Quote from: Omega;812372That could actually increase the kill-a-thon as now the PCs have no other way to get EXP other than killing everything and looting. You might entice with quest rewards. But thats going to possibly become pocket change compared to just loot-n-plunder unless you cleave close to 5es very treasure low premise.

The suggestion was xp for gold only, but "like AD&D" (1st ed.) would more accurately mean xp for TREASURE only. Yes, the DMG offered a rule requiring non-cash goods to be sold in order to get maximum value (as opposed for instance to keeping a magic item), but all such 'rules' are meant to be broken when appropriate.

(AD&D did include small awards simply for defeating foes, and some very powerful ones might actually be worth more made dead than otherwise impoverished, as their interests are not in hoards of the sort humans desire.)

If points are ONLY for accomplishing the goal, NOT for creating egregious and potentially career-ending complications, sound strategy is to try to accomplish the former while minimizing the latter.

What is treasure? Money, though the value may be low, but not only that! REAL WEALTH - which ultimately is happiness, but can be expressed in terms of assets in pursuit (which in turn can be money-valued in a market) - can take many, many forms.

Having rescued one's True Love, is the proper value really to be assessed by trying to sell that worthy? Aside from doubt whether the transaction is even feasible in the first place, I think not!

Quote from: rawma;812146(Is it just a long rest now, like recovering HP and spells?)

Leveling up in the middle of battle sounds like a dumb video game thing, but that doesn't mean the only alternative is for the GM to decide leveling without even tracking XP.

It doesnt say. Or at least I am not seeing anything on how long it takes. It may have been left vague on purpose.

The DMG gives some guidelines for various alternatives.

So the DM can safely say whenever and probably be right.

Quote from: mAcular Chaotic;812375But everyone says in AD&D it discouraged people from killing since it wouldn't gain them exp; it would just be a distraction and they would want to steal it without getting into combat.

That everyone isnt everyone.

Monsters have treasures ON them and eventually they have some items that sell for quite a bit. But you have to pry that stuff from their cold dead hands/claws/tentacles/pseudopods/grasping appendages/signifigant other...

The orc chief has a +1 sword and some gold. His trapped chest has some healing potions and maybe some gold. The gnoll chief though has some pocket change and all his goodies are in a hidden in a hole in the wall but doesnt take kindly to visitors. The evil wizard has ALL his damn stuff on him and he aint parting with them the easy way. etc.

Quote from: Omega;812390That everyone isnt everyone.

Monsters have treasures ON them and eventually they have some items that sell for quite a bit. But you have to pry that stuff from their cold dead hands/claws/tentacles/pseudopods/grasping appendages/signifigant other...

The orc chief has a +1 sword and some gold. His trapped chest has some healing potions and maybe some gold. The gnoll chief though has some pocket change and all his goodies are in a hidden in a hole in the wall but doesnt take kindly to visitors. The evil wizard has ALL his damn stuff on him and he aint parting with them the easy way. etc.

If the only way you can see is to kill 'im, and the only way you can see to kill 'im is stupid frontal assault, then it's likely to be your body up for looting soon - especially if you're burdened with all your worldly goods!

And trying to slaughter every bunch of kobolds for their usual treasure in old D&D (I'm talking lair here) is just what Forrest Gump said.

Quote from: Omega;812363Well if I had players that all they did was jump into a meatgrinder willy nilly EVERY TIME... it can get a little old when options were presented but are never taken.

Exactly.  I fucking hate it when people are stupid, but there really are some players who refuse to do anything other than "I run in and start hacking."

I simply refuse to play with them.  Not gaming is way better than bad gaming, and if I'm not having fun, it's bad gaming.

And as I said earlier, I say explicitly "if your idea of tactics is CHARGE!, your character will die.  A lot."

Quote from: Phillip;812380Variety is an asset, so players can choose what interests them and is up to their level of challenge ("Mapper, which way to the stairs back up?").

MAPPER:  We go north.
REF:  Ten feet, twenty feet, thirty feet north.  North ends, passage southeast, passage west.
MAPPER:  Um... my map says door north, passage east.
REF:  How about that.
MAPPER:  Fuck...
REF:   YOU'RE WELCOME!:D

Quote from: Old Geezer;812409MAPPER:  We go north.
REF:  Ten feet, twenty feet, thirty feet north.  North ends, passage southeast, passage west.
MAPPER:  Um... my map says door north, passage east.
REF:  How about that.
MAPPER:  Fuck...
REF:   YOU'RE WELCOME!:D

Dear gods that sounds really fucking boring.

Quote from: Kiero;812444Dear gods that sounds really fucking boring.

How so? The players, or mapper in this case told the DM where they were backtracking and the DM helpfully spelled out that what they mapped wasnt were it should be now.

Exactly this happened to me in my first AD&D session with our library club.

By first session and I was the mapper. We are going along backtracking from a dead end, map-map-map and all of a sudden I notice the map is going ways it cant. We'd walked through a teleport archway somewhere along the way.

Quote from: Omega;812451How so? The players, or mapper in this case told the DM where they were backtracking and the DM helpfully spelled out that what they mapped wasnt were it should be now.

Exactly this happened to me in my first AD&D session with our library club.

By first session and I was the mapper. We are going along backtracking from a dead end, map-map-map and all of a sudden I notice the map is going ways it cant. We'd walked through a teleport archway somewhere along the way.

Mapping. Something I'm glad has mostly died as a necessary activity in playing RPGs. Course it also ties into another dull concept, the dungeon. What better way to avoid all the richness of 95% of a campaign setting than spending it in a hole in the ground far away from civilisation.

Quote from: robiswrong;812364I think his concern was "how do you reward stealth kills with a system that doesn't really allow for stealth kills".

He got caught up in the details of the example, rather than the general point.

Broadly, yes.

I guess my ultimate (rhetorical) question was: what do you do when you want players to consider 'strategy x' more often but the system you are playing doesn't support 'strategy x'?

You either wing it, house rule it, ignore it (give up on 'strategy x') or shift to a system which supports strategy 'x' whilst still supporting the mainstay strategies too.

Quote from: Kiero;812453Mapping. Something I'm glad has mostly died as a necessary activity in playing RPGs. Course it also ties into another dull concept, the dungeon. What better way to avoid all the richness of 95% of a campaign setting than spending it in a hole in the ground far away from civilisation.

While spending all your time in a hole in the ground would let you miss out on a lot of cool stuff, you're kind of missing all the points - primarily the name of the game: Dungeons&Dragons.
Another point is that getting lost is tremendous fun. Misadventures in mapping is always a hoot (almost always, at least), no matter which side of the screen I'm on.

There's also the fact that "dungeon" isn't always literally an underground cavernous maze. It can (and has been) a haunted mansion, a spaceship, a town, a hotel, an outdoor ruin, a hive for giant ants/bees etc...

Quote from: baragei;812466While spending all your time in a hole in the ground would let you miss out on a lot of cool stuff, you're kind of missing all the points - primarily the name of the game: Dungeons&Dragons.
Another point is that getting lost is tremendous fun. Misadventures in mapping is always a hoot (almost always, at least), no matter which side of the screen I'm on.

I don't give a flying fuck what the game is called (nor for that matter do I care how the writer of a game "intends" it to be played); dungeons are a waste of my time, and mapping is tedious, make-work bullshit.

Oh noes, I used (D&D-derived) ACKS to run a historical game which had neither dungeons, nor dragons in it!

Quote from: Kiero;812453Mapping. Something I'm glad has mostly died as a necessary activity in playing RPGs. Course it also ties into another dull concept, the dungeon. What better way to avoid all the richness of 95% of a campaign setting than spending it in a hole in the ground far away from civilisation.

Quote from: Kiero;812472I don't give a flying fuck what the game is called (nor for that matter do I care how the writer of a game "intends" it to be played); dungeons are a waste of my time, and mapping is tedious, make-work bullshit.

Oh noes, I used (D&D-derived) ACKS to run a historical game which had neither dungeons, nor dragons in it!

There are a lot of players that seem to want to play D&D yet also seem to hate it. Truly bizarre.

I love it when players don't map. I do not enforce the process at all it is up to the players to do so or not. If they can find their way around without mapping then good for them.

Kiero, when you tell people that their way of playing a game is horrible and sucks, you sound like a fucking self-absorbed prick.

Maybe stop doing that so much and be a bit more chill about people liking, you know... different stuff.

It might make people a bit more willing to extend the same favor in return.