1E vs. 2E

[Zherbus]

The structure and algorithms were pretty much the same, but it was a bit clearer on statistics, especially the THAC0 concept which I think I am the only one on earth that likes it.

The big diffs were mainly the peripheral classes, such as bards, monks, assassins, and rangers.

In 1E, the bard progression made no sense to me. I mean... why? I liked the 2E approach, but it wasn't perfectly executed either.

Monks, to me, never felt like they fit a primarily european medieval fantasy world. That and they were really powerful later on in levels.

Assassins were fine, but didn't "fit" into the heroic image of an RPG. An assassin, to me, could just as easily been a thief. Though, in the truest sense of the word, it could be anything from a Fighter to a Mage.

Lastly, and more importantly, I liked the 2E rangers far and above the rangers in 1E. Every bit of them makes more sense to me in 2E. I talked on many topics on ADDC, but I have no access to the arguements I once gave for this.

Aside from that, Magical items and most monsters (not Dragons!) were the same along with the core classes. The modules were way better in 1E for sure. The balls to use actual demonic naming was better too. Gary's eloquent system was often obscured by his odd sense of stylized writing... meaning Zeb basically found ways to explain things better in many areas.

Also, 1E only has Unearthed Arcana for people to moan over. Unearthed Arcana had a lot of useful stuff in it, but other things that just kinda make one wince. 2E had... pretty much everything printed from 93 forward to be ashamed of. It makes a tough sell!

That said, I am always glad they are just about entirely interchangeable. The ability to use whatever you want out of both editions really makes AD&D on the whole a very deep game that can't ever be topped.

[Mira]

The structure and algorithms were pretty much the same, but it was a bit clearer on statistics, especially the THAC0 concept which I think I am the only one on earth that likes it.

Nope, I like it too, I'd been using it in 1E too actually, just because I liked writing down one number as opposed to writing a series of numbers from the charts. THAC0 was a shorthand way of copying the chart, it wasn't really a complicated thing.

The big diffs were mainly the peripheral classes, such as bards, monks, assassins, and rangers.

In 1E, the bard progression made no sense to me. I mean... why? I liked the 2E approach, but it wasn't perfectly executed either.

Monks, to me, never felt like they fit a primarily european medieval fantasy world. That and they were really powerful later on in levels.

Assassins were fine, but didn't "fit" into the heroic image of an RPG. An assassin, to me, could just as easily been a thief. Though, in the truest sense of the word, it could be anything from a Fighter to a Mage.

Lastly, and more importantly, I liked the 2E rangers far and above the rangers in 1E. Every bit of them makes more sense to me in 2E. I talked on many topics on ADDC, but I have no access to the arguements I once gave for this.

I agree on most of those, I never liked the 1E bard and never liked monks as presented. Assassins were good as NPCs, but not really useful as PCs. I did think the 1E ranger was better (in some ways, not all) though. I could find people wanting to play rangers in 1E, almost nobody played one for long in 2E.

--snip--
That said, I am always glad they are just about entirely interchangeable. The ability to use whatever you want out of both editions really makes AD&D on the whole a very deep game that can't ever be topped.

That was a big thing for me too, I had so much material for 1E, had built up so much of my world, being able to continue using that in 2E made life so much easier. Most of that stuff was created when I had more time to do that, later my time was much more limited. Being able to borrow easily from both makes it much easier to tailor the game to the group you're playing with.

Mira (The 50-50-90 rule: Anytime you have a 50-50 chance of getting something right, there's a 90% probability you'll get it wrong)

[Varl]

deleted because of explanation elsewhere

[Minstrel]

A big hello to all the old crowd from ADDC! Halaster got me set up with a login here, so I'll have a new home for OOP funness.

A thought on 2E druids and clerics:

I believe at some point the PH mentions that druids are supposed to be just an example of a specialty priest. Of course, the fact that they're the ONLY one described in the game's main sourcebook and that just about every supplement, module and sourcebook makes reference to druids as though they're right up there with fighters, mages, etc. makes that a bit laughable. As written, they're essentially canon now. All that really means to me is that, in theory, using or not using, or modifying the druid shouldn't be that big a deal.

2E should have had more time devoted to specialty priests, and maybe done away with the generic cleric altogether. At one point, Zherbus and I drew up a list for our version of FR and were planning to make every priest be a specialty priest. It was simplified, not the 2 page long fully statted druid type specialty priest, but just a list of major and minor spheres and one or two special abilities (turn as 2 levels higher, or cast 'light' 2x/day, stuff like that).

A table that had general types of specialty priests by ethos along with the above info would have been succinct and encouraged their use.

So to tie it in to the thread: 2E specialty priests were an improvement over 1e, but could have been much better and simpler, and implemented in a way that encouraged players to use them.

[Mira]

I love the specialty priests, and when they came out with the books (I think Powers and Pantheons?) that detailed the FR ones, we immediately decided never to use the 'generic cleric' ever again. They did such a great job with them, even made clerics a fun class to play!

Mira (Dare to dream the impossible. I mean, why not? Dreaming doesn't take any effort)

[Varl]

Specialty priests are all I use now too. Welcome to BIP too Minstrel!

[Halaster Blackcloak]

I agree with Minstrel. And Mira. And Varl. Hell, let's make it unanimous!

I never could understand the idea of a "generic cleric". Who does he worship. "The gods"? Some ambiguous group of divine beings? Seems to me that any cleric must belong to some religion. Putting the generic cleric in modern terms, that's akin to:

Father/cleric: "Let us pray."

Congregant: "Father, to whom do we pray?"

Priest/Cleric: "To anybody. We just use a generic, non-denomenational prayer. Somebody will answer it. Maybe Jesus, maybe Jehovah, maybe Buddha, maybe Allah, perhaps Gaia."

Congregant: "But don't the teachings of some of those mentioned go against some teachings of the others?"

Priest/Cleric: "Nah, we don't worry about that. We just pray generic prayers, and somebody answers!"



Specialty priests are such an improvment over generic clerics. It's one of the things I like far moer about 2E over 1E.

[McDeath]

I suppose it would matter depending on the depth of role playing involved. I've been with players that didn't care so long as they got their cure spells, turn undead, and a few of the other spells. Basically it came down to good/neutral clerics vs. evil clerics. Vanilla & Chocolate with no variations.

[Halaster Blackcloak]

I think you're right about the depth of the game, McDeath. If it's a campaign where there's not a lot of in depth development, then it's not such a big deal. But in a developed, ongoing campaign, that's where I think it really matters more.

[Mira]

I'd think those that played a game without much depth would have moved on to the 3.x rules, with all the crunching? I could be wrong though. Just seems to me that if you're not into the in depth role playing, and not into the game options, that the game wouldn't be all that fun for you. Though I do have to say I have seen people that have enjoyed playing the game when I would have been bored to tears trying to play the same way!

Mira (If Fed Ex and UPS were to merge, would they call it Fed UP?)

[Minstrel]

On a different subject, I'll add to the general consensus that the 2E DMG was lacking. I don't have extensive knowledge of the 1E DMG beyond flipping through someone else's copy a few times, but I get the general idea that it was packed with tables for just about anything you could ever want, and plenty you didn't, but someone else might.

The 2E DMG had...um...well I remember a couple useful things: a list of medieval professions, costs for various spells, some misc combat rules, some wilderness rules and of course magic items/treasure tables. But overall I seem to remember a lot of filler text. I want lots of stuff, half to get inspiration from, half for actual use: anything at all that would assist me in building an adventure. I might never actually roll a d20 to determine if my dungeon's surface is granite, shale, or marble but a list of dungeon surfaces would be terrific when building an adventure. A rewrite of the DMG might be a fun project (though perhaps redundant if you have a 1E DMG).

[McDeath]

Thou must get a 1st ed DMG. I need to get some TrollLords products that Gary worked on. (Canting Crew, etc) I've also thought of getting the AEG Toolbox booklet which is full of tables.

[Minstrel]

Those TLG world building books he did looked great, I just never got the spare cash to buy them. Has anyone perused a copy?

On the AEG Toolbox - that looks pretty nice. I'd never heard of it or AEG even before. I'd like to take a look to see how useful it would be in a non-3.x type d20 game (meaning for me, C&C), or an AD&D game.

That's the exact sort of stuff 2E needed, and as far as I remember didn't cough up really. There were some books that really beat one subject, (say, for example, castle building) to death, but I don't remember much that was just a general guide with lots of ideas for a broad range of games.

Aside from the DMG, I don't know if 1E did either though...

[Halaster Blackcloak]

Minstrel wrote:

I don't have extensive knowledge of the 1E DMG beyond flipping through someone else's copy a few times, but I get the general idea that it was packed with tables for just about anything you could ever want, and plenty you didn't, but someone else might.

Oh man, it had EVERYTHING!

Charts, tables, and information for diseases, mental illnesses, use of herbs, costs and construction of castles, encounter information, specific stuff about adjudicating spells, you name it!

On a scale of 1-10 with 1 being useless and 10 being overwhelmingly useful, I'd rate the 2E DMG about a 4 and the 1E DMG a 10+!