The big difference between AD&D and 3E is perhaps clearest to those of us who came to AD&D by way of the OD&D works of which it was a compilation and revision. Despite claims and good intentions, in practice the AD&D books did not really overcome the assumptions of prior experience with the D&D game.

Pieces had accreted gradually and piecemeal on top of the very simple original structure. They didn't necessarily even work very well together, though one aim of AD&D was to smooth those rough edges. Anyhow, there was never a "MUST" in there, only "IF" you use variant x then variant y is also recommended.

With 3E, there really was a strongly coupled system (whether well or poorly designed). Things depended on other things in a complex web, with a "game balance" ethos that made messing with the web an imposing prospect. If things were actually thrown up in isolation, that wasn't the impression fostered. There was no clear, simple core beneath the chrome.

I'd have to side with Philip here - I feel that part of the OSR backlash was in the influence of the Magic: The Gathering ethos of resource based gameplay that had creeped into 3rd Edition (and that had existed as part of the magic system since AD&D 1E's Vancian magic system.) This resource based system that is part of OD&D's wargaming roots becomes more and more pronounced as one engages in higher and higher level play in any D&D variant. Note how most OSR variants emphasize low magic, low level play - this is a sidelong attempt to avoid engaging with the resource management aspect of the OD&D Vancian magic system, which 3.x fully develops. The magic system really didn't change all that much between 1st and 3rd (still 9 levels, still scaling effects, etc.) and the system becomes more and more brittle and it becomes harder and harder to make the rulings "on the fly" that the OSR favors. This is why so much of the OSR favors the hard core, low level, high character death style play that directly avoids the resource management magic mini game of higher level D&D. The most honest versions of OSR games that take this issue head on are versions which simply deflate caster power (such as stopping caster advancement at 6th level spells).


The whole notion of "simplicity" of AD&D 1 is a myth - AD&D 1 at high levels is full of options and is every inch as complex a game, as full of options, as any 3.5 game, even without Unearthed Arcana. I know, because when I was 17 I gamed Queen of the Demonweb Pits at 17th level with my Magic-User, Greystroke. The way I had to play him wasn't substantially different from a 3.5 Wizard.

The reason that DMs can tinker in OSR games isn't because of flexibility of design, it's because most OSR games take place at such a low level that making on-the-fly rulings won't blow apart the game structure. The Jenga tower isn't that high. This isn't an indictment of the OSR style, but of the nature of the AD&D design. E6 functions as well as any OSR variant in this regard as an answer to this issue and can be run as a fine OSR style game. The D20 simplicity actually functions well at this low level-the problems with D20 complexity that are stated above also happen with AD&D at equivalent levels.

To be fair to those who claim that there are some contradictory writings by Gygax in the 1E books regarding houseruling: there are.

As Phillip points out, a context of the times is very helpful.  Gygax didn't always write well for posterity.

Gygax wanted to do tournament games, as has been mentioned.  So there was (possibly) a clear difference between tournament mode and the game at your table.  If you wanted to have a game at your table that was in close to full compliance with tournament AD&D, then you couldn't houserule very much.  AD&D was going to be defined by tournament mode; it was expected that most players would be tournament players; and an expected universal familiarity with tournament AD&D would result in campaigns that varied from it not being accepted as "AD&D" by the tournament-participating player base.  It was important to Gygax that a player should know the basic structure of what a campaign calling itself an "AD&D" campaign would look like.  It was important to the goal of a tournament structure to avoid players showing up to their first tournament and finding out that their normal tactics were not possible according to tournament standards - that would result in poor tournament participation long-term.

But.

If your campaign being in line with tournament standard is unimportant to you, then go for it!  Houserule to your hearts content.  And if some player tries to give you shit for not running a tournament (read: AD&D) game, tell him to go pound sand because TSR choosing to run tournaments doesn't trump each DM as absolute arbiter at their own dining table.  Just don't be surprised if players say your game isn't really "AD&D".

Of course, all of this fell by the wayside pretty quickly since tournament gaming didn't pan out as envisioned, since various factions of TSR began to hold up character assumption and heavy role-play as more important than more objective things like measuring progress against time spent, or treasure gained.  And so passages of text that tried to differentiate the boundary lines of where TSR asserted control over the game, versus where TSR left control in the hands of the DM became even harder to grok.

Quote from: Kaiu Keiichi;851285Also - Astonishing Swordsmen of Hyperborea has to be my favorite AD&D 1 inspired clone. It retains the spirit of AD&D 1, if that makes sense. I really want to play it one day.

It makes all the sense in the world. I love this game to bits.

I think a big part of what makes AD&D unappealing to the generation of gamers who came in after 3e is that the scale of play is almost totally different.  Battles are fought at a more removed, strategic scale; PCs will frequently have a bunch of redshirt hirelings to throw away and likewise the usual monster foot troops (orcs, hobgoblins etc.) come in greater numbers; combat in of itself carries no reward and players are encouraged to avoid it where possible.  The Dungeoncrawl itself really feels much more like a "campaign" where players are encouraged to take a longer view, flee or avoid individual fights and think laterally with the ultimate goal being Get To the Treasure At the Bottom.  

3e was all about the fancy new combat system, whereas AD&D was more about getting to the results and left most of the details of a fight to the imagination.  3.x is the edition where you can feel the difference between Greatsword Guy and Rapier Guy because it's built into the rules.  The game almost completely lost the grander strategy elements (with all its associated bookkeeping) and became more about tactics---using elevation, flanking, grappling or defensive fighting all became important aspects of the game.  This was great and let players feel like proper Action Heroes, but it also created a mentality of "if it isn't in the rules/if there isn't a feat for it, it doesn't exist!"  and made combat into a long slog unless everyone at the table was well read and prepared ("he'd be a great warrior if he only knew his math a little better!")  When getting into a fight with a squad of Hobgoblins eats up the entire session other aspects of the game necessarily get truncated.  Shopping, castle-building, hiring NPCs all sort of became vestigial at best in 3.x, and when newer players read the AD&D Player's Handbook or (especially) the DMG they can understandably come away with the impression players aren't allowed to do much of anything because so much is left uncovered by the rules, and what is covered is stuff like "how many people might settle your new Barony after you build a stronghold" which 3e players are trained to think of as unimportant stuff to be handwaved----your character is an Action Hero who stabs people in the face in order to get better at stabbing people in the face (or learn more spells or w/e) and their personal progression matters more than decorating their house.

Quote from: Harime Nui;851389I think a big part of what makes AD&D unappealing to the generation of gamers who came in after 3e is that the scale of play is almost totally different.

The different "scale of play" and the focus on combat and being an action hero are also the reasons why many of us who started with early TSR editions have little interest in WOTC editions. While the name on the game is the same, the actual games are very different in focus once you get into the meat of things.  If you liked the focus of 1970s and 1980s TSR versions you may not like the focus of WOTC versions and vice-versa.

5e tries somewhat to compromise between to the two focuses, but it is still too action hero focused for me. Combat still takes too long if you prefer the battles of 0e, B/X and streamlined 1e where you could have 5 or 6 PCs and their henchmen take on 20 or 30 orcs and have the entire battle done in 10 or 15 minutes.

Personally my ideal game of Dungeons & Dragons would have all the cool castlebuilding, wilderness-exploring aspects of late-game AD&D but two modes of combat---a broader 'squad-based' mode for when you're clearing a bunch of Hobgoblins out of a cave, and a 'cinematic mode' for when you are fighting an enemy champion or you're attacked in a bar while out of your armor and you want rules for when the Ogre tries to crush Aragorn or you throw beer in a guy's face or whatever.

Quote from: Harime Nui;851394Personally my ideal game of Dungeons & Dragons would have all the cool castlebuilding, wilderness-exploring aspects of late-game AD&D but two modes of combat---a broader 'squad-based' mode for when you're clearing a bunch of Hobgoblins out of a cave, and a 'cinematic mode' for when you are fighting an enemy champion or you're attacked in a bar while out of your armor and you want rules for when the Ogre tries to crush Aragorn or you throw beer in a guy's face or whatever.

OD&D.

Free Kriegspiel.

The referee's judgement is the only rule.  All else is supplementary material to help the referee.

The ogre tries to crush Aragorn?  I adjudicate it.
You try to throw beer in a guy's face?  I adjudicate it.

If I can't, I shouldn't referee.

Quote from: Harime Nui;851394Personally my ideal game of Dungeons & Dragons would have all the cool castlebuilding, wilderness-exploring aspects of late-game AD&D but two modes of combat---a broader 'squad-based' mode for when you're clearing a bunch of Hobgoblins out of a cave, and a 'cinematic mode' for when you are fighting an enemy champion or you're attacked in a bar while out of your armor and you want rules for when the Ogre tries to crush Aragorn or you throw beer in a guy's face or whatever.

O/AD&D allready did that. Chainmail and later Battlesystem (and BECMI's War Machine) and later yet Birthright though made the large wargame-esque side a bit easier to manage. That sort of versatility few other games had.

Quote from: Gronan of Simmerya;851400OD&D.

Free Kriegspiel.

The referee's judgement is the only rule.  All else is supplementary material to help the referee.

The ogre tries to crush Aragorn?  I adjudicate it.
You try to throw beer in a guy's face?  I adjudicate it.

If I can't, I shouldn't referee.

Kriegspiel...?

Kriegspiel.  An 18th and 19th century wargame.

In the late 19th century as rules got lengthier and more cumbersome, "Free Kriegspiel" was devised.  This is a game where the referee's experience and judgement are the rules.  There might be some written text to help the referee, but there was no implicit authority in any text.  All authority came strictly from the referee.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kriegsspiel_%28wargame%29#.22Free.22_Kriegsspiel

Quote from: Justin Alexander;851229First, you literally misquoted me. Shame on you.

Of course I didn't. I literally pressed the "reply" button and the forum program literally copied your words.

QuoteSecond, the situation you described explicitly fits the criteria under which the AD&D rules require a surprise check. Like I said.

You are wrong.

Quote from: Harime Nui;851406Kriegspiel...?

Literally means "wargame". Originally assumed between two opponents and hosting a bevy of very complex rules, "Free Kriegspiel" was the idea to add in a referee or adjucator, who could make judgements on a case by case basis, surpassing the capacity of any rules system to account for specific contexts and unique situations that arose in the game, and considered to allow a far more accurate approximation of reality within the context of the game (and also allowed systems to be much looser since they werent overextending themselves trying to account for things qith a heaping of baroque rules that any GM with common sense could decide on instantaneously). This was the origin of the role of "gamemaster" which was carried over into D&D, itself based on Dave Arneson's game of Free Kriegspiel.

As time went on, RPGs have actually been taking a step backwards towards trying to come up with game systems to account for everything rather than making use of the powerful tool of having a GM. This usually originates from game designers who had bad experiences with bad GMs that touched them badly.

Part of the OSR was reclaiming this often unspecified but assumed aspect of early RPGs which were originally aimed at a wargame playing audience who would understand without explanation the function and purpose of a GM (and what makes a good one). This is often simply expressed by the mantra "rulings not rules".

This mantra pisses a lot of people off.

Welcome to the forum, BTW.

Thanks, glad to be here!

I want to stick up for crunchier rules systems, but I don't basically disagree.  The ability to make a ruling that doesn't suck will always come before rules knowledge, in actual play.   That said one of the great things about a more detailed combat system like 3e has is it tells you what's possible to start with.  This might sound silly but like I said, a lot of people read the AD&D combat rules and they think you can't shove someone out of their square because there isn't a rule that says "to shove someone out of their square do XYZ" (maybe there is, I haven't read the AD&D book in a while, but you get my meaning).  It's good that 3.x has rules for jumping over an obstacle and attacking someone from above, or whatever, because it tells players (and DMs) that that's totally the kind of thing that can/will happen in this game.  So if the DM doesn't like swashbuckling antics because he's fat and doesn't know what athletic people can actually do or w/e you are much more allowed to give him sass for not letting you chandelier-swing than in a game where he's like the on-set scriptwriter.  

The other thing is the more of this stuff you put in there the more surprises there are, and surprises are cool and good.  A game with injury tables is a game where your Fighting Man can lose his hand, and then instead of dumping him you have an iron cap with a big-ass pata attached set on the stump and have him return to the Dungeon harder and stronger and that's totally a thing that happened because of the dice, not because I wanted to be an asshole or we decided together it would be a cool thing to happen to your guy.  Of course that doesn't work if you decide having one hand doesn't mesh with the image of the Fighting Man you had in your head and now the character is ruined.... which is an attitude sadly encouraged by more recent editions but that is definitely a separate issue from how much crunch you like in your blow-by-blow.

Ah, to be clear, its not necessarily a matter of crunchy vs lite rules, which is more of a preference thing. There are some games that try to actively restrict the role of the GM, which is what I was referring to, but thats well played out internet drama around here.

I'm just as good playing a crunchy wargame as a freeplay game of Risus, myself.