Quote from: ggroy;624436Did 2E AD&D produce any outstanding modules?

--No.

Quote from: RPGPundit;624431James Raggi has been quoted as saying that the OSR is now better than "TSR", which I take to mean he's saying that the stuff the OSR does now is better than the games and modules TSR put out in the real old-school days.

Do you agree?

Yes, its better than tsr. But the OSR isn't better than just plain "Old School" that existed at the time. TSR was merely the commercial face of what was a vibrant hobby. Most of the best old school stuff showed up in fanzines at the time, not in published products.

Plus, no OSR has yet to touch the awesomeness that was Planescape.

Quote from: ggroy;624436Did 2E AD&D produce any outstanding modules?

I rather liked Baba Yaga's Dancing Hunt, and there were a few really good Planescape modules. Plus, Dragon Mountain. 2e was really better for settings than adventures though.

Quote from: bryce0lynch;624516You've pulled this shit before B. Your other posts seem well put together and intelligent but then you go and trot this shit out again.

And you're pulling the same butthurt again because you can't come to terms with the idea that your opinions about what module's good and not good might not be shared, and that you might be subjective on the question.

Quote from: bryce0lynch;624516If everything is subjective then why talk about anything ever?

Not everything is subjective, no.

If you want to go about analyzing something in a less subjective manner, and conclude this or that is "good" or "bad", provide an objective frame of reference to begin with. In other words, that thing is "good" or "bad" at something, for a particular purpose, according to a particular frame of reference you set up before you go about analyzing such a thing. Context, in other words.

Just saying "this or that module sucks" or "that module is 'objectively' better than that one because I like it better!" is shit.

Saying "as an introduction module, this module might be better than that one because it spells things out on how to set up the game more clearly, includes everything you will need to flip through the game session and is generally better laid out for this purpose" is something that has a more objective frame of reference, or set of criteria, people can judge from their own POV. If I don't want an intro module, if I don't care for the layout, or prefer products that do not spell everything out for me, then I'll know at least what CRITERIA you used to make your pronouncement.

Quote from: bryce0lynch;624516How about from now on when someone says "It's good" you agree to translate it as "I liked it" and then maybe follow up with "Why did you like it?" instead of "good has no meaning."

How about you come to terms with the fact your tastes are not objective to begin with, and then try to provide a better, more objective frame of reference to whatever you're looking at, the comparisons and conclusions you are drawing from there, before I even have to ask that question? I don't know. Just an idea.

I dunno. I really haven't seen anything in OSR that comes close to the classic TSR modules.

I think it competes well with the 2nd tier TSR stuff, and is better than the stuff the came out in the later 1e and early 2e eras.

And the thing about Tomb of Horrors, while it has a reputation for being hard, it's certainly beatable. In his introduction to Return to the Tomb of Horrors, EGG mentions that the people he aimed it for (his players) beat it much to his chagrin, and that running at tournaments people sometimes came up with solutions he hadn't expected.

Indeed, I think that's what helped most early TSR modules - they had originally been written for tournaments and run for years before being published.

Though then again, some of the Basic/Expert modules presumably weren't and still are very good. Not so much B3, but B4 The Lost City is really a great module, I don't think anything in the OSR has touched it, same with X1 and X2.

Quote from: Benoist;624543Not everything is subjective, no.

On the other side of the coin, very few things are objective.  (Especially absolutes).

Quote from: Black Vulmea;624480Dude, they're iconic because they were widely played and well-known among gamers.

The comparison is not, which OSR modules reached the same number of gamers and the same longevity as TSR modules? but which OSR modules have a high level of name recognition and shared experience among OSR gamers?[/quote]

How much name recognition and shared experience did ToH have... in 1977, two years after it was first published? How much did WPM have in 1981, when it was two years old? Because one of the things name recognition and shared experience correlate with is how long the material has been around. Don't compare the shared experience of a 30+ years old module with those of a two year old product like ASE.

QuoteIs there a series of linked modules, like Giants, which get comparable buzz to ASE?

Ignoring the fact that ASE is a multi-part series, I suspect that linked adventure modules just don't have the same relevance today as they did back then. Today, we have the Internet with numerous forums and blogs providing all the inspiration for DMs they could ever need. There's no longer a demand for a published adventure series or "campaign path", because there are just so many more easily accessible tools for making your own.

QuoteOr particularly popular funhouse dungeons, like WPM, that get frequent mention?

Vornheim. Sure, it's a city not a dungeon, but then again, I could ask where the particularly popular funhouse cities are in the TSR product list. Same difference.

QuoteIt's not about numbers, dumbass; it's about shared experiences.

Shared experiences don't pop out of Zeus' head in full armament like Pallas Athena, dumbass. They need time to propagate and coagulate and the OSR at large is just too young to have any yet. Ask again in 10 years.

QuoteIf you want a real dungeon challenge with high level characters, that you're ready for multiple TPKs and just enjoy that kind of hardcore game experience, then ToH is stellar. It's also great to see what constitutes hardcore challenges in the game to not unknowingly emulate this kind of thing for rookie groups. It's a module I would recommend for anyone as part of a range of different models to use and build your own, with "here's a basic intro module, here's a big sandbox, here's this and that, and here's the hardcore made-to-be-a-PITA module." It is certainly not representative of the default game play, and shouldn't be construed as such, lest you want to be known as a rat bastard DM, but it's really great for what it is.

Well, exactly, and I'm perfectly fine with that. But, like you yourself have said, what ToH represents is just a narrow segment on the wide scale of what D&D is and does. What I dislike is when people hold it up as a shining paragon of D&D at large.

Quote from: bryce0lynch;624516EDIT: Or we just all agree that Melan is the final arbiter of Good.

I only arbitrate important matters with a sword in my right and a signed waiver for all possible damages in my left.

Quote from: Premier;624556Well, exactly, and I'm perfectly fine with that. But, like you yourself have said, what ToH represents is just a narrow segment on the wide scale of what D&D is and does. What I dislike is when people hold it up as a shining paragon of D&D at large.

OK I get you. I think ToH is an amazing module, one of the great ones really, but the way it's been construed in some quarters as a default example of what dungeons ought to look like was a big, big fucking mistake to say the least. I wonder how many horrible stories of asshole killer DMs and the like are linked to this fucked up phenomenon, to be honest.

Quote from: K Peterson;624453Well, I'm making reference to Raggi's alleged comments about being "better than", and substituting "superior to".

I wouldn't make that assumption. Better than could just as easily mean more variety as it could mean superior product. Of course you do know that James Raggi uses hard selling as part of promoting his products. That perhaps he deliberately left it vague to get people talking.

All things being equal, I think the TSR products are more likely to be good for a random draw.  That is not a knock on the OSR that has produced some utterly amazing products.  Just that the variance in quality is higher for a bunch of labors of love.  

You also have the perspective of decades of play testing of D&D and a lot of false pathways.  But you also have more structure and a limited number of approaches that break the structure down.

Quote from: K Peterson;624450I just don't feel that the vast majority of Retroclones out there have taken techniques far enough to be that revolutionary. A smattering of houserules that tweak a recognized core is not an improvement, necessarily, over that recognized core.

Well the point of the OSR is to play older edition D&D not something like them. With that being said, many people have stated they prefer to use OSRIC at the table as they feel it is a superior reference than the original books.

And in the case of ACKS they layer several major subsystem on top of what is essentially B/X D&D. In the case of Lamentation of the Flame Princess their starting point is OD&D which if you read the original require a lot of interpretation. Nobody can run the 1974 rules by the book due to the bad presentation of the original rules. So with Lamentations Raggi took OD&D and published a well received interpretation.  

The mistake you are making is that you have to something like 3e or even D&D 4e in order to "innovate". Innovation comes in many different ways and forms.  International Chess used the sames rules for hundreds of years however a gamemaster transported from a century ago would see a very different game now. What the OSR is doing is pushing forward with the older editions.

With D&D being a roleplaying game there more areas where newer authors can be different, improve, or increase variety than International Chess.

Well the first thing you have to realize about Raggi is, he's the OSR's Skarka.  Which means, despite his skill (and he does have skill), you can't count on anything he actually says outside his work, because he'll be as intellectually dishonest as he needs to be to promote his brand, namely himself, and his company.  Anything said publicly is marketing. Period.

So taken with the grain of salt, is this ludicrous claim ludicrous or does he have a point?

Well, here's the way I see it.  Technology has given Kevin Crawford the ability on his laptop to do 3 times the work of TSR's entire publishing dept in 1974.  The internet allows people to collaborate and influence each other's work a thousand times faster then the TSR days.  

So yeah, obviously, with all the people in the OSR working, none of them relying on it as their primary income, of course you're gonna get more successful Hail Mary's when you have a hundred quarterbacks and none of them have to worry about interceptions, downs, or even score.

If there weren't some OSR products that surpassed some TSR products, then something would be seriously wrong.

However, this is kind of like arguing which 'Love is Blindness" is better, the original U2, or the new Jack White.  Even if you say the new Jack White version is better, without the U2 version, there would be no Jack White version to begin with.  Does that count for anything?

Raggi sounds like the snot-nosed punk who inherited everything from his dad then made a few bucks more claiming he's richer then his dad who built the whole damn thing from nothing.

So, for people who claim the OSR has surpassed TSR, tell me where is the OSR module or product that beats the TSR one in the same area.

Darlene's Map
Greyhawk - yeah the world
Forgotten Realms - yeah the world
Tomb of Horrors
B2
Expedition to the Barrier Peaks
Planescape (yeah as a coherent line of products delivering a setting)
Bargle, Graz'zt, Iggwilv, Iuz - Where's the iconic bad guys we'll remember 20 years later.

So being deliberately provocative here (as Raggi most certainly was) - The OSR so far has produced some frames with good lines, some decent suspension improvements, and a good blueprint for an engine.  Maybe at some point they want to actually try making a car before they clear a space on the mantle for the Motortrend calipers.  

As great as the OSR is (and it can be very great) at it's best, 99% of the OSR isn't even making cars or parts of a car, they're making aftermarket accessories.  To actually compare that to the real Renaissance is, Rob, and I love ya bro, pretty laughable.

Quote from: CRKrueger;624573So, for people who claim the OSR has surpassed TSR, tell me where is the OSR module or product that beats the TSR one in the same area.

Darlene's Map
Greyhawk - yeah the world
Forgotten Realms - yeah the world
Tomb of Horrors
B2
Expedition to the Barrier Peaks
Planescape (yeah as a coherent line of products delivering a setting)

So being deliberately provocative here (as Raggi most certainly was) - The OSR so far has produced some frames with good lines, some decent suspension improvements, and a good blueprint for an engine.  Maybe at some point they want to actually try making a car before they clear a space on the mantle for the Motortrend calipers.  

The OSR has yet to produce a "full setting", far as I know (and if I'm wrong, someone will be along to correct me shortly no doubt).  That's a fair point, although I don't think we'll get one.  The "OSR" hasn't been focusing on that end of things so far.  It might come, we'll see.

(We can now proceed to argue about what constitutes a 'full setting' I guess)