It was just a general statement about watching YouTube videos and taking their word for it. They don’t know any more than we do, at this point. I wasn’t trying to suggest you were watching more, I apologize if it came off that way. 

Video is the future!

(me, under a rock. "get off my lawn! Where's my newspaper!")

AEDorsay

Being of the older crowd do you sometimes get the feeling that a lot of what the new players are asking for in game mechanics was already answered years ago in past editions?

A was just looking through my copy of 2rd edition and have found so many answers to questions like climbing speeds and swimming conditions. Plus all the special weapons.

Quote from TheGnome5786 >>

AEDorsay

Being of the older crowd do you sometimes get the feeling that a lot of what the new players are asking for in game mechanics was already answered years ago in past editions?

A was just looking through my copy of 2rd edition and have found so many answers to questions like climbing speeds and swimming conditions. Plus all the special weapons.

 
Oh yeah. Especially 1e and 2e rules. They could pretty much lift a lot of them wholesale and drop them into the next edition and still avoid things like the old encumbrance tables and rules. I have been converting a lot of them that I know work without much record keeping into rules for my game.

they also carry a lot more of the sense of “make it up if you have to” than current versions, which reduces the power of a rules lawyer.

but they also really sucked at giving depth to characters, and it very much obvious that the old “simple” classes would never work for most players these days. They need the sense of “I want one of these!” That the current class systems give them. 5e is a Player Edition; it wasn’t really geared as an entire version for DMs

I fully agree.

As a player I never felt constrained or hamstrung. I just worked harder at getting what I wanted during roleplay.

As another long term player and DM I agree with Dorsay - there is a lot that could be strategically lifted from older editions and gently reworked to make 6e a better product. One of the things I wouldn’t mind bringing back is less front loading of classes and subclasses so that they build more evenly over the levels. Spellcasters still do this fairly well simply because of the spell level progression and the L20 cutoff. Martials aren’t as good at this which is where much of the multiclassing comes from. What, really, as say a ranger is worth sticking around for after level 5 that can’t be out performed by taking levels in some other class and getting all those low level abilities from there as well? Fighter does a decent job by getting an extra attack at L5, L11 and L20 and an extra action surge (& indomitable) at L17 to max out their damage. I was looking over that old PC in my sig and to recreate his ranger abilities as they were in 1e he actually becomes a ranger 3 fighter 17 with 3 fighting styles (TWF, archery, and unarmed fighting) instead of a monk 3/ranger 17. 
While no one wants to see THAC0 return there is a lot from the weapons tables that could be brought forward both in terms of listed weapons and armor specific hitting and damage.

2nd edition even had flying ships piloted by wizards.

I am getting the idea that almost everything people want now has already been started or done in 1a and 2nd.

People used to complain about the games complexity but they are asking for all the rules and mechanics that made it look complex.

They got rid of THACO but want everything else back.

Quote from TheGnome5786 >>

2nd edition even had flying ships piloted by wizards.

I am getting the idea that almost everything people want now has already been started or done in 1a and 2nd.

People used to complain about the games complexity but they are asking for all the rules and mechanics that made it look complex.

They got rid of THACO but want everything else back.

 
not everything, lol.

they don’t want the class system, lol.

meanwhile, this old fart is making a bunch of standalone classes that blend different subclasses

Yeah thats true.

They tried that odd ball point buy system. Its at that point many of my friends and I went to MERP for a while. I liked that spell progression system just not their number of spells and spell specialization. Way to detailed.

Quote from PJtheACHER >>

Quote from TheGnome5786 >>

Yeah thats true.

They tried that odd ball point buy system. Its at that point many of my friends and I went to MERP for a while. I liked that spell progression system just not their number of spells and spell specialization. Way to detailed.

what is MERP? does it have something to do with The Lord of The Rings. ( i looked it up and a TTRPG about lord of the rings came up.

 
Middle Earth Role Playing, an Iron Crown set up for Tolkien.

ICE are the folks who made critical hits, well, a hit, lol. First major effort to do fumbles…

”you stumble over an unseen, invisible turtle and stab your foot.”

Middle Earth Roll Playing.

Rolemaster Was the parent game system.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Middle-earth_Role_Playing

You can still find the core rule books for sale and I even think published on line.

At first the critical hit tables were quite funny.

Your enemy was stabbed through the neck and dies a slow gurgling death in 6 rounds.

Quote from PJtheACHER >>

interesting, i assume you have watched/and or read The Lord of The Rings and probably also THE HOBBIT.

um...

maybe?

I mean, it isn't like one could walk up to me and I could recite from memory Hobbit, LotR, Silmarillion, and Lost Tales (everything available at the time) from memory or anything.  that would have been bad. Or that I was a complete ******bag purist, either.  nah, couldn't have been that arrogant self assured kid that was me.

So, imma go with nope never read them.  And what's a movie. *looks innocent*

Quote from PJtheACHER >>

um okay? im sorry i do not understand.

 yes, most of us have likely read the books, and I was jokingly saying how insufferable I was about them when I was a kid and how embarrassed I am today about it.

Read them all and watched them all. Even the original Return of the King

Where theres a whip theres a way.............

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YdXQJS3Yv0Y&ab_channel=NTorch

Quote from AEDorsay >>

Quote from TheGnome5786 >>

AEDorsay

Being of the older crowd do you sometimes get the feeling that a lot of what the new players are asking for in game mechanics was already answered years ago in past editions?

A was just looking through my copy of 2rd edition and have found so many answers to questions like climbing speeds and swimming conditions. Plus all the special weapons.

 
Oh yeah. Especially 1e and 2e rules. They could pretty much lift a lot of them wholesale and drop them into the next edition and still avoid things like the old encumbrance tables and rules. I have been converting a lot of them that I know work without much record keeping into rules for my game.

they also carry a lot more of the sense of “make it up if you have to” than current versions, which reduces the power of a rules lawyer.

but they also really sucked at giving depth to characters, and it very much obvious that the old “simple” classes would never work for most players these days. They need the sense of “I want one of these!” That the current class systems give them. 5e is a Player Edition; it wasn’t really geared as an entire version for DMs

I agree with this, since 3E really intorduced the concept of power-player builds and whereas in 1E and 2E players drew a lot of their power from Magic Items in 3E onwards the players are basically much more powerful on their own and this is certainly the case in 5E in which each character is individually capable of doing everything and hugely more powerful than earlier edition equivilents (Magic items aside).

The 1E DMG is worth any DM reading it provides masses of information but you may lose a few sanity points trying to make your way through it.