I'm close to pulling the trigger on the newest 3 core books for Castles & Crusades, and have been reading up allot about it (I've only been sitting on the C&C fence for 10 years lol). But I'd like to hear from the assembled sages her on the forums what the Like or Dislike about the game system.

As to me right now aside from a few small things, it looks like C&C is just D&D3E without the Feats and class/spell bloat. (which is a good thing). And if it is just that, why not go with "Basic Fantasy Role Playing" which is free.

To me the PRO's seem to be
The Skill Mechanic (SIEGE engine)
Stats as skills rolls
Prime Stats and Secondary stats and how they effect skill rolls
Niche protection for classes in regards to their skills/abilities
Higher is better for all rolls
Ascending AC
No Feats

To me the CON's so far are
The old style Saving Throws rather than Fort. Will, Reflex (though that is an easy house ruling to change)

Castles & Crusades originated as a project to make a ruleset that was compatible with AD&D. Compatible in that you can take any AD&D adventure or setting and run it as is by using the C&C stat blocks. In this they succeeded.

It has a lot of history and support behind it.

But since its creation the OSR expanded and grew and there is now dozens of variations on classic D&D including some like C&C meld newer mechanics into a framework that is compatible with classic D&D adventures and supplement.

One of them is Blood & Treasure. Which does uses the three save system along with Ascending AC and Nice Protection.

Unlike C&C the default skill system uses individual skills however they are based adding Reflex, Fort, or Will plus a attribute modifers. So while anybody can stealth by hadding their Fortitude bonus to their Dex bonus. Thieves are the best because they have higher reflex bonuses than other classes.

The author does have optional Feat and Skill point but they are true options. More on the order of how D&D 5e does it. Rather D&D 5e handles feat like how Blood & Treasures. You can use them but the game works fine without having feats. The same with skill points.

It worth checking at least as an alternative to C&C

http://matt-landofnod.blogspot.com/p/blood-treasure.html

And having played both, I think Blood & Treasure the better of the two. It feel like you get your money's worth with the books something I never felt with Castles & Crusades.

Then there are the various retro-clones, Basic Fantasy, Swords & Wizardry, etc. If you want to pick something to knock together your own take on classic D&D without reinventing the whole thing, I would start with the Swords & Wizardry house rule document. Add in things like the three saves and other elements and run it.

Quote from: Gwarh;852265The old style Saving Throws rather than Fort. Will, Reflex (though that is an easy house ruling to change)

This isn't entirely true; it's sort of a combination of both, and neither. You save against whatever attribute is appropriate, Primes being a base of 12, non-Primes a base of 18. The Challenge Class is added to the base, resulting in a target number. Roll a d20, add in the attribute mod and your level, compare to target number.

I think C&C is a pretty good game, but I greatly dislike the saving throw system and starting using AD&D's instead, mostly because I didn't like 20th level paladins failing their saves as often as 1st level paladins. Some people do prefer the way the saves work, however.

C&C's biggest strength is that combat takes about two brain cells to run. That in itself is a huge benefit. Plus, you can add in pretty much anything from AD&D/Basic/D&D3.X without even flinching.

I'll point out that if you jump in to C&C now, the latest full color printings of the books are gorgeous....nicest looking of all the OSR options out there. Peter Bradley's art is great (well, I like it anyway). I don't know what it is...these books just really appeal to me in terms of layout and design. It wasn't always like that, of course....make sure you don't get anything but the latest printings (or at least nothing earlier than the 4th Crusade prints).

C&C's consistency in mechanical design, derived from 3E, makes it very easy to teach to new players, too.

I'm one of those people who kinda likes the attribute-based save system, but I noticed in play it tends to mean each character has a few things he's really going to do well in saves against, and a few things that are his achille's heel. If you've ever made it to high level AD&D games and noticed that all characters might as well just assume "and he saved vs. X" all the time then having higher level characters who aren't universally invulnerable may appeal to you.

And like Brad said, combat is very easy to adjudicate in C&C. It's interesting for me because it tries really hard to emulate the flow/feel of 1E/2E combat, effects and results without rigorously following the old rules. The result is something that plays a bit like a very, very quick and intuitive redux of 3E combat, that paces like 2E and has familiar effects and spells dialed back to 2E era levels.


EDIT: A quick knote on Blood & Treasure....it is also an intriguing game, but (and this may sound shocking) it's really aimed at getting modern aesthetics and adventure themes into a sort of spiritually-OSR set of rules. I like it a lot, but it doesn't really feel as "D&D" to me as C&C does. I think YMMV heavily on this, and I'll just state that going with B&T would not be a bad choice either, I love everything J.M. Stater does. Maybe if he got Bradley to design his book layout and art I'd be hooked (sigh I'd LOL but I suspect I seriously do love the Bradley vibe in C&C. Maybe its just all the half-nekkid bikini-mail women still allowed to run around in the art or something).

Quote from: Brad;852277I think C&C is a pretty good game, but I greatly dislike the saving throw system and starting using AD&D's instead, mostly because I didn't like 20th level paladins failing their saves as often as 1st level paladins. Some people do prefer the way the saves work, however.

Yup. If you like it that high level warriors fail saves vs high level casters, it's a good game. Personally I prefer pre-3e approach.

I think whether you stick with C&C depends on what you're looking for.

When I first started playing C&C, it was because I had grown disillusioned with 3E, and sought a return to the rules and feel of TSR D&D.  At first, C&C seemed like exactly what I was looking for, but I kept running into more and more things about it that didn't work like I wanted.  Even things I first saw as improvements often turned out to not be what I really wanted, after all.  The way the rules work introduce some subtle, but significant differences between it and TSR D&D.  The saving throw thing is one.  The SIEGE engine, in general, is another (e.g., how it impacts the probabilities to surprise enemies, and who is good at detecting enemies, etc).  There were other "proud nails" that surprised me and that I caught my toe on, too.

What happened, with me, is that I found myself house-ruling C&C.  That's not a problem, and not a surprise -- most people house-rule, and C&C encourages tweaking and rules options.  However, I realized that all of my house rules were trying to make C&C more like TSR D&D.  I was just making more work for myself, running C&C.  Since I wanted the rules and feel of TSR D&D, it made a hell of lot more sense for me to just run TSR D&D.  Seems obvious, right?  (Don't know why I didn't realize that from the beginning.)

You may not be looking for what I was.  Still, I think if I were looking for a C&C-ish kind of system (general compatibility with TSR D&D adventures and stats, but slightly more consistent or modern approach to the rules), I'd favor Basic Fantasy over C&C.  It has that consistent, modern spin to the rules while keeping more true to the probabilities and game play of the original games, IMO.

Thanks for all the great feedback.

I actually own the Blood & Treasure core book (players book?) but have only skimmed through it. But what I did read impressed me enough to order the DM's and Monster Manual books off of Lulu.

Since I am a system collector anyway I guess I may as well grab the newest core trio of C&C books and give them a read through.

Also I've never sat down and read through cover to cover the Basic FRP book so I should do that also.

Hmmm so in the end I'm no closer to choosing an Old School Attitude, New school mechanics system. Lol.

Does anyone know if there are B&W versions of the newest releases of the 3 core C&C books?

I seem to remember reading somewhere that they offered Black and White versions of the newest books as a printer friendly option.

I personally prefer Swords & Wizardry: White Box, but if I had a group that wanted to play AD&D, I would run C&C. I've had fun every time I've played or run C&C. My preference for S&W:WB is more about the raw Sword & Sorcery feel.

I personally enjoy the SIEGE engine. It's fast and versatile and in actual play, that matters most to me over the occasional oddness the engine concept creates. The big issue is Spot Traps...it's a WIS save so Clerics spot traps (as good or better) than Thieves. But hey, Find Traps is a 2nd level Cleric spell so maybe the gods hate traps and the undead. For me, its a minor quibble to a good solid RPG.

BTW, as a player, I almost prefer C&C to other clones. The Prime system has allowed me to make some interesting PCs super-fast and C&C has my favorite version of the Bard and the Knight. Beardo, my Human Bard, has been incredibly fun to play.

Since we are discussing a new edition of C&C here this seems an appropriate spot for a related question. What am I missing out on by not upgrading to the newer printing? I have the C&C core books with the green covers, Castle Keepers guide included.

Quote from: Gwarh;852265To me the CON's so far are
The old style Saving Throws rather than Fort. Will, Reflex (though that is an easy house ruling to change)

C&C saving throws are not old style, they are SIEGE engine.

1) Old style: There is five categories of saves: vs poison, vs breath weapons, etc. Character has target number for each of them, that decrease with level. So, make a save vs poison at 3rd level in rolling a 15-20 on d20, but rolling a 13-20 on d20 at 7th level.

2) 3e style: Fort, Ref, Will: you get a bonus for each dependent on class and level, and you roll 1d20 + bonus + ability score modifier vs a target number that varies according to specific rules or GM fiat.

3) C&C style: GM tells you which ability score is relevant for saving throw. If it's a prime attribute you must roll 12-20 on d20, otherwise you roll 18-20. You add your level, but GM also add monster's level, or adventure level.

So what do we have?: old style categories are ludicrous as far as my preferences go. But they have one good thing: you know that increasing in level you become better at succeeding saves, because they are flat rolls. In this regard, C&C saves are the worlst, because if the GM is lazy he/she will tell that since you are a 15th level paladin, the adventure is 15th level, so the save for that trap is also 15th level, so basically you don't save any better than a 1st level paladin. However, if GM thinks seriously about it, he/she will create a table of challenges modifiers for easy/normal/difficult/impossible/etc. In this case, the saves become okay, and make more sense because they are based on ability scores, not ludicrous categories.

Nonetheless, C&C superficially resembles older D&D, but is different in many places, so you cannot use all those OSR modules made for 1e/Osric, etc., without adaptations (i.e. without work).

Lastly: my own game (see below) is a merging of Basic/1e/2e/3e, and works very well with OSR modules!

As an aside, there is an easier way to use the Siege engine.

Instead of separate numbers just add +3 to primes and -3 to non primes and treat everything like in 3.5 with a base difficulty of 15 or whatever the DC would be.

Its  mathematically identical and simpler


Also if you want to check the system out, there are two free variants from Beyond Belief Games, Tombs and Terrors and Medieval Murder Mysteries. You get get them at DriveThru free

C&C has two advantages that might not have been noted,

1st its got a lot of interesting support , Celtic and Nordic books, Rune Magic, 3 game worlds (Erde, Haunted Highlands and err tainted Lands) adventures, monsters and a ton of stuff including a huge free companion volume sort of like Unearthed Arcana  Also Freeport and Bluffside conversions too

2nd Its by default bounded, that is it stops at Level 12. There is official support past that but the game is built around 12 being the end game. I rather like this

On the whole I'd say it  reminds me of 5th edition and the two mesh well in places. 5e is far more "high powered fantasy" than C&C but the later is more to my taste.

The worst downsides

Well #1  is the editing. Its often very bad.

#2 Release schedules suffer  abit too but TLG is a small shop so that's understood. However in general if you want cool new stuff, you'll almost have to kickstart it. Basically TLG is a kickstarter company and while they have a solid track record, if you prefer a more conventional approach , you'll either wait quite a while for some things (ahem Elemental Spells)  or if a KS fails be SOL

Quote from: Philotomy Jurament;852290Still, I think if I were looking for a C&C-ish kind of system (general compatibility with TSR D&D adventures and stats, but slightly more consistent or modern approach to the rules), I'd favor Basic Fantasy over C&C.  It has that consistent, modern spin to the rules while keeping more true to the probabilities and game play of the original games, IMO.

I just use Mentzer Classic with Ascending AC, but yes I'd agree BFRPG is a good choice and I think better designed than C&C. You can add in the classes from Labyrinth Lord: Advanced Edition Characters to BFRPG for a more AD&D-ish experience; AEC redesigns them so they are balanced to a BX or BFRPG type power level.

Aside from the wacky mechanics, some downsides include:

- The editing (or really lack thereof). Everything from spelling errors to inconsistent terminology to just plain bad, bad writing. Despite several editions, it never improves and often gets worse. Considering the high quality of many of the free OSR games produced with little to no budget at all, there's just no excuse for that other than to say TLG just doesn't give a single fuck.
- The artwork. I'll admit this is largely a matter of personal taste, but weirdly proportioned asses and elbows are a running theme.
- Conversion. Unless you're planning on writing your scenarios from scratch or using only those things released by TLG it's not going to be very straightforward.

Quote from: Kellri;852368- The editing (or really lack thereof). Everything from spelling errors to inconsistent terminology to just plain bad, bad writing. Despite several editions, it never improves and often gets worse. Considering the high quality of many of the free OSR games produced with little to no budget at all, there's just no excuse for that other than to say TLG just doesn't give a single fuck.

This right here is what stops me from getting it. I have the old C&C books and although its an OK game, the lack of professional editing is a huge downside. Your book can be the the most beautifully put together tome in all creation, but if it is riddled with errors then what's the point?