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The recent discussions that touched on 1st Edition and implied setting made me want to crack open my 1st Edition books. Then I was suddenly reminded about what a game changer UA was when it came out.

Do you consider UA as a required part to 1st Edition? Or is UA simply some afterthought of options that unbalanced 1st Edition?

I'm in the "afterthought of options" camp, not even for the balance issues.  UA just changed the tone and character of the game so much.

I don't really see anything essential in the book.  There are some neat spells and magic items, and the alternate unarmed combat systems aren't bad, plus there's the infamous pole arms essay (which I like), but I'm perfectly happy sticking to the core rules.

Required? Definitely not. It's as secondary to me now as when I first purchased it in the 80s. I don't remember using any of it with my gaming group back in the day; it was more an idle curiosity.

Hell, I don't consider weapons vs. armour type modifiers and psionics to be essential to 1E and they're in the core books.

UA is all optional material.

Heck, anything in any book is optional material.

No, it's just a secondary, optional book.

I use everything in Unearthed Arcana in the game at my table.  I consider this the only option, and my players do as well.  

This book is on the table and is referenced as much by my players as the PHB.

Of course, the DSG, WSG, OA and some other Greyhawk related material are called to the table as needed, with everything within them being 100% in the game as well.

It's really not a big deal.  It is considered required at my table because it adds a lot to the game, actually bringing it up to a "basic" complexity whereas my players are used to a much higher degree of rule complexity and implementation.

Completely optional.  Some cool things, like thief/acrobat, and some spells, but the new method for rolling attributes was right out and not allowed.

I certainly remember one local group whose GM refused point blank to allow any of it in his games ;)

I'd have to go and dig out my book as well as it has been about 10 years probably since I looked at it. From memory, the Thief Acrobat was a good idea, although given some of the discussion in the 'Thief' thread, perhaps the abilities they got should have either been available as standard to all thieves without taking the sub-class, or made more general use. I can't think I ever saw anyone play a Barbarian - all I remember is a whole tribe of the buggers chasing us round Isle of the Ape! The one that does stick in my mind though was the Cavalier (and Paladin), along with the introduction of heavier armours. Being able to bump their stats seemed just...wrong... and the new armour did start something or an arms race amongst some PCs.

Aside from the classes, I'm struggling to think of much of the other content TBH...

EDIT: shit, how could I forget about the new stat rolling!? Was it 'Method 5' that might as well have said 'write down 18 in your prime stat and some other high numbers wherever you want'?

Absolutely not. Very little in the book adds to AD&D, and a lot detracts from it.

I have always been interested by how much D&D changes when you move beyond the core books and add supplements into the picture. So much edition war discussion is wasted because people aren't talking apples to apples.

OD&D with just the three little books is completely different from OD&D plus Greyhawk.

I think 1e is a very different, and much more twinkie game, with Unearthed Arcana. I find that the new spells are generally pretty good, the new classes generally don't add much, but the new races . . . I hate 'em.

Similarly, I think the core 2e system is actually very good. Other than the loss of demons and devils (and maybe half-orcs), I don't miss anything that was removed from 1e (good riddance, assassins and monks) and generally like what was added (wizard specialization, bards as core class). But when you add in the splatbooks and badly-designed kits, the system quickly gets unbalanced and unwieldy.

No.  I cherry pick stuff from UA, but I think a lot of the material is something to be avoided rather than embraced.

I'd use new spells, equipment, and magic items, all on a case-by-case basis.  The rules for combat in darkness are okay.  So are the new rules for weaponless and non-lethal combat.  I've no objection to the pole arm porn.  I'm not a big fan of the rest of the stuff, with a few exceptions for things like additions to "giant class" creatures and maybe some of the expanded weapons allowed to some classes, and probably a few other things I'm forgetting.

As an aside, the latest AD&D game I've been running allows weapon specialization.  Not going to do that, next time.

Quote from: Garnfellow;618318I have always been interested by how much D&D changes when you move beyond the core books and add supplements into the picture. So much edition war discussion is wasted because people aren't talking apples to apples.

OD&D with just the three little books is completely different from OD&D plus Greyhawk.

One of the things I have learned from the discussions on here is that the discontinuities between the editions seem somewhat smaller if you take the major supplements for each edition into account. OD&D plus supplements gets you something which ends up looking a lot like 1E. 1E plus UA, DSG and WSG ends up looking like 2E. 2E plus Player's Option doesn't get you to 3E, but at the same time 3E is fairly clearly an attempt to make the ideas from Player's Option work. 4E is 3.5E plus Book of Nine Swords with the miniatures-and-game-balance dials cranked up to 11.

Another thing I've learned is that I almost always prefer the core-book expressions of a particular edition (plus a few of the better supplements) to the supplement-bloated cocoon from which the new edition hatches. 2E is much less unwieldy than 1E+UA+WSG+DSG, for example, and that's not just because you're juggling less books - plenty of fat has been trimmed and a lot of bad ideas have gone in the bin.

Items from UA that I consider essential:

• The expanded level limits for demi-human races.
• The Racial Preferences Table.
• The expanded Armor and Weapons Permitted per class.
• Weapon Specialization rules.
• The expanded tracking rules for the Ranger class.
• The expanded 'giant class' list for Rangers.
• The expanded effects of armor rules for the Thief class.
• The expanded Armor Class Table.
• The new spell content (with a few exceptions).
• Cantrips for the Magic-User and Illusionist classes.
• Method V for Ability Score generation.
• The Starting Hit Points for Player Characters rule.
• A few of the new weapons listed (i.e., hand-crossbow, staff sling, caltrop and sap clarifications).
• Acquisition of cantrips rules (M-U and Illusionist).
• The information and clarification on spell books.
• Acquisition of new spells for 1st level Illusionists.
• The clarification of the Permanency and Serten’s Spell Immunity spells.
  
• The Underwater Spell Use clarifications.
• The clarification of the effects of darkness on combat.
• The Social Class and Rank rules.
• New magic items (with a handful of exceptions).
• Expanded random treasure tables.
• The expansion and addition of Non-Human Deities.

Unearthed Arcana isn't Old School.  :p

Entirely optional. Some elements I'll cherry pick (spells, items), and some I'll never use (like the classes) and yet some others I might use, but house ruled (weapon specs).

As Drohem mentioned - do you consider the PC demi-human modified level caps to be essential? Removing/advancing those caps seems like a major game changer to me.

Quote from: Lynn;618333As Drohem mentioned - do you consider the PC demi-human modified level caps to be essential?

I use the level limits from the PH.

Quote from: Lynn;618333As Drohem mentioned - do you consider the PC demi-human modified level caps to be essential?

No; I prefer the level caps from the Players Handbook.

UA is entirely optional and I cherrypick from it as I like. Demihuman level limits are per the PHB.

When UA first came out we used everything in it. Then we decided it all unbalanced and overpowered the game and changed the feel of it too much (everybody wanted to play shit like drow cavaliers), so we banned everything in it. Then gradually some bits and pieces got added back in, either as-written or in modified/nerfed versions. In my recent one-off games it's theoretically all been in-play, but since I pre-gen the characters for those games I avoid all the stuff I don't like, so it kind of dodges the issue. If I were to start another AD&D campaign (which isn't likely) I'm not sure what I'd do. There are some things (like the unarmed combat system and spell book rules, and some of the new weapons, spells, and magic items) that I'd definitely want to use, but other things (like underdark races as PCs) that I don't think I could stomach, and some others (like the weapon specialization rules and thief/acrobat class) that I'd probably want to house rule (to tone-down the former and beef up the latter). As a player I always lobby for its inclusion, because I always want to play a barbarian, ideally generated using the infamous "Method V" :)

Unearthed Arcana was made up mostly of Dragon magazine article material. All the stuff that we allowed in our games we had already incorporated into them. UA was only a convenient way to keep a lot of the more useful articles in one place.

I mix & match the PH and UA for demihuman level limits. Which is to say I generally only allow classes and multiclass combos as per the PH (so clerics are only allowed as PCs for half-elves and half-orcs, elves can't be rangers or druids, and half-elves can't be paladins) but for those classes and combos that are allowed the limits from UA (including the +2 level cap bonus for single-classed PCs that could have been multiclassed) apply. Except for the +2 level cap this doesn't make much difference - in a couple cases the UA limit is even one level lower than the PH limit (for, IIRC, hill dwarf fighters and high elf fighters and mages with sub-18 prime stats).

1e UA is entirely optional guidelines that the GM can choose to add to his/her campaign if they are suitable.

If I were running a 1e campaign set in my Hidden Valley setting, few UA rules were be suitable. However, if I were running a 1e campaign set in my Arn setting, up to 50%-60% of them might be usable.

It's optional, but way back when UA codified things that my friends and I had been using out of Dragon mag (Cavalier, for example).

Hmm... That reminds me that I ought to dig out my Dragon Mag CD and take a look at it again.  I remember Fedifensor, but there ought to be other adventures in there worth looking at.

Quote from: Warthur;618321One of the things I have learned from the discussions on here is that the discontinuities between the editions seem somewhat smaller if you take the major supplements for each edition into account. . . .

Another thing I've learned is that I almost always prefer the core-book expressions of a particular edition (plus a few of the better supplements) to the supplement-bloated cocoon from which the new edition hatches.

I agree strongly with both of these points.

I often find that when someone says, "I HATE edition X," what they really mean is "I HATE edition X, when you add in supplements Y and Z."

It's not hard to run a 3e game that strongly emulates the old school if you keep it to just the core. But it's almost impossible if you open up the splatbook floodgates.

Used it a few times back in the day.

Otherwise, it was largely optional.

Useful and/or non-disruptive, in order:

- magic items
- spells
- expanded equipment & equipment rules
- Ranger class features
- spell book rules
- social class rules

Others:

I pretty much like expanded 1e, so I'm good with weapon specialization, but then you may as well go the whole nine with NWPs etc.

Whether you like the expanded demi-human level limits kinda tracks your feelings on level limits at all, I think, in that if you like the expanded limits, you probably don't like the level limits that much.

I like thief-acrobats, but don't really like the UA unarmed combat system they're tied into that much (though it beats the DMG's system).

(I may add to this as I think of things, or as they come up)

I remember reading UA back when it first came out, considered using some parts, and then put it on my shelf and promptly forgot about it. We had good D&D going with only the corebooks. There are myriad possibilites available already, we didn't feel we needed more outside of a few Dragon articles which were too cool to pass up.

The fact that it's in pretty much pristine condition speaks to the degree that I haven't used it.

Not essential but definitely used via cherry picking much like 3e's version.

Quote from: Garnfellow;618368It's not hard to run a 3e game that strongly emulates the old school if you keep it to just the core. But it's almost impossible if you open up the splatbook floodgates.

Yes, this has been my experience with 3.x D&D.

Quote from: Imp;618383I like thief-acrobats...

While I wouldn't say that I *like* thief-acrobats, exactly, I think it might work fine in an urban-focused campaign.

Essential? I'm kind of in the "no such thing" boat.  
Did I use it? Sure.  
Would I again? Sure.  
Would I think of playing or running a game without it? Sure.

Optional and on a case by case basis. I do like the new spells, by and large. The magic items are largely annoying. The classes are a mixed bag.

Quote from: Philotomy Jurament;618418While I wouldn't say that I *like* thief-acrobats, exactly, I think it might work fine in an urban-focused campaign.

Except that they're absurdly underpowered, as in you have to be, like, 20th level to do a bunch of stuff that people IRL (and I'm not just talking Olympic-level gymnasts who, it could be argued, are equivalent to 20th level AD&D characters (even though they're all 16 years old), but rather reasonably athletic people with a reasonable amount of training - so in AD&D terms no more than about 3rd or 4th level) can do routinely. Drastically rework their skill-chart (bumping everything 5 levels - so that the first row of the chart labeled 6th level becomes 1st - is a good start, but probably isn't going nearly far enough) and ideally give them some more spectacular quasi-magical superpowers at higher level - ability to climb on ceilings, catch missiles and throw them back as an attack, fall unlimited distances without damage, walk on water, etc. - and you're looking at a more reasonable class.

Maybe, but, regular thieves don't get to be monks, either (barring magical items which the thief-acrobat would have about as much access to as the thief) - I mean, there's certainly a logic to giving non-magical classes quasi-magical heroic abilities, but you'd probably want to do it with fighters and regular thieves and also maybe rangers and paladins a bit (more) too. I'll buy that they could use a skill boost though.

Good point. Quasi-magical abilities at high level would both be too much of a conceptual break with the non-magical thief class and blur the distinction between this class and the monk (not that there's a whole lot of distinction to start with - I doubt many folks would've batted an eye had all of the acrobat abilities just been given to the monk class as extras - perhaps give tightrope walking and jumping to thieves and monks, tumbling and pole-vaulting just to monks).

I blame UA  for the scourge of the Stoneskin spell and ridiculous events like telling the Barbarian "Hey! Look over there!" so the magic-user could cast a spell. :eek:

I loved UA. We used it a lot in our 1e campaigns.

I stopped playing AD&D before UA came out. I scrounged up copies of the original 3 books a few years ago, but, not knowing what I missed, I've never felt like picking up UA.

The idea of unarmed combat rules which actually work is attractive, though.

Quote from: AnthonyRoberson;618466I blame UA  for the scourge of the Stoneskin spell and ridiculous events like telling the Barbarian "Hey! Look over there!" so the magic-user could cast a spell. :eek:

Won't argue with the former, but the latter doesn't seem any different/worse to me than telling the paladin "hey! look over there!" so the thief could do something non-lawful good, which was common practice long before UA was published. In both cases the disconnect comes from the assumed campaign-structure under which the books were written (that there would be a dozen or more players in the campaign, most players would have a stable of several characters, and the makeup of adventuring groups would vary widely from session to session depending on who showed up - if none of the other players there that night has a cleric you pull out your cleric character, if one of the players has a paladin he wants to play everyone else agrees to use one of their good-aligned characters, if one of the players has a barbarian either everyone agrees not to use a spell-caster or that player agrees not to use his barbarian (and maybe tries to set up a separate one-on-one session with the DM where he can use that character)) not being the way the vast majority of folks actually played, so almost everybody ended up just glossing over all those character type X won't associate with character type Y rules (and then complaining that character type X was overpowered - he wouldn't seem that way if he was forced to adventure by himself or was perpetually low-level because he almost never gets used because the other players don't want to set aside their character type Ys for his sake).

UA came along when we were screaming for more options for PCs, and it scratched some of that itch.  The additional spells are certainly a good deal, and now that I've played later editions of the game, PHB-only 1e would feel claustrophobic.

My "then" perspective: another AD&D rulebook?  Okay.  (I was 13 or 14; too young to understand issues with balance, etc.)

My "now" perspective: use with discretion, and not all of it.  Some spells, some magic-items, yes on the slight to moderate increase in demi-human levels, yes to Cavaliers but no to Paladins being a subtype of cavalier, no to thief/acrobats, no to barbarians, no to drow PCs (but yes to Wild elves), yes to the other demi-human types.

Knowing what I know now about the book's history colors my opinion of it in the overall, but it had to be done (to save TSR and thus D&D).

Quote from: thedungeondelver;618485Knowing what I know now about the book's history colors my opinion of it in the overall, but it had to be done (to save TSR and thus D&D).

I think I know what you are talking about, but would mind expanding on this a bit?  

I think it's interesting and it would be appreciated. :)

Quote from: Drohem;618500I think I know what you are talking about, but would mind expanding on this a bit?  

I think it's interesting and it would be appreciated. :)

This is my understanding, and it's based on what Gary told me:

Once the Blumes had managerial control of TSR, they created D&D Entertainment, Inc., put Gary in charge of it (per him, to get him out of the way of making day-to-day decisions about TSR operations) and shuttled him off to California to market D&D which he did an admirable job of.  He launched the D&D cartoon, and was working on the second season and negotiations for a filmed D&D movie produced by Edgar Gross, directed by John Boorman and starring Orson Welles (who was, according to Gary, impressed enough by the source material to insist it be a cinematic release, not a TV movie as Gary had first envisioned).

When things were coming to a head with those two (and other) projects, word got back to Gary that things had gone pear-shaped in Lake Geneva.  The Blumes were shopping TSR out on Wall Street and fortunes were dire.  Gary packed up and came back to LG, which unfortunately meant that the D&D movie project and D&D cartoon and other things died on the vine.

After reviewing TSR's finances he found out that there were 200 more employees than the company needed, tons of un-opened and not installed systems furniture*, and that the company had a pre-tax profit of $4 and $25m in unsecured debt; he did some legal financial maneuvering to get control of TSR again and to right financial matters, he quickly put together Unearthed Arcana.  He had to basically beg Random House to print the book, guaranteeing them big sales.

The book came at exactly the right time: years of buildup of various articles and notional things that he'd written about (A)D&D had players wondering if classes from modules, from Dragon, and the Gord books were or could be legal in AD&D.  He handpicked the best of that stuff and polished it and put it in the first new AD&D rulebook in five years.  People ate it up and the next year's pre-tax profit was $16m.  Of course a lot of this is owed to him firing the 200 extraneous employees, doing away with the needlepoint company the Blumes had purchased, and selling off the fleet of 300 cars they'd bought.  Random House's bill got paid, and the rest is history.

Gary's reward was for ... well, we know what happened a couple of years after that.

My opinion:

The book came at exactly the right time and was pitched in exactly the right way.  AD&D wasn't a role-playing game despite tons of competitors by '83, it was the role-playing game.  There was a LOT of pent-up desire for a new rulebook and more "stuff" in a codified volume.  By saying in the intro that it was not "optional" now but that everything in the book was a "rule-as-written" to be used in campaigns and by including things for players and Dungeon Masters, the book was able to double dip.  To wit: eight players in a game might not have a need of a monster manual each, and they've had the basically unchanged Players Handbook since 1978, but now, here comes Unearthed Arcana.  Players want a crack at playing a Drow PC, or a cavalier, or a barbarian, or having Stoneskin or Evard's Black Tentacles in their spell arsenal.   Now they have it!  And the DM needs to keep track of these changes and all the stuff for himself as well - and now he has that, too.  So your eight players all buy a volume: it's billed as being as essential as a Dungeon Masters Guide and a Players Handbook.

That was catching lightning in a bottle, and it created the model for RPG games for decades to come (for good or ill).


...

*=what the hell is "systems furniture" anyway?

I like the misc. magic weapons table! It was a crucial addition IMO, errata really.

And it was a product we wanted!

Nope. I enjoyed some of the magic items but the rest I rejected out of hand.

As a kid reading it I remember it making me feel "this is some weird shit that isn't really D&D." Don't remember why exactly, I think I thought that the ability generation stuff was wonky and that the classes had way too many special abilities to keep track of.

Now I'd use it mostly to raid it for things like spells but not much else.

There's really only two ways to handle PC races and classes.

1. Balanced - make them all mathematically equal and open to all, which usually means flavorful as dirt.

2. Unbalanced - some might be overpowered or not, but the overpowered races and classes should be limited either by DM Fiat or random aspects of chargen.

3d6 in order or arrange, you ain't getting a Cavalier or Barbarian, period.  The chance of you getting a Paladin ain't too good either.

4d6 drop lowest, arrange, you have a better chance, but the "overpowered" classes are going to be rare.

In MERP, Beornings and Noldor were a bit out of control too, which is why you set up a race roll chart - problem solved.

Keeping rare shit rare shouldn't really be tough for anyone to do.

Quote from: CRKrueger;618519There's really only two ways to handle PC races and classes.

1. Balanced - make them all mathematically equal and open to all, which usually means flavorful as dirt.

2. Unbalanced - some might be overpowered or not, but the overpowered races and classes should be limited either by DM Fiat or random aspects of chargen.

3d6 in order or arrange, you ain't getting a Cavalier or Barbarian, period.  The chance of you getting a Paladin ain't too good either.

4d6 drop lowest, arrange, you have a better chance, but the "overpowered" classes are going to be rare.

In MERP, Beornings and Noldor were a bit out of control too, which is why you set up a race roll chart - problem solved.

Keeping rare shit rare shouldn't really be tough for anyone to do.

Works I gues sbut the problme with rare stats give the toughest classes and lucky rolls get you the best stuff is the feedback loop which makes it even less balanced.

So great stats means you get to play a character with really tough abilities now you have great stats and tough abilities so you are much better than the guy with crap stats who can only play a weak class.

Also the full 4d6 method as publihsed 1e stats a character with less than 2 15s is a useless chanracter and can be re-rolled. If you follow that logic then a lot of classes that seem rare really aren't
A paladin is self limiting because 17 CHR means you don't have 17 Con or Dex so there is some genuine limit there but a ranger or a druid or a cavalier is not so hard to roll.

And I loved UA but we always stuck to 4d6 drop lowest and arrange
Now I look back on it and I think my god how unbalanced!!!!
The need for more classes with more powers is a shame and as I said 2e should have stripped right back to 4 classes.

Quote from: T. Foster;618438Except that they're absurdly underpowered...Drastically rework their skill-chart...and you're looking at a more reasonable class.

Could be.  I've never actually had anyone run a Thief-Acrobat, I've never played one, so I've never paid much attention to the class details (e.g., skill %s at given levels).  

Have you ever taken a stab at such a rework?

Quote from: T. Foster;618463Good point. Quasi-magical abilities at high level would both be too much of a conceptual break with the non-magical thief class and blur the distinction between this class and the monk (not that there's a whole lot of distinction to start with - I doubt many folks would've batted an eye had all of the acrobat abilities just been given to the monk class as extras - perhaps give tightrope walking and jumping to thieves and monks, tumbling and pole-vaulting just to monks).

Or drop the monk and use a re-worked Thief-Acrobat class, instead of a monk class?

Quote from: jibbajibba;618533Also the full 4d6 method as publihsed 1e stats a character with less than 2 15s is a useless chanracter and can be re-rolled.

Reroll if you don't get 2 15s, really?  We never used that one.  4d6 arrange and that's it, or 4d6 in order and that's it depending on who was DMing.

We had like 1 Cavalier Class Paladin in 20 years of gaming.  A few Cavaliers and a few Barbarians.  Most people didn't take them though because the rules and limitations of the class were enforced along with the awesome.

Quote from: Philotomy Jurament;618536Could be.  I've never actually had anyone run a Thief-Acrobat, I've never played one, so I've never paid much attention to the class details (e.g., skill %s at given levels).  

Have you ever taken a stab at such a rework?

A couple times, but I always ended up deciding the juice wasn't worth the squeeze (i.e. that even at best I'd still only end up with a barely viable class that no one was going to want to play). Plus in order to get there I'd be violating my self-imposed rule to not do a lot of house-rule screwing around with AD&D - that an important part of the appeal of the game (at least to me) is that it exists "by the book" (or nearly so, within a reasonably fuzzy definition of what that actually means) and that replacing significant chunks of it (like an entire class) with my own house-rules would undermine that. The worst case scenario of the status quo is that the acrobat is a worthless, underpowered class that no one ever chooses to play. That's pretty harmless and easy to deal with, and I'm happier continuing to do that than to re-open Pandora's House-ruling Box.

Quote from: CRKrueger;618546Reroll if you don't get 2 15s, really?  We never used that one.  4d6 arrange and that's it, or 4d6 in order and that's it depending on who was DMing.

We had like 1 Cavalier Class Paladin in 20 years of gaming.  A few Cavaliers and a few Barbarians.  Most people didn't take them though because the rules and limitations of the class were enforced along with the awesome.

Its in the PHB and DMG I think. We seldom enforced but the 'hopeless character rule' is definitely cannon.

We ran cavaliers, barabrians and thief acrobats. In fact my longest running PC is a thief acrobat (still running today although I haven't used him in a game for 3 years) although I retconned him into 2e so he became a Thief with an acrobat kit.
His long running ally is a barbarian and they adventured from about 6th level when they met in Ravenloft until the thief was 13th and the barbarian I think 11th.
We always enforce all class restrictions and one of the funniest of all was when another barbarian (played by the same player but a horse rider more than a viking) was challanged by a cavalier to a duel. A whole load of real life politics resulted from the refusal of the cavalier to fight on foot with no armour just using knives, the barbarians preferred choice of 'duel'.
but I digress.....

Barbarians and Cavaliers both way too tough especially when the class limits are either covered off by special powers, barbarians can both attack creatures hit by only magical weapons and can waive some of their anti-magic phobia as they level, or as things you would do if you roleplayed a character of that type even without preternatural powers, like Cavaliers attacking the most power foe on the field, showing mercy and follwoing a code of chivalry.

Quote from: CRKrueger;618546Reroll if you don't get 2 15s, really?

Like so many other things in the Advanced rules books, it's more an advice than a hard rule. That said, using this advice and rejecting characters who don't have two 15s doesn't mean you end up with a Paladin that easily. The discrepancy of probabilities between a 15 and a 17 matters, for one thing, and putting your 17 in Charisma when you do get it means you probably won't have an 17 Strength or 17 Wisdom, because characters with multiple 17 and 18 scores are even rarer, if legit, using 4d6 drop lowest. Statistically, a lot of people will choose to play something else, rather than the Paladin with a 17 Charisma, a code of honor he must follow, yaddi yadda, instead of say, a plain 17 Strength fighter or 17 Intelligence MU with no strings attached. As it should be, I might add.

So this idea that "hey you can discard a character that doesn't have two 15 so it's uber easy/usual to get a Paladin!" is bogus.

Quote from: thedungeondelver;618511This is my understanding, and it's based on what Gary told me:

[snip]

Thank you, that was informative and insightful. :)

Quote from: Benoist;618641So this idea that "hey you can discard a character that doesn't have two 15 so it's uber easy/usual to get a Paladin!" is bogus.

Indeed.  Here is the relevant quote from the 1e AD&D PHB (p. 9):

QuoteCHARACTER ABILITIES

Each and every character has six principal characteristics, the character's abilities. These abilities are strength, intelligence, wisdom, dexterity, constitution, and charisma. (See also APPENDIX I , Psionic Ability.) The range of these abilities is between 3 and 18. The premise of the game is that each player character is above average - at least in some respects - and has superior potential. Furthermore, it is usually essential to the character's survival to be exceptional (with a rating of 15 or above) in no fewer than two ability characteristics. Each ability score is determined by random number generation. The referee has several methods of how this random number generation should be accomplished suggested to him or her in the DUNGEON MASTERS GUIDE. The Dungeon Master will inform you as to which method you may use to determine your character's abilities.

I highlighted the sentence in red that is pertinent.

Quote from: Drohem;618650Thank you, that was informative and insightful. :)

de nada.

Quote from: Lynn;618294Do you consider UA as a required part to 1st Edition?

I do not. To me, 1e AD&D is the MM, PHB, and DMG, as interpreted by me....meaning I don't hold every letter in the books as sacrosanct. I don't use all of the monsters in the MM,  house-rule out bunches of the PHB (Psionics, druids, monks, bards, weapon vs. ac, and others), and use the DMG as a guide to help adjudicate the game, not as a letter-of-the-law instruction manual.

QuoteOr is UA simply some afterthought of options that unbalanced 1st Edition?

I personally think that some of the stuff in UA would be unbalancing if adopted in my game (not passing judgement on any others here....if it all works for you as a whole, by all means enjoy it in your game), you can probably guess from up above that I cherry pick UA for stuff I feel suitable for my game, which at various points in the past has included:
-unarmed combat rules
-ranger tracking
-weapon specialization (though toned down a bit...I don't allow PCs to specialize at first level)
-some spells
-some magic items
-some of the new weapons and armor

When UA came out there wasn't any thought -- of course it was part of the game, Gary said so! We use it all, and enjoy it. We always had a few house rules, and we sometimes tried Dragon Magazine articles too, so none of it was foreign.

But no, I don't consider UA to be any more optional than any other part of 1st ed AD&D canon. It has a ton of very useful stuff in it.

Quote from: Baron;618804When UA came out there wasn't any thought -- of course it was part of the game, Gary said so! We use it all, and enjoy it. We always had a few house rules, and we sometimes tried Dragon Magazine articles too, so none of it was foreign.

This was my experience as well.

Quote from: jeff37923;618347Unearthed Arcana was made up mostly of Dragon magazine article material. All the stuff that we allowed in our games we had already incorporated into them. UA was only a convenient way to keep a lot of the more useful articles in one place.

This is my opinion of the book too.  Actually, I would encourage anyone to get the Best of Dragon volumes instead, using the bits they like from them.

Quote from: Kuroth;619016This is my opinion of the book too.  Actually, I would encourage anyone to get the Best of Dragon volumes instead, using the bits they like from them.

yeah but we couldn't even buy Dragon in thw mid 80s so ....

Quote from: CRKrueger;618546Reroll if you don't get 2 15s, really?  We never used that one.  4d6 arrange and that's it, or 4d6 in order and that's it depending on who was DMing.

We had like 1 Cavalier Class Paladin in 20 years of gaming.  A few Cavaliers and a few Barbarians.  Most people didn't take them though because the rules and limitations of the class were enforced along with the awesome.

For us, useless characters were usually those with many well below average stats (a guy with a 6,8 and 5 for example and no stats over 13). But a character with all 11s to 13s wouldn't have been considered hopeless. Like you say, it did depend on who was GMing. I had one GM who pretty much let people keep rolling till they got a good set. I always liked letting people roll two sets using 4d6 take the lowest and choose the one they prefer.

No. UA is entirely optional, and I don't use any of it when playing AD&D.

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