AD&D Second Edition

Best Selling RPGs - Available Now @ DriveThruRPG.com

Silverlion

Legendary Pubber
Joined
Aug 28, 2017
Messages
4,446
Reaction score
8,477
So there isn't a lot of love for this one--despite some good ideas (YMMV, IMHO.) However, if you played 2E AD&D, what did you like? What would you take for an OSR game if anything?

AD&D2E is still my favorite for a lot of reasons (don't get me wrong 5e is fun) but the worlds and flexibility opened by kits and settings in 2E were amazing. Mind you, I believe kits should be a "this fits X setting," not a players option. Unless they're building the setting with you.

Me? I'd keep the core Mega classes: Cleric, Fighter, Magic-User, Rogue.
Then keep the "classes" as specific sub-classes of the frame.
Kits would remain but become specifically background/cultural and/or special training. Though balanced a bit better.

In many ways, 5E did some of these things: Subclasses and "Kits" but Kits as Backgrounds. Though left out grouping similar classes together (who often shared many details.) It also went back to basic for Proficiency bonus (everyone has the same to hit bonus based on level, which sort of underwhelms the straight-line fighter.)

I've been considering this at length because AD&D2E had a specific feel I liked, characters didn't feel too-powerful at the beginning but grew to stand out even more so against the default monsters/creatures. Especially in a few settings. Now with 5E (which I love) you feel effective but are still not going to rush a dragon at level 1-3 (well sort of I think the DMG puts a wee white dragon for characters in the DMG "adventure" but I may be misremembering another edition.)

Mind you, I'm a big fan of making a lot of things "options." Which is what 2E did.
 
I think I've mentioned before I had an irrational dislike for 2E when it came out. It seemed like an unnecessary cash grab that came around the same time as the Survival books which at the time I thought were bad. In hindsight I was too harsh on those books and 2E. Especially as it expanded into the various settings and splat books.

I'm still ignorant about it in play but I'd like to give it another try.
 
It's my second favorite (I think 5e plays better at higher levels...yes, we've broken that mythical level 10 ceiling in 5e).

But I had such a blast with AD&D2e back in the day. I loved the settings with the villains and the grand heroics. I loved the Player's Option books that people tell me were terrible and destroyed the game and yet we played with them for years and the whole thing was never derailed (whereas the actual act of attempting to run 3rd killed D&D for me until 5e came along).
 
I like the way druids and such were just specialized clerics (if I remember right) and magic-users could specialize in different schools, although I think everyone already did that at home. I liked doing away with unnecessary subclasses like assassin, acrobat, illusionist, druid, monk, cavalier, barbarian, what have you. I thought it was a pretty good edition. I liked some of the interior art. I sometimes wish I had kept the books I had. I didn't care for the bloated three-ring Monstrous Manual mainly because I always felt D&D in every incarnation after the original had too many monsters that were essentially the same. I also didn't like those Complete Fighter (or whatever they were called) book--I never bought any but guys would show up with them and want to have them incorporated into the game. I eventually went back to the three original 1st edition AD&D books because 2nd got unwieldy from my perspective and didn't really do anything I couldn't do with 1st, and 2nd was so blandly written. Not anywhere near as much fun to read as 1st edition. Oh, and some of the text made zero sense to me, like the description of what a character with low Dexterity might mean ("maybe he's blind as a bat"--uh, that would cause a lot more than just a minus to hit and a plus to AC!). They tried a little to hard to make the abstract into the concrete, making little sense--I seem to remember a few instances--did they try to explain Hit Points and why armor made you harder to hit as well? Seems like there was bit of that, but it's been almost 30 years since I read or played it so my memory is only clear on certain aspects. But I'd play it if someone I thought was a good Dungeon Master was running it. Never played in a non-homebrew D&D setting so I can't speak to the quality of those.
 
I owned the 2E AD&D PHB and DMG but never played it. I remember liking the new presentation (but wasn't there a lot of blue art or text?). I vaguely remember the division of types of spellcasters. That's about it, though.

2E came out the year I graduated high school, which coincided with the start of a long hiatus from gaming. That summer I sold off all but a (literal) handful of Rpgs which became more like keepsakes. At the time, I thought I was closing the door on that part of my life (only to make a return to gaming 7 years later).

I'd have to re-read 2E to get an idea of what I'd find appealing about it. I missed pretty much that entire phase of AD&D - the kits, the campaign settings, the revisions. If - a big if - I read it and found any interest in it, I think I'd be more inclined to use it as-is. I'm not an OSRian so wouldn't have a need to inject parts of it into something else.
 
I'm afraid I wasn't a fan. The weapon stats were a mess. Composite longbow built for strength with sheaf arrows. That's all I have to say.
 
I really liked 2e when it came along as it made me realize what a mess the 1e core books were and that I had really been playing a B/X mashed with 1e all along. The first few Completes were good but as they started to pile up things became unwieldy and I realized I preferred the simplicity of the at-that-time newly released RC.

But there was a lot to like: wide range of options, including XP; the much more flavourful clerics and druids; the significantly improved Bard and Thief; Wild Magic; spheres for mage specialization; the improved rules layout for reference at the table; the terrific cover art and often very good interior art; memorable and diverse settings like Taladas, Dark Sun, Birthright, Spelljammer, Al-Qadim. So many modules were put out there are far more gems among them than most acknowledge.

The supposed 'hate' for 2e seems just another overblown myth of the net propagated by a loud minority, similar to all the hate you find for DL and FR. I think it is notable that many of those returning to 5e in my experience are 2e babies.
 
I remember there being a lot of hate for 2E being expressed around the time 3E came out. And it must have been real because at the same time game stores were suddenly filled with reams of 1st edition stuff being sold off.

I also remember the perception among players of other games GURPS and Storyeller etc, that AD&D was incredibly backward and primitive and had essentially been left behind by advantcements in game design.
 
Most of my ideas for an OSR, is some minor fixes and roll high, have a few kits per class for styling the game one way or another. Example: How to do an Oriental campaign with kits. I want to add a couple of minor house rules, notably, lowering XP for wizards at 1-3, and upping their starting spells at level one to two spells. Tightening up some other things. Making magic missile have 1d6 damage again.
 
  • Like
Reactions: TJS
I remember there being a lot of hate for 2E being expressed around the time 3E came out. And it must have been real because at the same time game stores were suddenly filled with reams of 1st edition stuff being sold off.

I also remember the perception among players of other games GURPS and Storyeller etc, that AD&D was incredibly backward and primitive and had essentially been left behind by advantcements in game design.

well it came out a decade or so prior, and really was, system-wise, just a streamlined AD&D 1st edition. So by the time TSR died it was a dinosaur
 
I'd only keep the core players handbook, and get rid of the optional proficiency system. IMO it is the single main bad thing and I think that people used it was the massive combat bonuses gained through it.
 
I hated the actual layout of the books, font, color, etc. Also, my 1e books will be around for the cockroaches to read, while my 2e books vaporized on the shelf.

But, I played with a 1e core, adding things in. Concerning the power creep of AD&D, the 2e Dragons and Giants felt scary again. I used proficiencies and kits. I used both the Thief and the Rogue, the Bard and the Minstrel, the Priest and the Cleric, the Magic-User and the Speciality Mage.

2e’s biggest draw for me was the settings, Spelljammer, Ravenloft, Planescape, Dark Sun, Birthright, etc.
 
I've said before that AD&D2e was the rules written in such a way that actually reflected how people played AD&D. Of the people I met, there were those who SAID they played AD&D1e with all the Gygaxianisms, but they actually ignored or were ignorant of most of the additional rules in AD&D1e. What people played was something akin to B/X with AD&D1e classes and monsters. AD&D2e was that ruleset explicitly in print.

I always liked proficiencies. I liked non-weapon proficiencies in particular, because they helped give flavor to a character. I also liked how they weren't tied to level, so a beginning character with a high attribute could have a high proficiency check in something outside adventuring. It helped make low level characters feel more competent.

I adore the Monstrous Compendium binder format. I love the one page per monster along with the detailed descriptions and ecology. I wish modern games would do this again. I love being able to just take the pages I need out of the binder and have them with my notes during a game.

I bought the C&C Monsters & Treasures reprint in binder format because I didn't reasearch it properly. I had thought the binder would be formatted to one monster per page like the old MC. Nope. It's just a looseleaf version of the normal book printing, which was a severe disappointment. But that's on me for not doing consumer due diligence.
 
On the whole, I really liked 2e. Organizationally, 1e was a mess. Many things in 1e, like bards and psionics, were also tacked on in weird ways. 2e cleaned up much of this and streamlined the rules. Yea, they toned down some flavor aspects too much but that had no effect on our play as we mostly made up the settings. I liked the options of specialty mages and clerics and being able to tailor thieves skills.

TSR never had great consistency for product standards which showed as the line grew. The Complete * books had many good ideas as well as many lame ones. Kits were a good idea but the implementation varied across books in terms of power level and extent of rule changes (also, trying to balance a permanent bonus by starting with less gold is a bad idea). Some of the later books in the line, such as Necromancer and Sha'ir had more intense flavor.

The settings opened up so many options that they are still floating around, though mostly unofficially.

Today, I'd consider playing in a 2e game, though not a 1e game. Once, I got started, I'd probably be annoyed by the odd saving throw categories, arbitrarily complex ability mods, and would want skills over proficiencies but it didn't bother me much back then.
 
Proficiencies had almost no impact on combat other than whether your warrior character could use a weapon or not (It had less effect on other classes but they weren't about weapons first.) Except, when it came to things like specialization/two-handed combat. Which pretty much was a boon to warriors without super-strength. Plus they were optional anyway.

I will be streamlining saves if at all possible. I'll consider (and playtest) a few saving throw changes anyway. The example I think of is that a warrior should have a better chance at resisting dragon's breath than they do (sure they get more HP as well but still the iconic imagery of a warrior behind his shield guarding against dragon's is iconic.) While, on the other hand Wizards should dominate over spells (since they can essentially or should counterspell, as second nature.) But again, I don't want to stray to madly far from core.
 
2e is my favorite D&D edition and my group still plays it. 2e had a staggering amount of content and I loved the 'Player's Option' books. There were a few obvious discrepancies between them, but overall they were great and allowed for more freedom when creating a character. As for any negatives, there were probably too many non-weapon proficiencies (skills) and, of course, thAC0 (though my group had switched it to ascending AC before 3e even came out).
 
Proficiencies had almost no impact on combat other than whether your warrior character could use a weapon or not (It had less effect on other classes but they weren't about weapons first.) Except, when it came to things like specialization/two-handed combat. Which pretty much was a boon to warriors without super-strength. Plus they were optional anyway.

That's true for core. It's been a very long time but I think some of the options books allowed weapon proficiencies to function as proto-feats, which did make fighters stronger and more customizable, which was a good thing to me.

Oh yea, percentile strength was a bad attempt to fix earlier cutoffs and got worse when other books made abilities go to 25. If I were to go back to a 2e style game, I'd want the mods from basic or 3e+.
 
IMO, most players continued using the AD&D attribute charts solely because of the lure of percentile strength. Also, for example, the bonus on Con went up to +4 instead of the +3 of basic, and a couple of other attributes were like that too. The lure of potentially higher bonuses was what promoted the adoption of the generally more bonus sparse AD&D charts.

I prefer the standard B/X progression: 13-15=+1, 16-17=+2, 18=+3.

Edit: also, because the people who rolled fair all used 4d6 drop low to preference and the people who claimed to do 3d6 in order always cheated anyway.
 
Oh yea, percentile strength was a bad attempt to fix earlier cutoffs and got worse when other books made abilities go to 25. If I were to go back to a 2e style game, I'd want the mods from basic or 3e+.

I suspect if I do this, which I'm considering. That it will be a bit like a hybrid of BECMI/2E on a few things. Notably, the percentile strength WILL be going away. No other class uses it. It's a neat idea, but not well implemented. I suspect I'll leave all weapons available to a fighter--with proficient using giving a +1, and specialization (which will cut your proficiencies down) to a +3 (unless someone convinces me to steal weapon mastery wholesale from BECMI). And you can only specialize in a single weapon.

Another rule I was considering is that if you meet the minimum for the class you get a +1 to the prime attribute needed. (BUT with the caveat only one stat gets that) and scores only exceed 18 if you get both race+class bonuses to push it beyond that (and then 19 or 20 MAYBE.) Still debating as I want as few changes as I can get away with while still bringing it to a more modern (and cleaner) play manual. Of course, if you grab Dark Sun, well and combine it with this, that stat total might differ.

Right now I'm spit-balling. I loved 2E, I had the most fun with it despite many of its limitations.

If I weren't cloning at all. I'd be doing an OSR game where you are expected to multiclass but specifically to create variants. (That's a different thing.) In that case, all Warriors start as Fighters, but at 2nd level pick up say Cleric, and 3rd Rogue, to become a Ranger. Sure you could go Fighter all the way ending up as a Warlord. Plus every race would have paths only it could take (like the Elf taking up say a Bladedancer by mixing Fighter/Mage, but no it would be anything more than that with a focus on a single weapon using whatever specialization rules any warrior could use.)

So I'm trying to trim crazy ideas down while examining biases, and not going completely new OSR attempt.

Edit and as a random idea a Magic-User who doesn't specialize probably gets a Legend Lore ability but only to ID/detail magic spells, and creatures summoned/created by magic "Owlbears? Really? Neborea's love for hybrids lead her to crazy things, these things are probably too dangerous for us, right now, let's see if we can get away without a fight? They're tough, and formidable, especially with the enhanced night vision and it getting dark?"
 
I loved 2e. I was always jealous of the DM because they could always "play" when not with a group. Play= writing, prepping adventures, etc. With 2e, I felt like a player could "play" without a group as well due to all the cool stuff to read with kits...it was fun for me just to make different characters.
I haven't read any of the settings--Planescape, Spelljammer, Dark Sun....and I need to get my hands on some of that stuff because I keep hearing the settings were the best part of 2e.

What I hated?--The 2e adventures.
We played with 2e rules and with 1e adventures (and still do) and its perfect.
I'm glad that there is the 2e retroclone--For Gold & Glory.
 
I loved 2e. I was always jealous of the DM because they could always "play" when not with a group. Play= writing, prepping adventures, etc. With 2e, I felt like a player could "play" without a group as well due to all the cool stuff to read with kits...it was fun for me just to make different characters.
I haven't read any of the settings--Planescape, Spelljammer, Dark Sun....and I need to get my hands on some of that stuff because I keep hearing the settings were the best part of 2e.

What I hated?--The 2e adventures.
We played with 2e rules and with 1e adventures (and still do) and its perfect.
I'm glad that there is the 2e retroclone--For Gold & Glory.
The adventures really started to go downhill. Greyhawk adventures specifically. What started with Castle Greyhawk, ended up with the Falcon series. Bleah.
 
It's been a while but I think 2e adventures sparked discussion about railroading. I recall one scene (don't remember details) where the bad guys totally outclassed the party, then super good guys came in and quickly destroyed the good guys. I remember thinking, what's the point of that other than making players feel weak and unimportant? Who wants so have their characters sidelined while they watch action entirely between NPCs for 10-20 minutes?
 
Yeah. Even though I am very story oriented with adventures designed around a series of setpiece events, the 2e modules in the early days of the edition were really bad.

There was a set of Dragonlance modules which came out along with the launch of 2e. The trilogy starts with a really condescending day at the fair section. When I ran it, my players asked me if the adventure was written for 3rd graders. Whatever you think of Dragonlance and 2e "talking down" to players, the first module of that series definitely went above and beyond that. It's a shame, because there's a decent adventure trilogy in there, buried underneath the simplification.
 
Probably played 2nd edition the most out of all of them. I remember early on not wanting to switch over- was happy playing 1st (didn't like switching to first from Basic, that's another story). The kits grew on me after a bit. There was a ton of material for 2nd. Looking back on it, 2nd seemed like the edition where they wanted to cover everything medieval fantasy or not.
 
It's my second favorite (I think 5e plays better at higher levels...yes, we've broken that mythical level 10 ceiling in 5e).

But I had such a blast with AD&D2e back in the day. I loved the settings with the villains and the grand heroics. I loved the Player's Option books that people tell me were terrible and destroyed the game and yet we played with them for years and the whole thing was never derailed (whereas the actual act of attempting to run 3rd killed D&D for me until 5e came along).
I have done 5e up to 15th level; my observation about it is that minmaxing is a really big deal at that level. In doing the final boss battle on Rise of Tiamat, our alpha munchkin's goliath paladin dealt out more than 200 points of damage in a single turn. Even with his sneak attack damage, my poor little ranger-thief was looking rather outclassed.

We spent most of our time doing dungeon stomps, so my attempt at a gentleman-thief character was completely underutilised and I ended up having to multiclass a bit of ranger and morph into a sniper.
 
I liked most of the rules. The only issue I ever had was with THAC0, the rest of the mechanics were fine to me. I loved the customization of having the optional rules in it. I used Speed Factor, I used Proficiencies or Secondary Skills, I allowed Weapon Specialization, giving Fighters the multiple spec options... And the settings!

I loved the FR Adventures book for the city maps and the 'treasure' options, like gems and art objects. The first Undermountain box set is still my all time favourite adventure (And why I'm POed at the uncharacteristic changes they made to Durnan. The man was called 'the Thinking Man's Barbarian'! He's not some weaselly looking rogue type, durnit!)

Spelljammers was cool! Ravenloft was interesting... Darksun was the one I liked best.
 
The only things I think 2e did really wrong were:

  • Not switching to ascending AC.
  • Sticking with the AD&D attribute charts instead of moving to B/X style attribute bonuses
  • Sticking with spell memorization instead of moving to spell point based free casting (which was how everyone I ever met actually played)

That's really about it.

Edit: speaking of core, of course. I think the Complete books and a lot of the expansion stuff went off the rails.
 
Yeah, I think it was just around long enough for people to get sick of it. And there was a lot of problems by the time "2.5" Skills & Powers was introduced. The advent of the internet just kinda happened to coincide with that awkward period in between people getting sick of something through familiarity to the eventual point that nostalgia would kick in, and then the OSR has sort of dominated the nostalgia scene, but I have seen more than one 2E retroclone floated around.
 
Oh, and I like THAC0. It took a little bit for new players to get used to, but it's really quite simple and worked just fine for what it did. And for me, it is part and parcel of any D&D nostalgia I might have. To the point that my own little Phaserip-fueled game based on the D&D cartoon uses "THWACO" as the Fighting attribute.
 
I have done 5e up to 15th level; my observation about it is that minmaxing is a really big deal at that level. In doing the final boss battle on Rise of Tiamat, our alpha munchkin's goliath paladin dealt out more than 200 points of damage in a single turn. Even with his sneak attack damage, my poor little ranger-thief was looking rather outclassed.

We spent most of our time doing dungeon stomps, so my attempt at a gentleman-thief character was completely underutilised and I ended up having to multiclass a bit of ranger and morph into a sniper.

We went to 18th level (in the same Tiamat campaign) and the only real power disparity came from the Drow Rogue who rolled an 18 for Dexterity (and so he had a 20), but I was the only one who noticed. The rest of the group never did (or never complained), but everyone always had plenty to sink their teeth into role-wise and story-wise as well, so that may have helped.
 
It's been a while but I think 2e adventures sparked discussion about railroading. I recall one scene (don't remember details) where the bad guys totally outclassed the party, then super good guys came in and quickly destroyed the good guys. I remember thinking, what's the point of that other than making players feel weak and unimportant? Who wants so have their characters sidelined while they watch action entirely between NPCs for 10-20 minutes?

I did that intentionally in an encounter in the aforementioned Tiamat campaign...just to later have the higher level party blow off the coalition building efforts against The Cult of The Dragon and rush off and get killed (except for one, an archer who was maimed and sent back as a lesson).

The PCs got the point and spent the rest of the campaign taking the building of a coalition against The Cult very seriously
 
It's been a while but I think 2e adventures sparked discussion about railroading. I recall one scene (don't remember details) where the bad guys totally outclassed the party, then super good guys came in and quickly destroyed the good guys. I remember thinking, what's the point of that other than making players feel weak and unimportant? Who wants so have their characters sidelined while they watch action entirely between NPCs for 10-20 minutes?

There are a number of good to great 2e modules as well: The Night Below, City of Skulls, Dungeon of Death, Vale of the Mage, Rod of Seven Parts, the Lost Tombs and Dungeoncrawl series, Golden Voyages, Castle Forlorn. The revisionist idea that 2e abandoned the dungeon doesn’t stand up if one actually looks over the 2e modules, there are loads of dungeoncrawls.

Some of the more inventive and experimental Planescape and Ravenloft modules may require tweaks but have great ideas to work from (e.g. Hour of the Knife, Circle of Darkness, City of Dis).

I think we tend to remember the best of the Basic and 1e modules and ignore the number of mediocre modules, I’d say the quality of 2e modules is definitely hit and miss but that’s not surprising considering how many there are.
 
Last edited:
I think we tend to remember the best of the Basic and 1e modules and ignore the number of mediocre modules, I’d say the quality of 2e modules is definitely hit and miss but that’s not surprising considering how many there are.
I think the amount of hit and misses were about the same.
 
Ultimately, D&D 2e is my least liked version of D&D. It's probably my least liked RPG I've ever played. D&D 3.0 did a lot to turn D&D into an RPG I liked for the system. My current favorite version of D&D is still Rules Cyclopedia...but I wasn't aware of it until relatively recently.

But oh man, D&D 2e has amazing settings and artwork. It has yet to be topped by any fantasy RPG then or since.

dark-sun-625x330.jpg

2e%20dl%20taladas.jpg
 
Last edited:
Oh, and I like THAC0. It took a little bit for new players to get used to, but it's really quite simple and worked just fine for what it did. And for me, it is part and parcel of any D&D nostalgia I might have. To the point that my own little Phaserip-fueled game based on the D&D cartoon uses "THWACO" as the Fighting attribute.

68C534A8-4A71-42D3-BAA0-E3FC7B32F637.jpeg
 
There are a number of good to great 2e modules as well: The Night Below, City of Skulls, Dungeon of Death, Vale of the Mage, Rod of Seven Parts, the Lost Tombs and Dungeoncrawl series, Golden Voyages, Castle Forlorn. The revisionist idea that 2e abandoned the dungeon doesn’t stand up if one actually looks over the 2e modules, there are loads of dungeoncrawls.

Some of the more inventive and experimental Planescape and Ravenloft modules may require tweaks but have great ideas to work from (e.g. Hour of the Knife, Circle of Darkness, City of Dis).

I think we tend to remember the best of the Basic and 1e modules and ignore the number of mediocre modules, I’d say the quality of 2e modules is definitely hit and miss but that’s not surprising considering how many there are.

Aren't most if not all of those 2e modules you hold up as good also late releases? I think there was a shift in the adventures being offered from about 94 onwards. I think the ones you list are from that period. Before that it certainly seemed like everything was large font and railroad.

And yes, there are horrible Basic and 1e modules. I'd say that even some of the old modules which are revered are largely cack.
 
We are currently playing a 2e game and the only changes we've made so far is switching to ascending AC.

There was always a noticeable pause in the game after someone rolled while they mentally calculated what AC they hit using THAC0. It was so easy in the 80's and 90's but just doesn't flow as well as ascending at the table for us.
 
Banner: The best cosmic horror & Cthulhu Mythos @ DriveThruRPG.com
Back
Top