Quote from: Razor 007;1106552The newer rulesets and books have indeed provided me with great amounts of inspiration; but they have not increased the fun of actually playing the game.  Just sayin'.....

OD&D, and early AD&D captured lighting in a bottle.

Finally you begin to understand.

Quote from: rawma;11066865e is more verbose; they repeat a lot -

As an exercise, compare the page counts of each edition. And ask yourself whether or not there may be a point of diminishing returns.

Quote from: rawma;1106686Finally, why does everyone seem to have so much trouble running 5e combats quickly?

I think any system using the iterative rolled initiative system WoTC has used since 3e will run slower than d6-a-side. Another issue with 5e (and 4e) is that PCs tend to become relatively more robust as they level up; it takes longer to threaten them, so a significant fight takes longer. Running pre-3e D&D and even 3e it seemed that characters - PC & monster  - were often "eggshells with hammers", whereas 4e PCs & monsters were called "padded Sumo wrestlers", and 5e PCs & monsters are somewhat like that too.

The great trilogy of early fantasy games:
OD&D
TFT
T&T
There's magic in all those games. TFT is great for the tactical combat, and T&T material is always inspirational for the anything goes and zany attitude, backed up perfectly by the rules.

Quote from: Simlasa;1106680Older games in general just seem to get to the point much faster. Maybe not as clearly written, but decidedly less bloated.

Our group recently switched to 5e and I've been trying to really grok the rules... and it's just been a shlog, everything seems so overwritten. taking paragraphs to to say things that could be said in a brief sentence. I think part of it is that the authors are trying to create a mood, get the reader excited... but IMO that's the stuff that should happen in-game. I'm reading it to learn the game, not for the sake of reading. Leave the inspirational talk for the GM notes/suggestions.
Even Mythras, which I love, goes on a bit longer than it needs... muddies the text around the rules to where I'm more confused than if they'd just given me the basic info. Old Runequest was much cleaner.

Somehow looking at the LBBs of Classic Traveller gets me more fired up to play than the big glossy books full of paintings and graphics and bloated text.

I would suspect that the vast majority of 5e PH's are read and never actually played.

RPGs are a really niche hobby and I see podcast/Critical Role fans buying the books to just get more into the show.

Quote from: The_Shadow;1106743The great trilogy of early fantasy games:
OD&D
TFT
T&T
There's magic in all those games. TFT is great for the tactical combat, and T&T material is always inspirational for the anything goes and zany attitude, backed up perfectly by the rules.

I still play TFT and since it's back in Jackson's hands -there has been a renewed interest in the old system. I love playing quick tactical fights. and T&T is fantastic especially if you use TFT in place of T&T's combat system.  I started with OD&D and then AD&D but I've never stopped playing TFT all of these years.  these systems of course have their flaws but - in my opinion they are the most fun to play and even teach- my kids will play a quick round of Melee and Wizard anytime !  I've tried to mix TFT's combat with D&D but I've had too much difficulty meshing them. as for the newer stuff, I just cannot justify sinking more money into systems that I rarely pull off the shelf. I don't want to knock the other stuff, It's just the old stuff really is "lightning in a bottle"

Quote from: S'mon;1106729I think any system using the iterative rolled initiative system WoTC has used since 3e will run slower than d6-a-side. Another issue with 5e (and 4e) is that PCs tend to become relatively more robust as they level up; it takes longer to threaten them, so a significant fight takes longer. Running pre-3e D&D and even 3e it seemed that characters - PC & monster  - were often "eggshells with hammers", whereas 4e PCs & monsters were called "padded Sumo wrestlers", and 5e PCs & monsters are somewhat like that too.

Yes.  I measured it this using both systems through the end of 4E, 5E playtest, and then the start of 5E.  With 7 players, switching 5E to a side-by-side initiative system cuts combat times down to about 40% of what the default rules give, at least in the early levels.  Still not quite as fast as early D&D, but much closer.  Once you drop below 5 players, I suspect that combat time becomes more about attitude and attention than the system itself, but I haven't run with less than 5 in ages.

For a fan of early D&D "stuck" running 5E because it is the new shiny thing, I would suggest switching the initiative, do some minimal, selective pruning, and then run the game the same way you would the earlier versions.  That's what I'm doing.  The youngsters are really enjoying it.  Yeah, the characters are harder to scare and kill.  That means you can throw stuff at them and make them sweat!  We had two or three that were stuck in computer game mode for a short time, but they've learned to run for it, or even better--scout and evade.

Quote from: Razor 007;1106535So much fun.  The characters don't start out as super heroes.  They scratch and claw their way up the ladder.  When they win, it means something.  They experience emotions on every die roll, that players in modern gaming systems don't really experience.  It's more edge of your seat.

Quote from: finarvyn;1106674One thing I like about OD&D is that the game runs a lot faster than 5E. In 5E you might get through one combat per hour of play, but in OD&D you can do most of a dungeon in an afternoon.

These were huge "AH HA!" moments when I rediscovered the joy of old school play.   One of the most thrilling encounters of any game I've experience occurred during a LOTFP game, wherein a low-level PC group, with a few hired retainers, was pushing through the forest, got lost and decided to camp for the night.  I rolled a random encounter and ended up with a wolf pack.  This turned into a circle of PCs + retainers, back to back, wielding torches against circling wolves.  I rolled the wolf moral and they were either feeling brave, or just hungry.  They dragged down a retainer and tore out his throat.  The circle of PCs broke and they ran a retreating battle up to a rock formation, just barely visible in the gloom.  They managed to scramble up top and hold off the wolves, but they lost both their hired retainers and almost had a TPK.  It was just a random encounter with some wolves, but god-damn it was like something out of  "The Grey" https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1601913/

After this, they rummaged through an abandoned and monster infested keep, escaped to a river, and managed to get picked up by river pirates.  This was a day-game I was running at a local comic shop.  The whole thing took place over maybe 6 hours.  Another group next to me was running a 4e game (5e hadn't come out yet).  They got through one combat in the whole day.  One.

Quote from: rawma;1106686Finally, why does everyone seem to have so much trouble running 5e combats quickly?

I suspect it comes down to the fact that there are more hit points and more player options. In OD&D when a character went down they stayed down, but in 5E they get revived a lot faster and bounce back to re-enter combat. I've had some 5E games where I really thought we were headed for a TPK, then the party slowly pulled themselves out of danger and by the end won handily. Those sorts of things can eat up a lot of time.

I guess I just remember the old days when I'd set up a dungeon and the players could explore several floors in an afternoon. The Adventurer's League modules tend to be "three combats and done" style, and they take 4 hours to play. When I ran Hoard of the Dragon Queen for 5E and we found a dungeon area, it might take several four-hour sessions to finish the thing off a couple of rooms per day. I'm not quite sure why it takes so long in 5E, but for me it does.

Quote from: Kyle Aaron;1106727As an exercise, compare the page counts of each edition. And ask yourself whether or not there may be a point of diminishing returns.

As I said, there is a lot of redundancy in the 5e books, and they could be better organized. But there's a lot just plain left out in earlier versions, so that any two campaigns could vary wildly on very basic rules questions. The Basic Rules for 5e are free and only about 180 pages, similar to OD&D with Greyhawk (although with somewhat larger pages).

(Comparing page counts otherwise: The Rules Cyclopedia is 306 pages (but rather condensed), AD&D 1e is at 468, AD&D 2e at 832, 3e at 752, 3.5e at 956, 4e at 832, and 5e at 992 - taking what appear to be the 3 core books at each edition, from Wikipedia.)

Quote from: S'mon;1106729I think any system using the iterative rolled initiative system WoTC has used since 3e will run slower than d6-a-side.

Quote from: Steven Mitchell;1106816Yes.  I measured it this using both systems through the end of 4E, 5E playtest, and then the start of 5E.  With 7 players, switching 5E to a side-by-side initiative system cuts combat times down to about 40% of what the default rules give, at least in the early levels.  Still not quite as fast as early D&D, but much closer.

I cannot fathom why the 5e initiative system slows your games down so much. Everybody still has to act in a round however you choose the order; in 5e you roll to find out the order at the start, and the order doesn't change. (Adding in new combatants if summoned may slow the actual combat a bit; but it doesn't happen that often, and I'm willing to just put them in right before the summoner rather than rolling.) (I do miss rolling for surprise, but rolling for initiative has a similar feel.)

Quote from: S'mon;1106729Another issue with 5e (and 4e) is that PCs tend to become relatively more robust as they level up; it takes longer to threaten them, so a significant fight takes longer. Running pre-3e D&D and even 3e it seemed that characters - PC & monster  - were often "eggshells with hammers", whereas 4e PCs & monsters were called "padded Sumo wrestlers", and 5e PCs & monsters are somewhat like that too.

Quote from: finarvyn;1106870I suspect it comes down to the fact that there are more hit points and more player options. In OD&D when a character went down they stayed down, but in 5E they get revived a lot faster and bounce back to re-enter combat. I've had some 5E games where I really thought we were headed for a TPK, then the party slowly pulled themselves out of danger and by the end won handily.

Well, combat will run quicker if it often kills PCs, and I hear new characters are quicker to generate. I like having more options; fast combats that aren't very interesting seem like no gain to me. OD&D with higher level characters with magic items and allies also ran slowly in combat, because harder to kill and more options, while low level characters spent a lot of time trying desperately to avoid combat and the result was either grinding or TPKs - not many satisfying combats either way.

Quote from: rawma;1106946there's a lot just plain left out in earlier versions

There'll be a lot left out in any version. The play example I often give is of a party who, encountering mummies in their sarcophagi, cast hold portal on on sarcophagus, had the whole party sit on the other holding the lid down, used a rock drill to make two holes in the lid, poured oil in and lit it up.

No edition of D&D mentions whether hold portal works on a coffin lid. No edition lists a rock drill for purchase, nor has a skill or other rules for its use. No edition mentions how much access to fresh air is required for oil to burn, still less whether something confined in a small space takes more damage or the same from it.

Any finite rule set will fail to cover infinite reality or player imagination. At some point the DM must say "no, don't be stupid," or "interesting, make a roll." The question is not whether the rules are complete, since none are, but whether they are sufficient.

The game designer must also consider that nobody will remember all the rules, so that the longer the rules, the longer people will spend looking them up. Anyone can read rules at home on their own, if you're in a game group for a session then you want to play, not read. As well, human nature being what it is, the more rules there are, the more likely that when the DM is confronted by something outside the rules, they simply say, "no, you can't do that." A more minimalistic rules set lends itself more to, "interesting, make a roll." To this day my players remember drilling into the mummies' sarcophagi. We all remember Jon's evil cackle as he mimicked drilling. It would be a shame to have missed out on that simply because it wasn't covered by the 1,024 pages.

So: rules cannot be complete, but must be sufficient. What is sufficient? Well, that can be argued, and people's needs will be different. I would suggest that there's a reason so many rpgs have followed the model of having a relatively short book of core rules with a bunch of supplements expanding on various aspects. Each group can then mix and match to suit themselves.

Quote from: rawma;1106946I cannot fathom why the 5e initiative system slows your games down so much. Everybody still has to act in a round however you choose the order; in 5e you roll to find out the order at the start, and the order doesn't change. (Adding in new combatants if summoned may slow the actual combat a bit; but it doesn't happen that often, and I'm willing to just put them in right before the summoner rather than rolling.) (I do miss rolling for surprise, but rolling for initiative has a similar feel.)

There are several contributing factors.  I can only guess at how much each factor contributes based on general observations, since I did not test each factor in isolation.  (My goal was just to get to the best way, as quickly as possible.  The overall measurement was a tool in that, not an experiment for its own sake.)

However, in general I think these are the big ones:  

Cyclic doesn't scale very well.  There's a tipping point of players.  It varies in each group, but it is there.  It's roughly the point at which players being a bit slow in their decisions starts to cause people to tune out, thus creating a negative feedback loop of distraction.  If the players are sufficiently attentive, knowledgeable of the system,  and don't cross that line of numbers of players, then you will not see this factor emerge. I routinely run for an average of 7-9 players, but the range is more like 5 to 13.  And not always the same group composition, either.  Going from 6 to 7 or 7 to 8 was often but not always sufficient to almost double combat time with my group, as that line got crossed.

If you ask several people to decide what they are doing and then let you know as they can, the order will naturally vary each time.  This often means that the one person this round that needs a few seconds to consider, or look up a spell, or something similar, is not holding up the game.  By the time I've processed the other 3 people that can act right now, the 4th is ready.

After a little practice with the change, it changes how efficient narration works.  In cyclic initiative, you will often get clumps of a few players together and then a few monsters.  Essentially, it's a form of side-by-side for that fight.  The recurring player then monster then player then monster thing rarely happens.  With side-by-side, I can count on the clumping.  It becomes natural to handle a clump mechanically, then narrate at once for the entire clump.  Because multiple actions are being narrated, this leads to players paying more attention, and thus a positive feedback loop can be maintained.  (As a side effect of this, the fights sometimes become even more interesting, because the fights get faster as they go.)

This next point is subtle, and I'm not sure if it is distinct, or an outgrowth of the previous two points.  Players making decisions as a clump leads to them making decisions faster.  I'm not just talking avoid analysis paralysis here, but decisively picking an action and going through with it.  Might be a bit of a "herd" thing.  Might be conditioning from a stop, GO, stop, GO.  Might be something from my GM style of making them sweat that is being emphasized by the order.  I'm not sure.

Finally, there is the issue of numerous and varied monsters.  For various reasons in 5E mechanically and my own preferences, I want to have variety of monsters in most fights.  (I don't want a huge variety, kitchen sink in the campaign, but what I do use, I use in varied groups.)  Those reasons have nothing to do with this point, except that as a side effect of using the varied monsters, there is inevitably some quick consulting of notes, picking up different dice, etc.  Doing monsters in clumps means that the average handling time for each monster goes down.

As I have said elsewhere, running D&D for 3 or 4 players, often fighting a solo monster, it doesn't really matter which system you use.  It will be relatively fast, as long as you avoid analysis paralysis and other such player issues.  And of course analysis paralysis will hurt any game, even early D&D.

More on topic, I'd be very interested in someone who routinely runs an early D&D trying cyclic initiative in those system, and what it does to combat speed.  I think you'll find that it slows it noticeably, though how much is the interesting question.

I've never actually played 5E, but I've dealt with a lot of players that have and never had much difficulty getting them back to OD&D. I recommend a little booklet called "Philotomy's Musings", it's helped our gaming group a lot, especially in getting older 1E folks to appreciate the major differences with OD&D.

Quote from: Steven Mitchell;1107023More on topic, I'd be very interested in someone who routinely runs an early D&D trying cyclic initiative in those system, and what it does to combat speed.  I think you'll find that it slows it noticeably, though how much is the interesting question.

Cyclic initiative? I use individual initiative re-rolled every round and with some common sense rulings it works as fast as anything else.