End-of-Week Elmore (6/14/13)

"Oh my god! He killed Aleena!" "You bastard!"

 

I think I'm shallow. At least, when it comes to Dungeons & Dragons. Or maybe I'm not.

 

Perhaps I'm just nostalgic. Or maybe I'm not. Or maybe I am, and that's just friggin' fine.

 

You may be wondering what in the world I'm talking about here. Well, I know I've talked on this blog before about a yearning to run some Basic D&D action using the original rule books, specifically the Mentzer version of the game. At the moment, I'm running the Moldvay/Cook/Marsh analogue that is Labyrinth Lord. And while I'm having a good time, there's still something missing.

 

Once again, I'm thinking that I have a nagging, internal insistence that I use the Mentzer-era books I own to run/play Basic D&D. Note: when I talk about my Mentzer books, I'm referring to spiral-bound print-outs of the Basic and Expert books, and my old cherished copy of the Rules Cyclopedia.

 

You know, for a little while I was feeling sorta ashamed to say that my yearning is perhaps born, at least in part, from nostalgia. We all know that the n-word is indeed a dirty word to some members of the OSR community. But you know what? I don't give a damn. Who the hell am I trying to impress? I'm not trying to win a popularity contest here. I'm trying to play some f-ing Dungeons & Dragons (and who plays D&D to be popular, anyway)?

 

Why do I want to use the original rules, Mentzer in particular? Here's why:

• I want to see Elmore's art while I'm flipping through the books (unless I'm using my copy of the Rules Cyclopedia, which means I'll be seeing Terry Dykstra's art, which is also just fine by me). His art is closely tied to my gaming origins, and I get a deep-seated, positive visceral feeling when I see his work. Nostalgia, perhaps, but I don't really care.
• I want to read the game in Mentzer's vernacular, and experience the "archaic" layout (and damn the vaunted streamlined organization of retroclones!). Nostalgia, perhaps, but I don't really care.
• I have the old books (or printed PDF versions, at least) and want to use them.

Ok, so there, alright? Screw it, I want to use the old books and it's probably from some sort of nostalgia as well as a bit of practicality, since I want to use what I own.

The only real reason I'm not running a game with the old books right now is the fact that I'm running games at my FLGS, and the proprietors want people to run games that are in print (and therefore can be purchased from the store). I respect this requirement entirely, but it doesn't mitigate my desire!

I want the "gravitas" and the "warm and fuzzies" that come from playing Classic Dungeons & Dragons with the actual books from days of yore! And I don't care who knows!

In the Mind of a Mad Gamer

"Oh, and Game Master, just one more thing: love your campaign!"  

Perhaps the excessive heat the US has been suffering under has broken my brain. Perhaps seeing the bickering of my family over parental issues (that's all I'll say on the matter here) has broken my spirit. Whatever the cause(s), I've found my brain severely unfocused as of late. As a result, my mind has been spinning on all levels, and this includes my gaming life.

When I was young, my hobbies were a true escape from a tumultuous family life. I read books voraciously. I found solace in places like, well, Solace, the tree-top village in the Dragonlance Chronicles. Yes, reading was a hobby, and linked to that was a "hobby" of self-imposed isolation. To be hidden in the depths of a library, secluded among stout walls made of book shelves with a book in hand, was to be in paradise for a short time. I also liked to write fantasical stories, an interest that I'm sure I shared with many young people who enjoyed Dungeons & Dragons.

When I discovered Dungeons & Dragons, I was often in the role of Dungeon Master, as my enjoyment of crafting plots was the greatest among my childhood group. As with many of us, the game gave us a means to develop creatively and socially.

I suppose reading is still an escape for me, and roleplaying is still something of an escape and a creative outlet, as well as a great social event (I can't say enough about how much I enjoy being around my current group of players). Though now I'm escaping the sometimes onerous grind of adult responsibility/bullsh*t.

ANYway, to continue on from my recent post about self revelation, of late I've found myself feeling pulled in many directions with regard to what I want to run as a game master. I feel really upset at myself for putting my still-young Labyrinth Lord game on hold. I didn't want to do that to my players. But I also had to be true to myself with regard to the fact that I felt unfulfilled with what I was running.

After a lot of rumination on the more nebulous aspects of my feelings, I think I've reached some clarity on things. I suppose not many people out there will be interested in hearing a 30-something man go on and on about roleplaying woes, but this is more for my own sanity, I think. I need to lay out what's on my mind in some organized form. I hope this will alleviate the swirling miasma of Gamer ADD. I've been inspired by Chris at Classic RPG Realms, who isn't afraid to talk out his struggles regarding what system to use.

Again, I consider anything with D&D "DNA" to be D&D wearing a mask. All that being said, here's my thought process as of right now:

Basic D&D

I have come to realize that I really want to run a game using actual Classic/Basic D&D rules. The retroclone thing wasn't cutting it. This came as something of a shock to me, as I'm a big fan of the 'clones. But I can no longer hide from myself the fact that I want to play "pure" if I'm going to play Basic D&D.

If I'm going to deal with the somewhat arcane mechanics of Basic D&D, then I want to be actually playing Basic D&D. That means using the original rulebooks. I have a copy of the Rules Cyclopedia that I'm dying to use, and I have PDFs of the individual Mentzer box sets that I can print out (or have done so already).

I'm not sure if this sounds shallow or bizarre, but yes, I want to use those original books. I don't want to use a retroclone. There, I said it. Again, I have nothing against the 'clones. They're great, and they're the impetus behind looking back to explore early D&D.

But I want to see that Larry Elmore/Terry Dykstra artwork when I'm flipping through the books. I want to see the fonts they used. I want the beholder in the monster section! I want that authentic D&D experience, which to me means using the original books.

And in using the original books, I want to stay as close to rules as written as I can. I really want to cut down my house rules and just do rulings on the fly as needed. I think the majority of my house rules will pertain to the classes, to give them a bit more "oomph."

Again, I'm feeling very guilty about putting my Labyrinth Lord game on hold after only a handful of sessions. I think I owe it to my group to give Basic more of a fair shot. But to me that means actually using those original rule books. Once more, I ask: is this insane?

I'll include the DCC RPG here, because it uses Basic's race-as-class feature and many other connections to Basic. I really like what Goodman Games has done to the D&D chassis. But I feel like it has more rules crunch than I'm willing to deal with at the moment. I have an urge to run some DCC RPG in the future, but not right now. I don't want to deal with the crunch.

Advanced Dungeons & Dragons

When it comes to Advanced Dungeons & Dragons, for some reason I currently have the opposite desire: I do NOT want to run a game using actual AD&D rules. I would much, much rather use Castles & Crusades. I'm not sure if this is a strange divergence from my "NEED PURE BASIC D&D!" feelings. But there you have it. At any rate, I have no desire right now to GM an AD&D/C&C game.

D&D Mine

Every once in a while I get the urge to make my own "edition" of D&D. Who in our blogosphere community hasn't felt that urge, right? I want to take the Swords & Wizardry clone as a foundation and put in all the tweaks I want and make my own game! I was inspired recently by JB at B/X Blackrazor when he proposed the D&D Mine concept.

But at the moment, this still is a case of "MUST PLAY PURE BASIC D&D!" eating at my brain. So this recurring urge is, once again, pushed aside.

Other RPGS

I really like Savage Worlds and the Dragon Age RPG. Their allure is that they offer an alternative to those games that are variations on D&D (i.e. those games that use mechanics very similar to D&D, either Basic or Advanced). And this appeals, because I have no deep-seated desire to immediately house rule either of these non-D&D RPGs, because they aren't D&D!

I think that I'm so familiar with the D&D rules that I can't help myself when it comes to house ruling. I'm sort of tired of this uncontrollable need on my part to endlessly tweak the D&D design. So, to me, the logical solution is to try another RPG for a while, and take a break from D&D in all its forms.

Yet my desire to play these games, strangely enough, makes me yearn for D&D. I'm really feeling insane...

Conclusion

I try to tell myself that I don't have a time limit on my new gaming life. I can run one sort of game/RPG for a while and then switch to another at some point down the road.

Ultimately, I'm sorry to subject my poor gaming group to the results of my scattered mind. I'm feeling like a very divided self, with my attention pulled in too many directions. This is frustrating to no end.

Any advice is very much appreciated.

Why do I love the RC? XP for Roleplaying (and More)!

It seems like lately I've been reading some blog posts blasting D&D for not having rules for earning XP beyond killing things and taking their stuff (don't ask me to point out specific blog posts, I can't do it, so you'll have to trust me on this one).

Perhaps these bloggers were referring to OD&D or Moldvay/Cook/ Marsh BX. Why do I say that?

Because the Rules Cyclopedia (a consolidation of Mentzer's BECMI) has an experience chapter (Chapter 10) that breaks down how characters earn experience thusly:

1. By Role-Playing Well
2. By Achieving Party Goals
3. By Defeating Monsters and Opponents
4. By Acquiring Treasure
5. By Performing Exceptional Actions

So, as you can clearly see, earning XP from killing monsters and getting treasure are numbers 3 and 4 on the Rules Cyclopedia list! The chapter goes on to give the details on how exactly XP of all types is actually determined (I can't get into it now, sorta busy with work and all).

Thinking back through the misty fog of my memory, I seem to recally that, though I never played using the RC rules (again, being firmly an AD&D kid) I nonetheless read the Cyclopedia and mined it for information. This includes the experience chapter.

My love for the RC grows and grows...

Thoughts after reading Moldvay’s Basic Set

So, as part of my desire to read up on Classic or "Basic" D&D, I’ve read through Moldvay’s Basic Set. Here’s how I sum up my thoughts after reading it:

The nostalgia that I felt was heavy duty (again, I never played it when I was young, but it still reminded me in some ways of reading through the AD&D 1E books).

The only real difference that I could see between Moldvay Basic and Labyrinth Lord was the rules for attribute adjustment. It might be clearer to state that the only rules difference that matters to me is attribute adjustment, which I think is absent from Labyrinth Lord (then again, I haven’t read Labyrinth Lord from cover to cover, so I could be wrong). But really, I don't think that there are any other differences of any considerable size.

If I wanted to play by these rules or something like them, I’d rather play Labyrinth Lord.

This last statement is how I felt after finishing my read-through. I feel like Labyrinth Lord has a much better organization, appearance, and some small changes in the rules that make it much more accessible, at least to me at my current stage of life.

The big factors that appeal to me when thinking of running a Classic D&D game are:

Limited class options make it easier for the GM to remember class abilities and faster for players to create characters (even faster than Castles & Crusades/C&C, which is pretty quick when it comes to character creation).

Saving throw progression and other similar mechanics don’t require the thought process that goes into systems that require the GM to create target numbers for attribute checks (an issue I had with D&D 3E, but C&C mitigates much of the thought process with the SIEGE Engine system). If I ever thought there was a need for attribute checks in a Classic D&D game, I like the thought of making players roll under the appropriate attribute score. I’ve always felt that D&D attribute numbers were sort of useless, and their modifiers or lack thereof had more effect on the game (perhaps that was just my style of play back in the day…)

The four human races and the demihuman race-as-class options lend a certain archetypal/mythic aspect to the game that appeals to me. I have ideas for developing my own setting for use with Classic D&D rules, and using that in a future campaign.

How Classic D&D lends itself to a certain style of play that is appealing to me (i.e. simpler, faster, rules-light, archetypal/”mythic”). I truly believe that system influences style of play.

Actually, there’s one other big thought on my mind, as you can probably tell from all my references to C&C above: I still prefer C&C for my number-one go-to game. I love that system and its combination of AD&D and d20 D&D concepts. It’s the rules set that makes me want to do the least amount of house ruling. To me, at this point in my life, I find that “limited need for house ruling” is a big factor for me when it comes to a game system. This is mostly due, I think, to my limited free time for gaming. I would prefer to spend my time prepping for game time and actual play rather than rules tinkering. And less house rules means that players can depend mostly on published rules and not have to worry about tons of house rules that I might foist upon them.

While I was reading Labyrinth Lord, I found myself doing a lot of house ruling in my head. There were a lot of tweaks I found myself wanting to make. And in considering the changes, they were mostly efforts on my part to put C&C functionality into Classic D&D. Such as thinking about how to do attribute checks in Classic D&D in a manner that was satisfying to me.

I KNOW that this is a big heresy when it comes to Classic D&D play. I know there’s a rabid contingent of people, many many people out there, who would balk at my attribute check fixation. Trust me, I do so myself. In our C&C games, I try to minimize attribute checks when possible, resorting to asking my players to roleplay out the actions they want to accomplish as much as possible. Even if they are asked to make an attribute check, I still ask them to roleplay things out (and depending on how convincing they are, I will often give them bonuses to the associated rolls).

And come to think of it, instead of resorting to Classic D&D rules to get the Classic D&D “style” of gameplay (archetypal), I could very well just run C&C but restrict races and classes to what would be close to what is available in Classic D&D.

I am thinking of potentially asking my group if we could sometimes run Classic D&D one-shot sessions. Just so I can get a fix. One other aspect of Classic D&D that I like, funnily enough, is how deadly it can be. I would like to run a game that is more deadly and less about epic adventure. Again, this is just my own perception of game systems, but I find that AD&D/C&C (at least for me) lend themselves to more epic adventure style of play, where characters are more hardy at lower levels and therefore have a much greater chance of living to reach high levels and forging great destinies.

Anyway, there you have it, folks. For good or ill. Please give me your thoughts. I guess I’m on to read Moldvay Expert, and then on to Labyrinth Lord (for a more through read than I’ve ever given it).

Readin' Up on Basic/Classic/Just Plain D&D

I was recently chastized for referring to Moldvay and Mentzer's sets as OD&D, and perhaps rightly so. Mea culpa. Again, I never actually played OD&D or Moldvay/Mentzer in my gaming career. I started out with AD&D from the get-go. I may have collected things such as the Rules Cyclopedia and the Big Black Box, but never played those versions.

[Just as an aside, I would personally like to call Moldvay / Mentzer's versions D&D, rather than Basic or Classic D&D. Basic doesn't seem to fit to me, since Moldvay had an Expert set, and Mentzer had the Expert / Companion / Master / Immortal sets to follow up his Basic. I would prefer to call the iterations Original D&D, D&D, and AD&D...but I suppose that might not be clear enough. Ah heck, I guess I'll stick to Classic D&D, then.]

It's only now that I'm dabbling in Original and Classic D&D. I purchased Lamentations of the Flame Princess as well as Labyrinth Lord and Swords & Wizardry. As stated above, I have a copy of the Rules Cyclopedia at home, and even managed to snag some PDFs of the books in Moldvay and Mentzer's sets. So now I have piles of original versions as well as clones...and I need to start studying up!

I know in the past I declared Mentzer's version of Classic D&D to be my go-to once I was ready to run some plain-old D&D, either using the RC or the books from the sets. Well, now I'm not so sure.

So, I've decided to start really reading up on the old Classic material. I'm picking a starting point as of now, and that is Moldvay/Cook/Marsh B/X. I'm not really sure where I will go from there. Any advice would be very welcome!

And BTW, where's Holmes fit in with all this? I frankly have no real interest in considering Holmes. I've glanced at his version, and seemed like just a jumble.

Anyway, I'm off to start studying. If I have time, I'll post some impressions. Wish me luck on my journey of discovery...

EDIT: I suppose I should have included a status update of where my head is at currently with regard to "preferred" editions, eh? At this point, Labyrinth Lord seems to have risen above the rest of the pack, both original editions and clones, in my estimation. But I would like to read Moldvay to see how things were originally published. Mentzer and the RC call out to me, perhaps just from nostalgia. But from my prior superficial scans of the contents of LL, the Mentzer-era stuff doesn't seem as "shiny" anymore...at least at the moment.

As for Swords & Wizardry, it's sort of slipping further down on the rungs of my affection. I like some aspects of it, but these aspects (spells, some class options) may be things that I steal for use with a game founded on LL. And I have no interest in gaining access to the original books that S&W is based upon. Is that heresy?

When it comes to Lamentations of the Flame Princess, it too is probably something from which I will steal ideas. For instance, I may use Raggi's d6-based thief skills instead of percentiles. That would probably be the major borrowing.

See how this can all be quite maddening?! Curse you once again, Gamer ADD!

DCC Typo and Basic D&D Attribute Checks

So I was looking over the Dungeon Crawl Classics beta rules again, and also rereading the DCC Free RPG Day Adventure Starter, when I noticed the typo shown above in the Adventure Starter. Yes, it says "Mentzner" when it should read "Mentzer." To their credit, this typo doesn't exist in the DCC beta rules. I just thought I'd point it out, especially in light of my recent declaration of Mentzer's D&D being my non-Advanced D&D version of choice.

Anyway, I've been looking at sources like DCC and other game systems, as well as the blogosphere of course, for ideas for  house rules pertaining to attribute checks. Now, before you all start commenting about how OD&D is about player skill and not character skill, and thus there is really no need for attribute checks, I only want a simple mechanic I can use in those instances where I feel that character skill would exceed player skill.

Plus, I've always felt that the D&D attributes should do something other than provide you with bonuses if you have a 13 or above. I've often thought that they were pretty useless, just sitting there, these numbers that don't really have any practical use. Unlike systems like Savage Worlds (where attributes are the dice you roll to perform tasks) or Dragon Age, where you roll 3d6 as in D&D but you only record the bonus the die roll result provides (so if you roll an 18 for your Strength, you have a bonus of 4 to add to Strength attribute checks...the bonus is what you record on your character sheet).

I've seen people espouse a xd6 check mechanic for D&D, and there's the d20 method. I was thinking of going with d20 and sometimes subtracting character level from the die roll if deemed appropriate.

So, my question to you is: what attribute check mechanic do you use for OD&D, if any, and please let me know the meat of your "system" and in what instances you use it. Looking forward to hearing from you all!

Facing Down the Beast

So, instead of bitching about gamer ADD like I've been prone to do in the past, I decided to man-up and do what I should have done before: take all the RPGs that have been plaguing my mind and literally spreading them all out in front of me. Like a lineup of the usual suspects. And I gave them a good hard look, and some thought, and I was determined to come to some conclusions. And I think I've finally regained mastery of my gaming domain.

First there's Castles & Crusades, my number one game. The Sancho Panza to my Don Quixote. The Little John to my Robin Hood. The Riker to my Picard. I started out my gaming career with AD&D 1E/2E, and C&C to me is a near-perfect reimagining of those editions of the game. I like what Troll Lord Games has done with the system by incorporating the SIEGE Engine mechanic, bringing some 3E into the mix. I don't have to do much in the way of house ruling to get it to where I need it to be at my table. I will never need to go back to AD&D, because C&C has become the ideal version of those editions, to me.

Now, as I've said before, until recently I never actually played any version of basic/original/non-Advanced D&D. I bought the Rules Cyclopedia when it came out in the early 90's, and also bought the "Black Box" version of D&D, but never actually played them. I missed out on the whole boxed set thing entirely when I was a kid. The LBBs and all that Holmes, Moldvay, Mentzer, etc. jive was something I would have appreciated back then, I think...but I missed it all. I was just never exposed to it.

But looking back now, and having dabbled in OD&D (especially via Swords & Wizardry and Lamentations of the Flame Princess), I have become more and more enamored of OD&D and its clones. But looking through Moldvay, Mentzer, the Rules Cyclopedia, clones like Labyrinth Lord and S&W and LotFP and all the rest, I think that I feel strongly about actually using the original Mentzer books rather than a clone. I just like the look of the game, the layout of the books, the style, the art (as a confessed Elmore nut). There's just something about it that calls to me.

So, when I get the chance to run some OD&D, I'm going to use Mentzer, with some house rules I'm mulling over to add a bit of spice to things. I'm taking inspiration for my house rules from many sources on the web and blogosphere, as well as from other games. This includes the beta version of Dungeon Crawl Classics RPG.

Now, there are some other various games that have also been tempting me with their shininess. Games such as Barbarians of Lemuria, Dragon Age, and even that game based in Middle Earth called The One Ring that I just learned about YESTERDAY! Yes, gamer ADD has no mercy. Heck, I just really discovered a lot to like about Dragon Age less than a week ago, on Free RPG Day. All of these various other games I have lumped together as potential candidates, but I have used a bit of reality to temper my expectations. These miscellaneous games are nice and all, but I either don't own them, they haven't been published yet, or they would take time to learn that I just don't seem to have these days.

Above all, I'm totally dedicated to the Dragonlance game I am currently running, and have no intention of sacrificing it in order to jump into OD&D right now. And especially not for some new shiny game that would require a whole new cycle of reading rules, learning rules, teaching rules to others, etc. I've been waiting a looooong time to do a Dragonlance campaign,  and I have met a great group of gamers who make running the game a pleasure.

Wow, it feels good to get that all out! All it took was standing up to the beast!

Early-Afternoon Reflections & Some Gamer ADD

Well, as I near my 100th post, I've been reflecting on the events in my renewed roleplaying career since June of last year. That's when I started this blog. I don't really have time to do a year-in-review post at the moment, but I might do something like that for the actual 100th post. I want to take a look at my progress over the last year as far as actual gaming is concerned, refocus on the purpose of my blog and consider what I might do differently going forward, and perhaps make some predictions on what the future may hold. On the matter of roleplaying, I definitely feel like I need to make my own destiny, so the future will truly only be what I make it. And there's a part of me that is saying "You've been doing this for a year and you only have 100 posts?! Weak!"

I also wanted to report that I am currently suffering Gamer ADD again. This time, of all things, I find myself longing to possess the Mentzer Basic and Expert box sets. I know, I know, there are those out there that are going to start saying that the Moldvay Basic and Cook/Marsh Expert are superior, and that Mentzer's work is a "kiddified" version of D&D. I wish I had copies of all of those sets, so I could compare for myself. QUESTION: can anyone give me a summary of the differences, and the pros and cons of each? I am sure that there has to be such a comparison out there in the blogosphere. Oh, and I'm not sure if I should bring the Holmes thing into the mix...ugh.

I have a copy of the Rules Cyclopedia, so I technically don't need the Mentzer stuff. But I dug up some PDFs of the Mentzer books on the Internet, and I find myself enamored by them. Why? I have to admit that I'm not really sure. It might be pure nostalgia, and not necessarily the good kind. As some of you may know by now, I never really played "regular" D&D. I started out playing Advanced D&D as a kid. I may have been around the D&D books (like the Rules Cyclopedia) but my friends and I never used that other stuff. We were 1E PHB, DMG, and MM all the way.

Maybe the Mentzer stuff appeals on a very shallow level, since they contain a lot of art from Larry Elmore. Elmore was also the primary artist for the early Dragonlance novels, and we all know how I feel about Dragonlance by now.

It's only in recent years that I've payed more attention to the OD&D works. I've stated here before that I didn't really care to learn the difference between Holmes and Moldvay and Mentzer, but it's sort of seeping in through osmosis. Yet I find myself getting more and more curious about those box sets. Maybe it's a seed of gamer puritanism within me. Sure, I could use Labyrinth Lord or Swords & Wizardry or some other retroclone. But there's something about using the original books that somehow appeals.

Oy, it's enough to drive one insane! For now, I need to return a bit to reality and stick to the good gaming I have going on at the moment. Enough with the grass is greener stuff, right?