Opal

Just like how VHS won over Beta. The worst, but most popular.

When I say worst, I am, like giving 0e, AD&D1, and B/X a lot of attaboys, slack, and general handicapping for being developed in the hobby's first decade.
And 5e some serious demerits for actively choosing to throw away progress made by 3e and 4e.
 
Just objectively, 5e is less messed up than those early editions.  Mainly because it didn't undo 3e's consolidation of all resolution on the d20.
 
Complexity is interesting, because there's both quantifiable complexity (all RPGs are pretty complex, some push that complexity to the GM), and perceived complexity. A lot of older D&D fans find 0e, AD&D, B/X, OSR games & 5e simple, because familiarity can mask complexity.
So I'm guessing you have a more objective view. 
 

I guess this thread has come full circle, then, from announcing ONE to giving it up as a bad idea.
 
That means we're getting Ten More Years of 5e, arguably the worst D&D ever.
huzzah 😐

I'll never forgive FASERIP for what it did to Gamma World.
 
(No, it's not rational, just a grudge )

I'll never forgive FASERIP for what it did to Gamma World.
 
(No, it's not rational, just a grudge )

I'll never forgive FASERIP for what it did to Gamma World.
 
(No, it's not rational, just a grudge )

Looks like One D&D may be dead, in favor of incremental changes to 5e
 
https://www.reddit.com/r/rpg/comments/12b3con/according_to_content_creators_at_the_dnd_summit/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app&utm_name=ioscss&utm_content=1&utm_term=10
 
details to follow. 

...so, the Friday night Serenity game (as mentioned over in the WOTC OGL debacle thread) of my hubby's died out.  Now the plan is switching GMs and games every other Friday.  Hubby tossed his hat in the ring for a 1st ed 7th Sea game and made puppy-dog eyes at me to PLEASE be a player, he promises it'll be light-hearted and Heroic.  Told him I need to see what the others want to make first, but if folks go grimdark sociopath in spite of him, I will bail.  He accepts this.
 
And last Friday night we all discussed what the other Friday game would be and what folks wanted.  I was very clear about being a Big Damn Hero, about having my actions make a positive difference and no more bloody crapsack dystopias.  A couple other agree and someone suggests superheroes? (No Champions, alas -- GM initially wants the DC gamebook).  OK, so what's the theme and power level?

GM talks about having both DC and Marvel in the world, maybe either street level or Teen Titans/New Mutants.  I express how your average Marvel citizen can be hypocritically ungrateful towards heroics and how I'm leery of mutant wangst so can we please go four color with a touch of grit, and maybe more light-hearted too?  Another player brings up not wanting to play teenagers.  OK!  Street level it is...we'll look at the pdf and--

What's that, GM?  You're now switching to Marvel FASERIP?  OK, that can work for street level too, I guess and--
 
New Mutants, GM?  Seriously, you're insisting on that route?  And "things will be fine if you never reveal your mutation to the public"?  You love your wangst and crapsackery too much to let that thread stay unpulled, GM.

Hubby accepts I will not play the other "hero" game.  Just need to work up the courage to tell the GM now.

Except that we all play characters who are almost always far more competent than us in some areas. Very few of us here are master swordsmen, ace pilots, or can shoot lasers from our eyes. We have to rely on game mechanics to simulate abilities we don't have, and in Hero System those mechanics can get as elaborate as we like. We may or may not have enough experience or imagination to at least describe what we want our characters to do, but in the end we all roll the dice and crunch the numbers.
 
We want to play people different from ourselves, more capable than we are. That's the fun of these games, allowing us to take on roles we never could in real life. Well, what if I were by nature socially shy and awkward, but I'd enjoy the change of inhabiting a character who's suave, articulate and persuasive? I can, as you say, pay the points for the abilities such a character should have, but if I can't role play that effectively I have to rely on game mechanics to simulate it. What's wrong with having the option of mechanics to play that out in as sophisticated a manner as I and my game group would enjoy? Why should that be a negative for non-combat, but perfectly acceptable for combat?
 
 
BTW LiamEvans210 (the OP), is any of this helpful to your original inquiry? Is this what you were looking for?

Why is describing my intended action in combat, in exploration, in trap detection and removal, in infliltration, in research and in virtually every other situation, then allowing my character's skills and abilities to take over as we throw the dice "role playing", but describing my intended actions in a social setting and then allowing my character's skills and abilities to take over as we throw the dice "replacing role playing".
 
My character chooses his targets and his tactics in combat (wisely or foolishly) based on his personality. Ditto for exploration (perhaps he is careful and methodical, or maybe he is impulsive and hasty), trap detection and removal, infiltration, research and social interaction. Role playing means playing a character with goals, objectives, personal beliefs, character strengths and flaws rather than directing a pawn to the (perceived) most tactically advantageous choice in every situation.

You see the difference mechanic sometimes with opposing dice rolls.  For 2d6 it's the same curve as addition, except you subtract 7.  But it's more elegant in a way because it directly gives a bell curve around an average value, with a range of +-5, that's just easier to design a system around.
 
I've been looking into dice mechanics lately (which is why I was trying to remember how Rolemaster "worked") and man there are a lot of bad systems out there.  I am especially not fond of systems where you roll a single die, thus combining granularity with a flat distribution.  Only slightly better are lossy systems like the one where you throw a pool of dice and only count 6s.  And then yesterday I encountered the Genesys "generic" system that requires custom dice and is almost entirely incomprehensible.
 
Probably the most novel dice mechanic I've come across lately is the one from Reign, where you throw a bunch of d10s and look for sets.  So if you roll three 7s it's considered three "wide" by seven "high", and each dimension corresponds to a different aspect of success--typically width corresponds to speed while height corresponds to magnitude.  Unmatched "waste" dice still get counted for certain things so they're not actually wasted, and there's an opposed roll mechanic as well.
 
What's innovative about Hero is that it incorporates multiple ways to use d6s and even (in the case of damage) multiple ways to read the same roll.  Reading STUN/BODY off the same dice saves time and gives related, but still different, results for separate mechanics.  It's elegant in a way that few systems are, and honestly HERO really doesn't take full advantage of it.  There's no reason you couldn't read the "BODY" off of a skill roll to determine some secondary effect, for example.
 
 

Runequest allows everyone to know some kind of magic. Maybe it has a few ideas you can use for your campaign.

I'm currently "contemplating" a Sword and Sorcery game, and I'm stuck on how magic works. More specifically, how magic works at a PC level.
 
My general thoughts are:
 
1. Everyone uses magic all the time. When you get up in the morning, you are likely to put on your amulets and/or say your prayers even before you put on pants (or whatever).
 
2. This magic has a real impact on life and society. It covers things like crop yields, maternal and infant mortality, whether or not a wound becomes infected, and a whole host of other things.
 
3. At the same time, its effects at the game system level are negligible, and can be ignored. Essentially they are either minimal, or cancel out. Example: in a fight, each side is likely to be blessed by a priest or similar, who will also lay curses on the other side. So each combatant will be at +1 to hit from the blessing, and -1 to hit from the other side's curses, giving a net effect of +0.
Rather than figure this out each time, it's easier simply to ignore the whole thing. Any slight advantage one side has can be treated as part of the luck of the dice.
 
4. Of course, there is magic that can't be treated this way, which brings us back to the original starting point.
 
5. On a strategic/diplomatic/political level, magic operates as something like an intelligence service. It gathers intelligence, influences minds and opinions, can carry out sabotage and assassinations, and mobilize proxy/ally forces. It can also be negated by the enemy's countermeasures.

The last reason is why conventional means to similar ends are typically used in parallel.
 
6. But how does the previous point scale down to the "tactical squad"/individual level? In part, I suppose, the roles listed above can be reflected in available spells...
 
7. Magic isn't artillery.

Claw -Claw -Bite
 
 

Straight up and simple:  overpowered casters, unbounded by any sense of game balance or genre fidelity, let alone realism; and strictly inferior non-casters, struggling against the system to do much at all, and, if anything, more constrained in options and ability than actual reality.
 
Fortunately you're not going for that.

That's a more mythic take, I like it. Relics and artifacts sometimes start out like that.  
 
I can imagine building a FH character around bearing such an item, an inheritor or fated weirder, taking advantage of the way indestructible/irreplaceable foci work.

I've been looking into RPG mechanics lately, and in a fit of nostalgia I looked up the combat rules for MERP which I had somehow forgotten in the 35 years since I last played it.  I know now that I had suppressed the memory for a reason. 

After the synopses given of the evolution of Greyhawk (and my thanks to both of you again), I am going to suggest that the first step might be deciding _which_ Greyhawk you will be playing in.
 
For what it's worth, I was never a fan of grimdark as a _theme_, but it has value as a _threat_ (stop the impending grimdark), but frankly, I don't think any of us, under any but the most Monte Haul of DM, ever had a snowball's chance of keeping a party alive long enough to really become even an annoyance to Iuz the Evil or similar such published characters for any game in any genre.  And the other problem was playing a game for three or four years with only a single end goal....  It never happened.  We just lost interest and tended to find side quests to stay entertained.  It's like retirement: ten years into the job, and you start counting down, because you have had enough of that already.  That is apropos of nothing except to suggest that if the goal is to "stop Iuz the Evil,'  I would encourage you to consider starting them out at sufficiently higher than 'starting level" characters: while videogame developers might not have figured it out, grinding for levels specifically to get levels to complete the single goal laid out at the beginning?  Not a lot of fun.
 
And just as commentary: I rather _liked_ the crumbling ancient Empire as individual cultures and city states came into their own.  It was a rather oprimistic background that suited my own visions at the time.   Besides, I live in 2023.  I have had more than enough dystopia; thank you.
 
 

Actually he did not die. He survived the swim but was judged no longer fit to fight. The consul's of Rome awarded him a significant pension, that was honored by the Etruscan that was put back on the throne of Rome. (Tarquinius Superbus, last king of Rome) The Etruscan army he held at bay at the bridge, besieged Rome, and captured it. @ 6 th. century BCE. 

In my Pirates of Drinax campaign, some of the characters are fighter pilots, so I came up with some ranged martial arts maneuvers they could use.
 
Fighter Pilot Skills
3  Defensive Shot:  1/2 Phase, -1 OCV, +2 DCV, Range +0, Weapon  Strike
5  Dodge/Jink:  1/2 Phase, -- OCV, +4 DCV, Dodge All Attacks, Abort; FMove
4  Trained Shot:  1/2 Phase, +2 OCV, +0 DCV, Range +0, Weapon  Strike
0  Weapon Element:  Vehicle Weapons
 
What might be some other maneuvers a skilled fighter pilot would have, like Maverick from the Top Gun movies?

Early D&D was, or at least could be, the antithesis of playing a role. Why give your character any personality? They are short-lived and interchangeable anyway. Would rational people walk up to some machine that, pressing a random button, has about a 60% chance at impairing you, maybe 20% of killing or permanently disabling you, a 19% chance of providing some minor benefit and a 1% chance of granting massive benefits? Players pulled the switches because I can make another 200 characters later, and one of them will eventually beat the odds.
 
To me, the games became real "role playing" when PCs became expected to have personalities, backstories and survival instincts, evolving from the green pawn, red pawn and blue pawn on a game board.

I dont know... I mean, everyone has played full-contact Uno, right?  Same kind of vibe.
 
 
Oh, don't get me started on that kind of nonsense.  I am extremely fortunate in that at the age of 63, I still have both of my parents, and that they are not just "still with us," but vibrant and thriving.  Realistically, given the relative levels of health and healthcare, they should both outlive me by at least a decade (I have CHF.  I can look forward to ten to twelve years of slowly drowning to death).
 
I would love to say that having them is all wonderful, biscuits-and-gravy kind of stuff (and it kind of is, seeing as I how I like neither of those things).  Don't get me wrong: I love my parents,  but I haven't been able to hold a lengthy conversation with them since I hit forty.
 
My old man is constantly "you are too soft on those kids.  They don't know what [whatever he is sputtering about at the moment- some completely unnecessary hardship, usually].  You should have raised them the way you grew up; the way I grew up.  We have both been cutting firewood since we were nine years old!  We both worked the fields since we were kids!  We went hungry many a night in the dead of winter-  me more than you ever thiught about having to!  You should have raised them like that!  That's how you grew up!  I grew up worse than that, and I turn a out okay!"
 
Yeah...,   
 
The fact that you wish your grandkids had to suffer hunger and unnecessary physical hardship  suggests that maybe- just _maybe_-- you did not turn out as "okay" as you think you did...
 
Yeah; I am afraid the "everyone should be subjected to this!" Mindset makes very little sense to me outside of rolling the windows down and blasting Baby Metal.  I would like everyone who games to have the opportunity to try it, with a full understanding going in of just what it is and is not, but certainly I dont want to force it on anyone any more than want to experience some other kind of DnD.  At least that kind never really pushed "fantasy" as much as it pushed "battle of wits!  The five (or eight or whatever) of us against his most devious traps....."  It was like full-contact Uno for the "oh! My brittle bones!" set.  If I could find some other old school players, I might even want to try another game or two as I approach the "oh! My hip!" era of my life.
 
 
 
 
 
 
Correct.  More specifically, it wasn't what they would _become_ very shortly after.  I can't point to any one game and say that "this is when the games changed" (though, given the era and the palpable difference, I do tend to point to Traveller, which stressed throughout the cooperation of Playes and Referees while old DnD seemed to stress "the DM can easily kill you, so he should pull his punches enough that clever playing might allow you to live, maybe, at least every so often."
 
 
 
 
Yep.  All that.   Nail on the head, right there. 

I get the appeal, I just see it as a you had to be there kind of appeal.
 
I wouldn't want to inflict it on zoomers cause it was "good nuff for me when I was your age" or anything ;
IDK if you meant to imply old-school dungeon crawling wasn't actually an RPG 
 
But, yeah, it kinda wasn't.  And for those reasons I pointed out,  that you weren't really playing a denizen of a fantasy world, but a 20th century nerd being clever.  
 
It was more of an immersive immaginary puzzle game.  With survival horror imaginary stakes
 
 

I still play, but I'm an edition behind.
 
The classic dungeon crawl with all the explicit poking and listening and such arguably died with 3.0 and skill checks that actually worked.  Your passive perception could spot traps & ambushes your disable device could actually disarm a trap.  Your knowledge skills can identify monsters and recall their special abilities.
Less of the incongruous "player knowledge" being all important.

I still play, but I'm an edition behind.
 
The classic dungeon crawl with all the explicit poking and listening and such arguably died with 3.0 and skill checks that actually worked.  Your passive perception could spot traps & ambushes your disable device could actually disarm a trap.  Your knowledge skills can identify monsters and recall their special abilities.
Less of the incongruous "player knowledge" being all important.