I basically sat out the 2e era, at least as far as D&D goes. Re-reading some old Dragon issues, I feel a kind of nostalgia, even though I wasn't taking part at the time. I can see the ren-faire thing going on, plenty of attempts to make play "serious" and with in-depth campaign worlds rather than just dungeon exploration, and so on. There's an attempt to make 2e a generic fantasy toolkit rather than a recognition that D&D is its own thing.
But how was your play at the time? Did you still approach things the way you had with 1e? Did you use one of the manifold TSR settings or a homebrew? Did you feel there was a tension between the rules and the play culture? Were you having a good time or was it starting to wear thin?
Pretty much exactly like O, BX, BECMI and A.
Modules though tended to be more constained. Sometimes too constrained, by the plot. Felt like alot less open roam modules came out in the 2e era. But there were some gems like the whole Darkness Gathering series. One of my favorites of the 2e era.
I think mainly because 2e did not change much with the rules. Least not so drastically things were a slog to convert.
YMMV of course. Im sure someone will wander in with a horror story or three.
Addendum:
From experience as a DM and player at home and at cons the gameplay was overall unchanged. Lots of variance from table to table just like previous and aside from occasional grumbles at THAC0 or Kits it was overall amiable. WMMV horror stories there too Im sure. But at least for me that how it was. The players I picked up for 2e were the same.
Play moved WAAAY out of the dungeon for us. Never really did a straight crawl with 2E. Running B/X devolved into Listen, check for traps, open door, fight or investigate, move on (snooze). Sooooo...
Campaigns became pretty "questy" for us (the "Princesses & Perils" iteration of the game, I guess?). And as we played...
Splatbooks: soooooo many crazy options. So much extra shit out there. We were inundated. Plus, there were new systems with interesting doohickeys like boons & flaws (though not called that, necessarily). We liked the idea, so...
Eventually, a friend and I developed our own game rules, with intent to publish. Was gonna do everything using Adobe which, was, at that time, a new thing. Sadly, we got into this well before the era of online publishing. Everyone moved off to other states. Gaming died for me for about a decade. I really didn't think about this shit much until after I settled in the area where I now live.
Which gets me to considering how best to answer this question NOW:
As compared to my 2E days (exclusively as a DM):
*I plan shit out a LOT less.
*I focus on episodic stuff.
*Prefer rules light.
*The fewer race/class options, the better.
*Minutiae sucks.
*I say yes a lot more than I used to (pretty much all the time now).
*I appreciate the opportunity to game a lot more, now that it's no longer an expectation.
A few random notes, to be more direct in answering your question:
*We never ran a module straight. Always adapted the thing to some extent.
*All our settings were original.
*No tension between rules and play.
*I owned a ton of supplements, but the best ones, I thought, where the spellcards. Sped up play a lot.
So, that's my ramble-ass reply.
Out of all the d&d versions, we played 2e the most. Things I remember- it was the beginning of characters becoming super heroes in a way. The kit bloat got way out of hand. We had a lot of fun with it.
We did a very railroady thing in Krynn, but after we became a bit tired of the epic story, the GM did indulge us in a detour as treasure hunters that was more episodic. Think Ray Harryhausen in Krynn, more or less (or that's how I saw it in my mind's eye). The most memorable session for me, in that tangent, was us going down the ocean on a bell like contraption that trapped air inside to look for a submerged treasure. really not that different from dungeon crawling, but I never got my start in dungeon crawling, so it was a nice novelty.
Quote from: The_Shadow;895765But how was your play at the time?
That was my introduction to RPGs in general. :)
Back then, it was extra hard to get any rpg-related stuff around here. There weren't shops selling official sourcebooks/accessories, no famous communities, Internet was wild and still somewhat of a peculiarity, so no fancy rpg-related forums, no online help and SRDs. Plenty of time went to flesh-out settings, write adventures and what-not. We learned everything from each other, and considered everything, any wildest idea worth trying, any challenge worth taking, so no matter what we got, we tried that out.
First it was Forgotten Realms, then Al-Qadim, Ravenloft, Darksun, Birthright, Planescape and Spelljammer. Some among these were accepted and played regularly, some didn't get much love. Other settings we invented on our own. 99% of it was crap, including our attempt to recreate Howard's
Conan but hell, it was unique, original and damn creative back then.
In a way, it was the best time, even thought nowadays I laugh at people who seem to follow our steps and repeat our mistakes.
Btw...
In comparison: today I'm very picky, I often refuse to read a game or a supplement that looks like crap (I firmly believe that people who use certain fonts should be shot on the spot, and left there to rot, no burial). It takes very little to make me stop reading some book. For example, I think that certain scenarios for
Achtung! Cthulhu!, perhaps "The End of the World" or "Fragged Empires" (that I had the opportunity to read lately) aren't worth the paper they are printed on, and yet I realize that back in those weird times, I'd think them absolute pinnacle of design.
Heh. I became old. :)
Hmm. Our AD&D gaming was very "gonzo". Rarely did a vanilla dungeon crawl after a certain point. It was mostly cramming in starships and superheroes and other strange stuff into D&D. I'd hardly even say we were playing D&D, so much as making up fun shit out of D&D and sometimes rolling dice. We were preteen-young teen age range.
By 2nd edition, we had calmed down a lot. We had campaigns in Dark Sun and Spelljammer, so yeah. The boxed settings were great. We did try to play it a bit more "seriously".
It was more based on worlds, and their specific flavors, than locations.
Just thought of something else I recall about the 2e era- the DM went from carrying around three books to a milk crate and several binders.
I went from Red Box Basic to AD&D 2nd Edition, and there was this one GM who had ALL of the boxes up to Immortal and always tried to get us to play that, but everyone else was into the new shit. I remember a lot of my experience of AD&D 2 was vicarious, through Dragon Magazine or at cons, and in our home game it was either BECMI, with this guy, or if I was GMing I had moved onto RuneQuest. So I felt like we were outside the mainstream, and that my game had moved beyond the splat book circle, but that other GM finally moved onto AD&D 2 and bought everything again. I felt like his thing was tied to what TSR were doing and that my game, which we handed off on, was more evolved. RuneQuest seemed more sophisticated to me. Still does. But I think both of us had been influenced by the ambient gaming thing and were both running pretty railroad-y games, full of grand Quests.
The biggest change for us was that our characters started reaching "name level" in AD&D 1e whenever 2E came out. Suddenly, we had followers, castles and temples to upkeep, alongside dealing with the complexity of managing mini-kingdoms. We were a bit too young to understand how to really run things from that perspective at age 11. Eventually, we got tired of it and stopped playing for a hot minute. However, I ran small mini-games between then, using the old modules.
However, we eventually picked it back up whenever Planescape hit the shelves. That completely turned our game around, as we restarted from scratch. It's also about the time that I began DMing regularly.
We also began using supplemental material from Dragon to create interesting and new classes. We came up with some really wonky stuff. I only wish I still had my old campaign notes from when I was a kid. I mistakenly threw them out during a move many years ago.
It was a magical time of maidens traipsing with unicorns through virginal forests, knights travelling hither and non to battle threats to such flowers of beauty, for honor, faith, and said fair maiden hands... and settings where you could then have killer cannibal jungle halflings, or desert nomad dwarves, or divine right of kings amid a (fairy) realm management. All was well and the lands were at peace, and the garden bloomed with worlds and settings and a thousand beautiful campaign variations. From table to table, it was like travelling to unknown vistas and sipping deep from the well of imaginative life...
/skips off to the horizon
La la la la la!...
It was great fun for a while. I moved from AD&D 1e sort of... Well I still played it with my regular group who I still play with sometimes. Thanks to the Player's Option books, particularly Combat and Tactics, I made extensive use of miniatures and had this horribly micromanaged initiative system which divided combat into segments, particularly useful for characters with multiple attacks. Mostly I used Planescape as a setting.
However, I was also running some Buck Rogers XXVc which used similar rules. Combined with Battlesystem, we had some sweet fleet versus fleet battles.
My original group formed when I got my middle school friends to play through a dungeon I prepped after reading (and playing through the didactic solo adventure in) the D&D Introductory Game "black box." Each of them went off, and picked up a different game, and ran it. But I was the "D&D guy" — and no one bought AD&D; instead, I pestered my dad to get me the D&D Rules Cyclopedia.
Now there were some other kids in our school who played AD&D. They read game novels and went on and on about the Companions of the Lance and Elminster and Drizzt and shit — stuff I was vaguely aware of because I often got to buy Dragon magazine at the FLGS (o halcyon days!). We played a bit of 2e with these guys, but very little; the bulk of our D&D experience was RC.
A few years later, when I was in college, I got into oWoD LARPing (don't ask) for a short time, met a great crowd of enthusiastic gamers (also game novel readers) and as the LARP fizzled we got a regular and pretty epic AD&D 2e game. It lasted for two years and was fairly railroaderrific and definitely a "heroic fantasy" thing (even if my character sat squarely at the roguish threshold of "heroic").
What I gleaned from those two groups is that their AD&D 2e-powered take on D&D, as opposed to my own D&D RC-based games, was more scripted, more "global" (i.e. more "save the world" stuff), more "high fantasy" and more likely to use a published setting or module. Also, I thought it was pretty weak that AD&D had so much cool stuff (race + class, spells, monsters, magic items, insanely awesome settings I knew very little about but loved the covers), and got the lion's share of supplemental material in Dragon, but had no systems for cool stuff like rulership, or mass combat, or building a flying ship.
I do agree there seemed a shift to more wilderness and non-dungeon style adventures. Which was actually a nice change of pace from the often more dungeon-centric older modules. Possibly that was a outgrowth of there being so many and writers wanting to try something different. Or inspired by the few that came before like Isle of Dread.
Quote from: Opaopajr;895892It was a magical time of maidens traipsing with unicorns through virginal forests, knights travelling hither and non to battle threats to such flowers of beauty, for honor, faith, and said fair maiden hands... and settings where you could then have killer cannibal jungle halflings, or desert nomad dwarves, or divine right of kings amid a (fairy) realm management. All was well and the lands were at peace, and the garden bloomed with worlds and settings and a thousand beautiful campaign variations. From table to table, it was like travelling to unknown vistas and sipping deep from the well of imaginative life...
/skips off to the horizon
La la la la la!...
Damn, and I missed it. That's how I always imagined it though. Not sure where I was that decade, probably drunk and in grad school. I managed to skip 2nd almost entirely, but it wasn't the same as when I skipped 4th. I mean I didn't intentionally avoid it or anything. I did grab Birthright and thought that was pretty cool. I think I mostly played historical miniatures or chaosium rpgs in that era. It was a dark time. I should have went with the virginal unicorns and traipsing knights thing. Oh well.
My first three gaming items were Frank Mentzer's version of the Basic and Expert boxed sets and the Forgotten Realms grey box campaign set that I purchased at Toys-R-Us. I then bought AD&D 2E that same year (1989) at Walden Books. To me AD&D was just a continuation of my Basic/Expert set. So it was just D&D to me.
Well, that covers a lot of time for me (in 2.5 different states), but I can mostly sum it up as: mostly like 1e, with more system hacking and more new settings.
To me, the exotic settings (mainly Dark Sun and Planescape) were what really set 2e apart from 1e.
On the downside, some of the authors had a little too much self-loathing in reaction to high adventure gaming. "Use your crappy scores to roleplay" advised some of the core books. Whatever, bud. Nobody wanted that. Our characters might have quirks, but if we save our sucky characters for farmers and ratcatchers in Stormbringer and Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay. For AD&D 2e, gimme my 4(+)d6-drop-low wannabe demigods to take on the worst the dungeons (deserts? planes?) could dish out.
Quote from: Caesar Slaad;895963Well, that covers a lot of time for me (in 2.5 different states), but I can mostly sum it up as: mostly like 1e, with more system hacking and more new settings.
To me, the exotic settings (mainly Dark Sun and Planescape) were what really set 2e apart from 1e.
On the downside, some of the authors had a little too much self-loathing in reaction to high adventure gaming. "Use your crappy scores to roleplay" advised some of the core books. Whatever, bud. Nobody wanted that. Our characters might have quirks, but if we save our sucky characters for farmers and ratcatchers in Stormbringer and Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay. For AD&D 2e, gimme my 4(+)d6-drop-low wannabe demigods to take on the worst the dungeons (deserts? planes?) could dish out.
It's an attitude that still pans out to this day, with now 5e, forcing players if they want to use the array, rather than rolling, they get an 8 (-1) in a score. No choice, using the rules as written.
I find that annoying. My home game, I turned it into a 10. For those who want to actually, you know, feel heroic without the typical stat they have to find and dump.
Also, I'm planning this new game to be more S&S/Heroic Fantasy than the last three AL modules (save Strahd.) I'm sick of 'THREATEN THE UNIVERSE!!!11!' plots. Something more personal, sandboxy feels good to me.
As for the thread, I've always gotten the impression that the locales might have been different but the playstyles were pretty much the same.
It was a time before multi-classing and the min/max minigame became so prevalent...
2e was the birthplace of A LOT of great settings. Since I never really used pre-generated characters or modules, I never noticed a lot of the railroady problems of 2e.
Quote from: Novastar;895989It was a time before multi-classing and the min/max minigame became so prevalent...
Bullshit. The Dart Throwing Fighter was but one incident of Min/Max in all editions.
Quote from: The_Shadow;895765I basically sat out the 2e era, at least as far as D&D goes. Re-reading some old Dragon issues, I feel a kind of nostalgia, even though I wasn't taking part at the time. I can see the ren-faire thing going on, plenty of attempts to make play "serious" and with in-depth campaign worlds rather than just dungeon exploration, and so on. There's an attempt to make 2e a generic fantasy toolkit rather than a recognition that D&D is its own thing.
But how was your play at the time? Did you still approach things the way you had with 1e? Did you use one of the manifold TSR settings or a homebrew? Did you feel there was a tension between the rules and the play culture? Were you having a good time or was it starting to wear thin?
I started playing in high 2e 95-ish, and we had a blast. We freely mixed in 1e stuff without care (we were all unaware of edition warring as the internet was still a hard ur nerd thing at the time). We were limited to a ever evolving group with two primary DMs, and worlds were a definite good thing. Dungeon crawling was there, but it was not really a focus and was a bit too abstract IIRC.
"I can see the ren-faire thing going on, plenty of attempts to make play "serious" and with in-depth campaign worlds rather than just dungeon exploration, and so on." You mean 1980 Greyhawk?
Quote from: Teazia;896002"I can see the ren-faire thing going on, plenty of attempts to make play "serious" and with in-depth campaign worlds rather than just dungeon exploration, and so on." You mean 1980 Greyhawk?
I mean that the advice in Dragon magazine seems to assume that DMs were creating all these unique worlds with their own cultures and pantheons etc, rather than using Greyhawk/D&D defaults. 3e was the first to embrace "default D&D" as a positive thing. Gygaxisms were passe in the 2e era - at least in the published materials, so that's one reason why I'm interested in people's actual experiences.
Great insights in the thread so far!
Quote from: Christopher Brady;895992Bullshit. The Dart Throwing Fighter was but one incident of Min/Max in all editions.
The dart throwing fighter needed 18/76-90+ STR (for that +4 to +6 to dmg) and a place to hold all his ammo (each is 1/2 lb, and should have a case or quiver to logically hold them, barring DM stupidity). So you're "god mode" for around 4 rounds within 1/2/4 range (indoor in 10x feet, outdoor in 10x yards), whoopty fuckin' doo. It's white room arena theory crafting at its laughably worst.
Yeah, no. :rolleyes:
Quote from: Christopher Brady;895987It's an attitude that still pans out to this day, with now 5e, forcing players if they want to use the array, rather than rolling, they get an 8 (-1) in a score. No choice, using the rules as written.
Also, I'm planning this new game to be more S&S/Heroic Fantasy than the last three AL modules (save Strahd.) I'm sick of 'THREATEN THE UNIVERSE!!!11!' plots. Something more personal, sandboxy feels good to me.
1: Um... its an array tied into the race selection? And every race, including humans get at least 3 stat points. You can easily turn the 8 into a 9 or 10. And even if not you can buy it off with level up stat points. Its not like a -1 in something, is the end of the world. You must have some really whinny players that they cant stand a single -1. Heroic my ass.
2: Totally agree. While Curse of Strahd was a more traditional self contained and not-world-threatening adventure. The others sure were. Once is ok. Twice is pushing it. Three times it starts to get old fast. I hope the next one isnt another world beater. ugh.
Quote from: The_Shadow;895765But how was your play at the time? Did you still approach things the way you had with 1e? Did you use one of the manifold TSR settings or a homebrew? Did you feel there was a tension between the rules and the play culture? Were you having a good time or was it starting to wear thin?
My play was faboo, but also so varied as hard to pin down. The range for settings, and campaigns within, was large. As was the potential scope to narrow down immensely to local state, county, city, or even city district level -- or dial out into multiple planes or even overlapping settings (and in more than one manner, too).
Approach things the same as 1e? Yes and no. Dungeoneering died on the vine for the most part on at least half the tables I sat, though it was still there in spades if you wanted (and not just from AD&D 1e modules). Too many 2e modules did suffer from "novel narrativitis," so I enjoyed the tables where we often had DMs ignore their terrible railroady advice, which thankfully for me was the vast majority. I was always an elitist when it came to game novels (I assume they're all crap), and viewed anything patterned on it as obviously terrible by extention due to the assumed quality of the source material.
Settings? Oh yes. I used, or participated, in a few TSR settings. Oddly enough, they were never Forgotten Realms or Dragonlance. It was a majority homebrew, but that's also a plus to 2e as most of the conversions didn't need to worry about much system convergence or interference -- such as the dreaded playtesting versus unintended cascading combos.
Rules versus play culture... That's a weird one. By then RPGA (Organized Play) was already suffering from calcified attitudes and typical tournament style behavior. But I can't think of any edition, let alone system, that didn't endure something similar from that hell. However if we are talking about paradigms... not really. Second edition is such a large toolbox with a basic, and pretty resilient, chassis that it accomodated a surprising range of play assumptions. Part of it was the largest number of character stat generation methods (Methods I - IX as a start from the corebooks). Another part was the huge amount of material for pretty much every flavor I could think of. Want gritty fantasy fuckin Vietnam?, doable; want planes-hoppin' supers?, doable; want domain management?, doable; etc.
You'd have to expand that question a bit more to get the most from it, I think.
Did I have a good time? Oh yes, I had a very good time. Some things did wear on me, such as PO: Combat & Tactics as precursor to D&D 3e-ism bullshit tactical complexity (fucking hate glueball melee with prancing casters on the periphery in 3e). Yet overall there was so much material I never had the time to fully suck all the marrow out of. I play other games, but I look back and really find myself wanting to go back to AD&D 2e. The core chassis was easy, just about everything else is optional or modular, the locations were often fresh yet approachable (not too alien or 'trying too hard'), and the sheer volume of world building material to save the DM time.
In many ways I am like Gronan, I already found what I like and in my wanderings haven't found anything better.
Quote from: The_Shadow;895765I basically sat out the 2e era, at least as far as D&D goes. Re-reading some old Dragon issues, I feel a kind of nostalgia, even though I wasn't taking part at the time. I can see the ren-faire thing going on, plenty of attempts to make play "serious" and with in-depth campaign worlds rather than just dungeon exploration, and so on. There's an attempt to make 2e a generic fantasy toolkit rather than a recognition that D&D is its own thing.
But how was your play at the time? Did you still approach things the way you had with 1e? Did you use one of the manifold TSR settings or a homebrew? Did you feel there was a tension between the rules and the play culture? Were you having a good time or was it starting to wear thin?
When I played AD&D back in the day (I think that was 2e) we played it with a series of interconnected adventures. We went through dungeons, spent time on ships, climbed tall towers and did the normal adventuring stuff. Our thief sneaked and stole, our magic user cast a mean Spider Climb (I think that was what it was called, but he could climb walls with it), our cleric healed people and our fighter hit things with his sword.
We had a good time playing. I started with RQ and went back to it after the AD&D campaign finished, but would have been happy playing both.
The rules system seemed a bit limited and restricted in places, but we never really achieved high level, so that might have changed things a bit.
Quote from: Christopher Brady;895992Bullshit. The Dart Throwing Fighter was but one incident of Min/Max in all editions.
Since when? You dont need super DEX or STR to throw a dart in D&D. Just at least average DEX/STR. Same as anything else in D&D. And even a -1 isnt going to be totally debilitating.
I remember it was the first time in my circle where "game balance" became a topic of conversation like that was a thing that could and possibly should be.
It's funny, I recall that will all those kits and new races and what not, our group still hit the dungeons:) We played a bunch in Ravenloft as well.
Ravenloft is one big open air dungeon. With a castle to fool you.
Quote from: Omega;896077Ravenloft is one big open air dungeon. With a castle to fool you.
http://theangrygm.com/every-adventures-a-dungeon/
Quote from: Opaopajr;896033I play other games, but I look back and really find myself wanting to go back to AD&D 2e. The core chassis was easy, just about everything else is optional or modular, the locations were often fresh yet approachable (not too alien or 'trying too hard'), and the sheer volume of world building material to save the DM time.
I've pretty much settled on 2nd ed as "My" edition. After getting replacement rulebooks, I typed up a couple pages of the houserules that I've been using since the 80's. We should be getting some games in this summer, and I'll have 2nd ed ready if anyone asks me to GM.
Quote from: Ratman_tf;896127I've pretty much settled on 2nd ed as "My" edition. After getting replacement rulebooks, I typed up a couple pages of the houserules that I've been using since the 80's. We should be getting some games in this summer, and I'll have 2nd ed ready if anyone asks me to GM.
My biggest advice upon returning, go scribble up your own DM Screen from scratch - or at least have a notebook with those tables put in.
I can't tell you how many times I was pleased with photocopying or scribbling out several of the DMG tables for encounters (Not Random Encounter Tables; I'm referring to distances, lighting, "first impressions" reactions, morale, Mv rates for land, sea, & air, etc.). When you can skip merrily along into the game with nary more paper than PHB, DM Screen, manila folder of campaign notes (Who's Who NPCs, Random Encounter Tables, Maps, etc.), scratch paper (maybe graph, if you're player are well behaved), and a fistful of index cards, you begin to wonder why you got into the habit of lugging around reams. And the great thing is, if you do your DM Screen well enough, and internalize a few core PHB rules, you don't even end up taking the PHB out at all unless a new player wants to jump in.
When the table is mostly Screen/Notebook, Campaign Folder, Scratch Paper, Index Cards, and then dice and pencils, it's remarkably liberating. (Edit: it's also great advice for many other rules light to medium RPGs as well, I find.)
I started gaming in 1989. My early gaming was heavily influenced by the BECMI sample dungeon and the adventure modules I was picking up (primarily from the used section of Pinnacle Games in Rochester, MN). This included a strange melange of sources, most notably:
- B3: Palace of the Silver Princess
- B1: Keep on the Borderlands
- DLE1: In Search of Dragons
Of these, I'd say B3 probably had the largest influence (for whatever reason). My dungeon maps were based on it and the BECMI sample dungeon. (BECMI and AD&D completely failed to explain how hexcrawls were supposed to work in actual practice, so I never got into those except for drawing hex maps.)
My second phase was joining a group of other gamer geeks in 5th grade. We each had a stable of characters and would swap of DMing duties. We played exclusively at school during breaks, which meant 15 minutes here, an hour over lunch, etc.
When the rest of my group moved away at the end of that school year, my third phase was primarily gaming on the ADND echo on FidoNet and on the Prodigy message boards. The latter was primarily an "arena" game with multiple GMs who ran separate threads each describing a social location or ongoing scenario. You could go to the local tavern, for example, by posting there. You could also challenge other PCs to duels in the arena. (It was a very interesting open table format and I've never seen anything quite like it since.) The AD&D echo games, due the exigencies of their non-synchronous message distribution, had a strong sense of story to them. (GMs would post short narrative pieces of fiction describing what was happening. Players would respond with their "moves", which consisted of both immediate responses and hypothetical extrapolations of what they would do next depending on what happened. The GM would gather those together, interpolate a new piece of short fiction up to the point where they no longer felt confident in interpreting the players' intentions, and then wait for the next round of responses.)
Around this time I was also discovering theater, and I pretty firmly embraced "RPGs are storytelling and character acting". I also realized that AD&D was a clunky monstrosity of a game and, after trying to fix it, I moved on to other RPGs.
Quote from: Christopher Brady;895992Bullshit. The Dart Throwing Fighter was but one incident of Min/Max in all editions.
Quote from: Opaopajr;896022It's white room arena theory crafting at its laughably worst.
As is most min/maxing nowadays.
1e had double specialization and Oriental Adventures iron fist karate experts; 2e had bladesingers and dart specialists and Player's Options books; 3e had oddball combinations from 12 splat books (or just core tier 1s). I think the big difference was that before 3e, the designers hadn't presented the material as all planned out and balanced, so for the most part we didn't expect it (or maybe it's just everyone being on the internet now to constantly rehash where the system breaks down). "No sane DM would allow that" has always been a required component to the game, now we just say it like it's like confessing a sin. :-)
To the OP-- I think the fact that I was 15-26 in the 2e era played more of a role in how my games went than any influence from the game books. All the game settings did reinforce the idea that we were playing 'in a world' to be fleshed out had some influence on our DMs, myself included. We did all rush to buy (or at least have one of us buy) each new splatbook, and after the complete fighter book came out, there was a flurry of pirates and swashbucklers and so on. The talk about kit cheese has always confused me. Most of them basically just moved you back to what you already had in 1e or basic (an extra weapon proficiency? yay! I was proficient in all weapons before and it didn't break the game). Even the much ballyhooed bladesinger just gave you back some AC or something for you elven fighter/mu, which was nothing compared to being able to wear armor in 1e. After the fact I saw some of the kits in the FR warriors and priests of the realm book and saw some kits that were truly overpowered (priests of Meilikki could get fighter Str and Con bonus to hp for no clear reason). We still went to dungeons, travelled through wildernesses, etc. We did go on quests and things that broke the dungeon/wilderness-hexcrawl thing, but I think we did that in basic as well.
The most definitive thing that I would say existed about 2e was that it was mostly me, my group, Dragon Magazine, and maybe the FLGS to influence how I saw the game. No internet forums. No one pointing out rules we'd missed or that something was our homebrew solution. The same is true of basic and 1e. The difference is that I've gone back and played those again recently (1e more than I ever did back in the day). 2e is still encapsulated in the hazy teenage/pre-internet (for gaming for me) days and thus has a nostalgic halo around it.
Quote from: The_Shadow;895765I basically sat out the 2e era, at least as far as D&D goes. Re-reading some old Dragon issues, I feel a kind of nostalgia, even though I wasn't taking part at the time. I can see the ren-faire thing going on, plenty of attempts to make play "serious" and with in-depth campaign worlds rather than just dungeon exploration, and so on. There's an attempt to make 2e a generic fantasy toolkit rather than a recognition that D&D is its own thing.
But how was your play at the time? Did you still approach things the way you had with 1e? Did you use one of the manifold TSR settings or a homebrew? Did you feel there was a tension between the rules and the play culture? Were you having a good time or was it starting to wear thin?
Well, that was my introduction to RPGs, and if it wasn't for gamebooks and board/wargames that preceded it, I would have totally given up on the idea. Suffice it to say that after that experience for a time I considered CRPGs to be superior, including regarding the freedom of choice of player actions:).
(Turned out someone I knew was developing his own game and invited me on a test session to show me how it's done. He did, and this was what changed my mind).
But, what I remember of 2e was:
The core, Fighter's Options, and Skills and Tactics together did not contain the material for the kind of fighter I wanted to play (a human skirmisher with a kusarigama - and yes, I read all three of these before my first session).
The adventure being a module, and awfully railroady (though we called the "railroads" "meat sticks" instead, borrowing a term from gamebooks).
The GM not having an idea how to adjudicate players actually using, you know, tactics. We were all newbies, and it seems his last group of supposedly experienced players were using the tactics of "charge", "shoot", "step and attack" and "cast spell".
By contrast, in our first fight, when some bandits bursted into the inn, we used (without having planned in advance):
- Attempting to sucker punch them (the GM first thought I'm really trying to surrender to save my skin, and reminded me threateningly that my alignment is Neutral Good and there are civilians around...then, after I told him I want to actually use my Martial Arts to get close and sucker punch the guy, it suddenly didn't work and he struck me first).
- Taking higher ground and using thrown weapons and acrobatics to keep at a distance. This kinda worked, though it seemed that being on higher ground - tables - and throwing knives from there didn't provide bonuses. And the bandit seemed to reach him most if not all of the time.
- Reducing the amount of light in order to make the best use of my skill at fighting without seeing (failed, the GM ruled that "blind fighting" only helps when there's no light, not when there's less light).
- Disarming from distance. Why do you think I have a kusarigama? But it turned out the bandits were unphased by superior skill and immediately took out short swords which they had as sidearms. End result: spending two actions to make one of them lose an action by pulling a shorter sword (and his damage going from d8 to d6)
- Retreating and setting up a trap on the run (the bandit ran over the cord).
- Throwing sand in an enemy's eyes. At least the sand worked, though we wondered why exactly it doesn't make the enemy easier to hit, and why the thief who was fighting him now can't backstab a target that doesn't see him.
In the end the battle was resolved when I said "screw tactics". Then I proceeded to slash the closer one with the kama, and then bashed the one who was attacking the druid with the weight from a distance, dropping half of them in less time than I'd spent trying to inconvenience them (due to my damage bonus, they couldn't even withstand a single attack).
Which was, frankly, not the message I'd want to send to a group of newbies, but it seemed that that was what the GM was expecting and rewarding. Still not sure why, except maybe because HP damage has extensive rules and our tricks weren't well covered.
The adventure being an awful railroad, with everyone being unphazed that the inn has been attacked. Didn't matter that the innkeeper's daughter, whom they probably knew personally, was kidnapped, either.
What mattered was: it was the villagers' day off in the week, and damn them if they could be bothered to trade us supplies on (Sabbat, Shabbat, Sunday or whatever day it was)! Didn't even matter that we had fought off bandits and were planning to attack dangerous brigands who were able to just sneak in and capture a girl.
I hope this was the adventure, but I can't assume it wasn't the GM (who was a university student, so no, he doesn't have the high-school excuse). In fact, it seems likely.
So, if anyone wonders why I was suspicious towards "rulings, not rules" for a long, long time...it was experiences like that one:D!
Quote from: AsenRG;896350So, if anyone wonders why I was suspicious towards "rulings, not rules" for a long, long time...it was experiences like that one:D!
Well, someone comes to me and says they want a "skirmisher with a kusarigama", we're going to have a talk, because they obviously are coming with some very specific ideas in mind. Someone who thinks "skirmisher with a kusarigama" I can guarantee you doesn't have in mind "skirmisher with a kusarigama" at First Level. :D (Holy Shit the classic Smileys are back, WOOHOO, thanks Brett.)
That having been said, it sounds like a painfully bad GM. Simple stat checks would have made a big difference there in a lot of cases, also the GM makes the mistake of judging the character's motivation and not going by a good rule of thumb "if the player fooled you, they probably fooled the NPC too".
Quote from: Justin Alexander;896312I started gaming in 1989. My early gaming was heavily influenced by the BECMI sample dungeon and the adventure modules I was picking up (primarily from the used section of Pinnacle Games in Rochester, MN).
Now
that brings back memories. I started gaming only about a year later, and in the same general area. (Chatfield resident, rather than Rochester proper--for those of you who don't know the area, Chatfield is one of numerous small farming towns scattered about the area; Rochester is the 'major' urban hub of the region. At the time, it was about 80,000 souls.) So I also prowled Pinnacle when I could get there, although I spent more of my gaming dollars at B.Dalton and Waldenbooks. I still have some of the stuff I bought from there, new and used--the
Rolemaster boxed set,
Fantasy Hero Companion and
Rolemaster Companion VI, used copies of the
Ravenloft boxed set and RA1
Feast of Goblyns.
They went out of business in early '93, right?
Our gaming started as a 1E/2E hybrid, since the father of some friends had played and let them use his 1E PHB. We moved on to full 2E after a few months, with games heavily influenced by computer and NES RPGs. Unfortunately, as pre-teens/early teens of varying backgrounds and levels of maturity, parental beliefs, etc., the group fractured and I actually moved into an anti-D&D phase for about a year. I never did really rejoin that circle of friends that much (partially for that, partially for being placed in advanced classes), which is part of why so much of my gaming has been theoretical or 'armchair' for long stretches.
Quote from: Willie the Duck;896338As is most min/maxing nowadays.
1e had double specialization and Oriental Adventures iron fist karate experts; 2e had bladesingers and dart specialists and Player's Options books; 3e had oddball combinations from 12 splat books (or just core tier 1s). I think the big difference was that before 3e, the designers hadn't presented the material as all planned out and balanced, so for the most part we didn't expect it (or maybe it's just everyone being on the internet now to constantly rehash where the system breaks down).
Actually it's the internet. Before the Internet we didn't have a easy access to a network of stories of people who claim have done in their game.
Sounds mostly like an adventure module issue with a green (or poorly rules-savvy) GM.
About the kusarigama -- that's dirt easy, that's an adapted Chain weapon in Complete Fighter Handbook (the Fighter's Options, you said).
Kusarigama is a lenght of chain with a lump on one end and a sickle on the other.
By PHB and CFH alone:
* Sickles are small, slashing, Speed 4, damage 1d4+1 (lg mob: 1d4) weapons.
* Chains are large, bludgeoning, Speed 5, damage 1d4+1 (lg mob: 1d4) weapons. They also allow Called Shots: Disarm, Parry, Strike/Thrust. And they have 3 of 5 of the Lasso special attacks: Pull/Trip by attacking target's legs, Dismount a Rider, and Snag a Rider's Head.
* Kusarigama is a combination of the two. The damage is the same between both of the above, and speed factor is almost the same. All I would do is insist it was a two-handed weapon, deals bludgeoning
or slashing (decide beforehand), and Speed 5 or maybe 6 (if you even use Weapon Speeds). Then give me its specific chain length in feet and I determine its range increments from there. And it gets the above Chain functions for Called Shots and Special Attacks. Ta-dah, done.
Or were you looking to cheese the system a bit more by snowing the GM with bullshit? ;) Nah, your young self wouldn't do that. You're pure, like an angel, of this I am sure! :) I remember being young and impressionable by terrible chop sockey flicks of the 1980s... :p
Remember, regardless of Eastern weapon fetishization of that time, katanas are just long swords by another name -- not the higher damage powerhouses in their D&D statline. And similarly it's easy to take the same tack to rewording weapons that were essentially not all that different. As a GM, I don't play that power inflation game -- I know better.
:p
Quote from: AsenRG;896350But, what I remember of 2e was:
The core, Fighter's Options, and Skills and Tactics together did not contain the material for the kind of fighter I wanted to play (a human skirmisher with a kusarigama - and yes, I read all three of these before my first session).
The adventure being a module, and awfully railroady (though we called the "railroads" "meat sticks" instead, borrowing a term from gamebooks).
The GM not having an idea how to adjudicate players actually using, you know, tactics. We were all newbies, and it seems his last group of supposedly experienced players were using the tactics of "charge", "shoot", "step and attack" and "cast spell".
By contrast, in our first fight, when some bandits bursted into the inn, we used (without having planned in advance): - Attempting to sucker punch them (the GM first thought I'm really trying to surrender to save my skin, and reminded me threateningly that my alignment is Neutral Good and there are civilians around...then, after I told him I want to actually use my Martial Arts to get close and sucker punch the guy, it suddenly didn't work and he struck me first).
- Taking higher ground and using thrown weapons and acrobatics to keep at a distance. This kinda worked, though it seemed that being on higher ground - tables - and throwing knives from there didn't provide bonuses. And the bandit seemed to reach him most if not all of the time.
- Reducing the amount of light in order to make the best use of my skill at fighting without seeing (failed, the GM ruled that "blind fighting" only helps when there's no light, not when there's less light).
- Disarming from distance. Why do you think I have a kusarigama? But it turned out the bandits were unphased by superior skill and immediately took out short swords which they had as sidearms. End result: spending two actions to make one of them lose an action by pulling a shorter sword (and his damage going from d8 to d6)
- Retreating and setting up a trap on the run (the bandit ran over the cord).
- Throwing sand in an enemy's eyes. At least the sand worked, though we wondered why exactly it doesn't make the enemy easier to hit, and why the thief who was fighting him now can't backstab a target that doesn't see him.
The adventure being an awful railroad, with everyone being unphazed that the inn has been attacked. Didn't matter that the innkeeper's daughter, whom they probably knew personally, was kidnapped, either.
What mattered was: it was the villagers' day off in the week, and damn them if they could be bothered to trade us supplies on (Sabbat, Shabbat, Sunday or whatever day it was)! Didn't even matter that we had fought off bandits and were planning to attack dangerous brigands who were able to just sneak in and capture a girl.
I hope this was the adventure, but I can't assume it wasn't the GM (who was a university student, so no, he doesn't have the high-school excuse). In fact, it seems likely.
So, if anyone wonders why I was suspicious towards "rulings, not rules" for a long, long time...it was experiences like that one:D!
Yeah, sounds like terrible railroad adveture-itis.
1. Sucker punching should have worked -- at least in attempt, but likely very risky and easily failed one. That's the surprise round. Even if people are tense and with weapons drawn you can still have parley and walk close to each other, even at melee range. The first who breaks parley into surprise attacks would trigger surprise as the GM saw fit.
Granted, since the GM can assign surprise as deemed logical: party group single die roll, party group each individual roll, or only certain individuals roll. Surprise rolls usually only have 30% chance (1-3 on d10), and extenuating circumstances could have factored into such a roll. "It suddenly didn't work and he struck first," is very Hans Solo vs. Greedo revisionism in my eyes.
2. Higher Ground is a mechanical benefit only if the GM uses Group Initiative, Group Modifier style initiative. The party majority must have Higher Ground for it to even work as a group modifier. All the rest, tables, throwing knives, etc. is all about distance from the opponent. Which is a benefit unto itself as it can avoid attacks outright. Where you got this idea about "other bonuses"?, (I thought you said you read all those books above?,) I don't know.
But High Ground is just that, like a table, it's not *that much distance* to keep you safe from harm's reach. And the idea of extra bonuses? What were you expecting from an individual with a 2-3 feet of more height, i.e. within arm's reach? Unless you're dealing with Tiny creatures it wouldn't matter much.
Now using the table as a barrier where the two opponents decide who flinches and moves around first (a la movies), that's doable - but that gets into the fun of initiatlve order, Fog of War, and Held actions. Yes, you're dusty ol' AD&D 2e even has mechanics for that -- and half of them are baked into core.
3. Disarming from Distance. Well, your GM was nice in letting you do so, and thus lends credence to the Adventure Module Nonsense Theory. I would have asked you about the length of your Kusarigama, determined its ranged increments (in fixed indoors terms) and then proceeded to allow you the standard Called Shot Disarm that chain (and almos all weapons) already has. Granted, if you are talking about excessive lengths of chain, we're gonna have a lil' chat.
Since it was an indoors fight, and I'm assuming Kusarigama in excess of 30' chain a rarity, I would have given you a standard indoor 1/2/3 range increment. That would mean up to 10' no to-hit penalty, then 20' -2 to-hit, 30' -5 to-hit. And then with Called Shot another -4 to-hit. So you're looking at -4/-6/-9 to-hit. It should not take two actions unless the opponent was wielding their larger sword/weapon with two hands, so I am assuming two-handed longsword.
As for grabbing their alternate weapon and carrying on with the melee? What the fuck is wrong with that? It's only since 3e have I seen whole parties have ONE LONELY WEAPON ON THEIR PERSON. Didn't even matter if they were martials instead of casters -- ONE LONELY WEAPON ON THEIR PERSON. Not even a ranged weapon to complement their melee, or a melee to complement their ranged. Nope, ONE LONELY WEAPON ON THEIR PERSON. Batshit crazy paradigm to me.
As for your stupendous skill stunning them... If you landed the -9 to-hit, twice in the same round! with your Kusarigama weapon specialization extra attack (alternating every other round, 3/2), from that distance and as a seemingly low level character -- I'd definitely consider a penalized morale check for them. Was the scenario that cool? You did have your fighter take Kusarigama weapon specialization, right? 'Cuz you're very unlikely to single handledly Disarm the two-handed longsword otherwise.
4. Setting up a Snare while On the Run... Challenging. Very challenging. I wouldn't put much stock on its success, either. Just like the Sucker Punching having normally 30% success rate through surprise, I wouldn't be terribly surprised about an ad hoc snare made
while running away having a similarly low success rate. You'd be better served with caltrops or overturned furniture getting in the way... and even then, no too much greater % chance success. (50%?).
Are you sure you just don't have unreasonably high theatrical (*cough* cinematic, excuse me *cough*) expectations? :p
5. First, that's not how Backstab works, and now I know you haven't read the books
that thoroughly.
"To use this ability, the thief must be behind his victim
and the victim must be unaware that the thief intends to attack him. If an enemy sees the thief,
hears him approach from a blind side, or is warned by another,
he is not caught unaware, and the backstab is handled like a normal attack (although bonuses for a rear attack still apply)."
(AD&D 2e PHB. p. 40.)
Second, yes, you are right here, it should have made him easier to hit. "Darkness" -- as expanded in the chapter to include various forms of reduced vision, including blindfolds, and thus by extention sand in one's eyes -- affects movement, attack, damage bonuses, saves, and AC. Movement should be reduced down to 1/3 for safe movement (otherwise requiring DEX check), attack, saves, and AC should all suffer -4 (thus logically one's AC goes UP), and damage bonuses should go away.
So, if the rogue did attack him from behind while he was so blinded it wouldn't be a Backstab. But, due to the blindness -4 to AC, and the rear attack +2 to-hit, the rogue should have at least a +6 bonus to land their attack. I think that's the GM not knowing his stuff so well.
The sand in the eyes would have been an opportune time to mess with the opponent to knock them off-balance (+2 to-hit), and even run out of safe traveling range with debris in betwee so as to tempt them to follow unsafely greater than 1/3 speed and take a DEX check to trip. Then everyone gets +4 to-hit as the guy's prone. Or, if you have someone stronger, have them try to shove him down without much risk.
Here, I scribbled up your specialist kusarigama fighter with PHB and CHF. I'm timing myself to see how hard it is.
OK, it took me less than ten minutes. And you got a Kit in the bargain atop it all.
*Edited new additions.
-------------------------------
"Kusarigama Fetishist"
Kit (optional): Peasant Hero
Race: Human
Class: Fighter lvl 1.
AL: **. Mv: 12.
*Attributes
Str: 18/94. +2 atk, +5 dmg, Wgt Alw 235, Max (Overhead) Press 480, Open Doors 16(6), BB/LG 35%.
Dex: 13.
Con: 8. Sys Shock 60%, Rez Surv 65%.
Int: 16. # Lang (xtra prof, either WP/NWP) 5.
Wis: 12.
Cha: 6. Hench Max# 2, Loy Base -3, React Adj -2.
Saves:
PPD 14, RSW 16, Pet/Poly 15, Breath 17, Spell 17
WP (optional):
Kusarigama proficiency. large, slashing or bludgeoning, speed 6, damage 1d4+1/1d4. RoF, as melee. Range 10'/20'/30'.
Kusarigama specialization. (+1 atk, +2 dmg. +0.5 #a, so 3/2 attacks per round.)
Shuriken proficiency. small, piercing, speed 2, damage 1d4/1d4. RoF 2/1. Rng 2/4/6. (*snort* :rolleyes:)
*Dart proficiency. small, piercing, speed 2, damage 1d3/1d2. RoF 3/1. Rng 1/2/4. (for *snort* comparison :rolleyes:)
Martial Arts (Eastern standard for "Punching/Kicking") Specialization. +1 atk, +1 dmg, +/-1 chart shift, extra Martial Art attack per round; may pull damage bonus from strikes to hit for less.
NWP (optional)
Agriculture (kit bonus),
Animal Lore (kit bonus),
*Blindfighting (2 NWP),
*Hunting (1 NWP),
*Leatherworking (1 NWP),
Set Snares (1 NWP),
Tracking (2NWP).
*Gear: Fighters get the most starting gold, 5d4 x10gp, thus min. 50gp.
Kusarigama is essentially sickle+chain, which are 6 sp and 5 sp respectively. Add a few silver for workmanship and metal lump on the end +4 sp... total = 15 silver.
Kusarigama 1.5 gp.
Still have 48.5 gp left for armor and sundries. Hide gives AC 6, two hands would be tied up with kusarigama so no shield.
Hide 15 gp. AC 6.
Still have 33.5 gp for lots of stuff.
Maybe 15 gp for a bucket of shurikens, darts, quivers and cases, ropes for snares, spare kusarigama, etc.
Then leave 15 gp for tent and bivouac sundries, leatherworking supplies, creature comforts, etc.
And last 3.5 gp as petty cash and stashed trade goods in the form of finished leathers and pelts.
Kit Special Benefits: Local peasant community loves you, will always be sheltered there; likely neighboring peasant communities like you as well and will shelter you.
Kit Special Hindrance: Local peasant community sees you as their hero and calls upon you during times of crisis; obliged to help or lose respect in their eyes.
Bio: Peasant Hero, knows about farming and the problems pests can cause for crops. Often was called up for pest eradication duties with tracking and snares, but landed him on a great adventure slaying a dangerous nest of osquip (big rats) and nezumi. Now he's beloved and sees himself as a defender of his down-to-earth people.
------------------------
Quote from: Armchair Gamer;896385Now that brings back memories. I started gaming only about a year later, and in the same general area. (Chatfield resident, rather than Rochester proper--for those of you who don't know the area, Chatfield is one of numerous small farming towns scattered about the area; Rochester is the 'major' urban hub of the region. At the time, it was about 80,000 souls.) So I also prowled Pinnacle when I could get there, although I spent more of my gaming dollars at B.Dalton and Waldenbooks. I still have some of the stuff I bought from there, new and used--the Rolemaster boxed set, Fantasy Hero Companion and Rolemaster Companion VI, used copies of the Ravenloft boxed set and RA1 Feast of Goblyns.
They went out of business in early '93, right?
Our gaming started as a 1E/2E hybrid, since the father of some friends had played and let them use his 1E PHB. We moved on to full 2E after a few months, with games heavily influenced by computer and NES RPGs. Unfortunately, as pre-teens/early teens of varying backgrounds and levels of maturity, parental beliefs, etc., the group fractured and I actually moved into an anti-D&D phase for about a year. I never did really rejoin that circle of friends that much (partially for that, partially for being placed in advanced classes), which is part of why so much of my gaming has been theoretical or 'armchair' for long stretches.
Bit of nostalgia - I moved from Rochester to the Twin Cities in '75, and fell in with Bad Company... :)
Quote from: CRKrueger;896367Well, someone comes to me and says they want a "skirmisher with a kusarigama", we're going to have a talk, because they obviously are coming with some very specific ideas in mind. Someone who thinks "skirmisher with a kusarigama" I can guarantee you doesn't have in mind "skirmisher with a kusarigama" at First Level. :D (Holy Shit the classic Smileys are back, WOOHOO, thanks Brett.)
Why? He pitched the game as "play whatever hero you wanted to play". I just wanted a skirmisher, and a kusarigama is just another weapon proficiency from a supplement that I picked because I liked all the options it gave me. Since the class we ended up creating had access to all weapons (but not all armours, there were other trade-offs as well - which never saw play), I don't see what seems so wrong about a kusarigama.
In fact, the GM almost asked me to pick something with a smaller damage die, because I'd rolled only a few points short of 18/00, when we rolled characters, and thus had a huge damage bonus. Kusarigamas had 1d6 damage and IIRC he was worried that me picking a big weapon on top of that would have overshadowed most other characters.
QuoteThat having been said, it sounds like a painfully bad GM. Simple stat checks would have made a big difference there in a lot of cases, also the GM makes the mistake of judging the character's motivation and not going by a good rule of thumb "if the player fooled you, they probably fooled the NPC too".
I tend to agree with that impression. The group splintered after a total of 2 sessions because everyone had issues with the GMing, too (and most of the players in it failed to keep up with RPGs in general).
I quit earlier after the GM decided that some dog gets to ignore one of the special features of my newly-constructed class. To an extent that was a mistake - I didn't get to see him crying when the thieves splattered some Giant Spider or similar (which was, I supposed, to chase them on the railroad:D).
Quote from: Opaopajr;896491Sounds mostly like an adventure module issue with a green (or poorly rules-savvy) GM.
Well, he claimed not being either.
QuoteAbout the kusarigama -- that's dirt easy, that's an adapted Chain weapon in Complete Fighter Handbook (the Fighter's Options, you said).
Kusarigama is a lenght of chain with a lump on one end and a sickle on the other.
By PHB and CFH alone:
* Sickles are small, slashing, Speed 4, damage 1d4+1 (lg mob: 1d4) weapons.
* Chains are large, bludgeoning, Speed 5, damage 1d4+1 (lg mob: 1d4) weapons. They also allow Called Shots: Disarm, Parry, Strike/Thrust. And they have 3 of 5 of the Lasso special attacks: Pull/Trip by attacking target's legs, Dismount a Rider, and Snag a Rider's Head.
* Kusarigama is a combination of the two. The damage is the same between both of the above, and speed factor is almost the same. All I would do is insist it was a two-handed weapon, deals bludgeoning or slashing (decide beforehand), and Speed 5 or maybe 6 (if you even use Weapon Speeds). Then give me its specific chain length in feet and I determine its range increments from there. And it gets the above Chain functions for Called Shots and Special Attacks. Ta-dah, done.
Exactly. I seem to remember it was a 1d6/1d6 weapon (no bonus for larger opponents), as per the Complete book I found it in. And of course, I didn't even try to imagine it as a one-handed weapon.
QuoteOr were you looking to cheese the system a bit more by snowing the GM with bullshit?
If I did, it has been because my younger self didn't know it was bullshit:).
QuoteYou're pure, like an angel, of this I am sure! :)
Me;)?
One thing is for sure, I didn't try to cheat at games by claiming bullshit.
QuoteI remember being young and impressionable by terrible chop sockey flicks of the 1980s... :p
We all have been. And I'd just started martial arts practice:p!
QuoteRemember, regardless of Eastern weapon fetishization of that time, katanas are just long swords by another name -- not the higher damage powerhouses in their D&D statline. And similarly it's easy to take the same tack to rewording weapons that were essentially not all that different. As a GM, I don't play that power inflation game -- I know better.
Well, the matter never came up. I was into Chinese weapons at the time, so katanas didn't interest me.
But since I decided that the rules for dual-wielding suck, I didn't go that way, either. But I liked all the options a kusarigama obviously allows, and there was a fun opponent using one in a gamebook. Thus, my weapon choice.
QuoteYeah, sounds like terrible railroad adveture-itis.
Well, that was my point as well.
Quote1. Sucker punching should have worked -- at least in attempt, but likely very risky and easily failed one. That's the surprise round. Even if people are tense and with weapons drawn you can still have parley and walk close to each other, even at melee range. The first who breaks parley into surprise attacks would trigger surprise as the GM saw fit.
Granted, since the GM can assign surprise as deemed logical: party group single die roll, party group each individual roll, or only certain individuals roll. Surprise rolls usually only have 30% chance (1-3 on d10), and extenuating circumstances could have factored into such a roll. "It suddenly didn't work and he struck first," is very Hans Solo vs. Greedo revisionism in my eyes.
Well, it was revisionism in my eyes as well (though I'm not sure what you're referring to - Greedo was sucker-shot).
Quote2. Higher Ground is a mechanical benefit only if the GM uses Group Initiative, Group Modifier style initiative. The party majority must have Higher Ground for it to even work as a group modifier. All the rest, tables, throwing knives, etc. is all about distance from the opponent. Which is a benefit unto itself as it can avoid attacks outright. Where you got this idea about "other bonuses"?, (I thought you said you read all those books above?,) I don't know.
"Other bonuses" means "not my character, not sure what the rules there were".
QuoteBut High Ground is just that, like a table, it's not *that much distance* to keep you safe from harm's reach. And the idea of extra bonuses? What were you expecting from an individual with a 2-3 feet of more height, i.e. within arm's reach? Unless you're dealing with Tiny creatures it wouldn't matter much.
Certainly not range protecting him!
But a bonus to hit given that shooting downwards is almost universally easier would have made sense, IMO. Again, not my character.
QuoteNow using the table as a barrier where the two opponents decide who flinches and moves around first (a la movies), that's doable - but that gets into the fun of initiatlve order, Fog of War, and Held actions. Yes, you're dusty ol' AD&D 2e even has mechanics for that -- and half of them are baked into core.
Not what was attempted, so no comment.
Quote3. Disarming from Distance. Well, your GM was nice in letting you do so, and thus lends credence to the Adventure Module Nonsense Theory. I would have asked you about the length of your Kusarigama, determined its ranged increments (in fixed indoors terms) and then proceeded to allow you the standard Called Shot Disarm that chain (and almos all weapons) already has. Granted, if you are talking about excessive lengths of chain, we're gonna have a lil' chat.
It was kama-sickle, weight, and I was attempting it at 10' (entangling the weapon hand with the weight).
QuoteSince it was an indoors fight, and I'm assuming Kusarigama in excess of 30' chain a rarity, I would have given you a standard indoor 1/2/3 range increment. That would mean up to 10' no to-hit penalty, then 20' -2 to-hit, 30' -5 to-hit. And then with Called Shot another -4 to-hit. So you're looking at -4/-6/-9 to-hit. It should not take two actions unless the opponent was wielding their larger sword/weapon with two hands, so I am assuming two-handed longsword.
Wrong - it was one-handed weapon. Two actions was due to me missing the entangle on the first round, and were taken in two rounds.
QuoteAs for grabbing their alternate weapon and carrying on with the melee? What the fuck is wrong with that?
The fact that nobody had seen them having anything bigger than a knife was the problem, not that they had it.
Potentially fun fact, I'm
almost sure only that guy had a spare weapon that we found after the fight - though I'm not going to swear on that. But I remember we found leather armour, and one weapon per person. Except, of course, for the guy I'd been trying to disarm.
QuoteIt's only since 3e have I seen whole parties have ONE LONELY WEAPON ON THEIR PERSON. Didn't even matter if they were martials instead of casters -- ONE LONELY WEAPON ON THEIR PERSON. Not even a ranged weapon to complement their melee, or a melee to complement their ranged. Nope, ONE LONELY WEAPON ON THEIR PERSON. Batshit crazy paradigm to me.
Seems like those bandits were from the 3e Monster Manual.
Also, I'm almost sure I was the only one in our OD&D party, (years later, in a forum game) who owned and used more than one weapon. Make of that what you will, but I was the one with the least experience with Old School games.
QuoteAs for your stupendous skill stunning them... If you landed the -9 to-hit, twice in the same round! with your Kusarigama weapon specialization extra attack (alternating every other round, 3/2), from that distance and as a seemingly low level character -- I'd definitely consider a penalized morale check for them. Was the scenario that cool? You did have your fighter take Kusarigama weapon specialization, right? 'Cuz you're very unlikely to single handledly Disarm the two-handed longsword otherwise.
Nope, I didn't optimize. The GM believed my to-hit bonus was too big already as it was, and I wanted different styles of martial arts, so we agreed on that. Still, in a fight, most people don't try to disarm, because it fails easily. Anyone that can pull it from a distance is someone you don't want to bother with.
Quote4. Setting up a Snare while On the Run... Challenging. Very challenging. I wouldn't put much stock on its success, either. Just like the Sucker Punching having normally 30% success rate through surprise, I wouldn't be terribly surprised about an ad hoc snare made while running away having a similarly low success rate. You'd be better served with caltrops or overturned furniture getting in the way... and even then, no too much greater % chance success. (50%?).
There might have been some roll, but if there was, he made it, don't remeber. If therewas,he'd madeit, because I remember he constructed the trap (which was just a tripping cord across a doorway). Then the bandit just jumped over, not even noticing it.
If that makes sense to you, so be it.
QuoteAre you sure you just don't have unreasonably high theatrical (*cough* cinematic, excuse me *cough*) expectations?
Newbie players having unreasonable expectations? After being told that a 1st level character is a competent member of the profession?
Perish the thought!
Quote5. First, that's not how Backstab works, and now I know you haven't read the books that thoroughly.
"To use this ability, the thief must be behind his victim and the victim must be unaware that the thief intends to attack him. If an enemy sees the thief, hears him approach from a blind side, or is warned by another, he is not caught unaware, and the backstab is handled like a normal attack (although bonuses for a rear attack still apply)."
(AD&D 2e PHB. p. 40.)
Of course I haven't read backstab. I had exactly zero doubts that I'd be playing a fighting man class:D!
Thing is, the group expected backstab to work more like Sneak Attack, which can work if you're denied your Dex bonus due to surprise or misdirection, or stuff (in some people's reading, at least).
The point was moot, since the guy didn't hit him until after the sand's effect went away. Then he hit him with a very high roll, and rolled maximum damage, and dropped him, so at least that was amusing.
QuoteSecond, yes, you are right here, it should have made him easier to hit. "Darkness" -- as expanded in the chapter to include various forms of reduced vision, including blindfolds, and thus by extention sand in one's eyes -- affects movement, attack, damage bonuses, saves, and AC. Movement should be reduced down to 1/3 for safe movement (otherwise requiring DEX check), attack, saves, and AC should all suffer -4 (thus logically one's AC goes UP), and damage bonuses should go away.
Well, only the attack was penalised;).
QuoteSo, if the rogue did attack him from behind while he was so blinded it wouldn't be a Backstab. But, due to the blindness -4 to AC, and the rear attack +2 to-hit, the rogue should have at least a +6 bonus to land their attack. I think that's the GM not knowing his stuff so well.
Possibly.
QuoteThe sand in the eyes would have been an opportune time to mess with the opponent to knock them off-balance (+2 to-hit), and even run out of safe traveling range with debris in betwee so as to tempt them to follow unsafely greater than 1/3 speed and take a DEX check to trip. Then everyone gets +4 to-hit as the guy's prone. Or, if you have someone stronger, have them try to shove him down without much risk.
True, but the guy was acting on the simpler paradigm "I have a short sword, and an enemy who can't see the blade":D.
And to quote the edit in my previous post, in the end the battle was resolved when I said "screw tactics". Then I proceeded to slash the closer one with the kama, and then bashed the one who was attacking the druid with the weight from a distance, dropping half of them in less time than I'd spent trying to inconvenience them (due to my damage bonus, they couldn't even withstand a single attack).
Which was, frankly, not the message I'd want to send to a group of newbies, but it seemed that that was what the GM was expecting and rewarding. Still not sure why, except maybe because HP damage has extensive rules.
Quote from: chirine ba kal;896505Bit of nostalgia - I moved from Rochester to the Twin Cities in '75, and fell in with Bad Company... :)
You werent the one that offed my magic user were you? ooooh! :mad:
Quote from: Opaopajr;895892It was a magical time of maidens traipsing with unicorns through virginal forests, knights travelling hither and non to battle threats to such flowers of beauty, for honor, faith, and said fair maiden hands... and settings where you could then have killer cannibal jungle halflings, or desert nomad dwarves, or divine right of kings amid a (fairy) realm management. All was well and the lands were at peace, and the garden bloomed with worlds and settings and a thousand beautiful campaign variations. From table to table, it was like travelling to unknown vistas and sipping deep from the well of imaginative life...
/skips off to the horizon
La la la la la!...
This is both a beautiful post and most of the explanation of why I skipped 2e. (Well, in addition to the sanitizing of problematic elements, demons and assassins and such, and the steady decrease of target audience age as my age increased.)
For me, actual play in the 2e era was continuing to play 1e, maybe with more house rules than before.
Quote from: Christopher Brady;895987It's an attitude that still pans out to this day, with now 5e, forcing players if they want to use the array, rather than rolling, they get an 8 (-1) in a score. No choice, using the rules as written.
So, let's take a look at that. A player CHOOSES the array method over rolling, because they actually have that CHOICE, and then you're complaining that once the the player has CHOSEN that method, then they have "NO CHOICE, using the rules as written."
Juiblex fucking wept. Your passive aggressive whinging about the crime-wave of choice-theft that the industry is perpetrating against you (sorry, your players?) has become a caricature.
Quote from: Christopher Brady;895987I find that annoying. My home game, I turned it into a 10. For those who want to actually, you know, feel heroic without the typical stat they have to find and dump.
As the DM, you could also have chosen the official, optional variant for "Customizing Ability Scores." But, you did find a simple solution to your particular problem, so you *can* find your way out of the paper bag; we just get to witness you work through the trauma over and over again.
It kind of blows my mind that a 1-point ability bonus is what keeps a player from feeling heroic, especially in the context of the other stats in the standard array, but that's been beaten to death over in the hell-of-a-thousand-posts.
Quote from: Christopher Brady;895987Also, I'm planning this new game to be more S&S/Heroic Fantasy than the last three AL modules (save Strahd.) I'm sick of 'THREATEN THE UNIVERSE!!!11!' plots. Something more personal, sandboxy feels good to me.
I completed agree, here. Fewer epic arcs to save the universe, fewer modules slaved to the AL-workday, and more interesting adventures, please.
Quote from: AsenRG;896518And to quote the edit in my previous post, in the end the battle was resolved when I said "screw tactics". Then I proceeded to slash the closer one with the kama, and then bashed the one who was attacking the druid with the weight from a distance, dropping half of them in less time than I'd spent trying to inconvenience them (due to my damage bonus, they couldn't even withstand a single attack).
Which was, frankly, not the message I'd want to send to a group of newbies, but it seemed that that was what the GM was expecting and rewarding. Still not sure why, except maybe because HP damage has extensive rules.
Fighters, especially those with high strength, do very well in making short work of most enemies in the early levels. All those tactics things would matter, but you definitely needed a GM who knew what he was doing -- and from your additional detail from your following post, that sounds more condemning of his rules knowledge. With a group of other newbies it's perfectly fine for a fighter to do their job of not hold back and protect the party directly. Perhaps you wanted them to try their hand at things, but that'll come through with time anyway - not everything that the game's combat has to offer has to be seen in the first fight.
Your kusarigama guy could have easily availed himself of tactics though, especially if there was a second floor balcony, or even coordination of the group with using furniture (like a portable table) as cover. If your character was that strong, and had kusarigama weapon specialization, and your group was that weak, you could have easily had the extra time to pull some amazing things. With your second attack on the alternating rounds you could have done some interesting Trips, Disarms, Pins, shoves, etc. That said, the other players needed to know why they cooperate, where they can best do that, and respect the advantages each class brings to the table.
Two-weapon fighting is actually pretty strong, by the way, when people use it right. Often you have low armor, low HP characters strut their stuff too close to tanking melee and then die horribly. But if people know what they are doing, and much of the CH: Fighter is on, it's actually quite strong due to attack throughput and maneuver options. But again, with optional specialization anything, such focus comes at the cost of general utility.
PS: You haven't given me a statline or equipment guidelines for the kusarigama PC above... :(
Quote from: Armchair Gamer;896385They went out of business in early '93, right?
Something like that. It happened shortly after I had moved up to the Twin Cities, so I'm not sure of the exact timing. (I just came back down to my dad's place one time and discovered they were gone.) I felt like the writing was on the wall from the point where they changed location in the strip mall (moving around the corner into a storefront that you couldn't see from the street).
QuoteOur gaming started as a 1E/2E hybrid, since the father of some friends had played and let them use his 1E PHB.
I think this sort of thing (mix-and-matching 1e and 2e core rulebooks) was insanely common. I used a 1st Edition MM for four years, only replacing it when the
Monstrous Manual came out in '93.
Quote from: Natty Bodak;896617Juiblex fucking wept.
OMG. So gonna steal that!
Quote from: Opaopajr;896662Fighters, especially those with high strength, do very well in making short work of most enemies in the early levels. All those tactics things would matter, but you definitely needed a GM who knew what he was doing -- and from your additional detail from your following post, that sounds more condemning of his rules knowledge.
Maybe. My reading was always that it's condemning of his willingness to roll with stuff he didn't expect.
QuoteWith a group of other newbies it's perfectly fine for a fighter to do their job of not hold back and protect the party directly. Perhaps you wanted them to try their hand at things, but that'll come through with time anyway - not everything that the game's combat has to offer has to be seen in the first fight.
Ahem, I was a newbie as well:). I didn't start the fight with a sucker punch because I wanted an advantage, I wanted to avoid killing any of them.
Of course, the good intentions ended when they started trying to kill us.
QuoteYour kusarigama guy could have easily availed himself of tactics though, especially if there was a second floor balcony, or even coordination of the group with using furniture (like a portable table) as cover.
No second floor was ever mentioned until after the fight. And come on, we tried enough things for a group of 4 newbies, wouldn't you say:D?
QuoteIf your character was that strong, and had kusarigama weapon specialization, and your group was that weak, you could have easily had the extra time to pull some amazing things. With your second attack on the alternating rounds you could have done some interesting Trips, Disarms, Pins, shoves, etc.
I did the disarm, remember? It got us an additional loot item, as far as I can tell.
Why do you think the rest of this would have fared better;)?
QuoteThat said, the other players needed to know why they cooperate, where they can best do that, and respect the advantages each class brings to the table.
Well, we had scarcely met.
QuoteTwo-weapon fighting is actually pretty strong, by the way, when people use it right. Often you have low armor, low HP characters strut their stuff too close to tanking melee and then die horribly. But if people know what they are doing, and much of the CH: Fighter is on, it's actually quite strong due to attack throughput and maneuver options. But again, with optional specialization anything, such focus comes at the cost of general utility.
CH: Fighter wasn't on the table, though. The GM said explicitly he's giving me the book to look for options I like better, because he didn't want to create a new class (which we ended up doing anyway). He made it clear that he doesn't like the manoeuvres, though.
QuotePS: You haven't given me a statline or equipment guidelines for the kusarigama PC above... :(
Because I thought you were joking. After all, I have my custom class already, why would you need to create another?
OK, here's what I've got.
Str: 18/94
Dex: 13
Con: 8
Int: 16
Wis: 12
Cha: 6
The GM hated my rolls with the 4d6 pick best 3, assign as desired, BTW. And he was totally surprised I assigned them in that way (then he hated it again at the end of the session upon noticing that I get an XP bonus because my class' primary attributes, which I
think we set before rolling, were Str and Int;)).
I pictured him as kinda distant from people, so the Charisma thing was fitting.
Equipment: Kusarigama, leather armour. Due to lack of funds (rolled low on that one), that was all I got. There were some backstory considerations for it as well.
He just doesn't sound like a good GM, period. There was no real need for a custom class there and he sounds like a terrible fit for rolling with the game's punches. Ahh, good ol' generous Method V... Could have been even a paladin or bard with those numbers. You were very lucky to roll a 94 on d%, though. I have no idea why he hated your roll, especially since he selected that method; you got an 8 and a 6, which meant a third of your stats were below average.
Not knowing, or now trusting, his development of your custom class however I do think your stat choices are odd -- outside the high INT being simultaneously required to get the class XP bonus. I have no faith in his judgment for handling basic ad hoc running of the game let alone to create a custom class. I feel the easiest way for you to get +10% XP would be to stick in base class fighter, and considering your desires were easily met within that base class see no reason to step out of it.
I'll input them as is for a base class Fighter, reassign them for what I feel would be a stronger base class Fighter, and in keeping with the Warrior archetype, also make a Paladin version. I'll use the post above for your old character for simplicity's sake.
Quote from: Opaopajr;896935He just doesn't sound like a good GM, period. There was no real need for a custom class there
I disagree on the custom class. "Skirmisher" wasn't the whole concept.
Quoteand he sounds like a terrible fit for rolling with the game's punches.
On that, we agree.
QuoteAhh, good ol' generous Method V... Could have been even a paladin or bard with those numbers.
Sure. He said the same.
It wasn't what I wanted to play, though.
QuoteYou were very lucky to roll a 94 on d%, though.
True.
QuoteI have no idea why he hated your roll, especially since he selected that method; you got an 8 and a 6, which meant a third of your stats were below average.
I'm pretty sure he was seeing powerful PCs as a problem.
Though technically, he didn't pick it, he gave us a choice between it and "roll 3d6 12 times, pick the best 6 rolls". And he tried to steer us in that direction, telling us we'd get at least some low scores.
QuoteNot knowing, or now trusting, his development of your custom class however I do think your stat choices are odd -- outside the high INT being simultaneously required to get the class XP bonus. I have no faith in his judgment for handling basic ad hoc running of the game let alone to create a custom class. I feel the easiest way for you to get +10% XP would be to stick in base class fighter, and considering your desires were easily met within that base class see no reason to step out of it.
Thing is, they weren't met. Not that it matters; I didn't put the 16 in Intelligence because it was the way to a bonus. I did because I wanted to play a character that was a smart warrior. Consequently, I didn't even want a d10 in HP, so I had a d8 in that.
QuoteI'll input them as is for a base class Fighter, reassign them for what I feel would be a stronger base class Fighter, and in keeping with the Warrior archetype, also make a Paladin version. I'll use the post above for your old character for simplicity's sake.
Feel free to;). But again, this wasn't an exercise in character optimisation in my book. Sure, a Paladin would have been stronger...but also clumsier and less smart. Neither of these appealed to me.
And either way, we're now wildly off-topic:)! This is what play in AD&D2e was for me. I'm glad it wasn't like that for many of you, but that was all I could contribute, since of course, I wasn't looking to try the same edition again after this experience:D!
What was part of your concept that made it so radically different from the base 4 classes of the Four Archetypes, (let alone the vast array of optional classes and kits,) that required a custom class? An Eastern weapon? A lower Hit Die? Having a reason for high INT & WIS score (anyone can do that for any class, it's what you *need* to get for it that'd warrant a custom class)? So far from what little you're describing I don't see the need even remotely.
Wait... did you two pull out the PO: Skills and Powers book? ;)
I started with Basic in 1990 and quickly moved to 2E. Even though I owned some setting boxes (Forgotten Realms, Dragonlance, Dark Sun) and read tons of TSR novels, I ran mostly low/mid-level dungeon crawls in lairs/locales that I designed myself. Never really ran a campaign in an official setting (or modules). We also didn't do voices or any sort of thespianism. Everyone spoke in their normal voice, like "I attack," "I ask the merchant if x," or "My guy hauls ass when he sees the troll."
I started in the 1e era, and was around when 2e came out. In my circles at least, most of play didn't really change in the EARLY 2e era. It was only later, when more emphasis started to be placed on adventures with big metaplots, copycatting the WoD 'storyteller' style, and the idea of 'kits' making you think that it was mechanics that would be important in making your character special started to get more prevalent, that things started to go sour. I think also one of the first things I noted that started to change was the increased 'sanitization' of the setting products, making D&D seem more bland and banal. Demons and Devils being changed into 'bateezu' and 'tanari', and getting rid of assassins (not just as a class, but generally de-emphasizing the idea of the PCs being scumbags), were the early signs. 2e quickly shifted in that sense, not so much in mechanics, but it started to feel like it had gone from being "Heavy Metal" to being "the New Adventures of Hercules".
Epics. It felt like too many modules were "World Ender" class. A general loss of the more down to earth adventures.
On the other hand. The good ones were effectively a campaign so you got alot of traction. Others just seemed to lack propper scope. That followed through to BECMI modules too and the last of the Gamma World series.
That reminds me of "Die, Vecna, Die!" the last adventure published under TSR. Not only are you trying to defeat on of the biggest, most iconic non-deity villain in the D&D canon, but series of events the PCs are involved with end up destroying whole demiplanes (liked playing Ravenloft? Well this last adventure wipes it away!). It just reminds me of Marvel comics, where every writer who comes in wants to play around with Galactus or the Pheonix force (or at least gets to rehash the Cyclops/Jean Grey dynamic). I didn't see it in BECMI, other than the Wrath of the Immortals module (which by definition would have to be epic, and was like the only thing they ever did with the Immortal level of play, so I didn't begrudge it).
We mostly homebrewed our worlds and didn't run published modules, so most of the stuff that has been mentioned I found out about after the fact.
Quote from: RPGPundit;898022I started in the 1e era, and was around when 2e came out. In my circles at least, most of play didn't really change in the EARLY 2e era. It was only later, when more emphasis started to be placed on adventures with big metaplots, copycatting the WoD 'storyteller' style, and the idea of 'kits' making you think that it was mechanics that would be important in making your character special started to get more prevalent, that things started to go sour. I think also one of the first things I noted that started to change was the increased 'sanitization' of the setting products, making D&D seem more bland and banal. Demons and Devils being changed into 'bateezu' and 'tanari', and getting rid of assassins (not just as a class, but generally de-emphasizing the idea of the PCs being scumbags), were the early signs. 2e quickly shifted in that sense, not so much in mechanics, but it started to feel like it had gone from being "Heavy Metal" to being "the New Adventures of Hercules".
I started in 86 and my memories are very similar regarding the time it took for the game to shift fully to what we now think of as the 2E era. I even remember watching the Ravenloft products slowly start to emulate WoD over the course of the 90s (and I don't think I noticed it starting until the mid-90s when they even started releasing optional rules for players as monsters in Ravenloft). The storytelling thing I think hit a little earlier because there was so much of that around in the hobby at the time. There was always melodrama and talk of storyline even going back to the black boxed set in Ravenloft (heck the original module even has a bit of that) but it shifted radically with later modules (where you'd have scenes instead of chapters and a lot more metaplot).
I think what a lot of people might not realize if they started gaming after this period, is during the 2E era the 1E AD&D books, the 2E AD&D books and the D&D books were all sold side-by-side at the local bookstores and were almost viewed as interchangeable. I bought a ton of 1E books for my 2E games for example. The original 2E PHB had a lot of optional rules no one used. And even when they started releasing the class books with the kits and stuff, that was all optional material that a of folks didn't allow (or allowed on a case by case basis). When Skills and Powers came out in the mid-90s I remember there being a big split in my group over the issue. Because even though AD&D had NWPs, the idea of skills and powers felt much more like a White Wolf or GURPS thing than a D&D thing and so I didn't even allow that book at my table (and neither did most of the GMs I knew at the time). So even just looking at the mass of material that was released at the time, it isn't necessarily reflective of how people were playing the game. Each table was different (much more so than how tables seemed to be during the 3E era in my experience).
Quote from: BedrockBrendan;898108I think what a lot of people might not realize if they started gaming after this period, is during the 2E era the 1E AD&D books, the 2E AD&D books and the D&D books were all sold side-by-side at the local bookstores and were almost viewed as interchangeable. I bought a ton of 1E books for my 2E games for example. The original 2E PHB had a lot of optional rules no one used. And even when they started releasing the class books with the kits and stuff, that was all optional material that a of folks didn't allow (or allowed on a case by case basis). When Skills and Powers came out in the mid-90s I remember there being a big split in my group over the issue. Because even though AD&D had NWPs, the idea of skills and powers felt much more like a White Wolf or GURPS thing than a D&D thing and so I didn't even allow that book at my table (and neither did most of the GMs I knew at the time). So even just looking at the mass of material that was released at the time, it isn't necessarily reflective of how people were playing the game. Each table was different (much more so than how tables seemed to be during the 3E era in my experience).
Aside from some very minor, easily houseruled bits, we interchanged Basic, AD&D & 2nd edition depending on which game had the rule we liked better that moment. Not to mention all the modules being nearly the same system. It was a far cry from, say, going from 3rd to 4th...
Quote from: Ratman_tf;898137Aside from some very minor, easily houseruled bits, we interchanged Basic, AD&D & 2nd edition depending on which game had the rule we liked better that moment. Not to mention all the modules being nearly the same system. It was a far cry from, say, going from 3rd to 4th...
Yeah, I remember running AD&D modules for 2E without thinking about it. I also seem to recall bringing in some shaman material from one of the D&D books into AD&D.
I think the big difference between then and now, was the mass of setting material. That is really the thing that stands out from when I was playing. But it wasn't like everyone was running the settings purely out of the box. Many GMs made their own setting and drew on the monster manuals for various settings to help shape the flavor. Especially with the 2E monster manual binder, you could customize your monster stuff around that. So a GM might decide he wants 50% ravenloft monsters, 20% Forgotten Realms, etc. to get a particular feel. In my group I was sort of the Ravenloft GM, another guy ran Darksun, someone else ran a home-brew. I was also playing lots of other systems at the time though too. I was in an occasional TORG game and and the guy who did Darksun also ran Vampire and eventually Changeling (he also did spelljammer and planescape as well). I remember some Birthright campaigns and one of my friends would sometimes do Dragonlance. Really what I recall is playing a bunch of different settings. Also, lots and lots of modules. There were way more modules I think during the 1E and 2E eras than during 3E. And they didn't tend to be that big. They were usually 30-96 pages. If it was a 96 page adventure, I would typically expect to see a fair amount of setting material in it.
Quote from: Opaopajr;897022What was part of your concept that made it so radically different from the base 4 classes of the Four Archetypes, (let alone the vast array of optional classes and kits,) that required a custom class? An Eastern weapon? A lower Hit Die? Having a reason for high INT & WIS score (anyone can do that for any class, it's what you *need* to get for it that'd warrant a custom class)? So far from what little you're describing I don't see the need even remotely.
Wait... did you two pull out the PO: Skills and Powers book? ;)
Nothing, except it was supposed to be a fighter that can use the "hide in shadows", "move silently" and "climb sheer walls" skills, to kill sentries silently, and wasn't a Ranger.
The GM was one of those that thought that classes without those skills can't climb, sneak, or use a garotte, which sounded insane for someone in good physical condition:).
Quote from: RPGPundit;898022I started in the 1e era, and was around when 2e came out. In my circles at least, most of play didn't really change in the EARLY 2e era. It was only later, when more emphasis started to be placed on adventures with big metaplots, copycatting the WoD 'storyteller' style, and the idea of 'kits' making you think that it was mechanics that would be important in making your character special started to get more prevalent, that things started to go sour. I think also one of the first things I noted that started to change was the increased 'sanitization' of the setting products, making D&D seem more bland and banal. Demons and Devils being changed into 'bateezu' and 'tanari', and getting rid of assassins (not just as a class, but generally de-emphasizing the idea of the PCs being scumbags), were the early signs. 2e quickly shifted in that sense, not so much in mechanics, but it started to feel like it had gone from being "Heavy Metal" to being "the New Adventures of Hercules".
The sad influence of that is still felt today;).
So I think I can offer some insight as to what was going on then, as I learned 2e out of the 1989 book, purchased in 1989, and I had no idea how to play it, and I had no friends who played.
I also lived about 20mi from TSR at the time. This my come off a bit as conjecture, but a lot of the art in that book seems to be influenced by landscapes local to rural Wisconsin. There's also a ren faire nearby (Bristol), and the buildings there are pretty similar.
Our group, because we were in junior high/high school at the time, didn't have much income so we played pretty much out of the PHB and maybe a couple of modules. We pooled money for a DMG.
More importantly, we left out all the optional rules, like proficiencies, because the group that played rotated a lot, and we had some hand-me-down modules from B/X and BECMI. They were more common to find 2nd hand than AD&D material.
There was a lot less of an emphasis on 'Use only official material".
Nobody knew what to do with the miniatures. Most people painted a PC (Badly) and put it on the table. We sometimes used them for marching order.
Dungeons were rarely if ever used.
There was a boom in European history interest. Cadfael was running on TV and Dragon did a piece on it. These two things were kind of a spin off from an early '90s 'neo-hippie' boom going on at the time that swelled the Ren Faire crowd at least in the area.
Does this help? I can provide more cultural context from there if need be.
Quote from: RPGPundit;898022I think also one of the first things I noted that started to change was the increased 'sanitization' of the setting products, making D&D seem more bland and banal. Demons and Devils being changed into 'bateezu' and 'tanari', and getting rid of assassins (not just as a class, but generally de-emphasizing the idea of the PCs being scumbags), were the early signs. 2e quickly shifted in that sense, not so much in mechanics, but it started to feel like it had gone from being "Heavy Metal" to being "the New Adventures of Hercules".
And some of us grew up with this and prefer it to the grimier, nastier former iterations--more Tolkien and "knights in shining armor", less Leiber and "grubby thieves knifing each other for coppers." This, of course, is one of several ways you, your coconspirators Mearls and Zak, and your Dark Masters have pushed me away from both the OSR and current D&D. ;)
Quote from: Willie the Duck;898104That reminds me of "Die, Vecna, Die!" the last adventure published under TSR. Not only are you trying to defeat on of the biggest, most iconic non-deity villain in the D&D canon, but series of events the PCs are involved with end up destroying whole demiplanes (liked playing Ravenloft? Well this last adventure wipes it away!).
Not quite. I don't have
Die Vecna Die! on hand, but I do own it, and as I recall, it
explicitly states that it wipes out only the Burning Peaks cluster (Kas and Vecna's domains) and the rest of Ravenloft can be shattered or left alone as the DM desires, since each domain can be considered its own 'demiplane'. Ravenloft 3rd Edition launched only a year later, and while it took that adventure as 'canon', the Dread Domains were intact.
The Ravenloft portion of that adventure was done by Steve Miller, who wasn't terribly enamored of the project but certainly didn't intend to blow up the setting he'd just redefined a few years prior--he's one of the two designers on
Domains of Dread.
Also, while it was the last 2nd Edition adventure published, it wasn't "the last TSR adventure"--TSR was retired as a separate entity at the end of 1999, after the Silver Anniversary. DVD and other 2nd Edition products from 2000 bear the Wizards logo. :)
Quote from: Armchair Gamer;898193And some of us grew up with this and prefer it to the grimier, nastier former iterations--more Tolkien and "knights in shining armor", less Leiber and "grubby thieves knifing each other for coppers." This, of course, is one of several ways you, your coconspirators Mearls and Zak, and your Dark Masters have pushed me away from both the OSR and current D&D. ;)
Also, I should bring up that I had a friend who was a very devout catholic at the time, and his dad wouldn't let him play it until he was able to see the books. The 'toned down' material got the pass by his dad and we had a lot of fun.
Older players can bitch and moan all they want but this was a door that needed to be opened. I had several more religious friends get into D&D because the 2e material wasn't so objectionable.
Quote from: Armchair Gamer;898193And some of us grew up with this and prefer it to the grimier, nastier former iterations--more Tolkien and "knights in shining armor", less Leiber and "grubby thieves knifing each other for coppers."
I've never much understood the complaint about renaming the demons and devils, and removing the titty artwork, and similar. To me that's the juvenile stuff; it reminds me of the kinds of things that middle-class whitebread 14-year-old death metal fans draw on their schoolbook covers because they think it's edgy.
The sanitization didn't bother me as much as the dumbing down; there's some marvelous material in, say, the BECMI Gazetteers, but you can see where any depth and sophistication has been stripped out because the writers are writing for twelve-year-olds.
I took a break from gaming from 1985-1987 so missed the changeover to AD&D2e. When I did start again in the summer of 87, I bought the new Rules Cyclopedia and a used white 74' bookset to replace the one my ex had auctioned off.
I started right away with a new homebrew gaming world. It was my third original campaign setting. The first was done in crayon and pen and was not very good, some of the detail remains with me. The second was done with markers, and I can still remember some of the maps. I have the maps for my third campaign setting (1987) in a three ring binder, though I didn't use good markers so these maps are fading. My fourth campaign setting, done up starting in 1991 was done with Pentel markers, and look as good today as they day I drew them twenty-five years ago.
In the late eighties I just never was interested in the new books as TSR without Gary had almost completely disappeared off my Radar, as I was running Chivalry & Sorcery, Traveller, and Runequest games. In the early nineties I ran lots of 0D&D and Rolemaster games, and only noticed TSR again after they had been acquired by WOTC at the time of the new announcement for the 3rd edition, which was supposed to go back to the true roots of D&D.
Quote from: Armchair Gamer;898195
I'm not surprised that I'm not remembering it correctly. It's been since 2000. Still, wipe away Ravenloft or completely readjust the setting, it's still epic changes that happen with the PCs right on top of the changes. A far cry from 'go through the dungeon, get the treasure' of earlier modules.
Speaking of "Die, Vecna, Die," saw a copy of this module at half priced books, listed for $35. I assume this thing is rare or something (last official TSR product?)?
Quote from: daniel_ream;898216I've never much understood the complaint about renaming the demons and devils, and removing the titty artwork, and similar. To me that's the juvenile stuff; it reminds me of the kinds of things that middle-class whitebread 14-year-old death metal fans draw on their schoolbook covers because they think it's edgy.
The sanitization didn't bother me as much as the dumbing down; there's some marvelous material in, say, the BECMI Gazetteers, but you can see where any depth and sophistication has been stripped out because the writers are writing for twelve-year-olds.
...but I was 12 at the time, and absorbing all I could about medieval history, and I still struggled to understand that stuff. You can't please everyone.
Authors shouldn't try to. I'm simply lamenting that at that time TSR chose to focus on a demographic I wasn't in. Knowing what Aaron Allston could have produced had he not been required to play Tamora Pierce in reverse drag saddens me.
Quote from: Gnashtooth;898287...but I was 12 at the time, and absorbing all I could about medieval history, and I still struggled to understand that stuff. You can't please everyone.
That is absolutely true. There are (at least) two levels of analysis on can do of the material--critique of its value to oneself, and value related to their goals. Generally when they did something that I personally didn't like, but I totally understand why they did it, I try to be understanding, but as Daniel puts it, lament that I wasn't the demographic they could reasonably target.
Quote from: The_Shadow;895765I basically sat out the 2e era, at least as far as D&D goes. Re-reading some old Dragon issues, I feel a kind of nostalgia, even though I wasn't taking part at the time. I can see the ren-faire thing going on, plenty of attempts to make play "serious" and with in-depth campaign worlds rather than just dungeon exploration, and so on. There's an attempt to make 2e a generic fantasy toolkit rather than a recognition that D&D is its own thing.
But how was your play at the time? Did you still approach things the way you had with 1e? Did you use one of the manifold TSR settings or a homebrew? Did you feel there was a tension between the rules and the play culture? Were you having a good time or was it starting to wear thin?
I only ever did Temple of Elemental Evil back in '98 for 2E. It was a lot of dungeon crawling as one might expect. System had to be explained to me a lot since I was new to RPGs back then.
Quote from: daniel_ream;898216I've never much understood the complaint about renaming the demons and devils, and removing the titty artwork, and similar. To me that's the juvenile stuff; it reminds me of the kinds of things that middle-class whitebread 14-year-old death metal fans draw on their schoolbook covers because they think it's edgy.
The sanitization didn't bother me as much as the dumbing down; there's some marvelous material in, say, the BECMI Gazetteers, but you can see where any depth and sophistication has been stripped out because the writers are writing for twelve-year-olds.
I don't think they're directly related, but I do think it's in the same bucket of making the game more appealing to mass consumers. Dumb it down. Sanitize it. Market it next to ads for toilet paper and toothpaste.
Quote from: Omega;895768Pretty much exactly like O, BX, BECMI and A.
Modules though tended to be more constained. Sometimes too constrained, by the plot. Felt like alot less open roam modules came out in the 2e era. But there were some gems like the whole Darkness Gathering series. One of my favorites of the 2e era.
I think mainly because 2e did not change much with the rules. Least not so drastically things were a slog to convert.
YMMV of course. Im sure someone will wander in with a horror story or three.
Addendum:
From experience as a DM and player at home and at cons the gameplay was overall unchanged. Lots of variance from table to table just like previous and aside from occasional grumbles at THAC0 or Kits it was overall amiable. WMMV horror stories there too Im sure. But at least for me that how it was. The players I picked up for 2e were the same.
I pretty much agree though we didn't use any modules at the time.
It played pretty smooth and we played standard dungeon crawls, converted old modules, single class parties (6 fighters and a mage and all rogues and mixed rogues) silly games (in early 200 actually) and everything else. Like all D&D it had its bugs but was in general a good system. I'm still half convinced it was the best D&D edition.
Quote from: Ratman_tf;899331I don't think they're directly related, but I do think it's in the same bucket of making the game more appealing to mass consumers. Dumb it down. Sanitize it. Market it next to ads for toilet paper and toothpaste.
And note it often was next to those things. Near the end of the fad I bought Star Frontiers at Sears .
TSR had a brief period when they made major major bank
Quote from: 5 Stone Games;899355And note it often was next to those things. Near the end of the fad I bought Star Frontiers at Sears .
TSR had a brief period when they made major major bank
Yep.
(https://www.blackgate.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/12/sears1983.jpg)
Grognardia (put down the damn pitchforks, people!) I think got it right in his article about "Scrappy Doo"
http://grognardia.blogspot.com/2008/12/scrappy-doo-and-hickman-revolution.html
And while I agree with his premise, I'd also especially note that the mainstream-ifying of a thing also leads to the thing losing what made it interesting.
Devils & Demons got renamed, but not dorked. Ta'nari and Baatezu? They were A grade nasty. 2e was a weird sanitizing / not sanitizing. The Planescape Blood War is great stuff, Sigil was a place where evil & good had to co-exist, and Dark Sun was full of slavery, cannibalism and savagery. Lots of great dramatic depth in the 2e settings, even when the 2e rules felt watered down.
But how dumb do parents have to be to NOT realize, hey those are fucking demons in my kid's book!!!
Quote from: daniel_ream;898216it reminds me of the kinds of things that middle-class whitebread 14-year-old death metal fans draw on their schoolbook covers
14 year old death metal fans are the greatest human beings to have ever existed!!
One change I will note with 2e is an overall change in tone to a gradually more over-the-top style. Similar to how BECMI went. But with the modules and settings rather than the rules. A shift in scope.
Quote from: Spinachcat;89937314 year old death metal fans are the greatest human beings to have ever existed!!
https://youtu.be/wpyyXFmlzJo
Now, I started with 3.5e back in February 2007, I was thirteen at the time. So sadly, I missed out on the heyday of AD&D 1e and 2e by virtue of being born in 1993, but my dad was around for those days and he was a huge D&D fan (in fact, he introduced me to D&D and was my first DM) so he probably could tell tons of stories about his experiences with 2e D&D if he posted here.
Still, reading this thread is interesting. It really is amazing how different things were back then compared to now. In all honesty, I wish I could've been there to experience it.
Quote from: Doc Sammy;900173Still, reading this thread is interesting. It really is amazing how different things were back then compared to now. In all honesty, I wish I could've been there to experience it.
No you don't, because then you would have had to have lived in the olden days like us fogeys from before they invented electricity and running water and graphical user interfaces. :p
I was playing an AD&D 2nd ed campaign, at the same time as I ran Rolemaster myself.
I think both systems had some clunky bits, but I think I sometimes managed to "mask" these in Rolemaster, by thinking carefully about house rules etc, while the guy who ran AD&D 2e didn't streamline things at all, and it did feel odd in places. I don't remember much system details, apart from the notorious Thac0. Still, we ran our game in some colorful cities and the DM had tons of material, so it was kinda fun. Battles were more enjoyable in Rolemaster though (but with Rolemaster we needed a calculator, while AD&D did not).
I don't remember there being much difference. Obviously some campaigns had different styles based on who was playing or DMing, but that was always the case dating back to when I started playing as a grade school kid back in 1979. I'm always amazed to hear grogtards claiming that outdoor adventures were more prominent in the 2E era, since the very first published module I played was Keep on the Borderlands, where cross-country travel and wilderness encounters were a sizable part of the module. Homemade adventures also emphasized outdoor adventuring, if for no other reason than the fact that no DM I ever played with was so lame as to start the PCs at the site of the dungeon. Every adventure included a trip to the dungeon, and for the survivors, a trip home from the dungeon. Grogtards need to quit blaming shitty DMing on 2nd Edition.
I remember quite vividly that the 2E PHB was available some time before the 2E DMG. Since we weren't about to stop our regular gaming just to wait on the next book, we simply used the new PHB alongside the 1E books. I'm pretty sure almost everyone else did, too whether they want to admit it or not. How did this affect play? Not much. Many of the new rules were things most 1E players were doing already (ditching segments, simplifying initiative, listing weights in pounds, ignoring the fucktarded training rules, customizing thieves and clerics, et al). The biggest difference I noticed was that the 2E PHB included all the information about spells the players and DMs needed in a single book, whereas in 1E the information was badly organized and spread among three books. Anyone playing a magic-user who looked up what a spell did, only to read that the spell in question is like the druid spell of the same name, only different appreciated the no bullshit approach to how 2E was organized when it came to spells.
The equipment list was also done much better.
Players who wanted their PCs to hack first and ask questions later could do so in 2E or the 1E/2E hybrid most AD&Ders played just fine. Those who wanted to take part in railroad, Grand Quest circlejerks could do so long before 2E came along, as Dragonlance proved.
Quote from: Spinachcat;899373But how dumb do parents have to be to NOT realize, hey those are fucking demons in my kid's book!!!
Well, wording can matter an awful lot. For Christians, they might see some fantasy book with some kind of demon-like 'monsters' in it with weird names, and treat it differently than a book which outright said "Devils".
Quote from: Spinachcat;899373But how dumb do parents have to be to NOT realize, hey those are fucking demons in my kid's book!!!
Same way people will read a name and automatically assume that that is what the book is about or the thing is. In this case in reverse. Dont call a demon a demon and alls fine.