What's Old is New (Part 1)

I recently got a copy of the Premium 2nd edition Dungeons and Dragons (Advanced Dungeons and Dragons) Dungeon Masters Guide as a birthday present. This completed my set of the 2nd edition premium books and decided to run a game for some friends. I haven’t run 2nd edition in a long time but decided it would be fun to run a a game again. So before the game I spent a few days rereading the Players Handbook and Dungeon Masters Guide to re-quaint myself with the 2nd edition rules. Although, I'd played and ran 2nd edition before, it was old to me and I wanted to get up to speed again.

My friends and I met at a local hobby ship and they rolled up characters. Of the various methods of generating ability scores. I had them use Method V (Roll 4d6 drop the lowest value and assign the value to the ability score of their choice. But I was also more lenient. Some 2nd edition character classes have specific ability score requirements like the paladin. For instance, the paladin in 2nd edition requires a Charisma of 17 and a Wisdom of 13. One player wanted to play a paladin so I allowed him to assign the minimum required ability score to his Charisma and Wisdom. The other abilities I had him roll 3d6 straight. I felt like this allowed him to play the character class of his choice rather than penalizing him as a result of his die rolls.

Some of my friends were old enough to have played 2nd edition when it was published. But they spent a few minutes looking over the PHB again, because the system was in a way "new" to them as well. Two of them even had their old 2nd edition books around and brought them to the game. A new player in his twenties was only familiar with 3rd and 5th edition. It took him a bit longer to make a character because he’d never looked at the 2nd edition Player’s Handbook and classes among other things, for instance, are a bit different than in Fifth Edition D&D. For instance, paladins are required to be lawful good and human in 2nd edition where as in Fifth Edition, there is no racial or alignment restriction on paladins.

Another interesting difference is descending armor class. Basic Dungeons and Dungeons, 1st and 2nd Edition Advanced Dungeons and Dragons uses descending Armor Class. The highest armor class value is -10 where as in Fifth Edition Dungeons and Dragons and Dungeon Crawl Classics, the highest armor class can be around 22. This can be confusing at times. Each armor type is assigned a different value. For instance, Leather gives an AC of 8 in AD&D and 7 in Basic. It is 11 in D&D 5e and 12 in Dungeon Crawl Classics. If you're looking to convert 1st or 2nd edition monsters for your Fifth Edition Game this site has a quick AC convesion chart.

Another important difference between 2nd edition and other editions of Dungeons and Dragons is that 2nd edition uses THAC0 (To hit Armor Class Zero ) In 2nd edition under the THACO system, to calculate if a hit succeeds you would take the AC of the target and subtract it from the attacker's THAC0, then roll a 20-sided dice; if the dice rolls equal to or higher than the calculated number, the attack is successful and hits the target. That is, THAC0 − AC = roll needed to hit. Where as in 5e, you add your proficiency modifier, ability score modifier and any other relevant bonuses to your die roll and the Armor Class of the opponent is the target number. For example, if Bob the fighter was fighting an orc with an Armor Class of 13. He has a proficiency modifier of +2 and an ability score modifier of +3 then he would add +5 to a d20 roll in Fifth Edition to see if he hit the orc. In 2nd edition each class and level have a different THACO. Bob would have to look up his THACO value for his class to see what it was then subtract the value of the opponents Armor Class from your THACO.

Next time getting down to playing….



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