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Post by tdenmark on Oct 28, 2020 6:45:08 GMT -6
I have a number of OSR books in development that are in the same family as Warriors of the Red Planet, Guardians, Freebooters, Raiders, and Colonial Troopers. But something has been happening to my tastes over the past year. The more I play 5e the more I like it. There are simple things like advantage/disadvantage dice that are excellent, to the proficiency, saving throw, and (passive) perception systems that run much deeper and are further from OSR.
But I'm really wanting to incorporate some of the best of those mechanics into any new OSR books I make.
If an OSR book had a great and intriguing premise, cool art, and had a few 5e mechanics in it would you still be interested in it, or would the 5e stuff be a turn off?
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Post by jeffb on Oct 28, 2020 8:07:55 GMT -6
It would have to have a REALLY interesting premise/thematic/narrative take for me. There are already several OSR games out there that have borrowed 5e-isms (plus 4e and 3Eisms), like BlackHack & Relics & Ruins to name a couple. Then of course there's the boatload of things out there that are just stripped down 5E.
I would reiterate the first sentence again. If it's just another D&D esque fantasy game with all the same self referential D&D brand fantasy nonsense, no thank you. If it's a Mazes & Minotaurs, Encounter Critical, Seven Voyages of Zylarthen, or Exemplars and Eidolons? (Or some of your own works like Guardians, etc) Bring it on!
Frankly, most of the best things from 5E that make gameplpay interesting are tweaked and re-named 4E-isms
monster recharges lair actions death saves hit dice/healing surges encounter powers/short rest powers "interrupt" actions/attacks
but IMO, people are focusing way too much on rules/rules set in the OSR these days, and not enough on worlds & adventures (barring the ever present "hex crawling" or "mega dungeons"). There no Arduins, or Warlocks, EPTs. or even T&T's anymore- most of todays OSR variants are just the SoS with some different wrapping paper and a pretty Kickstarter campaign.
I don't mean to sound bitter, I'm not- just so bored with/over the OSR in the past few years. If James M hadn't started back up on Gognardia, I'd probably be completely tuned out to D&D/OSR by this point. I'm starting to wander off to other games.
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Post by hamurai on Oct 28, 2020 9:47:34 GMT -6
I play 5E regularly and it's my 2nd-favourite edition after OD&D. Several mechanics, firstly advantage/disadvantage, are easy to learn and clever enough to be used in pretty much all my OSR game sessions.
For me there's no sacrilege in incorporating modern mechanics in "old school" games. We're not forced to stand still and dismiss good new ideas just because we like old games.
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Post by linebeck on Oct 28, 2020 10:05:49 GMT -6
I voted no, but my dislike of 5e is not as extreme as the poll options you provided.
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Post by tdenmark on Oct 28, 2020 11:19:39 GMT -6
I voted no, but my dislike of 5e is not as extreme as the poll options you provided. Heh, ok, I was trying to make it a little fun. It was kind of a sideways reference to Gollum telling Samwise he can keep his nasty potatoes.
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Post by tdenmark on Oct 28, 2020 11:26:51 GMT -6
but IMO, people are focusing way too much on rules/rules set in the OSR these days, and not enough on worlds & adventures (barring the ever present "hex crawling" or "mega dungeons"). There no Arduins, or Warlocks, EPTs. or even T&T's anymore- most of todays OSR variants are just the SoS with some different wrapping paper and a pretty Kickstarter campaign. I agree. There has been this almost excruciating exacting of detail over this precise +1 here vs. that nuanced -1 over there in an almost religious fervor matched only by New Testament scholars arguing over a single letter that interpreted one way or the other might subtly change the meaning of a particular sentence. Blech. Let the creativity flow! There are too many cool ideas to be explored and I love the format of OSR books, the simplicity and directness and familiarity of the system. Honestly I could run Ravenloft for Halloween with OD&D and have just as much fun as playing it with 5th edition. I just like that the newer systems give the players more options to play with and explore with their characters.
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Post by Falconer on Oct 28, 2020 15:00:14 GMT -6
I voted the anti-5e option, but really for me it’s not that I have a 5e detector that will get set off (I don’t have any experience with 5e), it’s more that I tend to get unexcited about base game mechanics, in general. I wish these would be written as “OD&D Supplements” which take the base rules for granted.
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Post by linebeck on Oct 28, 2020 19:03:27 GMT -6
I always liked the dice chain mechanic from DCC. I’d like an osr style take on that that really goes all the way. I also like dice pool mechanics when you get to roll lots of dice at once. I’m a huge fan of static difficulty numbers but variable dice. Advantage/disadvantage scratches that itch but I would want even more.
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Dohojar
Level 4 Theurgist
Posts: 114
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Post by Dohojar on Oct 28, 2020 19:22:02 GMT -6
Sign me up. I really like 5e as a rules set but I also like me some old school mixed in.
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Post by Punkrabbitt on Oct 28, 2020 22:30:36 GMT -6
I am amazingly happy with OSR rules, the more time that goes by, the more I like 3LBBs + whatever the group wants to use. The only thing I've seen lately as a universal rule that I'm really excited about is advantage/disadvantage from 5e.
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Post by tdenmark on Oct 29, 2020 8:53:08 GMT -6
I always liked the dice chain mechanic from DCC. I’d like an osr style take on that that really goes all the way. I also like dice pool mechanics when you get to roll lots of dice at once. I’m a huge fan of static difficulty numbers but variable dice. Advantage/disadvantage scratches that itch but I would want even more. Can you articulate how dice chain works? I'm not deeply knowledgeable how DCC works. The one thing I like about Champions (or the Hero system if you prefer) is how satisfying tossing fistfuls of d6's is.
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Post by linebeck on Oct 29, 2020 17:24:07 GMT -6
I always liked the dice chain mechanic from DCC. I’d like an osr style take on that that really goes all the way. I also like dice pool mechanics when you get to roll lots of dice at once. I’m a huge fan of static difficulty numbers but variable dice. Advantage/disadvantage scratches that itch but I would want even more. Can you articulate how dice chain works? I'm not deeply knowledgeable how DCC works. The one thing I like about Champions (or the Hero system if you prefer) is how satisfying tossing fistfuls of d6's is. Let me try to explain how I understand it. Basically the idea is that you have D4-D6-D8-D10-D12-D20. DCC also adds a D3, a D16 and a D24. If you are unskilled you make your checks with a D10. Fighters also get to Roll a D3 plus a D20 when they attack. If a fighter is using two weapons, the second attack is using a D16. The idea is the difficulty target numbers are static and instead of having static modifiers you get to roll extra dice. One way of incorporating it into D&D is to to remove static bonuses and penalties and replace it with a die. For example if you are attacking from behind instead of adding to your attack a static modifier (such as a plus 4) you get to roll an additional D8. 50% of the time, you would get a +4 or less, but you could get up to a plus 8. Same with magic sword bonus (a sword +2 would become a sword +D4). You could also use extra dice to simulate increased combat powers against a static modifier. For example to hit an Opponent wearing plate mail you always need need to roll a 17 to hit. A one hit die monster would just roll a twenty sided die while a 5 hit dice monster would roll a D20 plus a D10. That’s the equivalent to a plus five bonus statistically but there is lot more “swing.” I’m not a game designer, but I think there is some interesting permutations that have yet to be exploited.
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Post by doublejig2 on Oct 29, 2020 20:10:04 GMT -6
I'm currently GM'ing a Dungeon Crawl Classics campaign. The chain of dice is a hoot. And, so are many other mechanics. But I do think I'll go back to OD&D after while to get my fix.
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Post by hamurai on Oct 30, 2020 15:22:41 GMT -6
DCC uses d3, d4, d5, d6, d7, d8, d10, d12, d14, d16, d20, d24, and d30, in fact. I agree, it's a very nice system with many cool adventure modules.
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Post by tdenmark on Oct 30, 2020 17:33:15 GMT -6
DCC uses d3, d4, d5, d6, d7, d8, d10, d12, d14, d16, d20, d24, and d30, in fact. I agree, it's a very nice system with many cool adventure modules. I'm surprised it doesn't use d50, d100, and d120 as well.
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Post by hamurai on Oct 30, 2020 23:58:06 GMT -6
I guess these jumps would be too large for the game system's granularity. D100 is used for several random tables, but not for any character mechanics like attacks or magic.
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Deleted
Deleted Member
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Post by Deleted on Oct 31, 2020 16:12:29 GMT -6
I tried really, really hard to make 5e more old school. For like five years. The conclusion I ultimately came to is that you'd have to radically gut the game to the point it's not even 5e anymore and at that point why not just play AD&D or something? That's the point I kept arriving at no matter what. If you wanna run old school, there's no need to use anything other than old school rules. Something fundamental gets lost in translation otherwise.
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Post by hamurai on Nov 1, 2020 1:54:55 GMT -6
That's a conclusion we've reached at several other threads, too. Instead of cutting 5E down to OD&D size, it's better to use 5E elements to build up on your OD&D game to expand it. It's a lot easier that way around.
That said, I still think Into The Unknown does a very good job at making 5E more like B/X.
Personally, I still think that "old school" is more a way of playing the game and less the mechanics (often they do allow for OS play, I think). I can easily take 5E characters and play them old school, as long as the players follow the lead: - Just narrate what your characters do, don't use die rolls all the time, - use a challenging puzzle instead of a 5th challenging encounter, - describe rooms in a way that players will fear a trap in every other corner and reward the cautious (don't just stick to Passive Perception, you can easily houserule that unless players say otherwise they're acting and moving casually with a -5 at PP while at normal pace), - pack more secret doors into the dungeon which have a very high spotting DC and again reward those who specifically say where to search with success, - use more monsters so players will be in need of hirelings again, - have players accurately track ammo and rations (I've seen many games where it's just hand-waved so the survival aspect is lost) - play old modules instead of the new ones (5E has more HP on everything, but 5E chars can just count as some levels above their actual level when you select a module for them. Or just add some more monsters to encounters. I found it rather easy to create a challenge from the old modules - or get the "reincarnated" versions from Goodman Games, they cost you but I think it's worth the cash for the nice re-organization and revamped encounters, plus you get the original module too) - if you're annoyed by the many class options, just use the free Basic Rules with only four races and four classes - if you're annoyed by PCs healing to easily after fights, require them to have a healer's kit for short rests (which may be used up after X attempts, depending on how hard you want to make it)
Those are the ideas I tried myself and they worked out nicely for my old school dungeon crawl group.
Don't get tempted to grab Runehammer's 5E Hardcore Mode, it's basically nothing that you won't come up with within 10 minutes of contemplation and it has some very "softcore" ideas about hardcore, too.
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Post by countingwizard on Nov 12, 2020 9:32:22 GMT -6
The biggest compatibility problem between OSR and 5e is that 5e is designed around stories while OSR (at least the D&D side) is designed around dungeons. And it comes right down to how XP is awarded. The old versions of D&D predominantly rewarded XP for finding treasure. 5e doesn't. That's the difference between a dungeon being designed around trying to explore every nook and cranny to find the treasure, and a dungeon that's designed around trying to complete a mission or move the story forward.
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Post by hamurai on Nov 12, 2020 10:28:34 GMT -6
Well, that's a very easy thing to house-rule then. Just award XP for gold and run the dungeon crawl with 5E.
The different recovery rules of 5E will make the dungeon crawl a lot more different than the way XP are earned.
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Post by Vile Traveller on Nov 12, 2020 11:16:45 GMT -6
I am currently working on my "Holmes" tweak of 5E and I concur with hamurai, it's easy to adjust the rules to make the play experience more old-school. For example, as well as the XP thing, I throw balance out the window and use OD&D versions of the spells. I think the key thing is that 5E is so easy to tweak without breaking (the DMG with its variant rules really brings this home), while 3.5E basically necessitated complete re-writes of the SRD to achieve this. The recovery rules, too, can easily be adjusted (not re-written!) to the same effect.
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Post by hamurai on Nov 12, 2020 13:23:29 GMT -6
Let us know how that Holmes 5E turns out! I'd like to get a look at it.
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Post by tombowings on Nov 12, 2020 13:48:03 GMT -6
I gave 5e a chance, but I found it a game of Player's Handbook vs. Monster Manual, rather than the player vs. the fantasy world.
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Merias
Level 4 Theurgist
Posts: 104
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Post by Merias on Nov 12, 2020 14:50:05 GMT -6
I voted no, but will echo the other sentiments here that my reaction was not that visceral. I'll also agree that at this point, new D&D-style rulebooks don't excite me anyway. New settings, unique adventures, unique takes on the game (Pits & Perils is one not mentioned yet that I really like) - if they happen to incorporate 5e mechanics, I won't disregard them.
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Post by hamurai on Nov 12, 2020 16:08:36 GMT -6
I gave 5e a chance, but I found it a game of Player's Handbook vs. Monster Manual, rather than the player vs. the fantasy world. Sounds more like an issue with the DM. I've never had that feeling in our 5-year old group so far... But I did have that feeling back in the day when certain inexperienced players wanted to give DM'ing a shot...
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Post by Vile Traveller on Nov 12, 2020 18:10:05 GMT -6
I gave 5e a chance, but I found it a game of Player's Handbook vs. Monster Manual, rather than the player vs. the fantasy world. Sounds more like an issue with the DM. I will say that successfully refereeing 5E needs more understanding of the details of the rules than OD&D, or it can easily deteriorate into a PCs vs. monsters game. In fact the real challenge in a 5E game should be the environment itself, and the rules support that. That Holmes 5E game will take a while, hamurai, because it will be a few months before I get my studio back! But I think I will prioritise it once I get a few BLUEHOLME™ books out of the chute after I settle into my new home.
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Post by Punkrabbitt on Nov 12, 2020 18:33:02 GMT -6
I gave 5e a chance, but I found it a game of Player's Handbook vs. Monster Manual, rather than the player vs. the fantasy world. Sounds more like an issue with the DM. I've never had that feeling in our 5-year old group so far... But I did have that feeling back in the day when certain inexperienced players wanted to give DM'ing a shot... You play D&D with 5-year olds? How does that work? I was playing Star Wars Saga when my kids were 6 and 8, I'm not sure how well it would have gone a year earlier o.0
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Post by doublejig2 on Nov 12, 2020 19:36:54 GMT -6
I don't really like peanut butter and chocolate, but enjoy each on its own.
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Post by hamurai on Nov 13, 2020 0:05:32 GMT -6
Sounds more like an issue with the DM. I've never had that feeling in our 5-year old group so far... But I did have that feeling back in the day when certain inexperienced players wanted to give DM'ing a shot... You play D&D with 5-year olds? How does that work? That came out wrong, I guess. The group is 5 years old, not the players.
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Post by Punkrabbitt on Nov 13, 2020 0:07:41 GMT -6
I knew that, I just wanted to brag about gaming with my kids again.
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