 3d6 in order, in which case you never get to pick your class at all, because the dice always tell you what you can and can't play, or you use the (as far as I can tell) universal houserule of reordering them to your own design, in which case, you can be a Wizard whenever you roll any decent stat, and if you roll all crappy stats, you just make another fighter, play him for 2 days and he dies and you then get to make a level 7 Wizard.

Also, though this is from memory, I'm pretty sure 9th level Barbarian converts to 7th half way to eighth Wizard. But either way, not important.

Morty
2009-04-06, 12:45 PM
One of the more significant changes, IMO, that "broke" a lot of AD&D's worlds was the change in preparation time for spells. When it takes 9 hours to completely recharge a high-level wizard's entire spell repertoire, then, yeah, it's kinda weird that Khelben and Elminster aren't doing more to run the world.

However, when it takes 10mins/spell/spell level, it's a lot harder to run the world. It can take DAYS of constant study for a high-level wizard to recover after blowing everything. Teleporting in, killing everything, then teleporting out, takes a lot of energy and is going to require a long to recover from... a long time in which you are very vulnerable to retaliation.

Well, looks like another thing that hasn't been included in the Infinity Engine games, although I can understand why. But in a tabletop game, it sounds like a good restriction for spellcasters.

Dr_Horrible
2009-04-06, 12:54 PM
Well, looks like another thing that hasn't been included in the Infinity Engine games, although I can understand why. But in a tabletop game, it sounds like a good restriction for spellcasters.

The main reason Infinity doesn't include that stipulation is because it wouldn't matter except to make resting impossible outside of town.

If you go to an inn or something, you automatically rest to recover all spells, because unlike a real game, in Infinity games, nothing happens while you wait. So you can come back six days later, and still be facing the exact enemies you would have faced.

Additionally, because of the chances to be attacked while resting. It would just encourage players to rest after every fight, thus having a better chance of regaining spells successfully then if they waited till they exhausted them and then recovered all at once.

Morty
2009-04-06, 01:04 PM
The main reason Infinity doesn't include that stipulation is because it wouldn't matter except to make resting impossible outside of town.

If you go to an inn or something, you automatically rest to recover all spells, because unlike a real game, in Infinity games, nothing happens while you wait. So you can come back six days later, and still be facing the exact enemies you would have faced.

Additionally, because of the chances to be attacked while resting. It would just encourage players to rest after every fight, thus having a better chance of regaining spells successfully then if they waited till they exhausted them and then recovered all at once.

Which is why my post included the "I can understand why" line.

qlawdat
2009-04-06, 04:03 PM
Well I am glad that I have gotten people so fired up with my question. However my question was not which system was better. What I am more interested in is if anyone knows of any sites that offer a quick refresher on running 2e. I would rather not have to read the whole 2e phb/dmg before I can start running a game again, but I am sure that if I do without reading the rules that I will be forgetting a lot of them.

qlawdat
2009-04-06, 04:05 PM
An unrelated question, does anyone know why half the time I try to go anywhere on giantitp.com it times out and I have to refresh it?

Kurald Galain
2009-04-06, 04:14 PM
Lastly as a wizard you do not ever move past the sling phase... ever... High level spells had negative side effects, huge costs on time consuming material components and dumping all your slots on anything but the BBEG left you months of study to gain anything back on a campaign...
Wow, do you ever sound bitter! I'm sure nobody is allowed to have fun (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/StopHavingFunGuys), now. :smalltongue:

Oracle_Hunter
2009-04-06, 04:38 PM
Well I am glad that I have gotten people so fired up with my question. However my question was not which system was better. What I am more interested in is if anyone knows of any sites that offer a quick refresher on running 2e. I would rather not have to read the whole 2e phb/dmg before I can start running a game again, but I am sure that if I do without reading the rules that I will be forgetting a lot of them.

Like I said before:

If you've prepped your players with that, the next thing you have to do is figure out what rules you are using. A casual glance through the PHB will reveal multiple variations on the rules - there really isn't a "default" set to use. So fire up a Word Document and start listing the rules you are using; I say Word because you'll want to print out a copy for your players to refer to. After awhile, everyone will get used to your system, but it'll be handy to have a reference to start off with.

So, unless you want someone to choose your rules-set for you, you're going to have to do just that.

Sebastian
2009-04-06, 06:03 PM
A point that I haven't seen mentioned here: AD&D (either 1e or 2e) reward good play, not good character building.

You have to use your brain and your wits more than your character abilities. Yes, you should know how to use those too, but they are often far less important than knowing, as a player, when to pack up your rucksack and walk out of the dungeon for the day and being able to think your way through things rather than dice your way through them.

Exactly. Before 3rd edition the game was supposed to challenge the players, after 3rd the game become more and more about challenging the characters.

So in D&D you have the puzzle and you, the player, must think how to solve it. in 3rd you have the puzzle, roll a DC 20, or something, check on your skill and see if your character can solve it. There are exceptions either way, and a good/bad DM had his weight, but that is the gist of it.

Chronos
2009-04-06, 07:07 PM
Quoth Ethdred:
Another thing (I'm on a roll now) is the paradigm that's been invented of all parties being 4 characters. Most 1/2E modules were for 6-10 characters, but could also be run with fewer. There was never this idea that you had to have one of each character 'type'. Now I see all this angst on the forums about 'no-one wants to play the healer' or 'I've got five friends, how do I handle this'.That's not new to 3rd edition... The 2e Player's Handbook divided the classes up pretty cleanly into warriors, priests, rogues, and mages, and encouraged at least one of each in every party ("at least" because multiclassing was pretty common). And while larger parties were possible, I don't think I'm alone when I say that, for reasons completely unrelated to any ruleset, it was and is hard to get more than four or five players together at once (my group had a total of four players, and rotated DM duties each adventure with the DM du jour's character being an NPC).

Now, if a group nowadays is lucky to have more members, it would be pretty silly to complain about that state of affairs, but I've never seen that happen, myself.

Matthew
2009-04-06, 07:23 PM
Well I am glad that I have gotten people so fired up with my question. However my question was not which system was better. What I am more interested in is if anyone knows of any sites that offer a quick refresher on running 2e. I would rather not have to read the whole 2e phb/dmg before I can start running a game again, but I am sure that if I do without reading the rules that I will be forgetting a lot of them.

Try this for general approach: Old School Primer (http://www.lulu.com/content/3019374)



An unrelated question, does anyone know why half the time I try to go anywhere on giantitp.com it times out and I have to refresh it?

Giant in the Playground is too big for its servers.

Oracle_Hunter
2009-04-06, 07:49 PM
...well, to be slightly more helpful, here's a list of "variation rules" and the number of variations listed in the PHB:
- Stat Generation (6)
- Non-Weapon Proficiencies (2 - and none)
- Encumbrance (2 - and none)
- Weapon Type vs. Armor Modifiers (yes/no)
- Initiative (4)
- Parrying (yes/no)
- Jogging and Running (yes/no)

A real Beer & Pretzels game would be as follows:
- Method V Stat Rolling (4d6, drop the lowest)
- No NWP
- No Encumbrance
- No Weapon Type v. Armor Modifier
- Basic Initiative (each side rolls a d10 every round, lowest goes first)
- No Parrying
- No Jogging/Running

For ease of use, you can also homerule
- Initiative: Only roll at the start of combat

Thoughts?

Oh, and my set-up for the "City of Heroes" campaign
- Method I: 3d6 per stat, in order
- Secondary Skills: roll randomly
- Specific Encumbrance
- Weapon Type v. Armor
- Homebrew Initiative: each player and monster group rolls 1d10 at the start of combat; lowest goes first. Entities make choices in this order, but actions resolve at the initiative phase indicated by weapon speed / casting time.
- Parrying
- Jogging/Running

Because I want to run an "authentic" game :smalltongue:

Matthew
2009-04-06, 07:52 PM
A real Beer & Pretzels game would be as follows:
- Method V Stat Rolling (4d6, drop the lowest)
- No NWP
- No Encumbrance
- No Weapon Type v. Armor Modifier
- Basic Initiative (each side rolls a d10 every round, lowest goes first)
- No Parrying
- No Jogging/Running

For ease of use, you can also homerule
- Initiative: Only roll at the start of combat

Thoughts?

In second edition even weapon proficiencies are optional (thankfully). I often play in something very close to this style. However, I wouldn't advocate rolling initiative only once per combat if you are rolling per side. That variance is key to interrupting spells and such.

Oracle_Hunter
2009-04-06, 08:05 PM
In second edition even weapon proficiencies are optional (thankfully). I often play in something very close to this style. However, I wouldn't advocate rolling initiative only once per combat if you are rolling per side. That variance is key to interrupting spells and such.

Hmm... fair enough. I don't see the "Weapon Proficiencies are Optional" note (particularly since Weapon Specialization is nonsensical without them), but you can just Rule 0 'em away if you want.

Your point on Initiative is well taken. Do that, or do my more complicated system :smalltongue:

Matthew
2009-04-06, 08:11 PM
Hmm... fair enough. I don't see the "Weapon Proficiencies are Optional" note (particularly since Weapon Specialization is nonsensical without them), but you can just Rule 0 'em away if you want.

The whole proficiency chapter is labelled optional. If you excise the chapter, then characters use the weapons available to their class without penalty (what you do about characters trying to use weapons not available to their class is up to you, as it is in OD&D). Weapon specialisation is removed with the chapter, but since fighters only specialise with one weapon it is hardly rendered nonsensical, since every fighter simply chooses one weapon to be specialised in (actually, it works better, in my opinion). :smallbiggrin:

holywhippet
2009-04-06, 08:16 PM
On the other hand, the most common low-level way of resurrection was via the Reincarnate spell, which randomly brought you back as e.g. a goblin, or perhaps a squirrel. Given the philosophy of 2E, I believe the designers expected you to continue playing as that.

?? The reincarnation table for 2 (well, 2.5) looks like this:

D100 Roll Incarnation
01-05 Bugbear
06-11 Dwarf
12-18 Elf
19-23 Gnoll
24-28 Gnome
29-33 Goblin
34-40 Half-elf
41-47 Halfling
48-54 Half-orc
55-59 Hobgoblin
60-73 Human
74-79 Kobold
80-85 Orc
86-90 Ogre
91-95 Ogre mage
96-00 Troll

Actually, I think the Ogre mage is the really funny one. Your halfling rogue gets reincarnated, and suddenly they can cast spells?

What do you mean by low level anyway. It's a level 6 spell for wizards and a level 7 spell for clerics/druids. Raise dead is only level 5 and ressurection is level 7 as well.


An unrelated question, does anyone know why half the time I try to go anywhere on giantitp.com it times out and I have to refresh it?

The server is overloaded either in terms of processing or bandwidth. Too many people are either trying to view the comics or post on the forums.

krossbow
2009-04-06, 08:20 PM
Truth be told, reincarnation can be pretty kick ass; Troll without the horrible ECL please?

Chronos
2009-04-07, 12:27 AM
The talk of initiative reminds me: You'll need to houserule something about the time units, because as presented in the book, they just don't work (I don't remember the details, but it ends up being something like 1 turn = 10 rounds and 1 round = 1 turn).

Of course, most DMs not only houseruled the time units, but many of them didn't even realize they were doing it. And if there was a rules lawyer at the table who did know the DM was houseruling it, he kept his mouth shut, lest the actual rules be (somehow) enforced.

LibraryOgre
2009-04-07, 12:42 AM
?? The reincarnation table for 2 (well, 2.5) looks like this:

That's the wizard version. The priest version included a lot more animals, but, oddly, wasn't available to Druids until Spells and Magic (when it was moved from Necromantic to Animal sphere).

Kurald Galain
2009-04-07, 03:37 AM
?? The reincarnation table for 2 (well, 2.5) looks like this:
No squirrels? Awww.



What do you mean by low level anyway. It's a level 6 spell for wizards and a level 7 spell for clerics/druids. Raise dead is only level 5 and ressurection is level 7 as well.
I seem to recall it being lower level than that. Guess not, then.



The talk of initiative reminds me: You'll need to houserule something about the time units, because as presented in the book, they just don't work (I don't remember the details, but it ends up being something like 1 turn = 10 rounds and 1 round = 1 turn).
No, 1 round = 1 minute and 1 turn = 10 rounds = 10 minutes. Easy as pie.

The reason why people need to houserule it, is because 1 round = 1 minute is rather silly. It means you can swing your sword once per minute, and makes for really weird action scenes. So the common houserule would be 1 round = 5 or 6 seconds.

hamlet
2009-04-07, 07:24 AM
The reason why people need to houserule it, is because 1 round = 1 minute is rather silly. It means you can swing your sword once per minute, and makes for really weird action scenes. So the common houserule would be 1 round = 5 or 6 seconds.

I don't find it silly at all, but do find people who equate a single round with a single swing of the sword silly. It's very specific that 1 round of combat (1 minute of time) involves a great deal of give and take, feints, parry and thrust, positioning, etc. and that the single die roll represents the chance to land a solid blow through all of that.

It boggles my mind that people, otherwise intelligent and imaginative, have trouble with that concept.


I wouldn't advocate rolling initiative only once per combat if you are rolling per side. That variance is key to interrupting spells and such.

Actually, we're experimenting with this now and it's actually quite good in practice. Yes, it means that you miss the variation that might let a spell caster sneak in with a spell uninterrupted, but in the end, it kind of evens out because as often as one side is locked out of spells because of a bad init roll, the other side is too. Simplifies things greatly if that's what you're looking for.

Overall, though, I've always liked the more complicated, individual initiative and counting of segments in 2e. It took a little longer to get through a round, but with intelligent players, it went very well.

Kurald Galain
2009-04-07, 07:53 AM
It's very specific that 1 round of combat (1 minute of time) involves a great deal of give and take, feints, parry and thrust, positioning, etc. and that the single die roll represents the chance to land a solid blow through all of that.
Hah. Have you ever seen an actual swordfight? Here's a hint: they don't take ten minutes. That's not even remotely realistic (even considering feints etc) because the average person (and yes, at low level in 2E you are an average person) both lacks the stamina to do that for such excessive times, AND can easily hit several times within seconds.

hamlet
2009-04-07, 08:08 AM
Hah. Have you ever seen an actual swordfight? Here's a hint: they don't take ten minutes. That's not even remotely realistic (even considering feints etc) because the average person (and yes, at low level in 2E you are an average person) both lacks the stamina to do that for such excessive times, AND can easily hit several times within seconds.

Yes I have (albeit a staged one, but find me somebody in the Western world today who's seen an actual sword fight and I'll mail you a cookie) and it lasted quite a bit longer than ten minutes.

The average person today has the fortitude of a damp facial tissue compared to the average fortitude of somebody who would be expected to engage in combat 1000 years ago. Saying that, people even today are capable of exertion lasting longer than 10 minutes at a time.

Kurald Galain
2009-04-07, 08:37 AM
Yes I have (albeit a staged one, but find me somebody in the Western world today who's seen an actual sword fight and I'll mail you a cookie) and it lasted quite a bit longer than ten minutes.

The average person today has the fortitude of a damp facial tissue compared to the average fortitude of somebody who would be expected to engage in combat 1000 years ago. Saying that, people even today are capable of exertion lasting longer than 10 minutes at a time.
[ citation needed ]

Let's just say that there is a reason that every single other RPG system I can think of, including ones with a realistic focus such as GURPS, uses combat rounds measured in seconds, rather than minutes. I frankly don't care for the implication in your previous post that all the people who disagree with you might be less intelligent and imaginative, or "have trouble with the concept".

Lapak
2009-04-07, 08:46 AM
I don't find it silly at all, but do find people who equate a single round with a single swing of the sword silly. It's very specific that 1 round of combat (1 minute of time) involves a great deal of give and take, feints, parry and thrust, positioning, etc. and that the single die roll represents the chance to land a solid blow through all of that.

It boggles my mind that people, otherwise intelligent and imaginative, have trouble with that concept.Putting the very reasonable objections of Kurald Galain aside, another large problem people bang their heads against on the 'several feints and dodges and etc. per actual roll to-hit' concept is that it doesn't carry over into missile combat. The archer standing behind the group isn't dodging or weaving, in many situations he'll have a clean shot at a target standing in the open, he doesn't use any ammunition except what he expends on his to-hit roll... yet it still takes him a full minute to fire.

Even in melee combat, the whole 'dodging and weaving and only one hit roll out of many potential attacks' thing doesn't jive with 'hit points represent fatigue and luck and divine favor as well as meat hit points.' Some of the attacks that HIT are supposed to represent the ducking and weaving and near-misses that every minute-long combat round supposedly consists of.

I love 1e and 2e, but I houseruled combat rounds back down to seconds years ago.

ken-do-nim
2009-04-07, 09:08 AM
Putting the very reasonable objections of Kurald Galain aside, another large problem people bang their heads against on the 'several feints and dodges and etc. per actual roll to-hit' concept is that it doesn't carry over into missile combat. The archer standing behind the group isn't dodging or weaving, in many situations he'll have a clean shot at a target standing in the open, he doesn't use any ammunition except what he expends on his to-hit roll... yet it still takes him a full minute to fire.

Even in melee combat, the whole 'dodging and weaving and only one hit roll out of many potential attacks' thing doesn't jive with 'hit points represent fatigue and luck and divine favor as well as meat hit points.' Some of the attacks that HIT are supposed to represent the ducking and weaving and near-misses that every minute-long combat round supposedly consists of.

I love 1e and 2e, but I houseruled combat rounds back down to seconds years ago.

Then you have to go mess with the movement rates to scale them down to seconds as well. And voila, all the sudden missile weapons rule the day! Previously, an archer can fire 2 shots at the oncoming warriors 120 yards away before they closed in on him. Now he can probably fire 20, assuming you knocked movement rates down from 120 yards to 12 yards per round. And game balance just went south.

hamlet
2009-04-07, 09:33 AM
[ citation needed ]

Let's just say that there is a reason that every single other RPG system I can think of, including ones with a realistic focus such as GURPS, uses combat rounds measured in seconds, rather than minutes. I frankly don't care for the implication in your previous post that all the people who disagree with you might be less intelligent and imaginative, or "have trouble with the concept".

I made no insinuation that you or others were less intelligent than I. Not at all.

And AD&D was always a game that pushed a lot of abstraction over realism. It wasn't about reciting every stroke of the sword, but about abstracting a battle to a quick and playable method on paper and at table.


another large problem people bang their heads against on the 'several feints and dodges and etc. per actual roll to-hit' concept is that it doesn't carry over into missile combat. The archer standing behind the group isn't dodging or weaving, in many situations he'll have a clean shot at a target standing in the open, he doesn't use any ammunition except what he expends on his to-hit roll... yet it still takes him a full minute to fire.


Well, assuming he's using a bow, it's twice a round. And no, he's not spending time weaving and dodging and parrying, he's spending time drawing an arrow, nocking it, drawing, aiming, waiting for a shot where he's not going to shoot an ally, and releasing, and repeating. I have no problem here.

Dr_Horrible
2009-04-07, 04:37 PM
Regarding fights:

1) I am a Fencer, I have been in fights, they never last ten minutes. The average point is 5-10 seconds depending on skill level of competitors. Each point represents a successful strike.

2) The 1 minute rounds completely break down when you get to a point where you have vast differences in skill. A level 10 Fighter facing a pathetic nobody might still not kill him in one minute, even if he is completely unarmed. That's just sad.

3) Movement. You aren't paying attention Ken. The whole point is that the actual actions are better represented by 6 seconds then 60. Yes including movement. 120 yards is probably too much for 6 seconds, but given a full minute of actually trying to move under combat conditions, even the most novice fencer can move far farther then 120 yards. Easily much farther.

I'd rather be told that I can move 120 feet in six seconds then in one minute. I'd rather be an ubermensch then a pathetic loser.

Oracle_Hunter
2009-04-07, 04:47 PM
2) The 1 minute rounds completely break down when you get to a point where you have vast differences in skill. A level 10 Fighter facing a pathetic nobody might still not kill him in one minute, even if he is completely unarmed. That's just sad.

I'd like to note that a "pathetic nobody" in AD&D likely has d6 HP - a single blow should kill him, if you're lucky.

A 10th level Fighter at least should not miss 10 times, while a 1st level Fighter might.

Sebastian
2009-04-07, 05:29 PM
[ citation needed ]

Let's just say that there is a reason that every single other RPG system I can think of, including ones with a realistic focus such as GURPS, uses combat rounds measured in seconds, rather than minutes. I frankly don't care for the implication in your previous post that all the people who disagree with you might be less intelligent and imaginative, or "have trouble with the concept".

I could agree, except that IMHO GURPS 1round=1second it is just too fast, how long is the average combat in gurps? 10 rounds? I doubt that 10 - or even 30 second are an acceptable, or "realistic", duration for many combats.

Personally the best definition of round duration (not for D&D) I've seen was something like, a round duration is equal to the average time between two lightning in a summer storm. (Yes, it was actually the game definition for the combat round duration.)

I think the best solution is just to totally abstract it, say that a round is a round, sometime it can last a little more sometime a little less, and just go from there, if you really need a duration in real time terms the GM can make up something appropriate.

Dr_Horrible
2009-04-07, 05:49 PM
I'd like to note that a "pathetic nobody" in AD&D likely has d6 HP - a single blow should kill him, if you're lucky.

A 10th level Fighter at least should not miss 10 times, while a 1st level Fighter might.

Except the whole point is that nobody gets 10 attacks in a minute. Level 1 Fighters get 1 attack, level 10 fighters get 3-4, So yeah, it's very very possible for a level 10 fighter to fail to kill a pathetic nobody in a minute. In fact, it's about 80% of the time that a level 1 Fighter fails to kill the guy in a minute.

Can you think of a single fight ever that involved a trained armed swordsman taking 2 minutes to kill a someone who just stands still windmilling his hands?

Swordguy
2009-04-07, 06:00 PM
Yes I have (albeit a staged one, but find me somebody in the Western world today who's seen an actual sword fight and I'll mail you a cookie) and it lasted quite a bit longer than ten minutes.

The average person today has the fortitude of a damp facial tissue compared to the average fortitude of somebody who would be expected to engage in combat 1000 years ago. Saying that, people even today are capable of exertion lasting longer than 10 minutes at a time.

I've been in four. Not sparring. Not staged fights. Real one. Gimme my cookie.

Moreover, I choreograph stage fights for a living - generally speaking, they resemble a real fight as much as I resemble Angeline Jolie (hint: I don't resemble Angeline Jolie whatsoever). The POINT of a stage fight is to tell an entertaining story, which means the fight has to last long enough to get the story across. That's completely antithical to the purpose of a real swordfight, which is to kill the other guy as quickly as possible so he doesn't kill you.

Real swordfights last 1-6 moves, then somebody is dead or down, or the fighters have separated out of distance. Time elapsed on a 6-move fight will be something on the order of 5 seconds, maybe up to 10 if it includes wrestlings at the sword.

For reference, my fights:
1) Assistant instructor at the salle is physically abusing his girl. I try to stop it, he swings, I deflect it wide, zone in, and pommel him in the face. Concussion. Fight over. Total time: about 2 seconds.

2) Occurred immediately after #1. We're both fighters, with 6-7 years of experience each. She attacks, we spar at wide distance for maybe 8 seconds (maybe 12 blows? It's kind of a blur), she swings at my head, I parry with the basket hilt over my head and swing the sword down into the side of her knee, cutting the tendon. She drops. Fight over. I've still got a scar on my nose from this one - close call. Total time: about 10 seconds.

3) Long fight - we both have over a decad
e of swordsmanship under our belts. We have 5 or 6 passes, each one being about 2-4 moves, and we bail out of a pass when we realize we're on the "bad end" of that pass. We end in a corps a corps and wind at the blade - I manage to be a hair faster and lock his wrists, allowing a draw cut along the outside of his sword arm, which forces a disarm or he'd be "de-gloved" (think about it). Fight over. Total time: about 45 seconds total, with maybe half that actually being fighting.

4) Drunk dude at Ren Fair starts threatening people with a sword. I draw to hold his attention until security (also drunk and on coffee break) bothers to get there. He swings vertically at my head, I zone to the side and stop-thrust him in the sword-shoulder (which incidentally locks his arm from being able to swing around and follow my motion). Fight over. Total time: maybe 1.5 seconds.

Chronos
2009-04-07, 06:01 PM
I'd like to note that a "pathetic nobody" in AD&D likely has d6 HP - a single blow should kill him, if you're lucky.

A 10th level Fighter at least should not miss 10 times, while a 1st level Fighter might.Yes, but under the rules as written, that tenth level fighter doesn't have to miss ten times; he only has to miss twice.

And since I got my book out now to look that up, I also checked on the old Reincarnate spell description: Character class isn't actually retained by either version of the spell. If you roll a player character race, then you create a character of that race (hopefully at least with the same experience as the original, but the spell doesn't say, and knowing Gygax, the intention was probably for it to be a new 1st-level character). If you end up with the ogre mage or troll or any other monster race, then no class levels for you, and good luck even figuring out what your ability scores or saving throws are (second edition monsters had neither listed).

Also note that Reincarnate being a 7th-level priest spell means even more than you might think, since in 2nd edition, priest spells only went up to a maximum of 7th level.

Swordguy
2009-04-07, 06:02 PM
Can you think of a single fight ever that involved a trained armed swordsman taking 2 minutes to kill a someone who just stands still windmilling his hands?

Which Jackie Chan movie do you want me to cite? :smallwink:

(I know, I know...I'm not helping. :smalltongue: )

chiasaur11
2009-04-07, 06:11 PM
Which Jackie Chan movie do you want me to cite? :smallwink:

(I know, I know...I'm not helping. :smalltongue: )

Ah, but he normally is able to get a ladder.

And the man is death incarnate with a ladder.

kjones
2009-04-07, 07:04 PM
Exactly. Before 3rd edition the game was supposed to challenge the players, after 3rd the game become more and more about challenging the characters.

So in D&D you have the puzzle and you, the player, must think how to solve it. in 3rd you have the puzzle, roll a DC 20, or something, check on your skill and see if your character can solve it. There are exceptions either way, and a good/bad DM had his weight, but that is the gist of it.

Alternately, in 2nd edition, you could have had the players roll Intelligence or Wisdom checks, and in 3rd edition, you could still have the players solve the puzzle. This isn't an edition thing - this is just a case of good vs. lazy DMing. (If it's just a check, you don't actually have to come up with a puzzle...)

With regards to the duration of a round - 6 seconds per round makes a hell of a lot more sense, even if ranged attack rates do get kind of silly by that point. I usually split the difference and went with 10 seconds per round - not too short, not too long.

Jarawara
2009-04-07, 11:53 PM
Except the whole point is that nobody gets 10 attacks in a minute. Level 1 Fighters get 1 attack, level 10 fighters get 3-4, So yeah, it's very very possible for a level 10 fighter to fail to kill a pathetic nobody in a minute.

Actually, since we are talking about the 1st edition AD&D 1-minute rounds, then the level 10 fighter does in fact get 10 attacks per round.

Against any less than 1HD creature (certainly the pathetic nobody qualifies as less than 1HD, yes?), the fighter class gets one attack per round per level.

It's a wonky rule, meaning that a 1st level fighter gets 1 attack per round on an Goblin, or a Hobgoblin, while a 6th level fighter gets SIX attacks per round on the Goblins, while still only getting 1 attack on the Hobgoblin.

But it does tend to fit within the idea of the 1 round equals 1 minute concept. The less-than-1HD creatures were simply the 1E version of modern day Minions. Mow 'em down as fast as your blade can fly.

Dr_Horrible
2009-04-08, 12:07 AM
Actually, since we are talking about the 1st edition AD&D 1-minute rounds, then the level 10 fighter does in fact get 10 attacks per round.

Actually since we are talking about the 10th edition rounds, nobody gets to do anything at all.

{Scrubbed}

Matthew
2009-04-08, 02:02 AM
Actually since we are talking about the 10th edition rounds, nobody gets to do anything at all.

See how when you lie about what's going on everything else you say doesn't matter at all?

Welcome to 2e. The D&D license is on 4e, but we are talking about second edition. Please try to keep up. Or at least don't tell us that we are wrong when you are the one who is actually totally crazy living in another universe.

The poster appears to be thinking of the "one attack per level rule" against 1−1 HD creatures. In second edition this is presented as an optional rule. Please try and be more polite about other people's errors, though.

Dr_Horrible
2009-04-08, 02:04 AM
Probably the poster was thinking of the "1 attack per level rule" against 1−1 HD creatures. In second edition this is presented as an optional rule. Please try and be more polite about other people's errors, though.

He straight up said he was talking about 1st edition. So everything after that really has nothing to do with the rest of the thread.

Matthew
2009-04-08, 02:06 AM
{Scrubbed}

Still no reason to be impolite.

hamlet
2009-04-08, 07:35 AM
I've been in four. Not sparring. Not staged fights. Real one. Gimme my cookie.

Moreover, I choreograph stage fights for a living - generally speaking, they resemble a real fight as much as I resemble Angeline Jolie (hint: I don't resemble Angeline Jolie whatsoever). The POINT of a stage fight is to tell an entertaining story, which means the fight has to last long enough to get the story across. That's completely antithical to the purpose of a real swordfight, which is to kill the other guy as quickly as possible so he doesn't kill you.

Real swordfights last 1-6 moves, then somebody is dead or down, or the fighters have separated out of distance. Time elapsed on a 6-move fight will be something on the order of 5 seconds, maybe up to 10 if it includes wrestlings at the sword.

For reference, my fights:
1) Assistant instructor at the salle is physically abusing his girl. I try to stop it, he swings, I deflect it wide, zone in, and pommel him in the face. Concussion. Fight over. Total time: about 2 seconds.

2) Occurred immediately after #1. We're both fighters, with 6-7 years of experience each. She attacks, we spar at wide distance for maybe 8 seconds (maybe 12 blows? It's kind of a blur), she swings at my head, I parry with the basket hilt over my head and swing the sword down into the side of her knee, cutting the tendon. She drops. Fight over. I've still got a scar on my nose from this one - close call. Total time: about 10 seconds.

3) Long fight - we both have over a decad
e of swordsmanship under our belts. We have 5 or 6 passes, each one being about 2-4 moves, and we bail out of a pass when we realize we're on the "bad end" of that pass. We end in a corps a corps and wind at the blade - I manage to be a hair faster and lock his wrists, allowing a draw cut along the outside of his sword arm, which forces a disarm or he'd be "de-gloved" (think about it). Fight over. Total time: about 45 seconds total, with maybe half that actually being fighting.

4) Drunk dude at Ren Fair starts threatening people with a sword. I draw to hold his attention until security (also drunk and on coffee break) bothers to get there. He swings vertically at my head, I zone to the side and stop-thrust him in the sword-shoulder (which incidentally locks his arm from being able to swing around and follow my motion). Fight over. Total time: maybe 1.5 seconds.

{Scrubbed}

Oh, and to Dr. Horrible: fencing is not combat either. I've been a fencer too, both SCA and Olympic style fencing. And yes, I've been in bouts that lasted more than 30 minutes with passes that lasted 5 solid minutes at a time. But it still isn't combat.

The fact of the matter is that 1000 years ago (the time period in our own history that is the closest match to any D&D type setting), warriors were trained for combat that could last for hours at a time. They were trained to march for 8-10 hours a day while wearing armor that could weigh at least 30 pounds while carrying pack. The truth of the matter is that they were physically capable of exerting themselves over a period of more than 30 seconds in combat situations. Battles themselves lasted for many hours.

There is nothing unrealistic about a 1 minute round.

Matthew
2009-04-08, 09:06 AM
{Scrubbed}

Oh, and to Dr. Horrible: fencing is not combat either. I've been a fencer too, both SCA and Olympic style fencing. And yes, I've been in bouts that lasted more than 30 minutes with passes that lasted 5 solid minutes at a time. But it still isn't combat.

The fact of the matter is that 1000 years ago (the time period in our own history that is the closest match to any D&D type setting), warriors were trained for combat that could last for hours at a time. They were trained to march for 8-10 hours a day while wearing armor that could weigh at least 30 pounds while carrying pack. The truth of the matter is that they were physically capable of exerting themselves over a period of more than 30 seconds in combat situations. Battles themselves lasted for many hours.

There is nothing unrealistic about a 1 minute round.

Actually, the general consensus in academia is that fighting was very brief indeed, and that the vast majority of a battle was taken up by manoeuvering, throwing things, and standing around. Even if that was not the consensus, though, there is no real direct evidence to support either contention. In my opinion, the one minute round is very unrealistic, and largely a result of transposing large scale wargame abstract time onto small scale individual skirmishes.

Lapak
2009-04-08, 09:27 AM
Well, assuming he's using a bow, it's twice a round. And no, he's not spending time weaving and dodging and parrying, he's spending time drawing an arrow, nocking it, drawing, aiming, waiting for a shot where he's not going to shoot an ally, and releasing, and repeating. I have no problem here.30 seconds is a long, long, LONG time in a fight. Look at modern analogues, which are, I'll add, intentionally nonlethal: boxing or MMA. Rounds are on the order of minutes in boxing because both fighters need a break after 3 minutes, tops. And in those 3 minutes they throw dozens and dozens of attacks at each other, a fair number of which connect. If they were armed with lethal weapons instead of padded gloves, most of the fights would be over in the first 20 seconds since the first solid hit would also be the last. An archer who is not immediately threatened by an adjacent foe should need much less than 10 seconds to go from arrow-in-quiver to arrow-released. And since he takes 30 seconds whether his allies are in melee with his target or not, something is wrong there.

As for movement, let's take 30' movement as the standard. If we assume a one minute round, moving 30' means you're going at an average of 0.34 miles per hour. If we assume a 6-second round, you're going 3.4 miles an hour. One of those is a brisk walk, the other is a wounded crawl; I'll leave it up to you as to which is more likely. A 60' movement rate upgrades a minute-long round to half a mile an hour, which is still a VERY slow walk, and a 6-second round to almost seven miles an hour, which is about right - it's a moderate trot fast enough to keep you from attacking. A 120' movement rate gets a minute-round up to a mile an hour - still far slower than I would want to move in a fight - and a six-second round gets up to sprinting speed, which is still not unreasonable. So movement would not and should not be scaled down.

Dr_Horrible
2009-04-08, 12:02 PM
{Scrubbed}

Oh, and to Dr. Horrible: fencing is not combat either. I've been a fencer too, both SCA and Olympic style fencing. And yes, I've been in bouts that lasted more than 30 minutes with passes that lasted 5 solid minutes at a time. But it still isn't combat.

The fact of the matter is that 1000 years ago (the time period in our own history that is the closest match to any D&D type setting), warriors were trained for combat that could last for hours at a time. They were trained to march for 8-10 hours a day while wearing armor that could weigh at least 30 pounds while carrying pack. The truth of the matter is that they were physically capable of exerting themselves over a period of more than 30 seconds in combat situations. Battles themselves lasted for many hours.

There is nothing unrealistic about a 1 minute round.

I think you missed the point. No one is claiming that human beings can't physically exert themselves at the level of fighting for more then 30 minutes. The point is that in any given fight, one or the other opponent will be critically wounded long before that point.

I can sprint for ridiculous periods of time thanks to ultimate frisbee, but still my opponent or I get a point long before I tire. The simple fact is that people are good at killing each other, and not good at fighting defensively for a long period of time.

bosssmiley
2009-04-08, 01:45 PM
this is just a case of good vs. lazy DMing.

Sir, I object to your use of 'lazy' as an antonym for 'good'. Necessity may be the mother of invention; but laziness is the (shiftless, deadbeat) father. :smallwink:

@Jarawara: Yeah, AD&D's "reap the weak" fighter ability was a little odd. IIRC it was an attempt to adapt Chainmail's "Heroic vs. Non-Heroic Character Combat" rules to D&D. OD&D ruled that it applied to any 1HD creature. AD&D fiddled with that because...err, clue me please. :smallamused:

Ethdred
2009-04-08, 06:55 PM
{Scrubbed}
The fact of the matter is that 1000 years ago (the time period in our own history that is the closest match to any D&D type setting), warriors were trained for combat that could last for hours at a time. They were trained to march for 8-10 hours a day while wearing armor that could weigh at least 30 pounds while carrying pack. The truth of the matter is that they were physically capable of exerting themselves over a period of more than 30 seconds in combat situations. Battles themselves lasted for many hours.


Sorry, I know you've been comprehensively beaten by several people with the 'you're wrong' stick, but where were you getting this from? I mean, which accounts of early-mid medieval battles have you been reading? Just name one that mentions a battle consisting of hours (or even an hour) of solid continuous combat. Or any accounts of people marching all day wearing armour and carrying a pack.

LibraryOgre
2009-04-08, 07:20 PM
Sorry, I know you've been comprehensively beaten by several people with the 'you're wrong' stick, but where were you getting this from? I mean, which accounts of early-mid medieval battles have you been reading? Just name one that mentions a battle consisting of hours (or even an hour) of solid continuous combat. Or any accounts of people marching all day wearing armour and carrying a pack.

The Battle of Hastings. 14-10-1066. It was notable for its length.

kjones
2009-04-08, 07:31 PM
ridiculous badassitude

Remind me never to piss you off. Guess they don't call you "Swordguy" for nothing.

Saph
2009-04-08, 10:05 PM
Remind me never to piss you off. Guess they don't call you "Swordguy" for nothing.

I was just thinking that. :)

Swordguy: #2 sounds harsh. Same person as in #1, and she went after you with a sword?

- Saph

Thane of Fife
2009-04-08, 10:30 PM
The Battle of Hastings. 14-10-1066. It was notable for its length.

Most of what I've read of Ancient Warfare suggests that units could be locked in combat for hours. Cannae, I believe, was supposed to have lasted for something like eight hours.

Swordguy
2009-04-08, 11:00 PM
I was just thinking that. :)

Swordguy: #2 sounds harsh. Same person as in #1, and she went after you with a sword?

- Saph

Well, I was taking a Lichtenauer CLASS at the time, so we all had swords...

What's the rule about getting involved in a civil war? "Don't, because they'll both turn on you, and then happily go back to killing each other."

I've been involved is so many fights as an adult (4 swordfights, 3 knifefights, two bar brawls off-base, two civilian shooting incidents, and a few [too many] military firefights) because I make my living dealing with a group of people who also like to carry weapons, and who tend towards violence as a problem-solver when diplomacy fails. As an analogy, most people won't be involved in a hostile firearms incident (as shooter or target) in their lifetimes. However, a cop is FAR more likely to be in one, because he habitually carries a firearm and is around people and situations where firearms are used. It's entirely possible for a cop to never shoot or be shot at, true, but they are far more likely to do so than the average person.

I'm similar, in that I make my living playing with weapons and armor of all sorts. This means I'm around people who do similar things, which puts me at a higher risk to get involved in fights. I'm just a statistical outlier fron the "average" population - and the fact that I get involved in a lot of stuff which doesn't directly affect me because I can't stand to stay out of a situation and let somebody get hurt or killed (and the fact that I enjoy fighting for real; I'm good at it - if I were 10 years younger and had an extra 4" height I'd seriously consider MMA) doesn't help my numbers any.

Back on-topic, large-scale combat doesn't last for hours and hours as straight fighting. What happens is that units intermingle and fall apart, and swirl and flow around the battlefield, sometimes being in combat, sometimes reforming and regrouping, sometimes moving around the field, and sometimes resting. If you've got a LOT of units, then some of them can be engaged at any given time, but it's very rare for ALL of them to be engaged ALL the time. I hate to use these guys as an example for anything except how NOT to fight (and how to be fat), but look at videos of SCA Pennsic battles sometimes (10,000+ fighters on the field). Where combat does occur, it only takes a few minutes at most for one side or another to figure out they're on the "losing" end of the fight, and to try and break away. Historical fights are similar - two phalanxes may have been fighting for 5 minutes or so before one breaks off and retreats. The survivors of both sides aren't completely broken yet, so they spend maybe 20 minutes redressing the formation and clearing the field in front of them so they can fight again. Until one side or the other is completely routed (turning their backs and running) or wiped out, most historic accounts would consider an entire day's worth of this sort of thing "in combat".

Chronos
2009-04-08, 11:51 PM
I'm similar, in that I make my living playing with weapons and armor of all sorts.And then, in your downtime, you sit around a table and pretend to play with weapons and armor, to unwind from work. Got it. :smallwink:

Matthew
2009-04-09, 01:19 AM
Most of what I've read of Ancient Warfare suggests that units could be locked in combat for hours. Cannae, I believe, was supposed to have lasted for something like eight hours.

Right, but we actually have no idea of exactly what that means. Ancient and medieval battles certainly lasted hours, but it is not at all clear what those hours exactly consisted of. One of the biggest items of contention is exactly how the Romans cycled troops from the rear to the front, which ancient sources describe as one of their innovations. The general academic explanation is that fighting was sporadic. This is certainly the case at Hastings, where there were multiple "attacks" on the shield wall, meaning that for large parts of the battle, the two sides were standing a bow shot apart.

The reason fighting is sporadic is because the opposing generals are trying to provoke one another into taking up a weak position that they can exploit. Light foot and horse screen your heavier troops and harass the enemy with ranged weapons, trying to prevent him from successfully manoeuvering his forces or to sufficiently annoy him into launching an ill timed and poorly coordinated attack.

A really excellent article on the subject is "The Face of Roman Battle" by Philip Sabin, which can be found in The Journal of Roman Studies, Vol. 90. (2000), pp. 1-17. You might also be interested in this Google Books preview (http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=KLqhJIy6A8YC&pg=PA156&lpg=PA156&dq=The+Roman+face+of+Battle&source=bl&ots=wMK6nS0VZS&sig=3EXhq34iULe9VVJiGDRI8AnCVX8&hl=en&ei=p4DdSYDnD6GUjAfu0qCrDg&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=6), where Gregery Daly tries to come to grips with what actually happened at Cannae.

Ethdred
2009-04-10, 06:33 AM
Right, but we actually have no idea of exactly what that means. Ancient and medieval battles certainly lasted hours, but it is not at all clear what those hours exactly consisted of. One of the biggest items of contention is exactly how the Romans cycled troops from the rear to the front, which ancient sources describe as one of their innovations. The general academic explanation is that fighting was sporadic. This is certainly the case at Hastings, where there were multiple "attacks" on the shield wall, meaning that for large parts of the battle, the two sides were standing a bow shot apart.

The reason fighting is sporadic is because the opposing generals are trying to provoke one another into taking up a weak position that they can exploit. Light foot and horse screen your heavier troops and harass the enemy with ranged weapons, trying to prevent him from successfully manoeuvering his forces or to sufficiently annoy him into launching an ill timed and poorly coordinated attack.

A really excellent article on the subject is "The Face of Roman Battle" by Philip Sabin, which can be found in The Journal of Roman Studies, Vol. 90. (2000), pp. 1-17. You might also be interested in this Google Books preview (http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=KLqhJIy6A8YC&pg=PA156&lpg=PA156&dq=The+Roman+face+of+Battle&source=bl&ots=wMK6nS0VZS&sig=3EXhq34iULe9VVJiGDRI8AnCVX8&hl=en&ei=p4DdSYDnD6GUjAfu0qCrDg&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=6), where Gregery Daly tries to come to grips with what actually happened at Cannae.


Thanks, I was just going to say most of that (but without the book citations!). Cannae may have taken a long time, but most of that was the time it took them to slaughter the trapped Romans so I don't think it really counts for these purposes. Remember, we're talking about whether it takes two people a long time to kill one another, not whether an entire army takes a long time to die. As Matthew says, Hastings was not one long punch up, even if from start to finish took a long time.

Morty
2009-04-10, 07:59 AM
Hm. So, to detract a little bit from the discussion about combat lenght, another thing I didn't like in AD&D after playing BG, ID etc. was the class/race restrictions. Would it imbalance the system horribly if I were to scratch them?

Kurald Galain
2009-04-10, 08:05 AM
Hm. So, to detract a little bit from the discussion about combat lenght, another thing I didn't like in AD&D after playing BG, ID etc. was the class/race restrictions. Would it imbalance the system horribly if I were to scratch them?

No.

Well, except for one thing: humans in 2E are rather bland, and their only real ability is unlimited progression in anything, as well as dual classing and paladinhood. So you may want to give humans some kind of racial ability anyway, like an additional WP or NWP, or in-world social benefits, perhaps +5% to all experience gained.

Note that this is not about balance. 2E is not balanced, is not designed to be balanced, and makes no claim to be balanced. For that matter, neither does any other RPG that I know of, other than 3E/4E. The reason for this is probably that most players of those systems really don't care about balance, since an RPG is not a contest.

kjones
2009-04-10, 11:01 AM
Demihuman level caps were Gary's hacked-together explanation as to why high-level elves, given their longer lifespans, wouldn't be a dime a dozen. Unless you're planning on longevity being a factor in your campaigns, the level caps are not particularly important - but I agree with Kurald in that humans come up short otherwise.

Morty
2009-04-10, 11:25 AM
Well, by "unbalance" I meant "generally screw up the way the game works". If the only thing it's going to affect negatively is that humans are going to be a bit weak then fine. I can give humans something to compensate.

Chronos
2009-04-10, 11:49 AM
Personally, I've always thought that the races should get an experience bonus corresponding to their lifespan. So the shortest-lived humans would get the biggest bonus, followed by the halflings, while elves would get no bonus at all. Thus, despite our shorter time, we humans could accomplish close to as much in one lifetime as could a longer-lived elf. This also has the advantage of making humans and halflings, in my experience the least popular 2e races but supposedly most common, more appealing to play.


Note that this is not about balance. 2E is not balanced, is not designed to be balanced, and makes no claim to be balanced. For that matter, neither does any other RPG that I know of, other than 3E/4E.And yet, ironically, 2e is actually significantly more balanced than 3e. While spellcasters were still able to do things non-casters could only dream of, the non-casters had a stamina and reliability the casters envied.

Dr_Horrible
2009-04-10, 12:39 PM
Personally, I've always thought that the races should get an experience bonus corresponding to their lifespan. So the shortest-lived humans would get the biggest bonus, followed by the halflings, while elves would get no bonus at all. Thus, despite our shorter time, we humans could accomplish close to as much in one lifetime as could a longer-lived elf. This also has the advantage of making humans and halflings, in my experience the least popular 2e races but supposedly most common, more appealing to play.

Except everyone who plays the game plays the same number of years, So even though my character could live to 5000, it's still only 70-75 where he levels 1-20.

Lifespan is not a factor that needs to be accounted for by PCs. And if it is, you just ruin things for races by penalizing them for advantages they never see.

Oracle_Hunter
2009-04-10, 01:18 PM
Except everyone who plays the game plays the same number of years, So even though my character could live to 5000, it's still only 70-75 where he levels 1-20.

Lifespan is not a factor that needs to be accounted for by PCs. And if it is, you just ruin things for races by penalizing them for advantages they never see.

Oh no? Wish ages its caster 5 years:
Humans hit Middle Age at 45, Old Age at 60 and Venerable at 90.
Elves hit Middle Age at 175, Old Age at 233 and Venerable at 350.

And Wish is not the only aging spell out there.

Besides, isn't it important for there to be some reason why the world isn't full of 350 year old Elven Archmages?

Chronos
2009-04-10, 01:41 PM
Well, the primary motivation for such a rule would be verisimilitude, not balance, but even from a balance perspective, it's not bad, since the shorter-lived races are kind of bland in 2e. What's wrong with giving a boost to the folks who are a little behind?

Lapak
2009-04-10, 01:54 PM
Another approach I've seen to patching the level-limits / heroic demihumans question is to use the level limits as limits, but not absolute limits. You can take any class you want as any race, but once you've hit the standard level cap you suffer an experience penalty so that it takes half again or twice as much XP to gain another level. So your elven mage can keep up with the human mage until he hits the cap, at which point the human will push ahead. The elf will eventually catch up, though, and possibly surpass the human, but it will take a LOT of work to get there. This alternate gives you the flavor of the original rule - certain races have an aptitude for certain classes and the human 'power' is to be good at everything - while leaving the flexibility in place. This is also useful in that low-level play doesn't change at all; pretty much everyone advances at the same rate up to a point.

This also opens the door to dwarven paladins, or whatever; they just suffer the XP hit right from level 1.

LibraryOgre
2009-04-10, 02:24 PM
Level limits really weren't an issue in most 2e games I was in... in general, they were high enough that you didn't run into them unless you started that high.

FWIW, however, the 3e I designed included an XP drag on elves. For every century of their life, they took a -5% penalty to experience. As they got extremely ancient, they had trouble moving out of their niches and learning anything new.

Dr_Horrible
2009-04-10, 02:37 PM
Oh no? Wish ages its caster 5 years:
Humans hit Middle Age at 45, Old Age at 60 and Venerable at 90.
Elves hit Middle Age at 175, Old Age at 233 and Venerable at 350.

And Wish is not the only aging spell out there.

Besides, isn't it important for there to be some reason why the world isn't full of 350 year old Elven Archmages?

Except that the Elf also has a 30% chance of instantly dieing when he casts Wish, just like the Human, so he's going to die before he even gets to Human Venerable age, if he gets there by casting Wish.


Well, the primary motivation for such a rule would be verisimilitude, not balance, but even from a balance perspective, it's not bad, since the shorter-lived races are kind of bland in 2e. What's wrong with giving a boost to the folks who are a little behind?

When you say bland do you mean that elves are have more useful abilities then humans, or that elves have more interesting features/story?

If the former, then ask yourself which is worth more, more XP, or the minor benefits of being an elf. It's pretty damn obvious this system just discourages anyone from playing anything but humans.

If the latter, then it doesn't help at all, because you are claiming that the boring race can be made more fun by making them more powerful then the fun race, and while that is in fact true, it's also something that "roleplay not rollplay" people refuse to admit. And those are the only people who play 2E.

Instead of just arbitrarily making humans stronger, why not actually give them something interesting, if that's really where you think they lack.

Jayabalard
2009-04-10, 03:05 PM
Well, by "unbalance" I meant "generally screw up the way the game works". If the only thing it's going to affect negatively is that humans are going to be a bit weak then fine. I can give humans something to compensate.It also makes the whole "humans are the dominate race" thing pretty unbelievable, since they wind up much weaker than the demihumans.

The level caps get around that a bit; humans wind up more powerful in the long run, and all of the most powerful people wind up being human... that explains why they at the top of the food chain and why all of the other races are confined to their little niche.

Swordguy
2009-04-10, 03:11 PM
Except that the Elf also has a 30% chance of instantly dieing when he casts Wish, just like the Human, so he's going to die before he even gets to Human Venerable age, if he gets there by casting Wish.

Where are you getting this? It just ages you 5 years in 2e. That's it (aside from any inconvenience caused by poor Wish-phrasing your your part).

Morty
2009-04-10, 03:13 PM
It also makes the whole "humans are the dominate race" thing pretty unbelievable, since they wind up much weaker than the demihumans.

The level caps get around that a bit; humans wind up more powerful in the long run, and all of the most powerful people wind up being human... that explains why they at the top of the food chain and why all of the other races are confined to their little niche.

I've never been too fond of this "humans are a dominant race" theme anyway, so I won't miss it too terribly. Also, I'm not opposed to humans being able to be of higher level in certain classes, what I do object to is that I can't play a halfing ranger, an elf paladin or a dwarven wizard at all.

Oracle_Hunter
2009-04-10, 03:20 PM
If the former, then ask yourself which is worth more, more XP, or the minor benefits of being an elf. It's pretty damn obvious this system just discourages anyone from playing anything but humans.

Minor benefits? You mean like:
- Being able to Multiclass (Fighter, Mage, and Thief)
- 90% resistance to sleep and charm spells
- +1 to hit with longbows, shortbows, shortswords and longswords
- Imposing a -4 penalty to enemy surprise rolls
- Infravision 60'
- A 1-in-6 chance of noticing any concealed door within 10'
- A 1-in-3 chance of finding a secret door when searching
- A 1-in-2 chance of finding a concealed door when searching

As opposed to the mighty humans who get
- Dual Classing (fear it! :smalltongue:)

I'd have argued that the system discouraged people from playing any race but Human. Specifically Half-Elves - they were sweet :smallbiggrin:

The level limits really weren't that onerous (the lowest was LV 8, IIRC). If anything the class restrictions chafed more (though not much more) and you could dodge most of those by being a Half-Elf. I'd agree that giving Humans a buff would be nice (the +5% XP bonus is a good one) but I, for one, shed no tears over elves being restricted to 11th level Mages :smalltongue:

Lapak
2009-04-10, 03:45 PM
Where are you getting this? It just ages you 5 years in 2e. That's it (aside from any inconvenience caused by poor Wish-phrasing your your part).It's been a while, but did supernatural aging from spellcasting require a system shock roll maybe? I don't remember that being the case, but that's the closest thing I can think of to what he's talking about.

Swordguy
2009-04-10, 03:52 PM
It's been a while, but did supernatural aging from spellcasting require a system shock roll maybe? I don't remember that being the case, but that's the closest thing I can think of to what he's talking about.

Well I be dammed. I played D&D from all the way back in 1987, and we've NEVER played this - even the games my uncle (Jon Pickens, editor, TSR) ran.

Yikes.


System Shock states the percentage chance a character has to survive magical effects that reshape or age his body, petrification (or reversing petrification), polymorphing, magical ageing, etc.

Jayabalard? My bad. We had it from magical ageing, polymorphs, etc that were done by somebody else - you didn't have to make an SS roll from your own magic.

kjones
2009-04-10, 04:06 PM
Swordguy: Learn something new every day, huh? :smalltongue: We never played that way either - otherwise, haste was a matter of life or death...

Chronos: Experience bonus? That's not the 2E way! Instead, you should have an experience penalty for non-humans.

Thane of Fife
2009-04-10, 04:56 PM
If the former, then ask yourself which is worth more, more XP, or the minor benefits of being an elf. It's pretty damn obvious this system just discourages anyone from playing anything but humans.

It's probably fairly balanced, really. Most level limits kick in around level 10, which is just where classes stop getting large benefits each level.

An elf can, for example:

Fall slightly behind in hit points and THAC0 as a fighter or ranger, though he can get access to the best ranger spells available.

Get access to all but the best spells as a cleric, which were available only to 18 Wisdom humans, so he's not missing much. He'd also be less amazing as an Undead Turner.

He's restricted to Lvl 7 or lower spells as a wizard, which is actually somewhat painful, but not a catastrophe.

He loses quite a few discretionary points as a thief, though his racial modifiers and dexterity boost can go a long way towards making that up. He can read scrolls with the best, however, though he will never be the backstabber that a human or halfling can be.

I have any number of high-level adventuring modules which feature human characters around level 20 fighting alongside demihumans of perhaps level 10. Remember that they can multiclass, unlike humans, and that continuing to acquire more powerful magic items is almost as good as continuing to level up.

Kurald Galain
2009-04-10, 06:59 PM
Where are you getting this? It just ages you 5 years in 2e. That's it (aside from any inconvenience caused by poor Wish-phrasing your your part).
That's a common misconception propagated on message boards. Obviously, beneficial spells like haste were never intended to have a chance of killing the affected. Any sensible DM would interpret that system shock roll as applying to aging attacks, like e.g. a ghost.

Chronos
2009-04-10, 07:10 PM
Also remember that you don't get many more HP after level 10, either (only one per level, for most classes), so the high-level characters aren't all that much more durable than at level 10.

Swordguy
2009-04-10, 07:30 PM
That's a common misconception propagated on message boards. Obviously, beneficial spells like haste were never intended to have a chance of killing the affected. Any sensible DM would interpret that system shock roll as applying to aging attacks, like e.g. a ghost.

For the record, I agree, but the RAW says differently (not that I'm a proponent of doing what RAW says). Which I'm glad about, because I've got a 2e campaign coming up, and I can't wait to drop this one on our resident RAWtard. Hopefully he dies, and then we can move on while using the "smart" ruling.

Kurald Galain
2009-04-10, 07:46 PM
For the record, I agree, but the RAW says differently
Actually it doesn't even do that. RAW never says "this spell has a 30% chance of killing you". An interpretation of RAW says that, but this interpretation hinges on the notion that a few examples of when system shocks might be needed is in fact a hard rule that everything that ages you, ever, henceforth requires a shock roll. 2E was never written in legalese.

Anyway, as we all know, RAW in 3E also says that you can heal people by drowning them, and RAW in 4E says that the only person a warlock can ever curse is himself. So, yeah.

Swordguy
2009-04-10, 08:00 PM
Actually it doesn't even do that. RAW never says "this spell has a 30% chance of killing you". An interpretation of RAW says that, but this interpretation hinges on the notion that a few examples of when system shocks might be needed is in fact a hard rule that everything that ages you, ever, henceforth requires a shock roll. 2E was never written in legalese.

Anyway, as we all know, RAW in 3E also says that you can heal people by drowning them, and RAW in 4E says that the only person a warlock can ever curse is himself. So, yeah.

You're missing the point. I finally have a decent excuse to hoist my whiny, annoying RAWtard on his own PEtard. I'll stick by that interpretation long enough to get some well-deserved schadenfreude, and then I'll go back to the sane interpretation. :smallamused:

Thane of Fife
2009-04-10, 09:44 PM
Actually it doesn't even do that. RAW never says "this spell has a 30% chance of killing you". An interpretation of RAW says that, but this interpretation hinges on the notion that a few examples of when system shocks might be needed is in fact a hard rule that everything that ages you, ever, henceforth requires a shock roll. 2E was never written in legalese.

Well, since, as far as I recall, there was basically nothing that explicitly stated that it required a System Shock check (possibly excluding the Polymorphs) - ghosts certainly don't have any such text. As such, it isn't nearly as unreasonable as you make it out to be that a spell which ages you would require a system shock check.

You could probably argue that Haste merely speeds up your metabolism, which isn't actually magically aging and therefore doesn't require the check, but it's much less cut-and-dry with the other spells.

ken-do-nim
2009-04-10, 10:33 PM
Actually, I do believe the intention is that all magical aging, petrification, and polymorph requires a system shock check. I have the 1E player's handbook in front of me at the moment, and the example is of the wizard's hireling agreeing to let the wizard polymorph him into a giant roc. Even though the hireling agrees - so this is clearly not an attack - he must still make his system shock check to survive the transformation.

Haste in AD&D and Classic* is really quite powerful and the fear of a failed system shock check does keep it in line.

*Edit: except that in Classic spells don't age the caster. Many 3E players don't realize how much of their game comes from the Classic line rather than the AD&D line. The best way to tone down haste in Classic is to enforce the exhaustion rules.

Yahzi
2009-04-11, 12:49 AM
Actually, I do believe the intention is that all magical aging, petrification, and polymorph requires a system shock check.
Polymorph specifically states you have to make a check. I don't think Haste does, so it could be open to interpretation; but the idea that beneficial spells of course don't kill you is not at all in keeping with with AD&D, where pretty much everything killed you. :smallbiggrin:

My copy of AD&D doesn't even say how much Haste ages you...

Looking over the old rules, I see where the antagonism between DM and players originally stemmed from. Sheesh!

kjones
2009-04-11, 12:55 AM
Looking over the old rules, I see where the antagonism between DM and players originally stemmed from. Sheesh!

It may seem strange to you, but that's how the game was played (and for some of us, we still play that way, whether our players realize it or not. :smallbiggrin:)

Oracle_Hunter
2009-04-11, 01:02 AM
Polymorph specifically states you have to make a check. I don't think Haste does, so it could be open to interpretation; but the idea that beneficial spells of course don't kill you is not at all in keeping with with AD&D, where pretty much everything killed you. :smallbiggrin:

My copy of AD&D doesn't even say how much Haste ages you...

Looking over the old rules, I see where the antagonism between DM and players originally stemmed from. Sheesh!

Haste says it ages 1 year because of increased metabolic process (PHB 150). It's probably on the next page :smallbiggrin:

And yes, the teachings of The Old Ways (http://penny-arcade.com/comic/2009/3/4/) are as true today as they were then :smallamused:

Yahzi
2009-04-11, 01:13 AM
Haste says it ages 1 year because of increased metabolic process (PHB 150). It's probably on the next page :smallbiggrin:
My PHB doesn't even have 150 pages... :smalleek:


It may seem strange to you, but that's how the game was played (and for some of us, we still play that way, whether our players realize it or not)
Ya, I was playing it back then too. :smallbiggrin: I agree that the world should be dangerous enough that the players have to stick together; but the old DMG specifically states that you should rook players at every possible turn. For instance, if they routinely buy spells from an NPC spellcaster, you should raise the price so they'll stop interrupting him.

In a more rational world, a spellcaster willing to sell spells in the first place might come to appreciate the regular business; according to Gygax, the spellcaster becomes annoyed with so much repeat business and easy gold. :smallfrown:

Oracle_Hunter
2009-04-11, 01:23 AM
My PHB doesn't even have 150 pages... :smalleek:

:smallconfused: are you sure you're looking at the AD&D Second Edition PHB (1989), or is it the original 1978 AD&D?

horseboy
2009-04-11, 02:21 AM
Lastly as a wizard you do not ever move past the sling phase... ever... High level spells had negative side effects, huge costs on time consuming material components and dumping all your slots on anything but the BBEG left you months of study to gain anything back on a campaign... Well, technically you didn't cast anything at the BBEG, because he saved on a 2+ and/or had an 80%+ Magic Resistance. The mage's "job" was to clear the way of minions for the fighters to face off against the BBEG.

2e is largely about a group of characters supporting each other in a world where the deck is stacked against them. They must actively help each other and support the team to ensure success.Yeah, 2nd has more in common with Call of Cthulthu in spirit than 3.x.


And as for stats, I'm not sure what you mean. Either you play with bull**** 3d6 in order, in which case you never get to pick your class at all, because the dice always tell you what you can and can't play, or you use the (as far as I can tell) universal houserule of reordering them to your own design, 4d6 best 3 as you want goes all the way back to Red Box. Played all through 1st and most of 2nd, never heard of anyone actually using the "organic" method until I started hanging out here. There were like 5 options for stat generations in the 2nd edition PHB.
Another approach I've seen to patching the level-limits / heroic demihumans question is to use the level limits as limits, but not absolute limits. You can take any class you want as any race, but once you've hit the standard level cap you suffer an experience penalty so that it takes half again or twice as much XP to gain another level. So your elven mage can keep up with the human mage until he hits the cap, at which point the human will push ahead. The elf will eventually catch up, though, and possibly surpass the human, but it will take a LOT of work to get there. This alternate gives you the flavor of the original rule - certain races have an aptitude for certain classes and the human 'power' is to be good at everything - while leaving the flexibility in place. This is also useful in that low-level play doesn't change at all; pretty much everyone advances at the same rate up to a point.Something like that was in the companion box. That way you got to keep playing your powerful elf, and they got better saves and something else, think a primitive version of evasion, but didn't go "up" in levels.

Kurald Galain
2009-04-11, 04:36 AM
Haste in AD&D and Classic* is really quite powerful and the fear of a failed system shock check does keep it in line.
No, the fear of aging one year keeps it in line. Plus, the spell isn't nearly as bad as its 3.0 counterpart. And also, it is not a given that the player will get whatever spells he likes, as the rule that each wizard gains two spells of his choice per levelup stems from 3E.

While yes, the rules are not 100% legalistic clear on this point, I should point out that every other spell, at least, that requires system shocks explicitly points that out (and haste does not), and that it is ludicrous to expect a 3rd-level spell to be able to kill a group of people, when the spells that explicitly do kill a single target (e.g. Finger of Death, Slay Living) are much higher in level.

Matthew
2009-04-11, 07:01 AM
Demihuman level caps were Gary's hacked-together explanation as to why high-level elves, given their longer lifespans, wouldn't be a dime a dozen. Unless you're planning on longevity being a factor in your campaigns, the level caps are not particularly important - but I agree with Kurald in that humans come up short otherwise.

An interesting note in first edition is that 1 in every 100 humans is capable of level advancement, and 1 in every 50 demi-humans. Too many pressures from various directions! The other thing about level limits is that they prevent multi-class characters from owning the game. Sure, it sucks when your elf fighter stops advancing at level 7, but it is somewhat less of an issue when he is a fighter/magician/thief and level 7/11/20. Of course, second edition relaxed most of the limits and (in keeping with its general spirit) indicated that caps could be released if preferred. If you keep the limits for NPCs and release them for PCs, verisimilitude (for whatever its worth in this context) is retained.



Chronos: Experience bonus? That's not the 2E way! Instead, you should have an experience penalty for non-humans.

Ha, ha. Funny, because it is true; I require demi-humans to accumulate more experience than humans to advance.



That's a common misconception propagated on message boards. Obviously, beneficial spells like haste were never intended to have a chance of killing the affected. Any sensible DM would interpret that system shock roll as applying to aging attacks, like e.g. a ghost.



Well, since, as far as I recall, there was basically nothing that explicitly stated that it required a System Shock check (possibly excluding the Polymorphs) - ghosts certainly don't have any such text. As such, it isn't nearly as unreasonable as you make it out to be that a spell which ages you would require a system shock check.

You could probably argue that Haste merely speeds up your metabolism, which isn't actually magically aging and therefore doesn't require the check, but it's much less cut-and-dry with the other spells.



Actually, I do believe the intention is that all magical aging, petrification, and polymorph requires a system shock check. I have the 1E player's handbook in front of me at the moment, and the example is of the wizard's hireling agreeing to let the wizard polymorph him into a giant roc. Even though the hireling agrees - so this is clearly not an attack - he must still make his system shock check to survive the transformation.

Haste in AD&D and Classic* is really quite powerful and the fear of a failed system shock check does keep it in line.

Right, we actually do know why haste and similar spells suffer the risk of death in first edition - it is because Gygax's own players were abusing those spells in his original Dungeons & Dragons Greyhawk campaign, and so his house rule was written into AD&D in the 1977 PHB.



ABUSE OF HASTE (http://www.enworld.org/forum/984248-post315.html)

The Haste spell, along with Speed potion consumption, was the subject of considerable abuse in not only my campaign but in many others. Thus the strictures added to the spell.
Most persons getting hasted were fighters with good constitution scores, so the system shock was not all that tough a challenge. Elf and dwarf fighters didn't care about the aging effect either, so the added demands didn't do more than cut the abuse by around 90%.

So, bottom line, in AD&D/1e Haste was written so as to have a chance of killing the affected.

Second edition is consistent in its attitude in that it makes all such effects a matter of game master discretion (thus allowing all previous interpretations). Somebody who started with second edition probably would not even think to require a system shock roll, whilst somebody who started with first edition would at likely at least know about the connection between magical aging and system shock.



You're missing the point. I finally have a decent excuse to hoist my whiny, annoying RAWtard on his own PEtard. I'll stick by that interpretation long enough to get some well-deserved schadenfreude, and then I'll go back to the sane interpretation. :smallamused:

Watch out for when he starts casting haste on monsters in the hope that they will fail a systems shock roll. :smallbiggrin:



*Edit: except that in Classic spells don't age the caster. Many 3E players don't realize how much of their game comes from the Classic line rather than the AD&D line. The best way to tone down haste in Classic is to enforce the exhaustion rules.

Yes, indeed. I knew from experience how much AD&D was included, but looking through the Rules Cyclopedia I was surprised to see just how much of it was in third edition.

BlueWizard
2009-04-11, 07:35 AM
:smallcool::smallcool::smallcool:

kjones
2009-04-11, 09:00 AM
The other problem with Haste requiring a System Shock roll is that it makes it a powerful offensive spell...

This isn't counting the party I once heard that was fighting a very powerful, very old wizard... they cast Haste on him and he died of old age.

Matthew
2009-04-11, 09:14 AM
The other problem with Haste requiring a System Shock roll is that it makes it a powerful offensive spell...

This isn't counting the party I once heard that was fighting a very powerful, very old wizard... they cast Haste on him and he died of old age.

Heh, heh. I would guess that the game master applied the effects at the beginning of the spell, rather at the end, but still that is just minimising the end effect. If that wizard doesn't have access to a Slow spell, he will still end up suffering the downside.