I've stated often I'll play almost anything, but it's hard to get me to buy.  SC asked me to start a separate thread.

I like lots of different settings and genres; my love for OD&D did not influence my decision to buy WEG Star Wars d20, frex, because they're different games.

Also, I got into this in the pre D&D years of "Tell me what you want to do, I'll tell you what dice to roll and what happens."  That's still how I like to play.

OD&D continues to be my go to "generic fantasy" game.  I'd use Pendragon for an Arthurian game, because, well, Pendragon; I love Malory almost as much as Greg Stafford does, and the whole "traits and passions" thing is genius for that.

A friend refs The Fantasy Trip and I have fun, but I'd never buy it even if it were available, and I'd never run it.

I bought Fantasy Hero in the mid 80s and both ran it and played it a while.  It has one really huge thing I like in that you can use skill points in so many different ways; combat is a lot of fun in that game.

However, making characters is a fucking nightmare, and designing shit for your world is too; rather than just saying "AC 3 5+2 HD 1-8 dam plus blah blah blah special attack" it takes a lot of work.  And magic makes it even worse.

Mostly, though, I grew disenchanted because I reached the point where combat took TOO long.  I don't want to spend half an hour, or even fifteen minutes, killing a dozen goblins.  FH is great for one on one fights with major opponents, but doesn't work for other kinds.  Since I want to play an exploration game where you can encounter things randomly, this is a problem

Fantasy Trip suffers from much the same problem, with the addition of the maps and counters.

I have reached the point where I don't WANT the combat to be the most important part of the game.  OD&D gets most combats over in a matter of a few minutes... even pretty big opponents don't take that long.  And that's what I want these days.  When the Fantasy Trip combat map comes out and the counters start getting put down, I just groan any more.

I bought Champions because it was the first superhero game that really worked well, and somebody locally was very enthusiastic about running it.  We played for over ten years.  Again, I've reached the point of feeling like it's too complicated.  I'll play if somebody creates a character for me, but frankly I can't be arsed to do all that work.

I bought Atlantis: The Second Age because I love the idea of Atlantis.  If I'd realized it was just another sword & sorcery setting I wouldn't have bothered.  I wanted lost cities beneath the waves an' shit.

I bought "High Medieval," but found the tone of the writing so annoying I gave up after five or six pages.

Setting matters to me a lot more than ruleset, which is why I haven't bought any newer editions of D&D since AD&D 1st ed.  I didn't even buy the Fiend Folio because I figured "if I need more monsters I can just make them up."

I'm a huge Star Wars fan so I bought WEG's SW d 6.  I loved the first edition and think the second edition revised was full of bad ideas.

I bought SW d 20 because again, somebody was running it, and you really can't play that game without the rules, unless you have a really good referee.  I bought a bunch of shit for it and finally got tired of the rules bloat.  I bought SW SAGA because it looked like another game was going to start up again, but never did.

I bought pretty much everything FASA ever did for Star Trek.  I loved that game.

I'm a firm believer in "This game is fun for me, why should I give you money for your version of Star Trek/Star Wars/Generic Fantasy/Superheroes/etc."  And frankly, most game companies do a really really shit job of selling their products.  "It's New!  And it's a Game!" really doesn't do it for me.

Old Geezer, you have played OD&D and (if I have read you correctly) Dungeon World. How do these two games compare to each other (Are they even comparable ?)

And also (I know that I can have the answer elsewhere but I am interested in your answer) how different is OD&D from basoc D&D/ AD&D 1 ?

Quote from: yabaziou;789684And also (I know that I can have the answer elsewhere but I am interested in your answer) how different is OD&D from basoc D&D/ AD&D 1 ?

OG may answer in due time.

My experience with the various early D&D incarnations has led me to the conclusion that no other version of the game is as conducive to the survival of characters rolled 3d6 in order, than OD&D (3 LBB ONLY-no supplements).

Basic and AD&D are very close mechanically but only in the original 3 booklet game can you roll 3d6 down the line and no matter what you get, still feel like you have a playable character that doesn't suck compared to what you could have rolled.

Likewise there is no need to worry about qualifying for a class, anyone can play any class they choose. Of all the D&D systems, OD&D is the friendliest to the player in that the luck you have during the generation process has the least amount of impact on your success during actual play.

One point where I definitely agree with the overall tone of OG's comments is that fantasy roleplaying games are much of a sameness when you are sitting at the table and everything is ticking along nicely. And that game you are playing, whatever you call it, is pretty similar to the form of D&D most people play when you start with something basic (OD&D, B/X, 1E with the bumps filed off, etc.) and add the most obvious house rules.

The trouble comes when the game isn't ticking along nicely. It might be because someone in the group is being a dick, but more often its because the DM had a brain fart and picked or wrote a rules set that gums up the works.

The problem with most fantasy roleplaying games (and I would say the biggest problem with the hobby as a whole) is that a large slice of publishers want to spend their time re-shaping rules and aren't good at it. It is such a waste of creative energy. This week I've been running Stonehell and reading Barrowmaze. If you know how great these are, imagine what a fucking waste of time it would have been if these authors had spent their energy foisting yet another dreary rules set on us.

That said, I think there is a simple reason why so many people do this (and have always done it): Gygax and his collaborators were genius at defining the half dozen principles that guide table top fantasy roleplaying, and hit the nail on the head when they defined 'flow' of the action — the mix of exploring, chatting, fighting, scheming, building castles, etc. that makes up the game. But they were simply shit at nuts and bolts rules. Yell all you want; it is obviously true and not worth arguing about in detail.

Because of this, the only way to play in the late 70's was to follow the principles but make up the rules. You might say 'rulings not rules', but that's a bit of a dodge because in practice every group I've ever seen settles on some common mechanics that are their most common 'rulings', and these mechanics are effectively that group's rules. If you inspire a bunch of creative, literate people with an idea but they have to make up the rules, most of them will eventually conclude that once their house rulings have taken shape they have actually invented a new game. They didn't. They are still playing D&D. But they call it Tunnels and Trolls or Runequest or The Fantasy Trip or whatever.

Quote from: Exploderwizard;789697Likewise there is no need to worry about qualifying for a class, anyone can play any class they choose. Of all the D&D systems, OD&D is the friendliest to the player in that the luck you have during the generation process has the least amount of impact on your success during actual play.

Why bother with so much of the mechanical process, then, and why not just let players say "this is what my guy's like, and he is a fightyman / wizardyman", or let them choose their own attributes?

If some players like playing the same sorts of characters of and over again... well, unless it's actively harming a game, whatever. Let 'em carry on.

Quote from: Larsdangly;789707But they were simply shit at nuts and bolts rules. Yell all you want; it is obviously true and not worth arguing about in detail.

This is only "obviously" true for those who prefer a less abstract game. If you are a gearhead who enjoys complex mechanical games then OD&D will seem to be a shit game. To those who appreciate and enjoy simple and abstract games, OD&D is a fine game.

So, not so obvious.

Could the rules have been presented more clearly?  Certainly.

Quote from: Ladybird;789708Why bother with so much of the mechanical process, then, and why not just let players say "this is what my guy's like, and he is a fightyman / wizardyman", or let them choose their own attributes?

If some players like playing the same sorts of characters of and over again... well, unless it's actively harming a game, whatever. Let 'em carry on.

The mechanical process takes about 30 seconds and part of the fun IMHO is not knowing what you will end up with.

Quote from: Exploderwizard;789711The mechanical process takes about 30 seconds

That doesn't mean it is worthwhile, that means it is quick.

Quoteand part of the fun IMHO is not knowing what you will end up with.

For some players, yeah (And if you like random characters, great, that's enough reason for you to roll). For others, no... and if...

Quotethe luck you have during the generation process has the least amount of impact on your success during actual play

...then the attributes wouldn't have much of an effect on the character anyway, regardless of if they were rolled or picked or just not bothered with.

iPad's giving me shit today so I can't quite cut and paste the relevant passages of Larsdangly's post.

Lars, I disagree with some of the specifics — I adore random character generation, especially with systems like D&D, BRP and Traveller THAT combine randomness and choice; and I think Gygax, Armeson &co. were far better designers than most of my generation of gamers usually gives them credit for.

I'm inclined to agree that Sturgeon's Law is in full effect when it comes to game design, and that some corners of the Internet do cultivate an unhealthy fixation with exegesis of rulesets.

However, I feel the folks writing OSR game's generally do a pretty good job of hacking the TSR D&D chassis into new and interesting games, provided they have something specific in mind.

ACKS does a great job of smoothing out the numbers for a "hardcore simulationist" D&D with an eye towards movers-and-shakers high-level play.

DCC cranks the gonzo up to 11, crunches the power curve, and generally lays out a neat framework for gonzo, flashy, heavy-metal-album-cover D&D.

AS&SH treads some of the same ground as DCC but with a laser-like focus on the horror and Fantasy yards of the Weird Tales trinity (HPL, REH, CAS) and a ruleset that hews much closer to the Gygaxian classics (OD&D and especially AD&D 1e) albeit supplemented with a plethora of new classes and monsters, plus an amazing setting.

SWN is the most flexible SF hack for D&D out there, especially when the supplement line — covering cyberpunk, transhumanism, post-apocalyptic, space fleet battles, interstellar arbitrage trade, you name it — is accounted for.

Hulks & Horrors takes a different route to SF D&D, eschewing flexibility for a built-in setting with plenty of falir, and OD&D/S&W for BX/LL as a base.

I'm 100% positive you can find plentiful counter-examples, but I named these because I feel they feature genuine good design, in that a lot of thought and care went into each of these games to make sure they got to crank out the tabletop action we expect of them, under the aegis of the hobby's lingua franca that is TSR D&D.

TL;DR — I wouldn't dismiss OSR rulesets so readily. I wouldn't discourage anyone from writing one. But yeah, more setting and adventure modules would be nice.

I thank you, Exploderwizard, for sharing your insight about OD&D with me (I also thank everyone who made futher posts about OD&D). I have no knowledge of OD&D or even its existence until recently. I used to think that basic D&D was the first D&D.

Quote from: Old Geezer;789675I bought Champions because it was the first superhero game that really worked well, and somebody locally was very enthusiastic about running it.  We played for over ten years.  Again, I've reached the point of feeling like it's too complicated.  I'll play if somebody creates a character for me, but frankly I can't be arsed to do all that work.

If you looking for recommendations.


You might want to take a look at Icons sometimes. It skill base and flexible but not detailed obsessed as Champions. Uses a 1d6-1d6 system so it a bell curve similar to Champion. The general mechanics is a die roll plus bonus greater than or equal to a target. The appeal is in the fact that has the same range and high level design of Champions except way less detail. It really easy to come up with rulings on the fly.

I believe this is what the Pundits uses for his Golden Age campaign.

Also you may want to look at Fudge and Fate family of games. Fate focus more on the narrative side of tabletop roleplaying. Fudge is more traditional.

Both are free to download. Both rely a lot of ruling on the fly, both are NOT number heavy. However they do uses the Fudge/Fate dice although they give alternatives to use.

I used them in lieu of GURPS/Hero System it works well with not a lot of fiddling. The downside is that +1 or -1 is a significant bonus in these Systems.

They are also free to download and check out.

Quote from: Exploderwizard;789697OG may answer in due time.

My experience with the various early D&D incarnations has led me to the conclusion that no other version of the game is as conducive to the survival of characters rolled 3d6 in order, than OD&D (3 LBB ONLY-no supplements).

Basic and AD&D are very close mechanically but only in the original 3 booklet game can you roll 3d6 down the line and no matter what you get, still feel like you have a playable character that doesn't suck compared to what you could have rolled.

Likewise there is no need to worry about qualifying for a class, anyone can play any class they choose. Of all the D&D systems, OD&D is the friendliest to the player in that the luck you have during the generation process has the least amount of impact on your success during actual play.

Besides the inflated importance of attribute scores, later versions jack up monsters with bigger damage rolls and multiple attacks.

Quote from: Ladybird;789708Why bother with so much of the mechanical process, then, and why not just let players say "this is what my guy's like, and he is a fightyman / wizardyman", or let them choose their own attributes?

No reason, but likewise why bother making it hard on someone who wants to roll up a character?

Quote from: Phillip;789729Besides the inflated importance of attribute scores, later versions jack up monsters with bigger damage rolls and multiple attacks.

There are still multiple attacks in OD&D. A fighter is capable of this when fighting creatures of 1 HD or less, as are monsters that do more than a die of damage.

An Ogre does 2 dice of damage on a single attack. Being 4 hit dice (thus equal to a hero), the ogre can instead attack 4 times for 1 die each when fighting creatures of 1 HD or less, which includes 1st level clerics, and magic users but not fighting men who are 1+1 HD.

But yeah, AD&D started jacking up the multiple attacks AND the damage ranges, but OTOH, most classes got a HP bump too.

Actually, the folks in Phoenix  called their game D&D until it was time to publish, when they called it  Tunnels & Trolls. Along with Dave Hargrave, who published his Arduin rules as a D&D supplement, they got lawyer letters from They $ue Regularly demanding expurgation of all mention of the seminal work. You can tell by the typeface in later printings where Dave complied with white-out.

Nonetheless, there is a point at which a game becomes quite its own thing, just as D&D was more than merely Chainmail redux (or even  just Arneson's elaborations on the Gygax/Perren rules).

Quote from: Exploderwizard;789734There are still multiple attacks in OD&D. A fighter is capable of this when fighting creatures of 1 HD or less, as are monsters that do more than a die of damage

.
Those are house rules, the second of which  I don't recall having seen before. The basics of the first are sometimes inferred from Monsters & Treasure reference to adapting monsters  to the Chainmail battle system, and the Chainmail Fantasy  Supplement references (Hero-1, etc.) in Men & Magic. Replacing "against normal men" with "against 1 HD or less" could be a back-port from AD&D, except that specifies less than 1 HD. (Personally, I treat orcs as equivalent to n.m.)

QuoteAn Ogre does 2 dice of damage on a single attack.

I seem to recall it getting just a bonus pip or two, not a second die, but don't have the book handy.

QuoteBeing 4 hit dice (thus equal to a hero), the ogre can instead attack 4 times for 1 die each when fighting creatures of 1 HD or less, which includes 1st level clerics, and magic users but not fighting men who are 1+1 HD.

As mentioned above, that looks like a house rule, not even what was actually stipulated for use with Chainmail. I'm quite sure it is not mentioned in the Alternative (D&D standard) Combat System. By somewhat different means, you'll get a big damage boost in Empire of the Petal throne, but D&D Supplement I (Greyhawk) is more to the point.

QuoteBut yeah, AD&D started jacking up the multiple attacks AND the damage ranges, but OTOH, most classes got a HP bump too.

I'm talking about Supplement I: big difference with a troll, or anything that gets claw/claw/bite (or hoof/hoof/horn, or whatever) vs. a single attack for 1d6. Also,  heavier hits from, e.g., giants - and HD as well scaled up to fighter (d8) level. Also, you've got orcs with an additional pip swinging swords with an additional pip vs. Magic-users starting with a pip less (albeit half a pip higher on average at  other levels).