"Dear JB" Mailbag #11

Something new...on non-Reddit letter, but rather a missive from the CAG discord. While it was addressed to all CAG members, I told the writer I'd throw his letter in the "mailbag" (he said my Dear JB stuff inspired the post anyway).

Dear JB:

My AD&D campaign kicked off in mid September and we’re 18 sessions in. I emphasized CAG style play even before then, but the system(s) we had used would often work against this, and my players developed a few bad habits as a result (I probably did too). Add to that the needing to learn AD&D rules and you get my approach to DMing which has included a healthy amount of teaching the game through providing information and verbalizing options to players that would (or should) just be known to players with more skill and experience with the game. At what point do you think I should back off and let the players figure things out on their own, maybe even through hard-earned lessons ( has happened already. 4 character deaths since September)?  

Signed, (Hopefully not egregiously) 

Helicopter DM 

Dear Helicopter DM:

After 18 sessions and nearly half a year (five and a half months?) I'd figure your players should have a pretty good idea of how the game is played. Hell, they should have been ready for any "training wheels" to come off 12-15 sessions ago.

I know I say this a lot, but D&D (even AD&D) isn't "rocket science." It's a game...and a game that is readily played by kids as young as 10 (or thereabouts). Note, I say played, not DM'd (though 12-13 is old enough to run AD&D semi-competently...I know, having done so myself). But with a Dungeon Master who's familiar with the system, there's not a lot players need to know: by the second or third session of play, all but the most obtuse players should have a solid handle on the basic system mechanics (AC, HPs, to hit rolls, saves, Vancian magic, experience points, surprise, initiative, secret doors, thief skills, etc.) because all of these systems should have been showing up in-play from the very first session.

"CAG" ("classic adventure gaming") is not a "style" of play, nor even some "mindset" one has to adapt. It is simply a term used to describe the type of play that emerges from playing old edition RPGs (like AD&D) in the way in which they're intended to be played, i.e. as a game. That's it...that's all it is. 

If your players are NEW to AD&D (that is, if they're used to playing other RPG systems: 5E, PbtA, Savage Worlds, etc.), they are going to have to learn the new rules and objectives of play...but that's really all they're learning. Risk is different from Axis & Allies which is different from Warhammer which is different from Advanced Squad Leader, and while there is some terminology (and dice) that carries over between games..and even similar themes...they are distinct games, and one has to spend some time learning the rules.

Similarly, AD&D is a distinct RPG from other editions of D&D, even though it shares the name Dungeons & Dragons in its title. Now, it's not INCREDIBLY different from 2E or 5E, so the "learning time" should be pretty negligible when making the transition from a different system. But there IS a period of learning. For an adult player who has played other versions of D&D I'd estimate the learning period to range from one to four sessions...and you can cut that learning time in HALF if the player has access to their own Players Handbook and the inclination to read in their spare time. 

Now, just because they've learned the rules doesn't make them any good at the game. If you're a beginner playing a veteran in a war game (like the ones mentioned two paragraphs back) you're most likely going to have your ass handed to you by your opponent, and that's to be expected. You come back to the game, not because you like getting pwned, but because you love the game...and you love it enough that you're willing to suffer through some hard knocks to get better at it.

In AD&D, the GAME is your opponent.

As the Dungeon Master, your job is to run the game; the game cannot be played without a Dungeon Master. Let me try an analogy: playing AD&D is like driving a race car. The system is the car; the battery of the car is Dungeon Master's effort level (the fuel is whatever fires the DM's imagination). The track or course is the adventure being played. 

The players...collectively...are the driver. They are trying to handle both the car (the system) and the course (the adventure)...not an easy task, especially for a beginning driver. When starting out, they need a slower speed and a simpler track, but as they grow in confidence and proficiency, you can give them more "curves" and press them to gear up, speed up, post better times. 

You don't want the group driving 30mph six months into their career.

Look: your players should, at this point, have a good handle on how to play AD&D. After half a year and 18 sessions, I'd probably expect your PCs to be in the 5th-6th level range (maybe 4th for multi-class or replacement characters). They are no longer "beginners;" haven't been for a long time. You should be offering them scenarios ("adventures") that are appropriate for their level range...appropriate meaning commensurate danger for commensurate reward...and, then, letting them play. YOU run the game. THEY drive the race car. 

They don't need to be experts for you to stop verbalizing possibilities to them. If I were running such a group, I'd be fine with them asking "um, can I do this?" or "hey, how would I do that?" But my attention would not be on offering suggestions of possible actions they could take...instead, my focus would be squarely on running the game: here's the situation my dudes, now what are you going to do about it?  

Rather than making excuses for your players (and for yourself) you should be making adventures...that's really the bottom line. Stop worrying about the players "learning the hard way" (or whatever). You either want to run AD&D...or you don't. The players either want to play in the game you're running...or they don't. Here's what I know for certain: YOU will not be satisfied and energized unless you run the game system you want to run. And no campaign can survive a Dungeon Master that is un-satisfied and lacks energy. Zero chance. 

Let them play...I promise the players will all survive (even if their characters don't). Direct all your worries and stress into making sure the playground is awesome and exciting, so much so that they don't mind the occasional bruise or scraped knee.

Sincerely,

JB

"Storygamers"

Oh, boy. A loooong one for a Friday.

"Storygamer" is a term that gets bandied about the internet a lot these days, generally in a pejorative fashion. I seem to see it a lot amongst those folks identifying themselves as "CAG (classic adventure gaming) gamers," generally setting themselves up in opposition to this particular type, or style, of player.

First allow me to reiterate (or explain) that this label of "adventure gaming" is simply meant to distinguish what I do from what is usually considered "role-playing" these days (i.e. in the 2020s). Up until the 2010s, I certainly would have called myself a "role-player," and these games I play "role-playing games" or RPGs. When it comes to running AD&D, I take the same approach I have (pretty much) always taken...generally speaking, the same approach I've taken towards ALL role-playing games I've run over the years.

That being said:

1) it is remarkably difficult to run most RPGs in the style of AD&D (and as evidence, I will point to the consistent LACK of my ability run other RPGs over the long-term; most non-D&D games...with some exceptions...have been extremely short-lived affairs).

2) the AD&D I run these days is a much more mature, calculated, and conscientious than the AD&D of my youth. Credit this with having grown as Dungeon Master, and the years of work I've done on self-analysis and self-development.

But just because I distinguish myself as an "adventure gamer" does not mean I consider myself part of a particular tribe. I'm less interested in being a part of any particular community, and more interested in the game itself...what it can do for me, what I can do for it.

[it is similar to my feelings of the "OSR" back in the day; as I've written before, I never saw myself as part of a "movement," so much as an old geezer that wanted to play old games]

So, while I'm happy to die on this hill of championing 1E play, I'm far less interested in digging a trench around said hill, and spiking it pickets to keep out the "storygamers." ESPECIALLY because I feel that, these days, we may be using too broad a definition of just what a "storygamer" IS.

Here's a good blog post defining story games from Ben Robbins (of Ars Ludi). It's from October 2012, but holds up today, echoing many of my own thoughts (from 2013 and now). Here's a solid quote:

"A story game is a role-playing game where the participants focus on making a story together instead of just playing “their guy.” The alternative–which I played 100% of the time for more than two decades–would be adventure games like D&D, where your character is your turf.

"Yep, I said adventure games. I’ve used the term “traditional games” a lot but in hindsight it’s a terrible term for the games we’ve loved for decades. Back in the 70s and 80s these same “traditional” games were frickin’ radical. I think “adventure game” is a better term. In an adventure game it’s the job of the players to beat the adventure the GM presents. Again, not my invention: “adventure game” was a common term for D&D etc. back in the day."

Yep. I'm not the first one to call my kind of gaming (i.e. Dungeons & Dragons gaming), "adventure gaming." And neither was Ben, as he readily admits. But I digress; we were talking about "story gaming;" and here ya' go:

"In adventure games your job is to play your character and make good decisions for them. If you mess up (or roll badly) your character can die and be removed from the game. In a story game any character you play is a facet of the shared story. You may even sabotage your own character or spin them into tragedy because it makes the story more interesting. It’s a shift from “what would my character try to do” to “what do I want to have happen to my character” and in the story at large."

Or, to put it another way:

"In an adventure role-playing game you can only accomplish something because your character can do it. In a story role-playing game you can make something happen because as a player you want it, not just because your character can make it happen. In an adventure game like D&D you decide what your character does, but your ability to succeed is a reflection of your character’s traits...

"In a story game...the character isn’t the limit of your power in the game. The rules give the players authority over things that are outside their characters’ control..."

Got that? A story gamer is playing a different kind of game (a "story game") with mechanical differences that support that type of play. Lots of examples abound, many of which came out of the Indie RPG (Forge) think tank. But what about all those folks who play D&D with funny voices? Check this out:

"Take D&D, old school D&D even. The players control their characters and the GM controls everything else. The characters’ chance of success is based on their character’s fictional abilities (good fighters win fights, poor fighters lose fights, etc.). But the GM could say to a player “Hey, tell me about the monastery your character came from.” Suddenly the player has some story game-style input into the fiction: their character didn’t create the monastery they were trained in, that’s the player making up things they want in the game. Or the GM could ask the group whether they want the next adventure to be more wilderness or dungeon crawling or political intrigue. Again, now the players are making contributions outside their characters. 

"Those examples are not that uncommon in adventure games. So hey, that makes them story games, right? 

"Not really. The important difference is that those contributions are arbitrary and non-binding. The GM is deciding when to ask the players for world input (if ever) and if the GM doesn’t like what they propose she can decide not to use it. The GM holds the veto. In an adventure games rules system, story game-style participation is an ad hoc privilege, not a right, and it can be rescinded at any time or never extended at all. It’s not a system.

"On the other hand, if you’re a player in an adventure game and you can always decide to make “bad but interesting” decisions for your character but the penalties can be pretty brutal. Yep, it was awesome and dramatically moving to have your paladin take off his armor before the big battle to show his unshakeable faith in his god’s prophecy, but in game terms it meant you had a terrible AC and got cut down in a few rounds. Oops. Now sit and wait while everyone else finishes the fight. The adventure game doesn’t have a method to reward your decision because that’s not what it’s built to do. It doesn’t expect you to play that way."

I am quoting heavily from Robbins's blog post because he echoes my understanding and feeling on the matter. What he is calling "story games" I (as a Forum alum) would probably call "story now" games...games designed to tell a story and unconcerned with aspects of exploration of challenge. They're nice parlor games, but not anything designed for long-term play (i.e. play of more than a handful of sessions). And they're not bad! At least they have an objective of play (tell a nice story) and mechanics to support that.

But Ben was writing in 2013. In 2014 we see the advent of 5th Edition Dungeons & Dragons...and shit starts to hit the fan. Because the publishers of 5E (i.e. Hasbro/WotC) had absolutely zero concern whether or not their game is coherent, instructional, functional, etc. nor even if consumers have any idea/consistent standard of how the game is meant to be played. Instead, their sole concern, was reestablishing market dominance, i.e. reclaiming the market share they'd lost to Paizo/Pathfinder after the debacle that was 4th edition. They did not Give A Shit how or why people played D&D, just so long as people were playing D&D...and they were going to do their damnedest to make sure THAT would be the game RPG folks were playing. Everything to Everybody.

SO...the  "brutal" consequence of trying to do "story" while playing an adventure game? All that had to go out the window. Characters have to be EXTREMELY hard to kill (if not impossible). Players have to "give consent" for negative consequences to affect their character. Creating character backgrounds and establishing stories for PCs became part of the actual chargen process. "Balanced" character archetypes ensure that no matter what a player's particular preference of "flavor," the characters will be on equal footing. Screw asymmetry. Thus the ascendance of My Guy/Gal syndrome and let's-tell-our-precious-little-stories-about-ourselves.

*sigh*

After my last post about the Euro OSR, I had a private conversation with an individual who discussed some of the issues they've had with their players, despite running a 1E game:

"...my players do not want to be motivated by gold, they find the notion of upkeep and training costs silly from an in-game perspective. 

"We ran indeed into a conflict...I wrote in a short reflection on the state of the campaign and their player skill that "saving the NPC is essentially a pretense for adventurous play - as adventurers, you want to loot treasure as much as possible while on the mission" and they were offended. ...They do not play to level up (and perhaps to a small extent even are used that the GM just awards level up after 'successfully' finishing an adventure without the tracking of XP)...

And:

"To a large extent my players are able to formulate their own objectives of play, especially during a long term campaign (i.e. unfinished business, taking revenge etc.), although in practice I seed the world with adventure locales...

"They pick perhaps also to some extent in line with their character motivations, or - at the same time - what they as players find interesting and then retroactively, if at all needed, formulate a motivation for their character. Especially this 'thinking meta as a player and bending my PCs' motivation to what I want' is very foreign to players invested in their characters..."

This, in my estimation, is NOT "storygaming." There is a disconnect between the players and the DM, but it isn't a bridge too far to span. In fact, it would seem to require only a step sideways by the DM to make things work: these players are still interested in "adventure" gaming, they just need some facilitation.

Among many (most?) D&D players who look down on old style play, there is a perception that killing and looting is too simplistic, too coarse, too dumb an activity to engage in. "Kill monster, loot treasure, repeat, how boring!" Most of these players...at least the ones that haven't jumped on the YouTube train of playing D&D like Improv Night at TheaterSports...still want adventure, but they want meaningful adventure, if not grandiose. Just like a fantasy story they've enjoyed reading (or watching on a screen). Collecting gold, doesn't seem "meaningful"...it seems mundane. And they want to be transported...the "fantasy" of fantasy adventure gaming is, essentially, an escape from the mundane hum-drum of the normal world.

But when we look at the classic adventures that everyone still adores...Hommlet, Against the Giants, etc...we'll see that none of them are bereft of story. Good adventures are scenarios: they have a premise, an idea or concept that gives them meaning. There's a reason players are there. 

And the characters' "story?" They build that through actual play, the longer they survive. It is inevitable in campaign play: the PCs will build friends and enemies, allies and rivals. They will have ambitions and victories and setbacks and comedy and tragedy...the longer they play. 

DMs want our players to live in the world we're building. We want them to want to spend time there. And most players who want to play D&D (and, yes, I'd even include modern 5E players) want a fantasy world worth living in. It's the DMs job to create that world.

When we sit down to play D&D, we all need to agree with the core concept of the game: players are adventurers in a fantasy world. "Adventurers" are individuals with a certain skill set that use those skills (and their wit) to risk danger as their occupation. That's their job. They are not town guards, or bakers, or kings-in-waiting, or court jesters. They are adventurers.

And because they are adventurers, we "keep score" (in this game we've agreed to play) by measuring how successful they are at their job (i.e. how much money they make), with some bonuses (x.p.) earned for defeating opponents with violence...because violence is inherent to the adventuring profession. They risk danger with their skill sets, i.e. sword and spell. Again: this is the game we've all agreed to sit down and play.

That doesn't mean the players can't choose to buck the premise. One of the great joys of D&D is that players have agency to operate outside the strict parameters set by (for example) a video game or a Fighting Fantasy novel. They are here to live in this world...not follow a script (and if the players assume they're supposed to follow a script, it's the DM's responsibility to disabuse them of this notice up front ASAP! That's not the game!).  

And living in a world requires some means of supporting yourself. 

It is the DM's responsibility to run the world...and that means providing consequences both for action and for inaction.  Players...because they have agency...have their choice of how to deal with the dangers of the world and the costs of living there. The DM has to make sure that there ARE "dangers" and "costs" so that the players are properly motivated to engage with them. The players can choose not to seek out treasure...and they will eventually be out of cash to feed themselves or their horses, reduced to living like penniless vagabonds (and treated the same by the locals). They can choose not to stamp out the monstrous ogre tribe that's moved nearby...and they'll see the village where they're staying dwindle as people move away (or are eaten), shops close, beer barrels run dry, etc. 

It all comes down to the DM's world building.  The (1st Edition) game already has rules for handling most pertinent situations that arise during the game. But it's up to the DM to build the world in which those rules get used...and it's up to the DM to present the world in a way that engages the players.

The players have no interest in investigating the caravan raids that have been halting trade with the southern jungles? That will affect the local economy. The players aren't interested in the giants expanding their territory into civilized lands? Civilization will start to shrink. The players aren't enticed to break up a slaver ring that's preying on the innocent? More people will continue to disappear in the night. 

It is UNIMPORTANT that the players wish to create mannerisms for their character, or write up a backstory. That's FINE if they want to do that. Most 1st edition PCs already have a "backstory" of sorts: they have a race. They have a class. They have a name. You can already tell a lot about the character's pre-game "history" just from these things (and more if you want to use secondary skills). It doesn't make them a "storygamer" to want to do these things...nor even if they want to "self-sabotage" (like the paladin removing his armor before a fight). 

That doesn't make the player a "storygamer," because we are not playing a story game. We are playing an adventure game. If it means anything at all, it just means they're not a very good adventurer (certainly in the case of the dipshit paladin)...and that doesn't mean they can't get better!

As the Dungeon Master, YOU have all the power. You create the world; you run the campaign; you arbitrate the rules. Any issue or disconnect here really falls squarely upon the shoulders of the DM. At least it does for those of us running old edition D&D. Choosing to DM this older version of D&D means choosing to take up this mantle of responsibility.

Old edition D&D is not "collaborative" in the same way a story game is. Players looking for a collaborative game...one where they provide input that impacts the game in spite of the rules and the results of the dice...would be best served to look elsewhere. Because old edition D&D doesn't support that kind of game play. It never has. Yes, you can glom on rule additions (hand out "narrative change" points to players or whatever), but the more adaptations you make, the more bits you're likely to muck up (requiring more changes), the farther you get away from what works WELL about the D&D game, and the more you'd (probably) be better served by finding a game that already has the objective of "creating a story."

Or, you know, such players could simply write their own fiction...either solo or in collaboration with others. Just saying.

Those players who stick around are signing up to play an adventure game, regardless of whether or not they are giving their characters fictional "motivations." That's FINE if they want to do that. A motivation rooted in fiction ("The six-fingered man killed my father; one day I'll have revenge!") is nearly as good as a motivation rooted in game play ("I want to find a fireball spell...and get to a level where I can cast it!"). Motivations are good, because they incentivize action. Doesn't mean they're ever going to be fulfilled or come up in play (that magic-user might die before 5th level...). Them's the breaks.

As DMs we are not true "storytellers," because all stories have an ending to them, and our responsibility as a neutral arbiter to the game prevents us from having an attachment to ANY possible ending. We create adventures (scenarios) with which the players interact. These scenarios make sense in terms of the fantasy world we've created. Our world is run to the best of our ability with the help of the rules. It is a world of adventure: a world with monsters and treasure, dungeons and dragons. The better we build it, the more players will want to adventure within it, and the more adventures they will have. Until their characters die or retire. And it's only then, when a PC has ended, will we be able to say "Okay, hear's the story of Stoutheart the Grim..." Or whatever.

DMs are world builders; D&D players are adventurers. The interaction of these roles (builder and explorer) is the game. Not a "story game." An adventure game. And, if YOU (DM) are running an old version of D&D...like 1st edition AD&D...you have nothing to worry about when it comes to "storygamers." Storygamers will find story games to play in, and that will be a 'win' for everyone involved.

Build your world, run your world, love your world. Do that and all the other "noise" will cease to matter.

: )

Basic Adventure Gaming

Some years back, I decided that I would stop referring to what I do as 'role-playing' and instead refer to these things (what I once called "RPGs") as "fantasy adventure games" (or "FAGs," for short). I know I was doing this as early as 2013, because I was very deliberate in my omission of any phrases of "role-playing" in my self-published Five Ancient Kingdoms game. You see, I wanted to end any confusion over how I (as a designer) intended my games to be played.

Of course, the term "fantasy adventure game" is not original to my noggin...I'm fairly sure I stole the term directly from my copy of Moldvay. "Fantasy Adventure Game Basic Booklet" it says, right there on the cover (the Cook/Marsh expert set says "Fantasy Adventure Game Expert Booklet"). The first paragraph of Moldvay's introduction begins:

DUNGEONS & DRAGONS Fantasy Adventure Game ("The D&D Game" for short) is a role-playing adventure game for persons 10 years and older...

It's a good term for what the game is about..."fantasy adventure," duh...and, I believe, helps put one in the mindset of what we're supposed to be doing when we sit down at the gaming table. Let there be no confusion! We are here to play a game of fantasy adventure; we are not here to play-act, explore alternate personalities, or craft delightful narratives...all things the "role-playing" term has come to represent.

For the most part, I've approached my entire role-playing hobby in this way...and why not, when my introduction to the hobby was the D&D game?...even with game systems that are clearly not conducive to this style of play. Or rather, I did...up until the early 2000s when I started reading RPG theory over at the Forge and recognizing how different systems facilitate different types of play.

So, yeah...I've been a fantasy adventure gamer (a "FAG") for a long time. 40+ years. And yet I understand that my view of how to use these games is different from the majority opinion these days. Which is why I decided to start distinguishing myself (and, yes, distancing myself) from the "role-playing" terminology. Not because I don't see what I do as "playing a role-playing games" (a genre of entertainment distinct from board games or computer games), but because my approach to how one plays an RPG is so foreign to the majority of the community...even that part of the community purporting to play Dungeons & Dragons, the FIRST fantasy adventure game.

I'm not the only one. I've previously mentioned the growing CAG community ("CAG" is an acronym for classic adventure gaming...I suppose the term "FAG" was found to be problematic...), a splinter group of the "old school" scene that exist mainly to 'keep the flame' of adventure gaming alive, in the same way that the early OSR tried to keep alive "old edition" gaming: by discussion, encouragement, and sharing of 'best practice' wisdom from old timers, not to mention just playing. In terms of the overall hobby, CAG style play can be seen as a niche of a niche: "old variety D&D" is enjoying the same proliferation and popularity one sees in the current (5th+) edition of D&D, but even among the folks who play old edition D&D (or its clones, like OSE) there is a lot of misunderstanding, misinformation, and inaccurate assumptions of what game-play is supposed to look like. The CAG folks aren't (especially) trying to rectify that, but they are trying to be a repository for knowledge, and a resource for folks looking for a way of playing these games in this particular style.

"This particular style." Yeah, I know how I sound. I'm trying to avoid writing "teaching people how to play D&D the correct way," because I know that ruffles feathers. Ruffling feathers isn't my objective today. Definitely not my objective.

*ahem* For more information on CAG, I'd suggest checking out the semi-regular CAG podcast, especially the first couple/three episodes. For shorter summaries, you can read Zherbus or EOTB's blog postings which are fair summations of CAG gaming philosophy. Both of these folks are strong proponents of 1E AD&D (and OSRIC, 1E's retroclone), for the simple reason that it is the system that best facilitates this type of play (a perspective I happen to agree with). 

But the question has come up: Can Basic systems (like B/X, BECMI, Holmes, Labyrinth Lord, Old School Essentials, etc.) be used for CAG play? And, if so, how?

The answer to the first question is decidedly "yes." The answer to the second is...longer.

The basic games (Holmes, Moldvay, and Mentzer) were all initially intended to act as introductions to the D&D game. It is only with the additional Mentzer volumes (the Companion, Master, and Immortal rule sets) that the "D&D" game (distinct from Advanced D&D, i.e. AD&D, the main product line of TSR for the majority of its existence) became something that could be considered a "complete" game system...a system of its own, standing in its own right.

This latter edition (called BECMI, later consolidated in Aaron Alston's Rules Cyclopedia, sometimes referred to as the "RC") is something I didn't play when it was first published (i.e 'in the days of my youth'). My friends and I played AD&D, although we did pick up some of the BECMI offerings (for 'reasons'). But there was a LOT of stuff for this line that hit the shelves...I've always assumed it was a popular game line at the time, which is why they created so much content for it (setting material in the form of Gazetteers, game accessories, adventure modules for all levels of play). Decades later (in the early 2000s) I acquired a lot of it and messed around with it a bit, thinking there might be something there. 

Meh.

Only recently, I've been hipped to the fact that it might not have been a very popular game line at all...at least in the USA. However, this Mentzer-penned version of "basic" was the version first translated (officially) into other languages and sold overseas. The 1E PHB and DMG were translated into both French and German, but Mentzer's Basic set (and the BECMI line) was translated to French, German, Danish, Finnish, Hebrew, Italian, Japanese, Norwegian, Portuguese, Korean, Spanish, and Swedish. For many countries outside the United States, Basic D&D was the seminal, defining version of the game.

I'm digressing. As said, the original Basic sets were meant to be a "gateway" to the AD&D game (as it was for me)...but that wasn't necessarily the case in other parts of the world.  Then TSR crashed and we didn't see, hear, or care about these "basic" games until the rise of the OSR circa 2007-9.

Mm.

This next part is tricky. The OSR didn't treat these Basic editions as "introductory" systems; quite the contrary, they looked at them as editions of D&D worth being played in and for themselves. There were a lot of reasons for this. Ease/accessibility was a major reason: they are short systems to read with less nuance. Their rules were so uncomplicated and simple that creating additional, compatible material (a thrilling pastime for creatives) was a cinch. And...probably...there was a lot of familiarity and nostalgia with these systems, especially in light of A) the OSR being an international community, plus B) Mentzer's Basic being the "standard" D&D most widely translated across countries/cultures.

They were also some of the earliest retroclones on the market. Labyrinth Lord wasn't written as an 'introduction' to anything, and its Advanced Edition Companion gave people additional (1st Edition) content, adapted to the Basic chassis. Lamentations of the Flame Princess used basic D&D as a vehicle for exploring all sorts of grimness. OSE simply re-organized the B/X books in a way to make them even more user friendly than they already were.  None of them were designed, nor seemed interested, in being a gateway or bridge to a more Advanced game. These clones were created by different, independent publishers (with different, independent motivations), NOT by a single, gigantic corporation hoping to funnel newbs to its flagship product. 

So...back to that second question.

When one understands the objectives of "adventure gaming," one can begin to see the limitations inherent in a game designed first and foremost as an introduction to the "real game" (the Advanced Dungeons & Dragons game written and published concurrently with the first 'Basic' set). Most of the stated attributes of adventure gaming (again, looking at the two cited blog posts above) are easily satisfied even with a basic system of procedures. However, the overall objective/goal of fantasy adventure gaming is long term campaign play...sustained play in an enduring fantasy environment, created by the DM and impacted by the players. Despite the ease and accessibility of the various basic rule sets, their systems have several insufficiencies that hinder long term play. These are:

1. Severe lack of distinction between character type. The basic character falls into one of seven categoric class, is defined by one of three alignments, and has an extremely limited selection of equipment and magic spells with which to choose. Variation between ability scores is compressed (seven possible options for each ability) contributing to a marked "sameness" between PCs. For an introduction to the game, this limited selection is more than adequate; it cuts down on the amount of "analysis paralysis" inherent in a new player approaching a complex game. For long-term engagement, however, more distinction and variety is desirable. AD&D offers 36 class variations (interlocking with race), another score of multi-class options, several times the number of armor and weapon selections, and four distinct spell lists, each of which contains more 1st level spells than any spell list in the basic systems. The variety in the advanced game is sufficient without being overwhelming, providing much "replay" value (in terms of exploring different character types for interacting with the D&D environment).

2. Lack of survivability. This has been discussed before: basic characters are fairly fragile at low levels, easily slain by misadventure. Lack of staying power is a barrier to long-term play, requiring more work on the part of both DM and players to ensure surviving to higher levels of play (a desirable outcome as it opens more content for players and DMs to experience). AD&D increases survivability by providing higher hit dice for most character classes, a negative hit point "buffer," and plentiful healing magic from clerical types even beginning at 1st level.

3. Less opportunity for advancement. Basic systems award x.p. for both combat and treasure found (just as in AD&D) but does so at a lesser rater: fewer x.p. are awarded for monsters and treasure x.p. is only awarded for monetary treasure (magical items being deemed as 'their own reward'). True, x.p. totals for advancement are slightly lower than in the Advanced game, but in practice, far more x.p. is awarded in the Advanced game, especially with the potential to sell magic items for exorbitant amounts of gold and x.p. This procedure in first edition AD&D allows characters to continue to rise at a regular pace, even as the x.p. totals needed for advancement rise to six- and seven-digit figures. Treasure pools for monsters also have a tendency to award more treasure than what is given for the hoards of basic monsters; type H treasure (the best available in B/X) awards an average haul valued at 50,000 g.p. Considering that H treasure only occurs in dragon lairs...and that 50K split seven or eight ways is quite a small amount for name level characters requiring 100K-150K each for advancement...that is a lot of risk for comparatively small reward. As basic game PCs rise in level, advancement has the potential to stifle which, coupled with low survivability, is a bad recipe for "long term" play.

4. Lack of options for mid- to high-level play. Even when a basic campaign awards sufficient treasure for regular advancement, there is precious little to spend all that money on. Basic games require no training costs, no upkeep costs, have a shorter list of "buy" options available, and prices of items are quite depreciated (consider that plate armor costs a measly 60 g.p. in basic play and is available to all but the poorest of 1st level characters). Basic rules provide no rules for item depreciation/destruction, and thus there is never a need to replace or repair equipment for hirelings and retainers. While the Expert sets of both B/X and BECMI provide some guidelines for the building of castes and strongholds, only Mentzer's Companion and Master books make any real attempt at providing "domain" (rulership) rules...and these are poorly done, providing heaps of unearned x.p. on the heads of domain rulers for doing little more than raising taxes on their populations. True, there is some impetus for conquest provided in the Companion book (if only to gain higher titles of nobility), but the "War Machine" system is extremely limited in scope (meanwhile, neither Holmes nor B/X offer any such systems, referring DMs to the out-of-print Sword & Spells for handling mass combat). 

I admit that Mentzer's BECMI system strives mightily to provide options for high level characters: proto-prestige classes, combat maneuvers, higher level spells, demihuman "crafts," powerful monster antagonists, and codified quests for immortality. But, for all practical purposes, these options remain far out of reach due to the lack of advancement opportunity (#3 above) which makes the achievement of Companion (15th-25th) level characters next to impossible to achieve. Such characters require well in excess of 1 million g.p. worth of treasure...the equivalent of 20 average sized dragon hoards...each, in order to reach such lofty heights. Personally, I've found 12th level to be just about the maximum effective in (standard) B/X play, and even that requires impractically large treasure hoards (a four ox wagon can only pull 25,000 coins weight; a bag of holding in basic can only hold 10,000 coins). Any character with half a million in gold coins has the cash to purchase multiple castle complexes given the procedures in the basic rules.

And I imagine that was deemed just fine by the original designers. Buy your castle, retire your character...and then graduate to the Advanced D&D game for your next go around. Buying a castle and settling down in your gold stuffed halls should be considered a "win."

But fantasy adventure gaming is not played with a particular endpoint in mind. Some characters will, of course, "retire"...especially demi-humans who've reached the level limits and are unable to progress further. For the majority of human characters, however, AD&D has no hard cap, no limitation to advancement; like the campaign itself, adventurers' careers have the potential to be perpetual, ongoing without end. In theory, basic characters (both B/X and BECMI) have a 36 level cap which should probably be all but unreachable, even after years of play...but the game does not scale nearly as well as it does in the AD&D game. Demons in BECMI are equivalent to (lesser) gods, not beasts to be fought in the deepest dungeon levels or (more usually) on the outer planes. And while Mentzer included his own version of artifacts in the Master set, they do not function nor serve the same purpose of reward as the artifacts and relics found in the 1E DMG (hint: there's a reason Gygax gives these items a sale value in gold).

So for those folks wishing to play a simpler, streamlined "basic" system with long-term CAG objectives, what can be done to remove these inherent impediments?

1. Increase character variability. The interlocking combination of race and class has generally been found to be sufficient for providing diversity in character choice. Labyrinth Lord's Advanced Edition Companion (and, presumably, OSE Advanced) takes pains to adapt 1E's system to the basic style and can be adopted wholesale...these games also tend to recreate the extended spell lists and equipment charts of 1E, but in a "basic" style. Solid world building with attention paid to markets and economy, and one's own setting-specific character options can also provide variety for players. The Complete B/X Adventurer provides a plethora of character options and new character classes, although the latter are meant to be used sparingly in better tailoring one's setting, not dropped in their entirety into a campaign.

2. Increase character survivability. Basic characters start to hit their stride around 3rd level, and one can simply start PCs at that level; likewise, DMs might add negative HP buffers, higher hit dice, and bonus spells (based on WIS or INT scores for clerics and magic-users, respectively). However, the main consideration for basic groups is to ensure they have enough bodies in their adventuring parties: 7+ is generally the fewest you want to see, and hired mercenaries (like the kind found in adventure module B2) should be readily available to low-level parties needing to 'fill out the ranks.' Special attention should be paid to both the Reaction and Morale procedures in the basic system, and both the DM and players should understand how these work, as 'breaking' foes (especially humanoids) is generally going to pay higher dividends than fighting them to the death. Fierce as a single ogre is, it is less likely to kill half a party than five to seven bandits/humanoids (all those attack rolls!)...especially ones armed with missile weapons. DMs need to take a look at what makes a "survivable" encounter for low level characters: the Tower of Zenopus example dungeon in Holmes basic, and adventure module B1 are both good resources in this regard. Also, it is incredibly important that DMs stock enough treasure that players are leveling up to more sturdy levels of experience as quickly as possible.

3. Provide sufficient treasure. Unless one adopts the AD&D system of awarding x.p. for magic items, and higher award totals for defeating monsters, DMs will need to find ways to stock immense amounts of coin and valuables for the players to advance. It should not be unusual for PCs to be 3rd level after 4-6 sessions of play (depending on character type and diligence in sniffing out loot), given a bit of luck and survival. Unfortunately it is difficult to sustain such progress even into the mid-levels, as I first noted waaay back in 2010...it is simply a flaw of design. However, one idea I had back then was to slash all x.p. requirements (i.e. the amount of x.p. needed to advance in level) by a factor of five or ten, while retaining the normal treasure hoard amounts and monster x.p. values. So, for example, a fighter's progression might look like this:

1st level: 0 x.p.

2nd level: 400 x.p.

3rd level: 800 x.p.

4th level: 1,600 x.p.

5th level: 3,200 x.p.

6th level: 6,400 x.p.

7th level: 12,800 x.p.

8th level: 24,000 x.p.

9th level: 48,000 x.p.

10th level: 72,000 x.p.

With an advancement table like this, a 50K dragon hoard split amongst eight survivors is a nice chunk of change: enough to raise a 6th level fighter to 7th or make a good size dent in a higher level character's x.p. needs.

4. Provide options for PCs of higher levels. Reducing the x.p. needed to advance alleviates some of the pressure to provide overflowing piles of gold and gemstones, but players must still have monetary needs to drain their coffers and perpetuate the cycle of treasure seeking. Here, solid world building will help, providing all manner of costs and expenses as well as delightful ostentations for purchase. DMs can, of course, adopt upkeep costs, item saving throws, and training fees from the 1E DMG...but then, why not just play AD&D?

More than that, game play needs to be scaled so that it remains interesting  even as play progresses...players should not be taking the same approach to monster fighting at 8th or 13th level as at 1st and 2nd. Here, a DM might well want to look at the later BECMI books (Companion and Master) for rules and procedures that are adaptable even down to 9th level (I would NOT however adopt the weapon specialization rules for low-level characters as it can disrupt game balance in the same way the UA's weapon specialization rules do). Likewise, DMs might wish to take a look at my own B/X Companion which provides a great deal of material specifically geared for high (15th+) level B/X play. Both "companion" books provide a number of new procedures (including unarmed and mass combat rules) in addition to a ton of new "content" (spells, monsters, magic items). For that matter, DMs looking for content might want to look at my last book Comes Chaos for a host of demonic entities and corrupted magic items, great for tarting up one's mid- to high level B/X campaign.  

The main thing, however, is to understand that there's going to be a lot of work involved in adapting a Basic rule system to the needs of long-term campaign play. While AD&D has requires a bit more work up front (learning to use its system) in comparison to the basic games, once learned it provides depth of game play from 1st up through the highest levels, needing only world building and adventure writing on the part of the DM to maintain solid, satisfying play. The basic system is incredibly easy to learn and run, but to make it an enduring form of play (i.e. the kind of play worth spending time out of our busy schedules) requires far more effort, not just in tweaking and experimenting with modifications to rules, but in designing adventures and developing content. Sure, there are sources for this content to be found: bestiaries, tomes of magic items, or various retroclones (and their supplements) with setting specific particulars...but searching out that content and curating it requires work. By contrast, I've yet to use every monster presented in original 1E Monster Manual, let alone the Fiend Folio and MM2, and there are spells and magic items from the original PHB and DMG that haven't yet been seen at my table...after decades of play.

Just saying.

That work, that effort that goes into making a basic game system a sustainable form of play can be fun at first...look at my blog as evidence of that! All the tinkering I did with B/X over the first 10-12 years of its life...but over time can lead to frustration and (in my case) ennui. The mature, adventure focused Dungeon Master wants to spend his or her time on world building and scenario creation, not hand holding and system modification, but the shallowness of basic game play requires BOTH those things in order to make it last and function ("hand holding" being a shorthand for customizing the game in a way that it doesn't kill the PCs nor bore the players out of engagement). YES, it CAN be done...but do you want to? Is that a price you're willing to pay just because you don't want to spend some time parsing the AD&D rule books?

There's a reason I'm not playing B/X these days...and it's not because I don't still think it's a great simple system that can be readily taught and is easily customizable in a multitude of ways. B/X IS a "fantasy adventure game;" it's just not a great one when it comes to sustained, long-term play. And at this point in my life, that's pretty much the only type of game play I'm interested in. 

Why AD&D For Fantasy Adventure Gaming

Over at the "Classic Adventure Gaming" discord, there is a channel/thread with the subject title of this blog post.  The originator of the conversation had several questions they wanted addressed, including:

• Why is it the Fantasy Adventure Gaming style prefers AD&D to other "old school" versions of the game? 
• Is running a B/X game in the Adventure Gaming style possible? 
• Is the Advanced Fantasy of OSE a reasonable middle ground? 
• Is running a game RAW an element of Adventure Gaming? 
• Any advice on how to sell AD&D to your players who like B/X for the simplicity?

This was posed back in November (when I was deep in the heart of Mexico), or I would have weighed in (duh). As is, most of what I would have said was rather sufficiently answered (and probably more succinctly and elegantly) than anything I would have written anyway.

And, yet, the subject continues to come up, in various shapes and forms: here was a comment recently posed on a different blog:

"...what’s the beef people have with OSE? It’s a retelling of BX using modern layout and publishing tools."

[this with regard to a criticism of OSE: Advanced being less-than-wonderful as a system for high level game play]

Of course, here at the B/X Blackrazor blog, I made my "reputation" (such as it is) in part by propping up the B/X system and extolling its virtues, long before there even was such a thing as "OSE" (close to ten years before, seeing as I started blogging circa 2009). So, I think it's safe to say I know some stuff about B/X play...the good and the bad. I think, if required, I could defend the system pretty well...the Basic edition of the game does have virtues, not the least of which include its clarity, accessibility, compactness, and simplicity. 

These are EXCELLENT things...for learning how to play D&D.

I now run AD&D exclusively (when I run games) even for new (i.e. "never have I experienced D&D") players. Not because it is clear, accessible, compact, or simple...first edition AD&D is NONE of those things. But none of those things matter to ME, because I already know how to play and (more importantly) how to RUN D&D. I know how to be a Dungeon Master. Can I be a better one? Absolutely...one can always get better at their craft. Experience, practice, self-evaluation/reflection, research...all these things go into honing one's skills (not just running and managing players, but building worlds and scenarios and running campaigns). It is an on-going process of refinement. If I am judged a "better DM" than others (I won't make that claim myself), it is ONLY because I've been doing it longer. There are PLENTY of DMs out there that have been doing it longer than me, who are smarter than me, who have been more consistent than me. But I know that I am competent...and I think that most people should be able to obtain a solid degree of competence with a few decades of practice; I am not unique in this regard.

SO...part of being a competent DM is knowing how to run the game at table. And running the game at table OFTEN involves picking up the slack for players. It is not imperative for players to know all the rules of the system (though the best players will have a high degree of knowledge/mastery when it comes to game mechanics). However, it IS imperative...heck, essential...that the DM has a good grasp of the game concepts and how they function. Which is one of the reasons the original B/X (Moldvay/Cook/Marsh) edition of D&D is so darn good...it provides ALL THE TOOLS NEEDED for a beginning Dungeon Master to 'learn the ropes:' clarity, accessibility, compactness, and simplicity. You have a Basic book of 64 pages (with plenty of examples) describing the most elementary concepts of a very complex game, and then an Expert book of 64 pages (most of which is simply new CONTENT...spells, monsters, treasure, extended tables...not CONCEPTS) to fill in a few additional "blank" spots in the game. These are GREAT TOOLS...for learning how to play D&D.

Everyone needs to learn how to play somehow. Learning to play as a player is "a piece of easy, chummer" so long as you have a competent DM running the game; most folks content to play a PC have little need to crack a rule book at all, except as a reference. The lack of actual nuts-n-bolts mechanics (saves, combat tables, etc.) in the original PHB may have simply been Gygax acknowledging the way MOST players approach the game: the DM is going to tell them their "target numbers" for dice rolls (or what followers are going to be available, etc.), what they need to know is how close they are to leveling up, and what new capabilities such leveling will convey to their character (in terms of hit dice, spells, skill percentages, etc.). The PHB is a lovely reference...and everything a (1E) player really needs as a reference.

Learning to be a Dungeon Master is a different story. It requires reading (and knowing and understanding) the rule books. I will argue (strenuously) that it's not something you just "pick up" from watching other DMs at the table or...worse!...from videos on Ye Old Internet. Such viewing can CLARIFY certain concepts, but you have to read the damn book. You have to know the game to run the game, and the knowing comes from reading (and learning) the rules which (surprise!) are found in the rulebook.

The B/X rules are short. Even at 64 pages, Moldvay's book includes...roughly...thirty-three pages of instructional text, of which at least five pages are EXAMPLES of: character creation, encumbrance, x.p. calculation, combat, dungeon design, and running a session. So, 27-28 pages of instruction? Is that too many? I don't think so...but I'm an old man who grew up reading books from a young age. If you want to learn how to be a Dungeon Master for the greatest game ever penned, I think that an afternoon or evening's reading seems like a small price to pay for the opportunity.

'Great, JB. We get it. SO...why then make AD&D your staple for adventure gaming? Why not just run Labyrinth Lord or OSE, or (even) "OSE Advanced" if you miss the inclusion of illusionists and beholders? Why insist on running 1st edition? What gives man?!'

B/X is a GREAT game...for learning to play D&D. But for running the game long-term, it is my opinion that you need a more robust game system. I have written about it at length before, but those posts are divided over many topics. Let's see if I can collate them here.

First you have to get on-board with a premise: that the game is at its best when run in the form of a long-term campaign. That means: there is a (fictional) world that PCs adventure in, that is sustained over time and that exhibits consistency. That PCs advance in level and thereby have opportunities to experience MORE content and adventure. If you can't buy into that premise, it doesn't matter what system you're running nor (probably) what game. 

SO, assuming you buy said premise, you need a system that sustains long-term play. And that is NOT just a matter of "bonus content." It's not just about adding additional levels of spell-casting or a larger selection of treasure and magic items or extra, more powerful monsters. If that was all there is to it then, sure, OSE Advanced might be your huckleberry. After all, it adds more content to OSE: AD&D classes, AD&D monsters, AD&D magic-items, etc.

But it's not the content (alone) that makes a game suitable for long-term play. Does OSE Advanced address issues of PC survivability that allows sustained play and advancement over time? AD&D does, adding clerical spells at 1st level (and bonus spells for WIS), increasing HD dice types, reducing penalties for low ability scores, adding rules for negative HPs, and increasing weapon damage versus large-sized monsters. Does OSE Advanced address issues of game economy, by adding x.p. and g.p. values for magic items, instituting training costs, and monthly expenses as AD&D does? Does OSE Advanced add systems that increase or promote verisimilitude like urban encounters, disease, racial relations (between sentient humanoids), discussions of medieval politics and taxes, folklore remedies and dungeon trappings? Does OSE Advanced introduce cosmological considerations, outer planes, interactions between clerics and their deities, dimensional cross-overs for even wilder fantasy adventures...as well as getting down to the nitty gritty of troop movements and costs for traditional war gamers?

Perhaps OSE Advanced DOES do all this? I honestly don't know, as I don't own the OSE Advanced books. But I know that 1st Edition AD&D does all this...and it does so in two books (the PHB and the DMG), one of which is 126 pages (and mostly "reference material:) and the other of which is 240 pages...of which more than half is non-instructional material: tables and charts and treasure descriptions and random dungeons and appendices and glossary and index and (repeated) cheat sheets.

SO...100 or so pages of DM-facing rules? For a system that supports long-term, sustained campaign play?

OSE Advanced Fantasy Player's Tome is 248 pages. OSE Advanced Fantasy Referee's Tome is 248 pages.  Sure, much of that latter book includes the monster manuals...got to have more content!...but does it have the oomph to use that content? And even if it did...which I'm not sure it does...why not just stick with my 1E PHB and DMG? Their page count means they take up less space in my backpack when I take them on the road.

There are other advantages to using 1E. It is OLD and it is MODULAR. There is a LOT of material that has been written for it over the years. I don't use the Unearthed Arcana or the Dungeoneer's Survival Guide or the Manual of the Planes...but I could. I don't use the vast majority of suggestions and variants and house rules found in the pages of Dragon magazine...but I could. In general, I have enough experience with the system that it's not necessary for me to consult the plethora of grey-beard AD&D players that exist in various forums and discord channels and chat groups...but I could, if I needed to do so. Those resources are available, which are great aids for would-be DMs trying to get better at their craft.

"But JB, those books (the PHB and DMG) are so OLD! And clunky! And crunchy! Hell, they aren't even SOLD anymore!" Oh, wait. Yeah...they are. 

But okay, let's talk about "crunch." I know several folks via the blog-o-sphere who will swear up and down that they run a B/X or (more usually) a BECMI or RC game, and have for years...long-term, campaign play...using nothing more than the simpler, stream-lined rules these Basic games provide. That, in fact, they do not want additional complexity. And these are guys older than me, with more years of experience...competent, veteran Dungeon Masters. Why? Why does it work for them?

I cannot say...I haven't played in their games. I could speculate, but instead I'll focus on the question at hand: "Why choose AD&D?" I can only discuss (with confidence) why I choose AD&D. For on-going campaign play, I want a robust system, designed in conjunction with that "added content." For me, a B/X fan, AD&D functions better and for a longer time than the Basic alternative.

As said (at the start of this post), I have played a LOT of B/X...at home, on the road, in campaigns, at conventions, in my youth, and as an adult, with family, friends, and complete strangers. What I have found is that...as written...the game does not sustain play over the long-term. Rather, the system becomes a source of frustration. 

Now some folks would say: "just add the changes you need to add to make the system sustainable." And that's fine advice. However, in practice what I find is that I simply end up adding pieces from AD&D. EXCEPT THAT a "patch" doesn't work as well as simply using the rule with the system for which it was designed and (presumably) play-tested. 

I could use the treasure tables from the DMG, the classes and spell lists from the PHB, the monsters in the MM...but then why not just play 1E? I like that fighters improve in hitting at every level. Why not 'port the combat matrix into my B/X game? Why? Because I can simply play 1E and discard the extra books.

Why play AD&D? Why NOT play AD&D? What is the issue? That it's hard to find the specific rules you're looking for in the book? Because it's "poorly organized" (the common complaint)? It still has an index and a table of contents; it still has quick reference sheets at the back of the book. I don't know, fella...I have little problem finding info I need within the book. And it's easy enough to create my own cheat sheets (if needed). So...what else? You don't like the artwork? You don't like Gygax? I mean, what is it, really?

A lot of folks talking these days about ACKS and (the soon-to-be-published) ACKS II. Okay. I picked up ACKS: it's a 270 page book that takes B/X and adds some extra elements to extend game play, specifically (what is commonly referred to as) domain play for high level characters. Fine and dandy. But AD&D's system, the way it's written, extends "standard" adventure play into high levels, while giving you options for that "domain stuff." To be clear, a lot of ACKS "extras" can be seen as having their precursors in AD&D. And so I ask again: why not just play AD&D? Because you want a single, enormous book to flip through? Because you want new art? Because you don't like the occasional Gygaxian digression into statistical analysis or flanking maneuvers from his war-game days?

Okay.

So sorry folks. So sorry this post is so long, and that I've taken up so much of your time. After all, none of this is terribly important anyway...the most important thing is (of course) that you play, regardless of what you choose to play and/or what your reasons are for playing the system you choose. Hopefully, I have managed to communicate my reasons (for those who are so interested) and this will be an issue I don't have to address again in the future. Hopefully. 

; )

Metagaming & Myopia

From the D&D Basic set, Sample Expedition (Moldvay, page B59):

Morgan: "...I'll search through the rags. Anything that looks like a cloak or boots?"

DM: "...Morgan, you do find a pair of old boots, but nothing like a cloak."

Morgan: "Fred will dump the silver and look for hidden compartments in the box. I'll try on the boots to see if I move silently -- we could use a pair of elven boots!"

DM: "...Morgan seems to be moving very quietly."

Morgan: "GREAT!"

The game of Dungeons & Dragons is a game. I know I've written that many times before; I know that other people have expounded on this idea many times before. It's not a new statement.

And yet, folks are constantly forgetting the fact.

"Your character wouldn't know that!" How many times has this phrase (or a variation of it) been uttered at the gaming table. How many times have DMs (or "helpful" PCs) policed would-be actions in the name of preventing a player from metagaming?

Per Ye Old Wikipedia, "metagaming" (i.e. approaching a game from outside the normal rule structure of the game in question) as applied to role-playing games

...often refers to having an in-game character act on knowledge that the player has access to but the character should not. For example, tricking Medusa to stare at a mirror when the character has never heard of Medusa and would not be aware of her petrifying stare.

In the above example from Moldvay's Basic, the Morgan's player is metagaming: she (the player) realizes there is a magic item called elven boots. She understands she is playing a game where players find magical treasures in dungeons. When she discovers an old pair of boots in a locked chest, she tries them to see if they function like the magical item...she uses player knowledge to inform and direct her character's action. Same as the player trying to trick Medusa into viewing her own reflected gaze.

Metagaming in roleplaying games is, generally, frowned upon. I was reminded of that recently when listening to the excellent first episode of the The Classic Adventure Gaming Podcast...a bunch of FAGs ("fantasy adventure gamers") discussing the fundamentals of fantasy adventure gaming, i.e. old edition D&D gaming.  These worthies bemoaned attempts to curtail metagaming as disrupting player agency...a bad thing in their estimation. A good example they cited was the DM disallowing a player from using flaming oil on a troll until AFTER seeing the thing regenerate from wounds sustained. 

As a longtime FAG myself, I found myself in total agreement with these youngsters (pretty sure I'm older than all of them...EOTB only started playing circa '87). But I wanted to consider WHY that is. I may be a cranky geezer, but I'm not so clueless as to believe I'm in the majority opinion here. What's the pushback against metagaming...and why do I find myself taking the opposite stance?

Back to wikipedia (*sigh*) where I find that the dislike of metagaming stems from two main issues:

1. It upsets the suspension of disbelief.
2. It affects game balance.

I'll address the second issue first. Metagaming for advantage has a loooong history, and applies to all sorts of competitive endeavors, not just roleplaying. If an umpire is calling pitches tight, you can draw more walks by making yourself smaller at the plate; if your boss cares more about friendship than performance when it comes promotion time, you go out of your way to be a "buddy." 

Gaming the system in this manner is certainly a form of cheating, but whether it is perceived as such is a matter of degree. Stealing signs in baseball wasn't illegal until 2017...and only then became illegal to use electronic devices to aid in sign stealing. Spreading rumors to your boss about a rival employee (in order to raise the boss's comparative estimation of yourself) would definitely be underhanded behavior.

But in a game like Dungeons & Dragons...a cooperative game of survival...what's the issue?  So what if the players know they need fire to defeat the troll? Oil, torches, fireballs...these are finite resources. The DM's ability to apply challenge (create monsters, etc.) is infinite. Why would a DM sweat players finding ways to circumvent challenge? Win or lose, the DM is going to responsible for creating NEW challenges anyway (in an on-going campaign). 

"Okay, JB, sure...but what about breaking the game? What about players that use the rules to their advantage such that there's no challenge AT ALL, EVER, EVER AGAIN?!"  Um...not sure what game you're playing there, pal. I guess I'd suggest you need to play something more robust...like 1st edition AD&D. In all my years of playing, I've never seen someone 'break' the system...and I've seen some pretty munchkin-y attempts.  The game scales amazingly well.

If the players aren't challenged by the game, it's the fault of the Dungeon Master, not "the meta."

So, let's look at the other complaint: upsetting the suspension of disbelief. Breaking the "immersion." Throwing sand in the well-oiled gears of the "role-playing" machine.

Mm.

D&D is a fantasy adventure game, i.e. a game that allows one to experience fantasy adventures. I know it is a "role-playing" game, but the role-playing is not the point of play...it is the medium through which the "play" gets done. You have a role to play. You are the fighter. Or the cleric. Or the All-Powerful Dungeon Maestro (trademark pending). What you are allowed to do in the game is based on the role you are playing. If you're a fighter, you don't get to turn undead or cast spells. If you are a player character, you don't get to design the dungeon. Got it?

"Immersion" (which I suppose could be loosely defined as "losing oneself in imagined escapist fantasy") DOES occur in the process of playing D&D, and for many participants...perhaps most participants...it is the main draw and attraction of the hobby. 

[I can tell you that my wife strongly dislikes playing RPGs because she is incredibly uncomfortable with the immersion experience: for her, it is NOT fun...rather it is disconcerting]

But in my experience, immersion does not come as the result of playing a role, or a character, or attending to one's background, backstory, character arc, etc.  Instead, immersion ONLY comes from being directly engaged with the gameplay at the table. That requires interest in the material and pressure applied by the circumstances of the game, as facilitated by both the DM and the system mechanics.

Now, I understand there are LOTS of human beings out there who don't give a rip about armor-clad, sword-swinging elves confronting slimy monsters in underground caves while looking for gold and jewels. I get that! Just like there are LOTS of people (like me) who care absolutely zero about whether or not they can put a round rubber ball through a netted hoop 10' off the ground. Different strokes for different folks. Hard to be engaged in a game whose premise you're just not into.

But it's the play of the game you are interested in that creates the immersive experience, the time loss where you look up and say "we've been playing for HOW long?"  You might get a kick out of pretending (internally or externally) that you are Michael Jordan, LeBron James, etc., but it's the action of playing basketball that draws you in, not the play-acting on the court. Likewise, I might enjoy putting on an accent and referring to myself as Wendell the Wondrous Wizard at the game table...but ACTING like an imaginary person is NOT the game. Confronting the challenge of the fantasy adventure at hand is the game.

Metagaming, then, does not discourage immersion...and, in many cases, can lead to deeper immersion as it allows players to more actively engage with the material at hand:

"Oh My God: a TROLL? We need fire to kill these guys!" "Who has the oil?" "I only have two flasks left and we're going to need the lantern to get out of the dungeon!" "I still have a light spell left." "Okay, we can risk it...see, this is why you save the fireball spell!"

D&D is a game. It is not a film, not a story. It does not require suspension of disbelief, because the immersion that occurs does not come (as with a film) from sitting down and passively absorbing the story that is fed through our senses. The immersion comes from participation and active engagement...as with any game.

No DM should worry about metagaming. Just worry about building the world...the game parts, run correctly, will take care of themselves. 

: )

3 Stages of Exploration (Part 4)

[continued from here]

The types, the varieties of exploration offered by the D&D game are wonderful, but their design is terrible and terribly flawed, and this is because of the “organic” way in which those latter stages were “designed.” Basically they weren't…a dungeon delving game was designed, and when players wanted to do something more, extra rules got “tacked on.”

And I’m beginning to think this may be the ONLY way for Dungeons & Dragons to work “as intended,” i.e. to allow the campaign to organically evolve. When I was a kid, we played B/X (which is just OD&D with rule clarifications and better organization), and it worked great for us. The AD&D books were gradually added over time and that worked great, expanding our options. We took the game out of the dungeon, built up high level characters and meandered into Stage 3 play…all “organically” ourselves.

But since that time I’ve tried to start and run D&D campaigns that resembled that earlier “evolutionary” game and failed, failed, failed. You can’t do Stage 2 or Stage 3 in a new campaign without serious DM cream puffery and/or railroading and even doing that ends in a failure more often than not because players AREN’T INVESTED IN THEIR CHARACTERS...and not just because the characters are new and "history-less." It’s hard to get excited and enthused about a 1st level flunky that could get killed by an orc arrow on any unlucky roll, and I (and my adult players) just don’t have the time to devote to working characters “up the ladder” of development to get to these other stages of exploration.

D&D sucks this way. You’re forced to follow the parameters of the Basic stage (start off on the 1st level of a dungeon fighting ducks for chump change) and go through a long “dues paying” period before you can “get to the good stuff.” At least, if you’re playing the game as written. And tinkering with it too much just makes it…well, not D&D.

Case in point…when writing my own D&D (“D&D Mine”), long before I got around to thinking about these ideas (which has only been a couple days folks), I had already figured out the only way to make my game “work” like D&D was to create a setting for the game with a sprawling mega-dungeon built in. At the time, I wasn’t really grokking the WHY, I just knew that the WHAT (or rather the “HOW” as in “how the game is supposed to look and work”), only functioned properly with that. Or I should say, “functioned best.” And I was kind of surprised by that…surprised because I could see I was doing the same thing that had already been done long before me by Arneson (Blackmoor) and Gygax (Greyhawk) as well as plenty of others (for example, Maliszewski’s Dwimmermount).

Creating a city with built-in mega-dungeon and a local history, however, just doesn’t sit right with me. It doesn’t! And the REASON it doesn’t is because I want to play a fantasy adventure game, something that models the literary characters and heroic stories that D&D is supposed to be based on. How many times in Howard’s stories do you find Conan in some subterranean complex or mega-dungeon? Not very many, pal…he’s got more important things to do than crawl around a cobwebby dungeon with a torch. It certainly doesn't occupy the majority of his professional attention.

Recently, I’ve been playing in an on-line B/X game. My character, a cleric, is the closest of the party members to leveling up, but he’s still only 1st level and we’ve been playing since April. Actually, a couple of us (including me) have been playing since before then, as it was a table-top game that got converted to on-line in order to pick up additional players (and make it easier on our schedules).

There’s a large mega-dungeon we’ve been exploring, and a hometown, and a world history. However, at this point I’m choosing to make the mega-dungeon a secondary priority and spend most of my focus on proactively exploring the local politics; specifically, my intention to stir up a hornet’s nest by using treasure found in the ruins to fund a revolution to over-throw the invading Imperials that conquered my homeland a decade or so ago. Right now, my character is decked out in expensive (250gp) plate armor, riding a stout courser, and wielding a shiny dwarfsteel warhammer (when I’m not swinging my two-handed maul). I’ve acquired a normal human henchman from the local underground cult to which I belong and he’s outfitted on a draft horse with chainmail…he’s mainly for show, guarding the horses, and being my step-n-fetch. My character looks the part of a war leader and I’m trying to act the part in order to become the part…a kind of pseudo-medieval Pancho Villa. When last we left off, we were getting ready to jump a band of Imperial mercs encountered on the road, possibly risking being branded as outlaws by the local constabulary, but definitely striking a blow against “our oppressors.”

Did I mention my character’s 1st level? He’ll probably get hit by a lucky arrow shot and killed instantly. That’s what happened to the 1st level illusionist I started the campaign with.

The rules of D&D are not really conducive to this kind of play…and by that I mean, this type of play at 1st level (i.e. right out of the gate). And dammit, it should be. Why not? Personally, I plan on playing this game as if it were conducive until my character gets himself killed. And then…I don’t know, it will depend on the next character I roll up. But I’m not going to stunt my role-playing (head-thumping as the experience might be) just because the rules don’t cooperate.

D&D needs to be redesigned so that all the stages can be addressed at any time at any level. At least, I think it does. YOU may not. Hell, you may be reading this and saying, “I’m just trying to fight goblins and pick up gold, yo.” For how long? Until you get bored and decide you’ll stick it back up on the shelf for another 10-20 years? I guess if that’s your thought, than you’re probably not my target demographic.

There’s already a game-type game that gives you a chance to have tactical encounters in a dungeon (Basic Exploration) and roll dice: it’s called 4th Edition. There’s already a game that tries a hybrid between tactical encounters and rules-supported character development (still Basic exploration): it’s called D20 or Pathfinder. If that’s what you want, you’ve got it already folks. Heck, if you want an even simpler version with the same objective that doesn’t address character much at all, then you can play one of the various iterations of the board game Dungeon! which is plenty fun.

But for me, I don’t want those things. I want a nice, living, breathing game that uses a simple, abstract game system (sorry, Alexis) and yet addresses all three stages properly, allowing multiple forms of game play and exploration from all players, regardless of preference, right out of the gate.

Because you CAN be a low-level courtier, or wilderness scout…you shouldn’t have to wait till you're high level to try that type of game play. If I want to play a 16 year old Joan of Arc leading the French army to victory against the English, then dammit, there should be rules that allow that! What happened to “anything you can imagine?” What happened to fantastic fantasy adventure.

I keep coming back to this quote I recently (re-)read in Ron Edward’s second article on fantasy heartbreakers. I’ll reprint it here so you can see why it’s haunting me:

“I think it’s central to D&D fantasy that a character must start with a very high risk of dying and very little ability to change the world around him or her, and then increase in effectiveness, scope, and ability to sustain damage…the concept seems to be that the player must serve his or her time as a schlub, greatly risking the character’s existence, in order to enjoy the increased array and benefits of the powers, ability, and effectiveness that can only be accumulated through the reward-system. An enormous amount of the draw to play a particular game seems to be based on explicitly laying out what the character might be able to do, later, if he or she lives. I want to distinguish this paradigm very sharply from the baseline “character improves through time” found in most role-playing games. This is something much, much more specific.”

The thing that haunts me about this analysis (which seems accurate to me as well) is this:

Is this the real basis for D&D’s popularity?

This “draw,” this carrot that’s dangled in front of the players…is that what makes them come back for more? Because if it is, then ALL this discussion might very well be a waste of fucking precious time (and I’ve written this up as a 12 page, 7000 word essay). There is great potential within the Dungeons & Dragons role-playing game (pre-1989, i.e. “old school” editions)…I know because I’ve observed it, I’ve played it. The same potential doesn’t exist within New D&D…the rules are designed to expand and improve the Stage 1 (basic) exploration and those same rules become extraneous or too complex for later Stage play (even if such was supported in the text of the rules…which it f’ing well is NOT). But there’s little way to GET to this potential style of play, even using “old school” rule sets, because they are accidents of design, not purposeful, and not well supported.

And maybe I’m retarded for even thinking about it. I’m not talking about piddling simulationist play…I’m talking about facing challenge on a variety of levels (i.e. “stages”): discovering the world outside the dungeon and becoming a ‘mover & shaker’ within that world. NOT limiting game-play to the challenge of exploring a Hazard Site. NOT simply figuring out how to defeat a particularly tricky puzzle (whether that “puzzle” is a tactical challenge against a superior opponent or a trick/trap not easily negotiated). Simply exploring a Hazard Site doesn’t allow you the depth of role-playing involved with Stage 2 and Stage 3 exploration when what you explore is Your Imaginary World and Your Characters’ Place In The World.

As I said, I know there are folks who don’t agree with me. Fortunately for you, the game as written is good enough for that Basic Exploration stage of play. Personally, I’d prefer to take the game up to the Expert and Master stages. However, I’m still mulling over exactly how to do that. I'll let you know if/when I figure it out.

; )