Coming a little late to the party.

Anyway, AD&D 2E is my favorite edition to this day, because:

It's the first iteration of the game I've played and the only edition I run.

I've been playing since early 90s, so I know the rules like the back of my hand (most of them, at least).

It's a great toolkit RPG for playing D&D, and made it clear that's what it was.

In that same vein, it's very customizable, rules-wise, not only because of the almost infinite smorgasbord of optional rules (core optional rules, kits, player's option, etc.), but especially because it is so easy to implement your own house rules without breaking the game.

Most of the settings were superb, like al-Qadim, Dark Sun and Ravenloft. And I know some people will hate this, but I loved "From the Ashes" Greyhawk (Carl Sargent was one of my favorite RPG authors).

Having said that, I love the 1E Dungeon Master Guide, and use it often.

Also, I think grey box Forgotten Realms and the setting's first supplements (like "Waterdeep and the North" and "The Savage Frontier") were vastly superior to 2E FR and a real toolbox for Dungeon Masters.

Last, but not least, I also like BECMI as a player (but have never DMed it).

EDIT: I never jumped into the 3.0/3.5 bandwagon. It had some good ideas, but the emphasis on crunch (feats, prestige classes and character building) and the "you can't do it if it's not in the character sheet" attitude killed it for me. Ditto for its clone/simulacrum, Pathfinder.

Also never played and never will play 4th. Have no interest in what I see as a tabletop version of a MMORPG.

And regarding 5e, it has a nice system despite the power bloat. Howerver, I simple refuse to give a single penny to WotC. If I wanna play a modern version of AD&D I'd use Castles & Crusades, which I like a lot.

ruins of zhentil keep, netheril, undermountain 1 and 2 box sets are all of FR that I retain for use, sold the rest, and I had most of it, before giving away all my non-six siders to be handed out to newbs coming into 5e.

The maps from the waterdeep box set I sometimes miss, but you can still get them online to study or chop up for your table. I actually retain but do not have installed the 2e core rules cdrom and the FR atlas.

Those 2e boxed sets and their maps were quite addictive but I recently rediscovered the old mystara style hex maps and really really like the vibe. Bought the worldographer bundle and am playing with making maps in that mystara style hexcrawl.

Quote from: Slipshot762 on February 10, 2021, 12:32:13 AM
ruins of zhentil keep, netheril, undermountain 1 and 2 box sets are all of FR that I retain for use, sold the rest, and I had most of it, before giving away all my non-six siders to be handed out to newbs coming into 5e.

The maps from the waterdeep box set I sometimes miss, but you can still get them online to study or chop up for your table. I actually retain but do not have installed the 2e core rules cdrom and the FR atlas.

Those 2e boxed sets and their maps were quite addictive but I recently rediscovered the old mystara style hex maps and really really like the vibe. Bought the worldographer bundle and am playing with making maps in that mystara style hexcrawl.

Although my current FR campaign is set in the grey box era (before Time of Troubles and 2E official material) I still check later material from time to fill in the blanks, setting-wise. Including the 3e campaign setting book, which is very well written and full of good fluff.

But, yes, TSR usually had very high production values during the late 80s and the 90s. The al-Qadim small "sourceboxes" are simply fantastic (Caravans has a huge poster of a fortune-telling magic carpet that is incredible).

I feel a bit torn between various versions of 3rd Edition (which I lump into the same broad category) and 5th Edition. I started with 2nd Edition AD&D and it still has a special place in my heart and I love the artwork from that era and much of the flavor in the books, probably more than any of the more modern editions, but I have to say from a rules perspective that both 3.x and 5 are superior.

In 3.x and Pathfinder, there are so many different options for class, feats, and character design: all of which I like. On the other hand, 5th more probably a better rule set on the foundational level, being both simple and elegant, even if there are a few quirks that I'm not crazy about and the fact that there are fewer character options, which is good in some ways such as fewer but more useful feats.

I've been mostly playing D&D with the same group of people for the last 20 years. We have traditionally played 3.x and have mountains of house rules we've created over the years and so much history with that system, including other games ported into d20, that my preference might still be with 3.x

Though if I were going to recommend an edition for someone just getting into the hobby, I would probably recommend 5th Edition.

Quote from: Greywolf76 on February 10, 2021, 09:44:27 AM
But, yes, TSR usually had very high production values during the late 80s and the 90s. The al-Qadim small "sourceboxes" are simply fantastic (Caravans has a huge poster of a fortune-telling magic carpet that is incredible).

   Alas, from what I hear, it's one of the big things that hurt them at the end--products were overproduced/underpricing, since they were getting bad quotes from their printer.

WotC destroyed D&D. They removed level limits, eliminated racial limits that made playing a human key, reversed THACO, and added Feats that became superpowers for Characters.

And no one talks about this. They talk about races and magic but avoid the deaper mechanical aspects. AD&D is a completely different game to Third Edition. And Fifth edition is just the Fifth edition of that madness (3, 3.5, 4, Pathfinder).

WotC doesn't know how to design D&D. They can't incorporate all the SJW bs into the game and still make it consumer worthy. Yes, many publishers have found ways to make money on the label, but WotC hasn't.

When Gary ran a movie and a Saturday cartoon for D&D,  it meant a lot. It moved the brand. Can WotC do the same?

Quote from: Theory of Games on February 10, 2021, 01:19:11 PM
WotC destroyed D&D. They removed level limits, eliminated racial limits that made playing a human key, reversed THACO, and added Feats that became superpowers for Characters.

And no one talks about this. They talk about races and magic but avoid the deaper mechanical aspects. AD&D is a completely different game to Third Edition. And Fifth edition is just the Fifth edition of that madness (3, 3.5, 4, Pathfinder).

WotC doesn't know how to design D&D. They can't incorporate all the SJW bs into the game and still make it consumer worthy. Yes, many publishers have found ways to make money on the label, but WotC hasn't.

When Gary ran a movie and a Saturday cartoon for D&D,  it meant a lot. It moved the brand. Can WotC do the same?

Those mechanical changes that you don't like aren't related to SJWs or anything though. Thac0 and feats are completely a-political ideas. Not to say that the politics of WotC doesn't influence the products, it does, but I don't think it influences many of the mechanical changes. Believe me, I'm as opposed to SJWs as anybody, but I think its a mistake to blame them for game mechanic changes that you don't like.

As for the particular issues you bring up, some of them are just making the rules simpler and more consistent. The fundamental way that you roll to hit things hasn't changed, but replacing Thac0 with a hit bonus and making higher AC better just makes the system more intuitive and less convoluted without fundamentally changing the nature of game play. I think that feats are cool, they allowed people to customize their characters. You had something like feats in AD&D with weapon proficiencies, weapon specialization, and fighting styles. I do think that there were some problems with 3.x feats - not that they are superpowers but because a lot of them weren't really that good but then you had these convoluted builds where you had to have your feat selections planned out for 15 levels. I didn't like that, but I think that 5th Edition fixed that feat problem. In 5th you can customize your character with feats but each feat is useful, you don't really have to combine them in special ways, there aren't mountains of boring feats that you have to take, and you usually don't have to take feats to have a certain kind of build.

Did anybody ever use racial class limits? I know that none of the AD&D I was ever involved in did. I think that they were seldom used because they are a terrible way to balance races. You choose a race with all kinds of special powers but then you hit maximum level and you are stuck there forever, that ruins so much of the fun. It's a problem for elves to be better at humans at character creation and it's a problem if elves can't advance past level x when human characters can: two wrongs don't make a right. 3rd (and subsequent) editions greatly improved this issue by giving humans some abilities that make them desirable to play, so that the elf and human players can both have fun whether they are at level 1 or 20.

Quote from: ShieldWife on February 10, 2021, 02:39:56 PM
Did anybody ever use racial class limits?...I think that they were seldom used...

Still do. Everyone I've gamed with over the last several decades uses them, so I wouldn't consider them "seldom used." I suppose opinions and experiences with race-based level limits vary, like everything else.

Quote from: Philotomy Jurament on February 10, 2021, 02:44:36 PM

Quote from: ShieldWife on February 10, 2021, 02:39:56 PM
Did anybody ever use racial class limits?...I think that they were seldom used...

Still do. Everyone I've gamed with over the last several decades uses them, so I wouldn't consider them "seldom used." I suppose opinions and experiences with race-based level limits vary, like everything else.

Well, maybe I'm wrong then. It might be hard to get any kind of statistics on that.

Do you have AD&D campaigns that go to high levels? If so, what do the demihuman players do?

Quote from: Philotomy Jurament on February 10, 2021, 02:44:36 PM

Quote from: ShieldWife on February 10, 2021, 02:39:56 PM
Did anybody ever use racial class limits?...I think that they were seldom used...

Still do. Everyone I've gamed with over the last several decades uses them, so I wouldn't consider them "seldom used." I suppose opinions and experiences with race-based level limits vary, like everything else.

I used the optional rule (think it's from 2e, note sure) that level advancement past the racial limit costs x2 xp.
It never sat right with me that any character should have a level cap while others don't.

Quote from: Theory of Games on February 10, 2021, 01:19:11 PM
WotC destroyed D&D. They removed level limits, eliminated racial limits that made playing a human key, reversed THACO, and added Feats that became superpowers for Characters.

And no one talks about this. They talk about races and magic but avoid the deaper mechanical aspects. AD&D is a completely different game to Third Edition. And Fifth edition is just the Fifth edition of that madness (3, 3.5, 4, Pathfinder)

Wait, you say Feats are superpowers and magic is just some kind of shallow mechanic?

Remind me which Feat lets my human character Fly again?

Quote from: Armchair Gamer on February 10, 2021, 11:05:05 AMAlas, from what I hear, it's one of the big things that hurt them at the end--products were overproduced/underpricing, since they were getting bad quotes from their printer.

More or less.

The issue was more overordering. They did have issues with overproducing some content (Jeff Grubb detailed how Al-Qadim had very high production values but was supposed to be a short run, that instead got extended and screwed up the economics of such high production values with products that were not as viable as the early run), but they massively overordered almost every product.

The system they had in place was kind of weird, where they actually got paid for copies shipped, instead of copies actually sold. So they shipped tons and tons of product, got their advance payments, and then watched in horror as returns kept rising (thus eating back most of the original "profit"). The result was warehouses overflowing with excess materials that got ordered, shipped, then returned.

Quote from: ShieldWife on February 10, 2021, 09:58:07 AM
I feel a bit torn between various versions of 3rd Edition (which I lump into the same broad category) and 5th Edition. I started with 2nd Edition AD&D and it still has a special place in my heart and I love the artwork from that era and much of the flavor in the books, probably more than any of the more modern editions, but I have to say from a rules perspective that both 3.x and 5 are superior.

In 3.x and Pathfinder, there are so many different options for class, feats, and character design: all of which I like. On the other hand, 5th more probably a better rule set on the foundational level, being both simple and elegant, even if there are a few quirks that I'm not crazy about and the fact that there are fewer character options, which is good in some ways such as fewer but more useful feats.

I've been mostly playing D&D with the same group of people for the last 20 years. We have traditionally played 3.x and have mountains of house rules we've created over the years and so much history with that system, including other games ported into d20, that my preference might still be with 3.x

Though if I were going to recommend an edition for someone just getting into the hobby, I would probably recommend 5th Edition.

Hi, ShieldWife.

I agree with you that the d20 system is superior to the Advanced rules, if only for the fact that it uses a unified rules system. In fact, the system itself is quite elegant and intuitive. And its one of the reasons I also like Castles & Crusades a lot (my go-to modern fantasy system)!

The problem I have with 3.0/3.5 is of an excessive focus on published products on "crunch" which, in turn, led to a change in many players' mindset, too. For instance, I've seen players focused on "creating character builds" instead of just "creating characters". It seems that the d20 system with its focus on feats, prestige classes and combos was turning everyone into a min/maxer.

Of course I can be wrong, but that was my perception and experience at the time.

Regarding character customization, if you take into account all the kits and optional rules and subsystems (from the Player's Option series, 2E is not too far behind).

I haven't played 5e, I've only read the books. The rule system seems quite good, despite its power bloat (5e first-level characters are as tough as 2e fifth-level characters... and don't get me started on the killer zero-level cantrips. LOL!) However I really dislike the current attitude of WotC and its developers, so I won't touch it with a ten-foot-pole. 

Quote from: Theory of Games on February 10, 2021, 01:19:11 PM
WotC destroyed D&D. They removed level limits, eliminated racial limits that made playing a human key, reversed THACO, and added Feats that became superpowers for Characters.

I partially agree with you here, ToG.

I find the d20 system itself very good, and in the late 90s the 2e rule set was already quite outdated. Many of the new things were quite good. A unified system, ascending AC, zero-level spells, standardized effects (incapacitated and stunned now always meant the same things instead of varying from one designer to another), and so on.

The problem was the new mindset introduced with such a crunchy system.  Creating a character became an "optimization mini-game" in and of itself. As I said above, players (at least the ones that started playing with 3.0) seemed more preoccupied with the perfect character build and cool feats than with just creating a good character and having fun. The designers, in trying to make a game impervious to bad DMing they greatly reduced the DM's fiat.

Also, designing NPCs in 3.5 was a nightmare... a puny goblin shaman stat bloc occupied almost an entire A4 sheet of paper, while in 2e it took, what? Four to five lines, at most. All of a sudden, it was GURPS all over again.

One of the reasons I find Castles & Crusades the legit "spiritual successor" to old TSR games is that while it uses a modern, unified system, it still keeps the same mindset of previous editions without what I consider "crunch bloat". 

Don't get me wrong, I love it and still run 2e games to this day, warts and all, but I can appreciate what I see as the good points of the d20 system.

I vacillate between Rules Cylcopedia, which seems to continue edging out ahead as my favourite, and B/X which wins serious points for simplicity. But here I am running 5th edition, because what I like and what my players want out of a game is different. You make concessions for friends, and work on campaigns to run on roll20 for one's own sanity.

We play 5e. It's what our kids play, what they saw with Critical Role (which I won't put down because it brought people into the hobby). 5e is what is played in the high school where the kids go. I have fun running and playing it. As for preferred? I'd have to say like others 2e. I ran that inside and out. But it's just not practical for the group I play with (might be a generational thing, idk). And I'm okay with that.