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Post by thegreyelf on Nov 11, 2013 10:42:33 GMT -6
I picked up my OD&D Premium Reprint yesterday. Some initial thoughts:
1. It's really, really nice. The box construction is sturdy and just overall excellent.
2. The new cover art is cool, mostly variations and modernizations on the original themes. It's disappointing to see b&w line art on the supplement books which had color cover art originally, but it is what it is.
3. The books themselves are not as sturdy as the originals--they used thinner stock for both the covers and interiors. That's not to say they are cheaply constructed--they're not--they're just not as heavy or substantial as the originals. Cover stock is white, but still has the marbleized textured indentations that were on the original covers.
4. The layout was redone--it matches the original but looks overall cleaner and easier to read. The interior art has not been redone and is the classic awful, amateurish art we all have come to know and love.
5. The premium dice are a nice touch and are really cool looking. Mine roll pretty well, too.
6. The books are numbered Book I to Book VII instead of Books 1-3 and Supplements 1-4.
7. WotC really screwed up by not including reprints of Chainmail and Swords & Spells. I made my own and added them, which brings me to...
8. There's PLENTY of room in the box once the cardboard inserts are removed, to add your own books to the mix. I added Chainmail, Swords & Spells, my two Age of Conan books, the Chainmail Combat System booklet that was done on here ages ago, a Philotomy's musings booklet, and a Sword and Sorcery adventure generator book.
9. Since the books fit so perfectly into the opening (avoiding bouncing around), WotC included a ribbon bookmark that can be used to lift the stack out of the box. A very nice touch.
10. Conan and Elric have been excised from Gods, Demi-Gods, and Heroes.
11. I was a little disappointed that they left the "Corrections" page at the end of Greyhawk rather than incorporating the errata. It seemed a little lazy.
12. Yes, $150 is a good bit of bank, but if you consider that for the 2e and 3e reprints, each of the cores was $50, and you get the same amount of material here, albeit in a more compact and concise format, it's in line with the other premium reprints and actually feels PREMIUM, for a change.
Overall, as I said, this is the first Premium Edition Reprint that WotC has done that really and truly feels premium. I haven't been this excited to hold a D&D product since my 5th edition white box came in the mail. I'm extraordinarily happy with my purchase, and were I not taking a big paycut soon, I might pick up a second one off of Amazon (for about $50 cheaper than in the store) to leave shrinkwrapped on the shelf.
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joseph
Level 4 Theurgist
Posts: 142 
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Post by joseph on Nov 11, 2013 11:57:27 GMT -6
Thanks form the review! The photos that I have seen are quite impressive, the box looks fantastic!
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Post by mgtremaine on Nov 11, 2013 13:20:53 GMT -6
NOOOOOOOOOOOOO by CROM AND ARIOCH !!!!!!
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Post by Falconer on Nov 11, 2013 15:02:40 GMT -6
Yeah, that’s a big turnoff.
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Post by kesher on Nov 11, 2013 15:20:39 GMT -6
Yeah, that’s a big turnoff. But expected, yes? I mean, the original was in violation of copyright law...  |
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jacar
Level 5 Thaumaturgist
Posts: 345
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Post by jacar on Nov 11, 2013 15:38:45 GMT -6
Yeah, that’s a big turnoff. Why is that such a big turn off? To my mind, these mythology books are fairly useless. You are a cleric. You pick a god. Then you get to cast your spells. The actual stats of said god has little or nothing to do with anything. Gods are gods. They can't be defeated. The game worked perfectly fine without it. So the exclusion of a few gods is a non-issue. You want to be a follower or cleric of Crom, only the DM can stop you! |
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Chainsaw
Level 5 Thaumaturgist
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Post by Chainsaw on Nov 11, 2013 15:38:58 GMT -6
Good thing I have a nice minty 5th print, hobbits and all. Same with supplements. I am glad they are reprinting for those that want fancy reprints, but I am not buying.
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Post by Finarvyn on Nov 11, 2013 16:14:18 GMT -6
Slippery slope. It's a reprint but not an exact replica. Stuff is changed but errata isn't integrated into the text. I have such mixed feelings about this product.
And they should have included Chainmail. I don't care so much about Swords & Spells because I don't ever use it, but Chainmail adds to the product IMO.
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jacar
Level 5 Thaumaturgist
Posts: 345
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Post by jacar on Nov 11, 2013 16:43:35 GMT -6
The lack of "Chainmail" is a big miss. Swords and Spells is no big loss. I have a copy on my hard drive bought off of Wizards during there first run through PDF distribution. It mostly stays on my hard drive.  Not terribly worried about the exactness either. If they went through pains to clarify some of the rules (a tough thing to do!) then so much the better. |
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Post by funkaoshi on Nov 11, 2013 16:55:07 GMT -6
The reprint wouldn't be as much fun without confusing references to a game no one owns.
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Post by oakesspalding on Nov 11, 2013 17:59:25 GMT -6
Re: copyright. When the Tolkien references were taken out in the transition from 5th to 6th edition they actually missed a number of them. In my 6th edition copies I count 3 remaining references to "hobbits" and 7 remaining references to "balrogs", most of them in The Underworld and Wilderness Adventures. Out of curiosity, did they leave those in? Also, did they leave the Martians in?
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Post by waysoftheearth on Nov 11, 2013 18:12:34 GMT -6
What about references to Outdoor Survival? It's a shame that, having gone to all the trouble of tidying the layout, they didn't bother to integrate the errata  Lack of Chainmail is pretty serious omission considering all the reference to those rules in the 3 LBBs, especially for all the additional monster and hero details that aren't given in D&D because they appear in CM. Swords & Spells would have been useful for some of the spell durations/areas of effect also. |
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Post by Falconer on Nov 11, 2013 18:38:13 GMT -6
To my mind, these mythology books are fairly useless. You are a cleric. You pick a god. Then you get to cast your spells. The actual stats of said god has little or nothing to do with anything. Gods are gods. They can't be defeated. The game worked perfectly fine without it. So the exclusion of a few gods is a non-issue. You want to be a follower or cleric of Crom, only the DM can stop you! Hm, I have a lot to respond to this, but first I have to ask: Have you ever read Gods, Demi-gods & Heroes? |
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Post by geoffrey on Nov 11, 2013 19:55:59 GMT -6
[E]rrata isn't integrated into the text. They integrated the errata into a howler such as Unearthed Arcana, but they didn't do the same for the seminal GREYHAWK?  |
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Post by mgtremaine on Nov 11, 2013 19:58:26 GMT -6
G,D-G,H is lessened by the removal. Seriously those two sections are really cool. Seems like a missed chance to make it legit, credit Chaosium or whoever they were suppose to, throw a few bucks at Michael Moorcock if required. It's not like he doesn't deserve it -Mike |
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Post by geoffrey on Nov 11, 2013 20:00:17 GMT -6
Yeah, that’s a big turnoff. You are a cleric. You pick a god. Then you get to cast your spells. The actual stats of said god has little or nothing to do with anything. Gods are gods. They can't be defeated. The implication of OD&D is that clerics are Christians and anti-clerics are Satanists. There is no indication in GDG&H that the gods therein are meant to be worshipped. In fact, their stats indicate that they are just a step up on the toughness scale from Demogorgon and Orcus. The beings in GDG&H are meant to be faced in combat, sometimes defeated, and sometimes even killed. Judges Guild understood this with their Unknown Gods, in which most gods have 80 to 100 hp, and some even have 40 hp. If you can't kill a god, what's he for? |
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Post by austinjimm on Nov 11, 2013 23:26:19 GMT -6
Photos? I'd really like to see what the interior looks like.
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Post by oakesspalding on Nov 11, 2013 23:38:06 GMT -6
Gygax said all sorts of things at different times, the uniting factor being that he was always a strong defender of his opinion of the moment, a trait that could be interpreted as stubbornness if not sometimes outright intolerance. That's not so much a criticism as a description, and as it happens I think that he was usually (though not always) very right.
But the above comments are odd given his overseeing of Gods, Demigods and Heroes and (even more to the point) Deities and Demigods. If fighting a god is silly or pointless, why are combat statistics for all the gods laid out precisely like combat statistics for monsters in the Monster Manual? Is it just so that referees will get a buzz out of discovering that Thor has 150 hit points (as opposed to 100 or 200 or whatever)? Who knew?
There is actually quite a tradition in fantasy and myth of mortals interacting with and sometimes even getting the better of the gods. So it's a bit unfair to say that any such thing is "childish" or "comic bookish". If so, then so are 18th level wizards, "artifacts" and all the other high-level cargo introduced by Gygax himself within a few short years after the introduction of the game.
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Post by Stormcrow on Nov 12, 2013 0:31:41 GMT -6
The idea behind Gods, Demi-gods, and Heroes was that they represented the upper limit of the D&D universe, and thousand-level characters with a million hit points were just products of people who didn't get it. The statistics are meant to fix the upper scale of D&D.
The book is like a monster manual of gods, but if you're able to fight them you've just proven your game is silly.
Despite what it and its successor for AD&D claim, the book is not particularly useful.
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Nov 12, 2013 2:02:20 GMT -6
Gygax said all sorts of things at different times ... That's true and I usually make that point before posting his words. Thanks for highlighting that. I guess it all boils down to the very nature of reality and the divine in one's campaign. As to the hit points and AC of the deities, I believe the intro to that volume spells that out far better than I could say it. At any rate, my basic point is: the rules imply nothing. What a referee reads into it is based upon how he wishes to run his campaign ... this is how it should be. But telling me that a deity has X hit points means he can be killed is an argument without any weight behind it. Run it your way! You don't need a mandate from the rules as written or anyone else. If it's fun you're doing it right! |
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Nov 12, 2013 5:35:15 GMT -6
I love people who speculate instead of actually reading the text. No, wait I do the other thing.
"To quote Tim Kask in the Foreword,
“This volume is something else, also: our last attempt to reach the “Monty Hall” DM’s. Perhaps now some of the ‘giveaway’ campaigns will look as foolish as they truly are. This is our last attempt to delineate the absurdity of 40+ level characters. When Odin, the All-Father has only (?) 300 hit points, who can take a 44th level Lord seriously?” "
From "Gary Loses Control of his Game," my chapter on GDG&H in my book, "We Made Up Some $hit We Thought Would Be Fun."
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jacar
Level 5 Thaumaturgist
Posts: 345
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Post by jacar on Nov 12, 2013 5:55:20 GMT -6
Hm, I have a lot to respond to this, but first I have to ask: Have you ever read Gods, Demi-gods & Heroes? Yes. |
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jacar
Level 5 Thaumaturgist
Posts: 345
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Post by jacar on Nov 12, 2013 6:06:05 GMT -6
I love people who speculate instead of actually reading the text. No, wait I do the other thing. "To quote Tim Kask in the Foreword, “This volume is something else, also: our last attempt to reach the “Monty Hall” DM’s. Perhaps now some of the ‘giveaway’ campaigns will look as foolish as they truly are. This is our last attempt to delineate the absurdity of 40+ level characters. When Odin, the All-Father has only (?) 300 hit points, who can take a 44th level Lord seriously?” " Funny that for all the good intent, making a GD&H book actually had the opposite effect from what Kask says. Instead of setting the upper and unattainable limit, this book provided a challenge or a target to shoot for. *shrug* |
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Nov 12, 2013 7:08:24 GMT -6
Which I mention. "If you stat it, they will kill it."
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Post by thegreyelf on Nov 12, 2013 7:12:35 GMT -6
In case anyone is interested I did a full review over on my blog: wastedlandsfantasy.blogspot.com/I think it's well worth the $150 price tag. They didn't actively change anything--they just added new cover art and excised two pantheons that they didn't have the right to include anyway. Considering the rumored cost of the Conan license, it's forgivable and not unexpected. Personally, in my campaign I always adopted an idea that became canon in 2e: the stats for gods aren't really stats for gods; just stats for their most common physical avatar. Kill the avatar, you just piss off the god and he or she will take you out in other ways. Yes, not including Chainmail was a miss. We can hope that WotC might remedy this by making it available (along with Swords & Spells) on dndclassics.com. Failing that, let's not pretend it's not easy to find. Which isn't to excuse the oversight, but it's not insurmountable and as we all know the game does work without Chainmail. S&S I wanted to see in there not for its utility, but because it is, in fact, part of the OD&D canon and just should've been there for historical reasons. Anyway, feel free to check out the full review I did and I'd love to hear comments. |
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Nov 12, 2013 7:38:59 GMT -6
Thanks for the review! My copy has yet to arrive ... |
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jacar
Level 5 Thaumaturgist
Posts: 345
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Post by jacar on Nov 12, 2013 8:16:43 GMT -6
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joseph
Level 4 Theurgist
Posts: 142
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Post by joseph on Nov 12, 2013 10:07:13 GMT -6
Photos? I'd really like to see what the interior looks like. Check the other thread in this forum, probably still on the last page... |
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Post by Falconer on Nov 12, 2013 11:52:48 GMT -6
I actually really love Supplement IV. I think it hews closest, of all the supplements, to the 3lbb vibe of being based on mythological and literary sources (whereas the other Supplements really showcase the creativity of their authors), which is one of the things I love about D&D in the first place. Supplement IV is full of NOT ONLY GODS but also demi-gods and heroes … and monsters … and artifacts … from MANY great mythoi. In this respect it is superior to the AD&D DDG. Sure, there are many resources out there that can give me similar or better information, but the handiness of Sup. IV makes it worth its price. Check out the CSIO which uses Sup. IV to populate its temples (Thoth, Bast, Apollo, Odin, Tsathoggus, the Blood Stained God, Quetzacoatl…), and where Balder is a shopkeeper in disguise. I love that vibe.
Anyway, the whole idea of “gods shouldn’t have stats! you should never fight the gods!” is weak sauce. All Kask said was that 300 HP is the upper limit that should probably not be reached or exceeded by any single player. What we are really talking about is petty pagan gods which roam the earth freely, according to all the myths. (Not Yahweh and Satan who are more absolute and lie beyond the scope of the game, save as implied indirect ultimate objects of worship for Clerics and Anti-Clerics.) So, why not let Odin come to your players’ aid? Why not let the players fight the Spider-god of Yezud? Why not let Arioch bargain for your players’ souls? Because it’s insensible?
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Nov 12, 2013 17:25:49 GMT -6
Anyway, the whole idea of “gods shouldn’t have stats! My post was not intended to convey that message. I apologize to you and everyone else on the board for any offense I gave. I explained the "why" in a post to Geoffrey upthread, I won't bore everyone by posting again. |
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Not terribly worried about the exactness either. If they went through pains to clarify some of the rules (a tough thing to do!) then so much the better.
