AD&D is magic items. I don't think it's possible to overestimate the importance of magic items in AD&D. They were the premium of treasure taken in adventures. And they grew to define what your character could do and accomplish. As opposed to all of your abilities being defined by abilities you gain as you advance, AD&D often defined a character's power level by the items they had managed to win on their adventures. Some feel like this is a bad thing. For such items can be lost, broken, stolen or otherwise stripped from your character. That is exactly the point. Certainly a 10th level fighter was far superior to a first level fighter. But a 10th level fighter with a Vorpal Blade was much more powerful than a 10th level fighter without a magical blade. This may seem unfair, but it was a matter of drive and motivation for characters to adventure to gain such items. Items such as a Holy Avenger were precious beyond belief. A paladin who lost such an item was presented with a powerful challenge that cased them to play much harder and more strategically than one who could simply take a short or long rest and rise again just as powerful as they were yesterday.
The purpose or intent of some of the changes in 5e's magic items was said to make them more strange, usual or rare. This is not at all what they have achieved. In fact magic items are almost irrelevant in most of today's 5e games. They are not near as wondrous or useful as they were in AD&D making them less impressive and "magical". And moreover they are often superfluous to a character that already possesses a great number of super abilities.
In AD&D magic items played a major role in most games and were far more magical than people are used to today.
Huh, that’s interesting (about 5E and their approach to magic items). Based on the couple sessions of 5E I’ve listened in on (via podcast), I’d agree with your assessment that’s NOT what they’ve achieved.
ReplyDeleteAre you still running your 5E home game? Are these missives on “the spirit of AD&D” meant to instill some of this old magic in players of 5E? Or have you finally gone back to AD&D (and these posts explain the reason why)? Just curious.
Thanks BJ, yeah my game history seems to follow a pattern. I have played every edition but continue to come back to AD&D as my preferred system of play. I started with AD&D in '81 and played it for years. Then after a hiatus from gaming, was roped into DMing a 3.5 game, which I'd never played. This was back in like '06 just as 4e came out. My players were younger and wanted the latest thing so we gave 4e a whirl. That was when I began to really become disillusioned with the state of D&D. I tried to get my players to go to OSRIC, but we ended up playing Pathfinder for a time, until I put my foot down and refused to run anything but AD&D or OSRIC. So we played that until I changed jobs and was thrust into another hiatus. My own kids bought 5e for me for Christmas one year so I agreed to run that for them. That's the home game you referred to. But I just stopped that recently. My work life is crazy stressful right now, but I have also lost all enthusiasm for 5e. My blog has always been a sort of tribute to AD&D, but I cover all sorts of things. Thanks for asking!
ReplyDeleteThanks for answering!
DeleteYeah, I’ve been catching up (as I can) on your old posts and knew you were running 5E for the fam. I’m sorry work’s taken a toll on your gaming...these are rough times for a lot of folks.
I’ve been playing AD&D with my kids lately and (despite toning things down to a “PG” level), it’s been a pretty good time. I appreciate these posts of yours, though it breaks my heart a little that you’re unable to run your game of choice. In my home, the DM gets to choose the game, and we already have different editions we prefer (my boy runs B/X, my daughter does a highly modified free form thing). So far, that’s worked for us.
: )