Thoughts while watching the conversation between John and Zak

A conversation between John Wick and Zak S.

That conversation was spawned by John’s “Chess is not an RPG”. (I haven’t read that article at the time I’m watching the conversation.)

(Edit: I have now read the article...thoughts here.)

Note: These are just my thoughts. They are not necessarily absolute truths even if I seem to be stating them as such. As always on this blog, this is thinking out loud.

Role-playing—in the context of role-playing games—is making decisions in-character. Therefore you can role-play in any game that allows you to make decisions.

Since role-playing is making choices, the choices a game allows determines how much the game supports role-playing. By trading rules for rulings by a referee, you trade a finite number of responses to any choice for an infinite number. Sometimes called “tactical infinity”.

(There’s a point to be made that even with tactical infinity there may be limits on the choices. Infinity plus limits does not necessarily equal a finite set. But that’s probably a whole ’nother discussion.)

There is no denying that by the Moldvay edited Basic D&D booklet (pp. B2, B3, B60) and first edition AD&D DMG (pp. 7, 9, 230) DM rulings over rules is the explicit intent of D&D and AD&D.

I’d argue that it was there in the original game too, but the text is less clear. Also, descriptions of Chainmail games from before D&D indicate that Gygax and associates played that game very much in a “rulings over rules” fashion. For example, there was a story told of a Chainmail game where one side set fire to the woods where the other side had units holed up. (If anyone has a reference to a telling on that story, please post the link.)

---

It should be noted that even the original D&D had an example of play that does give some idea of how the game is meant to be played.

---

I laughed when John said that if you want to role-play don’t be a fighter. To me it is exactly the opposite. The fighter is the blank slate that only becomes interesting through role-playing. Although there has been some effort over the years to take that away from the class.

---

I like Zak’s analogy of a supermarket versus a set of ingredients and a recipe.

---

Although in a couple of editions of D&D a three minute combat might take three hours to play out, that hasn’t generally been the case.

Has there ever been an edition of D&D that explicitly says seducing a barmaid can be done in a minute with a single die roll? Even in editions with skills and even if it were a single roll, wouldn’t that typically be played out by doing a lot of things over time to accumulate bonuses to that roll?

Unless you just want to get it out-of-the-way fast because it isn’t something the group wants to spend time on. In which case this is a feature. And it still is a ruling instead of a rule.

---

There is something about the simplicity of the battle rules in Diplomacy that really seems to drive the negotiation aspect of the game.

The combat system in Moldvay’s Basic D&D really is simple and not the majority of the book. In my experience, this is essentially how people played combat most of the time in AD&D. Others have told me their experience is similar.

That simplicity, however, seems to allow real tactics to be applied effectively. Rules mastery is not required. Which, I think, makes it easier to make decision more in-character and less as-player.

Maybe.

---

What is the difference between a role-playing game and a conventional game?

When I am attempting to design a conventional game, I am trying to make a closed system. When I am attempting to design a role-playing game, I am trying to leave things open for player creativity and referee rulings. So the difference between a conventional game and a role-playing game isn’t that the rules tell you to role-play but that the rules leave space for role-playing.

Did the original D&D do this intentionally or accidentally? shrug Maybe both. The afterword seems to say that it was at least partially intentional.

While it may not be that people role-played in D&D because the rules were incomplete, I don’t think that can be counted out as a factor.

And, as always, I’m not sure that role-playing games even are games.

---

Another thought: “Role-playing” in the sense of “playing a role-playing game” is making decisions for the character. Those choices may not be made purely in-character. (Role-playing₂ is not always purely role-playing₁.) I’m OK with some amount of “metagaming”.

More messing with ability scores

Previously I wrote about replacing the intelligence ability in classic D&D with quickness. This yields three pairs of ability scores...

strength / constitution
dexterity / quickness
charisma / wisdom

In Star Frontiers, ability scores are paired in a similar manner. When generating them, you roll once for each pair, and the same value is applied to each score in the pair. Then the player may adjust them by taking points away from on score in the pair and adding them to the other.

(The AD&D2e book Players Option: Skills & Powers did something similar, though it split the original six ability scores into twelve scores.)

The range of scores is 1–100 (though initial values range from 30—70) and the adjustment is limited to 10 points. So that would translate to 2 points in D&D. e.g. If 12 was rolled for dexterity/quickness, the player could set the scores at 12/12, 13/11, 14/10, 11/13, or 10/14.

I’m not sure that only rolling three scores would be a good thing, though.

Highlights at dndclassics.com

Here are some items on dndclassics.com that I thought were worth highlighting.

D&D Basic Set Rulebook (Moldvay edit): I may be biased. This was my first role-playing game purchase. I still think, however, that this is the best version of the game published under its own name. While it is heavily rooted in the original game; it is cleaned up, organized, and communicates more clearly than its predecessors. It’s compatible enough with all other TSR-era editions of D&D and AD&D that you can cherry pick bits from them when and if you want to expand on it.

This book only covers levels 1 to 3. With its companion Expert Set, you have a game that goes to level 14 and beyond. As I’m writing this, though, the Expert Set Rulebook is not yet available on dndclassics.com.

B2 The Keep on the Borderlands: This adventure came in the box set with the Basic Set Rulebook above. In some ways, I consider this as much part of the “core rules” as the Rulebook itself. It gives some practical advice and examples for Dungeon Masters.

HR1–7 The “historical reference” series: These are for me perhaps the best things to come out of the AD&D 2nd edition era. I’ve always liked a bit of history in my games. I think game books about history in some ways do a better job of giving you a feel for what historical periods were like than most history texts. Because they are more concerns with playing in that world rather than describing historically significant events. Here are the links:

• A bundle of all seven
• HR1 Vikings
• HR2 Charlemagne’s Paladins
• HR3 Celts
• HR4 A Mighty Fortress
• HR5 The Glory of Rome
• HR6 Age of Heroes
• HR7 The Crusades

Rules Compendium (3e): (Not to be confused with the Rules Cyclopedia, which I hope will appear on dndclassics.com in the future.) While the Wizards-era 3rd edition isn’t my favorite edition of the game; I do like it, and I do play it. So, I’m curious about a book that purports to bring the most important rules of that game together along with correcting errata. Although, I’m not sure it would be any more useful than the Hypertext d20 SRD.

Unearthed Arcana (3e): (Not to be confused with the first edition AD&D Unearthed Arcana which is not yet available through dndclassics.com.) This book may be the most “old school” book of the Wizards-era 3rd edition. Because it gives you all sorts of tools for modifying the game and making it your own. All the rules are also open content and available in the Hypertext d20 SRD. The book itself, however, also includes some helpful commentary.

Edit: ...and I have now purchased all the items on this list.

Wizards of the Coast

I’m going to talk about the next edition of D&D below so, a couple of points to begin with...

1. Yes, “D&D Next” is a terrible name. That’s because it’s a project name. The real name will be decided (I assume) by actual marketing people when the project gets closer to becoming products.
2. I will reiterate that Wizards should make clear on the books what edition of the game it is. There’s already enough confusion for non-collectors looking at D&D books and not being able to tell what edition they are.

OK, now on to the thinking aloud...

First, we have what Mike Mearls wrote in “Legends and Lore: D&D Next Goals, Part Two”. I like what he says under the head “The Basic Rules”. This is what I want the the D&D brand to be doing for the hobby. And what’s good for the hobby is good for Wizards. By attracting more than just the people who like a single style, they will build a market they can sell lots of different RPGs to.

Which, I think, is the real answer to the fragmentation problem, which Next has the potential to exacerbate. Instead of trying to get everyone playing the same game, you “narrowcast” with multiple games. Especially since a lot of those customers will buy more than one of those games.

(I know that goes against the conventional wisdom of what TSR’s downfall was, but TSR had many and bigger problems.)

On a side note, I saw the question, “Why do you want more people to play D&D?” What I want is for everyone that would enjoy D&D or the hobby in general to be able to find it. For good or ill, most people’s first contact with the hobby will be D&D. So, if D&D is too heavily focused on a certain style of play, it gives lots of people the impression that it is representative of the hobby when its not. While a basic D&D may not be the game for everyone, it is more likely to send those who don’t like it looking for an RPG that they do like than to send them away thinking there is nothing in the hobby for them.

I don’t like some of the stuff under the head “Current Design Goals” in that Legends and Lore column, though.

Second, we have dndclassics.com. Good quality PDFs of older edition material with no DRM with text that is searchable through RPGNow (and DriveThruRPG). They even have the 1981 Basic booklet that is my favorite but which had never been offered in PDF in the past. I am happy to say that I am a Wizards of the Coast customer again.

Plate mail

There seems to be a misconception about the term “plate mail” from TSR-era D&D among armor enthusiasts dealing with spread of D&D jargon as well as among some gamers.

D&D plate mail armor is not plate armor. In D&D, “plate mail” refers to mail armor augmented by some pieces of plate armor.

In D&D, actual plate armor—distinct from plate mail armor—is called “suit armor”. (D&D Master Players’ Book p. 15) In AD&D, plate armor is called “field plate armor” or “full plate armor”. (AD&D Dungeon Masters Guide p. 27; Unearthed Arcana pp. 75–76)

Yes, “plate mail” is an unfortunate term. (I’ve been using “mail and plates” until I find a better term.) It should be considered game jargon rather than a general term or historical term. And it should not be considered a synonym for “plate armor”.

(You may notice that plate armor, likewise, is typically augmented by some bits of mail.)

Note that—unlike “plate mail”—the use of “banded mail”, “ring mail”, “scale mail”, or “splint mail” in D&D is not similarly justified. It would be better to drop the word “mail” from these terms.

For what it’s worth, banded and ring armors might never have existed.

While “chain mail” has come into common use, in medieval usage it was called simply “mail”.

The “plate mail” drawing comes from the AD&D Dungeon Masters Adventure Log. The plate armor is Telecanter’s clean up of an image from Charles John Ffoulkes’ Armour & Weapons

Protection from what?

...or “Would that technically be rules lawyering?”

From the D&D Basic Set c. 1981...

Protection from Evil

Range: 0 (caster only)
Duration: 12 turns

This spell circles the cleric with a magic barrier. This barrier will move with the caster. The spell serves as some protection from “evil” attacks (attacks by monsters of some alignment other than the cleric’s alignment) by adding 1 to the cleric’s saving throws, and subtracting 1 from the “to hit” die roll of these opponents. The spell will also keep out hand-to-hand attacks from enchanted (summoned or created) monsters (such as living statues), but not missile fire attacks from these creatures (see COMBAT). The cleric may break this protection by attacking the monster in hand-to-hand combat, but still gains the bonus “to hit” and saves.

I’ve read this spell many times, but I didn’t notice something that was noticed Saturday. The last sentence says that by attacking the monster, the caster breaks the spell.

Well, that’s how I’d read it before. First, we’ll note that the cleric can freely make missile attacks against the monster. Secondly, we’ll note that a qualifying attack doesn’t break the spell, because the “bonus ‘to hit’ and saves”† remains.

But then what is lost? OK, let’s look closer. The spell grants...

1. A +1 to the cleric’s saving throws against attacks by monsters of an alignment different than the cleric’s.
2. A -1 “to hit” when a monster of an alignment different than the cleric’s attacks the cleric.
3. Prevention of hand-to-hand attacks on the cleric from enchanted (summoned or created) monsters.

So, the cleric making a hand-to-hand attack against a monster only negates 3. Note also that the specification of monsters for 1 and 2 is different from the specification in 3.

This spell turns out to be surprisingly complicated. Was it intended to be that complex or was it worded poorly?

As a recovering rules lawyer, this whole discussion made me a bit uneasy. Though this is certainly a far cry from the rules lawyering I participated in with AD&D or Wizards’ D&D.

---

†But no “to hit” bonus is given. Only a penalty to the monsters. Presumably it is called a bonus here since it is in the caster’s favor.

(A)D&D hardback spines

Say, you’re in a Half Price Books looking at the role-playing games. You’ll probably see some books that look like these. (Clicking it should show you a bigger version.)

(You may want to reference my D&D ID page and the time line in Wikipedia’s “Editions of Dungeons & Dragons” article while reading this.)

The top two represent first edition Advanced Dungeons & Dragons published by TSR. (Of course, it wasn’t called “first edition” at the time. That came later when second edition was published.) Later books had the orange spine. Some of the early books where later printed with new covers and the orange spine, but the contents are the same.

The third and fourth represent second edition Advanced Dungeons & Dragons published by TSR. Again, the fourth one is later books. Some of the earlier books where printed with new covers and spines to match this new trade dress but, again, the contents are the same. Note that the later books lack the handy “2nd Edition” text.

Note that all edition of the game published by TSR are highly compatible.

The fifth spine represents “third edition” Dungeons & Dragons published by Wizards of the Coast. Note, again, that there is nothing that explicitly says “third edition” here, although that’s what it is most commonly called.

The sixth spine represents “3.5” Dungeons & Dragons published by Wizards of the Coast. The “core” books did say “v.3.5” on the cover, but other books didn’t. Honestly, though, I don’t have enough 3.5 era books to tell you much about distinguishing 3.0 from 3.5. Mainly I do it through knowing pretty much all the 3.0 products, so if I don’t recognize it, it is probably 3.5. ^_^ The good news is that 3.0 and 3.5 are very compatible.

The seventh spine represents “fourth edition” Dungeons & Dragons published by Wizards of the Coast.

I believe there was only one hardback ever published for “classic D&D”. i.e. The “non-advanced” D&D published by TSR before and parallel with AD&D. That is the Rules Cyclopedia. Everything else for classic D&D was, I believe, saddle-stitched or boxed sets.

Of course, what you really need is a “pocket guide”, but this is what you get. ^_^

I’d love to do something like this for the perfect bound books as well, but I don’t actually have any of them.

Hey, Wizards of the Coast! If you’re reading this, I hope you’ll understand why I don’t think “D&D next” should just say “Dungeons & Dragons” on the cover. Even if I’m playing “D&D next”, I’m going to occasionally see second-hand books, and I’d like it to be easy to tell unambiguously if a book with “D&D” on the cover is intended for the game I’m playing or not. Yeah, yeah, I know. You’re going for the “make it easy to use anything from any edition”, but as a customer, I still want every book to tell me what edition it was originally intended for. I shouldn’t have to have the knowledge of a collector for this. There is zero reason for this confusion to exist. I know everyone at TSR and Wizards thought it made sense at the time to do what they did, but you were wrong. Please, do not contribute to the confusion. Thank you.

Create food & water in Labyrinth Lord

Here’s the follow up to my post on the Create Food in Expert D&D (1981).

In AD&D, Create Food & Water is a 3rd level cleric spell. It provides food for three people per level of the caster. The 3rd level spells-per-day for a cleric maxes out at nine at 19th level. A 19th level cleric could support 513 people. Note also, however, that the casting time has increased to 10 minutes. (The Expert book doesn’t list a casting time, so I presume that it is 10 seconds—i.e. 1 combat round.)

In Labyrinth Lord (both the base game and the AEC), Create Food & Water is a 4th level cleric spell. It only provides for three people regardless of the level of caster. So, a 20th level LL cleric, with six 4th level spells per day, could only support 18 people.

Note that both here and for my earlier Expert D&D (1981) numbers, I’m treating the cleric’s spells-per-day limit as a strict daily limit. If the rules or DM allows for re-prep’ing spells within a day then even more people could be supported, but at the cost of a lot of the cleric’s time.

Lamentations of the Flame Princess Weird Fantasy Role-playing lacks such a spell.

D&D Next Classes

From EN World: What We Know About “D&D Next”:

The goal at the moment is to include all the classes that were in the first PH style book for each edition.

Surely someone else has already compiled this list, but since I didn’t find it, I compiled it myself.

Note that many classes appeared first in a supplement for a previous edition. I’m not listing the first appearance of each class. I’m listing its first appearance in Men & Magic or a Players Handbook (first PHB for editions with multiple PHBs).

In the non-advanced line, you had race-classes and the Mystic. Race-classes aren’t included because it seems that D&D next isn’t going that direction. The Mystic, rightly or wrongly, I’m counting as Monk.

AD&D2e had the “specialist wizard” & “specialist priest” which I am also omitting from this list.

• Assassin (1e PHB)
• Barbarian (3e PHB)
• Bard (2e PHB; optional 1e PHB)
• Cleric (0e Men & Magic)
• Druid (1e PHB)
• Fighting-man/Fighter (0e Men & Magic)
• Illusionist (1e PHB)
• Magic-user/Mage/Wizard (0e Men & Magic)
• Monk (1e PHB)
• Paladin (1e PHB)
• Ranger (1e PHB)
• Sorcerer (3e PHB)
• Thief/Rogue (1e PHB; the Holmes Basic Set)
• Warlock (4e PHB)
• Warlord (4e PHB)

For a grand total of 15 classes. Though I think there is the possibility of some of them being combined.

Note that a Psion class was also mentioned in the D&D Experience seminars.

Here they are in roughly chronological order...

• Cleric (0e Men & Magic)
• Fighting-man/Fighter (0e Men & Magic)
• Magic-user/Mage/Wizard (0e Men & Magic)
• Thief/Rogue (1e PHB; the Holmes Basic Set)
• Assassin (1e PHB)
• Druid (1e PHB)
• Illusionist (1e PHB)
• Monk (1e PHB)
• Paladin (1e PHB)
• Ranger (1e PHB)
• Bard (2e PHB; optional 1e PHB)
• Barbarian (3e PHB)
• Sorcerer (3e PHB)
• Warlock (4e PHB)
• Warlord (4e PHB)

Composite long bow?

AD&D lists a composite long bow. As does WotC’s 3e D&D. Which recently struck me as odd. As I understood it, longbows weren’t composite, and composite bows weren’t long. Am I wrong?

AD&D2e Rangers

Why do rangers get two-weapon fighting in second edition AD&D (and later editions)? Well, I’ve heard reasons that claim to be informed by people from TSR, but this is why it made sense to me at the time.

When I looked at the ranger class, I primarily saw Robin Hood. (And perhaps the strongest image of Robin Hood for me then was the Disney movie starring anthropomorphic animals.) My image was of someone who wouldn’t wear heavy armor or carry a shield. Yet, under the AD&D rules (as I and my friends played or misplayed them) the advantage of heavy armor and a shield were too good to pass up. Giving the ranger class two-weapon fighting ability and restricting it to when they were wearing lighter armor gave mechanical reasons for our rangers to look more like my image of the class.

My opinions have changed these days. I have different opinions about armor. I have different opinions about two-weapon fighting. I have different opinions about the ranger class. At the time, however, it made perfect sense to me.