Quote from: mythusmageBeing the old man on these boards let me fill in a few holes.

Bah! I'm the grumpy old curmudgeon here. Get closer so I can whack you with my walker!

-clash

Completely tangential to the historical discussion:

My friends and I played 2e with a bare minimum of house rules.  At the same time, all we ever did was sketch out corridors on graph paper and throw wave after wave of humanoid monsters at the party.  No traps, no swimming, no magic, no nothing that wasn't THAC0 or Initiative.

We managed to avoid all the busted rules by virtue of being 13.  Yay us.

Quote from: SettembriniCould well be. But I find RC has more in common with 3.5 than it has with my memories of AD&D 2nd play as well as the textual artifact of my 2nd Ed. PHB.

RC is so close to what 3.5 is now, it's amazing! Somebody said RQ was an influence to 3.0. Look up you RC again, no need for RQ influences, it's all there, including skills and combat maneuvres, which are basically feats; five foot step; proto-AOO, ten second turns, even a whole entry on balancing encounters!

Pundit will hate it, but go and look up the chapter on encounters and on the Proto-CR. It's all there.
The RC is directly related to 3.x! Moreso than AD&D 2nd.

I don't hate it, its absolutely true! You're right, and there's no doubt in my mind that D&D was the main influence for D&D. Its so obvious it sounds utterly stupid when its said.

So its Runequest this year, huh? A couple of years ago the claim was Rolemaster, and before that it was Ars Magica, etc etc ad nauseum.  The D&D haters are always trying to claim that anything that makes D&D enjoyable must have been "stolen" from some other system, when in fact most of the stuff that makes D&D fundamentally enjoyable was from right there in D&D.

RPGPundit

Quote from: RPGPunditSo its Runequest this year, huh? A couple of years ago the claim was Rolemaster, and before that it was Ars Magica, etc etc ad nauseum.  The D&D haters are always trying to claim that anything that makes D&D enjoyable must have been "stolen" from some other system, when in fact most of the stuff that makes D&D fundamentally enjoyable was from right there in D&D.

"In terms of my game design history, I owe a lot to RuneQuest." -J. Tweet.

I'm willing to give the folks who credit RQ a resounding "maybe" based upon this alone.

Quote from: jrients"In terms of my game design history, I owe a lot to RuneQuest." -J. Tweet.

"The other designers already had a core mechanic similar to the current one when I joined the design team, and I've seen the same basic idea in a few other games as well." - J. Tweet.

(Link for reference, as well as my own purposes, because I know I am going to have to look this up again.)

There are lots of influences that go to and fro in the game community, and lots of parallel evolution. I think it's fair to cite some RQ, ars magica, and Rolemaster (remember what Monte was doing before he started working for TSR/Wizards? ), but I think that RPGPundit has a good point in that its more likely than not that many things that supposedly D&D got from other games, D&D got from earlier iterations of D&D.

Quote from: Caesar SlaadI think that RPGPundit has a good point in that its more likely than not that many things that supposedly D&D got from other games, D&D got from earlier iterations of D&D.

No doubt.

I'm really enjoying all the history, and I really wish someone could find a
way to talk wizards into letting the RC be reprinted via PoD. It's been awhile since I checked, but I thought used on eBay were normally going for $20+ at one point, seems like there would be a market.

Quote from: cnath.rmI'm really enjoying all the history, and I really wish someone could find a
way to talk wizards into letting the RC be reprinted via PoD. It's been awhile since I checked, but I thought used on eBay were normally going for $20+ at one point, seems like there would be a market.

Well, it's not print on demand but you can buy the PDF for $4, and then have Kinkos print and bind it.

Now that I'm back we continue with...

As noted before, both editions of AD&D were adhoc productions with little real development. D&D, starting with the Holmes edition, were planned in contrast. The two versions also had different aims and thus different philosophies.

As part of his attempt to divorce the new AD&D game from D&D it was Gary's aim to present a set of rules whereby players and GM could adventure in a world. He also designed AD&D to give players a comprehensive set of options, D&D in contrast was kept relatively simple, the better to draw new blood into the hobby. You look at the supplements TSR produced for D&D 1e and you'll notice that they were designed to flesh out the world; to give the players more options as to the sort of adventures their PCs could participate in. As it turns out, D&D essentially did the same thing, but in a more straightforward manner. Now add Gary's style of writing - a playful, conversational tone - and you get a work most unlike other RPG rules of the time.

AD&D 2e had a more technical voice, but it still had the aim of giving the player rules whereby he could adventure in a world. In that there was a substantial continuation from the Gygax edition. While clearer the writing still had the conversational tone. It was only later, when lesser writers replaced the original 2e author, Jeff Grubb, that the quality of the writing declined to the point much of the prose became incomprehensible.

Though, when you get right down to it, first edition AD&D maintained its quality better than second edition did up until the end. That because Gary kept a close eye on his child, and chose good people to work on it. Jeff Grubb, for example, on the Wilderness Survival Guide.

Now, it should be noted that Gary and his successors under Lorraine did note the problems with AD&D first and second. And both intended to correct those problems.

Gary's purpose was to go the route of PC empowerment. A course he maintained with Dangerous Journeys and later Lejendary Adventures. (Gary once wrote that a beginning LA Avatar is equivalent to a 9th level first edition AD&D character. I can attest to the fact a starting Mage in Mythus can be powerful indeed.) As a result the original Unearthed Arcana presented player and character options that strongly biased things in their favor.

You see, Gary has long viewed the PC as the focus of the game. The movers and shakers. He's a strong advocate in his own way of PC protaganization. As part of this he really has little truck with such things as balance. The players play heroes, the GM plays villains, and the rest is just backdrop. That was the thinking behind his Unearthed Arcana and the reason why it did things the way it did. Had things gone his way at TSR the game we call Dungeons & Dragons would now be a very different thing.

On the other hand AD&D 2e went another way entirely. It become more, D&D in a sense. Yet, at the same time, less D&D than even AD&D 1e had been. It also soon accumulated contraditions and disparities, and it became apparent that the game needed revision. The options books were the first step towards that revision. Towards, if you will, an AD&D third edition. And the reason why they took the shape they did is Gary Gygax.

In part three, TSR picks up a new game line, and AD&D gets sub-characteristics.

Quote from: Abyssal MawWell, it's not print on demand but you can buy the PDF for $4, and then have Kinkos print and bind it.

Will they do that with pdf's that you buy online?

Quote from: mythusmageIn part three, TSR picks up a new game line, and AD&D gets sub-characteristics.

Looking forward to it, I've enjoyed the first two parts, thanks.

Quote from: Mr. Analytical"Big" Ron has an excellent article somewhere arguing that in fact, there is no such game as D&D.  There are only different bodged houseruled games all playing under the same name.

Utter nonsense written by someone who has boldfacedly admitted that he stopped doing anything with D&D ages ago (until he was recently forced to by some neighbour kid of his or whatever).

D&D is D&D. The fact that a lot of people have houserules for D&D is a result of D&D being the most played RPG in the history of human existence.  The reason why there are more home-brewed variants of D&D than Runequest, or Sorceror, or My Life With Master is because D&D has had literally millions of times as many players and games and campaigns run.

But at the end of the day, in 99% of the cases in question, a player could migrate from one D&D campaign to another and still recognize the game being played. To claim that there "was no such game" is wishful thinking from someone who despises the game for its popularity.

RPGPundit

While I was asleep, Pundit stood guard.

I planned on not bringin Ron`s Article here, but now the can is opened.
The "All good games are Champions/RQ related" is the biggest piece of Edwardian Propaganda flying around. I can vouch for him, in that he truly believes in it, as he has never encountered other games in any meaningful way.

But the RC proves:

3.5 is closer to OD&D than anything else in gaming. Functional and clean non-houseruley game engines are not a recent development.

Quote from: SettembriniWhile I was asleep, Pundit stood guard.

I planned on not bringin Ron`s Article here, but now the can is opened.
The "All good games are Champions/RQ related" is the biggest piece of Edwardian Propaganda flying around. I can vouch for him, in that he truly believes in it, as he has never encountered other games in any meaningful way.

But the RC proves:

3.5 is closer to OD&D than anything else in gaming. Functional and clean non-houseruley game engines are not a recent development.

Aw come on Settembrini, you can't reduce the suggestion that RQ/Champions were highly influential games to 'Edwardian Propaganda'. The history's there; the points about mechanics I made in my earlier post are there. I might be wrong about the influence on D&D, for sure, but I was there when these things were happening. So don't duck the issues by chucking round cheap anti-Forgist crap, especially when it's aimed at someone who hasn't drunk the Kool-Aid anyway.

Furthermore, I really doubt that Edwards would say "All good games are Champions/RQ related" given the "Brain damage" and "child abuse" comments as well as the fact that none of his games are anything like Runequest or champions.

Also, I don't think that "there's no such game as D&D" is necessarily pejorative.  It's just an observation about the inter-action between rules as things written down and rules as things that govern actual play.

You too, went overboard here.

RQ and Champions were hugely influential, and rightly so. But not for D&D. Period. Everything else is revisionist history. Champions for example leads directly to GURPS and WoD. But those games are character centered superhero extravaganzas. For those point buy onanistic navel-gazing games, Champions is truly the icebreaker and champion.


Traveller, GDW or FGU made vastly different games along other lines of tradition, totally seperated from the Champions mindset.

Anybody with an RC at hand will see, that if any non-D&D influence can be seen, than it's traveller. I'm not saying that this is what actually happened. But the text inside the RC, the mindset of "roll and live with the result", the kingdom and fief generation, the magic construction rules, the construct construction rules are way more in the line of the "wargame/universe simulation" approach found in Traveller.

Champions/RQ is just a codeword for modern-hip-and cool, for those who actually think those games are. The RC is indeed clearly laid out, but with vastly different aims and goals. It's totally laughable to trace anything in it back to a whole different tradition of games.