I’ve been reflecting a lot about what I’d like to do next in gaming. As much as I wish it were otherwise I still struggle a bit with playing 5E vs going OSR. In part I still really want to like 5E despite finding it entirely tedious to run. But more than that I’m afraid I’m being influenced by the specter of nostalgia. I’m afraid I’ll run an AD&D game, that it will not live up to my memory and in the end I’ll be as discouraged with that as I am with 5E.

So I started looking for some inspiration or stories or something. I can’t be the only person thinking about this. Of course I realize I’m more like 10 years late to the party but search I did and in doing so found a video on the Joethelawyer YouTube channel, “How to Run Your First OSR Campaign if You’re Coming From One D&D | 5E | 5.5 | 6e, and from there several others.

I’ll link^{1 2 3} the rest of the videos in the footnotes but I won’t summarize them here. The salient point is that we can’t play OSR games in the current day like we did years ago.

This is something I’ve been struggling with. A strong part of me wants to play the games of yore like I did—or like I imagine I did—in those days. I’d love to turn the clock back to 1990 and experience D&D as a 16 year old all over again. The lack of life experience, giant holes in my D&D collection and archaic Gygaxian jargon made for a game that was as mysterious and strange to plan as to run. I never once worried about doing Greyhawk “right” or running an epic campaign or house ruling the game.

Sadly there’s no going back. But current me has an opportunity to do what young me couldn’t. That is to run D&D like an adult. Sure I may struggle with doing a setting “right” now that I have nearly 35 years of additional knowledge. I may balk at inconsistent rules and obtuse language that I once found fascinating. But what if I had been 30 in 1990? How might I have ran the game differently? Now I can find out.

To give myself a fighting chance for fun I have to be internally honest about my expectations and what is fair or not. For instance if I expect my players to magically address the world differently simply because the rules have changed I’m very likely to be disappointed. Advice for dealing with players types didn’t magically appear with the release of 5E. That’s battle tested advice that emerged over decades of play that is as true now as it was in the 70s and 80s.

It’s also not fair to expect sessions to be very different. We all come to our weekly game with varying levels of energy and excitement. It’s also unfair to expect the players not to covet their characters. I love high mortality in games. My players don’t now and didn’t “back in the day.”

In short, “don’t hate the player, hate the game.” Gamers haven’t really changed and it’s unreasonable to expect a change in the rules to change the individual.

It almost sounds as if I’m talking myself out of going OSR. I am not. I’m just banishing the bad nostalgia.

Looking Forward

“THE REFEREE IS THE FINAL ARBITER OF ALL AFFAIRS OF HIS OR HER CAMPAIGN.”⁴

Call me a grognard but I prefer a system in which the DM‘s role as final arbiter of rules is clearly enshrined. It is not that I want to be the dictator of my games but I do have some clear ideas about what I want in my settings and I expect to retain veto power.

Newer games seem to like to diminish the DM role to that of mere referee. Players need only show up at game time. The DM thinks about their game throughout the week. Given the greater investment of the DM I think it only natural for a games to work this way.

Combat

Combat in modern games takes up entirely too much time for my taste, both when preparing and when running the game. There are obvious reasons. The amount of space in the PHB dedicated to what the players can do, large hit point pools and monster complexity. If my players are to be believed they often find the combat quite engaging. I however find it immensely tedious.

What I look forward to perhaps most of all is brief deadly combat. Not only because I prefer the faster pace but also because character frailty is a factor in player choice. Combat should be a solution of last resort not a forgone conclusion at the beginning of every encounter.

Challenge

It’s often been said elsewhere. Modern games challenge the character sheet not the player. If every challenge can be solved by player looking down and making a role then what are we doing? If a player looks at their character sheet and can’t find a solution and therefore finds their character’s situation hopeless then what are we doing?

I think the best of games challenge both the sheet and the player and I just can’t wait to experience that again.

Modular Play

Around the release of 2E the campaign style of play became popular. I’ve been loathe to admit it but I hate campaign play. I’ve never been able to sustain interest in one as a DM and any player of mine can tell you from experience that my plots tend to wander.

I so badly want to go back to running modules. Short concise adventures of a few levels with clear plots and obvious conclusions. I want to take breaks from running. Plan the next phase and not have to worry overly much about telling a great big tale.

Conclusion

There are of course other things I look forward to. Random rolling. Open rolling. Player shenanigans. Just running games I haven’t had the chance to yet. I’m sure more ideas will emerge as I explore and experience the games of yore from a more mature perspective.

Tonight I run my first game of Mörk Borg. While not a game of yore I’m am so very excited to engage in the simplicity of the system and uniqueness of the setting.

Foot Notes

1. GP Adventures – That Guy With The French Accent; Tabletop RPG Talk: The OSR is not like it was “Back Then”, and it’s Okay
2. Tenkar’s Tavern; The OSR is NOT What We Remember it to Be – How Many Sandboxes or Hex Crawls Did You Run?
3. Greyhawk Grognard; How did you Play D&D Back in the Day?
4. Gary Gygax, THE GAME: AD&D Player’s Handbook (Lake Geneva: TSR Games,<br/> 1978), 8.