🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <3eo1p5$d...@newsbf02.news.aol.com>, 
redjr...@aol.com (REDJr42234) writes:

> [msp...@orion.etsu.edu (Mark Spears) wrote:]
> 
>> In 1st edition rules, it seemed that characters fell into
>> four stereotypes:
>> "I'm a fighter.  I kill things."
>> "I'm a thief.  I steal things."
>> "I'm a cleric.  I'm a fighting healer."
>> "I'm a magic user.  I throw fireballs at things."
>> In 2nd edition, they improved it somewhat,
> 
> I hate to be contrary to anyone, but I have to say, this is probably one
> of the more silly things I've heard about AD&D, from an actual player. 
> First of all (and of course, this is all opinion), I believe the 1st
> edition rules were better, merely because there were LESS of them.  Now,
> the game has gotten ridiculous.  If you're playing D&D, you get a
> gameboard and all this useless crap (Monopolies & Dragons?), and if you
> play AD&D, you better be sure you have all 900 hundred volumes of tables
> and charts and numbers and die rolls.  It seems that the entire element of
> *imagination* was completely overlooked and/or obliterated with the game. 

If you took a different approach, 2nd Ed. is *vastly* improved.  Take
the 900+ volumes as additional, hence optional, rules.  Use the charts
you feel work, drop those you don't like.  It adds so much variety.
Even with the volumes, I found myself breaking the rules and creating
new ones, for even more different characters.
 
> When the 2nd edition rules started coming out, I could see it was going
> nowhere.  It was as if TSR felt that the people buying the material had no
> imagination, no soul, no mind, no anything except a desire to roll dice. 
> Entire volumes on ONE character class?  More rules?  Making the system
> more cumbersome?  Why?  It was fine the way it was... but I guess that's
> all a symptom of the people today.. they don't want to think for
> themselves.. they want it spelled out for them, so they don't HAVE to do
> anything about it except roll a die and see what part of what beastie they
> hit, and for how many points of damage, and for how long their sword is
> still swinging and if they also hit the wall with the swing and so on, and
> so on.

I went from D&D -> AD&D -> AD&D2.  I went from die rolls -> more die
rolls -> role-playing (when I reached AD&D2).  To me, all those rules
gave the characters extra uniqueness, and role-playing is something
above and beyond rules, it just has to come from the players.  The
biggest problem I've seen is DMs who can't use the rules effectively
(hence it ends up being die rolling) or players who aren't creative.
 
> When I played AD&D years ago, it was primarily 1st edition rules... and
> whatever my group felt was lacking, we added.  And having an excellent DM
> helps immensely.  Thankfully, we had a few.  If you play the game the way
> it was meant to be played, then you'd never get those notions you
> mentioned about the particular character classes... there was so much
> opportunity in this game for embellishment and imagination, it's hard to
> actually imagine someone that would be content with playing it *just* that
> way...

I agree, and AD&D2 provided even more opportunity for embellishment and
imagination.  The one gripe is TSR also seemed to have gotten greedy,
such that some AD&D2 material is great, and lots are sub-standard,
hence AD&D2 got a bad name.  Try looking at the Al-Qadim rules, they
provide so much flavor and atmosphere, and aren't all that die oriented.
Avoid Dark Sun if you hate stats...  its the one world I didn't play in.

> To me, the MOST important element of a CRPG is the story.  Because let's
> face it, there's nothing out there that really lets the player ROLE-PLAY. 
> So, with a good interface and an excellent story, you've got a good fake.

Yes, the story is most important.  The problems in CRPGs I see the most
is rotten interfaces (stuff with good stories like BAK and LOL lose out
on details for simplicity...  simply not acceptable to me).
 
> And SSI, in my opinion, completely destroyed the Advanced Dungeons &
> Dragons games, as far as potential was concerned.  The interface was fine,
> most notably for combat (which is SSI's strong-point, given they are a
> strategic software house), but the stories... ugh.. they were terrible.  I
> remember how exciting it was to see Pool of Radiance in the store .. an
> actual AD&D computer product!  And it was pretty novel the first time
> around.  But the random monster encounter thing (which games suffer from
> to this day) and all the repetitveness.. and the weak story.. just made
> for bad gaming all around.  Sure, it was different, but this was AD&D..
> one of the biggest single 'names' in role-playing.. and it was lame.

Yes, SSI's approach made the CRPG AD&D hack & slash.
 
> (and I couldn't believe they would actually THINK that bringing
> 'Tryanthraxus' back in a later game was a GOOD idea!  Geeeeez was that
> stupid!).
> 
> The first Dragonlance game almost felt like it was trying to be good.. in
> the beginning, the sotry almost felt like it might have substance.. but in
> the end, it really didn't... I never even bothered with that third Gold
> Box series...
> 
> The Eye of the Beholder games are silly, in my opinion and I'm not really
> fond of the interface.  Because now it no longer resembles role-playing,
> but rather action.  I just recently bought Ravenloft hoping that it was an
> improvement, as far as story and interface, and so far, it's dim on story,
> and the interface is just as annoying.
> 
> The only ones that look promising as far as interface goes are the Dark
> Sun games, but I know close to nothing about the Dark Sun setting (since
> it was released after the 2nd edition stuff started coming out, I just
> couldn't stomach buying any more of TSR's products--it's bad enough they
> completely destroyed the Dragonlance saga by embellishing with the release
> of 4 million more poorly written novels), and I haven't had the money to
> try them out.
> 
> Like everyone else, I'm rather hoping that Interplay will do better things
> with it.  To me, the most important thing is STORY, and I just don't know
> if ANY software company is capable of story-telling anymore...

Give me a story, but if the interface is too simple, I'd still give it a
pass.  I see what's headed more & more into the realm of adventure than
what RPGs are.  Careful here...  adventures basically have a good story,
they don't have character attributes and so on.  If all you're looking
for is a good story, you needn't look at CRPGs...  just look at the
adventure games out there.  Most of 'em drive me nuts, since they
become puzzle solving.  I'd like some combat, some puzzle solving, but
most of all, role-playing.

The best example I can think of is the middle generation Ultimas (IV, V)
as a pretty good mix.  Lots of conversation, some puzzles, some combat,
lots of exploring.  And to me, Origin spoiled it by coming out with
the totally yucky interface of U7 and U8.

I think I might give Star Trails a try, seeing it is the only one that
is reasonably close to what I loved...  Darklands.  IMO, combat should
always be turn based, not live action (and I'm hating most of the
stuff using Doom interfaces...  only System Shock does it right).

Adrian Chew :-)