What does old school mean to you?

[ReaperWolf]

There's been a resurgence of old-school gaming products these past few years: Labyrinth Lord, OSRIC, Swords & Wizardry, even Microlyte20. Even Castles & Crusades claims to be old-school.

 

For those following the trend, what does old-school gaming mean to you?

 

I myself have been enjoying developing content for Dungeonslayers: http://www.dungeonslayers.com/

 

Best!

 

>>ReaperWolf

[Lars Porsenna]

Old Skool means dungeon crawls, killing monsters and looting the body.

 

Damon.

[morganm]

That's so esoteric Lars =) Love it! I would only add:

More pizza around the table than rule books.

More role playing and less rules lawyering.

 

I love Microlite d20 because it can facilitate an 'old school' gaming experience but it's compatible with modern gaming content. Plus it's easy enough to adapt old school gaming content on the fly. We've played some classic AD&D modules, D&D 3.0 & 3.5 modules, and new Paizo Pathfinder modules/scenairos.... it works just fine with all of them.

[Inarah]

For me it means a simplicity of rules, and emphasis on role-playing, and a responsibility on the DM's part to come up with content and make it fun. D&D was what, 50 pages of text in a booklet? You crawled around bashing doors and monsters, having fun with your character, and the Dungeon Master made it all up on his own. We didn't need Tomes, Compendiums, Adventurer's Guides, character generators or sanctioned tournaments.

 

Give me a piece of paper, some dice and a pencil and I am ready to play.

 

And bring the cheetos.

[Bruunwald]

Old Skool means dungeon crawls, killing monsters and looting the body.

 

Damon.

I'm more of a split personality on old school. On the one hand, it sometimes means what we see above. On the other hand, it sometimes means being looser with the rules and embracing the old ad hoc.

 

Still again, it means being in the spirit of wonder at what's behind the door. Close corridors. Torchlight.

 

Being less fancy and playing from the gut.

[sethohman]

No rules bending / stretching due to maxed out character builds. You used a trident, because you found a +1 trident. A fighter hit things, and a mage cast magic missile.

 

And magic missile automatically hit.

[JimL]

Low level D&D parties deciding that they would feed their troublesome magic-user to the dragon to save their skins! Developing the Death Ain't That Cheap Chart to make serious and funny things happen when you found yourself with negative HTK. While this was originally a ploy by the DM to entice us to make wiser choice in battle it became a badge of honor when you were penalized for one to many blows to the face with a Charisma of 2.

 

The best memory...finding a black ebony chest, banded with ice cold black-silver, emitting a fog of cold vapor (DM's description)...What do you do? Well open it of course and free the liche!!

[Doug Sundseth]

 

More role playing and less rules lawyering.

 

 

I must assume that you are too young to have actually been an old-school roleplayer.

 

I can assure you (from far too much experience) that OD&D had at least as many rules arguments and as much munchkinism as even the most rules heavy system later created. And role-playing (of the sort that amateur thespians seem to prefer in RPGs) was far more a second-generation-game phenomenon than first generation.

 

Still, at this point, 2nd gen is probably ancient to all you whippersnappers.

 

Oh, and "Get off of my lawn!"

[Lars Porsenna]

I can assure you (from far too much experience) that OD&D had at least as many rules arguments and as much munchkinism as even the most rules heavy system later created. And role-playing (of the sort that amateur thespians seem to prefer in RPGs) was far more a second-generation-game phenomenon than first generation.

 

Totally agree. And this is what I was alluding to in my post (which was not tongue-in-cheek, but serious). Maybe you got a little role-playing haggling over the price of a sword with the local arms merchant, or the brownie playing pranks on the party. But beyond that, it's kill the monsters and take their stuff.

 

Damon.

[rgtriplec]

For me it means a simplicity of rules, and emphasis on role-playing, and a responsibility on the DM's part to come up with content and make it fun. D&D was what, 50 pages of text in a booklet? You crawled around bashing doors and monsters, having fun with your character, and the Dungeon Master made it all up on his own. We didn't need Tomes, Compendiums, Adventurer's Guides, character generators or sanctioned tournaments.

 

Give me a piece of paper, some dice and a pencil and I am ready to play.

 

And bring the cheetos.

 

I haven't done any role-playing since I was in college in 91. At this past Origins I sat in on a D&D session and felt like I was auditing a class in Greek as the DM went over his pile... big pile of stuff. I was thinking I think our DM sometimes brought one book and maybe a monster manual. Then when the game started I was thinking where is the big elaborate story and role playing part.

[Spike]

@ Morganm.."More pizza around the table than rule books." ...you summed it up pretty well.

 

Or as I say, you don't need a spreadsheet to figure out how to kick a goblin in the bruggs. You just do it.

 

@ Inarah..I hope you still feel that way after the gnolls.

[bikerdrew]

Tunnels and Trolls 1st edition, a couple of large bags of Crisps (corn chips) and some cans of beer and a heap of badly painted Citadel fantasy figures. Oh... and more d6 than you can hold in one hand scattered around the table.

[jackquil36]

Teenage mutant ninja turtles - In 1980's, every young boy in America was legally obligated to spend at least two hours a day pretending to be one of the Turtles, and another two arguing with friends over which one was superior

[wyrmgear]

Hmmm, I seem to remember sitting in the science classroom, after school hours, in Junior High ('81 or '82...maybe 83) with scratch sheets and graph paper.

 

I must confess to becoming a stuff junkie since then. I like stuff. Lots of it. Books, terrain, minis (especially minis- RPGs are what got me hooked on minis), maps, sound tracks....

 

A well told story and imagination is all that is needed, to be sure; and I had a blast in those days- but quite honestly, I dig the tools and bits (must be an extension of wanting the perfect garage, you know, sweet wall mounted cabinets with metal doors and scads of tools I'll never use...but I know they're there).

 

Dungeon crawls are a blast, but I need something more substantial now-a-days. I played D&D in Junior high but when I was 18 I tried Call of Cthulhu with an amazing group (fun was the name of the game, but they appreciated a good yarn)and never once missed D&D (though I did play occasionally - I also like a diverse selection of games).

[SIGIL]

Old school gaming vs new school... best discribed by the roll for initiative hosts..... old school had more of a personal level to the feel of the game. In OD&D your character was nto likely to live or at least adventure beyond 4th or 5th level if you played the rules properly. Your stats were often between the numbers 6 and 14 and very often you had more low numbers than high. You were LUCKY to find a +1 sword at the end of an adventure, and you usually had to fight like hell to get it. You had leather instead of plate, a pack mule or a henchman, a theif who was of little to no use what so ever in melee combat, a fighter who had no magic what so ever ( could they even use scrolls back then? ), a cleric who was liek a magic user with a few more hit points and heavier stick, a magicuser who had to use their head to be useful and could actually be REALLY useful when played smart, and Rangers who were marginally good fighters with less str and HP but could fire a bow competently.

 

 

Elf, Dwarf, Halfling....... CLASSES, and dammit that is just how I liked it! You were encouraged to play a human because the other races were supposed to be RARE. Which fit the feel of the setting back then.

 

It was a whole other ball game, and one that I think most gamers today really miss out on.

 

 

Now it is all high number stats placed specifically according to the best possible benefit, "special" abilities that read ike spell effects, homogenized classes that are practically unrecognizable from one another. Magic items rain fromt he sky. Gold grows from the trees. There are more races than you can easily memorize.

 

 

All that said I liek a bit of high fantasy here and there. I am REALLY lookign forward to Dark Sun, and to be honest i think that 4E will fit DS liek a glove and I will sing it's praises within that context.

 

For me a lot of the magic of DnD is how the rules once complimented the setting to the point that they almost became a single unit in my imagination.