Hey there! New to the forum and this site. As a player from the 80’s, I had to go see the movie. The movie led me here, curious about game play these days. I was looking at the Core Rulebooks Gift Set. I had not played through the 90’s, but did briefly in 2000. I did not care for some of the changes as the extra steps that were made seemed to take a away from game play to me. My question is, does the core set allow you to go back to using the game play I am familiar with, or is it completely restructured?
Well, the core rules reflect the current 5e rules, which are significantly different than the old AD&D stuff of the 80's. However, they are much more streamlined than the third edition rules of 2000. So they are not nearly as in-your-face and heavy as those rules.
As someone who started playing in 1983, and has played most every edition, I can say that I prefer the current rules the best. They aren't perfect, but many of the things that I did not like about the past rules have been improved. No more THAC0 calculations, no more "roll high to hit, roll low to save, roll % for thieves' skills" of AD&D, but also no more calculations from third edition of +4 base attack bonus, +3 strength bonus, +1 enhancement bonus, +1 holy bonus, -3 power attack...
I'd suggest giving the Basic Rules a try (they are free!) and go in with an open mind to see if the new rules allow the kind of play you enjoyed. If they do, then get the Core Rule set and enjoy! (Although be warned, there is an updated core rule set coming out a year to a year-and-a-half from now, but being on sale for 40% right now does help!) I also find having all of the rules and character building stuff in this website to be immensely helpful!
However, if the Basic Rules do not fit your taste, thankfully, there is a whole range of fans and other companies that have been doing what's called the OSR movement (Old School Renaissance) where they recreate the old rules of past editions but with some clean up and improvements. There are dozens of them, however, so it can take some digging around to find the right fit. So I would still suggest trying the Basic Rules here first. (Edit to add: VornIsDead beat me to it while I was typing this. They list several of the most popular OSR games.)
Either way, I hope you find the game that you enjoy and reclaim that fun of the past!!! It is a very exciting time to get back into D&D! Good luck!
Hey there! New to the forum and this site. As a player from the 80’s, I had to go see the movie. The movie led me here, curious about game play these days. I was looking at the Core Rulebooks Gift Set. I had not played through the 90’s, but did briefly in 2000. I did not care for some of the changes as the extra steps that were made seemed to take a away from game play to me. My question is, does the core set allow you to go back to using the game play I am familiar with, or is it completely restructured?
You can play AD&D today on most other virtual table tops, just not on D&D Beyond. If you check out dragonsfoot.org you can find other players of D&D original rulesets. Also there are a number of Virtual Table Tops (fantasygrounds, foundry) that support AD&D.
If you liked the basic edition of D&D look up Old School Essentials or Dungeon Crawl Classics if you want the 1970's vibe with the van with the unicorn spray painted on it type of motif, they are also on a number of VTT's.
The problem you'll find with 5E is they did a poor job on combat compared to prior editions. The fights drag on due to HP inflation, and then you have characters who are more Superman than a guy with a sword and board.
The biggest change is thAC0 has been gone since 2000. f you can roll a d20 to hit above the AC number than you will be fine. Plus you wont have to translate 2-8 damage to using 2d4. If dice are needed the rules are clear which dice you need. XP is on one math based table, and the rules are streamlined so you don't have to own all the books and all the dragon magazines to know how to deal with something. Also the font in the books is no longer 8pt thin. You can read these books without much issue. Spells likewise are more or less balanced. Gone are the days on disintegrate a 10foot cube out of a dragon. With a chance to kill yourself instead. On Death, gone are the insta kill effects. We now have saves, and death saves. And being hit for half your hit points doesn't kill you.
Essentially all the punishing things that Gygax wrote are gone. Plus a lot of his racist ideas.
So, the one thing I've noticed with 5e is that there are a lot of folks who hate on it in a way that I wonder if their experience is based on the same game I play. I don't remember that being a thing with BECMI D&D or AD&D. But my time with those systems then were before the internet was largely available to the public, so maybe there was some mimeographed zine put out by players of Fantasy Trip or Paladium Fantasy hating on AD&D for something.
But seriously, 5e is definitely not a "rule for everything" system, and explicitly gives DMs license to do their own thing. Some consumers of WotC's publications get upset with lackluster products that could have given an opportunity for the "official rules" to an aspect of the game, the most recent Spelljammer set being probably the best example of that failure. But if you're AD&D inspired, it's not hard to adapt 5e to game that hits the notes you want it to. It's pretty versatile to the point that there's an entire multiple ENNIE award winning industry of 3rd party publishers taking the 5e core and tweaking to speak more directly toward themes and styles not given to players on a platter in the core rules.
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Jander Sunstar is the thinking person's Drizzt, fight me.
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Hey there! New to the forum and this site. As a player from the 80’s, I had to go see the movie. The movie led me here, curious about game play these days. I was looking at the Core Rulebooks Gift Set. I had not played through the 90’s, but did briefly in 2000. I did not care for some of the changes as the extra steps that were made seemed to take a away from game play to me. My question is, does the core set allow you to go back to using the game play I am familiar with, or is it completely restructured?
Well, the core rules reflect the current 5e rules, which are significantly different than the old AD&D stuff of the 80's. However, they are much more streamlined than the third edition rules of 2000. So they are not nearly as in-your-face and heavy as those rules.
As someone who started playing in 1983, and has played most every edition, I can say that I prefer the current rules the best. They aren't perfect, but many of the things that I did not like about the past rules have been improved. No more THAC0 calculations, no more "roll high to hit, roll low to save, roll % for thieves' skills" of AD&D, but also no more calculations from third edition of +4 base attack bonus, +3 strength bonus, +1 enhancement bonus, +1 holy bonus, -3 power attack...
I'd suggest giving the Basic Rules a try (they are free!) and go in with an open mind to see if the new rules allow the kind of play you enjoyed. If they do, then get the Core Rule set and enjoy! (Although be warned, there is an updated core rule set coming out a year to a year-and-a-half from now, but being on sale for 40% right now does help!) I also find having all of the rules and character building stuff in this website to be immensely helpful!
However, if the Basic Rules do not fit your taste, thankfully, there is a whole range of fans and other companies that have been doing what's called the OSR movement (Old School Renaissance) where they recreate the old rules of past editions but with some clean up and improvements. There are dozens of them, however, so it can take some digging around to find the right fit. So I would still suggest trying the Basic Rules here first. (Edit to add: VornIsDead beat me to it while I was typing this. They list several of the most popular OSR games.)
Either way, I hope you find the game that you enjoy and reclaim that fun of the past!!! It is a very exciting time to get back into D&D! Good luck!
Hey, thank you for all the responses. I am gonna dig deeper into the site here, but also order up the set, I believe. Thanks!
You can play AD&D today on most other virtual table tops, just not on D&D Beyond. If you check out dragonsfoot.org you can find other players of D&D original rulesets. Also there are a number of Virtual Table Tops (fantasygrounds, foundry) that support AD&D.
If you liked the basic edition of D&D look up Old School Essentials or Dungeon Crawl Classics if you want the 1970's vibe with the van with the unicorn spray painted on it type of motif, they are also on a number of VTT's.
The problem you'll find with 5E is they did a poor job on combat compared to prior editions. The fights drag on due to HP inflation, and then you have characters who are more Superman than a guy with a sword and board.
The biggest change is thAC0 has been gone since 2000. f you can roll a d20 to hit above the AC number than you will be fine. Plus you wont have to translate 2-8 damage to using 2d4. If dice are needed the rules are clear which dice you need. XP is on one math based table, and the rules are streamlined so you don't have to own all the books and all the dragon magazines to know how to deal with something. Also the font in the books is no longer 8pt thin. You can read these books without much issue. Spells likewise are more or less balanced. Gone are the days on disintegrate a 10foot cube out of a dragon. With a chance to kill yourself instead. On Death, gone are the insta kill effects. We now have saves, and death saves. And being hit for half your hit points doesn't kill you.
Essentially all the punishing things that Gygax wrote are gone. Plus a lot of his racist ideas.
So, the one thing I've noticed with 5e is that there are a lot of folks who hate on it in a way that I wonder if their experience is based on the same game I play. I don't remember that being a thing with BECMI D&D or AD&D. But my time with those systems then were before the internet was largely available to the public, so maybe there was some mimeographed zine put out by players of Fantasy Trip or Paladium Fantasy hating on AD&D for something.
But seriously, 5e is definitely not a "rule for everything" system, and explicitly gives DMs license to do their own thing. Some consumers of WotC's publications get upset with lackluster products that could have given an opportunity for the "official rules" to an aspect of the game, the most recent Spelljammer set being probably the best example of that failure. But if you're AD&D inspired, it's not hard to adapt 5e to game that hits the notes you want it to. It's pretty versatile to the point that there's an entire multiple ENNIE award winning industry of 3rd party publishers taking the 5e core and tweaking to speak more directly toward themes and styles not given to players on a platter in the core rules.
Jander Sunstar is the thinking person's Drizzt, fight me.