Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

I'll continue to argue that AD&D was the best version of the game.

Great stuff as ever.

I'd love to see a retro review of Rifts. We did try playing it once, I think.

The Mega Damage rules stuck with me. The idea of some weapons that will just instakill anything without similar (Mega) defensive capabilities, is a nice one in principle, but for a tabletop RPG the only way it really works is for the mega gun to be the maguffin of the adventure. I can think of at least a couple of Iain M. Banks SF stories where something like that happens -- where the whole plot revolves around getting this one ridiculously powerful sidearm that can shoot a military starship out of the sky or hit someone with perfect accuracy on the other side of the world.

But if you make those guns... not exactly commonplace? but accessible to some starting characters? Then there are only two real ways it can go: either everyone picks the characters who can get Mega weapons, and you never actually use regular damage. Or else you have a kind of Mega ceiling where half the PCs just die in certain combats.

Anyway on the upside I am pretty sure it was the first RPG where I could (and obviously did) play a dragon.

Racerguy180 wrote:
I'll continue to argue that AD&D was the best version of the game.

I support this message!

 Alpharius wrote:

Racerguy180 wrote:
I'll continue to argue that AD&D was the best version of the game.

I support this message!

Encumbrance in gold pieces taught me a lot about hard work and the true meaning of wealth. That and the value of a ten foot pole.

 Kid_Kyoto wrote:
And we’re back, with some final thoughts on this forty one year old adventure module.



As I said, great art, great production values, cool ideas. The adventure portion of the book isn’t bad, it just lacks a 3rd act.

It was a tournament scenario. You might as well complain about the missing second season of Firefly.

But "it was a tournament scenario" was -why- all of the production values were so high for the content.

Disclaimer: In order for there to be people with names like King Geoff the Third, somebody has to be King Geoff.

Racerguy180 wrote:
I'll continue to argue that AD&D was the best version of the game.

No arguing with that. For what you wanted out of it, AD&D was clearly the best.

Do note that other people might want something different, and therefore prefer a different version.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Ian Sturrock wrote:
Great stuff as ever.

I'd love to see a retro review of Rifts. We did try playing it once, I think.

The Mega Damage rules stuck with me. The idea of some weapons that will just instakill anything without similar (Mega) defensive capabilities, is a nice one in principle, but for a tabletop RPG the only way it really works is for the mega gun to be the maguffin of the adventure. I can think of at least a couple of Iain M. Banks SF stories where something like that happens -- where the whole plot revolves around getting this one ridiculously powerful sidearm that can shoot a military starship out of the sky or hit someone with perfect accuracy on the other side of the world.

But if you make those guns... not exactly commonplace? but accessible to some starting characters? Then there are only two real ways it can go: either everyone picks the characters who can get Mega weapons, and you never actually use regular damage. Or else you have a kind of Mega ceiling where half the PCs just die in certain combats.

Anyway on the upside I am pretty sure it was the first RPG where I could (and obviously did) play a dragon.

That was a big weaknes in Rifts. The game is only really playable if everyone has mega-damage weapons and armor. Pretty much all the encounters are equipped with them, so any characters without both either evaporate in the first encounter or two, or are pretty much irrelevant. Character classes that don't start with them just don't get used at all.

 Alpharius wrote:

Racerguy180 wrote:
I'll continue to argue that AD&D was the best version of the game.

I support this message!

I don't, its pure nostalgia goggle time. AD&D bulked out basic D&D, but was deeply flawed but only patched in 2nd ed. 3rd 'rebalanced' that adding a lot of flavour but made the game widely open to abuse, 4th was a clusterfeth. 5th got it mostly right.

AD&D was awesome because it was what was available at the time, and had a the draw of a generic medieval fantasy setting unlike Runequest which tied the players too deeply into its narrative.

 solkan wrote:

 Kid_Kyoto wrote:

It was a tournament scenario. You might as well complain about the missing second season of Firefly.

I disagree, in a tournament you need something to keep the players on track, a goal for them to accomplish and a ticking clock. Otherwise...

The room is empty except for a discarded ration wrapper and some dust in the corner.
I search for secret doors! I check for traps! Oh, sorry, opposite order, traps first, then secret doors.
(without even rolling) No secret doors or traps.
I pick up the ration wrapper.
It has a picture of strawberries on it and some incomprehensible writing.
I cast comprehend languages.
Really?
I cast comprehend languages.
It says 'Contains one ration bar, strawberry flavored'
Is there a ration bar inside?
No, it's been eaten.
I put the wrapper in my pouch. I poke the dust with my 10 foot pole.
The dust is stirred slightly. Nothing else happens.
I sprinkle some on my fingers to see if it's Dust of Disappearance.
Your fingers don't disappear.
I turn it in case it's a Demi Lich.
It is not a Demi Lich.
I cast detect magic.
The dust is not magic.
Should we try casting speak with the dead in case it's the remains of a crew member?
It is not the remains of a crew member. Are you ready to move on?
Are you kidding? We just burned a half dozen spells, we need to set up camp and rest!

Like that.

On the other hand 'You have 12 hours until the malfunctioning robots release Yellow Musk Zombie spores' kind of focuses the mind nicely.

Anyone here old enough to remember the first Zork, on cassette?

That is what your text reminded me of, Kyoto.

 jeff white wrote:
Anyone here old enough to remember the first Zork, on cassette?

That is what your text reminded me of, Kyoto.

It's (barely) before my time, but honestly I had way too many conversations like that in games.

I read a parody of D&D years ago which spent dozens of pages on searching a room, down to pulling the legs off a table and carving them up to see if anyone hid a wand inside. It was funny but hit a bit too close to home.

 Orlanth wrote:

 Alpharius wrote:

Racerguy180 wrote:
I'll continue to argue that AD&D was the best version of the game.

I support this message!

I don't, its pure nostalgia goggle time. AD&D bulked out basic D&D, but was deeply flawed but only patched in 2nd ed. 3rd 'rebalanced' that adding a lot of flavour but made the game widely open to abuse, 4th was a clusterfeth. 5th got it mostly right.

AD&D was awesome because it was what was available at the time, and had a the draw of a generic medieval fantasy setting unlike Runequest which tied the players too deeply into its narrative.

Sure, goggles maybe, but what wasn't working out could be house ruled by the GM who ran the world. Mostly, I found that differences in game quality depend on maturity and realism, with the maturity up to the group and the realism mostly on the GM. It pays to have a GM who knows more about the world, the real world, and how it works, than the players. Nothing is worse than arguing with a GM about how gravity works, for example...

Lately, I like looking at this:
https://osricrpg.com/index.php

In secondary school we abbreviated the "check for traps, check for hidden doors, detect magic, sense sloping passages, check for free lunch, etc. etc." conversation to "do a Jelley Check" after a kid called Jelley who used to slow down our games in exactly that manner otherwise.

I'd LOVE to argue which edition of D&D is best (it's obviously Tunnels & Trolls) but let's start a new thread with that conversation as it's clearly Serious Business to many and this thread is surely mostly for nostalgic hilarity.

 jeff white wrote:


Sure, goggles maybe, but what wasn't working out could be house ruled by the GM who ran the world.

So, basically every RPG game ever?

 Kid_Kyoto wrote:

 jeff white wrote:
Anyone here old enough to remember the first Zork, on cassette?

That is what your text reminded me of, Kyoto.

It's (barely) before my time, but honestly I had way too many conversations like that in games.

I read a parody of D&D years ago which spent dozens of pages on searching a room, down to pulling the legs off a table and carving them up to see if anyone hid a wand inside. It was funny but hit a bit too close to home.

If they do this too often, the room they camp in turns out to be a Mimic...

 Ian Sturrock wrote:
In secondary school we abbreviated the "check for traps, check for hidden doors, detect magic, sense sloping passages, check for free lunch, etc. etc." conversation to "do a Jelley Check" after a kid called Jelley who used to slow down our games in exactly that manner otherwise.

I'd LOVE to argue which edition of D&D is best (it's obviously Tunnels & Trolls) but let's start a new thread with that conversation as it's clearly Serious Business to many and this thread is surely mostly for nostalgic hilarity.

I totally forgot to have the dwarf check for sloping passages, the Paladin detect evil, the elf scan the dust with infravision, the thief hear noises, the Druid try to talk to it and everyone try to disbelieve. Just add them to the Jelley Check!

Actually in my group we just called it SENSE! As everyone just tries to sense everything they can.

Stop it, now!

You can't add sense to D&D.

 Orlanth wrote:
Stop it, now!

You can't add sense to D&D.

Correct, but not so for AD&D. It's full of sense, amongst other things.

I would certainly enjoy a Rifts Retro-Review. I had great times with that game, with the full understanding that it's very, uh, x-treme.

Thank you for this write-up! It was a really enjoyable read.

I run my first D&D game last summer, and wanted to mix sci-fi and fantasy. Even had thought about a crashed spaceship, which would work as a dungeon.
However, I hit to a brick wall trying to figure out various things.

Then I discovered this module and absolutely loved it! It was released a decade or so before my time and I've only been playing D&D since the end of 4th edition, so I was not familiar with this classic.
I did not run it as is, as I wanted to experiment with my own stuff, but I certainly took a lot of inspiration from it. To name a few things, I borrowed the key card mechanic, a few monsters and the actual adventure hook itself.

It was a blast!

And I agree with your earlier statement regarding the difficulty of role playing with articles that are familiar to the players, but not to the characters.
It was a fun challenge to try and describe everyday items as shapes, weird materials and colors, instead of what they actually looked like. Even managed to fool the players a few times.

 Kid_Kyoto wrote:
I totally forgot to have the dwarf check for sloping passages, the Paladin detect evil, the elf scan the dust with infravision, the thief hear noises, the Druid try to talk to it and everyone try to disbelieve. Just add them to the Jelley Check!

Actually in my group we just called it SENSE! As everyone just tries to sense everything they can.

Yes but has the Cleric communed with their God yet to see if the ration wrapper was a divine omen? We can't move on till the ritual is complete.

Ahh, the sloping passage.

If the GM tracks time faithfully, players who check for everything soon end up trapped in goblin netting or end up with their exits closed behind them, soon to be ambushed once their torches run out…

AD&D is full of everything but sense. I cite the AD&D initiative system to support this statement. I started in 1978 with the Holme's Blue Book which did have a bit of sense, but frequently referred to something called Advanced Dungeons & Dragons... which didn't exist yet. Well, the Monster Manual did. The Player's Handbook released that August at GenCon.

I never ran this module (S3) or Tomb of Horrors (S1) but I did run White Plume Mountain(S2) and the Lost Caverns of Tsojcanth (S4), which was the better of the 2 by far. The S series modules are not forgiving adventures, but they can be much fun.

I loved D&D as well as AD&D back in the day. I am less enamored of current state of D&D but that is probably nostalgia getting in the way somewhat and I am well aware of some things I do not like about D&D which can encourage certain game styles that I dislike (ie a Monty Haul focus on wealth/power and being a murder hobo).

However more to the point of this thread, I loved the original Barrier Peaks back in the day and I love the Goodman Games reprint.

This thread has been an enjoyable read and I hope there is going to be a similar one going over Rifts, which I was to explain to Mrs. GG just yesterday after seeing some Rift books on eBay.