Hi,
Just designing my first world and campaign in many years and plumbing the depths of my first edition manuals but to no avail -
Can anybody tell me if there are some nicely compiled 1ed breakdowns of how segments, melee rounds, rounds, turns, weapon speed and initiative actually work anywhere in the books or t'internet please?
Back in the day we used to simplify it greatly and wing it - but for once I want to go bak to the Gygax roots of the game. I also have 3 players who are old Skool wargamers but never RPlayed before - so I want to do combat and movement/encumberence as tightly as possible because it will be the first thing they scrutinise.
Thank you for your time.
PZ
You should really read the section of the Player's Handbook that starts with the section entitle "The Adventure", which begins on page 101, and continue to page 109. It is 8 pages of light reading, but it does give an overview of encounters. Of particular note are the Surprise rules. Familiarize yourself with these very well. I would call this section "mood reading", and it should serve as a nice appetizer for the next thing you very much need to read...
...which is the Dungeon Master's Guide, specially the "Combat" section. Start on page 61 at the beginning, and read through to page 82. This is the detailed combat section, and it will tell you pretty much everything you need to know about combat.
Something I highly recommend doing is photocopying these sections of the books and taking a highlighter to key points in the rules. Most of the text will be descriptive, but hidden in there are some key points. Highlight just the key points, rather than whole blocks of text. Basically, make yourself a crib sheet. As you get back into the swing of things, you will reference them less and less.
You may also wish to familiarize yourself with the Item Saving Throws section, as a lot of people forget that you roll for those every time a character has suffered damage of some type, whether it is from falling or from having failed a saving throw versus a particular effect. Sure, even though the fighter failed his saving throw versus the evil mage's lightning bolt, he still survived...but his sword and armor were blasted apart, mid-combat, and those ogres still want to bash his face in. _________________ - Moderator/Admin (in some areas)/Member -
Last edited by Cebrion on Sun Mar 24, 2013 5:38 pm; edited 1 time in total
Thanks Cebrion, you've really helped me...
Returning to these books after many years is great - it's a lovely nostalgia trip and I like the way they are clearly (read uniquely ) formatted in the days before everybody had word processor level 12 skills
I keep finding some great nuggets of info in the DMguide - it's like 'oh I forgot how interesting that artefact was' and then I go off on a tangent and forget what I'm originally looking to read.
As for item and armour damage - how do you do item and amour damage from melee combat etc? Again back in the day it was something I never really considered but would like o play around with now.
Thanks for your help.
Between the DM Log and the DM Screen, they contain most of the useful tables you'll need to run a game.
The only 1e rules I recall offhand for armor damage are in the descriptions of plate armor and field plate armor, introduced in Dragon 72 with the cavalier, and perhaps revised slightly in UA (my recollection is that the cavalier was mostly the same, but I'm not sure about the two new armor types). Both would absorb some damage, and would eventually require repair over time.
If you're looking for detailed rulings on 1e, I recommend reading through OSRIC available for free from K&K @ http://knights-n-knaves.com/osric/ OSRIC is a restatement of the original 1e rules, and leverages the benefits of hindsight, 30+ years of sage advice, and such, to make the rules crisper and easier to understand. (If you're interested in buying a high-quality hardcover for OSRIC, you can do so from our Black Blade Publishing site @ http://black-blade-publishing.com/Store.aspx for $26).
The K&K website is also an excellent resource for tapping the hardcore 1e fans' collective wisdom. DMPrata's ADDICT rules @ http://knights-n-knaves.com/dmprata/ADDICT.pdf are also a useful resource (although I don't subscribe to all of David's interpretations, he does an excellent job of parsing the rules and explaining his logic and reasoning for his interpretations, so if you don't use his logic here and there, you can make informed decisions about how/why he drew his conclusions, and make your own informed choices accordingly). I just pinged David on FB to see if he has a more current version, and if so, I'll let you know.
You can also ask for 1e rules advice on Dragonsfoot, but there are many folks who mash together 1e, 2e, and Basic/Expert/etc. there, and in general I don't recommend it as a place to get well-grounded 1e rules advice. _________________ Allan Grohe<br />https://www.greyhawkonline.com/grodog/greyhawk.html<br />https://grodog.blogspot.com/
That's the 2.2 version of ADDICT, and it is the current one. _________________ Allan Grohe<br />https://www.greyhawkonline.com/grodog/greyhawk.html<br />https://grodog.blogspot.com/
I don't recall there being a set amount of damage for armor or weapons in general for 1st edition. However, the 2nd edition Complete Fighters handbook created Damage Points for armors. Every hit caused one point of damage to armor. The armor was repairable as long as 1 damage point remained. You would have to obtain a copy for the complete optional rule.
Otherwise you can grant items a bonus to its save based on the bonus it provides to ones armor class. Instead of using the DP system optional rule.
You may also wish to familiarize yourself with the Item Saving Throws section, as a lot of people forget that you roll for those every time a character has suffered damage of some type, whether it is from falling or from having failed a saving throw versus a particular effect.
Oh, nothing sucks more than falling down a 10' pit and laughing off the 1 point of damage on a bad DM damage roll, only to realize all your freakin' health potion bottles broke and are now dripping down your front...
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