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Out of all the various retroclones, the one I keep hearing the most positive things about (from non-grognards) is probably Swords & Wizardry. Is there anything in particular that makes it different from the other bunch of retro-elfgames?
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Jul 11, 2012 07:46
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Rulebook Heavily posted:Advanced Dungeons and Dragons Second Edition / Black Books ("2.5") Actually, the paragraph literally says "THIS IS NOT AD&D 3rd EDITION!".  Also, I've never heard of the revised black books themselves being called "2.5". It's usually the term that people use to refer to AD&D 2E played using the optional rules from the Player's Option books. I've never seen the term "2.5" used before the 3.0/3.5-era, though.
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Jul 11, 2012 18:37
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Payndz posted:Gygax's "What ho, my good fellows!" thesaurus-vomiting writing style quickly gets wearing, too. Someone needs to write a browser plug-in or something that takes input from gaming-related sources and translates it into High Gygaxian. "Magic items can be a useful addition to any campaign." -> "As any Game Master worth his proverbial salt needs must be aware, the inclusion of sorcerous artifacts, relics of power, and other valuable trappings of dweomercraft into the setting milieu can and will provide countless, aye, endless opportunities for Player Characters to gain riches and experience during their ceaseless quest for High Adventure."
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Feb 24, 2013 20:26
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AlphaDog posted:doddering lunatic wizard Pretty spot-on description of E.G.G. right there.
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Feb 25, 2013 20:55
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gtrmp posted:The fiends were reintroduced to the game pretty early in its lifespan, and half-orcs were reintroduced as playable in a few sources, but monks and assassins never really had one specific canonical incarnation in 2e, either as a class or as as kit. There was a actually a monk class presented in the Scarlet Brotherhood supplement for the revised Greyhawk setting (The Adventure Begins and related supplements) that was released in the late 1990's. Regarding the eternal discussion on 1E vs 2E AD&D, I've always preferred 2E. 1E has a lot of "flavor", sure, but it's a disorganized mess of separate rules system that don't play well together most of the time. 2E didn't fix this altogether, but it was a lot easier to learn for someone without previous D&D experience. As for 2E being a "cleaned-up" version, I don't see why that has to be a bad thing. Then again, I don't consider random prostitute tables and gender-based ability modifiers to be absolutely essential in order to enjoy the game. To be honest, the only thing from 1E that I really missed in the 2E books was the random dungeon generator.
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Oct 18, 2013 07:42
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FRINGE posted:Why? From what I gather, it reads like something a 15-year old would write if he went out of his way to be as dark and totally gritty as possible. "To cast this awesomely EEEVIL ritual, you have to...RAPE A KID! YEEEAAAH!"   (Yes, the rape and murder of pre-pubescent children is apparently a requirement of certain ritual spells in Carcosa.)
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Feb 10, 2015 08:40
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Covok posted:As for scoring, add up all XP from characters and the GP value of magic items, dead characters count as 1/2. Everyone gets 3 lives. Sounds reasonable. That'll probably get them, oh, a couple of rooms into the dungeon?  Also, have a look at this handy reference/walkthrough.
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Mar 27, 2015 11:24
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Moriatti posted:Also, I would suggest 2e instead of straight AD&D. Same retro feel with a bit more work put into narrative. You can still use AD&D modules and such with it too. If it doesn't include a Random Prostitute Encounter table, it's not real AD&D. 
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Mar 29, 2015 14:26
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Covok posted:That said, it did feel like all the math was just sort of there. Like things didn't feel like there was a system behind it. Am I wrong? Things like save bonuses, your to-hit vs AC, and, especially, ability score bonuses. At its heart, pre-2E AD&D is just a garbled mess of unrelated tables, vaguely formulated rules exceptions, wonky subsystems, needless percentile rolls and dense Gygaxian prose all crudely bolted together. It's not without its charms, but it helps if you see it more as a "build-your-own-D&D"-kit than a complete and thought-out roleplaying system. 2E didn't fix all of this, but it got rid of the worst excesses and made the core books actually readable. You often hear grognards praise AD&D1E as the Perfect Holy Grail of gaming, but 99 times out of 100 that's just the nostalgia talking. With the amount of well-written, playtested and streamlined retroclones out there, I'd actively advice against using it for retro-D&D/OSR type stuff unless you've got a previous emotional attachment to it. Comrade Koba fucked around with this message at 23:11 on Mar 29, 2015 |
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Mar 29, 2015 23:07
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Covok posted:What's the best AD&D retroclone, out of curiosity? If you want straight-up, no-frills AD&D, go with OSRIC. It's a very faithful reproduction of the 1E rules, but in a single rulebook that's actually edited and properly organized. It's pretty dry and doesn't evoke any particular feel, but AFAIK it was originally written simply to make it possible for people to publish new 1E material without having to deal with trademark or copyright issues. For a better old-school feeling, you can't go wrong with Labyrinth Lord. It's really a clone of Basic/Expert D&D and not technically AD&D, but there's a free companion volume that contains optional rules to make it play a lot more like 1E.
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Mar 30, 2015 00:20
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Covok posted:Did anyone ever play with those? Like all those little optional things I saw -- like weapon speeds --, while fine for a computer game, seemed poor for a tabletop game. Well, Gygax does explicitly state in the 1E DMG that if you're not playing by the rules as written, you're not playing AD&D at all. 
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Mar 30, 2015 10:04
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I see you've yet to mention the most epic "intelligent" sword ever created.
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Jul 20, 2015 13:21
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I'm really starting to like Swords & Wizardry. The lack of extensive tables and special rules as well as the fact that it's somewhat intended to use as a toolkit to create your own variant is starting to grow on me. Now, I've got a couple of questions. First, are there any noticable differences between the "Core" book and the "Complete" rulebook that's being published by Necromancer Games? The Complete edition has a bunch more classes (paladins, rangers, monks, etc), but did they change anything else? Also, is there anything lacking from the book that would be useful? So far I'm only missing rules for morale, which can turn out pretty important in old school dungeons. I sort of want to run a Keep on the Borderlands-variant as a PbP game, with a "Fantasy Vietnam" feel. Still haven't picked a system, but S&W is in the lead so far.
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Aug 1, 2015 12:07
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remusclaw posted:I don't mind a switch to ascending AC, but the single saving throw thing changes up the class balance too much for my taste. For one they gave magic users better saves than fighters. who are tied with dwarves for the worse saves at the highest level.. In my experience, having a single saving throw makes things much more flexible, since you can just throw in situational modifiers without having to decide which save(s) it should apply to.
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Sep 28, 2015 09:20
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MagnumOpus posted:It looks like this used to sell on Lulu but is not available anymore. Where did you find it? The editorials and the letters column alone makes this worth reading. So...much...Gygax. 
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Nov 6, 2015 21:23
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Regarding old B/X variants, is anyone familiar with the "Gray Book" version of D&D? I recently came across a PDF of it, and from what I can gather it seems to be a heavily expanded version of the Holmes D&D rulebook from the late 70's, including rules for higher levels (20th and above, where the original Holmes only covered levels 1-3), additional classes (paladins, rangers, illusionists, etc.) and a lot of other stuff I don't think was ever in the original booklet. It clocks in at 140-something pages (the original was around 50 pages, I think), and is listed as being edited by one Steven J. Ege. The cover is the same as the Holmes book, but in grayscale instead of blue. The title page also has the WotC logo and a copyright notice that says it was produced in 2008. The foreword is the same as in the 1978 printing. Is this a semi-official product in some way, or just some dudes own expanded fan version?
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Jan 20, 2016 15:23
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Ratpick posted:So, I started thinking of a way to tie natural healing rates to a character's maximum hit points, and then it hit me: hit dice! I'm sure this rule has been in some old-school game (might've been World of Dungeons, actually), but the idea is that whenever a character rests they can reroll their hit dice and that's your new total of hit points provided it's more than you started with! On the other hand, this means that it will likely take ages to heal those last few hit points once you've got a few levels under your belt. I think using hit dice is generally a good idea, though. Maybe you could heal 1(hit die size) of HP for every day of complete, uninterrupted rest? That would make Fighters and the like heal a lot faster than wizards and rogues, but it could sort of make sense if you think of HP as measurement of general toughness and fatigue as well instead of simply being "meat points".
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Jan 27, 2016 12:13
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Arivia posted:Think I'll do it as a weekly blog feature, since it's going to take awhile to tear through these (each map takes about 4 hours). Here's my list so far in rough order: Really looking forward to this. I didn't have a lot of friends to game with in my early teens (  ), so I spent way too many hours of my childhood just rolling up crazy random dungeon adventures with the 1E DMG.
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Apr 1, 2016 12:55
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gradenko_2000 posted:2. Did anyone in the OSR ever try to remake/reboot the Tomb of Horrors? It's not OSR, but there's always the 2e (sort of) sequel. I think it was (partly) covered in the FATAL & Friends thread. I'm sort of hoping there won't be a proper remake. The idea of a dungeon whose literal, stated purpose is to murder PCs is a concept best left in the 70's, I think.
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Aug 4, 2016 18:38
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Lightning Lord posted:Nope. That'd make Gygax the OG teenage dirtbag, since he specifically stated the original intention was to gently caress over his players and/or unfortunate con visitors. The problem with ToH is that it isn't a meat grinder at all. It's not challenging, it's just cheap.
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Aug 4, 2016 22:37
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Lightning Lord posted:Night Below is a complete campaign designed to take level 1 characters to about 14. You might have to fiddle a bit to retain that if you use anything other than 2e. As a bonus it shows off non-drow Underdark stuff, focusing on aboleth, derro, svirfneblin, illithids and so on instead. It's also set in Genericland so it's easy enough to transfer to anywhere. Carl Sargent designed it, he's a cool guy Aw yeah, seconding this. Night Below is awesome. 
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Sep 23, 2016 15:18
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gradenko_2000 posted:Pissing off deplorables alone is well worth the price of admission. "more like Swords & Misandry, AMIRITE??" 
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Oct 5, 2016 16:47
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This new printing looks awesome, and anyone who makes an honest attempt in moving "the OSR" away from the toxic, hateful manchildren that tend to inhabit it deserves to have piles of cash thrown at them. I'm backing the hell out of this.
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Oct 7, 2016 09:22
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quote:Going forward, I'll delete all pro and anti social justice comments. I'm not going to pick sides. "Bigotry or inclusiveness, I don't know, maybe the truth lies ~somewhere in the middle~". ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ alg posted:Which basically makes the OSR into the whitewashed wasteland a lot of fatbeards would like it to be. Whitewashed Fatbeard Wasteland sounds like a great name for an OSR module. 
Comrade Koba fucked around with this message at 17:50 on Nov 18, 2016 |
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Nov 18, 2016 10:15
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Ratpick posted:That gave me an idea for a Magic-User who saves his precious spell slots and throws darts and burning flasks of oil in combat while shouting "Magic missile!" and "Fireball!" "Bigby's Forceful Hand, motherfucker!" *punches orc in the face*
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Feb 13, 2017 12:51
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thorsilver posted:I like a crunchier OSR game, my nostalgia is pretty laser-targeted at ADnD (mainly 2e but 1e is good too) so all the millions of Basic/etc. clones don't do a lot for me. What else is out there based on 1e/2e that's worth a shout? For Gold & Glory is a free 2E retroclone. I’ve got the print version, it’s a bit dry and uninspiring but at least it’s a handy 2E rules reference in a single softcover book.
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Oct 31, 2017 21:32
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If you want to give ACKS a try without giving money to nazi shitbiscuits, there’s always easily available  . It’s one of the most pirated retroclones, by the looks of it.
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Nov 1, 2017 22:24
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Fuego Fish posted:I didn't realise some people's willpower was so weak they can't help but throw their money at reprehensible scumbags, simply because they just gotta have a lovely-rear end elfgame splatbook or some loving mediocre fried chicken. "Hmm, yes, I see, those are all very good points, HOWEVER there are no *actual* rules for genocide in the Complete Alt-Right Handbook, therefore we shouldn't judge." 
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Nov 2, 2017 16:01
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