Dungeons & Dragons Through the Versions: Part 1

My gaming group has graciously agreed to help me perform an experiment. We've been playing AD&D 1st Edition now for over 15 years - we've seen the best of the rules and the various inconsistencies in the books. I've also exposed them to 2nd edition and 3rd edition on occasion, but we all come back to playing 1st edition. I have a 4-5 page house rules document that I've updated continuously as new problems arise. So we decided to deconstruct the rules and see how they can be changed without significantly altering the "flavor" of the system.

In order to conduct this experiment, I converted the classic module T1: Village of Hommlet into Basic (Moldvay) D&D, AD&D by-the-book (or "Dogma" AD&D), 2nd edition AD&D, 3rd edition D&D, 4th edition D&D, and 5th edition D&D. I also converted the module to Pathfinder rules (which are just about the same as 3rd edition with some exceptions) and will be trying to convert to Hackmaster as well.

We've already completed phase 1 of the experiment. Phase 1 consisted of Basic D&D in the upper ruins of the moathouse. We spent quite a lot of time role-playing in the village before actually getting to the moathouse, but that's more of the party's style than a failure of the module (besides, half the module is concerned with detailing the village anyway - why not use it?). All the characters were set at 3rd level (although I should have instead used XP totals to determine level....live and learn). The players rolled up a lackluster, dimwitted Thief named Allawishas, a Cleric of Fharlanghn named Axil, and a female Elf named Elquis. They were decently geared and each rolled a single magic item to begin (to simulate prior adventure). The Thief rolled a hand axe +1, the cleric rolled a potion of healing, and the elf rolled a wand of paralysis with 4 charges. The thief had very low scores (6 Int, 5 Wis, 8 Str) but a decent Dex (15). The Elf was mediocre at best. The Cleric had a 7 Int, but a decent Wis (14). They entered Hommlet and immediately encountered the NPCs in the inn. They shuffled around the village a while, gaining rumors and shopping in the various stores along the main road. Then they were approached by a jittery Spugnoir (magic-user NPC) who was curious to see if he could join them to explore the Moathouse. He only desired first pick of any scrolls found and in exchange would use his potent sleep spell to help the party. They agreed (begrudgingly) and after 4 sessions headed out to the moathouse.

Their first encounter with the giant frogs out front was a nail-biter! Lackluster stats and the first time they ran under Basic rules led to a lot of page-flipping and questions. I took things slowly, explaining why certain things were happening when questioned. We used ONLY those rules written into the basic rulebook (so no charging into combat) and followed the order of combat listed in the charts. They took a beating from the frogs but killed all but one of the smaller frogs who jumped off into the moat to escape death. That combat took about a half-hour but was only about 10 rounds long. We took so long because of having to explain things and going slowly to get used to the system. The players liked quite a few aspects of the combat system since it was so much easier to do than AD&D. All the characters survived, but the cleric was grievously bitten by a large frog. They healed up as well as they could and proceeded inside on the next session.

This session had them exploring exactly as I thought they would. They headed to the open tower door to the left of the main gate. They looked around from the doorway using a lantern and decided to explore inside. The Elf went in first and luckily was not surprised by the crab spider lurking therein. The party entered combat with the spider and triumphed after a few rounds. No one was poisoned but the elf did suffer a bite. They searched the tower very thoroughly and took the treasure in the pile at the center of the floor (some coins and an ivory box). The Thief climbed to the ledge above and looked out over the courtyard from the doorway above leading to the parapets. From this they determined that the upper floors were a ruined mess and not accessible to the party. They then climbed the stairs and entered the main building. They opted to go to the western corridor first. They had some luck forcing open doors after a few tries but found nothing of interest. The kitchen door was very stuck and they gave up after a few tries. They encountered a giant gecko lizard in the barracks at the end of the corridor and were not surprised. They took some damage during the fight but were able to successfully kill the creature. Wounded, out of spells, and now laden with a chest of treasure, they decided to head back to town. On their way back to the road, they were ambushed by Turuko and Kobort who had followed them to the moathouse! The elf was easily able to take them out using her wand of paralysis (the party won initiative and were not surprised), and the possibly TPK turned into a windfall for the party. They were able to kill the paralyzed opponents without ruining their gear! They stripped them down and then left the bodies in the marsh grass along the road (the entire party was of Neutral alignment). Back in town they sold their valuables at the moneychangers and pawned off the gear they found at the Traders (for 40-60% of value). No one made a level (no big surprise there), but they were all looking forward to more.

The next session had them splitting treasure, buying new gear, and talking to the druid in Hommlet. They then returned to the moathouse to explore the southern section of the main building. After finding very little in the side rooms, they entered the large southern dining hall and encountered the giant snake lairing inside. They were not surprised and engaged the creature with missiles and spells before closing in for the kill. The thief located the jeweled dagger (a good find at 850 gp value)! They then headed north again to investigate the storage area/stairway. They were attacked by a horde of normal rats that jumped and scrambled at them from the shelves. It took some time but they managed to kill all the rats off. They investigated the shelves and found the jug of lantern oil. Then the thief checked the stairs for traps. While searching he came upon the gold ring on the third step (and pocketed it). They descended and were narrowly missed by one of the green slimes on the ceiling. They decided to head back up the stairs since they had no fire to destroy the thing and could see another blob on the lower ceiling. They ended the night at the top of the stairs..

The final session had the party hearing noise in the main chamber. The bandits had snuck out to see what all the commotion was about in the place. The crossbowmen crept forth, their only illumination being torchlight from the room behind them. The party detected them and doused their lantern. Then they used the cover of the shadows to begin assaulting the visible bandits with missiles! The bandits began to fire back! The party thought there were only 4 of them, but the ones that survived the initial missile assault called for help from the room and over the next few rounds all the remaining bandits entered the fray! The party was trapped in the little alcove in the dark (two being human, and only the elf being able to see in the dark). They could not go down the stairs because of the green slime, and could not flee the building for fear of being taken out by a crossbow, javelin, or spear. They decided to fight it out and it took several rounds of fighting to win. A lot of lucky (and unlucky rolls) dragged the combat on and two of the party members (the thief and the elf) were severely hurt (death at 0 hp is very final in this game). The cleric and Spugnoir leapt to their defense and ended up facing the bandit leader for their efforts. Spugnoir took out the last two remaining bandits with his sleep spell which he almost lost but for a winning initiative roll! The party looted the bodies and the elf snuck into the chamber using her invisibility spell. She found a lone bandit at the back exit (hole in the wall) trying to dig out the chest to grab the spoils for himself and escape. She killed the bandit and summoned the others into the room. They ended up with quite a bit of treasure. They loaded it all in the chest and carried it back to the village.

The players enjoyed themselves and did not mind the limited options. They had a good time role-playing their flawed characters, playing up the low intelligence (perhaps a bit too much). They liked the fast pace of combat and the quickness of rolling characters. They did miss some of the options of AD&D, but given their ability scores, they would not have been able to play very different characters. As a side note, the ability scores were generated using 3d6 in order which is the method presented in the rulebook. The ability score adjustment table was also appreciated since it gave bonuses for lower scores (but also had penalties for scores of 8 or lower). All in all it was a success. We ended the Basic phase there and the players were instructed that the next session would continue the adventure, but with different characters and using 1st edition AD&D "dogma" rules.