AD&D 2nd Edition is very comfortable to me as I spent the most time with it. I've seen multiple people mention how 5th edition feels just like 2nd Edition in play.

For the record, it doesn't. It's more similar to 2nd Edition than it is to 4th, but 5th edition has a lot more in common with 3rd Edition in the presented play style. I do understand that to people who have played a lot of the newer games it must feel lighter, but it is substantially different from any flavor of AD&D.

5th has 3rd edition's math style, feats (optional), a skill system instead of non-weapon proficiencies, etc. It does have a few holdovers from 4th with the hit dice healing and such. But other than being a game within the D&D family, I don't see how it's supposed to be so similar to 2nd edition.

So, I'm a bit confused about why people say this. Is there something that I'm missing? As someone who has played both games, I don't really see it.

I don't see 5e as being like 3e. 5e uses its own set of math, thanks that bounded accuracy stuff. And saving throws are attribute based. (Ascending Armor Class and attack bonus were actually from TSR era Gamma World, around 1991 or so)

Other than the name, feats weren't that new. IIRC, some of the 2e splatbooks offered proficiences that were more or less feats.  (And while the skill system is different, most of the skill list in 3e was taken from BECMI D&D, including the dreaded Rope Use)

I think because it harkens back to the feel of 2e and some of the gameplay style while still having elements from 3rd. And while 5e has things called feats. They are not the ones from 3e. Also backgrounds and even class paths in 5e have a slight feel for kits from 2e. Not sure how 3e handles it. But 5e's NPC reaction system is similar to BX and 2e's systems, just alot more complex.

When I flip through the PHB's for 2E, 3E, & 5E; there is something about the look and feel of 5E, that reminds me of 2E.  Although, obviously there is much in common between 3E & 5E's roll high D20 mechanics.  It's almost like 2E & 3E had a baby, named 5E.  Hey, 2 + 3 = 5.

Quote from: Beldar;1088622a skill system instead of non-weapon proficiencies

Er, no. Apart from rolling high, 5e's Proficiency system is on/off just like the 2e NWP, not skill points like 3e.

I can see it.

3e, once you realize the veneer may seem similar to AD&D memories yet the mechanics underneath are "Magic UNLEASHED!", is barely manageable throughout level progression. It's very much 'Riding the Tiger' as a GM. It's either a heavy system mastery investment to become conversant and kludge together the seams as they strain to bursting, or it's an unintended disaster the moment a player figures out your oversight. Or better yet, you find a better system or a functional cap to 3e, like 3e E6 or FantasyCraft.

Between 3e EXPLOSION!: The Magic Big Bang and 4e D&D Tactics, and 5e being cleaned up and direct speaking, of course 5e is going to look familiar to AD&D 2e. It's been over decade since things were this approachable.

5E has elements of all previous versions, with the possible exception of OD&D.  (It may have some OD&D too, but I suspect most of it is second hand through one of the intervening versions.)  Some are more obvious than others, but they are there.  Then 5E is also very easily modified by the GM even more towards a particular version.  Which is why for me it is more like BECMI/RC than anything else--I deliberately move it that way in rules selected and how I run it.

If you have a GM or are a GM that really likes 2E, deliberately runs 5E much like 2E, in settings reminiscent of 2E--then a player probably will see a definite correspondence.

I can see the comparison.  Skills are similar to proficiencies, paths/schools/colleges/whatever-they're-called-on-a-per-class-basis are like kits, etc.  But I bet that's more dependent on the GM, and their GMing style, more than anything else.

5e is a mechanical implementation of what people were attempting to do with AD&D "back in the day" IMO.  It lacks many of the rules that were in early D&D, and defined it, such as morale and reaction.  (There are allusions to these, but they're not so central.)  However, I read of so many people who started in the 80's during the fad-era who skipped all of that, and didn't have the S&S background to really grok what the system was after, and tried to play high fantasy with the system.  To me, that's exactly what 2e was attempting to do - morph AD&D 1e into the high fantasy game, and it's exactly what 5e has done, but with a lot of learned concepts taken from 3e and 4e.

It's like WotC rolled back to core 2e as the predecessor to 5e in style, but then pulled mechanics from 3e and 4e that had been proven to work well and built 5e up out of that.  I definitely think a whole lot of the success of 5e can be laid at the feet of the designers who realized that the big success of D&D back in the 80's was down to people wanting to play epic fantasy games, as opposed to epic mechanical games (3e/4e), or for that matter, down-in-the-dirt S&S games (0e/1e).  2e is definitely the closest match of the line, though I can see the argument that BECMI is a parallel to the same thing.

Not pre 2e due to complexity.


Not post 2e due to bounded accuracy, as in an army of orcs is always a threat, when it just stops being a threat in both 4e and 3e.

Mechanically, 5e is just 4e with a bunch of rules removed and a vancian casting added back in. You still have at-will, per encounter (short rest), and daily (long rest) powers.

5e also effectively has 3e's save math. Good saves start at 2 better than bad saves and grow to 6 better at an identical rate... they just left the bad saves at 0 and subtracted the bad save value from the good. Similarly the save DCs line up with the 3e versions less the value of a bad a save at that level.

In addition, 95+% of the saves in 5e use either Con (Fort), Dex (Reflex) or Wis (Will) with the ability scores using 3e's ability modifiers.

There is a LOT of 3e DNA in 5e.

Quote from: Rhedyn;1088685Not pre 2e due to complexity.


Not post 2e due to bounded accuracy, as in an army of orcs is always a threat, when it just stops being a threat in both 4e and 3e.

Mechanically, 5e is just 4e with a bunch of rules removed and a vancian casting added back in. You still have at-will, per encounter (short rest), and daily (long rest) powers.

If the orc army is not a threat in 4e the DM is DOING IT WRONH. In 4e the world keys off PC level and the DM has to stat accordingly. Eg in Epic 4e the PCs might battle Throngs of hundreds of orc warriors statted as single creatures.

Quote from: S'mon;1088697If the orc army is not a threat in 4e the DM is DOING IT WRONH. In 4e the world keys off PC level and the DM has to stat accordingly. Eg in Epic 4e the PCs might battle Throngs of hundreds of orc warriors statted as single creatures.

Most of us know that is bullshit though.

Quote from: Rhedyn;1088710Most of us know that is bullshit though.

That's how the game works. If you don't do it your 4e game will suck.

Quote from: S'mon;1088712That's how the game works. If you don't do it your 4e game will suck.

Or you do what we did in 3.5 and just keep pulling out cooler higher CR monsters.


You don't have to make 4e a table top MMO provided your GM's creativity goes beyond "how about more orcs?".