Converted to 1E

[AxeMental]

Does anyone know of anyone that was converted to playing 1E at DF or ENworld (when the game they came in on was a later edition)? This ties into Robert's comments in the F...the OSR thread.

[T. Foster]

Does anyone know of anyone that was converted to playing 1E at DF or ENworld (when the game they came in on was a later edition)? This ties into Robert's comments in the F...the OSR thread.

Chainsaw? IIRC he was playing in a 4E game when he read some of our pro-1E/pro-Gygax posts at ENWorld, followed us back here, and reignited his childhood love of the old/good stuff. Also, possibly, Mythmere. He was working on C&C with Troll Lord Games but he became convinced by our arguments as to that game's failings and 1e and 0E's merits and was inspired by that to create OSRIC and S&W (and, in so doing, the legal foundation for the entire OSR).

Even if those are the only two (and I assume they're not) that still makes it worth it.

[Guy Fullerton]

Mythmere

[Guy Fullerton]

I sorta fall into that bucket too. I didn't "come in on" a later edition (played B/X and 1e growing up), though I did play the later editions up until 3e burned out my rpg energy in 2003. I started reading DF and the Acaeum (for non-D&D reasons), and 1e started turning my gears again.

[EOTB]

When I think of "converted" I think "exclusive or primary use". I don't think the bar needs to be that high. Even semi-regular use of 1E along with other systems is a win for our style of play - after all, our argument is that 1E has a specific and different style. To expect that it will scratch every sort of itch for every person is unrealistic. Further, I don't think anything good was gained by it being the only system because that simply meant people it didn't quite fit were going to try to influence the publisher to change it.

As an example of someone on this lower bar, I would say Theslo, who had little experience with 1E, mainly ran 2E, but ran a 1E campaign for his players while sincerely looking to produce an authentic 1E feel. And his group enjoyed it. Theslo had a positive experience with it.

Thread here

http://dragonsfoot.org/forums/viewtopic ... =questions

Is every campaign he ever runs from this day forward going to be 1E? No, but he came away with a positive view of the system, that it was different than 2E in material ways, and he would be open to using it again. If that experience was replicated a lot do you think it would be good or bad?

[Zenopus Archives]

It happens. As an example here's a blog I follow that I found last year (via Twitter of all places...!); it's by a DM who started with 4E but then decided to learn 1E:

The Mad Cleric

Why and how I’m playing First Edition AD&D

* * * * *

The AD&D 1E Facebook group has over 8000 members, and the G+ AD&D group has almost 2500 members - these would probably be good places to ask a question like this.

I've just started using FB for RPG talk in the last year (under the name Arch Zenopus - due to FB naming restrictions). Discussions are not as good/interesting, but volume of readers is high. Some groups, like the one for Gary Con, seem more active than their corresponding Forums.

[howandwhy99]

I really started in D&D with the introduction of 2nd ed after spurts of toying with the hobby before high school. It was hard not to pick up on what was happening with D&D living in SE Wisconsin in the early 80s, at least as a kid.

By college I knew 2nd ed was fundamentally flawed. It was touted as "so much better than 1st", but the initial design of the game was still in 2nd too even if backward headed. I heard a lot of stories and forlorn "this is what D&D really is" from adults (read: older kids and young adults) during the early 90s, but never truly met anyone who knew what D&D was. Not until I fell into an OD&D game in 2004 (thru 2008) did I meet someone who didn't just know, but knew almost everything about it.

[thedungeondelver]

Through college (late 80s into early 90s) I played a raft of different games: Role Master, Space Master, Champions (4th edition), the RPG portion of Mechwarrior, Call of Cthulhu, and a bevy of one-off games of different systems (I remember playing Star Wars d6 from West End Games, Aliens and Ghostbusters). Not one of them really scratched the itch but nobody wanted to play AD&D so I was stuck until the late 90s when I said "Screw it," and started my own game(s). So I came back after a long hiatus. But I knew 1e was what I'd wanted all along.

[bobjester]

I don't know anyone who converted to 1e from other, later game systems. For myself, I never really left, but I kept one foot in the 1e room while testing the 2e room extensively. There were always things about 2e that chapped my hide, so my 1e books were never out of reach when I played "2e". Hells, I can say this about BX too, considering that most of my D&D games in the 80s & 90s were a combination of 1st, 2nd & BX rules.

As for 3x, I peeked in that room and shut that door as quickly as I could.

It wasn't until I got on the internets, communicated with other D&D enthusiasts and ultimately joined K&KA and DF that I realized just how good the 1e rules stood up to time. I play & run 5e now, but that's only because that's the only game my group has collectively agreed to play, and I'd dearly love to run my 1e Greyhawk campaign again.

[Cloak n' Dagger]

When I was in middle-school and high school, I only had BEMCI to play. Later on in college, my first "real" (A)D&D playing was with 2nd edition, the early to mid-90s when 2nd edition was in its prime. It wasn't until I met Ancalagon and his group playing 1e sometime in the early years after Y2K, that I actually played 1e for the first time. After all these years since, I've ditched anything except 1e, OD&D or any thing which emulates those systems (AS&SH, White Box, S&W, OSRIC, etc).