OSRIC/AD&D Score Generation

[Jorgo]

I have been wanting to play OSRIC or at least test out some character creation, but I don't care for rolling scores. Since both OSRIC and Fifth Edition D&D want you to roll 4d6 and drop lowest, would the alternatives presented in the Fifth Edition player's handbook (default spread/point buy) be balanced in OSRIC?

[rredmond]

My daughter has played 5E and 1E and says that the chargen in 5E, if you do the point buy, will create "better" or "stronger" characters. But considering 1E, which I'm most comfortable with :) , the DM can bolster the monsters, or difficulty of the module, or encounter, in a similar fashion.

I always enjoyed seeing the fighter with the 18/99 Strength get taken down by his overconfidence. Save or die, and level drain, are scary things no matter what your PCs attributes are! :D And if it makes it more fun for you and the folks you play with, it can't hurt to try it and see what happens. Tweaks can certainly be made along the way!

Happy gaming,
--Ron--

[Jay R]

The expected value from 4d6b3 are 9, 11, 12, 13, 14, 16. That's the spread to use to have a "typical" result from rolling 4 and dropping 3, without taking the risks of rolling low or the advantages of rolling high.

[D+1]

The listed methods for ability score generation in AD&D tend to skew towards having few real bonuses. Even 4d6-low, IF you hold to what you roll, is going to usually need some re-rolls in order to get the "essential" minimum of two 15's or better.

If you want PC's to have more scores with bonuses then you either start looking at alternative methods or you change the ability score tables themselves to spread bonuses out to less difficult-to-get scores.

If actually rolling scores is an issue for you then, yes, a default spread, arrays, or point-buy methods are the way you'd want to go.

https://www.dropbox.com/s/3wd3c4qbbo...thods.rtf?dl=0
That's a list I put together of both official methods from various editions and a whole bunch I got from other people.

[Yora]

I quite like the middle way of having the players roll six numbers but assigning them to be ability as they want.

[LibraryOgre]

I have been wanting to play OSRIC or at least test out some character creation, but I don't care for rolling scores. Since both OSRIC and Fifth Edition D&D want you to roll 4d6 and drop lowest, would the alternatives presented in the Fifth Edition player's handbook (default spread/point buy) be balanced in OSRIC?

One thing to bear in mind about the Standard Array is that it's a touch low for 1e, which suggests (in the PH) that PCs should have 2 scores of 15 or better.

If you don't care for rolling, I'd suggest a simple method: 16, 15, 14, 10, 9, 8.

[Jorgo]

A question: it says in OSRIC that if you add a different incentive to being human, you could change the level restrictions. What about if you changed it so that each race could reach unlimited levels in their allowed classes, and humans could reach a restricted level in any class? What would be a good feature for humans to incentivise being human? +1 to any score?

[LibraryOgre]

A question: it says in OSRIC that if you add a different incentive to being human, you could change the level restrictions. What about if you changed it so that each race could reach unlimited levels in their allowed classes, and humans could reach a restricted level in any class? What would be a good feature for humans to incentivise being human? +1 to any score?

For humans, I go with a +1 to Charisma and a +1 to all saves. It fits with humans being, generally, the race that will get along with anyone, and two human-heavy classes (Paladin and Druid) having big charisma requirements... and a bonus to Charisma isn't specifically useful to any one class, or general combat. The +1 to all saves ties in with humans being general seen as lucky, and being all-rounders... dwarves, gnomes, and halflings have great saves against specific things, elves have strong resistances against a couple types of TPK-magic, and humans are just generally good without being stand-out.

[Yora]

I find that level limits don't actually balance anything.

As long as the party is at levels lower than the maximum for some of the characters, level limits do absolutely nothing and the demihumans are just plain better than humans. And from the way most people talk about it, it's a really rare events for parties to get that high.

Once characters have reached the limit and stop improving, it just plain sucks to no longer gain XP while the other players do.

It really only matters once at character creation. When the players have to consider "Do I expect this campaign to last for so long that the other players are getting 3 or more levels than the maximum level of my character?" Then the player either plays that race or doesn't. Either case, nothing is getting balanced.

[Jay R]

My experience is that level limits actually only cost the PC his first wish. Usually, the character gets a wish before he reaches that level, so he wishes for no level limit. That's what my elves and dwarves always did.

[viking vince]

When I am the DM, wishes are not powerful enough to grant such a wish (although they can add one extra level to the limit).

[hamlet]

My experience is that level limits actually only cost the PC his first wish. Usually, the character gets a wish before he reaches that level, so he wishes for no level limit. That's what my elves and dwarves always did.

As a DM, my response to that Wish was to turn the individual in question into a human. Then again, the being granting the wish was a jerk and thought he was funny, so there you go.

I think by the book wishes can't do that, but I honestly don't remember.

[LibraryOgre]

The consensus I have seen is that a wish will add a single level to your level limit, which hardly seems worth it.

[Jay R]

When I am the DM, wishes are not powerful enough to grant such a wish (although they can add one extra level to the limit).

Given that many DMs simply waive the level limits for free, I don't think that this is too much for a wish. Gaining the ability to continue to level up is nice, but not unbalancing, so I have no trouble with it. Losing the first wish seems a perfectly good trade-off for the benefits of a nonhuman race.

As a DM, my response to that Wish was to turn the individual in question into a human. Then again, the being granting the wish was a jerk and thought he was funny, so there you go.

I understand, but since a human couldn't be multi-classed, and most non-humans at the time were, this would often involve far more paperwork and DM decisions than simply granting it. [The only non-human single-classes I saw were Thieves, who could already level up forever, plus the extremely rare Dwarven Fighter.]

I think by the book wishes can't do that, but I honestly don't remember.

I first encountered this in original D&D, when wishes were purely at the discretion of the DM, along with a warning not to let it unbalance the game.

[D+1]

Given that many DMs simply waive the level limits for free, I don't think that this is too much for a wish. Gaining the ability to continue to level up is nice, but not unbalancing, so I have no trouble with it. Losing the first wish seems a perfectly good trade-off for the benefits of a nonhuman race.

Quite so. My own perception has also been that MOST DM's completely disregard level limits (and male/female ability score mins/max's and a lot more questionable bits of 1E).

I first encountered this in original D&D, when wishes were purely at the discretion of the DM, along with a warning not to let it unbalance the game.

AD&D description of the Wish spell pretty much sums up as, "A few effects will have certain quantified results, also the exact terminology used in stating the wish will generally be followed, but ultimately DM's are given full discretion in what they will/won't allow a wish to do."

[viking vince]

Given that many DMs simply waive the level limits for free, I don't think that this is too much for a wish. Gaining the ability to continue to level up is nice, but not unbalancing, so I have no trouble with it. Losing the first wish seems a perfectly good trade-off for the benefits of a nonhuman race.

You are correct, of course, in noting that many DMs do not use level limits. I do. I also use level drain BtB.

[Lord Torath]

I've never really liked the level drain mechanic. It's a little too metagamey for me, and it primarily punishes melee combatants. They are the ones most likely to get in touch-range of a level-draining opponent. I much prefer something more like 3rd Edition's "negative levels", that adversely affect you, but you have a better chance of overcoming. Even if it takes a week or two.

[viking vince]

I have never read a 3e sourcebook, so I offer no opinion on that.

Level drain is metagamey. So are many other things.

[LibraryOgre]

I've never really liked the level drain mechanic. It's a little too metagamey for me, and it primarily punishes melee combatants. They are the ones most likely to get in touch-range of a level-draining opponent. I much prefer something more like 3rd Edition's "negative levels", that adversely affect you, but you have a better chance of overcoming. Even if it takes a week or two.

My problem is less "metagamey" and more "pain-in-the-assy"... stripping a character of the level they gained is an annoy process, especially in 2nd edition, where there are more level choices made.

[Lord Torath]

I have never read a 3e sourcebook, so I offer no opinion on that.

Almost everything I know about 3.X I learned from Order of the Stick. I'm mostly a 2E/Basic guy.

[MeeposFire]

My problem is less "metagamey" and more "pain-in-the-assy"... stripping a character of the level they gained is an annoy process, especially in 2nd edition, where there are more level choices made.

Yea that is a big reason why I hate it. I always liked the idea of it being removable penalties that last a while unless you use things like restoration to cure them. You never actually lose a level but the basic penalties are smilar.


As another option you could go the 5e route which is essentially reduce your max HP until you are cured. It won't directly kill you anytime soon but it weakens you after every hit.

[Yora]

I sometimes think I am the only one who thinks energy drain is a great mechanic. But I run B/X, where substracting levels is easy and catching back up to the rest of the party quick.

[hamlet]

Yea that is a big reason why I hate it. I always liked the idea of it being removable penalties that last a while unless you use things like restoration to cure them. You never actually lose a level but the basic penalties are smilar.


As another option you could go the 5e route which is essentially reduce your max HP until you are cured. It won't directly kill you anytime soon but it weakens you after every hit.

In 2nd edition, I always applied XP Deficits. You got level drained, you dropped your XP total to the minimum of the previous level, but you kept your levels in and of themselves and you had to catch back up. You didn't become a drag on the party in crucial times, but it was still a nasty penalty.

You could be drained right up until 0 XP and after that, you turned into Farmer Joe or worse.

[Magua]

Level drain always struck me as like level limits. It doesn't matter until it's ruinous.

If the party can cast or afford restoration, etc, then it's an inconvenience and/or gold cost, and this is fine.

But if the party can't cast/afford restoration, if someone loses more than 3-4 levels (easy to do in a fight with a vampire who drains two levels in a hit), you're done. I remember playing the Ravenloft module as a 7th level thief, and getting down to 3rd level before just giving up; it was not enjoyable.

[Yora]

If you don't have access to restoration then you probably also don't have access to raise dead. Which makes energy drain much more lenient than instant death effects. Like almost every poison.

[Lord Torath]

Poison at least gives you a saving throw to avoid the effects. With level draining, the only way to avoid it is to not get hit. Relatively easy for mages and thieves; much more difficult for front-line warriors.

The second half of this blog post pretty much sums up my feeling of level drain: Runecarver: Building a Better D&D part 8
(bad language alert: the author feels VERY strongly about this!)

[Magua]

If you don't have access to restoration then you probably also don't have access to raise dead. Which makes energy drain much more lenient than instant death effects. Like almost every poison.

Raise dead is 5th level, restoration is 7th. Not to mention that by the DMG's costs, restoration of a 10th level character is 110,000gp, whereas raise dead cast by the same 15th level cleric would be 12,500. For poison in general, if you can afford either of these, you can also afford a periapt of proof against poison.

Poison allows saves, where energy drain does not. Your basic ring of protection or whatever also helps here.

Slow poison (2nd level) and neutralize poison (4th) exist.

In all these cases, you can plan for it or take precautions. Energy drain, even if you know it's coming, you can't.

Mostly though, it's the immediacy of the effect. If I die and there's no hope of raising, then that's that, roll up a new character. If I'm energy drained four levels and there's no hope of restoration, then it's more this limbo where either I retire the character or be permanently behind the other members of the party.

[Yora]

Okay, that's just a badly designed spell.

Neither of them actually showed up in my own games yet.

[D+1]

I've never really liked the level drain mechanic. It's a little too metagamey for me, and it primarily punishes melee combatants. They are the ones most likely to get in touch-range of a level-draining opponent.

Just to nitpick: almost everything disproportionately affects melee combatants. They take more damage. They get caught in more traps. They are the target of, or in the area of more spells. They thus make more saves, more attack rolls, etc. And, of course, they are subject to a lot more monster special attacks of ALL kinds simply by virtue of being the ones right in front of the enemy all the time.

Disliking level drain in particular for its disproportionate effect upon melee PC's is hardly then a meaningful criticism of it. Metagamey is a valid criticism, especially because it doesn't NEED to be metagamey mechanically. Fails to properly model the widely disparate sorts of effects it's used to model is valid criticism. Mechanically fails to be fully curable or defensible for no sensible reason is valid criticism. When people have the shocking gall to propose CHANGES to its mechanics for one or more of those reasons it is then tirelessly championed in defiance of those multiple significant criticisms - and that, too, is a further criticism. :)

[MeeposFire]

Just to nitpick: almost everything disproportionately affects melee combatants. They take more damage. They get caught in more traps. They are the target of, or in the area of more spells. They thus make more saves, more attack rolls, etc. And, of course, they are subject to a lot more monster special attacks of ALL kinds simply by virtue of being the ones right in front of the enemy all the time.

Disliking level drain in particular for its disproportionate effect upon melee PC's is hardly then a meaningful criticism of it. Metagamey is a valid criticism, especially because it doesn't NEED to be metagamey mechanically. Fails to properly model the widely disparate sorts of effects it's used to model is valid criticism. Mechanically fails to be fully curable or defensible for no sensible reason is valid criticism. When people have the shocking gall to propose CHANGES to its mechanics for one or more of those reasons it is then tirelessly championed in defiance of those multiple significant criticisms - and that, too, is a further criticism. :)

Yes but in in these games warriors tend to have abilities that mitigate those issues like high HP, good AC, and good saves. Level drain ignores all those defenses so unlike the other issues you mention they get no defense against this.