I should make a caveat before starting into this, but John Bellairs is one of my favorite young adult authors. However, though I had read numerous middle grade titles I had never read Face in the Frost. And if you were to have asked me back in the day if I thought Bellairs was a "children's author" I would have equivocated. His writing appeals to some rather "adult" topics, and though his protagonists are decidedly middle graders, their demeanor and personalities were very mature for their age. This novel is definitely written for adults. Middle graders could of course tackle it, but the themes here, the characterization, and the scenery and settings are written to a rare intellect. And to top it all off, this novel was included by Gary as a seminal work of the D&D oeuvre.
In Face in the Frost we have on display some of the same fantastic-real world setting that is common to fantasies of this period. Indeed, drawing on historical figures such as Roger Bacon, and Prospero (though no the one you're thinking of). Starting rather comfortably in a cozy, if weird, Bellairsian home the story sets off with some "odd goings on" in the wizarding world that hints at potentially dark forces at work. And weird here expands to encompass not only the home, but to the whole world and adventure these wizards set off upon. Shrinking spells, crystal balls, illusions galore and magic books are just some of the classic eldritch tropes so well known in D&D.
But what this book grants, perhaps with the exception of Vance's Dying Earth series, is the flavor of D&D wizarding more than any other. The idea of a wizards "sanctum", the bizarre nature of magic itself, the almost comical reality that magic creates, and the literally no-holds barred possibilities that such magic generates are perfectly captured by the magical adventure of Face in the Frost.
I think this is noteworthy. Gary Gygax is known for not being rather fond of magic users. Whether this is due to Howard's, and his scriptoral kin's, tendency to write spell workers as the bad guys; or because he felt a personal love for mighty fighting heroes is up for debate. Others have said it was due to the magic-users potential to become too powerful, and Gary was always looking for opportunities to clip their wings. Even Tim Kask has made the point that he had to argue for giving magic-users an unerring strike via magic missile, saying "give the poor magic-user something!" Because Gary wanted to make them have to roll to hit with their one effective damage causing spell at low levels.
But I don't think Gary "hated" magic-users. Maybe I'm wrong, and I certainly wouldn't want to take umbrage with someone as wise and experienced as Tim Kask. But you have, according to Gary, in works like this one, and others, the clear idea of what D&D wizardry could be. Mysterious, weird, comical, yes, but also very, very powerful. If you're looking for potential archetypes while playing a magic-user you need look no further than works like this and others in Appendix N. Face also provides for would be DMs, above and beyond other works, what an adventure might look like for high level magic-users. With an opponent and the associated weird setting to match their skills and abilities. Gary was fond of constructing such adventures, which in my mind bring to memory White Plume Mountain, Tomb of Horrors, and his later Dungeonland and The Land Beyond the Magic Mirror.
Finally, what some OSR games have tried to regulate, namely the weird and dangerous element of magic in old school fantasy is already there in the spirit of AD&D as well as the rules themselves. The DMG held tables for insanity, potion miscibility, magic item destruction and malfunction. And nothing short of the DMs imagination inspired by works like Face in the Frost can sculpt the warp and weft of a world where magic is very much indeed a strange and unusual power that few dare lay hold of. What has inspired later OSR developers has been that few actual rules enforce the weirdness or danger of magic. Gary left this to DM and player imagination. And for those looking for the heart of it, Face in the Frost delivers in spades.
I might also pay homage to the creation of sinister, sorcerous villains in Melchior. Able to plane shift his enemies, wrap the world in perpetual winter, and create and place all sorts of magical obstacles in the way of our protagonist Prospero and his erstwhile companion Roger. It takes more than a simple bag of hit points to challenge high level wizards, and Melchior is the kind of villain such players need to challenge their mettle and thrill their adventuring chops. And, moreover, we have the wizard's guild, though this idea of wizarding brotherhoods is at home in several works in Appendix N, that come to his rescue near the end. This too is a cool idea to use when crafting high level challenges for magic-users. One would want to be careful of too much deus ex machina with such a device, but used strategically it has much potential.
I hope my love for this novel has not been too much on display, but not since my reading of The Fourth Dimension by Rudy Rucker has my mind felt like it was under the influence of actual magic. I can not recommend it highly enough. It is one of those books, however, that I'm protective of. I dare not share it with those who might not appreciate it's fine vintage. I so wish Bellairs had written more fantasy like this. Ah well, Lewis Barnavelt is a fine companion to spend time with.
The other day I came across a little video on social media of two guys siting outside, and the one turns to the other and says, "I just feel like I'm losing my fire, you know." To which the other guy nods sympathetically, and the first guys continues, "I used to have this raging inferno inside me for life. Like a bonfire of passion to embrace the world, chase my dreams, and get all that I could out of life, right?" And the first guy, still nodding says, "Yeah, yeah." And the first guy goes on, "And now, now it's like all I have is a tiny spark, buried deep inside, like a little candle guttering in the wind that I have to shelter from the wind of life. I have to stay inside, not go out or the wind will just snuff it out." And the clip cuts out with the second guy still nodding.
I identified with this on so many levels. I wanted to mention it in regards to gaming.
Let's face it, making it from this:
To this ...
Is not a bridge too far, and many of us went from pre-teen to teenage/college gaming fairly reliably. But to make it onwards to this:
Or even this ...
Can be a much harder journey. Time, careers, relationships, stress, responsibilities and much, much more vie for time with your desire and will to sustain a gaming group. My journey here was easiest with my students first and my children next. But if those avenues evaporate as your children grow up and move on, you might find yourself struggling to hit that last phase ...
If you have managed to do that, seriously count your blessings, and accept my deepest admiration.
And I'm not saying it is some impossibly difficult achievement. Though it may be harder for some than others, it is doable. I am my own worse enemy in this regard. The real challenge is to kindle the fire sufficiently to make it happen. Don't sneeze to hard, you might snuff my candle.
So, as is often the case with me, I sail through the broken ruins of the gaming internet and occasionally come upon well preserved erudite commentaries. Standing like dwarven pillars guarding the gates of Scylla and Charybdis, they bring clarity in my efforts to slay the modern dragons of the gaming world.
Such is a piece entitled "Six Cultures of Play", by Retired Adventurer. And actually the winds that directed me there were when I came across a video that sought to summarize the ideas expressed in the blog article.
Turns out, that what these gentlemen are describing as "Classic" is almost exactly on-point on for my preferred style of play. I have played traditional, but tend to play it more like it's classic than real traditional. I feel constrained in a classical mold and/or module. And once you drift to neo-trad or modern, I'm out of my element. This article also explains my discomfort with much of the OSR. I was one of those caught in the boulders that fell when us "revivalists" sought to resurrect 1e and got caught in the landslide that was the OSR. I considered myself OSR for awhile, as it seemed to be carrying the banner I wanted championed. But truthfully, I felt left behind by what they were doing as well.
I also think that this dilemma explains my difficulty in finding a gaming group. So few who have not really played classically, understand what it is about. And really, one of the few ways to do it is to actually play the early expressions of that style. Early AD&D 1e and Basic/Expert. Bur even these can be played traditionally, and often were. And it seems like the whole world has at least shifted to traditional if not further down the cultural shift spectrum. Where does one find such a critter as me?
At any rate, I also agree with these creators that cultures are not exclusive to person or game. Nor is one better than another. Even I would be hesitant to champion myself as a pure classicist. But I am certainly at least 2/3rds if not closer to 90%.
I didn't read this gem until much later in my Dungeons & Dragons life, but I was simply amazed at how clearly the book shaped Gary Gygax's formation of D&D. The book represents one of my favorite genres of fantasy called "gate fantasy". It features the hero Holger who is fighting in World War II and gets transported to the legendary world of medieval France. At first, of course, I just assumed it was an early example of gate fantasy, as the book was published in the early 60's. However, as I read on, I found that the mixture of legend, myth and inner longing to be so powerfully evocative of my own feelings about what AD&D did for me so many years ago, I understood Three Hearts as a seminal work of D&D inspiration.
For early D&D players Three Heart and Three Lions reads like a textbook of inspiration. Herein we have a world caught in the grip of the struggle between Law and Chaos. Chaos includes the realms of faery as well and the struggle of it's better creatures such as elves and dwarves who lie between the realms of men and the other. The portrayal of the doughty dwarf Hugi, Holger's companion, is so much more accurate to my view of dwarves than the four feet wide musclebound cubes presented in modern fantasy games.
Race Comparison 1e PHB
Dwarf in 1e Monster Manual
Today's Dwarf
Also included in the tale are numerous monsters that would become iconic within the AD&D monster manual such as nixies and trolls. In fact I dare say I never used nixies in my games, nor was familiar with them. But here they are with a clear idea for their use. Magic swords, polymorphing maidens, and the like were all here on fantastic display. The tale reads as a strange and lovely mix of fantasy and fairy tale, much like my own initial experiences with the game as a youth.
Moreover, we have in Three Hearts and Three Lions a world that is steeped in legend and myth. The Cycle of Charlemagne, the Wild Hunt, Morgan le Fay and the Arthurian Cycle permeate the book as principal sources of dynamic action and drama. Some might have been puzzled by the inclusion of the Arthurian Mythos in the Deities and Demigods and fewer still used them that I knew of. But I now understood that Gary saw them as ripe pickings for fantastic adventures that could be had within then D&D.
As the plot plays out we find Holger intimately interwoven with the deeds of the past. His role revealed as an ancient hero of yore, and that his defeat of the forces of chaos mirroring his defeat of the forces of the Nazis. The tale kept me spellbound in this regard. And played out for me the desire to be a part of such adventures, just like Holger. Indeed it was my strongest dream as a young man growing up in central Texas, to do so. AD&D gave me that opportunity. Cause such cravings within me to return to just such a fantasy world, who like Holger longed to return himself.
Anderson clearly wove potential messages in his fanciful tale that give us pause today. Holger's return to Catholicism as a flight of fancy or an identification with the beyond is but one. However, what it gave Gary Gygax was clearly much fruit with which to offer to the world a chance to play at Holger's game and become Ogier the Dane ourselves.
This short phrase is from the first pages of the AD&D Players Handbook, first edition. It comes strategically as the first phrase in the portion of the book describing what the game is about. It would be over a year later that the Dungeon Masters Guide would offer Appendix N to DMs for "Inspirational Reading". It was a different age when Gary Gygax, and frankly all of the early tabletop gamers, developed their love for the speculative & weird. The paragraph above the list of recommended authors describes the age in which many of these men had grown up.
"my father ... spent many hours telling me stories he made up as he went along, tales of cloaked old men -who could grant wishes, of magic rings and enchanted swords, or wicked sorcerors and dauntless swordsmen." I readily identify with this experience as my mother did much the same for me. I was her first child, and she admits to raising me on a steady diet of fantastic tales, legends and quaint childhood fantasies. This was a common experience for many raised long ago, and I would dare so there are still those who do so. Lucky is the child raised by an adult with an open storybook and a fertile imagination.
I think this alone can do much for giving an idea of what sorts of things were imagined as fodder for an Advanced Dungeons & Dragons campaign. The list he offers here is less a prescription than it is a phantasmagoric garden from which "you will be able to pluck kernels from which grow the fruits of exciting campaigns." And he urges even more to expand beyond this mere list from "any other imaginative writing or screenplay," more ideas that may not be captured here.
More than anything, for me, this list and this idea captures what the imaginative ground from which D&D grows. We all too often find ourselves constrained by the predominant fantasy of the day. We are indeed richly blessed with so much to choose from in a publishing world that daily offers up new wonders for us to select from, and an entertainment industry that makes such awe inspiring series of fantasy epics that we should stop and consider how lucky we are. And, might I add, with which Gary Gygax had a large part to do. However, the danger in having such wonderful selection is that we become overly influence on a certain kind of fantasy. JRR Tolkien for example, only one of famous Inklings, has come to exert such a strong influence over the genre that it can become near impossible to escape his shadow. I would dare say over half of today's fantasy offerings are hugely indebted to his vision, or what has become interpreted as his vision. For instance. As much as I love what Peter Jackson has done with the franchise, that was decidedly not my vision of the Lord of the Rings when I first read There and Back again or The Fellowship. In my mind's eye it had a much weirder and more dark fairytale quality than what is today called "High Fantasy". The movie Excalibur, is instructive for those who might wonder what sorts of visions arose from the 70's, or even the original animated movies which sought to capture Tolkien's epic. They have more in common with the infamous Wizards or Fire and Ice animated movies than they do with more modern offerings.
Now, this is not to say "better" or that the late 70's and early 80's did not also have their "standard fare" or interpretation of what fantasy is. Only that it did not loom so large as some do today. So, I today recommend broadening our visions, stepping out of our proverbial fantastic comfort zones to enliven our fantasies. Much of the OSR creative field has captured some of this, and expanded the vision of what swords and sorcery can be, and I heartily encourage continued exploration in this vein.
So, my last post was a bit personal and perhaps a bit sad. It was hard to write truthfully. I am coming to grips with myself as much as my gaming, so it's bound to hurt a little bit. To summarize in a nutshell, I developed my gaming preferences pretty early in life, say age 12 to about age 17. I gamed past this date, but my "experience" of gaming during this age has always been a touchstone for what ideal gaming is like for me. I stopped gaming about 1994 or so, and came back to it in the early 2000's. When I did I wanted to game like I did back in the day. I've been chasing that dream ever since. Never quite achieved it, but came close a few times.
In this journey I've wondered if it is the game I'm missing, since I haven't truthfully played AD&D with the rulebooks since I restarted. No other game quite offered me the same magic. But OSRIC came the closest and I really hoped HackMaster might fit the bill. But they didn't. So I began to wonder if what I was missing was good guy friends to game with. But I also had a chance at that and that didn't do it either.
That brings me to today's post. Something that I haven't talked a lot about is my fascination with shiny new things. I am drawn to things I find new and intriguing. The mystery and chance to experience something new is a big part of who I am. And the flip side of that is my quickly waning lack of interest after a short time. I even recall buying several other games back in the day desperately trying to get my friends to try them as something new and fresh. Gamma World, Star Frontiers, Space Opera, Call of Cthulhu just to name a few. No one else was really interested though. I would even "stop gaming for a few weeks altogether, telling my friends I was done with gaming and wanted to focus on other things. Of course that never lasted more than a month or so.
Now, on this last point, the Satanic Panic had screwed me up and cause me no end of confusion and doubt about my past times, but I've went into all that before. Now is not the time for a re-hash of that. But it certainly contributed to my occasional rejections of gaming.
But my point here is, perhaps my vacillations in gaming recorded in the last post have more to do with my own ADHD like wishy washiness than it does about games or gaming friends. I mean this could certainly be the case. And it doesn't help. I mean let's face it, we all have enough challenges holding a gaming group together and committing to regular games. You add in some kind of flakiness like my indecision and low boredom tolerance and it becomes near impossible.
So, is that a contributing factor? Well, sure it is ... but ...
Gaming is so appealing to me partly because it is unpredictable. I love not knowing how things will turn out. Love seeing the story unfold in real time before me. There is nothing like it that I've found. Maybe LARPing, but that's just live action gaming after all. It is perfectly designed for people who love constant new experiences and the unexpected. I feel like I'm discovering non-stop when I play the game. So here we have a high return activity for somebody like me, I don't think it's just boredom that makes me give up on things.
Now, I also have a rather low tolerance for certain kinds of stress. And as I've returned to gaming at a very different time in my life it has presented new challenges. I mentioned in yesterday's post, responsibilities and children, not to mention a marriage. All these high value things, and the responsibilities that come with them are certainly more valuable than a past time. But personal interests, past times, passions, and hobbies are valuable. So valuable we should strive to make them a part of our lives to be fully healthy. They are at least as critical as physical exercise. So what causes us to set aside those things that mean so much to us?
Now there are individual differences to be sure, but I believe that the most common reason is investment vs reward. When we are tired, overworked, stressed, or just wasted from dealing with life, taking the time to put on our jogging shorts at the end of the day, go the gym, write on our novel, or drive over to our friends house to game can all seem like just too much some times. The investment in energy to make it happen can just be a hill too far. Even though, most of us would admit that after doing so we always feel better.
For me this has happened most recently with my Fifth edition D&D game. I play with my kids and one or two family friends. They have all really become gamers through fifth edition. I played some with my kids when they were younger, but 5th edition for them is like 1st edition is for me. And for that reason I will always be thankful to Wizards of the Coast, Peter Adkinson for his preservation and resurrection of the IP and those who continue to hold the banner of D&D and TTRPGs high--even when we disagree. My kids are the beneficiaries. And now they have some of the same memories I do of the best game on earth.
Despite all this, though, I still quit GMing 5e for our group first and then let the campaign fizzle out. The investment for reward for me in terms of 5e was simply not high enough. I don't hate the game, but I also don't love it. I will occasionally get the itch so strong that we'll do a 5e one shot. Why 5e? Because that is what everyone else loves and expects. They would play a different game with me, but they'd be humoring me. And that's not a good feeling.
I have read numerous posts about trying to get people to try old school games, and it always includes some injunction like, once you get them to agree to play now you need to run a really good game so they learn to love your game too. I do not like the idea of putting my game on trial. I mean I'll fight for it, try and persuade people to play and advocate to my dying day. But I want to know you want it. I am not going to force it down your throat.
I am struggling to write this post. Truthfully, I struggle with this blog. I was never truly sure what this blog was about--beyond gaming that is. Anyone who has been with me on and off over the years knows I have changed focus several times. Whether I wanted it to be or not, the blog turned out to be a very personal odyssey. Less and less useful, perhaps, to the general gamer. More and more relevant to the lost gamer of old, and possibly to the middle aged man that as Lovecraft so eloquently put it has "lost the key to the gate of dreams".
Some time ago, I blogged heavily about the fact that perhaps the answer to my feeling of gaming loss, was that I needed a gaming group. A new group of adult friends that I could connect with over gaming. Especially over games that I wanted to play. And then, lo and behold, they reached out to me. I had a great guy, super nice, who wondered if we wanted to get together and game. He had a friend or two and asked if I knew anybody else we could game with then maybe we could start a game. It seemed as if exactly what I wanted was coming to pass.
What happened you ask? Well, I was a dad. Getting time away when you have three kids at home wasn't exactly easy. So I took my two oldest kids. Not exactly what I pictured, but we work with the tools we have, right? And don't get me wrong. I have since gamed with my kids as much if not more than anyone else. Then, as I emailed back and forth and talked over email and phone with these new gaming contacts, they asked me what I wanted to play. I chanced it and said I would really like to try HackMaster 4e.
A brief divergence is in order here to explain the significance of this. As I've written about before, in the deep of the OSR, around 2007 or so I re-encountered Knights of the Dinner Table. I can't quite describe the feelings I had as I read more and more of this perfectly captured gestalt of the gaming world I recall. I felt like I was coming home. It was soon after that I found out that HackMaster 4e. was an actual game! My excitement was overwhelming. All of the hopes and of the OSR seemed like they were being realized. Here was a company that had written a game that seemed to carry on the proud AD&D tradition. But then, everything changed.
KenzerCo, the company that had created HackMaster revealed plans that WoTC was shifting gears and their agreement to use the license they had been granted was coming to an end. As a result they were going to create a new version of HackMaster, Fifth Edition. My stomach dropped. Would that change things? What would the new edition be like? How much could it be like AD&D? I would just have to wait and see. I did, and was disappointed. While HackMaster 5e is a fine, beautifully produced game, it was not AD&D.
It was awhile later that these new guys had reached out to me, but I was still enchanted with HackMaster 4e as the potential true heir to 1e. So I told them I wanted to try HackMaster 4e. And believe it or not, they agreed! It was decided I would GM, since I was most familiar with the game, though I had never actually played it. Within days the new guys had created new characters. They were fully embracing the idea, but ... they had a different idea than I did. I can't blame them though. They saw HackMaster as the parody it was presented as. As a made-up satire of a game played in a made-up satirical universe. They laughed about their characters taking so many quirks and flaws their characters were practically unplayable. I didn't handle it well. They did not see what I saw. That HackMaster was a brilliant game, that it could be played as a real game, not as a joke. I still recall the awkwardness on this phone call, and how I struggled to not appear offended, and failed to do so. But these were good guys. They backed off the idea, and I gave up pushing HackMaster. It was a short time later I gave up the GM role, even before we started, and another guy agreed to GM what he was comfortable with, 3.5.
I was right back where I had been many other times. We gamed for about six sessions and I called it quits. So what was wrong here? Was it me? Was it the other guys? Was it the game?
I don't blame the other guys. They were good guys. I don't blame my kids--I'm the one who invited them and the guys were more than glad to have them join. The game was maybe partially to blame. I mean the guys had seen the aspect of the game that was implicitly a part of the game. The game is a parody, of a sort. So I can't really blame the game, it is what it is. So, the fact is, I am the only one left to blame. And that's not new. I blamed myself then and I do so now.
So why did I quit? It wasn't the kids, it wasn't the guys, it wasn't my other responsibilities, it wasn't even that we were playing 3.5. But in some strange way it was all those things.
As I ran the game club at the school where I taught, we had lots of fun playing lots of different editions of the game. 3.5, Pathfinder, Castles & Crusades, 4e, Call of Cthulhu, and OSRIC. I definitely had the most fun playing OSRIC. I sort of had to exert myself to tell all the club members that I was only going to GM OSRIC. And the club members jumped in with both feet. Our campaign in OSRIC was some of the most fun I had playing in the club. I actually had told the members that we were playing AD&D and that I would be using the AD&D rules, but OSRIC was a near exact clone so they could use those rules and we would be just fine. But the fact was, we weren't. I mean the games were great, but what began to come up again and again, were the little niggling differences between OSRIC and AD&D. Club members would come up and ask questions about rules, make declarations based on OSRIC that did not jive with AD&D. Granted the differences were small, but somehow they loomed very large in my mind. It was some months later that I cancelled the OSRIC game and we switched back to Pathfinder, by popular vote. I didn't vote, I let the students do it.
Who's to blame here? The kids? The game? Me? Yeah. Me again. Sure there are plenty of reasons, but we were having a great time gaming first edition. I mean no one can not call OSRIC first edition. It's as close of a clone that has been written. But I wanted my 1e books at the table. I wanted them to be the ultimate recourse. I was still looking for something else.
And what happened with HackMaster? Well, I may have my timelines messed up in the re-telling, but when HackMaster 5e was released in 2009, and actually when Basic was released, I could tell right away that this was not the same game. But I jumped in, tried to embrace it, but it never took. It was so different from 4e that I just couldn't stay excited about it. And the company that created it would of course shift to 5e. I had some hope that KODT wouldn't be affected, but it was. Now, don't get me wrong, I still love KODT. I just try and look past the little differences they've added in that refer to 5e instead of 4e. I mean, heck, back in the day when I played AD&D I probably wouldn't have liked KODT. I would have seen it as a crass parody, making fun of the game I loved. And I would have seen all the variances from AD&D as proof that they weren't really talking about my game anyway.
But time is a funny thing, and memory even funnier. I re-encountered KODT at a time when I was desperately longing for some connection to the world of old school gaming. In the satire that was KODT, I recognized the truth of what it was trying to represent. I saw in it and the game a chance to return to the past. The same thing the OSR had promised. But time travel is not possible. No one gets to go back. We just go forward with the experiences of the past to shape us.
I could say I misjudged OSRIC, I misjudged the OSR, I misjudged KODT and I misjudged HackMaster. Maybe it was because I didn't know what I was looking for. Maybe because I didn't know myself. Maybe in the end I misjudged myself.
Nostalgia is a powerful emotion. I don't even know whether to call it an emotion. I've studied it alot since the OSR grew wings some 20 years ago now. Truthfully, psychologists aren't agreed about what it is, and what purpose it serves. I've read lots of theories, but nothing quite rings true. What I have heard is that nostalgia is stronger for some than for others. I certainly admit it is a powerful force in my life. So I have to admit how much nostalgia has played a role in my gaming life, especially since I picked it up again back in early 2000.
How do I separate the strong feelings I have about the game as it was for me and the current reality of the gaming world? I've tried so many times to game other editions. I always end up quitting; disillusioned by the current game and the lack of what I'm looking for in the experience. For awhile I thought it was the lack of friends to game with. Friends that were more than just my students or even my own children--since the relation between a teacher and his students, or kids and their dad will never quite be like gaming buddies. That is, after all, what KODT seemed to capture. BA, Sara, Brian, Dave and Bob. Gaming buddies. I wanted something like that. But the guys who had reached out to me certainly gave me that opportunity. But I walked away from that too.
If you happen to be relatively new to my blog, I would like to restate a fundamental premise of my work and my thinking:
D&D founded on the d20 system is a fundamentally different game to previous editions.
I have spent numerous entries on establishing this fact. There are of course, ways around it--arguments against it. And I have long ago given up the idea that only pre-d20 systems should be called D&D. D&D is an IP now, and that argument is just a horse with no legs left. But the game that was pre-2000 D&D, essentially the little brown books, Basic in all it's iterations, 1e and 2e are the games I'm referring to. And yes, I know much of what was later adopted into 3rd already existed in 2e. I would even accept these optional rules as a part of the game, because the game was not a d20 game under 2e. d20 games are d20 games, not pre-2000 D&D.
I am also not saying that later clones, simulacra and tributes are not the same game. Some are. But some are decidedly not. The list of most candidates are rather short, but I won't go into that here.
I don't think anyone can claim that I'm an "at the cutting edge" blogger or gamer. I'm a tired, aging grognard. Content to grumble away in my tiny corner of the internet, barely beyond an echo chamber. I am alternatively amazed and intimidated at the opinions out there in gaming land. Occasionally I come across something I agree with heartily, more often with stuff I just find mildly entertaining or useful and then there are times like this. Times when someone engages me so profoundly on an intellectual level I just have to reply. Consider me behind the times, but I just came across Marcia B.'s The OSR Should Die post.
Wow. If nothing else this writer is clearly intelligent. I wondered as I read on if she was a philosophy grad student, or doctor of sociology, or simply a polymath. I was impressed not only with the knowledge she brought to bear in her gaming analysis, but her erudite writing ability. Following her arguments was a bit of a challenge, and for some time I shifted my opinion on exactly what her theme or thesis was; and now I'm not sure one can reduce her essay to only one thesis.
I mean clearly her point is that it is time to give up the rather useless term OSR; but it goes deeper than that. It was near the end of her essay where she talked about nostalgia, that I thought I might have a grasp on her motive.
"The banner of old-school play was upheld by too many groups with too many desires which overlapped and contradicted and crossed paths and diverged again. None of them held onto the banner because it was necessarily accurate for themselves or because they were its rightful owners, but because the banner is a signifier of a desire to return to the past ... As such, it doesn’t really signify anything as much as it acts as an ideological rallying call to return to some tradition." -- Marcia B.
So much is being said here. Marcia has developed an argument that OSR as a term is a false objectification. There is no definitive "OSR", but rather a term which people use to hang their desires upon. Ostensibly a desire to return to the past. However, as Marcia also points out, this return to the past is a mythic past not rooted in reality per se, at least in many cases. But in terms of object oriented ontology it is possible to give object status to abstract concepts such as the OSR. The trick is in examining whether such a term deserves status. But in the paragraph above, Marcia clearly objectifies the term as an "a signifier of a desire to return to the past," and "an ideological rallying call to return to some tradition."
What had originally spawned the OSR, grognards pining for new AD&D material, was perhaps really never a desire to return to the past as much as a desire for support for their preferred edition. Now, she acknowledges, and I agree that many of us in the group, and I count myself as one, did long for the past. But practically speaking we simply wanted TSR back producing new 1e material. I myself wrote extensively on the golden age of TSR and imagined what it's return would look like. And in this sense, the "tradition" is very clearly marked as how the industry supported 1e and how we played and are continuing to play AD&D. In this sense a "preserved" past.
Now Marcia, it seems to me, will go on to assert that the tradition itself is illusory. Not of the sort imagined by current OSR creators and producers. And I also agree here. The current state of what people call OSR has so developed and extended the game and its concepts that it has ranged far and wide from a "way" the game was played in the past. This was because in the development of the old school idea several things occurred.
Many who might have played AD&D in their youth began to realize they weren't playing RAW back in the day. And the more they came to grips, as critically thinking adults, that the AD&D rules were a little challenging to play RAW, they realized the games they recalled as youth were not exactly concordant with the AD&D ruleset. This led some back to Original D&D on a quest to discover the real roots of how they played. Now in some cases this arose organically. For instance, I never played OD&D. But I was taught to play by four gamers who had all cut their teeth on OD&D. So a lot of my playstyle of AD&D had been influence by an OD&D playstyle (or at least a playstyle based on the OD&D ruleset). I didn't really understand this until I processed my own renaissance (literally rebirth).
However, as many of us grappled with this distinction in reconciling the actual AD&D ruleset with what we recalled from our youth, OD&D didn't quite seem to fit either. So quite a few retreated to B/X. Now I owned B/X Moldvay-Cook but back then I could clearly smell the differences and never actually played that version. So like others, B/X didn't quite seem the right sized hat either.
Now, a sizeable group of grognards had never really shifted to AD&D when it came out. Their introduction to D&D was through a different route. Either Holmes, Moldvay Cook initially, or they migrated from 0e to Basic as it was closer in spirit to the 3little brown books. Even if they tried AD&D, the fact was they preferred the Holmes, or later Moldvay-Cook or even the quite late Mentzer BECMI version. I sort of envied these players for awhile. They were actually closer to OD&D than my AD&D was, and enjoyed that free wheeling style so indicative of classic play. And it doesn't need to be said that it was easier to emulate the old style of play with the basic/original rules. But where was the right version for me?
So you had players from the mid 70's to the mid 90's who were all not sold on 3.5 and were pining for something else. It was as much exploration as it was emulation. We were looking for the feel we recalled, and it was rarely embodied in the full rulesets we were now reading. Yes, you had those fully satisfied with AD&D RAW, or having came to terms with its more arcane rules and were vibing away with it. You also had those who were playing Original (0e) and Classic (Basic). But many still did not have a home.
It was these originals who began toying with rulesets and creating simulacra of the old games. Some in an effort to capture the "feel" of the past. Others who were taking 0e's injunction to heart by "imagining the hell out of it!" Thus you have the rise of the OSR as Marcia seems to be picturing it. You still have all of these gamers who might be said to fall within the general moniker or label of OSR, but you also have an entirely new crop drawn by the fertile ground for creativity and invention that found a home within the movement. This was due in part to the efforts of old school proselyters, and others just wondering what all the furor was about. Some damn fine product has been produced that fits all over the map as regards "old school" Beautiful, crazy, weird and gobs of fun in some cases. Also, controversial, edgy and offensive to whichever group chose to take issue.
But this elucidation is not Marcia's point. For you see, this grand crazy carnival that tends to be labelled "old school" is not all that old school anymore. It isn't rooted in the past. And even if it is in some cases, this past is also emblematic of all sorts of unsavory elements that have impeded the OSR's success. She spends more than a few words on the effect of Zack Smith's crimes on the OSR as a brand. There is an implied problem also extant in the "past" many of the OSR proponents seek to enshrine. We all know the subtler controversies heaped upon fine veteran gamers like Ed Greenwood and other younger gamers like Alexander Macris and the list, which goes on, is truly, lamentably, long. Not to mention Wizards choice to distance itself from controversial content. And the travesty of the subsequent roasting and cancellation of the very founders of the hobby itself. So the move away from the idea of "old" seems multilayered and nuanced in the extreme.
I am sure that there will be those who may see in my analysis of Marcia's excellent essay a slanted perspective, if not outright wrong headedness. But ultimately what I am positing here is that Marcia's purpose may be more about redeeming the OSR than letting it die.
As first Marcia points out that because the OSR means so many things, it is useless as a term and therefore we should jettison it--it should be allowed to die. But moreover that the term is rooted in a false notion of the past, and therefore not in the past at all. She elegantly outlines that the developments of the OSR designers are only peripherally connected to a past playstyle and in truth could be called a new playstyle. A creative development that only has a tangential relation to the past if any. If we can jettison the term and its false connection to the past we can free ourselves of all the ugly baggage that it might entail.
The other possibility is that some feel constrained by OSR assumptions of one camp or another. Must it be rules light? c.f. OSRIC Must it rely on player skill? c.f. Classic Fantasy. And on and on. The sheer variety of works that have been produced by the OSR mitigates against such an assumption. As does the supposed desire to remove ourselves from problematic material. c.f. LotFP. Would abandoning the term OSR free our constraints, that also appear not to exist?
I suggest the same thing has happened to the term Dungeons & Dragons. I've argued this very point on my blog in the past. What "is" Dungeons and Dragons. At one point I actively argued that no game past 2e could rightly be called Dungeons & Dragons; the mechanics having been usurped by the d20 system. As my arguments progressed in various essays I grappled first with the fact that Original Dungeons & Dragons was also technically a very different animal, and that AD&D had been such a development that it might fundamentally differ from the original. Then an astute friend pointed out that we must admit that the term Dungeons & Dragons was an IP, and that anyone who owned the IP had the proper right to call their game Dungeons & Dragons. And further still my thoughts developed to consider the fact that playstyle could vary so much, especially in Original and Classic (Basic/Expert), that one's experience of Dungeons & Dragons could vary considerably even within the same edition.
Why the deep concern over terms and definitions? Methinks thou protesteth too much. But such is grist for the philosopher's mill, and the OSR has also been the birthplace of deep and meaningful gaming philosophy. Why does it matter? Well, because it does. But also, such battles inevitably rest in not only foundational ontologies, but in ethics and metaphysics. Is it "right" to include games I don't like in a term I identify with. Well, to those of us more progressive thinkers who still read Marion Zimmer Bradley, enjoy JK Rowling and still buy Zack Smith's gaming material, and to those who don't and won't, such issues are clearly relevant ethically. What is D&D smacks to me as much of metaphysics as it does of ontology. As does what is the OSR. Humans are inherently a philosophical race, I mean we invented it after all. Or re-discovered it if your preferences run to Plato. The nature of things we love and seek to understand just flow in those channels.
So what's my view? Well, I'm a lot less comfortable with absolutes these days. Marcia herself leaves to other writers and perhaps gamers to figure out what to do about it. But my opinion on Marcia's essay is, beyond the fact that it is a well written philosophical powerhouse, that she is calling less for the death of the OSR and more of a redemption of it's potential to a true renaissance broken free from the chains of its medieval scholasticism. She never decries the brilliant prolifera of its creativity, it seems instead she yearns for freedom to allow gaming creativity to grow past it's roots. I think others have already embraced the concept, hence the terms like New School Revival, New School Gaming and the like. While such a change is laudable, and a veritable fact, the rumors of the OSR's death have been greatly exaggerated. The OSR is and will continue to go strong, as exactly what Marcia objectified it as, "a signifier of a desire to return to the past," and "an ideological rallying call to return to some tradition."
Many talk about a sweet spot at which levels you get the most out of play in whatever iteration of D&D you are playing. I am not going to try and cross that bridge, and am not informed enough to say much about high level AD&D play.
We played intermittently in my youth. At first it was rare to have someone hit 3rd level without dying, but that was largely due to my ignorance in DMing. We would often play weekend sessions. We were more of an adventure driven group than a campaign driven group. A campaign we took to just be the same characters having passed through a series of adventures. And series was only loosely defined. We really didn't even refer to this as a campaign. Naturally your experience may differ, and I'm sure guys who played every day after school might have had different results.
With that in mind we rarely passed 10th level. The high level characters I recall were a 9th level fighter, a 15th level magic user, an 11th level Paladin, an 8th level ranger, a 12th? level ninja (Dragon Magazine Ninja), a 14th level halfling thief, and my own 11th level magic user. Those were heights we achieved. And there were a myriad of lower level characters sprinkled in and about. And we never had a problem playing at those levels. We were always challenged.
I've heard of people playing higher level and it becoming difficult, but they must have meant in excess of level 20. Or ran very different games than we did. And many of those mentioned above were played for literally years -- from age 12 to over age 20 in players years in some cases. Levelling was not easy. It was a long term commitment. And we loved it. Those
I'm not sure what that says about us, about AD&D or gaming, but there it is.
I've been thinking a lot about what "my" D&D looks like. Lot's of ground's been covered since 1981 when I started playing. And my tastes were influenced by the game as it developed, and by the increasing proliferation of fantasy and science fiction that in large part was influenced by D&D. A creative feedback loop. James Raggi did a great job of talking about this here.
But in the fondest parts of my gaming life, what did I play? What rules did we use? What did we love and what did we hate, not understand or simply not use?
We started rolling 3d6 in order to pick a class. This was the way I was taught by the guys that had been playing since Original D&D.
We later added 4d6, first in order and then arranged as we like, or trading two for one to increase some abilities. We also experimented with other ability generation methods from the DMG, but all these felt sort of like cheating.
We used the AD&D classes.
We sometimes used classes from Dragon, but we argued about what class should be allowed, as some were clearly created to just be NPCs.
We used all the races in the PHB, influenced by Dragon and later Unearthed Arcana. But we did not use "monster" races and tended to stick with the PHB core. One thing that never seemed to make sense to us was race as class. We never played that way.
Sub races were considered part of the game, but it became clear with time that subraces could also be campaign specific
We did use class restrictions fairly rigorously, but did not pay near as much attention to level limits. Truthfully few demi-humans were played, largely because of these restrictions. I almost always played humans, as I felt like I could identify with them more. I wanted to be the adventurer I was playing. Call it lack of imagination, as some people don't even want to be human and love playing as all sorts of different races. But the fact ism all the main characters in our group back in the day, with one exception, were human. The one exception was a halfling thief.
We used and loved the magic items in the DMG, and they played an integral part in the game.
We used 1d6 individual initiative, unmodified. We later changed to d10 as we liked the idea of breaking actions into segments of six seconds. But we also knew the math didn't quite work out, so ended up using it sort of like d6 initiative.
We used the combat tables, but little else in related to combat. We did not use surprise, weapon adjustment or speed factors, etc.
AC as was from the PHB.
Spells as per PHB, though we only gave lip service to material components, but spent more attention to duration, and a little to casting times, but not enough to modify initiative intelligently.
Starting Gold generation at level 1, and pre-purchase of equipment as listed in PHB.
We used most equipment, but didn't spend much time on resource allocation or encumbrance
There were later ideas that made character generation fun, mostly from Dragon, Survival Guides or UA. Random tables like heritage, background social class, family structure, non-weapon proficiencies and the like. We also liked the age table and secondary skills table from the DMG, but they rarely mattered after play began.
We loved exceptional strength but mostly just for the to hit and damage bonus. We never rolled to open stuck doors, but occasionally used bend bars lift gates.
We did use rolls for secret doors.
Intelligence for languages, but rarely for spell bonuses or rolls to learn. Same for wisdom, but we did like the extra spells. Dexterity to AC and to hit, but rarely for reaction. Con for hp, but rarely needed to roll resurrection or survival shock. And charisma rarely for anything.
Speaking of charisma we never used followers or retainers.
We used 9 point alignment.
We rarely played assassins, bards were impossible, but just about every other class made an appearance.
We did not use gender ability restrictions.
We gave lip service to racial preference but it was never a real issue.
We did use weapon and armor restrictions
We did use Vancian casting of course
We did have some multiclassed demihuman characters, but few lasted very long.
Languages were used, but not alignment language, we wrote it down but really didn;t know what it meant.
We did use weapon proficiencies, attacks pre round for fighters and eventually specialization, but this was a late addition.
Barbarian and Cavalier were rolled up but rarely played with
We did use missile weapon ranges and rates of fire and reload times.
We understood time as 1 minute rounds, divided into segments that somehow mattered for spell casting and initiative, but that rarely came into play, and that turns were ten minutes.
Distance we knew was feet (') inside and yards (") outside, but even that wasn't always crystal clear.
Light range and duration a bit, movement in theory
Psionics, 1 time.
Most of the DMG was a mystery, but could sometimes solve tough questions if we could find an answer therein.
Experience, 1 gp per experience and back of DMG to look up xp for monsters.
We loved the concept of planes and planar structure and used deities in the DDG for our clerics, but in a rather simplistic way generally.
We only used critical hits and fumbles later on, and generally played death at 0 hp.
Later we played around with death at -10 and variants but mostly death at 0, and resurrection rarely came up.
Both since I wrote a post and since I've played. Well, we had a session or two, one shots. 5e. At one point I had agreed to play 5e as a player, but was done DMing. But even that stopped awhile back. I was just not enjoying myself. The last session I did DM a short 3 hour one shot. I occasionally get so game-sick (home sick for gaming) that I'll pull those who I know would be up for a 5e romp together to get a fix--albeit a bit watered down.
I've been thinking lately about the last time I had a good AD&D session, which was almost 15 years ago when I convinced the kids at the school club to start an OSRIC campaign. We played for over three years, and the kids loved it. And truthfully, I didn't do much convincing. I simply told them if they wanted me to continue DMing, we would be playing first edition. And, as I said, they loved it!
So maybe that's a lesson for now. I simply put it out there that AD&D is what I'm running and invite anyone who would like a seat at the table.
