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Why D&D 2e is the BEST edition ever.

nikolokolus

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May 8, 2013
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4,090
Hackmaster still has the best initiative system I've ever seen in an RPG. It takes awhile to grok it, but it really is a great innovation, and it really builds tension with the GM counting up each second and you're waiting for your number to be called and hoping to god your enemy doesn't have a lower number.
 

agris

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Add to it the GURPS-like d100 skill system, the overall brutality of the systems, and their 1e/2e roots PLUS using original AD&D campaigns - to my mind, it really can't be beat.
 

TumblingTorin

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May 27, 2021
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64
On a side note, perhaps I should also mention that there are some benefits of having classes level up at different rates.
Since it means 1 or 2 people level up at a time, you don't have to stop the game to level up. It's boring for people to have to wait for others to finish leveling their characters. This helps with pacing, especially if you have limited time. You can keep the game going while they level up and you don't have to keep moving the player's handbook around between people. They can listen in and interject if they want. It doesn't always go well, especially when important things are happening but it helps for the most part.
I haven't really played much D&D, any version, but I thought players were given exp after an "adventure" was completed and they were back in town and since gaining levels takes a fair bit of time waiting for others to level wouldn't be an issue. Does D&D levelling start getting quick in later versions or was 2 faster than other versions...?
I think different classes levelling at different rates is good and brings another pro/con issue to consider.
People have different ways to do leveling. Some DMs don't track XP and have players leveling up after important events.

A classic rule is getting XP from killing monsters and relying on that on leveling up. I remember 1e has rules in the DMG on getting XP based on the gold/treasure you obtained in dungeons and bringing it to a safe area, which made it fun to steal treasure without the monster knowing and getting XP for that. Some people have homebrew rules that allows players to waste money on carousing and get XP for that. I don't remember how the rules for XP work in 3e, but I do remember that edition made the XP tables for all the classes unified.

5e relies on the killing monsters for XP rule mainly but the DMG have alternate rules for XP and leveling. In 5e, they made the XP requirements to get level 1 to 3 very fast and then slows down for the rest of the level.
 

Rean

Head Codexian Weeb
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Strap Yourselves In
If you want simplicity, is there anything simpler than OSR's XP for gold gained? Imagine living in a universe where the only way to become a stronger person is killing things.

Save that shit for the hood.
Niggerism and RPGs don't go together.
 

Cryomancer

Arcane
Glory to Ukraine
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If you want simplicity, is there anything simpler than OSR's XP for gold gained? Imagine living in a universe where the only way to become a stronger person is killing things.

Milestone leveling >>> Leveling by doing things related to your class >> XP by gold >> XP by killing.

Just my opinion. Even in video games, VtMB ""leveling"" system > WoW leveling. About my group. Is official. Disbanded. The DM will no longer DM again due IRL stuff. I DMed a one shot session but the party din't liked and I honestly din't liked DM it too. So after a conversation, we stooped playing. Maybe ship of horrors was not the best choice to a guy who never DMed anything but 3E in person...
 

Rean

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Strap Yourselves In
If you want simplicity, is there anything simpler than OSR's XP for gold gained? Imagine living in a universe where the only way to become a stronger person is killing things.

Milestone leveling >>> Leveling by doing things related to your class >> XP by gold >> XP by killing.

Just my opinion. Even in video games, VtMB ""leveling"" system > WoW leveling. About my group. Is official. Disbanded. The DM will no longer DM again due IRL stuff. I DMed a one shot session but the party din't liked and I honestly din't liked DM it too. So after a conversation, we stooped playing. Maybe ship of horrors was not the best choice to a guy who never DMed anything but 3E in person...

I also do milestone leveling and have never done anything else, but I run years-long story-driven campaigns, not 'games' per se.
Still, there is a charm to the simplicity the 'XP by gold' notion brings and if you dive into it a little bit, you also find that there's a certain depth to it, too, especially when you attach it to a realistic world where money is not easy to come by and day-to-day survival aspects come into play.

Sorry to hear it didn't end up working out with your group, unfortunately most groups don't last for longer than a couple of months, if that.
 

Cryomancer

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What would be cool but has potential to slow the game too much is if each class had a "arc" to level up.

Eg :
  • A Fighter will go into a tournament with other fighters
  • A Ranger will try to track down and kill a powerful dangerous creature
  • A Magic user will attempt to find a obscure grimoire, research and develop a new spell and etc.
  • A monk will go in a pilgrimage and start to train in the mountains
  • A warlock/witch will summon his/her patron and do a task to the patron in exchange of magical knowledge
Since it would take too much time, I suggest maintaining this type of leveling for a specific iconic level up like lv up. Like reaching "teen" levels(13+), since it can take a entire session per "character arc".
 

SoupNazi

Guest
What would be cool but has potential to slow the game too much is if each class had a "arc" to level up.

Eg :
  • A Fighter will go into a tournament with other fighters
  • A Ranger will try to track down and kill a powerful dangerous creature
  • A Magic user will attempt to find a obscure grimoire, research and develop a new spell and etc.
  • A monk will go in a pilgrimage and start to train in the mountains
  • A warlock/witch will summon his/her patron and do a task to the patron in exchange of magical knowledge
Since it would take too much time, I suggest maintaining this type of leveling for a specific iconic level up like lv up. Like reaching "teen" levels(13+), since it can take a entire session per "character arc".
A group I very very briefly played with (1 session, decided not to join them any more, house rule of going to the toilet en-masse would be fine, but only the last person being allowed to flush was a bit too much for me... and a few other things) solved this by the DM having 1on1 sessions for the character's individual questlines while the party was officially on downtime. I didn't get to have one as I quit right away as mentioned, but from what the DM told me, it seemed to have worked pretty well. Gave the characters some additional depth and made the players develop things like family, relationships, business interests, etc. One of the characters was a date (as in the fruit) farmer, another was a member of a noble faily and there was a lot of plotting involved in who's going to be the new patriarch, etc. It seemed fun and if I ever end up DMing a cool, stable group where it'd feel like it makes sense, I'd like to give something like that a shot myself.
 

Mortmal

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Jun 15, 2009
Messages
9,158
house rule of going to the toilet en-masse would be fine, but only the last person being allowed to flush was a bit too much for me
Bizarre
it's some guy in poverty who count every cents, 6 guys going to toilet will crash his budget, i am probably right...I seen people in shops, millenials and such counting every euro, youth are in deep poverty with shitty low wage jobs .
So it's better to play d&d with old people, drinks, free cake and unlimited access to bathrooms.
fraisier-4p.jpg
 

SoupNazi

Guest
house rule of going to the toilet en-masse would be fine, but only the last person being allowed to flush was a bit too much for me
Bizarre
it's some guy in poverty who count every cents, 6 guys going to toilet will crash his budget, i am probably right...I seen people in shops, millenials and such counting every euro, youth are in deep poverty with shitty low wage jobs .
So it's better to play d&d with old people, drinks, free cake and unlimited access to bathrooms.

You're not exactly wrong in that they weren't rich people, but they were definitely not counting every penny, and claimed this was for "ecological" reasons. Either way, I would have rather thrown them a few bucks for hosting (I think that's fair anywhere, if someone's providing the space) than this :lol:

There were a few more things, but that was just general incompatibility, nothing I could fault them for all that much, even though it was uncomfortable. But that was the bizzarest thing.
 

JamesDixon

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Strap Yourselves In Codex Year of the Donut
I've played AD&D 1/2E and D&D 3.x. I find that AD&D 2E is to be the best version of what Gary was trying to do. It clarified a lot of problems from Basic and 1E to make a better cohesion. The plus side was the addition of Proficiencies for skills. Plus, you had to be creative to handle encounters and the like.

I didn't care for 3.x due to the complete way the game ground to a halt during combat. I also hated the you can't do this without x skill. It literally removed the creativity I had in AD&D.

One of the things we never did in the games I played was using the hirelings. I wish that we had because it makes having your PC be extra special as well as an employer for the locals. Someone has to get all the treasure out of the dungeon why not hirelings? I also loved the individual awards based upon your classes as an optional rule.
 

Eldagusto

Educated
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Mar 23, 2021
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Antartica
I'm all for restricting classes for different races, it adds nuance. It worked really well for instance in Dragon Age where Dwarves couldn't work magics like a mage but they could weave it into artifacts.
 

Caim

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Joined
Aug 1, 2013
Messages
15,468
Location
Dutchland
:necro:

Been really digging into 2e lately. There's a lot to like here but there's quite a lot of stuff that feels like holdovers from earlier editions. Just to list a few things:

- Classes having different XP rates at which they gain levels
- Non-human races being unable to level up all the way
- The whole dualclassing/multiclassing dichotomy
- Druids having an entire tournament arc build into their leveling process
- Some of the weird notations. Fighters after a certain level get 5/2 attacks if they specialize, a kind of notation that is explained only once (in the dual wielding rules of all things)
- The whole percentile die on Strength thing
- Stat requirements for classes, meaning that if you roll poorly you can't play the class you want to play. The most obvious example is the Paladin, who requires a 4 in 216 roll (or just over 1.9%) if you just want the charisma to be one, and that's ignoring the three other attributes that require a minimum level. Then there's the chance of you not being able to play anything just because you rolled poorly for four different stats. Then there's the really tough stuff from other books, like those specialized wizards who have two opposing schools of magic at the cost of everything else, two of whom require a 16 in 3 different stats
- How incredibly flimsy your character can be. Past this edition you always got the max HP of your Hit Dice at first level, but in 2e you're only one poor roll away from being less durable than your average kobold or goblin

I still have a lot of digging to do, especially into the magic system, but this looks like it can be good fun.
 

Zed Duke of Banville

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Been really digging into 2e lately. There's a lot to like here but there's quite a lot of stuff that feels like holdovers from earlier editions. Just to list a few things:

- Classes having different XP rates at which they gain levels
Differential XP requirements for leveling by class are part of every edition of D&D since the beginning.

- Non-human races being unable to level up all the way
Demi-human level limits has also been part of every D&D edition since the beginning, as an imperfect means of limiting their power.

- The whole dualclassing/multiclassing dichotomy
Gary Gygax should never have introduced the general concept of multiclassing for demihumans, which makes them far too powerful and desirable for players, but instead left as options only specific combinations in keeping with the identity of a demihuman race, such as elves being fighter/mages.

- Druids having an entire tournament arc build into their leveling process
This began with the monk character class introduced in Supplement II: Blackmoor, but the monk class was excluded from AD&D 2nd edition. Admittedly, the tournament idea is a bit too setting-specific, not something that necessarily makes sense for a DM's own campaign world.

- Some of the weird notations. Fighters after a certain level get 5/2 attacks if they specialize, a kind of notation that is explained only once (in the dual wielding rules of all things)
Weird notations are a vital component of any prestigious RPG. +M

- The whole percentile die on Strength thing
Introduced in AD&D 1st edition as an imperfect means of giving a boost to fighters; not a great idea, since it requires 18 strength for a fighter to receive that boost, which is randomized over a considerable number of extra categories between normal 18 and 19.

- Stat requirements for classes, meaning that if you roll poorly you can't play the class you want to play. The most obvious example is the Paladin, who requires a 4 in 216 roll (or just over 1.9%) if you just want the charisma to be one, and that's ignoring the three other attributes that require a minimum level. Then there's the chance of you not being able to play anything just because you rolled poorly for four different stats. Then there's the really tough stuff from other books, like those specialized wizards who have two opposing schools of magic at the cost of everything else, two of whom require a 16 in 3 different stats
Stat requirements were introduced in Supplement I: Greyhawk for the paladin class. Gary Gygax introduced an alternative attribute score generation system in Unearthed Arcana precisely to answer your objection.

- How incredibly flimsy your character can be. Past this edition you always got the max HP of your Hit Dice at first level, but in 2e you're only one poor roll away from being less durable than your average kobold or goblin
Part of every edition of D&D since the beginning.

I still have a lot of digging to do, especially into the magic system, but this looks like it can be good fun.
:martini:
 

Erebus

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Jul 12, 2008
Messages
4,763
2nd Edition is the only D&D edition I really played a lot, and I'm still very fond of it. Compared to the highly mechanic 3rd Edition, it was very imperfect but also full of imagination and excitement. Its settings, its many boxed sets and its countless accessories were a sheer delight. 3rd Edition made more sense in many ways, but it didn't have the same magic.
 

Alex

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São Paulo - Brasil
- Druids having an entire tournament arc build into their leveling process
This began with the monk character class introduced in Supplement II: Blackmoor, but the monk class was excluded from AD&D 2nd edition. Admittedly, the tournament idea is a bit too setting-specific, not something that necessarily makes sense for a DM's own campaign world.

I think making the druid more setting specific makes a lot of sense if you think of the druid class as an example of what a dedicated cleric class is supposed to look.
 

Zed Duke of Banville

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- Druids having an entire tournament arc build into their leveling process
This began with the monk character class introduced in Supplement II: Blackmoor, but the monk class was excluded from AD&D 2nd edition. Admittedly, the tournament idea is a bit too setting-specific, not something that necessarily makes sense for a DM's own campaign world.

I think making the druid more setting specific makes a lot of sense if you think of the druid class as an example of what a dedicated cleric class is supposed to look.
Druids were the neutral alignment subclass of clerics, providing an alternative to lawful alignment (i.e. good) clerics and chaotic alignment (i.e. evil) anti-clerics, in original D&D with its single-axis three-alignment system. :M That association of nature with neutral (in AD&D's two-axis nine-alignment system, "true neutral") alignment still existed as late as the 1994 Planescape campaign setting.
 
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RPG Wokedex Strap Yourselves In
I agree with most of these being unnecessary, especially demihuman level cap and how dual classing works but some of these are genuinely good:
-Different level requirements: this makes perfect sense. It's harder to learn new level of magic than to become better at lockpicking. Also helps with balance since you don't need to make sure that everyone get similar power increase at every level. This also lead to some neat stuff like Darksun preservers needing more XP than defilers since it's harder to become more powerful wizard if you need to make sure that your magic doesn't damage the environment
-Strength percentile: it's an imperfect solution but it was implemented because 18 was once supposed to be a peak of human performance. Which meant that if you found Gloves of Giant's Strength you actually become stronger than any man alive could ever hope to be. It sucks in BG3 when you find these (or a similar item I don't remember) and you realize that your fighters are already stronger than that. Once you let players level up stats as they wish they kinda lose their meaning.
-Stat requirements: well you can't be a Wizard if you're a moron, and Paladins are supposed to be rather rare.

In general D&D (as most RPGs) is not just a game, it's also a system thats supposed to simulate reality on some level. This may lead to some solution that don't make sense from a pure gameplay perspecive. But RPGs (especially tabletop ones) are supposed to make you feel like you're taking part in an actual fantasy adventure. And if you don't sometimes take realisim over gameplay it will make the game feel more arbitrary and less real. Take random stat distribution. On one hand it's unfair, some characters will be better than others. On the other hand it makes perfect sense that some people are naturarly more gited than others. If you use point-buy then the gameworld will feel more artificial as everyone is somehow equally capable in general
 

Alex

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- Druids having an entire tournament arc build into their leveling process
This began with the monk character class introduced in Supplement II: Blackmoor, but the monk class was excluded from AD&D 2nd edition. Admittedly, the tournament idea is a bit too setting-specific, not something that necessarily makes sense for a DM's own campaign world.

I think making the druid more setting specific makes a lot of sense if you think of the druid class as an example of what a dedicated cleric class is supposed to look.
Druids were the neutral alignment subclass of clerics, providing an alternative to lawful alignment (i.e. good) clerics and chaotic alignment (i.e. evil) anti-clerics, in original D&D with its single-axis three-alignment system. :M That association of nature with neutral (in AD&D's two-axis nine-alignment system, "true neutral") alignment still existed as late as the 1994 Planescape campaign setting.

I know, but I meant specifically for the 2nd edition, that introduced clerical spell spheres and (I believe, correct me if I am wrong) the idea of making custom classes for clerics of a particular deity or cult; the druid class is different enough from the normal cleric, having very different spell spheres and very different special abilities.

Edit: To be more clear about my point (sorry if I wasn't before). I know the druid presented in AD&D 2e is not particularly unique in the way the druid of older editions was unique. But I think it made sense to make him that way to highlight what the DM could do as particular clerics in his setting. The druid hierarchy stuff is easy enough to just ignore if the DM so wants.
 

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