AD&D via Pathfinder aka "I want an old school feeling game"


Advice

401 to 450 of 476 << first < prev | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | next > last >>

Come to think of it, in balance terms, random stats might reduce the imbalance between players who optimise well and the less tactical players.


Big McStrongmuscle wrote:


Mark Hoover wrote:
3. High death rates = fun or acceptable: my players hated dying.
Also pretty normal after second or third level. My group would sometimes lose characters to freak accidents while still level one, but after that, we rarely had anyone die for good except in very unusual circumstances. As a whole, I always found the high death rate of old school games to be more exaggerated in the telling than true. Maybe it was a Killer DM thing.

Definitely not exaggerated in the groups I played in in the 70's. It wasn't just one DM, either, it was everyone. I used to figure that a character had a half-life of a game session. But by 1980 mortality rates had settled down to roughly what they are now.


Hmm, I've been looking at GAZ13 and I must say that the precursor to drow is awesome. When did the subterranean elves become demon spider worshiping feminists? I think they, like the goblins of Pathfinder, need a reflavoring.

EDIT: Wow...403 posts.I'm glad my thread has inspired such discussion.

Alrighty guys, I've noticed what you all have written and what I remember from watching as a child that there weren't any "Ye Olde Magick Shoppes" around in 1e or 2e. I wonder when that changed and why. It also made me look at the Master Craftsman feat, which I think is pretty cool now that I look at it..


Luna_Silvertear wrote:
Hmm, I've been looking at GAZ13 and I must say that the precursor to drow is awesome. When did the subterranean elves become demon spider worshiping feminists? I think they, like the goblins of Pathfinder, need a reflavoring.

Long before then. The original Drow modules date to the late '70s.

The elves in GAZ13 weren't precursors but a reflavoring for D&D.


1 person marked this as a favorite.
Thorri Grimbeard wrote:
Big McStrongmuscle wrote:


Mark Hoover wrote:
3. High death rates = fun or acceptable: my players hated dying.
Also pretty normal after second or third level. My group would sometimes lose characters to freak accidents while still level one, but after that, we rarely had anyone die for good except in very unusual circumstances. As a whole, I always found the high death rate of old school games to be more exaggerated in the telling than true. Maybe it was a Killer DM thing.
Definitely not exaggerated in the groups I played in in the 70's. It wasn't just one DM, either, it was everyone. I used to figure that a character had a half-life of a game session. But by 1980 mortality rates had settled down to roughly what they are now.

*Pulls out my 1984 character sheet archive...*

Let's see...

Fighter: Level 5. Killed by failing poison save after fighting giant scorpion.

Rogue (Thief): Level 6. Killed by falling boulder trap. "Rocks fall, your thief dies."

Fighter/Wizard: Level unclear. Killed by drawing "void" card in "Deck of Many Things."

Wizard: Level 9. Killed by Azmodius himself. Later raised and continued to adventure.

Monk: Level 7. Killed in combat.

Cleric: Level 8. Killed by psionic mind eaters. Unable to defend against them, but attracted them through use of some spell.

That's 1984.

In comparison, I've had a grand total of two characters of any level die in the past three years. One of those was a TPK due to the GM completely misunderstanding the spell "darkness" and the implementation of "blind fight" feat. One was dragged off a cliff by a grappling troll.


Back in the 80's there were only 3 of us that GM'd on any regular basis. But all 3 were what would now be labeled as killer GM's. Every thing we read and everybody we talked to told us that it was "supposed to be that way."
Everyonce in a while we would hear about someone that didn't have high kill rates. Everyone talked about them like they didn't really know what they were doing. Only lame GM's didn't kill players regularly. {shrug} Not saying it was right or wrong, but that was what we heard so that was how we played.

I remember at one point we had 3 players and each person had at least 3 character sheets. The primary highest level one that you were really playing. At least one lower level hireling that was working up in levels for when your primary died (when not if). The new character you were writing up for when one of the other 2 died (again, when not if).

It was very rare to run even a short mission without at least one of the hirelings dying in some unrecoverable manner. A long difficult mission was likely to kill most of the party at least once if not twice.

I wouldn't enjoy that deadly anymore, but we loved it back then.


Wow, that's rough. Admittedly, I was a much more cautious player back then, and my group might have been more forgiving than most, but I only ever remember losing two characters in those days. After a few vicious 2e and 3.x games I played back in college, my record is now much worse, heh.

One was a youngish mid-level wizard who got on the bad side of an archmage by breaking his concentration with magic missiles for five rounds in a row while he was trying to blow up the party with his mega-spells. Those stupid casting time rules work in your favor sometimes. My shield spell did stop one return hail of max-dice magic missley death, but you apparently do not need concentration to throw out a Finger of Death from the Hand of Vecna. We unanimously agreed after the party rezzed me that while it did save several other characters' bacon, what I did to provoke that guy was incredibly stupid.

The second death was entirely the fault of a jerk player. The party MU/Th in a Ravenloft game had a spat with the cleric and decided to betray and murder the entire rest of the party at night during his watch. He snuck away invisible, then sicced a pair of double-strength beholders on us while we were all still asleep. Cleric got disintegrated in the first round to start a TPK. My ranger died last, and for the only time in his unlucky fumble-filled existence, he had such a hot run on his saves that the one surviving beholder had to bite him to death.

There were a lot of subsystems, instakill parasites, and magic gimmicks (especially if you used psionics) that could make AD&D crazy deadly, but our group didn't use that many of them, and I don't think most of them are really all that necessary for an old school game. I didn't know too many people who thought rot grubs made for fun play.


Adventure Path Charter Subscriber; Pathfinder Starfinder Adventure Path Subscriber

For what it's worth, I've written several posts on my blog about how to make Pathfinder play more like earlier editions of the game. For example:

General advice on making the game have an old-school feel (e.g. a list of ability score prerequisites for classes)

Making spellcasting model 1E/2E spellcasting

Removing alignment from the game (this one is splitting the difference - older editions had alignment, but there were extremely few mechanics based around it, unlike now)

I hope these help!


1 person marked this as a favorite.
Big McStrongmuscle wrote:
I didn't know too many people who thought rot grubs made for fun play.

Heh... rot grubs. Just one of an entire class of deadly things in AD&D that led to insane party dynamics like this:

Fighter: "Hey, there's a body over here. We need to search it."
Wizard: "Hey thief-guy! Come search this body."
Thief: "What? No way! You search it."
Fighter: "It's your job to search dead bodies."
Thief: "Bullhockey! It's my job to steal things, or to loot bodies we just killed. Random bodies full of rot grubs, poison needle traps, sudden ghast attacks, exploding gasbags or sudden strangling tentacles are whole party situations. I vote the cleric do it, he's got the best saves."
Wizard: "I'll poke it with a stick."
Thief: "Your funeral."

Later...

Fighter: "Hey, look! A random, unattended treasure chest! Let's open it."
Thief: "LOL, go ahead man."


I wasn't a killer GM by any stretch; at least, not in my OWN opinion. You folks be the judge:

I had 5 campaigns go the distance into double digit levels and accomplish major goals. Of those we lost 4 characters. One was an 11th level dwarf who stuck his head into a sphere of Anhilation. The next was a 5th level halfling killed by being stupid enough to not heed a buddy's warning to get out of the blast radius of a homebrew spell called Earthmaw. The third was a 6th level fighter that was just played really dumbly, knocking on doors and shouting through the dungeon and such; lucky spear shot to the eye. And finally there was a 13th level wizardess at ground 0 of a retributive strike, but she caused it and didn't plane shift.

Now of course we had other deaths; hirelings and animals, low levelers in campaigns that died out after some of the party did, etc. But of the really serious campaigns where they were really trying to stay alive, that's what happened.

Now on the flip, here's my play history: I was a player in 3 long-standing campaigns. In said campaigns I lost at least one character in each; due to low funds I stayed dead in one, rolled up another character, he died too. Now of those 4, 3 of them were brought back to life, but the fact remains that as a player, I and other players ALL lost characters.

My point? Killer GM or not, our games were highly lethal. I suppose we balance out the folks who had the opposite experience in 1e/2e.

But now take last night's PF game. Using the strain/wound variant rule the party used up EVERY last bit of healing but made it to the bitter end of a 12 encounter slog where most melee encounters were APL+2. They were down to mundane melee/ranged attacks going toe-to-toe w/a modified greenhag whose only mission was to grapple and hold for 3 rounds. They also had at will cantrip level powers.

Though all the party was damaged except the wizard only one dropped into negatives; stabilizing touch trait handled that. Then the NPC they were trying to save took a nasty kill shot and again; stabilizing touch. In total the party walked away, fully intact, but completely out of all major powers and their gear in tatters. Had they gone through the spooky forest 1e/2e style, I'm sure that one of them would've died from a combination of non-optimized stats, random wilderness encounters and not being able to go down past -10 in HP.

@Luna: I think what changed to provide magic shoppes was a cultural shift away from books and pop culture where magic was rare to a norm where magic items were expected to drop with a "ding" from every zombie and goatman faced. Also you have a need to stack on all those buffs and damage adds/special effects since you begin the game optimized but then as you progress don't get many opportunities to surpass your original DPR capability.

In 1e when you got to 11th level you were inflicting ridiculous amounts of damage. Now in PF it's only ridiculous in relation to level 1 and without magic shoppes providing the most optimized potential you wouldn't keep pace with your APL CR monster equivalents. But then again maybe I'm WAY off base here.


thejeff wrote:
Luna_Silvertear wrote:
Hmm, I've been looking at GAZ13 and I must say that the precursor to drow is awesome. When did the subterranean elves become demon spider worshiping feminists? I think they, like the goblins of Pathfinder, need a reflavoring.

Long before then. The original Drow modules date to the late '70s.

The elves in GAZ13 weren't precursors but a reflavoring for D&D.

Wow, I didn't know that.


I'm a killer DM...killer of horses that is. My PCs used to buy the cheapest, scrawniest horses they could find in town because they knew as soon as they traveled into the wilderness to find the dungeon (that they disappeared in for days) that the horses were monster bait. And they were right.

Oh, I'd play it by the book and roll my 3 random encounters per day to see who/what came by to munch on the poor, tied up horses. Sometimes they would try to bring hirelings to guard the horses, but that didn't always help for extended dungeon stays. *grin*

One of the things I would recommend to "keep it old school" would be to ban electronics at the gaming table. No laptops, smart phones, or tablets. If the DM wants it to help run the game that's fine, but try to keep the players focused on the gaming table.

Here's to old school. Good luck!


I second DOS - no eBooks and such. Also - make one of the players take notes with a pen or pencil and a notebook. Make the same player or a different one keep a mini-map.

Y'know another thing we must've done wrong ALL these years? Hirelings. A select few of my players hired them, and only for very SPECIFIC things like only caring for a single shield or bringing along a cartographer.

For the most part not one of my players, in over 30 years of gaming and MULTIPLE groups mind you, ever hired any experts to build and maintain a campsite. This seems really bizarre, considering what I've seen from a lot of these and other 1e/2e threads.

I don't have an explanation either. I don't know if it was greed to keep all the treasure, not wanting to bother with the bookeeping, the difficulty to care for and maintain the NPCs, or what. I've even had 1e and 2e PCs buy war dogs and mounts before hiring warrior types. Weird...


On the mapping thing...

One area where I am probably selfishly promoting "new school" is in the use of fairly comprehensive terrain elements.

I think I'll start a thread asking about using terrain vs "old school" feel.

I love the terrain. I love being able to give my players exactly what the room looks like, up to and including desks, chairs, fireplaces, etc.

But there's a big difference between "You enter a room that is dark and musty, and smells of old paper mold. There is a cluttered desk in the middle with an ancient sand-filled hourglass laying on its side. The room is lit dimly from the smoldering remains of an old fire in the fireplace giving just enough light to read the largest titles on the tattered books in the bookshelf on the opposite wall." and "here's the room you're in. It's old, musty and the only light is from this fireplace here..."


Mark Hoover wrote:
... not one of my players, in over 30 years of gaming and MULTIPLE groups mind you, ever hired any experts to build and maintain a campsite ...

We tried, they always died.


Luna_Silvertear wrote:

[list]

  • 15 point buy character creation with max hp at 1st level and the chance to roll for starting gold or taking average. Slow Advancement on XP.

    I still can't decide if I should point buy or have them roll for stats. Pros and cons of each?

    I will probably also try to bring the Bard back to it's druidy root and modify the spell list accordingly, either by stating that bards get their spells from the druid spell list or some other way. Multiclassing will only be allowed in one other class based on the same limitations due to race. There will be no Prestige Classes.

  • Like we said, earlier editions had fast advancement for the first couple of levels.

    And, altho there’s a lot to be said for rolling stats, if you do, be sure to have a fallback. No hopeless characters.

    Actually, make the paladin and Bard prestige classes.


    One way to balance rolling for stats and the balance of point buy is to create a table with multiple 15 point-but legal stat arrays. Have players roll a 1d(however many arrays there are) to determine which stat array they will use. By selecting certain arrays, you can discourage abuse of SAD classes.

    Edit: Not that this method is in-itself old school, but I do think it is a happy compromise.


    Mark Hoover wrote:
    ... think what changed to provide magic shoppes was a cultural shift away from books and pop culture where magic was rare to a norm where magic items were expected to drop with a "ding" from every zombie and goatman faced. Also you have a need to stack on all those buffs and damage adds/special effects since you begin the game optimized but then as you progress don't get many opportunities to surpass your original DPR capability

    Oh crickies no. Loot & other forms of pelf was piled high, sometimes we couldn’t carry it all.

    The difference is- you couldn’t min/max/opt your PC by knowing or planning to buy specific items. Sure, there’d be “a magic sword”- in fact scads of them. But the kitting out of your PC at “Ye Olde Magik Shoppe’ was what didn’t happen.


    DrDeth wrote:
    Mark Hoover wrote:
    ... think what changed to provide magic shoppes was a cultural shift away from books and pop culture where magic was rare to a norm where magic items were expected to drop with a "ding" from every zombie and goatman faced. Also you have a need to stack on all those buffs and damage adds/special effects since you begin the game optimized but then as you progress don't get many opportunities to surpass your original DPR capability

    Oh crickies no. Loot & other forms of pelf was piled high, sometimes we couldn’t carry it all.

    The difference is- you couldn’t min/max/opt your PC by knowing or planning to buy specific items. Sure, there’d be “a magic sword”- in fact scads of them. But the kitting out of your PC at “Ye Olde Magik Shoppe’ was what didn’t happen.

    Yeah, I think the cultural shift was towards looking for synergies and players selecting what items they'd like to enhance their characters. It wasnt uncommon (in our group, anyway) for people to have quite an eclectic and not-terribly-optimal array of magical loot. It was still quite a high magic feel though.

    Liberty's Edge

    Regarding "old school". I guess I am one those that has played since 1978, so I might be qualified to at least speak on the matter. The game of D&D has evolved in ONE major sense and that is it is a LOT harder now to kill characters. Old school: 1st level wizards with one hit point and 18th level wizards with 32 hit points. Class options strictly based on race, it was a primarily Humanocentric game back then.

    If you want to entertain some older gamers, play the Pathfinder game as it is written, just pull NO punches. Those guys are used to rolling up three characters a night and brag about having survived so and so's dungeon. The game only crawled out of the dungeon later and it is the dungeon that still challenges.

    Around my table we play pretty hard core. There are no "Monty Haul" games and non "disposable" magic is still a rare treat. My players hate it when I pull punches or "soften up" on them. They take pride on being tenth level and if they have only died once, then it is a true accomplishment.

    Some might find this "hard core type of game not to their liking, but I think once you challenge them, you will find that it is something worthwhile. Treat your games competitively, those guys do not come from the generation of "everyone gets a prize". Make the games competitive and give out experience points at the end of the night in a measure based on their accomplishments. Some will level faster than others in this style, but it will serve to increase their enjoyment.

    Do that, play the game as written (it truly is a better game version after all), and DM with vivid description and a sense of dread.

    RPG Superstar 2012 Top 16

    2 people marked this as a favorite.

    Hmm, had completely different experience with 'killer DM'. Of course, we used mostly published modules, and usually 6-8 characters of the appropriate levels. There were some nasty fights, but actual character death was pretty rare.

    Also, 1E was forgiving of failure in some ways. For instance, Gauntlets of Ogre Power gave you 18/00 Str. Period. If you had a 15, you got 18/00. Ditto Giant Strength Girdles. You turned from a wuss to a badass instantly. If you failed the chance to learn a spell, it was later ruled that you could reroll after you gained a level. SO eventually you'd get any spell you wanted. All you wanted was that 19 Int so you could learn ANY number of spells.

    Monsters had harder times hitting you...no Str bonuses to hit. Magic armor had unlimited Dex allowance, and was effectively weightless, didn't slow you down either. Monsters had fewer hit points, and at/rd were slightly better then iteratives...plus you got them every round, not on 'full attacks'. Plus, most popular weapons did additional damage against larger critters, and many monsters were large. Hells, Slow Poison could recover a person who failed a poison save after they were already 'dead', and basically made you immune to Poison while it was active!

    Plus, every character could have a henchman. It's fair to say that we hit modules with a horde and steamrolled them, gave our henchman our second level gear, etc. Getting nice gear pre-10th happened all the time...you didn't have to wait until level 12 to have a chance of getting a +3 sword in loot. At 10th level, the general idea was that a paladin should be questing for a holy avenger...a level 18 weapon in PF. the holy grail of a +3 meant there was nothing in the game except a demilich that you couldn't damage consistently. Oh, and intellect devourers.

    I've played through Against the Giants in 1E, 2E and 2E+, and rangers and paladins with holy swords, and fighters with bow spec, steamrolled them. Add in Walls of Fire and 12d6 fireballs going off, and yeah, that main room cleared remarkably fast.

    In 2E, giants got +4 HD, added their armor to their AC, and added Str to damage. In 2E+, they also got damage based on the weapon they were using, modified by size. Fire Giants swinging 4-24 Greatswords were impressive...up until they got hit by 24d6 of Cones of Cold to the face, and the ranger with the bastard sword of Giant Slaying doing 4-32 +24 dmg per attack started ripping into them...

    Once you started drawing on all the 1e and 2e material, characters could get extremely powerful relative to fairly static monsters. The only thing you had to worry about was casters with save or dies...and that's why you had Scarabs of Protection, and archers to shut them down. Oh, and Energy Drain, but that's what Negative Plane Protection was for.

    Tomb of Horrors was unique for its 'no save' kills. That was definitely not the standard. The standard was stand up and brutal fights that you could win if you were geared for fighting...and we were always geared for fighting. The monsters rarely had a decent chance against us.

    ==Aelryinth


    Alzrius wrote:

    For what it's worth, I've written several posts on my blog about how to make Pathfinder play more like earlier editions of the game. For example:

    General advice on making the game have an old-school feel (e.g. a list of ability score prerequisites for classes)

    Making spellcasting model 1E/2E spellcasting

    Removing alignment from the game (this one is splitting the difference - older editions had alignment, but there were extremely few mechanics based around it, unlike now)

    I hope these help!

    These links are awesome, especially the first one. Point 4 specifically caught my attention. I think, for my game, I will have the players roll 3d6 reroll 1s or 4d6 drop lowest; Roll two columns and take the better one; use those ability scores to create a character (I may include the ability score requirements for the core classes found in point 4 of the first link in Alzrius' post and my quote of it); and encourage them to build their character organically. Now, the vets I'll be running the game for will probably not mind these changes, but newer players might not like it at all...and that is to be expected. As to why I won't really get into details as I can't do so without losing my tact. I've got a vid you guys should check out by Andrew and Jason (DawnforgedCast and Darkageof respectively) over at Youtube that goes along with our discussion in the thread.

    Old School v. New School

    It's almost two hours long, but you can listen and go do something else on the interweb (I'm listening to it as I type this and jumping over to GAZ1 to prepare my Mystara Game for Pathfinder). I hope it inspires some thought here. I'm trying to get a hold of Jason to invite him to drop by here, but he's a bit difficult to get in touch with. Anyway, let's keep this thread going. I'm loving this so much, I hope you guys are too.


    1 person marked this as a favorite.

    I don't know if you read it, but I feel it bears repeating. I'd really think twice before putting in race/class restrictions. One of the things that really got me, my dad, and our group on board with 3e was that they got rid of those restrictions. Leaving races and classes unrestricted keeps a good deal of creativity flowing for character ideas. In my opinion, this is one rule from the old days you are better off doing without.

    Also, at least in terms of a challenge, I'd hesitate to use only NPC classes. NPC classes tend to be really mediocre challenges, especially for "boss fights". I remember having to fight a level 13 aristocrat and how I one shot him... was very anticlimactic.

    Just a couple of things to think about.


    If the goal is to recreate the old style of game, then whether a rule is better or not isn't necessarily relevant. Good or bad - level limits for demihumans was one of the distinctive feature of D&D games "back then". Whether that feature will bring feelings of fond nostalgia or irritation will depend on the group, I'd imagine.


    Steve Geddes wrote:
    If the goal is to recreate the old style of game, then whether a rule is better or not isn't necessarily relevant. Good or bad - level limits for demihumans was one of the distinctive feature of D&D games "back then". Whether that feature will bring feelings of fond nostalgia or irritation will depend on the group, I'd imagine.

    It's nostalgia for the group of vets. While they like how 3e opened up all class/race combos, for my specific game, they don't mind going back. I've already run it by them with some of my own changes. One of them will be playing a Dwarven Paladin, something not allowed by RAW in 2e, but I am allowing it because I am the GM and I am the final law. This will probably be a one time thing Odraude. If I run my game for a younger set of players, or a different set of players, I'll most likely remove that little rule if they're not up to it.

    RPG Superstar 2012 Top 16

    Actually Dwarven paladins of Berronar Truesilver and I believe Moradin were allowed late in 2E. I can't recall the LG protector god of the halflings, but I think he was allowed to have them, too...not sure, however!

    ==Aelryinth


    Hey guys, do you know of any other conversions of old modules other than Tomb of Horrors and White Plume Mountain? What about sequels?


    There's a 3x Keep on the Borderlands out there I think. There's also Return to the Keep on the Borderlands. There was a Slavers sequel for Greyhawk in 3x.

    Personally I treasure my ONE year of Dungeon magazine. I've tooted Paizo's horn on a few threads and I'm about to do it one more time: I subscribed as a kid, and then later bought a bunch of back issues. Then I got a years worth of Paizo's Dungeon leading up to their last issue; those were some of the BEST Dungeons I have ever had and I've used nearly everything in them.

    Maps of Mystery, Mud Sorcerer sequel, the Savage Tide stuff...SO MUCH good stuff! For anyone who 1. is from Paizo, 2. worked on the mag and 3. might be reading this post, I never got the chance to properly thank you. So thank you!


    Luna_Silvertear wrote:
    Hey guys, do you know of any other conversions of old modules other than Tomb of Horrors and White Plume Mountain? What about sequels?

    Dungeon Crawl Classics are excellent 3.5 modules in the vein of classic adventures (which might be better as any 'old school' player is going to be aware of the details of most classic old modules [even if they haven't played them]).


    There's a conversion of the Lost Caverns of Tsojanth around. The last issue of Dungeon Magazine has a conversion of Kill Bargle. I have a Dungeon mag with the Mud Sorcerer's tomb. Dungeon 112 with Maure Castle is very old school.

    The new D&D playtest is much more old school in feel than 4E and has Keep on the Borderlands, Isle of Dread and the Mud Sorcerers Tomb with it. However, the playtest only has Cleric, Wizard, Fighter, Thief and Monk classes currently available, though they now go up to 20th, and there's a pretty good bestiary. It's free, so IMO it's worth looking at.


    Necromancer Games/ Frog God games has pathfinder compatible modules that are very old school in feel. They also have several of their modules available for Swords and Wizardry, which is one of the retroclone rpgs.

    I still think that the Dungeon Crawl Classics rpg might be worth a look if you really want an old school feel.

    WotC is reprinting the Slave Lords trilogy and some other old school modules to go with the reprints of 1e that they recently released.


    This thread is really rocking!

    I think some 2e modules started to showcase magic shops.

    And then, when the classic dnd computer games came out start with the DOS based games like Curse of the Azure Bonds and eventually Baldirs Gate 1&2....well, magic shops became easy access. I think those games set an expectation of shops. You couldn't buy everything you needed, but you could buy maintenance supplies like heal potions, scrolls, +2 arrows etc. too easy.

    So We never allowed shops in our games and always added a house rule of no shops. There was nothing wrong with asking around for a senior wizard to get stuff. But his price was an adventure...dangerous of course. You had to do some work for him. And good luck lying to him saying you accomplished the mission but found nothing else. Of course, maybe the wizard didn't like the party, and the party if they survived decided to bump him off.

    About combat. I prefer fast combat. I'm still coming up to speed on 3.5e and pathfinder combat. The new stuff for the fighters are great, but it adds more time. We always played that HP was more than health. It was also the ability and skill to outlast your opponents. So as you fought more difficult opponents, it took longer to wear them down. It made possible for run n gun ...um ....run n slash fights up and down hallways and tunnels.

    All my player groups when I played 2e often would play a primary PC and a hireling as backup and just to round out the group if short on players.

    The Paizo modules are like yummy balanced classic dungeon crawls. My new group hopes to start playing in a few weeks. It's probably going to be a mash up of 2e and things we like from pathfinder/3.5. To me. Pathfinder/3.5 is like 2e with megatons of options. Our goal is to keep things moving quickly - which was already a problem with 2e as peeps started rule arguing more and more.

    Luna - thank u so much for starting this thread!!!!

    Luna_Silvertear wrote:

    Hmm, I've been looking at GAZ13 and I must say that the precursor to drow is awesome. When did the subterranean elves become demon spider worshiping feminists? I think they, like the goblins of Pathfinder, need a reflavoring.

    EDIT: Wow...403 posts.I'm glad my thread has inspired such discussion.

    Alrighty guys, I've noticed what you all have written and what I remember from watching as a child that there weren't any "Ye Olde Magick Shoppes" around in 1e or 2e. I wonder when that changed and why. It also made me look at the Master Craftsman feat, which I think is pretty cool now that I look at it..


    I have another idea about race/class restrictions.

    Make those the only favored classes allowed by race.

    Liberty's Edge

    Adamantine Dragon wrote:

    On the mapping thing...

    One area where I am probably selfishly promoting "new school" is in the use of fairly comprehensive terrain elements.

    I think I'll start a thread asking about using terrain vs "old school" feel.

    I love the terrain. I love being able to give my players exactly what the room looks like, up to and including desks, chairs, fireplaces, etc.

    But there's a big difference between "You enter a room that is dark and musty, and smells of old paper mold. There is a cluttered desk in the middle with an ancient sand-filled hourglass laying on its side. The room is lit dimly from the smoldering remains of an old fire in the fireplace giving just enough light to read the largest titles on the tattered books in the bookshelf on the opposite wall."

    and "here's the room you're in. It's old, musty and the only light is from this fireplace here..."

    Which is which?

    Sovereign Court

    2 people marked this as a favorite.

    To the OP: Inspired by this thread, I decided to "kick-it" old school last night. With my game room ready, but much of my stuff still unpacked, I did the following:
    >Did not use a GM screen
    >Did not set up initiative tags like usual
    >Did the "wooosh" sound every once in a while and split attention from player to player as they went their seperate ways in town. In old school we often did "split the party". So as a GM, I did a LOT of cut-scenes back and forth, monitoring everyone's engagement in the game. When one person seemed a little checked-out I would "woosh" over to them, and make some shit up on-the-spot. It made for a very entertaining game of Pathfinder RPG.

    Old School Prep:
    Instead of printing elaborate stat blocks and flagging pages in bestiaries, and instead of using Combat Manager, or my tabletop projector rig... I just had ideas jotted down on a quarter sheet of tiny graph paper. Yeah we used graph paper back then. The tiny stuff is the bomb. All I did was jot down some NPC names, drew a little dungeon, made some notes about monsters and traps, and off I went.

    I cannot tell you the shit I came up with on-the-spot.
    Here's a taste of where the mind goes when you're not shacked to modules, minis, maps, or rules:
    1) One of the pirate NPCs the party had traveled with for some time was hanged.
    2) Peeking into a noble's manor they saw a man who'd been the victim of vivisectionist experiments
    3) A secret underground "prince" delivered a missive and an enchanted sword via an organization member
    4) The bard received a mission from the local brothel house.
    5) The plot about one PCs father was revealed as it pertained to the slave trade.
    6) A new PC character was introduced by way of the local church, a church that participates in ritual executions of criminals
    7) A known sorceress claimed the inquisition forced her to work for them because she could raise the dead***

    ** My only OOPS!-Factor - a casualty of improvisaion that I shall figure out by next week.

    MY POINT: None of this had anything to do with the Pathfinder Ruleset. It had to do with the way you keep players on their toes by stradling the line between what is "known" and what is "unknown" or ambiguous. There is a tension caused by the unknown, and it is the lure of the drama that pulled everyone in deep.

    By the end of the night the players were saying, "great session" and "great job". I swear, sometimes I prepare for 16 hours just to run the game session and I don't get such compliments.

    Thanks Luna (The OP) for asking your initial question... because by responding to you over the holidays via this thread, you got me thinking about the "fun" associated with GMing with speed, imagination, and light-but-resourceful preparation.

    Best things to have ready:
    > A list of NPC names; cross them off as you introduce NPCs that you imagine and use on-the-spot
    >A short list of monster names, maybe some page numbers for when it feels like the players are ready for a battle
    >Good listening skill: A big secret about how we used to play in the 1980s and the key to a successful game was to listen to your players to come up with the solutions/outcomes/story ending. Listen carefully to their chatter as they discuss problems, then use one of their ideas as the actual solution. This still works in 2013. Trust me.
    >Confidence - just trust your imagination, and roll-with-it. Imagine the setting, know your NPC motivations and the culture of whereever you are - then just improv the rest.

    It's refreshing to just PLAY!

    Liberty's Edge

    Luna_Silvertear wrote:
    Hey guys, do you know of any other conversions of old modules other than Tomb of Horrors and White Plume Mountain? What about sequels?

    How about this 3.5 sequel to Temple of the Frog, from the Arneson's Blackmoor setting. If you wanted to get more technical, the 2nd version of Temple of the Frog was sort of shoehorned into the Becmi D&D Mystara setting as something that took place in the "past" (time-travel elements and all).


    Pax Veritas wrote:

    Best things to have ready:

    > A list of NPC names; cross them off as you introduce NPCs that you imagine and use on-the-spot
    >A short list of monster names, maybe some page numbers for when it feels like the players are ready for a battle
    >Good listening skill: A big secret about how we used to play in the 1980s and the key to a successful game was to listen to your players to come up with the solutions/outcomes/story ending. Listen carefully to their chatter as they discuss problems, then use one of their ideas as the actual solution. This still works in 2013. Trust me.
    >Confidence - just trust your imagination, and roll-with-it. Imagine the setting, know your NPC motivations and the culture of whereever you are - then just improv the rest.

    Seconded. New or Old school, do this. I have a bunch of tactical players so I used to sculpt games for hours and stat out everything. Since they didn't like fluff I was essentially crafting really hard Descent 2 missions every month.

    I was not inspired and did no improv; my game suffered. Then I hooked on w/some 50% RPers and my inspiration started coming back. But I was still sculpting...

    Finally after a couple games I just walked in w/a page of notes, sat down and ran. No monsters, no traps, no mechanics; just reacting to the players. I got the first honest session compliments I've received in 10 years.

    I'm not saying improv is a win button, but it DEFINITELY helps the players feel more connected. As PV says; listen to them and use their stuff. If at the beginning of the adventure you foreshadow a hag and the PCs start saying "wait, wasn't there a witch in your backstory cleric?" then try to work the action around to a scene where, when they finally meet the hag she looks at the cleric and says "hello darling granddaughter; come give me a KISS!" and make her roll a low save. Even if she makes it, tell the PC that her hands tremble and a greenish hue comes over her skin, but only for a moment.

    Blam - immersion.

    As for monsters/traps? Roll some dice, add one of the PCs own modifiers, and see if that would hit the PC. Now you have a roughly APL monster. Want to make the monster harder? Add +2 to the attack roll.

    So right now I'm prepping a megadungeon. I know that it's tainted by a corruptive force from the plane of shadow...and that's it. I'm going to prep the general notes of the zones of the dungeon and some flavor about the corruption. Then I'm going to have the door open to the first chamber. I may or may not even have a map prepped. Let the good times roll...


    @Pax

    I'm an inexperienced GM compared to you, and my confidence in my "just roll with it" abilities are a little lack luster. That said, I would've given all my dice to be at your table that night. It must've been amazing to watch. I've currently got an overview of a plot for my game. I'll post what I've got thus far. It should be more than enough to last maybe 4-6 sessions. This is a very basic outline and gives me time to plan what happens afterwards.

    There is an unnatural plague in town. The party has 10 days to find a cure.
    The ingredients for the cure are:


    • Water from the source. (A spring)

    • Willow bark from a Dryad's tree. (Obviously must be a willow)

    • A dream mushroom. (A highly toxic mushroom with halucinogenic properties...maybe found in a demiplane)

    • A drop of Celestial blood. (The mayor's daughter is secretly a Sorceress with the Celestial Bloodline)

      ----

    • The ingredients must be mixed in a bowl made of mythril. (There is an old dwarven keep [maybe] on the other side of the mountains north of town)

    • The ingredients must then be mixed into a medium for consumption that was made with love and care. (The town is known for its wine. The medium will be two bottles from its first pressing over 100 years ago)

    This will be an adventure beginning at first level. I don't know what level they should be at when the adventure is complete as I still have to figure out why someone put the plague on the town and who did it. I've also got to create the plague itself in case one of the PCs catch it. I've left the details kind of vague so I can drop it into any setting, which will most likely be Mystara in the Grand Duchy of Karameikos. What level do you guys think this adventure should end at and is 10 days long enough time for the PCs to accomplish their goal while maintaining that sense of urgency?


    1. the 10 days should be fine, so long as they don't need to craft the bowl from scratch. The water and willow might be related: the party seeks the dryad's tree and begs for the bark, but she sends them on a minor quest (5 room dungeon). Upon completion she gives them the bark but she's also heard from the forest that they're searching for a pure spring so she directs them to it with a warning that the way is treacherous.

    2. Depending on how religiously you stick to experience they could be as low as 2nd level upon completion or as high as 7th. Personally I'd figure it like this for MY game: the party starts at 1st, learns of the plague turning people into monsters and even encounters some (potential exposure). They head to the local cleric or whoever's obvious for help but they're all infected there too; difficult battles ensue. This concludes adv 1. Adventure 2 sees the now-desperate heroes contacted by the secretive mayor's daughter who claims to have a hail mary of a cure, but in 10 days time the monsters already beyond aid will have infected or destroyed everyone. She gives them the list and suggests one as a possible starting point; I'd choose the dryad tree but whatev. The obtaining of this first ingredient is not only the end of adventure 2 but also pushes the PCs into 2nd level. More adventures occur around finding the rest of the ingredients, one at a time, as organically as your players want - if they like sandbox you could scatter these around and have them pick, but if they're kind of railroad enthusiasts like my players I'd give them a set order, either suggested by the mayor's daughter or having one lead into the next a la the dryad telling them where the next ingredient is. My set up would be: Dryad tree as above; this leads them to a shrine in the wilds. Fighting their way to the shrine they discover it to be of dwarven make and spy other clues to a hidden enclave of dwarves in the area (worst case scenario the dwarves arrest them for stealing the sacred beer brewing water from the shrine). The heroes have to barter money and service for the mithril bowl used in their sacred beer making but do so well that the dwarves explain that there's a haunted cave at the foot of the mountain on their way back to town - it has the dream mushrooms but has mites and dream spiders and such. Party goes there, takes mushrooms, heads back to town. Getting back to the mayor's daughter is tough; the terminal plague victims-turned-monsters have her holed up at her family manor and the party has to get to her there. Once inside they realize that this whole thing began as part of a mite plot to make everyone in town as ugly as them and the remainder of the mites they fought before are on their way to finish the job. So now they're trapped at the mayor's manor house, are missing the celestial blood and about to be overwhelmed by remaining monsters and mites. At the 0 hour the mayor's daughter does the big reveal and BLAM - celestial blood. Now the party just has to break through to the wine cellar and hold off the forces of evil long enough for the mayor's daughter to pull it all togehter and provide them a cask of antidote. Secret exit out of wine cellar and mayor's daughter sacrifices herself to cover escape. The party flees across town, gets to a bar, and sends the word out to the townsfolk and as dawn breaks the light of the sun drives away the mites, the party and a few guardsmen clean up the roaming monsters with the afflicted drinking the wine and getting healthy.

    My party would get a level every 2 adventures, getting to be roughly 3rd to 4th level upon completion of all this. That was all pretty railroady and filled with cheese, so you could distill this down to a prepless outline if you'd like.

    3. the plague in my version would turn people into monsters; specifically vermin that the mites coould then control. Stage one would attack charisma making the victim pale, irritable and prone to several verminous behaviors (consuming dung, clicking sounds, etc.) Stage 2 also affects the person physically draining their intellect (vermin are "mindless") and providing outward signs of infection; antennae, a shell starting to tear through the skin, budding wings or re-curved legs. Finally in stage three you have full transformation into full on monstrous vermin. Due to the low level I'd make them giant fire beetles or centipedes, but if you want to go "old school" you can pick random monstrous vermin from CR 1/3 up to CR 6 for the people to become.


    I'd hesitate to go too high level with a 10 day limit. Rocketing up too fast in game time strains my suspension of disbelief.

    Keep an eye on travel time too. If any of the things they need are even 2 days away, you've just eaten a lot of that time.

    You can also relax the deadline a little by not having it be quite such a hard deadline. More like a real disease: The sooner you get the cure the less people die from it.
    Even if the PCs don't catch the plague, they should have friends and/or relatives in town suffering from it.


    Luna_Silvertear wrote:

    @

  • Willow bark from a Dryad's tree. (Obviously must be a willow)

    [

  • Cool. But why a willow? Willows were not known for healing.


    DrDeth wrote:
    Luna_Silvertear wrote:

    @

  • Willow bark from a Dryad's tree. (Obviously must be a willow)

    [

  • Cool. But why a willow? Willows were not known for healing.

    Oh, yes they are. The salicin in the bark was a major precursor to the development of aspirin.

    Sovereign Court

    I found 2e to be the most loose in terms of how XP are handled. There are several pages in the DMG discussing it, suggesting several different metrics for doling out XP. All of this amounted to guidelines, with complete DM discretion on XP and leveling.

    Looking at your outline I'd probably just make life easy as a GM and level in the following way:

    Level 2 after collecting ingredients
    Level 3 after getting the cure mixed and created.
    Level 4 just before the boss battle that is causing the disease.

    Just chunk out the xp amounts so the leveling occurs at those moments.

    In terms of urgency, tell them that they will all get bonus xp depending on how many people survive the plague.


    Bill Dunn wrote:
    DrDeth wrote:
    Luna_Silvertear wrote:

    @

  • Willow bark from a Dryad's tree. (Obviously must be a willow)

    [

  • Cool. But why a willow? Willows were not known for healing.
    Oh, yes they are. The salicin in the bark was a major precursor to the development of aspirin.

    Which is why I picked it.

    Grand Lodge

    Pathfinder PF Special Edition, Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber
    Luna_Silvertear wrote:
    I would count chocolate in that bit of wealth. The Incans ransomed their emperor? I'll have to ask the wifey about that.

    Yes and no. They as Pizarro demanded, did fill a room up with gold to meet his demands. He executed the emperor anyway, allowing him Christian rites as his show of gratitude for the wealth.


    Luna_Silvertear wrote:
    I can't decide if I should use 15 point buy in my game or roll for stats using 3d6 reroll 1s or 4d6 drop lowest. I'll repost my list of changes from upthread here. I've placed a couple of notes in italics

    Another method to consider is the "Organic" method from the old 3.0 DMG: roll 4d6 in order, drop the lowest. Then reroll one stat and switch two scores. I also like the idea Whale_Cancer raised of rolling scores until you arrive at 15-point buys: I've done this myself once, only it's time-consuming.

    I'm running 3 new campaigns with eleven-year-olds, and I have resorted to point buy, for, as someone above mentioned, if one of these kids rolled a bit low I'm wary of them suiciding their characters to get a "re-do."

    Alzrius: thanks for linking to your blog. I find your suggestions really useful. I have always felt that magic should "feel different" from fighting in D&D/Pathfinder, and that 3rd Edition took a bit of this away by making most magic spells "insta-shots."

    Luna, I understand that your players are okay with race/class restrictions so that's the best approach for your group, but personally I think that, speaking generally about older approaches to the game, 3rd Edition did right by eliminating these restrictions.

    First, my young players' preconceptions of fantasy don't hew closely with the tropes that dominated at the time of D&D's creation. Second, they find that a huge part of their enjoyment comes from the enormous freedom they now have in creating and developing characters. They've been begging me to allow the Advanced Race Guide, which I'm allowing in one campaign. If that's making any of you think I've totally bought in to the "new school," consider that it's for creating characters to enter Rappan Athuk. :)


    @The Rot Grub

    I agree with your comment on the race/class restrictions, so this is a one time thing for this one group only. That said, I personally would find it fun to play in such a game myself, but that's just me. Maybe I should get into Castles and Crusades, get some of the 2e AD&D books, or go back to OD&D.

    @Mok

    That sounds like a plausable breakdown of the level progression I'd like to have. I know I'll be running slow advancement, which roughly equals...20 enounters, If I'm correct? 4th or 5th level is where I want to end this leg of the adventure. I'm hoping to get to level 20...Hmm...the adventure will be nonlinear and I haven't gone beyond what I've already posted as far as creation goes. I still have so much more planning...

    @LazarX

    So even though they gave him the gold, he killed the emperor anyway...that's a d*ck move...

    Grand Lodge

    Pathfinder PF Special Edition, Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber
    Luna_Silvertear wrote:

    @LazarX

    So even though they gave him the gold, he killed the emperor anyway...that's a d*ck move...

    Well they were planning on (and did) enslaving the entire lot anyway. Justified it as bringing "Christianity to pagan heathens."


    thejeff wrote:

    I agree with much of what you wrote in the rest of the post, but I just wanted to comment on that particular rule. I suspect the rule against gaining more then one level from a single session wasn't so much because level gain was expected to be quick, but because he expected characters of different levels to adventure together. If you started a new character it was expected to be at first level, even if the rest of the group was 10th. The experience from one session of 10th level opposition would be enough to get several low levels, even with PF experience charts.

    Also, the way dual classing worked, once you switched classes, you still only needed the normal amount of experience to gain levels in your new class, so you'd go up fast, very fast without the 1/session rule.
    So, that rule doesn't show much about the standard pace of level gain in 1/2E, but about the...

    This is all true re: the 1e/2e rule of not gaining more than one level per session.

    I did not play D&D during the 1e/2e era, but it seems like, looking back, asking a player whose character died back then to roll up a new 1st-level character was more feasible than it is in Pathfinder because (1) although their hit points were still very low, they could contribute to the party's damage-dealing ability at a comparable rate so as not to feel useless (in D&D 3.x it seems that the ability to deal damage at higher levels scales up dramatically from the get-go), and (2) they could reach the rest of the party's level of experience, or almost reach it by one level, in a relatively-short amount of time.

    I admit, from the GM side of the screen I prefer the idea of everyone "earning" their XP and always starting from Level 1. But my impression is that's not nearly as feasible in D&D 3.x as in previous editions to have a mixed-level party. Is that the experience of people who have also played previous editions?


    Luna_Silvertear wrote:

    @The Rot Grub

    I agree with your comment on the race/class restrictions, so this is a one time thing for this one group only. That said, I personally would find it fun to play in such a game myself, but that's just me. Maybe I should get into Castles and Crusades, get some of the 2e AD&D books, or go back to OD&D.

    Have you had a chance to look at C&C? When I looked at it a while ago, it did look appealing to me. Also, I think there is an active C&C forum over at Dragonsfoot.

    Another system to look at is Justin Alexander's Legends & Labyrinths. He basically is trying to prune 3rd Edition down to its basic mechanics, and from the Beta it seems to support more rules-light play. If you contact him I think he'd be happy to send you the Beta and receive your feedback as well.

    Of course, these other systems don't need to be adopted wholesale, but might be rich material to mine ideas from.

    401 to 450 of 476 << first < prev | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | next > last >>
    Community / Forums / Pathfinder / Pathfinder First Edition / Advice / AD&D via Pathfinder aka "I want an old school feeling game" All Messageboards

    Want to post a reply? Sign in.