Comments on: Retro Gaming: AD&D 1st Edition, Part 1

By: Relic

Relic — Thu, 27 Oct 2011 09:13:43 +0000

Great post!

Sword and Board was definitely not the way to go tho, unless you had a magical shield, as a shield only added +1 AC, otherwise. The advantage of that big ol’ 2Hander, especially against large creatures, far outweighed the shield. Magical shields did make a difference, but a whole article in Dragon was a dedicated rant about how lousy shields were in DnD, and suggested adding “Shield Specialization” to bring the base bonus to a whopping +2.

Technically, any fighter-TYPE got multiple attks per round, but yes, other classes didn’t get them. IMO this is good, as it made fighters viable: a real factor in combat.

Again, great post!

By: Relic

Relic — Thu, 27 Oct 2011 09:04:25 +0000

Zet,
I don’t know if your DM house-rules a lot, but most of your info is flatly wrong, tho some is close.
* * *
1) Dual classes do NOT get the second class’s HP until they **exceed the level** of the prior class. This is why you never (unless you wanted it for RP reasons) took M-U before FIghter, since you would be stuck w/the M-U lower HPs for those first few levels forever.
* * *
2) You were both wrong about Bards.
BARDIC PROGRESSION IN 1E:
*Fighter* to at least 5th, and no higher than 8th.
THEN
*Thief* to at least 5th, and no higher than 9th.
THEN
*Bard* under Druidical tutelage.
In THAT order. NO exceptions. PHB pg. 117.
There was a prior version of the class which was better, imo. THe split class thing was likely an attempt to reconcile various cultures’ views on musician-type adventurers. Closest is the Skald, which on occasion was just a retired fighter spinning yarns of the glory days, but the 1E Bard was a mess, tbh.
* * *
Multiclasses DID have to multi immediately. There was no way to delay it. Period. The reason is this: multis were actually seen as a single class made of two classes.
This is a hold-over from the days in OD&D (still seen in Basic and Expert D&D) when non-human races **were classes** themselves. You played a human fighter or cleric, etc, or you played an elf or dwarf, AS A CLASS. Elves, for instance, were a mix of Fighting Man and Magic-User.
1st Ed MCs could not delay the mix, and they could not *stop* it either; once you had exceeded your level limit, you still had to pay the split XP, even tho the other class no longer progressed.
Only human Dual/Triple classes delayed class progression, and they had the lousy HP and skill-use issues to deal with as a result.
3) Weapon Speed did NOT affect how many attks you got until you had already had a round of combat go by. Even then, if the “faster” weapon was not x2 faster, or at least 5 lower than the other weapon, the WSF did nothing at all. Add to this that initiative was actually determined by how many attks you got, and who had reach advantages, and only THEN by the rolls, and it was pretty fair.
If you are still playing 1E, you might want to confront your DM w/these things if they are causing you pain! Sounds like he or she house-ruled a lot.

By: Relic

Relic — Thu, 27 Oct 2011 08:36:24 +0000

Spot on, Alamar.
More importantly, in addition to multis being able to use any of the allowed classes weapons, any 1st Ed AD&D multiclassed caster could use ANY ARMOR the noncaster class could use, WHILE CASTING. Only the thieves and assassin mixes got harmed by multiclassing . A 1st Ed. elven F/M-U for instance could wade into battle in full plate with a sword, and the only limitation on casting he had was needing to sheathe the sword or drop the shield to have a hand free to cast. Once he did so, he was there flinging Magic Missiles and Fireballs while wearing full plate. Anything else was house rules or a misread. The Multiclass rules were very specific an noting the armor advantages of various MCs, and only the thief combos got armor warnings.
* * *
In 1E, if you were a non-human, there really was NO reason to single class, really. The only class that was unlimited to all races was generally the Thief, which was a lousy class in most cases, and the only advantage of single classing was the (optional, given it was in UA) Unearthed Arcana rule permitting single-classed non-humans to rise 2 lvls higher in any class that they COULD have multi’d into. Level limits on non-humans meant you lived it up while you could, and having 2 classes worth of abilities for maybe a 1 level XP difference was, esp. at 1st lvl before you had to pay those XP differences, a no-brainer issue for living that fantasy life to the fullest right up front. This is why 1st ed multis had to round their HP down; it was to compensate for being OP. Multiclassing was THE way to go for nonhumans in 1E.

By: taggart

taggart — Mon, 05 Sep 2011 23:18:42 +0000

This is an interesting blog, just got back into 1E after a 28 year absence or so and a quick tour of ebay to re-collect the books me mother binned along with other stuff when I was asked to leave ha ha. Now my lads are well into this- and their bands of friends too. I am even popular as a DM with them. Beats having them out late breaking bus shelters! I am absorbed with the nostalgia not least of teenage boys thinking they know it all and out thinking some of the rules and situations in the rules. The book of house rules is growing with well thought out tables and percentages. Fanstastic. So it seems to me there is a danger of straying far away from the Gygax vision in the early 70′s of him and his kids enjoying each others company with an absorbing challenging fun new RPG game, and being too “up ourselves” with arguing meaningless tosses. If you agree, have the rule, if not, change it. Dont be so much of a purist that the fun gets missed. Incidentally, I havent got involved with 2,3,4 E, although my little band have in various forms along with 40K. All agree, they enjoy 1stE. But they are a bit bright. It seems to me WOTC sold out after meanly ditching the Gygax connection and dummed it down for a faster younger game. Whoa, not arguing, just saying, not for me – or us. Moot point, we dont play devils or demons which was part of the bad publicity of original 1st edition all those years ago, and none of the other parents now have any concerns, – enjoy the break from their kids a bit. May your die rolls be high – and RIP Gary – Cheers.

By: zetsu1919

zetsu1919 — Sun, 02 Jan 2011 10:29:50 +0000

okay you didnt get duel class right. you do get hitpoints as you level up in the second class though i do agree it was bad. and what you say about bard is stupid because you said bards need to duel class fighter druid and theif but not in that order. 1 that would be 3 classes which wasnt allowed 2 you didnt take druid you just naturally got druid spells and 3 you had to take thief first then fighter then bard, another thing, in the begining of the book it says that half elfs can be bards because they can triple class so they could be a fighter/ thief and at the right level use the 3rd slot as bard. you also said you didnt know if druids got wildshape and they do get it just so you know. the way first edition worked is that you rarely level up and dont need to level up. level caps werent that bad. i have been playing 1st ed. for 2 years and om still 9th level. ive played 3rd edition before and was 9th level in a couple months. you also said you have to multiclass at 1st level, you could be a 5th level elf fighter before deciding to be a mage. oh, and i agree that the weapon speed sucks because according to it you can attack 5 times with a dagger for 1-4 while a 2-handed sword attacks once for 1-10, its stupid so nobody runs it that way that ive ever met. you should look at unearthed arcana because that book was a revision of first edition. it added like 3 classes, more spells, and better rulings on everything.

By: Alamar

Alamar — Mon, 17 May 2010 15:37:50 +0000

3.X multiclassing was flawed in many ways, though 3.5 tried to address front-loaded abilities. There was a cost to multiclassing in later editions, and spellcasters were hit especially hard. I would note, however, that your interpretation of the rules of multiclassing in 1e appears to differ from everyone else I’ve seen. A Fighter-Mage-Cleric could use cleric weapons, unless I’m misremembering. I’ll check later when I have my books on hand, I forgot to load the 1st edition ones on my pad.

Most of the other issues you brought up are nonexistent. Fighter-rogues have to take their armor off if they want to use their abilities well… so what? That’s the price they pay for being a fighter-rogue. I played a very fun Paladin/Rogue not so long ago, and I just wore a chain shirt for my armor because that let me use rogue abilities reasonably well. I really think you’re picking nits with the 3e system and ignoring the bad parts of 1e here. Even the ‘dipping’ you mention is discouraged in the rules by having an XP penalty for multiclassing with a gap between your classes, though I think the rules are a tad too lenient on it, what with Favored Classes and all.

That said, 1e didn’t have the ridiculous matter of a Fighter suddenly deciding to pick up Wizard spellcasting, while the Wizard had to spend years in apprenticeship before chargen. 3e was a phenomenal leap forward in many ways, but it wasn’t without some major wallbangers.

By: JoeSnow

JoeSnow — Mon, 17 May 2010 14:58:29 +0000

I have to disagree with you about multi-classing sucking in A,D&D 1st edition. It was one of my favorite aspects of the game back then and all my characters were multi-class. The system they have today where you can ‘dip’ one level into another class while running your other class(es) to the max is BS. The front loading of abilities and spells to make dipping more viable is also BS. What happened to starting out gimp and acquiring your abilities over time? That was part of what made the game interesting. The limitations on weapons and armor also made the game more challenging. You could be a Fighter-Magic User but were limited to cloth armor, daggers and staffs. You got bigger bonuses from using those items, though, because of your fighter nature so you would have a Magic User that had a more reasonable life expectancy than a pure Mage because his AC and to hit bonuses would be better when he ran out of spells to cast. Seriously, how realistic is it that someone can multi-class a fighter/wizard now and be able to wear their full plate armor while fighting but have to take it off when they want to cast a spell? Or a fighter-rogue who has to remove his heavy armor when doing anything stealthy? Then you have the issue of them having to carry their heavy armor and weapons around when they want to do anything outside the realm of fighting. Have you ever seen anyone putting on or removing a suit of full plate armor? It can easily take a half an hour or longer. It’s not realistic to expect player characters to do that in the heat of battle. Restricting their choices is far better. I used to multi-class mostly fighter-cleric characters because clerics could still wear some of the heavier armors and the cleric limitation on blunt weapons only wasn’t so bad for a fighter. I did once roll a Fighter-Magic User-Cleric that was fun because he could only use a staff (the only weapon common to all three classes) and wear cloth (magic user restriction) but could fill a multitude of roles in group. Versatility should come with a price and the price was gear restrictions and longer level up times. Characters that can do it all and still level up quickly are no challenge and no fun. You might as well switch the game to god mode if you’re going to have characters that overpowered in the game. All rulesets after 1st Edition sucked tremendously.