Quote from: Brad;851576This is exactly why the players should never read the AD&D combat rules. Or any combat rules, really. Every single time when I play with newbies, they ALWAYS come up with all sorts of shit "not in the rules". Every time. This tells me not showing them the combat rules and just coming up with rulings is the way to go.

The free mode brings in a dynamic that's different from board games. I like that, and while I also enjoy board games and computer games -- some of which I include in the category of "role playing" -- I don't see the point of reducing the more versatile human-moderated RPG to the technological limitations of those other forms.

Quote from: Harime Nui;851828Yeah.  Restricting the DM is completely counterintuitive.  He's supposed to be the referee, not the opposition.

That's my own preference as well, but I can see the appeal for some people in 4E D&D, in which a DM running a properly constructed combat scenario can (and probably ought to) "take off the gloves" and concentrate on trying to beat the players.

An odd thing is how much the 4E fan base seems (from what I've seen, anyhow) more inclined to a non-challenging, entitled tourist kind of entertainment. Even beyond that, there's a segment that's really more into collaborative story telling and seems impressed by how "rules light" 4E feels to them -- compared with 3E!

Is it all about "page 42" and ad hoc "skill challenges," or is it all about the kind of details you won't even find in GURPS? The question can get murky, I think.

Quote from: Phillip;852047Agreed! The notion that the purpose of the books is to be combed minutely by rules lawyers -- which seems to typify the attitude of a 3E/4E player culture that is more ultramontane than the designers of those games --is anachronistic in respect to the common understanding in the hobby in 1979, and plainly contrary to what Mr. Gygax states in the AD&D books

That comment is Gygax reinforcing the idea that the referee are the ultimate arbiters of the campaign.

However the purpose of AD&D compared to OD&D is to

QuoteDictums are given for the sake of the game only, for if ADVANCED DUNGEONS & DRAGONS is to survive and grow, it must have some degree of uniformity, a familiarity of method and procedure from campaign to campaign within the whole. ADVANCED D&D is more than a framework around which individual DMs construct their respective milieux, it is above all a set of boundaries for all of the "worlds" devised by referees everywhere. These boundaries are broad and spacious, and there are numerous areas where they are so vague and amorphous as to make them nearly nonexistent, but they are there nonetheless.

By the time Gary Gygax was writing AD&D, TSR was besieged with hundreds of people asking various rules questions. The solution to was to create a version of D&D that was authoritative. AD&D is the result.

The section you were quoting from is found here.

QuoteIT IS THE SPIRIT OF THE GAME, NOT THE LETTER OF THE RULES, WHICH IS IMPORTANT. NEVER HOLD TO THE LETTER WRITTEN, NOR ALLOW SOME BARRACKS ROOM LAWYER TO FORCE QUOTATIONS FROM THE RULE BOOK UPON YOU, IF IT GOES AGAINST THE OBVIOUS INTENT OF THE GAME. AS YOU HEW THE LINE WITH RESPECT TO CONFORMITY TO MAJOR SYSTEMS AND UNIFORMITY OF PLAY IN GENERAL, ALSO BE CERTAIN THE GAME IS MASTERED BY YOU AND NOT BY YOUR PLAYERS. WITHIN THE BROAD PARAMETERS GIVEN IN THE ADVANCED DUNGEONS & DRAGONS VOLUMES, YOU ARE CREATOR AND FINAL ARBITER. BY ORDERING THINGS AS THEY SHOULD BE, THE GAME AS A WHOLE FIRST, YOUR CAMPAIGN NEXT, AND YOUR PARTICIPANTS THEREAFTER, YOU WILL BE PLAYING ADVANCED DUNGEONS & DRAGONS AS IT WAS MEANT TO BE. MAY YOU FIND AS MUCH PLEASURE IN SO DOING AS THE REST OF US DO!

While he starts off with a laudable sentiment of the spirit of the rules versus the letter of the rules. However reading the rest of the text it not same as the free kriegspiel attitude of OD&D. As long it was within the broad parameters of AD&D it was fine. And again his ultimate point to reinforce the idea you the referee was the ultimate authority.

The attitude AD&D was a marked change from the attitude of OD&D. OD&D was about using a loose framework to make shit up that was fun. AD&D was about using a toolkit to make up shit that was fun. If you had aerial combat in a AD&D campaign then Gygax wanted to you to use the rules in the DMG.

He tried to make something that was flexible so handle a lot of interesting fantasy adventures but ultimately AD&D was about standardizing rules.

What A.D.D.C.I.T shows that Gygax did not succeed in all areas. You mock the author for using footnote from Dragon magazine but if your intent was to thoroughly explain how AD&D combat was supposed to be run officially then it perfectly legit. And certainly within the spirit of AD&D as Gygax defined it at that time.

Now Gygax's attitudes on some of this stuff changed later. But when you read what Gygax, Kask, and the rest of the TSR were writing circa late 70s, your left with the impression that they were a bunch of guys bombarded with rules question, trying to deal with competitive tournaments, and unsympathetic to  types of campaigns that were not part of the upper midwest gaming scene.

This doesn't make AD&D "bad" nor does it make it "good" It just explains why it was the way it was. Why the snarky attitude in various product intros and the Dragon Magazine. Obviously it worked on some level because for most AD&D is THE edition of classic D&D and the most popular edition of D&D ever.

Quote from: Harime Nui;851828Yeah.  Restricting the DM is completely counterintuitive.  He's supposed to be the referee, not the opposition.

The point of AD&D was to restrict the referee. Understand Gygax's attitude on restrictions was not "there is only way to run a campaign" (although there was a little of that), but if you want to do X here are Y rules to handle it. He tried to make AD&D a flexible toolkit.

What he was firm about was that the referee is the final authority when it came to the campaign.

One goal of AD&D to stop the rain of questions that TSR was getting.

Quote from: estar;852063The section you were quoting from is found here.

No, actually. I referred to the Foreword, and the 1st page of the main text, in the DMG. However, the message is repeated through the PHB and DMG.  

The question is what the important "broad parameters" are. I assert that they are NOT (per Prata, Alexander, et al) to turn an example of DM rulings (from a page that clearly states only one 'rule,' unrelated to initiative) into arbitrary rules per se that must be applied all the time and every time.

To zoom in on such minutia is to miss the forest for the trees, which of course suits the often overlapping new schools of entitlement and rules-lawyer-ism to a tee. The smoke screen facilitates such murky maneuvers as simultaneously lambasting old D&D and claiming the prestige of the name.

As I stated earlier, the main message (from what I saw at the time) was that an express elevator to a 30th-level "Dungeons & Beavers" game could no longer plausibly be credited as the designer's intent. Gary owned up in the DMG to his failure to lay things out clearly in the OD&D booklets, having thereby created the impression in some minds that awesome treasures might simply be stumbled over and picked up for trifling effort and characters could be 20th level after a year (vs. no higher than 14th, by Gary's account, after 4 or 5 years of play in Greyhawk and Blackmoor) . He had addressed this in articles in TSR/TD, but now it was dealt with in the standard reference for Dungeon Masters.

 

QuoteIf you had aerial combat in a AD&D campaign then Gygax wanted to you to use the rules in the DMG.

I'm not aware of him ever saying so. It's not at the level that he gave the impression of actually giving a shit about.

HE apparently didn't use the baroque unarmed-combat systems in the DMG, until a few years later when he agreed (as if it were a revelation) with the conclusion of Roger Moore and others that they were a pain in the neck.

Psionics? He didn't even care enough to get the stats right.

Experience point calculations? The figures in the DMG don't add up BTB, because he just eyeballed whatever seemed right to him.

Initiative? He says in the PHB that the DM will CHOOSE when to apply dexterity, weapon speed, etc. He could have given an authoritative solution to the conundrum of what the correct rule is for spell-casting in melee, except that he apparently didn't care enough to HAVE a single 'correct' rule in the first place.

What weapons require two hands to wield? Use your common sense and knowledge of medieval arms, he said.

Morale and reaction? He says right in the DMG that a good DM should be able to dispense with what is perhaps the most detailed table of factors in the whole game.

QuoteWhat A.D.D.C.I.T shows that Gygax did not succeed in all areas. You mock the author for using footnote from Dragon magazine but if your intent was to thoroughly explain how AD&D combat was supposed to be run officially then it perfectly legit.

Huh?? How is an over-complicated house-rule system relevant? Did this article have any sort of official imprimatur? Mr. Gygax had long since departed from TSR and Dragon Publishing, so any such Official rubric could not come from the man who had actually written the AD&D books! You might as well quote Dave Hargrave in 1977 as Leigh L. Krehmeyer (first and last I've ever heard of her) in 1988.

More plausibly, you could quote a Gygax article from The Dragon or Unearthed Arcana as being Officially Approved AD&D material afterward, but it does not change the plain meaning of prior text.

QuoteAnd certainly within the spirit of AD&D as Gygax defined it at that time.

Double Huh?? You spin on a dime from claiming Gary was being all Ex Cathedra, to claiming that some lady's house rules are legit (if not, as per Prata, binding on everybody). Three impossible things before breakfast?

Don't lay on Gary the bullshit that some noobs made up for themselves when they were 10 years old or whatever. The things that you're liable to read in their Bible, it ain't necessarily so.

Those same kids years later were among those who whined about the guys at Wizards "breaking the rules," when the guys at Wizards were the only ones in a position to have said -- which they had not -- that they were indeed officially binding rules.

Break the circle and stop the movement, the wheel is thrown to the ground
Just remember it might start rolling and take you right back around

Quote from: Phillip;852076No, actually. I referred to the Foreword, and the 1st page of the main text, in the DMG. However, the message is repeated through the PHB and DMG.

Then cite the sources like I have rather than expecting us to rely on your authority that the text says X. I don't expect anybody reading what I assert to believe me unless i show them what I am talking about.

Quote from: Phillip;852076The question is what the important "broad parameters" are. I assert that they are NOT (per Prata, Alexander, et al) to turn an example of DM rulings (from a page that clearly states only one 'rule,' unrelated to initiative) into arbitrary rules per se that must be applied all the time and every time.

My point is that Gygax of the late 1970s intended for the rules of AD&D to be played by the book. Something I have demonstrated by the quote from Gygax's own writings. For example to refute what you are saying I quote from page 9 of the DMG.

QuoteAnd while there are no optionals for the major systems of ADVANCED D&D (for uniformity of rules and procedures from game to game, campaign to campaign, is stressed), there are plenty of areas where your own creativity and imagination are not bounded by the parameters of the game system.

Quote from: Phillip;852076To zoom in on such minutia is to miss the forest for the trees,

My point in zooming on such minutia is that when Gygax penned those book that it was to address specific issues that TSR were facing over the D&D game. That Gygax solution to deal with that was to create a toolkit of hard and fast rules. He recognized, within limits, that there were many ways of running D&D campaigns. His goal was not to say "There is only one way of running a campaign. His goal was to say "If you do X you must use Y rules in order it to be an AD&D campaign."

This is further reinforced in the rash of "official" Gygax editorial in the Sorcerers Scroll column of Dragon magazine.

If you view the situation as "bad" or "good" that on you.

Quote from: Phillip;852076which of course suits the often overlapping new schools of entitlement and rules-lawyer-ism to a tee. The smoke screen facilitates such murky maneuvers as simultaneously lambasting old D&D and claiming the prestige of the name.

You are venting about something unrelated to debate over whether Gygax of the late 70s intended for the rules of AD&D to be run by the book.

On that issue you are claiming that that wasn't his intent yet offer no quotes or links to indicate otherwise expecting us to say "Yes Phillip you are right because that how you remember AD&D."

And that understandable because regardless of what we know know about the genesis of AD&D, back then 9 out of 10 thought Gygax's decrees about "official" AD&D was silly. What we liked about AD&D went beyond its official status. That it source of inspirations to thousands of campaigns and millions of players.

To me the fact that AD&D was designed in response to people bombarding TSR with question daily, trying to run fair D&D tournaments, to quash silly campaigns, and to make a few bucks along the way does nothing to diminish that.

It make the genius of AD&D all the more remarkable that was it able to transcend its genesis into the beloved game it became. The same way in that the badly written and badly organized OD&D transcended its origins.

I personally respect OD&D more than AD&D because I think that OD&D is the more solid design because it was born more out of actual play in Gary's Greyhawk campaign than designed. AD&D in contrast was more designed than something that was born out of actual play.

And I think my opinion has weight because if you look how people played back in the day and now, that the vast majority play with OD&D style combat, and ruling with AD&D stuff like classes, items, spells, and monsters.

Quote from: Phillip;852076As I stated earlier, the main message (from what I saw at the time) was that an express elevator to a 30th-level "Dungeons & Beavers" game could no longer plausibly be credited as the designer's intent. Gary owned up in the DMG to his failure to lay things out clearly in the OD&D booklets, having thereby created the impression in some minds that awesome treasures might simply be stumbled over and picked up for trifling effort and characters could be 20th level after a year (vs. no higher than 14th, by Gary's account, after 4 or 5 years of play in Greyhawk and Blackmoor) . He had addressed this in articles in TSR/TD, but now it was dealt with in the standard reference for Dungeon Masters.

That was main public reason we were given for AD&D back in the day. Now we know more of how AD&D was created and the circumstances that TSR was in. Unless of course you are saying the scholarship of Playing at the World and Hawk & Moor is bullshit. Or wait that Gygax and the other TSR associates didn't write all those response to questions about how it was like back in the day on Dragonsfoot and other forums.

Or course you could just build your own case in support your own interpretation of the events.
 
 

Quote from: Phillip;852076I'm not aware of him ever saying so. It's not at the level that he gave the impression of actually giving a shit about.

Gygax wrote around 3,500 words on Aerial combat from page 50 to 53 of the DMG, greatly expanded from the section in OD&D. While I don't think he wrote AD&D to showcase fantasy aerial combat. I don't think it was just an afterthought either. My take was that him, Kask, and TSR got more than a few question on OD&D's aerial combat and like many of the other section wrote up a fuller treatment of the subject as the official rules.

Quote from: Phillip;852076HE apparently didn't use the baroque unarmed-combat systems in the DMG, until a few years later when he agreed (as if it were a revelation) with the conclusion of Roger Moore and others that they were a pain in the neck.

Psionics? He didn't even care enough to get the stats right.

Experience point calculations? The figures in the DMG don't add up BTB, because he just eyeballed whatever seemed right to him.

Hence why I respect OD&D more as I know that the vast majority of the book was a result of actual play from his Greyhawk campaign. I read those antedotes as well. My conclusion is that they addressed some complaint, or area that causing a lot of questions and in those case Gygax tried to design an improvement or accepted a contribution that he felt at the time would definitely address the issue.

Anyway that my own personal opinion nothing to do with the issue whether Gygax intended to AD&D to be run 'by the book'.

QuoteInitiative? He says in the PHB that the DM will CHOOSE when to apply dexterity, weapon speed, etc.

I will be blunt, the PHB does not say that.

Instead it says on Page 105.

QuoteYou have already seen information regarding the damage each type of weapon does, how heavy each is, how long and how much space each needs, and each weapon’s relative speed factor. The same charts also give relative efficiency against armor types. Your referee will use these factors in determination of melee combats by relating them to his Attack Matrices

Quote from: Phillip;852076He could have given an authoritative solution to the conundrum of what the correct rule is for spell-casting in melee, except that he apparently didn't care enough to HAVE a single 'correct' rule in the first place.

I think he just flubbed the explanation. It happens. If you go through it there only two or three ambiguous rules I outline it in this post.

http://www.therpgsite.com/showpost.php?p=851552&postcount=19

And note I don't follow precisely what DM Prata does in A.D.D.C.I.T. I stuck only what can be found in the first three books while DM Prata looks at the entirety of the AD&D line.

Quote from: Phillip;852076Morale and reaction? He says right in the DMG that a good DM should be able to dispense with what is perhaps the most detailed table of factors in the whole game.

Again that not what the book says.

Page 37 of the DMG

QuoteWhen all modifying factors have been checked, adjust the base loyalty and roll percentile dice as noted above. (If you are certain of your DM ability, most of these factors should be apparent without actually checking them out, simply by empathizing with the character or group in question, and having them act accordingly. Until you are absolutely certain, however, it is urged that you use these tables.)

Quote from: Phillip;852076Huh?? How is an over-complicated house-rule system relevant? Did this article have any sort of official imprimatur? Mr. Gygax had long since departed from TSR and Dragon Publishing, so any such Official rubric could not come from the man who had actually written the AD&D books! You might as well quote Dave Hargrave in 1977 as Leigh L. Krehmeyer (first and last I've ever heard of her) in 1988.

Damn you are really hung up on the that reference to a Dragon Magazine Article. That out of 214 fucking footnotes he makes reference to Kreshmeyer.
You know even what Kreshmeyer's article said? It simple

• convert everything to percentile
• find the nearest die type and chance.
• Roll that for surprise

It not so much a rule but a gamer pointing out that you can take all the weird ass chances of surprise convert them percentiles and figure it out from there.

Now does DM Pratas insert his own intrepetations. Yes he does there are several ambiguous situations in the AD&D combat rules. He attempts resolve it in a way that he feel it is consistent with the rest of the rules. So you are right in one sense that it is a house rule.

But you know what that still a bullshit argument against the utility of ADDICT. Because outside of those case he draws together actual rules with reference so you find them yourself and not just accept his say-so.

Are you going to tell me that weapon speed factor comes into play any other time than when initiative is tied?

Or that Gygax does not recommend handling the 10 segments of psionic combat before normal combat is dealt with?

So what are these house rules that ADDICT is so guilty of.

First Gygax doesn't provide any rules or advice on handling spell casting against a charging foe.

Second Gygax doesn't provide any rules or advice when it two spell casters are going against each other. Spell casting time and weapon speed factors matter when it weapons vs spell. But when it comes to spell vs spell ... nothing.

Quote from: Phillip;852076More plausibly, you could quote a Gygax article from The Dragon or Unearthed Arcana as being Officially Approved AD&D material afterward, but it does not change the plain meaning of prior text.

which ADDICT does for the majority of its text something that you conveniently are ignoring.

Quote from: Phillip;852076Don't lay on Gary the bullshit that some noobs made up for themselves when they were 10 years old or whatever. The things that you're liable to read in their Bible, it ain't necessarily so.

I don't have too, I read what the guy wrote, I read what people involved wrote back in the day, I read what people involved day. Unlike you I am not trying to rely on 30 year old memories of how I though it was. I double check back to the sources and make sure what I say is backed up by what was written.

Estar, if you RTFM then there's no need for someone to go through exhaustively and pull out snippets for your delectation. Then again, if you're determined to read it with a spin that casts Gary as a hectoring tyrant with a fetish for petty details of dice tossing, you can keep doing that regardless of what's there in black and white. It would not be the first  text that people taking it for Holy Writ managed to make dreadful because that's what they wanted.

QuoteGygax wrote around 3,500 words on Aerial combat from page 50 to 53 of the DMG, greatly expanded from the section in OD&D. While I don't think he wrote AD&D to showcase fantasy aerial combat. I don't think it was just an afterthought either. My take was that him, Kask, and TSR got more than a few question on OD&D's aerial combat and like many of the other section wrote up a fuller treatment of the subject as the official rules.

That's not at issue. What's at issue is your claim that Gary gave a flying fuck whether I used those rules slavishly in my AD&D campaign.

Quote from: Phillip;852112That's not at issue. What's at issue is your claim that Gary gave a flying fuck whether I used those rules slavishly in my AD&D campaign.

A claim you haven't refuted and in which I supported by quotes from the text of the AD&D books. And I gave the reasons why he cared at that time. And I agreed that later on his attitude was different.

Quote from: estar;852116A claim you haven't refuted and in which I supported by quotes from the text of the AD&D books. And I gave the reasons why he cared at that time. And I agreed that later on his attitude was different.

A claim you have not supported and (though it seems therefore superfluous) is refuted by what he did say. You arbitrarily ignore what does not suit your thesis, so the likelihood of you changing your mind is close enough to nil. There's no real debate here.

Estar, I'll help you out: There's an article in an issue of The Dragon (finding which one is an exercise I leave for you) in which Gary says something about 2nd, 3rd, Nth editions, supplements and such. I reckon that'll give you better ammunition than you've cobbled together so far.

On the weight of evidence, I still think you're wrong. But at least you could have a rickety peg leg on which to stand!

Quote from: Phillip;852110Estar, if you RTFM then there's no need for someone to go through exhaustively and pull out snippets for your delectation. Then again, if you're determined to read it with a spin that casts Gary as a hectoring tyrant with a fetish for petty details of dice tossing, you can keep doing that regardless of what's there in black and white. It would not be the first  text that people taking it for Holy Writ managed to make dreadful because that's what they wanted.

 My claim supported by what in black and white. Yours is not nor have you made any attempt to support your claim by the black and white text. And yes I read the fucking manual multiple times and played it multiple times.

I agree that Gary is not a hectoring tyrant. That not why he adopted the authorities tone he did in writing AD&D and in his Sorcerors Scroll. In case you some how missed it. In my opinion the reasons are in order of importance.

1) TSR was being bombarded by rules questions and requests for ruling. By bombarded it was to the point it was interfering with what they were trying to produce.

2) D&D competive tournaments were a big part of the hobby at the time. Every one had their own house rules. AD&D would help to fix that.

3) Gary and the TSR staff were very annoyed at certain types of campaigns that were being declared as being D&D. AD&D was designed to fix that.

I don't see how this cast Gygax as a hectoring tyrant as you put it. Designing AD&D with an authoritative tone is a reasonable attempt as solving these issues.

Furthermore I did not say or claim that people back in the day took the AD&D books as gospels. In fact I mentioned that people ignored and in fact ridiculed the  Sorcerors Scroll columns where he was critical. In fact it continued to be mocked as seen in the Knights of the Dinner Table with the Gary Jackson character.

In my neck of wood it was just chalked up to the guy being eccentric or if a person was less charitable Gary was being corporate greedy. Now thanks to what we know now there is a more reasonable explanation.

Quote from: Phillip;852118A claim you have not supported and (though it seems therefore superfluous) is refuted by what he did say. You arbitrarily ignore what does not suit your thesis, so the likelihood of you changing your mind is close enough to nil. There's no real debate here.

I  quoted from the man's book and writings. You haven't, back your shit up.

Quote from: Phillip;852119Estar, I'll help you out: There's an article in an issue of The Dragon (finding which one is an exercise I leave for you) in which Gary says something about 2nd, 3rd, Nth editions, supplements and such. I reckon that'll give you better ammunition than you've cobbled together so far.

On the weight of evidence, I still think you're wrong. But at least you could have a rickety peg leg on which to stand!

Do your own research if you want to refute my point.

Quote from: estar;852120My claim supported by what in black and white. Yours is not nor have you made any attempt to support your claim by the black and white text.

You're in an alternate universe, pal. More accurately, you just pretend the words don't exist when they're right in front of your face. Some basis for conversation, Mr. Brick Wall.

Quote1) TSR was being bombarded by rules questions and requests for ruling. By bombarded it was to the point it was interfering with what they were trying to produce.

Yep. And Sage Advice kept on being there to answer questions like, "One of my players wants to get pregnant. What should I do?" (You're a DM, not a doctor, Jim. Or do you mean wants a character to ...?)

Quote2) D&D competive tournaments were a big part of the hobby at the time. Every one had their own house rules. AD&D would help to fix that.

Yep. But I'm not freakin' Origins XXIII. I'm not an employee of TSR Hobbies. I'm running my campaign. The relevant statements are plain English, hardly High Purple Gygaxian, but every word seems to be FNORD to you.

Quote3) Gary and the TSR staff were very annoyed at certain types of campaigns that were being declared as being D&D. AD&D was designed to fix that.

As I have repeatedly described.

All of which has zipadeedoodah to do with the point of contention. You have done a great job of arguing that you're one incoherent dude!