BrOSR

Autumnal said:

That one of thing could bring forth ye olde fulminations.

Click to expand...

dbolack said:

The only person I know who might remember the "Cal-Tech perversions" is Bruce Baugh, I seem to recall he had some access to that era via an older brother...

Click to expand...

Thomas Shey said:

Raises hand

Bruce and I are of an approximate age, and I played with the CalTech folks a couple times.

But over and above their particular offshoot, a lot of West Coast gaming was vastly different from from the Geneva folks. But then, I know you already know that.

Click to expand...

Autumnal said:

I have no recollection of Gygax’s gripes but can hazard some guesses.

Caltech house rules had a percentile combat roll, with a vast matrix of weapons versus armor type with to-hit and damage modifiers.

They had spell points, which produced more or less exactly the same results as spell slots but were in theory more flexible. (And maybe they were at higher levels. I never played it above 2nd or 3rd level, and know that limits my exposure significantly.)

I think there was some kind of photo-skill system, though I remember no details.

That kind of thing could bring forth ye olde fulminations.

Click to expand...

M.L. Martin said:

Like the introduction to the PHB?

"Naturally, every attempt has been made to provide all of the truly essential information necessary for the game: the skeleton and muscle which each DM will flesh out to create the unique campaign. You will find no pretentious dictums herein, no baseless limits arbitrarily placed on female strength or male charisma, no ponderous combat systems for greater "realism", there isn't a hint of a spell point system whose record keeping would warm the heart of a monomaniacal statistics lover, or anything else of the sort."--Gygax, AD&D Player's Handbook, p. 6

Click to expand...

THE GAME

APPROACHES TO PLAYING ADVANCED DUNGEONS 8 DRAGONS

A few brief words are necessary to insure that the reader has actually obtained a game form which he or she desires. Of the two approaches to hobby games today, one is best defined as the realism-simulation school and the other as the game school. AD&D is assuredly on adherent of the latter school. It does not stress any realism (in the author’s opinion an absurd effort at best considering the topic!). It does little to attempt to simulate anything either. ADVANCED DUNGEONS & DRAGONS is first and foremost a game for the fun and enjoyment of those who seek to use imagination and creativity. This is not to say that where it does not interfere with the flow of the game that the highest degree of realism hasn‘t been attempted, but neither is a serious approach to play discouraged. In all cases, however, the reader should understand that AD&D is designed to be an amusing and diverting pastime, something which can fill a few hours or consume endless days, as the participants desire, but in no case something to be token too seriously. For fun, excitement, and captivating fantasy, AD&D is unsurpassed. As a realistic simulation of things from the realm of make-believe, or even as a reflection of medieval or ancient warfare or culture or society, it can be deemed only a dismal failure. Readers who seek the latter must search elsewhere. Those who desire to create and populate imaginary worlds with larger-than-life heroes and villains, who seek relaxation with a fascinating game, and who generally believe games should be fun, not work, will hopefully find this system to their taste.

Click to expand...

Dave and I disagree on how to handle any number of things, and both of our campaigns differ from the "rules" found in D&D. If the time ever comes when all aspects of fantasy are covered and the vast majority of its players agree on how the game should be played, D&D will have become staid and boring indeed. Sorry, but I don't believe that there is anything desirable in having various campaigns playing similarly to one another. D&D is supposed to offer a challenge to the imagination and to do so in many ways. Perhaps the most important is in regard to what the probabilities of a given situation are. If players know what all of the monster parameters are, what can be expected in a given situation, exactly what will happen to them if they perform thus and so, most of the charm of the game is gone. Frankly, the reason I enjoy playing in Dave Arneson's campaign is that I do not know his treatments of monsters and suchlike, so I must keep thinking and reasoning in order to "survive". Now, for example, if I made a proclamation from on high which suited Mr. Johnstone, it would certainly be quite unacceptable to hundreds or even thousands of other players. My answer is, and has always been, if you don't like the way I do it, change the bloody rules to suit yourself and your players. D&D enthusiasts are far too individualistic and imaginative a bunch to be in agreement, and I certainly refuse to play god for them -- except as a referee in my own campaign where they jolly well better toe the mark. Let us consider the magic-user question.

Click to expand...

I desire variance in interpretation and, as long as I am editor of the TSR line and its magazine, I will do my utmost to see that there is as little trend towards standardization as possible. Each campaign should be a "variant", and there is no "official interpretation" from me or anyone else. If a game of "Dungeons and Beavers" suits a group, all I say is more power to them, for every fine referee runs his own variant of D&D anyway.

Click to expand...

Magic-use was thereby to be powerful enough to enable its followers to compete with any other type of player-character, and yet the use of magic would not be so great as to make those using it overshadow all others.This was the conception, but in practice it did not work out as planned.Primarily at fault is the game itself which does not carefully explain the reasoning behind the magic system. Also, the various magic items for employment by magic users tend to make them too powerful in relation to other classes (although the GREYHAWK supplement took steps to correct this somewhat). The problem is further compounded by the original misconceptions of how magic worked in D &D — misconceptions held by many players. The principal error here is that the one 1st level spell allowable to a 1st level magic-user could be used endlessly (or perhaps at frequent intervals) without the magic-user having to spend time and effort re-memorizing and preparing again after the single usage. Many players also originally thought scrolls containing spells could be reused as often as desired. Finally, many dungeon masters geared their campaigns to the level of TV giveaway shows, with gold pouring into players’ purses like water and magical rewards strapped to the backs of lowly rats. This latter allowed their players to progress far too rapidly and go far beyond the bounds of D & D’s competition scope — magic users, fighters, clerics and all.

To further compound the difficulties, many dungeon-masters and players, upon learning of the more restrictive intent of the rules, balked. They enjoyed the comic book characters, incredible spells, and stratospheric levels of their way of playing. Well and good. D & D is, if nothing else, a free-form game system, and it was designed with great variation between campaigns to be allowed for — nay, encouraged! Of course, there are some variations which are so far removed from the original framework as to be totally irreconcilable with D & D; these have become games of other sorts and not a concern of this article. On the other hand there are many campaigns which were scrapped and begun afresh after their dungeon masters consulted us or after they read other articles pertaining to the play of D &D as conceived by its authors — just as there will probably be some dungeon masters ready to try again after reading this far. It is for all of these referees and their players, as well as those who have played the game pretty much as was desired but were never quite positive that you were actually doing so, that the foregoing was written

Click to expand...

It requires no careful study to determine that D & D is aimed at progression which is geared to the approach noted above. There are no monsters to challenge the capabilities of 30th level lords, 40th level patriarchs, and so on. Now I know of the games played at CalTech where the rules have been expanded and changed to reflect incredibly high levels, comic book characters and spells, and so on. Okay. Different strokes for different folks, but that is not D & D. While D & D is pretty flexible, that sort of thing stretches it too far, and the boys out there are playing something entirely different — perhaps their own name “Dungeons & Beavers,”tells it best. It is reasonable to calculate that if a fair player takes part in 50 to 75 games in the course of a year he should acquire sufficient experience points to make him about 9th to 11th level, assuming that he manages to survive all that play. The acquisition of successively higher levels will be proportionate to enhanced power and the number of experience points necessary to attain them, so another year of play will by no means mean a doubling of levels but rather the addition of perhaps two or three levels. Using this gauge, it should take four or five years to see 20th level. As BLACKMOOR is the only campaign with a life of five years, and GREYHAWK with a life of four is the second longest running campaign, the mostable adventurers should not yet have attained 20th level except in the two named campaigns. To my certain knowledge no player in either BLACKMOOR or GREYHAWK has risen above 14th level.

Click to expand...

Mannahnin said:

And then in a second article, D&D is Only as Good as the DM, specifically opines that the CalTech folks had taken it too far. Page 23:

Click to expand...

Emerikol said:

On criticism seemed to be super rapid advancement. That idea though has won out these days everywhere. Campaigns are often one year or less and they end at or near 20th level.

Click to expand...

Emerikol said:

This is what I was referencing.

Click to expand...