Quote from: MGuy;581608While I don't think I agree with him for the same reasons I stand with RPGPundit on this one. I took it out of the game I am making though I acknowledge that a lot of people like it. I've tried to, instead, look at "why" people want to multiclass. Most of the time it is for the extra options, to fill out a character concept, for optimization, perhaps to fit something that happened in the campaign that would constitute a radical change (Cleric/Paladin losing faith and doing something else). I find it infinitely better to instead reduce/eliminate the need to multiclass to do these tasks. I feel a similar way about Prestige Classes.

I don't think that I would exactly disagree with any of those reasons.

Quote from: dbm;582191Remember that the abilities of multi-class characters in 2e and not additive like in 3e.  For most things (attack bonus, saving throw bonus) you take the higher value. For hit points you take the average value.

You average between values on hp? That seems like one of the only weird spots to me.

You've got my second homebrew itching at the back of my brain though.

QuoteSo I definitely think that 1e/2e multi-classing produced more viable outcomes than 3e. Worthwhile but not overpowering when compared to the single-class characters.

I'd be happy to hear more about this stuff. I've been interested in this aspect of 1e/2e but it's hard to tell just from a read-through how it might play out.

QuoteSo I definitely think that 1e/2e multi-classing produced more viable outcomes than 3e. Worthwhile but not overpowering when compared to the single-class characters.

Agreed. Unless you were playing very high levels for some reason. IIRC a 14th level fighter had 1.5 million exp so that's good enough for a 11/12 F/MU which is barely keeping up but the disparity really kicks in from there. So I never saw the sense in racial level limits when factoring this in.

For all intents and purposes 14/14 was a hard cap not even factoring in level limits. You could relax it a bit by doing a houserule like allowing all points to go to whatever class had a limit not reached once the other had or so on. Example being 12/15 if you went that way.

Which makes for a damned powerful character but the single classed character would be FAR stronger in their area of expertise. A 12th level fighter is no match for a 20th level version, same goes for a 15th level wizard vs. their 20th level counterpart. But combined they could contribute but in no way dominate.

Quote from: beejazz;582285You average between values on hp? That seems like one of the only weird spots to me.

You've got my second homebrew itching at the back of my brain though.


I'd be happy to hear more about this stuff. I've been interested in this aspect of 1e/2e but it's hard to tell just from a read-through how it might play out.

A multiclass character in 2E levels up separately in each class, and their final HP roll is halved (round down, minimum 1). So the fighter/mage with a 16 Con (+3 modifier) gets [d10+3]/2 when they level as a fighter, then [d4+3]/2 when they level as a mage.
If you have a Con penalty, you can skirt it somewhat via multiclassing - e.g. fighter/mage/thief with a 6 Con still gets a guaranteed 3 HPs per level, despite their -2 modifier, although they're a level or two behind.
Actually surviving first level is going to be very painful and would take awhile however.

Because of how multiclassing worked combined with character generation it made no sense not to multiclass given the level limits on top. It was the only way to make demihumans relevant in any game reaching mid/high levels. Level limits were unneeded overkill unless you chose to single class for some reason other than loving elven thrives or half elf bards.

Quote from: Bloody Stupid Johnson;582337A multiclass character in 2E levels up separately in each class, and their final HP roll is halved (round down, minimum 1). So the fighter/mage with a 16 Con (+3 modifier) gets [d10+3]/2 when they level as a fighter, then [d4+3]/2 when they level as a mage.

Almost

The max Con bonus to HP for non-fighters is +2, so a fighter/wizard with Con 16 gets (d10+3)/2 when they level as a fighter and (d4+2)/2 when they level as a wizard.

Quote from: dbm;582450Almost
 
The max Con bonus to HP for non-fighters is +2, so a fighter/wizard with Con 16 gets (d10+3)/2 when they level as a fighter and (d4+2)/2 when they level as a wizard.

 
Hmm...
 
I checked into that and 2E PHB says (p.44), that "if one of the character's classes is fighter and he has a Constitution of 17 or 18, then he gets the +3 or +4 Constitution bonus available only to warriors, instead of the +2 maximum available to the other character classes)".
 
1E PHB doesn't have any such explicit note that I saw on a quick look, so this might be a difference between 1st Ed. & 2nd Ed ?? (I started with 2E - so when something isn't spelled out I tend to not notice and just assume that of course the way 2E would have done it is the one true way).

Quote from: Marleycat;582349Because of how multiclassing worked combined with character generation it made no sense not to multiclass given the level limits on top. It was the only way to make demihumans relevant in any game reaching mid/high levels. Level limits were unneeded overkill unless you chose to single class for some reason other than loving elven thrives or half elf bards.

And in 1e/2e, the main reason for level limits was to give humans, with unlimited advancement potential, a place to shine.

At least, I remember the level limits in 2e Forgotten Realms for the demihuman races ensured I always played a human.

(my campaign world of choice, Dragonlance, had FAR more open options for demihumans)

Quote from: Novastar;582583And in 1e/2e, the main reason for level limits was to give humans, with unlimited advancement potential, a place to shine.

At least, I remember the level limits in 2e Forgotten Realms for the demihuman races ensured I always played a human.

(my campaign world of choice, Dragonlance, had FAR more open options for demihumans)

Yup, hence a subtle reason why DL is my favorite setting.  It also capped out at level 18. Then you had to deal with the inane housrules of ridiculous x-times Exp on top. Screw that! I either walked out, played human, and finally just ran the damn game.

@BSJ, I remember it being capped at +2 unless you were a single class Fighter type.  Multiclassed types did not qualify. Could be wrong given my experience is all late 1e/2e. I just assumed the 1e rule carried over and it's how we played it.

Quote from: dbm;582450Almost

The max Con bonus to HP for non-fighters is +2, so a fighter/wizard with Con 16 gets (d10+3)/2 when they level as a fighter and (d4+2)/2 when they level as a wizard.

I don't think I'd ever noticed that rule in 2e.  I certainly never used it way back when I ran 2e.

RPGPundit

Quote from: RPGPundit;582795I don't think I'd ever noticed that rule in 2e.  I certainly never used it way back when I ran 2e.

RPGPundit

2e D&D did have that rule, right in the description of Constitution.
Broke it apart as +2(+3) for a 17, and +2(+4) for an 18.
One of the reasons you find a ton of written NPC's with 16 Con scores.

I find that 2e AD&D had a relatively large number of rules people ignored without realizing it, and even material brought into games under the incorrect assumption that it was core material.

I keep finding people who had no idea that the corebook had weapon vs armor charts, or that it didn't have critical fumble rules.

Quote from: RPGPundit;582795I don't think I'd ever noticed that rule in 2e.  I certainly never used it way back when I ran 2e.

RPGPundit

I'm a long way from my book right now but from memory the multi-classing section discusses this and explicitly gives an example where the character only gets more than +2 HP on their fighter level.

Multiclassing gone?Apparently not.

Link goes to a wotc article on the topic.

Quote from: beejazz;583161Multiclassing gone?Apparently not.
 
Link goes to a wotc article on the topic.

I have misgivings about this.
 
While front-loading can be a problem with 3E type multiclassing, I think splitting your second classes' basic abilities across several levels is something that's dangerous because unless they're very careful, they'll wind up creating a setup where certain classes can only be multiclassed in a particular order - like how in 3.5 the Fighter1/Rogue1 who started as a fighter got a quarter of the skill points of the Rogue1/Fighter1 who started as a rogue. The idea could work, but only if its not possible to pick up the key ability of a second class by multiclassing straight into it, and not impossible to get some key features as a secondary class.