Quote from: NathanIW;848208One thing I had to get over was this idea that what people mean by old school or OSR must include all things from the early days of the hobby.  I thought it was ridiculous that some ideas present in games published in the 70s would be excluded.

Now I see that it's actually about today.  When people talk about OSR or old school in relation to RPGs they don't mean "stuff present in the first decade of the hobby."  Instead they mean a very specific approach to play that actually excludes elements that show up very early in the history of RPGs.

It's not a historical categorization where examples to the contrary prove it wrong, it's about an identifiable approach and games and ideas produced now that align with that approach.

--

For anyone who insists that a definition of old school that excludes ideas present in the 1970s is useless (as I used to) then I'll simply say this:  you've got the wrong 70s.

If you talk to the people who were there with the people involved in the original campaigns, they'll point back to an even older tradition of referee moderated war gaming.  An approach that goes back to Free Kriegspiel in 1876.

So it's okay that Old School in terms of RPGs excludes my favorite game published in the 1970s because it departs from the notions of referee moderation established a full century earlier.

But that's just for people who need "old school" to be about the past and not about today.  Who don't accept that it's about current activity related to a particular approach to gaming present in the 70s rather than being a historical classification including all approaches present in the 70s.

Which is all fine except that the people claiming Old School credentials are also doing a fair bit of one-true-wayism.

Its fine to say this was a way of playing that was common in this place in this period but it should be parenthesised with at the same time this alternate style of play was also popular here etc.

Quote from: jibbajibba;848225Which is all fine except that the people claiming Old School credentials are also doing a fair bit of one-true-wayism.

I don't see a whole lot of that.  I think that's often read into it by people who don't like the distinction in the first place.  I see more this-is-the-way-I-playism than one-true-wayism.

Quote from: NathanIW;848208One thing I had to get over was this idea that what people mean by old school or OSR must include all things from the early days of the hobby.  I thought it was ridiculous that some ideas present in games published in the 70s would be excluded.

Now I see that it's actually about today.  When people talk about OSR or old school in relation to RPGs they don't mean "stuff present in the first decade of the hobby."  Instead they mean a very specific approach to play that actually excludes elements that show up very early in the history of RPGs.

It's not a historical categorization where examples to the contrary prove it wrong, it's about an identifiable approach and games and ideas produced now that align with that approach.

--

For anyone who insists that a definition of old school that excludes ideas present in the 1970s is useless (as I used to) then I'll simply say this:  you've got the wrong 70s.

If you talk to the people who were there with the people involved in the original campaigns, they'll point back to an even older tradition of referee moderated war gaming.  An approach that goes back to Free Kriegspiel in 1876.

So it's okay that Old School in terms of RPGs excludes my favorite game published in the 1970s because it departs from the notions of referee moderation established a full century earlier.

But that's just for people who need "old school" to be about the past and not about today.  Who don't accept that it's about current activity related to a particular approach to gaming present in the 70s rather than being a historical classification including all approaches present in the 70s.

Pretty much this, yes.

Quote from: NathanIW;848208But that's just for people who need "old school" to be about the past and not about today.  Who don't accept that it's about current activity related to a particular approach to gaming present in the 70s rather than being a historical classification including all approaches present in the 70s.

Fair and accurate point. But one might as well ask, what is "new school"? Is Pathfinder new school? What about Polaris? Apocalypse World? Vampire: the Masquerade? (Fun fact: V:tM is closer chronologically to OD&D than to 5e. Do the math and feel old age creeping in.)

Things converge and diverge as time goes by, branching out like a tree pruned by the invisible scissors of fad and market. My view, doubtlessly skewed by my own time (1992) and place (Brazil) of entry in the hobby, is that the OSR has been about reviving and experimenting with a playstyle that's gotten out of vogue somewhere between the mid-1980s and the early 1990s.

I can claim limited exposure to this early in the 1990s, mostly via the D&D Rules Cyclopedia, and in fact I doubt I'd be so interested in OSR material were it not due to the combination of (a) my limited exposure (and lasting adhesion) to what we today would agree to call an "old school" or "OSR" design philosophy, and (b) not having this playstyle directly catered to in a long time.

In any case, while I understand some gamers may feel that the OSR has appropriated the "old school" designation, to the detriment of the variety of playstyles in vogue back in the day, as an OSR-friendly gamer I'm not really interested in claims of legitimacy or an unbroken lineage that can be traced back to David Wesely's Braunsteins, or free Kriegspiels, or whatever. You have a good, non-linear dungeon, or a neatly keyed hexcrawl with sword-and-sorcery sensibilities, or some random tables I can use, or a clever new D&D hack, I'll look into it. It's not the full extent of my gaming fandom but I definitely consider myself an enthusiast.

Quote from: The Butcher;848257Fair and accurate point. But one might as well ask, what is "new school"?

Anything and everything that one wishes to point at in order to form a contrast.  But then often only for that one point of contrast.  "New School" is rhetoric.  Not with any negative connotations though, but in terms of it's original meaning of effective communication.  Like if I say "not like this" and point at something and call in "new school" in order to explain something about what I'm doing now with regards to an old school approach.  And just as "old school" excludes stuff from the 70s, "new school" can include stuff from the 70s.  It's not about historical categorization but about communication.  It's okay that Runequest's approach to skills is both "new school" and is from the 70s.

QuoteIn any case, while I understand some gamers may feel that the OSR has appropriated the "old school" designation, to the detriment of the variety of playstyles in vogue back in the day, as an OSR-friendly gamer I'm not really interested in claims of legitimacy or an unbroken lineage that can be traced back to David Wesely's Braunsteins, or free Kriegspiels, or whatever.

Well said.  I'm also totally okay with OSR proponents having monopolized "old school" in regards to RPGs.  I'm okay if they really have appropriated the term and any critic pointing that out is right.  It's about effective communication about what people are doing and what you should expect from their work.  "Old school" isn't about a historical category but about a current approach that calls back to it.  And if someone was back there playing in Wesely's game or at Gary's table, good for them.  It's cool they can talk about it and I like hearing little nuggets about the early days of D&D.

QuoteYou have a good, non-linear dungeon, or a neatly keyed hexcrawl with sword-and-sorcery sensibilities, or some random tables I can use, or a clever new D&D hack, I'll look into it. It's not the full extent of my gaming fandom but I definitely consider myself an enthusiast.

Me too.  I'm terribly pragmatic and anti-commercial when it comes to RPGs.  I'm looking to get a pretty specific thing out of what people are producing and if they stick to this narrow subset of gaming that has come to be called "old school" then I know I'm at least dealing with something that is likely to interest me.  There is simply too much out there to be able to pay attention to it all, so having a network of blogs, g+ communities, publishers, artists, designers, etc., that are on the same page about this definitely saves me from wasting time on wading through stuff I'm not interested in.

Quote from: Christopher Brady;848156No different than how a lot of people play now.

Yes! Me included! And a bunch of other people in this thread, I would guess.

Quote from: Christopher Brady;848156Even those that did want to tell a story back in say, '82?  Or is that too New School for you?

TBH I like New School games. Or at least a few aspects of them. I just enjoy OS games more, nowadays.

OS isn't strictly chronological. People have been telling stories since the dawn of time, so I guess you could say 10,000 BC if you are claiming OS credit for telling stories, and I would have to agree.

Didn't understand the 82 reference, though. Are you thinking of a particular module (Pharaoh was published in 83, Dragonlance in 84)?

We all like to tell stories in once sense or another.  Some of us use the game as the basis for the story, while others use the story as the basis for the game.

Quote from: NathanIW;848208One thing I had to get over was this idea that what people mean by old school or OSR must include all things from the early days of the hobby.  I thought it was ridiculous that some ideas present in games published in the 70s would be excluded.

Now I see that it's actually about today.  When people talk about OSR or old school in relation to RPGs they don't mean "stuff present in the first decade of the hobby."  Instead they mean a very specific approach to play that actually excludes elements that show up very early in the history of RPGs.

It's not a historical categorization where examples to the contrary prove it wrong, it's about an identifiable approach and games and ideas produced now that align with that approach.

--

For anyone who insists that a definition of old school that excludes ideas present in the 1970s is useless (as I used to) then I'll simply say this:  you've got the wrong 70s.

If you talk to the people who were there with the people involved in the original campaigns, they'll point back to an even older tradition of referee moderated war gaming.  An approach that goes back to Free Kriegspiel in 1876.

So it's okay that Old School in terms of RPGs excludes my favorite game published in the 1970s because it departs from the notions of referee moderation established a full century earlier.

But that's just for people who need "old school" to be about the past and not about today.  Who don't accept that it's about current activity related to a particular approach to gaming present in the 70s rather than being a historical classification including all approaches present in the 70s.

Well said.

Quote from: Zevious Zoquis;848268We all like to tell stories in once sense or another.  Some of us use the game as the basis for the story, while others use the story as the basis for the game.

That's a nice way of putting it.

I cannot see how I could preach some "one true way" with this OS/NS stuff.

There are lots of things I like about OS games and a lot of things I like about NS.

Not only I play both but I wrote a game that is in many ways the opposite of what I (and others) describe as OS (characters are special from the start, for example, they are encourage to write backgrounds and passions, and character creation isn't random and surely takes more than 10 minutes).

It is like playing Dark Souls and Plants versus Zombies. Why shouldn't I do both?

Stick around long enough and you'll run into the OSR Taliban. They're the ones who claim that combat wasn't really an important part of D&D until 3rd edition. Or that nobody used published adventures back in the day. Or that PCs loaded down with magic items are a new school thing.

It is absolutely revisionism.

I just think it's sad that so many long-time players seem almost ashamed to talk about how they really played, and instead prefer to theory-wank about how they should have played.

I think the key difference is old school relied on the player himself for most things while new school systematized it. Old school relied more on logic and RP, whereas new school abstracted them to mechanics.

Quote from: The Butcher;848257Fair and accurate point. But one might as well ask, what is "new school"? Is Pathfinder new school? What about Polaris? Apocalypse World? Vampire: the Masquerade?

  New school is like the cake and the spoon.

  Seriously, there is a self-described Old School out there, and it's a recognizable thing, even if "Old School" may not be the most accurate descriptor (I prefer "Early Gygaxian", but no one asked me) and may be  used in the same way one speaks of the 'Fair Folk' and the 'Good People'.

  But I don't know that I've ever seen anyone identify as "New School", and it doesn't seem to be used as anything more than a way of saying "not Old School." Anything that can run from Runequest and Rolemaster (in some definitions), through the World of Darkness, to FATE and Dungeon World, Pathfinder and Nobilis and all points between, is pretty much a meaningless term.

Is Amber old school?

Is Toon old school?

Is Space Opera with its "skills for everything" old school?

Is Palladium's Splicers or Heroes Unlimited or After the Bomb old school?

The problem I see with discussions of "what is old school" and "what is OSR" too often focus on TSR D&D vs. WotC D&D and that confuses the discussion as the rest of the rich history of the RPG hobby is left out.

Also, as I (and others) have previously discussed, the OSR - as a community -  is predominantly an AD&D Revival movement with a smaller subset focused on development of retrowhatevers and another small subset focused on revival of non-D&D games of the early days.

So "what is old school" has different definitions for the various subgroups. For instance, there is an OSR school of thought that Old School is "written by Gygax" or "published by TSR" and FOR THEM, the OSR is about playing with the original games and modules.

Quote from: Eric Diaz;848267Didn't understand the 82 reference, though. Are you thinking of a particular module (Pharaoh was published in 83, Dragonlance in 84)?

I am speaking of a couple of DMs who started their campaign in 1982 and being girls of the time period were very much into Fantasy novels, and they wanted to play a game simulating things that they read.  They were fans of Tolkien and Terry Brooks, and wanted to emulate stories of that nature.

I didn't actually join until 1986, but they ignored all the basics that people are claiming were 'old school' style and ran it their way.  I loved it, but I had no real clue what it was other than it vaguely being D&D.  In '89 is when I really got into this hobby, and those two girls largely informed and shaped my gaming habits.

So to me, this 'Old School' stuff people are claiming are how it was 'originally' played, is New School, I only started seeing people do it within the last 2 decades.

Quote from: Haffrung;848281Stick around long enough and you'll run into the OSR Taliban. They're the ones who claim that combat wasn't really an important part of D&D until 3rd edition.

It's not that combat wasn't important, but that combat was fast and somewhat abstract until the Player's Option books appeared. Sure there were many groups with complex house rules for combat that made it take much longer but combat wasn't designed by the rules to be a time-consuming tactical battle before then. Also, tactics in combat were what I call "real-world" tactics (defend from higher ground, attack from the flanks or the rear, etc.) as opposed to what I call "rules manipulation tactics" (the tactical manipulation of interacting rules widgets).

Length of combat (and full-on "rule manipulation tactics" in 4e) is one of the main reasons I do not like WOTC editions of D&D. If the average length of a combat encounter in an RPG (including any setup and tear-down of minis and terrain if required) is much over 10-15 minutes, it bores me both as a player and as a GM. Rules manipulation tactics do not interest me at all as I'm not interested enough in RPG rules mechanics -- I expect the rules to fade into the background not be upfront and center as I play.  Are my feelings universal? Of course not, but I have near zero interest in games with lengthy and complex combat or where the rules are designed to be upfront and center when I'm playing a character.