Older D&D and Retroclone Thread: From OD&D To 4E

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Traditional Games > Older D&D and Retroclone Thread: From OD&D To 4E

DalaranJ: Apr 15, 2008; Yosuke will now die for you.

Indolent Bastard posted:

As D&D players are the most likely to have what I'm looking for I'm posting here and not in the SA-Mart and hoping nobody minds too much.

I am wondering if someone here might have a particular D20 that they would be willing to part with. It is a 19mm (I think it's 19mm and not 16mm, but whatever the "standard size" is) opaque black die with white ink. The numbers are sans serif with pips to identify the 6 and the 9. Let me know if you posses such a die and would be willing to sell, trade, or even give it away.

Thanks.

That's just a chessex die. It's less than a dollar.

http://chessex.com/Dice/Opaque%20Dice/25408.htm

# ? Aug 9, 2016 00:18

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# ? Jun 6, 2024 00:44

Indolent Bastard: Oct 26, 2007; I WON THIS AMAZING AVATAR! I'M A WINNER! WOOOOO!

DalaranJ posted:

That's just a chessex die. It's less than a dollar.

http://chessex.com/Dice/Opaque%20Dice/25408.htm

Thanks.

# ? Aug 9, 2016 00:20

Terrible Opinions: Oct 18, 2013

Lightning Lord posted:

Half-agree, the intention was to be a tournament module, which isn't springing it on people, and to challenge players. Gygax had the secondary goal of loving with Rob Kuntz and his son Ernie, which yeah is dirtbag behavior

Unless it was dramatically ruining their fun I don't really see how that's dirtbag behavior. loving around with your friends is normal.

# ? Aug 9, 2016 00:22

Evil Mastermind: Apr 28, 2008

The Master and Immortals sets are up, completing the run of the Basic box sets. Except for Wrath of the Immortals, but that's technically sort of kind of not part of the BECMI series.

# ? Aug 9, 2016 15:00

FRINGE: May 23, 2003; title stolen for lf posting

I never thought the "I" stuff would be back. I may have to finally read that.

# ? Aug 9, 2016 17:05

BinaryDoubts: Jun 6, 2013; Looking at it now, it really is disgusting. The flesh is transparent. From the start, I had no idea if it would even make a clapping sound. So I diligently reproduced everything about human hands, the bones, joints, and muscles, and then made them slap each other pretty hard.

To anyone with more D&D experience than me - I'm thinking about running Beyond the Wall, which is a 2e retroclone (from my understanding). I'm considering doing away with saves completely and just using attribute checks like everything else in the game - is there some significant balance reason to use the 5 or 3 different saves? Just seems like extra bookkeeping for the limited payoff of "some classes are better at dodging than others", when those classes already will have more Dex than the wizards.

# ? Aug 9, 2016 21:05

drrockso20: May 6, 2013; Has Not Actually Done Cocaine

BinaryDoubts posted:

To anyone with more D&D experience than me - I'm thinking about running Beyond the Wall, which is a 2e retroclone (from my understanding). I'm considering doing away with saves completely and just using attribute checks like everything else in the game - is there some significant balance reason to use the 5 or 3 different saves? Just seems like extra bookkeeping for the limited payoff of "some classes are better at dodging than others", when those classes already will have more Dex than the wizards.

Beyonders The Wall is actually a BX clone, not a AD&D 2E clone

# ? Aug 9, 2016 21:11

remusclaw: Dec 8, 2009

If it's anything like the numbers in actual D&D, the saves are better for being the old five rather than tying it to stats. Tying them to stats means the guy who rolled the best has the best saves. With the old save setup, your saves are based on class, and as such, the Fighter, who needs to tank, also coincidentally has the best saves, meaning he can tank, rather than how it is in 3rd edition up where they are supposed to be able to tank but can't because their saves are poo poo.

# ? Aug 9, 2016 21:13

Pham Nuwen: Oct 30, 2010

remusclaw posted:

If it's anything like the numbers in actual D&D, the saves are better for being the old five rather than tying it to stats. Tying them to stats means the guy who rolled the best has the best saves. With the old save setup, your saves are based on class, and as such, the Fighter, who needs to tank, also coincidentally has the best saves, meaning he can tank, rather than how it is in 3rd edition up where they are supposed to be able to tank but can't because their saves are poo poo.

In our level 1 BTW game, the fighter was a loving combat monster, dealing huge damage while the rest of us tended to get one-shotted by orcs who, in retrospect, probably shouldn't have had 1d8 damage swords when everyone but the fighter had 8 hp or fewer.

# ? Aug 9, 2016 21:50

Ryuujin: Sep 26, 2007; Dragon God

Also the way to play Beyond the Wall is not to "roll" for stats as one did in a lot of the old D&D games. No they way to play it is to roll on the random background chart, which does change your stats yes but with a lot more flavor.

Reminds me I really wanted to play Beyond the Wall, especially if I could use the bear or baby dragon playbooks.

# ? Aug 9, 2016 22:13

remusclaw: Dec 8, 2009

Pham Nuwen posted:

In our level 1 BTW game, the fighter was a loving combat monster, dealing huge damage while the rest of us tended to get one-shotted by orcs who, in retrospect, probably shouldn't have had 1d8 damage swords when everyone but the fighter had 8 hp or fewer.

Early style D&D is a deathsport until around 4th level or so, when people have enough hp to survive a fight. At that point, you can be pretty mean to the players and they will likely survive it and even thrive doing it, at least as long as you avoid gently caress you enemies like level drainers and such. In my old first edition game, while running White Plume Mountain, the fighter, who was 6th level, and already down to like 1/3 hp, managed to basically solo the two Ifrit who hassle you on the way out, which I thought was going to be the end of the group.

remusclaw fucked around with this message at 22:20 on Aug 9, 2016

# ? Aug 9, 2016 22:17

hectorgrey: Oct 14, 2011

To be fair, the fact that combat in old school D&D is so lethal at low levels should probably be taken as a hint that maybe you should try to avoid fights that you're not sure you can win...

# ? Aug 10, 2016 01:58

Pham Nuwen: Oct 30, 2010

hectorgrey posted:

To be fair, the fact that combat in old school D&D is so lethal at low levels should probably be taken as a hint that maybe you should try to avoid fights that you're not sure you can win...

Tried repeatedly to hint to my fellow players that we don't necessarily have to slaughter every single creature but they didn't get it, so we spent multiple 8 hour rest periods in random rooms of the goblin caverns. :shrug:

# ? Aug 10, 2016 02:18

FRINGE: May 23, 2003; title stolen for lf posting

hectorgrey posted:

To be fair, the fact that combat in old school D&D is so lethal at low levels should probably be taken as a hint that maybe you should try to avoid fights that you're not sure you can win...

Thats the way we always played, but based on the internet that style of play is not well liked now. :/

# ? Aug 10, 2016 03:04

gradenko_2000: Oct 5, 2010; HELL SERPENT; Lipstick Apathy

FRINGE posted:

Thats the way we always played, but based on the internet that style of play is not well liked now. :/

My own experience is that players tend to fight who they want, but if you play up the potential lethality of the game, then they will try to engineer as many advantages into the fight as possible, such as funneling the enemies into a chokepoint, taking them by surprise, barring secondary doors to prevent reinforcements from coming in, and even killing enemies via smoke inhalation.

# ? Aug 10, 2016 03:13

FRINGE: May 23, 2003; title stolen for lf posting

gradenko_2000 posted:

My own experience is that players tend to fight who they want, but if you play up the potential lethality of the game, then they will try to engineer as many advantages into the fight as possible, such as funneling the enemies into a chokepoint, taking them by surprise, barring secondary doors to prevent reinforcements from coming in, and even killing enemies via smoke inhalation.

Thats sounds like a good/fun group to scheme with. It also hearkens back to that article "combat as sport vs combat as war".

I took the other post as meaning things that might "be there" because the world is happening around them, but things that are obviously not great ideas for the players to assume are good targets for hobo-murder. Like a 2nd level party who happens to see a tangle of trolls fighting over food. Thats better left as a tale for the tavern ("you wouldnt believe what we saw!") than a running sword-first tackle.

edit: The troll thing was just a random thought/example. Of course theres ways to try and take them anyway with guile, fire, and more fire. Pretend I said a pack of tarrasques or whatever.

# ? Aug 10, 2016 03:30

DalaranJ: Apr 15, 2008; Yosuke will now die for you.

BinaryDoubts posted:

To anyone with more D&D experience than me - I'm thinking about running Beyond the Wall, which is a 2e retroclone (from my understanding). I'm considering doing away with saves completely and just using attribute checks like everything else in the game - is there some significant balance reason to use the 5 or 3 different saves? Just seems like extra bookkeeping for the limited payoff of "some classes are better at dodging than others", when those classes already will have more Dex than the wizards.

The major problem with using attributes is that saves are one of the parts of the game that is intended to be level dependent and show diversity between different classes. In addition, '5 saves' provides the narrative benefit of not prescribing the required method of recovery. There's also potentially a thematic benefit, apparently in Gary's World TM, being poisoned is significantly (i.e. 5-15%) different than being turned to stone and how dare you suggest they are the same? Using attributes as saves can lead to some confusion as to how dangerous certain threats are to individual characters, do you dodge acid spit or do you resist its corrosion, it might be unclear.

That being said, BTW is a rules light game that focuses on attributes, so feel free to lop off saves, you probably won't notice the difference.

# ? Aug 10, 2016 04:39

gradenko_2000: Oct 5, 2010; HELL SERPENT; Lipstick Apathy

The Five Saves model of TSR-era D&D is good as far as:

1. It is independent of your stats. A high-level Fighter with 6 Intelligence or Wisdom was still going to be able to avoid spells and polymorphs more than half the time, just because they were a high-level Fighter.

This is in contrast to d20-era D&D where the Fighter would either need to goose their Wisdom to get a high Will save, or supplement it with magic items and feats, and they're still going to be behind because the base save bonus is still Poor.

In contrast to "roll under attribute", the five saves model improves over time. In some cases this may mean that your saves are better at level 1, but unless you're running with 16+ attributes, the five saves model is generally going to give you better results later (unless your game never gets that far, which is also a consideration)

2. It does not make any assumptions as to how you avoid the spell. From a narrativist perspective this is nice because you don't need to describe the physics of it, and especially since the 1 minute combat rounds of D&D means there's a lot of room defining what it meant to save against Dragon's Breath.

3. It has a fairly precise definition of what each save separately applies to. There's little ambiguity as to which save you should use for any given situation.

d20-era D&D's Fortitude / Reflex / Will saves also accomplishes this to a degree, but it does so by defining how the save is performed, and with categories that are very broad.

The real juxtaposition is against the "roll under attribute" model, where you're guaranteed to be ignoring at least two if not three of your attributes because there's overlap between Strength / Constitution and Wisdom / Intelligence / Charisma and even Dexterity / Wisdom in some cases, so you're going to be playing mother-may-I with whichever is stronger between your "paired attributes" (which is itself a consequence of the attribute selected being down to how you accomplish the save).

[It's a real problem with 5th Edition D&D, where they have six saving throws, one for each attribute, but the distribution of which spells correspond to which saving throw is so uneven as to make you wonder why they bothered. It's almost assuredly a nostalgic sop to "old-school D&D", but they ended up making the problem worse than if they stuck to Fort/Ref/Will, or went all the way back to Five Saves.]

# ? Aug 10, 2016 05:31

FRINGE: May 23, 2003; title stolen for lf posting

gradenko_2000 posted:

The Five Saves model of TSR-era D&D is good as far as:

1. It is independent of your stats. A high-level Fighter with 6 Intelligence or Wisdom was still going to be able to avoid spells and polymorphs more than half the time, just because they were a high-level Fighter.

This is pretty huge, and one reason I did not like 3e.

# ? Aug 10, 2016 08:22

hectorgrey: Oct 14, 2011

FRINGE posted:

Thats the way we always played, but based on the internet that style of play is not well liked now. :/

Which is fair enough; people don't have to like the same things. It would just be nice if people would at least try a method of play before deciding whether it was for them or not. At my Uni, we had a guy run ACKS - which actually became quite popular once people started playing it. That said, I think it helped that the guy running the game was up front about what people should expect right from the start.

gradenko_2000 posted:

My own experience is that players tend to fight who they want, but if you play up the potential lethality of the game, then they will try to engineer as many advantages into the fight as possible, such as funneling the enemies into a chokepoint, taking them by surprise, barring secondary doors to prevent reinforcements from coming in, and even killing enemies via smoke inhalation.

That too - and that's something to be encouraged. To quote Sun Tzu, the victorious warrior wins first, and then fights, while the defeated warrior fights, and then seeks to win.

hectorgrey fucked around with this message at 15:59 on Aug 10, 2016

# ? Aug 10, 2016 15:57

drrockso20: May 6, 2013; Has Not Actually Done Cocaine

hectorgrey posted:

Which is fair enough; people don't have to like the same things. It would just be nice if people would at least try a method of play before deciding whether it was for them or not. At my Uni, we had a guy run ACKS - which actually became quite popular once people started playing it. That said, I think it helped that the guy running the game was up front about what people should expect right from the start.

That too - and that's something to be encouraged. To quote Sun Tzu, the victorious warrior wins first, and then fights, while the defeated warrior fights, and then seeks to win.

Soldier's interpretation of Sun Tzu might be a bit more appropriate for this thread;

https://youtu.be/h42d0WHRSck

# ? Aug 10, 2016 22:34

DalaranJ: Apr 15, 2008; Yosuke will now die for you.

gradenko_2000 posted:

The Five Saves model of TSR-era D&D is good as far as:

1. It is independent of your stats. A high-level Fighter with 6 Intelligence or Wisdom was still going to be able to avoid spells and polymorphs more than half the time, just because they were a high-level Fighter.

This is in contrast to d20-era D&D where the Fighter would either need to goose their Wisdom to get a high Will save, or supplement it with magic items and feats, and they're still going to be behind because the base save bonus is still Poor.

In contrast to "roll under attribute", the five saves model improves over time. In some cases this may mean that your saves are better at level 1, but unless you're running with 16+ attributes, the five saves model is generally going to give you better results later (unless your game never gets that far, which is also a consideration)

2. It does not make any assumptions as to how you avoid the spell. From a narrativist perspective this is nice because you don't need to describe the physics of it, and especially since the 1 minute combat rounds of D&D means there's a lot of room defining what it meant to save against Dragon's Breath.

3. It has a fairly precise definition of what each save separately applies to. There's little ambiguity as to which save you should use for any given situation.

d20-era D&D's Fortitude / Reflex / Will saves also accomplishes this to a degree, but it does so by defining how the save is performed, and with categories that are very broad.

The real juxtaposition is against the "roll under attribute" model, where you're guaranteed to be ignoring at least two if not three of your attributes because there's overlap between Strength / Constitution and Wisdom / Intelligence / Charisma and even Dexterity / Wisdom in some cases, so you're going to be playing mother-may-I with whichever is stronger between your "paired attributes" (which is itself a consequence of the attribute selected being down to how you accomplish the save).

[It's a real problem with 5th Edition D&D, where they have six saving throws, one for each attribute, but the distribution of which spells correspond to which saving throw is so uneven as to make you wonder why they bothered. It's almost assuredly a nostalgic sop to "old-school D&D", but they ended up making the problem worse than if they stuck to Fort/Ref/Will, or went all the way back to Five Saves.]

Yeah, that's what I said. :effort:

# ? Aug 10, 2016 23:43

Doodmons: Jan 17, 2009

So my google-fu is currently failing me. I'm trying to get copies of Dark Dungeons, Darker Dungeons and Darkest Dungeons to compare the three and decide which one I like the look of more, but the PC game is throwing off my search results and I don't actually know who wrote them so I can refine my search. Does anyone have a link to where I can get copies of each of these?

# ? Aug 19, 2016 11:30

gradenko_2000: Oct 5, 2010; HELL SERPENT; Lipstick Apathy

Dark Dungeons: http://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/177410/Dark-Dungeons

Darker Dungeons got lost when the author lost his original webspace, and he's decided not to put it back up on the web because he feels there are quality and editing issues with it.

Darkest Dungeons was renamed Blood, Guts & Glory after the game was changed to a Victorian steampunk setting with anthropomorphic animals. In any case it's fairly distant from Dark Dungeons because it's no longer tied to Rules Cyclopedia, but rather an attempt to mesh 3.5e D&D with Rolemaster.

Blood, Guts & Glory: http://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/177412/Blood-Guts-and-Glory

# ? Aug 19, 2016 11:43

Lightning Lord: Feb 21, 2013; $200 a day, plus expenses

Doodmons posted:

So my google-fu is currently failing me. I'm trying to get copies of Dark Dungeons, Darker Dungeons and Darkest Dungeons to compare the three and decide which one I like the look of more, but the PC game is throwing off my search results and I don't actually know who wrote them so I can refine my search. Does anyone have a link to where I can get copies of each of these?

They're by Blacky the Blackball. He got a new site, so a lot of links around the internet to his work are dead. Darker Dungeons only seems to be available as a hard copy from Blacky's Lulu page at the moment, and Darkest has been renamed Blood, Guts and Glory, probably because of the video game.

Dark is essentially a 1:1 retroclone of Rules Cyclopedia, while Darker adds some of Blacky's houserules:

Blacky the Blackball posted:

This is from memory, rather than by looking back at the documents, but I think the complete list of changes in Darker Dungeons is:

1) Turn Undead, Thief Abilities, Finding Secret Doors, Stonelore, Morale, and Saving Throws all use the same "d20+mod >= 20" mechanic as attacks (the mechanic has changed, but the chance of success remains the same).

2) Elves and Magic-Users have been partially "Swapped" (i.e Elves are now the wimpy ones that need fewer XP and Magic-Users are now the ones who can fight but need more XP).

3) Alignment has been removed completely.

4) Mystics have been changed to Lupines (although the are mechanically unchanged).

5) Mountebanks have been added as a new class.

6) Druids are now a separate class from 1st level rather than something Clerics become at 9th level, and they have been given a "Control Animals" ability.

7) Shield Weapons have been removed; but shields now come in three varieties - "Buckler", "Normal" and "Tower". They no longer simply add a flat bonus to your armour class, but work like weapons (and you can buy Weapon Feats for them).

8) I've added Flails and Morningstars to the weapon list, and a couple of the cleric weapons (Mace and War Hammer) have been improved because it was silly to have them less effective than a club.

9) Immortals now have one or more speciality domains; and their clerics find it easier to cast spells from those domains (and harder to cast spells from the opposite domains).

10) Magic-Users and Elves may now specialise in one of four schools of magic (but they do not have to). If they do, they find it easier to cast spells from that school but harder to cast spells from the opposite school.

11) Initiative is now rolled on a d20 rather than a d6.

12) As a result of changes 1 and 11, there is no need for special bonuses for Dexterity or Charisma. Each ability score now just has a standard bonus.

Darkest/Blood, Guts and Glory is, weirdly and interestingly enough, basically a mashup of vaious D&D mechanics and streamlined Rolemaster, because Blacky loves RM but finds it clunky these days. Some of these might be a bit different since Darkest became BG&G:

Blacky the Blackball posted:

Ability Scores and bonuses: Taken from D&D 3.x (i.e. the usual six scores on a 3-18 scale).
Races: Original (but generic fantasy).
Classes: Inspired by Rolemaster 2e and renamed for copyright reasons.
Skill Rules: Base skill mechanic taken from D&D 3.x. (d20+bonus vs variable DC). Specific skill list inspired by Rolemaster 2e with skills renamed for copyright reasons.
Skill Acquisition: Inspired by Rolemaster 2e.
Rounds, Initiative and Combat Actions: Taken from Dark Dungeons.
Attacks, Armour and Damage: Inspired by Rolemaster 2e, with some simplification and clean-up, and scaled to d20 use instead of d100 use.
Damage/health/injury system: Inspired by Rolemaster 2e, with lots of clean-up to make the damage from critical strikes consistent with the healing spells, healing herbs, and natural healing.
Spellcasting Mechanics: Original, with elements inspired by D&D 3.x, D&D 4e and Rolemaster 2e.
Spells: Inspired by Rolemaster 2e and renamed for copyright reasons.
Monsters: Inspired by Rolemaster 2e and renamed where necessary for copyright reasons.

Hi gradenko :smaug:

Lightning Lord fucked around with this message at 12:12 on Aug 19, 2016

# ? Aug 19, 2016 12:03

gradenko_2000: Oct 5, 2010; HELL SERPENT; Lipstick Apathy

quote:

Skill Rules: Base skill mechanic taken from D&D 3.x. (d20+bonus vs variable DC)

Grogsay: This was a mistake. RM had the better skill system because you were always rolling against a flat DC of 100 (or 20, in this case).

# ? Aug 19, 2016 13:43

gradenko_2000: Oct 5, 2010; HELL SERPENT; Lipstick Apathy

Across all of the Oriental Adventures from AD&D to 3rd Ed, is there a particular one you'd recommend to use a setting book? What about a module set there?

# ? Aug 21, 2016 17:36

FRINGE: May 23, 2003; title stolen for lf posting

gradenko_2000 posted:

Across all of the Oriental Adventures from AD&D to 3rd Ed, is there a particular one you'd recommend to use a setting book? What about a module set there?

What about the d20 Rokugan stuff? The L5R setting had a ton of history/setting/material that was pretty cohesive, well established clans, bad guys, etc... I have some of the old AEG material, but only skimmed the d20 books. They seemed alright from a look-over.

# ? Aug 21, 2016 20:34

fidgit: Apr 27, 2002; And my wrath shall wax hot, and I will kill you with the sword; and your wives shall be widows, and your children fatherless.

obeyasia posted:

Anyone going to Gen Con? The after hours Doug Con event looks to be killer this year.

Did you make it out? I ran one table of Punjar 50k on Thursday and it was insane. Usually Saturday night is the best for DougCon, but I think we peaked early this year.

# ? Aug 22, 2016 16:58

Dre2Dee2: Dec 6, 2006; Just a striding through Kamen Rider...

edit:gently caress wrong thread

Dre2Dee2 fucked around with this message at 20:32 on Aug 22, 2016

# ? Aug 22, 2016 20:18

obeyasia: Sep 21, 2004; Grimey Drawer

fidgit posted:

Did you make it out? I ran one table of Punjar 50k on Thursday and it was insane. Usually Saturday night is the best for DougCon, but I think we peaked early this year.

I ran a table on Saturday night.

I think I know who you are, based on your post history. Social Network cross reference checks out. Your name starts with a T!

obeyasia fucked around with this message at 21:04 on Aug 22, 2016

# ? Aug 22, 2016 20:57

drrockso20: May 6, 2013; Has Not Actually Done Cocaine

gradenko_2000 posted:

Across all of the Oriental Adventures from AD&D to 3rd Ed, is there a particular one you'd recommend to use a setting book? What about a module set there?

Go lookup Yoon-Suin, pretty much the best Not Asia RPG setting I've ever seen

# ? Aug 23, 2016 01:05

Halloween Jack: Sep 12, 2003; I WILL CUT OFF BOTH OF MY ARMS BEFORE I VOTE FOR ANYONE THAT IS MORE POPULAR THAN BERNIE!!!!!

Are there any old-school style superhero games out there that you like? I got hooked on Arkham Asylum while also playing old-school D&D and it occurred to me that a supervillain hideout, or just the mean streets of Crime City, would make a great model for a dungeon delve. I've checked out Hideouts & Hoodlums, but I didn't care for it.

# ? Aug 27, 2016 23:06

DeadReed: Feb 14, 2012

There's Guardians by Night Owl Workshop and Sentinels of Echo City by Splintered Realms Publishing. I thought they were leagues better than Hideouts and Hoodlums and Mystery Men. If there's anything redeeming about HIdeouts and Hoodlums, it's the sourcebooks which they stat out all of the Golden Age heroes (even Superman and Batman got stats if I recall correctly).

# ? Aug 28, 2016 06:25

gradenko_2000: Oct 5, 2010; HELL SERPENT; Lipstick Apathy

Besides "roll d20 (or 3d6) and get equal to or lower than your attribute score to succeed", what other "skill systems" have you guys used in old-school D&D for things that weren't covered by Thief skill percentages and 1d6 secret door detections?

# ? Aug 28, 2016 06:54

Covok: May 27, 2013; Yet where is that woman now? Tell me, in what heave does she reside? None of them. Because no God bothered to listen or care. If that is what you think it means to be a God, then you and all your teachings are welcome to do as that poor women did. And vanish from these realms forever.

gradenko_2000 posted:

Besides "roll d20 (or 3d6) and get equal to or lower than your attribute score to succeed", what other "skill systems" have you guys used in old-school D&D for things that weren't covered by Thief skill percentages and 1d6 secret door detections?

Kevin Crawford likes "roll 2d8 + Skillvalue/attribute and compare to target number to see if you succeed with d20s only for attack rolls" for his games' skill systems.

# ? Aug 28, 2016 07:04

aldantefax: Oct 10, 2007; ALWAYS BE MECHFISHIN'

How is that curve vs. d20 or 3d6? 3d6 tends to make more average rolls and d20 is pretty variable, so I can assume that 2d8 is the middleroad of the two.

# ? Aug 28, 2016 09:23

Elector_Nerdlingen: Sep 27, 2004

gradenko_2000 posted:

Besides "roll d20 (or 3d6) and get equal to or lower than your attribute score to succeed", what other "skill systems" have you guys used in old-school D&D for things that weren't covered by Thief skill percentages and 1d6 secret door detections?

"Write down what you used to do before adventuring or what you would do if you weren't adventuring. If something comes up that's related to that and you try to do it, roll a dice and try to get 5 or better. If it's easy, roll a d12. If it's middling, roll a d8. If it's hard, roll a d6".

# ? Aug 28, 2016 09:25

Sax Solo: Feb 18, 2011

aldantefax posted:

How is that curve vs. d20 or 3d6? 3d6 tends to make more average rolls and d20 is pretty variable, so I can assume that 2d8 is the middleroad of the two.

2d8 is very close to a 3d6 - 1.5.

For tabletop gaming, 2Dsomething is close enough to a bell curve that you're not really going to notice, so it's not really a middle road, more like a 90% towards one side road.

# ? Aug 28, 2016 14:34

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# ? Jun 6, 2024 00:44

Cascade Jones: Jun 6, 2015

Covok posted:

Kevin Crawford likes "roll 2d8 + Skill value/attribute and compare to target number to see if you succeed with d20s only for attack rolls" for his games' skill systems.

Did he start using that right after Spears of the Dawn? I thought most of his older stuff was 2d6 + skill/attribute vs 8+, or basically the Traveller skill system.

RE: other skill systems. Rob Conley's Majestic Wilderlands supplement for S&W uses "Roll 15+ on a d20, adjusted by attribute and class bonus". Those bonuses don't get above +1 for attribute and maybe +2 for class at higher levels, and difficulty modifiers stay around -1 to -2.

e: Here's an example of the skills from Majestic Wilderlands. A Fighter with a STR over 13 will have a +2 to this Athletics roll:

quote:

Athletics (STR)
This ability is used for various physical tasks involving strength.
A successful roll at 0 will allow a character to jump over a 2� foot obstacle.
If the character is encumbered then it is a -2 modifier.
For every foot over 2 feet it is -1 to the ability roll.
If the task fails the character will stumble and not clear the height.
A successful roll at +0 will allow a character to lift a locked heavy gate.
A successful roll at +0 will allow a character to push open a stuck door.
A successful roll at +0 will allow a character to lift an unlocked heavy gate.
A successful roll at a -5 modifier will allow a character to bend bars 1⁄2� or larger in diameter.
A successful roll at a -5 modifier will allow a character to smash open a locked or barred door.
A successful roll at a -5 modifier will allow a character to swim across rapids or a strong current.

I just noticed while posting that the roll to lift locked and unlocked heavy gates are the same. Hmmm

Cascade Jones fucked around with this message at 02:06 on Aug 29, 2016

# ? Aug 29, 2016 02:00

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Traditional Games > Older D&D and Retroclone Thread: From OD&D To 4E

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