OSR A Pathfinder Group Tries Old-School Essentials

[turnip_farmer]

Sounds like it is working well and you are having a good time with it so great.

I would expect some issues with the system that 3e-PF-4e-5e started to address regarding older D&D. Magic-users having one spell. Save or Die. Energy Drain. Healing. Low Level Thief skills. Death at 0 HP.

I have not looked into OSE's specific advanced options but alignment rules for a lot of AD&D classes (paladin, ranger, monk, druid) can be issues.

Just be aware these are common issues with older editions and might come up as they and you get into it.

I've gotten my players to try out DCC RPG to scratch the old school itch. It definitely treats the ease of character death as a feature, and sets out its stall from day one so the players know what to expect. If you play it as recommended on the rulebook, each player behind with multiple 0-level characters, some of which are guaranteed to die in the first session.

It does slack off a bit if any characters survive past the first couple of levels, they do not die immediately upon hitting zero (though some things can still kill in one hit).

Wizards do take a bit of time to get off the ground in this system, but that's the trade-off you choose for cosmic power at higher levels, and it usually only takes a few weeks of in game time to get a few spells. The slow pace of healing requires spending days sitting around recuperating in a village between adventures, so that 'few weeks' doesn't need to take too long if the GM is not vindictive.

Thieves get some pretty good skills right at level one.

 

[Voadam]

I love the DCC modules, settings, and 3rd party stuff. They often bake a lot of hard core chaos magic throughout (in addition to hardwiring it into the spell casting). A lot of great weird flavor and tone.

 

[kenada]

The other easy tweak to 3d6 in order I like is to give the players the option of flipping the set. Subtract every score from 21 to get an exactly "upside-down" mirror of their numbers. This allows just a little bit of customization and turns a bad set of mostly below-average numbers into a good set! But, for example, if you happened to roll a 15 Wisdom and some bad numbers in your first set and really wanted to be a Cleric, maybe you choose to keep that set.

The way I've been running my existing game I've just told my players to re-roll if their total modifiers are negative, but this does occasionally result in someone having to re-roll multiple times. The "flip" option ensures that no one has to be stuck with a bad set, but doesn't need any re-rolling.

We ended up rerolling a few characters who got crummy rolls. I saw the “subtract from 21” method mentioned in the ability scores thread here and considered doing something else as a backup, but I wanted to keep things as close to the “authentic” experience, which I guess rerolling bad characters is.

I can definitely see the virtue of the care method though, in terms of giving the players a uniform/even set of total values. Definitely a selling point for players accustomed to point buy.

“It’s random, but you can’t roll a bad character” is definitely a selling point. I’m not a fan of point buy. I don’t like how it slows down character creation, but what I really don’t like the inevitable focus on one ability score over the others. You gotta have that max score because having two good (but not max) ones just isn’t viable.

 

[Retreater]

I find the most confusing aspect of OSR-style games is trying to change ability score generation methods to get characters that don't stink. In this area I suggest just using an ability score array. If you're concerned about under-powered characters, just avoid random determination of scores.
There are plenty of other ways to reinforce the better parts of OSR play.

 

[Democratus]

I find the most confusing aspect of OSR-style games is trying to change ability score generation methods to get characters that don't stink. In this area I suggest just using an ability score array. If you're concerned about under-powered characters, just avoid random determination of scores.
There are plenty of other ways to reinforce the better parts of OSR play.

I guess it all depends on what it means for a character to "stink".

In OSE, I've run multiple characters with scores as low as 4, and more than a few with no score higher than a 9.

It didn't get in the way of playing the character at all.

Wizards don't need high INT to cast spells. Fighters don't need high STR to fight.

Saving throws are based off of your class and level, rather than your stats.

 

[Mannahnin]

Right. High ability scores HELP a bit, but they're not nearly as important as they became in later editions. Or, for that matter, as they were in AD&D (which predated B/X).

 

[Retreater]

When DMs create up-teen million different methods of generating ability scores using confusing methods of character creation, that just reinforces the notion that "low ability scores stink and aren't fun to play." I'm not the one saying that - I'm saying that when DMs aren't cool with rolling 3d6 and want to lessen the possibility of getting low scores, then THEY are the ones who are saying that. And if they do feel that way, take away the random element and just give them the scores the DM wants instead of creating an obtuse method to make it look like there is actually a random determination.

 

[Mannahnin]

I take your point, but I would opine that there is some valid middle ground between "any scores are fine" and "at least two 15s or better to be a viable character" (Gygax, 1E).

 

[kenada]

I also think putting this all on the DM is unfair. Players come to the table with their own preconceptions. You can try to correct them, but sometimes you need to compromise.

 

[Democratus]

I take your point, but I would opine that there is some valid middle ground between "any scores are fine" and "at least two 15s or better to be a viable character" (Gygax, 1E).

That middle ground is "editions".

• In B/X, any scores are fine.
• In AD&D (1E/2E), scores matter more so two 15+ may feel necessary.