# Treasure and leveling comparisons: AD&D1, B/ED&D, and D&D3 - updated 11-17-08 (Q1)



## Quasqueton

It started with a curious notion, and it built up from going through one adventure module noting certain things mentally. Then it became actually taking notes on a piece of paper, and comparing between them.

Following this opening post, will be lists of the treasure (gp value, xp value, and magic items) in the iconic adventure series of AD&D1, B/ED&D, and D&D3.

NOTE: This thread will contain spoilers for:
AD&D1's _Temple of Elemental Evil, Against the Giants, Descent to the Depths of the Earth, Vault of the Drow,_ and _Queen of the Demonweb Pit_.
D&D3's _Sunless Citadel, Forge of Fury, Speaker In Dreams, Standing Stones, Heart of Nightfang Spire, Lord of the Iron Fortress,_ and _Bastion of Broken Souls_.
B/ED&D's _The Keep on the Borderlands, The Isle of Dread,_ and others.

I will probably be adding data from other classic adventures as well.

-------------------------------

The layout of the data:

*Party begins at:* This is the level (and xp) that the party of adventurers begin the adventure module. For the "adventure path" modules, the levels (and xp) will carry over from one adventure in the series to the next.

*Total gp value:* This is the total value of items that had a value listed for them in the adventure module (usually coins*, gems, and jewelry). It does not include the value of mundane armor, weapons, and equipment taken from fallen foes.

*Total xp value:* This is the total value of enemies and/or challenges that had a xp value or CR. For AD&D1 and B/ED&D, it includes the standard 1gp = 1xp. But this will not include xp for using or selling the magic items (an AD&D1 rule only). It also does not include the 5-10% bonus xp for having a prime requisite ability score above 12-15. Although this means the AD&D1 and B/ED&D xp values will not be as high as they could be in actual play, these extra xp are too variable to include in this data list.

*Total magic treasure:* This includes magic items listed as treasure in the module. It does not include non-treasure magic items, like what the captain of the guard in the town might have, or things that might have a magical effect but what can't be taken by the PCs.

*Party finishes at:* This is the level (and xp) that the partyof adventurers come out of the adventure module.

-------------------------------

AD&D1 and B/ED&D rules and adventures expected a larger party of adventurers than D&D3 assumes. (Some AD&D1 and B/ED&D adventures expected/suggested as many as 10 PCs.) For these adventures I'm using 6 PCs in my calculations because: 
*1*- In my experience, with several groups through the years, I've never seen more than 6 PCs regularly in a game
*2*- WotC did research in the late 90s to find out what the normal average was for most game groups, and their data showed 4 PCs were the average (3-5).** 

For AD&D1 parties***: a fighter, paladin, cleric, magic-user, illusionist, and thief. 
For B/ED&D parties***: a fighter, cleric, magic-user, thief, elf, and dwarf.****

To compare the leveling rates between the older editions and the current edition, I'll use these D&D3 PCs:
D&D3 to AD&D1 comparison party: a fighter, paladin, cleric, wizard, illusionist, and rogue.
D&D3 to B/ED&D comparison party: a fighter, cleric, wizard, rogue, fighter/wizard, and fighter

D&D3 rules and adventures expect only 4 PCs. So for D&D3 adventure modules, I'll use: a fighter, cleric, wizard, and rogue.



* AD&D1 coinage was 1 gp = 20 sp = 200 cp = 1/5 pp.
   B/ED&D coinage was 1 gp = 10 sp = 100 cp = 1/5 pp.
   D&D3 coinage is 1 gp = 10 sp = 100 cp = 1/10 pp.

**It seems that Gygax and TSR based their "large party" assumption on their personal experiences (like EGG sometimes having upwards of 20 Players at his table at one time) and tournament gatherings (having 6-9 Players in a game) rather than on market sample information of actual home games (which reports say they had none).

*** The various classes in AD&D1 and B/ED&D used different xp charts, so I chose 6 different classes to show how they level up at the different rates.

**** In B/ED&D, the elf, dwarf, and halfling were classes as well as races. Elves were essentially fighter/magic-users; dwarves and halflings were essentially just fighters. Since halflings had a level cap at 8th, I chose to drop them from the list of characters here. (Elves capped at 10th, and dwarves capped at 12th.)

-------------------------------

I hope you find this data as interesting as I have found it. I'll start with the beginning adventures of the respective iconic "adventure path" series.

Quasqueton


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## Quasqueton

*AD&D1 - The Village of Hommlet - The Moathouse*

The iconic first adventure for AD&D1.


> *The Village of Hommlet - The Moathouse* by E. Gary Gygax
> 
> *AD&D1 party begins at:* (0 xp each)
> Fighter 1
> Paladin 1
> Cleric 1
> Magic-User 1
> Illusionist 1
> Thief 1
> 
> *D&D3 party begins at:* (0 xp each)
> Fighter 1
> Paladin 1
> Cleric 1
> Wizard 1
> Illusionist 1
> Rogue 1
> 
> 
> *Total gp value:* 30,938 gp
> 
> *Total xp value:*
> AD&D1: 38,148 xp (not including the xp value of using or selling magic items, nor the 10% bonus for ability scores over 15)
> D&D3: 25,548 xp
> 
> *Total magic treasure:*
> +1 plate mail armor
> +1 arrows (x4)
> staff of striking
> phylactery of action
> potion of undead control
> scroll of protection from undead
> magic-user scroll spells: push, stinking cloud, fly
> 
> 
> *AD&D1 party finishes at:* (6,358 xp each)
> Fighter 3
> Paladin 3
> Cleric 4
> Magic-User 3
> Illusionist 3
> Thief 4
> 
> *D&D3 party finishes at:* (4,258 xp each)
> Fighter 3
> Paladin 3
> Cleric 3
> Wizard 3
> Illusionist 3
> Rogue 3



So the AD&D1 party averages level 3.33, and the D&D3 party averages level 3.

Quasqueton


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## Quasqueton

*BD&D - The Keep on the Borderlands - Caves of Chaos*

Now the iconic first adventure for BD&D.


> *The Keep on the Borderlands – Caves of Chaos* by E. Gary Gygax
> 
> *BD&D party begins at:* (0 xp)
> Fighter 1
> Cleric 1
> Magic-User 1
> Thief 1
> Elf 1
> Dwarf 1
> 
> *D&D3 party begins at:* (0 xp)
> Fighter 1
> Cleric 1
> Wizard 1
> Rogue 1
> Fighter/Wizard 0/1 or 1/0
> Fighter 1
> 
> *Total gp value:* 29,852 gp
> 
> *Total xp value:*
> BD&D: 36,057 xp
> D&D3: 72,975 xp
> 
> *Total magic items:*
> shield +1 (x3)
> potion of healing (x4)
> scroll of fireball
> hand axe +1 (x2)
> rope of climbing
> arrow +1 (x6)
> potion of invisibility
> scroll of cure light wounds, hold person
> potion of poison
> wand of paralyzation (7 charges)
> scroll of protection from undead (x2)
> spear +1
> staff of healing
> plate mail +1 (x2)
> potion of gaseous form (x2)
> potion of growth
> sword -1 cursed
> elven boots
> snake staff
> scroll of detect magic, hold person, silence 15' radius
> sword +2
> helm of alignment change
> wand of enemy detection (9 charges)
> potion of stone to flesh (x6)
> amulet of protection from turning (x28)
> amulet of protection from good (x6)
> 
> *BD&D party finishes at:* (6,010 xp each)
> Fighter 3
> Cleric 4
> Magic-User 3
> Thief 4
> Elf 2
> Dwarf 3
> 
> *D&D3 party finishes at:* (12,162 xp each)
> Fighter 5
> Cleric 5
> Wizard 5
> Rogue 5
> Fighter/Wizard 2/3 or 3/2
> Fighter 5



So the BD&D party averages level 3.2, and the D&D3 party averages level 5.

Quasqueton


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## Quasqueton

*D&D3 - The Sunless Citadel*

And the iconic first adventure for D&D3.


> *The Sunless Citadel* by Bruce R. Cordell
> 
> *Party begins at:* (0 xp each)
> Fighter 1
> Cleric 1
> Wizard 1
> Rogue 1
> 
> 
> *Total gp value:* 2,336 gp
> 
> *Total xp value:* 19,700 xp
> 
> *Total magic treasure:*
> +1 morning star
> wand of entangle (13 charges)
> +1 shatterspike longsword
> +1 crossbow bolt (x2)
> Night Caller whistle (special)
> Quaal's feather token (tree)
> everburning torch
> everburning candle
> divine scroll spells: command, cure light wounds, inflict light wounds, magic stone, faerie fire, entangle, slow poison
> arcane scroll spells: mage armor, spider climb, knock, pyrotechnics
> potions: fire breath, endure elements (fire), cure light wounds (x4), cat's grace, protection from elements
> 
> 
> *Party finishes at:* (4,925 xp each)
> Fighter 3
> Cleric 3
> Wizard 3
> Rogue 3



Ends exactly where it says it will.

Quasqueton


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## Quasqueton

I'll be adding more over the next days and weeks. I'm having to recompile my notes since the Great ENWorld Forums Crash of '06. I was really hoping the tech-admins would get the lost data recollected so I wouldn't have to go through all this again. But, oh well. I have the data still, but I must reformat it for posting in an intelligible form  

Quasqueton


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## Quasqueton

*AD&D1 - The Temple of Elemental Evil - The Last Tower and Upper Rubble*

Continuing the AD&D1 adventure path.


> *The Temple of Elemental Evil - The Last Tower and Upper Rubble* by E. Gary Gygax
> 
> *AD&D1 party begins at:* (6,358 xp each)
> Fighter 3
> Paladin 3
> Cleric 4
> Magic-User 3
> Illusionist 3
> Thief 4
> 
> *D&D3 party begins at:* (4,258 xp each)
> Fighter 3
> Paladin 3
> Cleric 3
> Wizard 3
> Illusionist 3
> Rogue 3
> 
> 
> *Total gp value:* 7,079 gp
> 
> *Total xp value:*
> AD&D1: 10,329 xp (not not including the xp value of using or selling magic items, nor the 10% bonus for ability scores over 15)
> D&D3: 9,450 xp
> 
> *Total magic treasure:*
> +1 longsword
> +2 shield
> +1 arrows (x9)
> cloak of elvenkind
> potions: healing, speed, extra healing, water breathing
> 
> 
> *AD&D1 party continues at:* (8,079 xp each)
> Fighter 4
> Paladin 3
> Cleric 4
> Magic-User 3
> Illusionist 3
> Thief 4
> 
> *D&D3 party continues at:* (5,833 xp each)
> Fighter 3
> Paladin 3
> Cleric 3
> Wizard 3
> Illusionist 3
> Rogue 3



The AD&D1 party averages level 3.5, and the D&D3 party averages level 3.

Quasqueton


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## Quasqueton

*AD&D1 - The Temple of Elemental Evil - Dungeon Levels 1 and 2*

Continuing the AD&D1 adventure path.


> *The Temple of Elemental Evil - Dungeon Levels 1 and 2* by E. Gary Gygax
> 
> *Dungeon Level 1*
> 
> *Total gp value:* 29,686 gp
> 
> *Total xp value:*
> AD&D1: 42,855 xp (not not including the xp value of using or selling magic items, nor the 10% bonus for ability scores over 15)
> D&D3: 53,550 xp
> 
> *Total magic treasure:*
> +3 crossbow bolt (x1)
> +2 chainmail armor
> +2 dagger
> +1 shield
> +1 morning star
> +1 ring mail armor
> +1 battle axe
> +1 mace
> +1 cloak of protection
> +1 ring of protection
> ring of shooting stars
> rope of climbing
> stone of weight (cursed item)
> elfin chainmail (technically, not magic)
> wand of paralyzation (38 charges)
> scroll of protection from undead
> jars of Keoghtam's ointment (x3)
> javelin of lightning (probably used by enemy)
> potions: healing (x3), speed, dimunition
> scroll of protection from earth elementals
> cleric scroll spells: animate dead, prayer
> 
> 
> *AD&D1 party continues at:* (15,221 xp each)
> Fighter 4
> Paladin 4
> Cleric 5
> Magic-User 4
> Illusionist 4
> Thief 5
> 
> *D&D3 party continues at:* (14,758 xp each)
> Fighter 5
> Paladin 5
> Cleric 5
> Wizard 5
> Illusionist 5
> Rogue 5
> 
> 
> *Dungeon Level 2*
> 
> *Total gp value:* 105,084 gp
> 
> *Total xp value:*
> AD&D1: 145,902 xp (not including the xp value of using or selling magic items, nor the 10% bonus for ability scores over 15)
> D&D3: 69,684 xp (does not include xp for 1 drelb, and 1 sumonster -- I do not have CRs for these creatures)
> 
> *Total magic treasure:*
> +3 longsword frostbrand, (intelligent, Lawful Good, detect evil, detect magic, detect shifting walls and rooms, levitation)
> +2 warhammer
> +2 chainmail
> +2 ring of protection
> +2 broadsword
> +2 shield
> +2 cloak of protection
> +1 longsword flametongue
> +1 shortsword, +3 vs. lycanthropes and shapechangers
> +1 plate mail armor
> +1 banded mail armor
> +1 shield
> +1 dagger (x2)
> +1 chainmail armor
> +1 cloak of protection
> +1 mace
> +1 ring of protection
> +1 short sword
> +1 leather armor
> rod of smiting
> dagger of venom
> bag of holding (100# version)
> ring of free action
> ring of fire resistance (x3)
> necklace of adaptation
> rope of entanglement
> cloak of the manta ray
> gargoyle cloak (x4)
> trident of yearning
> potions: invisibility, healing, extra healing, poison, water breathing, fire resistance (x2)
> scroll of protection from devils
> scroll of protection from elements
> scroll of protection from lycanthropes
> continual light gems (several)
> cleric scroll spells: dispel magic, flame strike, tongues, resist fire, neutralize poison, true seeing, purify food and drink, flame strike, part water, control weather
> magic-user scroll spells: friends, magic missile, knock, mirror image, web, slow, rary's mnemonic enhancer
> illusionist scroll spell: misdirection
> 
> 
> *AD&D1 party finishes at:* (39,538 xp each)
> Fighter 6
> Paladin 5
> Cleric 6
> Magic-User 5 (99% of 6)
> Illusionist 6
> Thief 6
> 
> *D&D3 party finishes at:* (26,372 xp each)
> Fighter 7
> Paladin 7
> Cleric 7
> Wizard 7
> Illusionist 7
> Rogue 7



The AD&D1 party averages level 5.7, and the D&D party averages level 7.

Can someone tell me the CR for a drelb and a sumonster? I don't know what book(s) they may be in.

Note: If we assume that each of the AD&D1 characters had a 16 in their prime requisite ability score (Strength for fighters, Intelligence for magic-users, etc.), the AD&D1 party would be:

*AD&D1 party finishes at:* (43,492 xp each)
Fighter 6
Paladin 5
Cleric 6
Magic-User 6
Illusionist 6 (illusionists cannot get a bonus for high ability scores)
Thief 7

Averaging level 6 (the magic-user and thief gained a level).

If I were to add in the xp for the magic items, the level would go even higher.

Quasqueton


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## Hussar

Well, this should bring things out of the woodwork again.

I would just like to say thanks to Quasqueton for this.  While this may not be definitive, it's at least a fair bit better than saying, "Well in my game..."


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## Quasqueton

*AD&D1 - The Temple of Elemental Evil - Dungeon Levels 3 and 4*

Continuing the AD&D1 adventure path.


> *The Temple of Elemental Evil - Dungeon Levels 3 and 4* by E. Gary Gygax
> 
> *Dungeon Level 3*
> 
> *AD&D1 party begins at:* (39,538 xp each)
> Fighter 6
> Paladin 5
> Cleric 6
> Magic-User 5 (99% of 6)
> Illusionist 6
> Thief 6
> 
> *D&D3 party begins at:* (26,372 xp each)
> Fighter 7
> Paladin 7
> Cleric 7
> Wizard 7
> Illusionist 7
> Rogue 7
> 
> 
> *Total gp value:* 183,279 gp (plus 9 random gems and 2 random jewelry)
> 
> *Total xp value:*
> AD&D1: 229,744 xp (not including the xp value of using or selling magic items, nor the 10% bonus for ability scores over 15)
> D&D3: 47,203 xp (does not include xp for 2 leucrotta -- I do not have a CR for these creatures)
> 
> *Total magic treasure:*
> +3 periapt of proof against poison
> +3 crossbow bolts (x5)
> +2 javelin
> +2 shield
> +2 spear, backbiter
> +1 chainmail
> +1 shield
> +1 battle axe
> +1 short sword (x2)
> +1 longbow
> +1 leather armor
> elfin chainmail (technically, not magical)
> crossbow of speed (missing string)
> bracers of defense AC 6 [+4 AC] (x2)
> belt of holding (special)
> boots of elvenkind (small)
> cloak of elvenkind
> expanding/shrinking storage box (special)
> rod of protection against turning and control (special)
> cloak of poisonousness
> necklace with one pebble evoking an Otiluke's freezing sphere (special)
> ring of delusion (seems like x-ray vision)
> tome of leadership and influence
> vacuous grimoire
> ebony fly
> crystal hypnosis ball
> ring of invisibility
> mirror of mental prowess
> wand of lightning (5-50 charges)
> wand of wonder (50 charges)
> potions: plant control, red dragon control, hill giant strength, dimunition, healing, delusion (seems like treasure finding), speed, ESP, flying, sweetwater, polymorphing
> scroll of protection from undead
> scroll of protection from magic
> magic-user scroll spells: spider-climb, levitate, infravision, extension I, gust of wind, tongues, polymorph self, remove curse, airy water, limited wish, magic mouth, fly, charm person, polymorph other, (7 random spells)
> magic-user's spell book with 97 spell levels (up to 5th)
> cleric scroll spells: animate dead, raise dead, restoration
> incense of meditation (x6)
> 
> 
> *AD&D1 party continues at:* (77,829 xp each)
> Fighter 7
> Paladin 6
> Cleric 7
> Magic-User 7
> Illusionist 7
> Thief 8
> 
> *D&D3 party continues at:* (34,239 xp each)
> Fighter 8
> Paladin 8
> Cleric 8
> Wizard 8
> Illusionist 8
> Rogue 8
> 
> 
> *Dungeon Level 4*
> 
> *Total gp value:* 450,751 gp
> 
> *Total xp value:*
> AD&D1: 504,835 xp (not including the xp value of using or selling magic items, nor the 10% bonus for ability scores over 15)
> D&D3: 42,066 xp
> 
> *Total magic treasure:*
> +3 plate mail
> +3 shield
> +3 sling stone (permanent)
> +2 hammer
> +2 shield
> +2 ring of protection
> +1 plate mail
> bracers of defense AC 3 [+7 AC]
> bracers of defense AC 4 [+6 AC]
> staff of striking
> ebony fly (cursed after 7 uses)
> stone of controlling earth elementals
> potions: extra healing (x2), speed (x2), healing, growth, (29 random), flying, polymorphing, climbing, invisibility
> boots of levitation
> ring of fire resistance
> rope of entanglement
> portable hole
> cloak of poisonousness
> mirror of lifetrapping (1 compartment)
> ring of featherfall
> book of vile darkness
> ring of free action
> rod of smiting
> Daern's instant fortress
> wand of fear (unknown charges)
> wand of ice storms (42 charges)
> wand of fire (unknown charges)
> wand of metal command (21 charges)
> half a candle of invocation
> candle of invocation (chaotic evil)
> Magic-user spellbook with 20 spell levels (up to 2nd)
> Magic-user spellbook with 69 spell levels (up to 5th)
> cleric scroll spells: silence 15' radius (x2), dispel magic (x2), cure critical wounds (x2), flamestrike (x2), slay living (x2)
> 
> 
> *AD&D1 party finishes at:* (161,968 xp each)
> Fighter 8
> Paladin 7
> Cleric 8
> Magic-User 9
> Illusionist 9
> Thief 10
> 
> *D&D3 party finishes at:* (41,250 xp eachl)
> Fighter 9
> Paladin 9
> Cleric 9
> Wizard 9
> Illusionist 9
> Rogue 9



The AD&D1 party averages level 8.5, and the D&D3 party averages level 9. .5 level difference. The AD&D1 thief has reached "name level".

Can someone tell me the CR of a leucrotta?

If we add in the 10% bonus for prime requisite ability score(s) above 15, only the paladin would gain a level.

Quasqueton


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## Quasqueton

The above finishes the main objective of the Temple of Elemental Evil adventure. There is more to the adventure: explore the elemental nodes, then destroy the Golden Orb of Death, and/or kill the demoness Zuggtmoy. As the text of the adventure states:







> The fourth level of the dungeon is the true climax of the whole campaign. . . .
> The anticlimax comes when the party finally reaches the portion of the third level wherein Zuggtmoy is bound.



The above data does not include the seperated "prison" section of the dungeons. The ways of getting to that area are very limited, and the party could wipe out the entire temple forces and never know it is there -- the high priests don't even know Zuggtmoy is there.

The elemental nodes are huge, and encounters are strictly on a random wandering monster basis. The text even states that exploring the nodes can be a full campaign in itself.

The party could consider the sacking of the 4th level of the dungeon the end of the adventure, and they would not be wrong. Exploring the nodes, assembling the Golden Orb of Death, destroying the orb, and killing the demoness are superfluous at this point.

So, for this data, I am calling the ToEE complete. Next, the AD&D1 and D&D3 parties will be moving on the Giants series.

Quasqueton


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## Quasqueton

Observations I've made based on the data: 

Magic items were not rarer in AD&D1 than they are in D&D3. In fact, by the same levels, a party will probably have quite a bit more magic in AD&D1 than in D&D3. But D&D3 allows the PCs to tailor and customize their magic items to better suit their needs. An AD&D1 fighter may have a +1 broadsword, a +1 spear, a +1 handaxe, and a +2 dagger at 5th level, but the D&D3 fighter might have his preferred +2 greatsword at 5th level. (A quantity vs. quality issue?)

And especially things like potions and scrolls. Note how the poor AD&D1 illusionist in this data doesn't find a scroll until about 6th level, and it has only one spell. A D&D3 spellcaster can have a handful of chosen spell scrolls by 3rd level, either by purchasing them or scribing them personally. But AD&D1 spellcasters just got what they found.

The D&D3 characters are not leveling up appreciably faster than the AD&D1 characters. I suspect that what many people remember as very slow leveling in AD&D1 is a result of DMs not including as much treasure in their campaigns as the official adventures (and the rules as written) include (and assume). For instance, an official adventure might have 1,000xp worth of monsters and then 9,000gp as treasure (for a total 10,000xp). But an individual DM's adventure may have 1,000xp worth of monsters and only 2,000gp as treasure (for a total 3,000xp). Thus leveling was slowed greatly. But this is an effect of the DM, not the rules.

I remember doing this when I ran an AD&D1 game. It was not my intention to slow advancement, but thinking back on it now, that was a byproduct of my style.

Anyone else's experience support this? 

Quasqueton


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## AdmundfortGeographer

Quasqueton said:
			
		

> Anyone else's experience support this?



My own DMing practice was to dish out 10% of the treasure value as XP, rather than a 1-to-1 equivalent. I may have dished out treasure less than 3e standard practice, but I don't think it was noticibly lower...

Very interesting experiment, I'm interested in seeing more results of the D&D3 vs. B/ED&D comparisons.


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## Gentlegamer

Quasqueton said:
			
		

> **It seems that Gygax and TSR based their "large party" assumption on their personal experiences (like EGG sometimes having upwards of 20 Players at his table at one time) and tournament gatherings (having 6-9 Players in a game) rather than on market sample information of actual home games (which reports say they had none).



You mean on actual first hand playtest experience. Gygax also had many sessions where only one high level character participated, but such a character was seldom alone. Henchmen, hirelings, and followers fill out the rest of the party number even if fewer players are there.


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## T. Foster

No henchmen in the 1E party soaking up XP and excess magic items? No characters having to eat excess XP because they stop gaining XP once they have enough to go up a level (this makes a big difference in the moathouse, where almost all of the characters will have to eat a huge chunk of XP after defeating Lareth and gaining his treasure)? No characters dying and having to restart at level 1? Are you decreasing the XP awards for overmatched encounters as instructed in the DMG? I've run T1-4 through from beginning to the end (or, rather, to the same place you did -- not including the Nodes or the sub-level) twice (and T1 alone several more times) and neither time were the characters anywhere near the levels you have shown at the end; they averaged about level 6 with only the thieves at level 7. Of course they didn't kill every single monster or recover every single piece of treasure, either...


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## Odhanan

Thanks Quasqueton. That's all very interesting data to look at.


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## Hussar

T. Foster - I would point out three things.  Firstly, Quasqueton didn't include ANY xp for selling magic items.  Any lost xp would be more than made up by this.  How much is a crystal ball worth for example?  Secondly, he also didn't include the 10% bonus for high stats - something which at least some of the PC's may have had.  Thirdly, since the kill xp is SO COMPLETELY overshadowed by gold xp, that any adjustment there would be meaningless.

I mean, look at the totals by the end of Dungeon Level 4 - 450 k gp and total xp of 550 k.  FOUR TIMES as much xp comes from gold as from kills.  You could likely drop 50% of the kill xp and it would make no difference.


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## T. Foster

Hussar said:
			
		

> T. Foster - I would point out three things.  Firstly, Quasqueton didn't include ANY xp for selling magic items.  Any lost xp would be more than made up by this.  How much is a crystal ball worth for example?




Granted, but note that in order to get XP for selling a magic item you must do so immediately -- if you use for awhile and then sell it later you don't get any XP for the gold (you get XP for the item, which I'm pretty sure _was_ included in the calculations). Also, I think you and Quasqueton are both seriously underestimating the amount of XP a party of 1E characters will eat in the Moathouse. When they encounter Lareth the Beautiful a party is likely to all still be 1st level (with perhaps only a thief having gained enough XP for 2nd level -- but even so he might not have enough gold to pay the training costs and therefore may be "stuck" at 1st level, despite technically having enough XP for 2nd); upon defeating Lareth they'll get a _ton_ of gold and XP, enough, as Q's calculations show, to theoretically get them to 3rd-4th level, but they'll have to eat the majority of it and only increase to 2nd level (possibly 3rd for the thief). I've run this module at least 5 separate times and it's _always_ turned out this way. I've _never_ seen a party achieve 3rd-4th level characters by clearing the Moathouse -- because so much of the treasure/xp is concentrated in a single encounter I don't think it's even _possible_.



> Secondly, he also didn't include the 10% bonus for high stats - something which at least some of the PC's may have had.




True, but with 1E's geometric XP progression at low levels that 10% bonus doesn't make all that big a difference, level-wise -- Q noted the spots where including the 10% bonus would've pushed a character to the next higher level.



> Thirdly, since the kill xp is SO COMPLETELY overshadowed by gold xp, that any adjustment there would be meaningless.
> 
> I mean, look at the totals by the end of Dungeon Level 4 - 450 k gp and total xp of 550 k.  FOUR TIMES as much xp comes from gold as from kills.  You could likely drop 50% of the kill xp and it would make no difference.




The proportional difficulty adjustments apply to treasure XP as well as monster XP. I agree, though, that this isn't likely to make as much difference as "wasted" XP at leveling up (especially in T1), henchmen serving as XP sinks (they count as a full character for purposes of dividing XP, but they only get half the XP and the rest is "lost"), and characters dying and being replaced by new characters with 0 XP. 

I'm not bringing this up to try to denigrate Q's effort in doing these calculations, and I agree that they're very interesting, I'm just pointing out that because of all these complicating factors I don't think totalling up the XP value of all the monsters in the module, totaling up the XP value of all the treasure in the module, dividing by the number of characters, and comparing the result to the XP charts is likely to provide an accurate "real world" feel for where a party will be XP/level-wise be at the end of a 1E module. I've tried doing this (with my own home-brew adventures, mostly) and I know that in practice it doesn't work. That Q's calculations place a party at 3rd-4th level at the end of T1 and 8th-10th level and the "end" of T1-4 when my actual play experience from multiple runs of both places them at more like 2nd-3rd and 5th-7th* respectively supports this contention.

*the module says it will take characters from level 1-8, but that assumes the party will at least explore the Elemental Nodes and possibly confront Zuggtmoy as well, whereas both times I've run it (and in Q's calculation) we stopped after Dungeon Level 4, which explains why my results lag behind what the module itself promises.


----------



## The Shaman

Post deleted...I'm not going to waste my time with this any more than I already have.


----------



## Numion

T. Foster said:
			
		

> The proportional difficulty adjustments apply to treasure XP as well as monster XP. I agree, though, that this isn't likely to make as much difference as "wasted" XP at leveling up (especially in T1), henchmen serving as XP sinks (they count as a full character for purposes of dividing XP, but they only get half the XP and the rest is "lost"), and characters dying and being replaced by new characters with 0 XP.




We never had henchmen in our AD&D game. I don't remember the reason, but even what you posted would've been reason enough.


----------



## Quasqueton

I don’t want to argue personal experiences, but I do want to address some of the factual issues brought up.


> Granted, but note that in order to get XP for selling a magic item you must do so immediately



That must have been your house rule.

"Any magic item not identified brought no experience to the one possessing it. Once it was IDed and usable, then it could be sold or retained and the XPs awarded accordingly." -- E. Gary Gygax



> (you get XP for the item, which I'm pretty sure was included in the calculations)



No xp from magic items, at all, was included in the data calculations. Notice the note, “_not including the xp value of using or selling magic items_” after every xp award listing.



> The proportional difficulty adjustments apply to treasure XP as well as monster XP.



To use this rule (which in my personal experience, as a DM and a Player, was never used), the DM must add up all the hit dice of every enemy defeated in the adventure, divide by the number of creatures to get the average HD level. Then divide this number by the average level of the adventurers involved in the adventure. If you get a fraction less than 1, that is the fraction of xp the adventurers get; if the fraction is greater than 1, the adventurers get full normal xp. (It is my understanding that this rule only applies to monster xp, not to gp xp.) That’s a heck of a lot of calculations for a DM to figure, just to award xp at the end of a game session. I have never known a DM to do this, and it is not something that I can easily do for this data.

Any xp that might be lost through this “proportional difficulty adjustment” can be more than made up for by adding in the magic item xp (for using or for selling). A +1 sword (for example) is worth 400 xp to the character using it, or it can be sold for 2,000 gp which would be translated to 2,000 xp for the whole party.

So, for example, the Moathouse magic treasure is worth 9,600 xp if used (more than the total monster xp), or 33,800 gp/xp if sold (over 4 times the total monster xp). Selling the items increases the xp award from 38,148 xp to 71,948 xp.

The Dungeon Level 1 (ToEE) magic treasure is worth 12,610 xp if used (559 xp short of the total monster xp), or 76,400 gp/xp if sold (almost 6 times the total monster xp). Selling the items increases the xp award from 42,855 xp to 119,255 xp!

[If it is necessary for me to add up the “proportional difficulty adjustment” and add in the magic item xp (for use or sell), I will do so, for absolute completeness. But having looked at the data and the rules, I guarantee you that the AD&D1 party will get more xp from the extra calculations. I believe and would bet that the AD&D1 party would actually gain a level (if not more than one).]


_The Temple of Elemental Evil_ adventure stated that it will/can take adventurers from 1st to 8th level, and this it does. The elemental nodes and killing Zuggtmoy is superfluous, and the module says as much.

Again, I don’t mean to challenge anyone’s personal experiences. I’m only presenting data straight from the adventure books, according to the rule books. A group’s and a DM’s play style can alter the game results, for both good and bad, for faster advancement and slower, for more treasure and for less. But I can’t measure play style, I can only present the data as it appears and runs straight out of the books.

Quasqueton


----------



## Garnfellow

Quasqueton said:
			
		

> To use this rule (which in my personal experience, as a DM and a Player, was never used), the DM must add up all the hit dice of every enemy defeated in the adventure, divide by the number of creatures to get the average HD level. Then divide this number by the average level of the adventurers involved in the adventure. If you get a fraction less than 1, that is the fraction of xp the adventurers get; if the fraction is greater than 1, the adventurers get full normal xp. (It is my understanding that this rule only applies to monster xp, not to gp xp.) That’s a heck of a lot of calculations for a DM to figure, just to award xp at the end of a game session. I have never known a DM to do this, and it is not something that I can do for this data.




I did use this rule for a while, but eventually dropped it -- not because it was a pain in the butt (although it was), but because it was a pain in the butt AND with exponentially increasing XP thresholds, quite nearly meaningless. The adjustments almost always were not worth the effort.


----------



## Gentlegamer

Are probabilities that characters are drained of levels by AD&D and BD&D undead factored in the experience point/level considerations?


----------



## (Psi)SeveredHead

I've never played 1e.

I wonder why 2e treasure values are never included in these threads.


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## Hussar

(Psi)SeveredHead said:
			
		

> I've never played 1e.
> 
> I wonder why 2e treasure values are never included in these threads.




Lack of decent source material?


----------



## Quasqueton

In all of the Moathouse and the Temple of Elemental Evil, there is not one level-draining undead. (This really surprised me when I realized it.) In the Caves of Chaos, there is 1 wight.

I would hope that everyone can understand that variables like “did anyone get level drained,” “did anyone die and have to start over,” “did a new player come in with a 1st-level character,” “did the DM play the monsters to their full potential,” etc. cannot be calculated in a data list like this. The fact that some people have asked about it says that not everyone understands this concept.

Maybe the party TPKed against Lareth at the end of the Moathouse adventure, and so they have to start with new 1st-level characters going into the Temple.

Maybe all but one PC died, and the one survivor got all the xp for himself.

Maybe the DM decided to run some side adventures between the Moathouse and the Temple, and so the characters actually went into the temple for the first time at 8th level.

Maybe the DM had the Players create new characters at 3rd level for play through the Moathouse.

Maybe the group had 10 PCs. Maybe the group had 2 PCs.

Maybe the group decided to play a different game half way through the adventure, and these characters never actually made it to the finish.

If anyone needs more incalculable variables, I can come up with more. If anyone thinks that the potential existence of such variables invalidates the yardstick this data is marking, then there’s nothing in this thread for you. I’m not saying this data is absolute; it is just the best estimate of a real outcome using actual data from the books themselves.

Quasqueton


----------



## jcfiala

I think this is a very interesting thread.  I'm curious what data you calculated for 'Against the Giants'


----------



## T. Foster

Quasqueton said:
			
		

> a lot of stuff




OK, so you're not factoring difficulties but you're also not including XP for magic items. Fair enough trade off, and I'll grant that the latter should at least counterbalance the former. I notice that you still didn't address the issue of wasted excess XP (i.e. if a character has 1,000 XP going into the adventure, needs 1,501 XP to attain 2nd level, and gains 10,000 XP from the adventure (which, going straight by the chart, would be enough to put him at 4th level) he only gets 501 XP (enough to hit 2nd level) and stops there, and the remaining 9,499 XP are lost/wasted) which _does_ make a difference, but, y'know, whatever. Maybe no one you knew growing up used that rule either. It's your "study" so I guess you can apply whatever rules and assumptions you want.


----------



## Quasqueton

Noting the snide comments directed at me, I’ll still try to address the questions asked.



> OK, so you're not factoring difficulties but you're also not including XP for magic items.



”Difficulties”? Something other than overcoming the monsters and such? What are you meaning?



> I notice that you still didn't address the issue of wasted excess XP (i.e. if a character has 1,000 XP going into the adventure, needs 1,501 XP to attain 2nd level, and gains 10,000 XP from the adventure (which, going straight by the chart, would be enough to put him at 4th level) he only gets 501 XP (enough to hit 2nd level) and stops there, and the remaining 9,499 XP are lost/wasted) which does make a difference,



First, it is my understanding that the xp would only stop one point short of the *second* level, not at the absolute bottom of the immediate next level. So, in your example, the character would go up to 3,000 (1 short of the amount [3,001] needed for 3rd level). [It was a common D&D gag to talk about killing a rat back at the inn after the adventure so you could get that 1 more xp needed to level again.]

Secondly, note that other than the initial Moathouse adventure, the PCs don’t gain more than one character level per “dungeon level”. And even more, I doubt the PCs would clear a whole dungeon level in one [~4-hour] game session, so a windfall of xp all at one time is not likely, and is not seen in the data I’ve laid out.

Thirdly, if this was an issue, how would someone taking such data work around this? Should I be figuring and mapping how far the hypothetical party might get in a game session, and then figure up the xp for that game session?


I’ve not listed the data in any game session grouping. Going from 1st level to 8th level is not accomplished in 4 game sessions (the number of posts I’ve made with the data). The Moathouse, the Last Tower and Upper Ruins, Dungeon Level 1, Level 2, Level 3, and Level 4 (6 “dungeon levels”, hundreds of encounter areas) could well take 40 game sessions (over 10-12 months Real Time) to get through. The PCs would be getting xp in small or moderate sized chunks (gaining a level every 5-6 game sessions), not in one big 10,000 xp wave.



> but, y'know, whatever. Maybe no one you knew growing up used that rule either. It's your "study" so I guess you can apply whatever rules and assumptions you want.



Actually, my serious groups all did use the rule of no more than one level at a time (not that we ever came close to more than one level at a time, anyway). I did meet kids who claimed to gain levels in leaps and bounds, but that didn’t happen in my games.

Now maybe I’m reading these posts incorrectly, but it seems to me that there is a strong undercurrent of disbelief about the data. Instead of asking questions and pointing things out to make sure I’m taking all reasonable things into account, it reads like some are trying to poke holes in the data and/or cast aspersions on my honesty. I’m wondering why.

Is it unbelievable that AD&D1 and D&D3 characters might gain levels at about the same rate, judging from the iconic/official adventure modules? What is the resistance to the data, here? I mean, some of the points being asked about here really seem like stretches. And the subtle hints that I’m making up stuff, ignoring rules, or making unreasonable assumptions seem a little catty. Not that I’m infallible, but I’m not biased on this subject either. (I expected slower AD&D1 advancement and faster D&D3 advancement, too.)

If you stick around for a while, you’ll see that the D&D3 group does eventually pull ahead in the level advancement rate, later. (It happens at around “name level.”) But if you want to work so hard to discredit the data in the beginning, I guess the later data will be dismissed as well.

Quasqueton


----------



## AdmundfortGeographer

T. Foster said:
			
		

> I notice that you still didn't address the issue of wasted excess XP (i.e. if a character has 1,000 XP going into the adventure, needs 1,501 XP to attain 2nd level, and gains 10,000 XP from the adventure (which, going straight by the chart, would be enough to put him at 4th level) he only gets 501 XP (enough to hit 2nd level) and stops there, and the remaining 9,499 XP are lost/wasted) which _does_ make a difference, but, y'know, whatever. Maybe no one you knew growing up used that rule either.



 Did you see many examples in the experiment above that this would have been applied?

And I don't think you are reading that rule right.  Or else you are also saying that a character that has 1,000 XP going in and needs 1,501 to attain 2nd-level, but gains 602 XP instead only gains 501 XP and stops right there. Is that how you would have played that too?  The way I remember it being played was that the charater would get all XP up to a single point *below* it would take to get 2 levels.







			
				T. Foster said:
			
		

> It's your "study" so I guess you can apply whatever rules and assumptions you want.



Yup, there are those "scare quotes" that are always helpful at subtle innuendo that one doesn't believe something is what it is.  :\


----------



## Quasqueton

As another note, from the original designer himself:


			
				E. Gary Gygax a.k.a. Col_Pladoh said:
			
		

> The number of XPs given to rise a level was initially intuitive, later on based on the play of my campaign group. I think that 52 sessions to reach 10th level is about right if the time per session is about four hours. Longner sessions would reduce the number accordingly.



If getting from 1st to 8th level took 40 game sessions, as I suggested above, (1 level per 5-6 game sessions), they could reach level 10 in about 52 game sessions, just as EGG said was proper in his mind/intention/experience.

The “release notes” from WotC on the reformulating of the D&D xp chart and rate, said that they wanted a group to be able to reach level 20 within 2 years. That would mean the group could reach level 10 in 1 year (52 weekly game sessions). (I’ve heard “2 years” and “18 months”, but I can’t find the information on the WotC Web site right now.)

Comparing these two opinions/intentions, we see that leveling up to level 10 would probably be at about the same rate in both editions. It’s *after* level 10 that we’d see an advancement rate difference.

Also note:


			
				E. Gary Gygax said:
			
		

> If play was intensive dungeon crawling, the 52 play sessions might take up only a few weeks of game time, with several adventure sessions being the continuation of a single day of delving.



Quasqueton


----------



## SWBaxter

Quasqueton said:
			
		

> Can someone tell me the CR of a leucrotta?




There's one in "The Wizard's Amulet", Necromancer Games' first (and free) adventure, they peg it at CR 3. I don't know off-hand if it's appeared anywhere else.

Thanks for working through this comparison, it's pretty interesting. Brings back some fond memories, too.


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## gizmo33

Quasqueton said:
			
		

> Now maybe I’m reading these posts incorrectly, but it seems to me that there is a strong undercurrent of disbelief about the data.




Yea, it doesn't match at all with my experiences.  I'm really surprised you can get to 3rd level from the Moathouse in Hommlet. I remember being shocked at the level advancement in 3E when we started playing it.  

I don't understand why I would have been shocked.  Granted, I used a houserules XP system for many years before 3E.  But I ran plenty of TSR modules and used normal 1E XP rules for years prior to that - you would have thought I would have said "wow - this reminds me of 1E".

I don't have the numbers in front of me - I think the XP awards for killing a bugbear, for instance, would be pretty easy to compare as a % of what a fighter of X level needs for next level.  I really expect the 3E awards to be far higher.

That's not the whole story though, because as you point out, there's a treasure award as well.  I think that's where this is all coming from.  I might still have some old XP sheets from early games (I'm a packrat when it comes to DnD notes).  I'll dig out the modules and have a look at things so you don't feel like the only one that's looked at this.  I never had any doubts about your honesty.


----------



## T. Foster

Quasqueton said:
			
		

> Now maybe I’m reading these posts incorrectly, but it seems to me that there is a strong undercurrent of disbelief about the data. Instead of asking questions and pointing things out to make sure I’m taking all reasonable things into account, it reads like some are trying to poke holes in the data and/or cast aspersions on my honesty. I’m wondering why.
> 
> Is it unbelievable that AD&D1 and D&D3 characters might gain levels at about the same rate, judging from the iconic/official adventure modules? What is the resistance to the data, here? I mean, some of the points being asked about here really seem like stretches. And the subtle hints that I’m making up stuff, ignoring rules, or making unreasonable assumptions seem a little catty. Not that I’m infallible, but I’m not biased on this subject either. (I expected slower AD&D1 advancement and faster D&D3 advancement, too.)
> 
> If you stick around for a while, you’ll see that the D&D3 group does eventually pull ahead in the level advancement rate, later. (It happens at around “name level.”) But if you want to work so hard to discredit the data in the beginning, I guess the later data will be dismissed as well.




I've got no horse in the AD&D1 vs. D&D3 race, I was just surprised that your calculations seemed significantly out of line with my considerable real-world experiences playing these modules, and was trying to pinpoint what might be some of the reasons why. After giving it a bit more thought, and taking your responses to my questions/comments into consideration, I'll admit that given your criteria (a party of 6 characters operating at peak efficiency -- no character deaths, no henchmen sucking up XP, no wasted XP upon leveling, killing every monster and recovering every piece of treasure) your calculations are indeed correct and such a group will be at significantly higher level upon completing the modules than mine were, because none of the groups I ever ran operated at anywhere _near_ "peak efficiency" -- characters died and had to re-start at level 1/0 XP, they had henchmen diluting the XP haul, they were forced to waste XP upon leveling (especially at the end of T1, as noted previously), they didn't kill every monster, and they certainly didn't recover every piece of treasure. 

For the specific purpose of comparing XP/level totals for an AD&D1 and a D&D3 group going through the module at peak efficiency I suppose this methodology works, but to extrapolate to a more general "a party who plays through this module will end at level x, XP y with z amount of gold and magic items a,b,c" type conclusion (which may not have ever been your intention, but it seems like others have been doing so) these calculations don't seem particularly accurate or useful to me. Perhaps if you included a "fudge factor" by assuming the party operates at average, say, 75% efficiency (i.e. they get 75% of the max. possible gold and XP) that would make the numbers more closely match the results I got through actual play, and thus more useful for DMs trying to plot out campaign-arcs using these modules and such...


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## Aaron L

I just love all of the "thats not true, thats unpossible!" responses to the factual evidence presented.  No matter how youre home group or DM decided to play/run the module, this is exactly how they were written, inarguably.    


Everyone looking at 1E through rose tinted nostalgia just cant handle it.  Its giggle inducing.  


(BTW, I LIKE 1E)


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## SWBaxter

gizmo33 said:
			
		

> That's not the whole story though, because as you point out, there's a treasure award as well.




The treasure award is actually most of the story. Not for nothing do people say D&D is about "killing things and taking their stuff" - in 1E, taking their stuff was the major source of XP. Lots of people houseruled the XP system, which I suspect is one of the reasons some people are reporting their memories don't match the facts Quasqueton has posted. Of course, lots of DMs reduced the treasure in those modules, which would also mess with the advancement rate. I personally eventually switched to the "silver standard", which basically meant that experience due to treasure was 1/10th of the listed amount.


----------



## Raven Crowking

I'm waiting for the comparison that demonstrates that characters went from 9th to 20th level as fast in 1e as 3e.  That should be quite an eyeopener.

In addition, the fact that you could not gain enough XP to gain 2 levels before you had trained to gain the first per 1e RAW (the remainder being irrevocably lost) does need to be factored in to determine what the final XP calculations are for modules in 1e.  Ignoring such a significant rules difference will by necessity to skew results.

I could say that person X and person Y both donated $100.00 to a charity, but if I didn't take into account that person X reneged on half the payment, my data would be in extreme variance with reality, especially if it was compounded over a period of regular donations.

RC


----------



## AdmundfortGeographer

Quasqueton said:
			
		

> If you stick around for a while, you’ll see that the D&D3 group does eventually pull ahead in the level advancement rate, later.





			
				Raven Crowking said:
			
		

> I'm waiting for the comparison that demonstrates that characters went from 9th to 20th level as fast in 1e as 3e.  That should be quite an eyeopener.



As Quasqueton said his as yet unpublished results don't show that... I guess you'll be waiting a long time.


----------



## Quasqueton

> Perhaps if you included a "fudge factor" by assuming the party operates at average, say, 75% efficiency (i.e. they get 75% of the max. possible gold and XP)



To humor you...
The parties at 75% "efficiency":

*AD&D1 party finishes ToEE at:* (121,476 xp each)
Fighter 7
Paladin 7
Cleric 8
Magic-User 8
Illusionist 8
Thief 9

*D&D3 party finishes ToEE at:* (30,938 xp eachl)
Fighter 8
Paladin 8
Cleric 8
Wizard 8
Illusionist 8
Rogue 8

The AD&D1 party averages level 7.8, the D&D3 party averages level 8. (And this still does not include xp for magic items.)

Quasqueton


----------



## Quasqueton

> Lots of people houseruled the XP system, which I suspect is one of the reasons some people are reporting their memories don't match the facts Quasqueton has posted. Of course, lots of DMs reduced the treasure in those modules, which would also mess with the advancement rate.



This is what I suggested, too:







			
				Quasqueton said:
			
		

> I suspect that what many people remember as very slow leveling in AD&D1 is a result of DMs not including as much treasure in their campaigns as the official adventures (and the rules as written) include (and assume). For instance, an official adventure might have 1,000xp worth of monsters and then 9,000gp as treasure (for a total 10,000xp). But an individual DM's adventure may have 1,000xp worth of monsters and only 2,000gp as treasure (for a total 3,000xp). Thus leveling was slowed greatly. But this is an effect of the DM, not the rules.
> 
> I remember doing this when I ran an AD&D1 game. It was not my intention to slow advancement, but thinking back on it now, that was a byproduct of my style.



Personally, I removed xp for gp altogether. To make up the difference, I doubled the monster xp. Unfortunately, I didn't really examine just how much xp was expected to come of gp. It wasn't until I started doing this data research that I realized just how much I slowed down level advancement in my AD&D1 game. For removing the xp for gp rule, I should have not just doubled monster xp, but probably quadrupled or quintupled the monster xp.

None of my AD&D1 campaigns ever got characters above 7-8th level. Had I not cut the xp for gp, they might have gotten up much higher. I didn't *want* to slow level advancement -- it was a side effect of trying to take out so much of the monetary treasure from the campaign.

It's an interesting concept -- by reducing the treasure awards of their games, many DMs may have made their games level slowly, against the expectations of the standard rules. And they probably did this without realizing the effect they were making.

It's also an interesting concept that what many people claim was a normal aspect of AD&D1 (slow level advancement) may actually have been an inadvertant, yet artificial construct of a DM's house rules.

It's also an interesting concept that slower advancement is possibly the easiest change to make in a D&D3 campaign.

Quasqueton


----------



## T. Foster

Still higher level than either time I ran it (guess we were at less than 75% efficiency...) but a little closer. I wonder if you factored in the wasted XP from the moathouse and had the characters start the temple proper at level 2 (except for the thief at level 3) if that might not put the party right about where I would expect them to be (level 6-7). 

On the topic of "efficiency" is there a general assumption in D&D3 that a party will kill every possible bad guy and collect every possible piece of treasure in an adventure? Because this certainly isn't the case in AD&D1 (or at least most AD&D1 modules) -- there are red herring encounters designed to waste resources that wise players will try to avoid*, there are 'treasures' that do the same (a party that loads themselves down to the 3" move class trying to glean every last copper and silver piece is setting themselves up to be waylaid by wandering monsters on their way back to the surface), plus 'easter egg' treasures that only the luckiest or most thorough (which, again, is a trade-off -- the longer you spend searching for hidden treasure the more wandering monsters you'll face) parties will ever find. Given all this, 75% efficiency of monsters slain and treasure recovered is probably about the best that can be expected, and the other 25% is just there to tempt the greedy or incautious into overreaching...

*truly wise players will actually seek to avoid combat whenever possible-- or at least get as much treasure with as little fighting as possible. As the calculations show, treasure is where the XP is at in AD&D, and trying to gain XP by killing monsters is a sucker bet. This isn't evidence that the system is broken or that too much treasure is being given out, it's the way the game was designed. OD&D and AD&D1 were fundamentally games about _getting treasure_, and killing monsters, disarming or avoiding traps, and solving puzzles were merely means to that end.


----------



## T. Foster

Quasqueton said:
			
		

> Personally, I removed xp for gp altogether. To make up the difference, I doubled the monster xp. Unfortunately, I didn't really examine just how much xp was expected to come of gp. It wasn't until I started doing this data research that I realized just how much I slowed down level advancement in my AD&D1 game. For removing the xp for gp rule, I should have not just doubled monster xp, but probably quadrupled or quintupled the monster xp.




It's stated explicitly in the Moldvay-edit Basic Set (1981), and probably in the Mentzer-edit Basic Set (1983) as well that characters should receive approx. 80% of their XP from treasure and only 20% from monsters. That's B/E D&D, but I'd imagine the same ratio holds true in AD&D1 as well (especially since AD&D1 gives XP for magic items, while B/E D&D doesn't).


----------



## MerricB

Quasqueton said:
			
		

> First, it is my understanding that the xp would only stop one point short of the *second* level, not at the absolute bottom of the immediate next level. So, in your example, the character would go up to 3,000 (1 short of the amount [3,001] needed for 3rd level). [It was a common D&D gag to talk about killing a rat back at the inn after the adventure so you could get that 1 more xp needed to level again.]




Just a few notes:

In the Basic (Moldvay) D&D edition I learnt from (and this would have been retained by Mentzer), XP would stop 1 point short of the gaining of the 2nd level. This is explicitly stated in the text. There was no adjustment of XP for difficulty of the challenge.

In AD&D, once you reached enough XP for the next level - but had not gained it - you would stop gaining XP entirely until you trained for your next level. Note, that as awards were given after each expedition, it was theoretically possible to gain two levels at once (for a particularly goodly amount of XP).

Also in AD&D, the XP for monsters was reduced if the party overpowered them (3 orcs vs 6 level 1 PCs would award 1/2 XP for the orcs), with calculations based on HD vs Level, with additional HD bonuses available for each special ability the monsters had.

XP for Gold awards in AD&D were likewise reduced - using a different formula, IIRC - based on the difficulty of the fight. (The reduced gold award is, in fact, explicitly stated in the end notes of _Tomb of Horrors_ - 1 XP per 2 GP recovered). Interestingly, if 4 1st level characters defeated an owlbear and recovered 1,000 GP, they'd get a 1:1 ratio, the same as if the same characters found 100,000 GP! Only the difficulty of the fight counted.

In actual play of AD&D, training and reduced XP costs were often ignored. (I never saw them used in the games I participated in). The example of T.Foster's group actually using them was probably not uncommon, but I didn't see it in my experiences. 

It should be noted that 3e actually cleaves closer to the AD&D example with its CR/XP system!

That there is a big difference in the gaining of levels after 10th level in 1e and 3e is given; it is the major divergence between the systems. (In fact, AD&D is definitely designed for PCs to retire once they reach "name" level, as demi-humans become non-performers at the highest levels).

Cheers!


----------



## kigmatzomat

I've ran 2e and 3e campaigns from 1st - 20th level using standard, by-the-book rules.  Checking my game notes, I'd say both took about 270 hours of gaming to complete using homebrewed settings with 2-3 shrink-wrapped modules of "GM Lazy" in each.  

I don't think I've been displeased by any edition's leveling.  The contrast has been more with other systems, like CP2020, where advancement is painfully slow and character death is likely before any noticeable improvement.


----------



## Melan

MerricB said:
			
		

> In actual play of AD&D, training and reduced XP costs were often ignored. (I never saw them used in the games I participated in). The example of T.Foster's group actually using them was probably not uncommon, but I didn't see it in my experiences.



I have never seen this rule used, either. I didn't even know it existed until someone told me where to look.


----------



## Quasqueton

First: I checked my AD&D1 DMG, and indeed, a PC should stop gaining xp immediately at gaining the minimum for the next level. It is actually typed in all caps, but at the very end of the 2.5 pages of xp info (and you remember the density of the DMG’s text  I was remembering the rule from the BD&D rules, that xp stops just short of the second level.

Personally, I never knew anyone who used this rule -- I wouldn’t use it today, either. But then I also still wouldn’t use the training rules either. Such rules in AD&D1 really just made xp and leveling logistics too tedious and aggravating. 

The thief says, “Hey, everyone, let’s take a break from adventuring for a few weeks so I can train up to my new level.”

The magic-user says, “No way, I’m not even half way to my next level yet.”

The fighter says, “If we take a break now, the BBEG will just pack up and leave his lair; we’ll never finish this adventure if we wait for you to train up.”

The cleric says, “Just suck it up. We’ll all take a break after finishing this, and we’ll all level up together.”

The paladin says, “Besides, you don’t have enough gold yet to pay for your training.”

The thief says, “Crap. A fat lot of good it does me to have low xp requirements for each level. I might as well be playing a barbarian.”



> I wonder if you factored in the wasted XP from the moathouse and had the characters start the temple proper at level 2 (except for the thief at level 3) if that might not put the party right about where I would expect them to be (level 6-7).



No offense intended, but I’m not going to massage the data to get it to show what you expect it to show, or to reflect your personal experiences with the adventures. We have no evidence that your personal expectations or experience is the norm or intention for the adventures. You can consider the levels calculated with the data to be the maximum potential of these adventures.



> On the topic of "efficiency" is there a general assumption in D&D3 that a party will kill every possible bad guy and collect every possible piece of treasure in an adventure? Because this certainly isn't the case in AD&D1 (or at least most AD&D1 modules) -- there are red herring encounters designed to waste resources that wise players will try to avoid*, there are 'treasures' that do the same (a party that loads themselves down to the 3" move class trying to glean every last copper and silver piece is setting themselves up to be waylaid by wandering monsters on their way back to the surface), plus 'easter egg' treasures that only the luckiest or most thorough (which, again, is a trade-off -- the longer you spend searching for hidden treasure the more wandering monsters you'll face) parties will ever find. Given all this, 75% efficiency of monsters slain and treasure recovered is probably about the best that can be expected, and the other 25% is just there to tempt the greedy or incautious into overreaching...



There is no “efficiency” assumption in any edition of this game (with regards to “clearing out” a dungeon).

There are many variables in all these adventures that can result in different end levels, treasure, and magic for the PCs. In the Moathouse, if the PCs fight their way past the six 1st-level fighters and one 2nd-level fighter, and then have a hard time with the 4th-level fighter, they may have to retreat out of the dungeon for a day or so of rest and recuperation. When they go back in, they may find that Lareth has taken all his treasure and left the lair. In such a case, the PCs loose out on a lot of treasure and xp. This could happen with any party in any edition. But this data collection (the adventure module itself) assumes the PCs will encounter Lareth and defeat him. (EGG even tells the DM what to do/what will happen after the PCs kill Lareth – an assassin will come after the PCs.)

Or, in the time the PCs are out, Lareth might bring in/hire more guards and humanoids. When the PCs come back and finish the adventure, they may actually gain more xp than was originally placed in the dungeon.



> It's stated explicitly in the Moldvay-edit Basic Set (1981), and probably in the Mentzer-edit Basic Set (1983) as well that characters should receive approx. 80% of their XP from treasure and only 20% from monsters.



Where is this in the Moldvay set?



> XP for Gold awards in AD&D were likewise reduced - using a different formula, IIRC - based on the difficulty of the fight.



What about treasure found without fighting enemies to get it?


So, I will continue listing the data as I have. Polls here on ENWorld show that most people never used the “measure of challenge” or the training rules in actual AD&D1 play. (I also have read that Gygax, himself, did not use those rules – MerricB, do you have a link to those statements?) Although polls on ENWorld shouldn’t be taken as universal fact, it does show me that most people here find the data in line with their real/actual play experiences.

Quasqueton


----------



## Ron

Quasqueton said:
			
		

> First: I checked my AD&D1 DMG, and indeed, a PC should stop gaining xp immediately at gaining the minimum for the next level. It is actually typed in all caps, but at the very end of the 2.5 pages of xp info (and you remember the density of the DMG’s text  I was remembering the rule from the BD&D rules, that xp stops just short of the second level.
> 
> Personally, I never knew anyone who used this rule -- I wouldn’t use it today, either. But then I also still wouldn’t use the training rules either. Such rules in AD&D1 really just made xp and leveling logistics too tedious and aggravating.
> [...]
> 
> Quasqueton




We used and it does make a difference as, in many modules, it's easy to accumulate experience points, especially for low level characters. We never used training, though, although I personally gave only one tenth of the printed treasure to players and still I think it was too much -- in my own adventures, the characters were much less wealthy.


----------



## jrients

Quasqueton, thank you for taking the time to research the mdoules, crunch the numbers, post, and re-post your results.  I find your methods sound, as any proposed efficiency factor or other fudges only introduce more uncertainty into your estimates, not less.



			
				T. Foster said:
			
		

> OD&D and AD&D1 were fundamentally games about getting treasure, and killing monsters, disarming or avoiding traps, and solving puzzles were merely means to that end.




Although I've grown less curmudgeonly about the new-fangled editions of D&D, you've put your finger on one of the things that I miss in my 3.x play.


----------



## Storm Raven

T. Foster said:
			
		

> I've got no horse in the AD&D1 vs. D&D3 race, I was just surprised that your calculations seemed significantly out of line with my considerable real-world experiences playing these modules, and was trying to pinpoint what might be some of the reasons why. After giving it a bit more thought, and taking your responses to my questions/comments into consideration, I'll admit that given your criteria (a party of 6 characters operating at peak efficiency -- no character deaths, no henchmen sucking up XP, no wasted XP upon leveling, killing every monster and recovering every piece of treasure) your calculations are indeed correct and such a group will be at significantly higher level upon completing the modules than mine were, because none of the groups I ever ran operated at anywhere _near_ "peak efficiency" -- characters died and had to re-start at level 1/0 XP, they had henchmen diluting the XP haul, they were forced to waste XP upon leveling (especially at the end of T1, as noted previously), they didn't kill every monster, and they certainly didn't recover every piece of treasure.
> 
> For the specific purpose of comparing XP/level totals for an AD&D1 and a D&D3 group going through the module at peak efficiency I suppose this methodology works, but to extrapolate to a more general "a party who plays through this module will end at level x, XP y with z amount of gold and magic items a,b,c" type conclusion (which may not have ever been your intention, but it seems like others have been doing so) these calculations don't seem particularly accurate or useful to me. Perhaps if you included a "fudge factor" by assuming the party operates at average, say, 75% efficiency (i.e. they get 75% of the max. possible gold and XP) that would make the numbers more closely match the results I got through actual play, and thus more useful for DMs trying to plot out campaign-arcs using these modules and such...




However, for purposes of a _comparison_ that sort of adjustment is essentially meaningless. If you assume that the 1e group is being "inefficient" to some degree, you will have to assume that the 3e group is similarly inefficient - resulting in a net wash.

The purpose of this comparison, as far as I can tell, is not to determine what PCs from various editions would "expect" as a result of going through these adventures, but a comparison across editions to see what the relative results would be like. So the 1e group doesn't get all of the treasure, you will have to assume that the 3e group wouldn't either, otherwise you are not really comparing the same things, you are jiggering the data to get to a particular result.


----------



## dagger

Ron said:
			
		

> We used and it does make a difference as, in many modules, it's easy to accumulate experience points, especially for low level characters. We never used training, though, although I personally gave only one tenth of the printed treasure to players and still I think it was too much -- in my own adventures, the characters were much less wealthy.





I know 3 different groups that used that rule, including my own.


----------



## Lanefan

MerricB said:
			
		

> In AD&D, once you reached enough XP for the next level - but had not gained it - you would stop gaining XP entirely until you trained for your next level. Note, that as awards were given after each expedition, it was theoretically possible to gain two levels at once (for a particularly goodly amount of XP).
> 
> In actual play of AD&D, training and reduced XP costs were often ignored. (I never saw them used in the games I participated in). Cheers!



Lots of things to say here:

1. Very interesting number-crunching, quas.  Dare I ask how long it took?

2. My own 1e experience is vastly different in that every game I've ever been in has ditched the ExP-for-gold idea completely, usually replaced with a "dungeon bonus" at the end of each adventure based on whether the goal was achieved, survival, etc.  To compensate, the ExP amounts needed to bump have usually been lowered after about 5th-level...still, the advancement rate overall is very slow.

3. Every game I've ever been in has required training for a PC to (fully) bump.  However, you can continue to gain ExP after bumping, though there's a penalty if you go too long before training.  It never made sense that someone would arbitrarily stop learning from their experiences.  That said, do your numbers assume for both editions that characters are training "in the field", or do not need to train to advance (as 3e does)?

4. Most adventuring parties I've seen run between 7-15 characters, including henches, NPC adventurers, etc.  As our adventures tend to sometimes be a bit on the lethal side, players have learned that running 2 PC's each avoids several sessions of having nothing to do when one of the PC's dies.    (yes, our gaming groups and WotC's so-called market research results are very, very different)

5. A question: do your numbers assume a 100% opposition kill rate? (in other words, no opponents missed)  Also, do they take into account ExP earned from wandering monsters? (sometimes, these can add up to as much as the module's pre-gen's)

Lanefan


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## Hussar

> 5. A question: do your numbers assume a 100% opposition kill rate? (in other words, no opponents missed) Also, do they take into account ExP earned from wandering monsters? (sometimes, these can add up to as much as the module's pre-gen's)




Heh, never thought of this one.  Some are arguing that Quas' numbers are very high.  This would balance things out a lot as well.


----------



## Olgar Shiverstone

First, let me thank Quas for all this hard work -- this is fascinating.

Second -- unlike others who have posted here, I think this does match my own 1E and BD&D experience.  Although the parties I DM'd (many times) through these modules didn't come out at the precise levels he has indicated, they were typically groups of 8 PCs who didn't hit every encounter, get every treasure, or have a 100% survival rate.  Applying that to my nostalgic memories, and I can see hitting the same levels that Quas has posted here.

I ran a number of one player solo adventures in B/ED&D (being a too-generous young DM, I wasn't particularly deadly) and those characters would level at phenomenal rates.  Both solo and party PCs had ludicrous amounts of treasure after a while ... gold that simply couldn't be spent, and surplus magic weapons for days.  I have a number of character sheets and my DM records still from back in the 80s that clearly show those trends both for solo characters as well as large party play.  For my group(s), that was the point of strongholds -- to have a place for your racks of surplus +1 swords.

Also, as I was raised on B/ED&D before moving to AD&D, I used the B/ED&D XP system -- stop 1 XP short of the next level, and no training time or gold requirements (something I was happy to see dropped in 3E).  I did give magic item XP per the DMG tables, but didn't give XP for sold items.  And I didn't ever adjust XP for encounter difficulty -- one of a number of things I'm not surprised I missed in the 1E DMG, as every time I pick that book up I find something new.


----------



## Quasqueton

> A question: do your numbers assume a 100% opposition kill rate? (in other words, no opponents missed) Also, do they take into account ExP earned from wandering monsters? (sometimes, these can add up to as much as the module's pre-gen's)



My data is a listing/calculation of every set/numbered encounter in the adventure. I do not include wandering monsters (too variable).

Again, the xp/level data is not going to be a perfect representation of the exact way each and every party will level in the adventure.

The party may run through the adventure, avoiding most of the encounters, kill the BBEG, and move on with half the xp and treasure in the adventure.

The party may run in and run out, numerous times, allowing guards and such to be “restocked” between raids. They may encounter many wandering monsters. When a monster carries 2-12 gp, the DM may roll 12 (in this data collection, I assumed an average roll for all random treasure values). So this party may end up with double the xp and treasure in the adventure.

The party may hire a small army to march into the dungeon with them and have to split xp and treasure with 20 characters.

The party may number only 3 PCs (of very experienced and competent Players) and still raze the whole dungeon.

Or the party may have the average number of characters, go through and encounter each area once, get the average treasure rolls, and get the exact xp and treasure amounts I’ve listed.


I decided to go with what is listed in the adventure, straight, as is. Some people may consider these numbers the maximum potential; some may consider it the minimum expectation. I believe it is the average probability.

Considering this average probability, the only way the AD&D1 party would come out lower level than what I’ve calculated is if the game used the training rules – but polls here, and conversations I’ve had in other places (Web and Real World) shows that the majority of games did not use the training rules.

_And even if you do use the training rules in the level calculations shown so far, it only reduces the AD&D1 party one level on average._



			
				Olgar Shiverstone said:
			
		

> Also, as I was raised on B/ED&D before moving to AD&D, I used the B/ED&D XP system -- stop 1 XP short of the next level, and no training time or gold requirements (something I was happy to see dropped in 3E). I did give magic item XP per the DMG tables, but didn't give XP for sold items. And I didn't ever adjust XP for encounter difficulty -- one of a number of things I'm not surprised I missed in the 1E DMG, as every time I pick that book up I find something new.



This describes my experience, as well. Although I would have given xp for sold magic items, no one ever sold a magic item in my campaigns. I generally marked out a lot of treasure (money and magic) from published adventures, and I simply didn’t put in nearly as much treasure in my homemade adventures. So the PCs didn’t usually have a surplus of either in my campaigns – by my intentional design.

[But I saw characters from other games with notebook pages full of magic items gathered from published and homemade adventures.]

Quasqueton


----------



## Quasqueton

Lanefan said:
			
		

> Very interesting number-crunching, quas. Dare I ask how long it took?



Time depends on the adventure.

The T1-4 adventure has the xp value of each creature right in the creature’s stat block, so that was straight forward. This was a convenient feature of the mega-module design. In other adventure modules, I have to refer to the back of the DMG for the pre-calculated (except for the hit point variable) xp award.

The B2 adventure required me to calculate the xp for each monster encountered.

Getting the gp and magic required reading each encounter area description with a close eye because the info was mixed in with the text – Gygax (the author of the adventures I’ve so far covered for AD&D1 and B/ED&D) seemed to have a “stream of consciousness” style of writing in his adventure modules.

The D&D3 adventure required me to look up the CR of each creature and then look up the xp on the DMG chart. Finding the treasure was much easier though, as the current style of adventure module layout tends to organize the DM info better for quicker reference and reading.

Although I didn’t time my work, I’d figure it took me about 1.5 hours to go through an adventure (or two levels in the ToEE) and pull out the data. Figure 1 hour to calculate it all and write it up in an ENWorld forum format.

I’ve read these adventures so closely, now, that I could probably run them without the texts.

Quasqueton


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## Raven Crowking

Quasqueton said:
			
		

> So, I will continue listing the data as I have. Polls here on ENWorld show that most people never used the “measure of challenge” or the training rules in actual AD&D1 play. (I also have read that Gygax, himself, did not use those rules – MerricB, do you have a link to those statements?) Although polls on ENWorld shouldn’t be taken as universal fact, it does show me that most people here find the data in line with their real/actual play experiences.




We used it.

If you do not account for the RAW of the editions described, it is no wonder that the experiences of those who used the RAW differ from the numbers you are showing.

Either way, though, the raw data (pun intended) is interesting enough.  I'm sure that, if someone else is interested enough, they can go through it again to deal with the XP/Training issues.

RC


----------



## Quasqueton

> If you do not account for the RAW of the editions described, it is no wonder that the experiences of those who used the RAW differ from the numbers you are showing.
> 
> Either way, though, the raw data (pun intended) is interesting enough. I'm sure that, if someone else is interested enough, they can go through it again to deal with the XP/Training issues.



I’ve adhered to the RAW as closely as possible in this data. The training rules (including the xp-stop) makes any such general calculations extremely complicated at best, and just impossible at worst.

Because of the variable xp charts in AD&D1, someone doing the calculations must judge the xp cut off for the different classes at different times. Then one must figure, “well, does the party stop the adventure and let the one or two PCs train up, or do they continue and tell the PCs to just suck up the xp loss?” If they don’t stop, then the different PCs will have different xp totals – the thief stops at 1,251 and can’t gain anymore, but the magic-user continues gaining up to 2,501. So when the party does decide to stop for training, and they all level up, the magic-user has double the xp total as the thief, even though they were on the same adventure. 

This seriously screws over the classes with lower xp needs – kind of destroys this class item as a feature and balancing factor. (What’s the benefit of having low xp needs when you can only level up at the same time as another class that requires much more xp? Might as well all have the same xp needs.)

And, someone doing the calculations must do some figuring as to when a game session or dungeon delve ends/breaks and when the DM would award xp. This is pure guess work, and is too variable to make any kind of probability data.

This variability is the same reason why I haven’t included the xp for magic items. A single character gets the xp for an item he uses, but the gp-xp value is spread among the party if they sell it. And what if no one uses the item, but they don’t sell it either?

Figuring the data as some are suggesting would variabalize it out of any probability or comparative usefulness.

It’s like talking about an AD&D1 1st-level fighter’s hit points. If I say the fighter has 6 hit points (taking the average and rounding up, and not including a Con modifier), some would be correct in saying that the fighter could actually have anywhere from 1 to 14 hit points – the d10 variable plus Con modifier. This is technically correct, but it doesn’t do any good when you are trying to look at the average probability, or trying to compare it to other editions. (And then, of course, there’d be others saying they use different methods of rolling hit points, and so their results would be vastly different.)

But I would hope that everyone could agree on 6 hit points for an AD&D 1st-level fighter as a baseline for discussion and comparison. Or you can dismiss any discussion or comparison because assuming 6 hit points doesn't fit the full rule range and doesn't jive with someone's personal game experience ("I never had a fighter with more than 5 hit points.")

Quasqueton


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## jcfiala

Raven Crowking said:
			
		

> Either way, though, the raw data (pun intended) is interesting enough.  I'm sure that, if someone else is interested enough, they can go through it again to deal with the XP/Training issues.




How would you suggest doing that?  Was there a general time period that most groups would stop for retraining?  Was it when 2 people needed retraining?  When 75% of the group did?  Did groups finish a module before being able to retrain?  

I never used the retraining rules when playing AD&D1, so I'm curious.


----------



## Rothe

jcfiala said:
			
		

> How would you suggest doing that?  Was there a general time period that most groups would stop for retraining?  Was it when 2 people needed retraining?  When 75% of the group did?  Did groups finish a module before being able to retrain?
> 
> I never used the retraining rules when playing AD&D1, so I'm curious.




I can only answer from personal experience but generally when 2 people needed training; for the one DM who used training.  Our parties were typically 4 PCs without henchmen (but with a trained war dog typically).  We never got xp for treasure even with the guy who used training.  What we would do is leave the dungeon to train.  Since the dungeon might restock and prepare for our visit we might just never go back, or very cautiously scout it first to see if they reinforced.  IIRC we never finished a dungeon with this DM because of the training interrupted the dungeon crawl.  Since we got no xp of gold we still got pretty far, yet I'm sure this frustrated this DM.  Luckily he didn't try to railroad us into doing something we as players and our characters would never do: attack a position that has been prepared and reinforced for weeks by an enemy that now knows your tactics/abilities.

I'd be interested to see how others who did use training played modules.  Did you leave to train?  If so did you go back to the dungeon?  And if you went back to the dungeon where its denizens prepared for your return?  

In all the other 1e AD&D campaigns back in the day (1979-1984), my own included, we never got xp for gold, never had training (except in certain cleric and MU cases or if you wanted to be a bard) and one could level on the spot IF to get experience you did things your class normally did/acted like your class, used your class abilities etc.  It was a training by doing mentality.  In these campaigns we did tend to clean out dungeons and were very methodical about it.

You might think with no xp for gold we leveled very slowly and with no training costs we got obscenely rich.  Not really on both accounts.  On the first we typically played on average 20-30 hours per week every week, that's well over a 1,000 hours of playing per year with marathon weeks during holidays.  We never got obscenely rich for our level either because encumberance rules were strictly enforced.  Thus, it was hard to carry out too much coin even with bags of holding.  There was also taxes, tithes if a cleric, paladin, druid or ranger, dues if a member of a thieves guild, and getting new spells was costly as none ever sprang to mind when leveling.  We also invariably played good aligned characters so we often made donations to various temples, our characters families, the poor, etc. if nothing else, to ensure some friendly clerics for raise dead etc. spells and a friendly base of operations.  You'd be surprised how hard it is for someone to assasinate you when you are loved by the servants and common folk in a village.


----------



## Enkhidu

I'm hoping to see the later levels posted fairly soon, so we can get to the "name level" slowdown debate.


----------



## Ridley's Cohort

Great work, Quasqueton.  Really good stuff.

My experience is that 1e/2e PCs do not level very differently at lower levels than 3e.  But advancement ground to a virtual halt ~8th level in earlier editions because of the exponential xp goals (which one would expect to change radically once one hit the 'teen levels if the DM does not purposefully hold back on the gp -- but I have no significant personal experience in campaigns at those levels to confirm this).

I am very curious about the G-series.


----------



## buzz

This is great stuff, Quas!

However, it's to be expected that you'll see disagreement. *No group* played 1e or Basic exactly the same, much less uniformly by the book. If anything, early D&D tended to be a starting point that was then drifted hither and yon in service of the whims of the group.

That said, I think that the as-written analysis you've demonstrated shows that a lot of common thinking about the "good old days" is just plain wrong. At least, one can't converse productively until everyone involved has complately lain out how "their D&D" played.

Thanks again for your work!


----------



## Raven Crowking

buzz said:
			
		

> However, it's to be expected that you'll see disagreement. *No group* played 1e or Basic exactly the same, much less uniformly by the book. If anything, early D&D tended to be a starting point that was then drifted hither and yon in service of the whims of the group.




Quoted for truth.



> That said, I think that the as-written analysis you've demonstrated shows that a lot of common thinking about the "good old days" is just plain wrong.




Quoted for WTF?

What Q's analysis shows most, IMHO, is that your first point is correct.  As a correllary to your first point, your second point cannot be demonstrated that easily.

RC



Oh, yeah, IME, we never used the gp = xp rule, and PCs stopped to train when they were done with what they were doing.  So, they'd clear the moathouse, tally XP, and then train.  As the above QFT quote shows, YMMV, and probably does.


----------



## Emirikol

Fascinating assessment.  It brings back memories..sad ones knowing that I can't ever play those scenarios again...

jhj


----------



## Quasqueton

A return thanks to everyone who has thanked me for doing this. It is good to have one's effort appreciated, enjoyed, and/or found interesting.

Quasqueton


----------



## Lanefan

Rothe said:
			
		

> I'd be interested to see how others who did use training played modules.  Did you leave to train?  If so did you go back to the dungeon?  And if you went back to the dungeon where its denizens prepared for your return?



Depended entirely on the situation.  If there was somewhere nearby where training could be done, sometimes just the PC's who needed training left while the rest kept an eye on things; other times, the whole party left and returned as a unit, to a dungeon that may or may not have restocked in the meantime.  If the adventure was isolated/off-plane/whatever such that training was impossible, we just kept going.  That said, our system allowed a PC to still gain ExP while untrained (though if you left it too long, an increasing ExP penalty kicked in; your advancement eventually ground to a near-halt but would never stop completely).

Side note: we also had (and still have) it that if a character wanted to forego the whole idea of training right from the get-go they could, but all advancement was at half-rate...this provided a simple mechanic whereby someone living in isolation, for example, could still slowly gain levels.

Lanefan


----------



## Quasqueton

*AD&D1 - Against the Giants - The Steading of the Hill Giant Chief*

Entering the AD&D1 Giant Series.


> *Against the Giants - The Steading of the Hill Giant Chief* by E. Gary Gygax
> 
> *AD&D1 party begins at:* (161,968 xp each)
> Fighter 8
> Paladin 7
> Cleric 8
> Magic-User 9
> Illusionist 9
> Thief 10
> 
> *D&D3 party begins at:* (41,250 xp each)
> Fighter 9
> Paladin 9
> Cleric 9
> Wizard 9
> Illusionist 9
> Rogue 9
> 
> 
> *Total gp value:* 252,675 gp
> 
> *Total xp value:*
> AD&D1: 380,420 xp (not including the xp value of using or selling magic items, nor the 10% bonus for ability scores over 15)
> D&D3: 84,835 xp
> 
> *Total magic treasure:*
> +3 battle axe
> +3 spear
> +3 shield
> +2 war hammer
> +2 giant slaying sword (x4 vs. giants, intelligent Neutral Good)
> +2 arrows (x11)
> +1 flametongue (intelligent, Chaotic Neutral or Chaotic Good, detects gems [types and number])
> +1 flametongue (intelligent, Lawful Neutral or Neutral Good)
> javelin of lightning (x5)
> scarab of insanity
> adamantine chain (teleports users to frost giant adventure glacier)
> potions: extra healing, hill giant control, healing, poison (x2), storm giant strength, delusion, water breathing (x4)
> 
> 
> *AD&D1 party finishes at:* (225,371 xp each)
> Fighter 8
> Paladin 8
> Cleric 9
> Magic-User 9
> Illusionist 10
> Thief 11
> 
> *D&D3 party finishes at:* (55,389 xp each)
> Fighter 11
> Paladin 11
> Cleric 11
> Wizard 11
> Illusionist 11
> Rogue 11



The AD&D1 party averages level 9.2, and the D&D3 party averages level 11. 1.8 levels difference. At this point, the AD&D1 cleric and illusionist join the thief at "name level".

Just for class comparison interest, the xp required to get from 9th level (name level for most classes) to 10th level in AD&D1:
Fighter 250,000
Paladin 350,000
Cleric 225,000
Magic-User 115,000
Illusionist 75,000
Thief 50,000

Quasqueton


----------



## Enkhidu

Quas, I can't for the life of me remember how far you got in the other thread. Did you get all the way through Q1?

And thanks for the repost - this is good info.


----------



## MerricB

Quasqueton said:
			
		

> So, I will continue listing the data as I have. Polls here on ENWorld show that most people never used the “measure of challenge” or the training rules in actual AD&D1 play. (I also have read that Gygax, himself, did not use those rules – MerricB, do you have a link to those statements?) Although polls on ENWorld shouldn’t be taken as universal fact, it does show me that most people here find the data in line with their real/actual play experiences.




http://www.enworld.org/showpost.php?p=984260&postcount=316

"When the PCS gained their XPs mainly through adventuring, active combat, spell-use, thieving, exploration and the like I didn't usually require any extensive training, often allowing them to assume they trained "on the job," so as to goin a level immediately.

"Only when an adventure brought a great windfall of XPs so as to make a sudden jump in level possible did I demand that the PCs stop adventuring and find mentors to train them. That happened about once every three or four level gains even with my best players.

"Above a certain level, say 15th or so, who is around to train such PCs. In that case an enforced period of self-study was directed for the PCs in question." - Gary Gygax.

Cheers!


----------



## Quasqueton

*AD&D1 - Against the Giants - Glacial Rift of the Frost Giant Jarl*

Continuing the AD&D1 Giant Series.


> _*Against the Giants*_* - Glacial Rift of the Frost Giant Jarl* by E. Gary Gygax
> 
> *AD&D1 party begins at:* (225,371 xp each)
> Fighter 8
> Paladin 8
> Cleric 9
> Magic-User 9
> Illusionist 10
> Thief 11
> 
> *D&D3 party begins at:* (55,389 xp each)
> Fighter 11
> Paladin 11
> Cleric 11
> Wizard 11
> Illusionist 11
> Rogue 11
> 
> 
> *Total gp value:* 626,058 gp
> 
> *Total xp value:*
> AD&D1: 948,640 xp (not including the xp value of using or selling magic items, nor the 10% bonus for ability scores over 15)
> D&D3: 160,332 xp
> 
> *Total magic treasure:*
> 
> hammer of thunderbolts
> +3 frostbrand longsword
> +3 chainmail
> +2 giant slayer bastard sword
> +2 dagger
> +2 bolts (x11)
> +2 plate mail
> +2 shield
> +1 battle axe
> +1 shield, +4 vs. missiles
> +1 shield
> heavy crossbow of speed
> ring of three wishes
> ring of invisibility
> cursed scroll
> ring of fire resistance
> armor of vulnerability
> potions: healing (x3), poison (x2), fire resistance, dimunition, polymorph self, frost giant control, cloud giant strength, delusion, extra healing, storm giant strength, human control, oil of slipperiness, speed
> box of holding
> necklace of missiles (5 beads)
> iron horn of valhalla
> pearl of wisdom
> Nolzur's marvelous pigments (x8)
> scroll of protection from magic
> scroll of protection from elementals
> wand of cold (16 charges)wand of paralyzation (45 charges)
> magic-user scroll spells: crystal brittle, energy drain
> cleric scroll spells: cure serious wounds
> 
> 
> *AD&D1 party finishes at:* (383,477 xp each)
> Fighter 9
> Paladin 9
> Cleric 9
> Magic-User 11
> Illusionist 10
> Thief 11
> 
> *D&D3 party finishes at:* (82,111 xp each)
> Fighter 13
> Paladin 13
> Cleric 13
> Wizard 13
> Illusionist 13
> Rogue 13



The AD&D1 party averages level 9.8, and the D&D3 party averages level 13. 3.2 levels difference. All the AD&D1 characters are now name level.

Quasqueton


----------



## WayneLigon

Quasqueton said:
			
		

> Personally, I never knew anyone who used this rule -- I wouldn’t use it today, either. But then I also still wouldn’t use the training rules either. Such rules in AD&D1 really just made xp and leveling logistics too tedious and aggravating.
> 
> So, I will continue listing the data as I have. Polls here on ENWorld show that most people never used the “measure of challenge” or the training rules in actual AD&D1 play.




In over 20 years of playing all three previous editions (OD&D, 1E, 2E; I cannot say that I ever knew anyone to run the Moldavy editions; those were considered 'old' once 1E came out and I never saw them played), I never seen anyone use those restrictions either. 

Ironically, until this week, I'd never heard of the 'measure of challenge' stuff in 1E. If you killed an orc you got like 10xp, regardless of how tough it was to do so.

I never knew a GM who split XP up with henchmen. They fought, sometimes, but only PC's ever gained XP. 

Also, I've _never, ever _ seen people get XP for treasure or gold found. Ever. As in, not even once. Those columns might as well have not existed in the DMG. The _only _ XP we ever got was for killing things, or, later on, for solving particularly knotty problems if you had a nice GM or one who ran a lot of non-combat stuff.


----------



## Hussar

And the 3e crowd takes the lead.... whoops.  Heh.  

I have to admit, Q, that I probably find your evidence compelling because it parallels my own experience so closely.  

But, yeah, thanks for this.


----------



## Quasqueton

*AD&D1 - Against the Giants - Hall of the Fire Giant King*

Continuing the AD&D1 Giant Series, to the last lair.


> _*Against the Giants*_* - Hall of the Fire Giant King* by E. Gary Gygax
> 
> *AD&D1 party begins at:* (383,477 xp each)
> Fighter 9
> Paladin 9
> Cleric 9
> Magic-User 11
> Illusionist 10
> Thief 11
> 
> *D&D3 party begins at:* (82,111 xp each)
> Fighter 13
> Paladin 13
> Cleric 13
> Wizard 13
> Illusionist 13
> Rogue 13
> 
> 
> *Total gp value:* 1,061,319 gp (yes, that's over 1 million)
> 
> *Total xp value:*
> AD&D1: 1,618,746 xp (not including the xp value of using or selling magic items, nor the 10% bonus for ability scores over 15)
> D&D3: 156,168 xp
> 
> *Total magic treasure:*
> +4 attack/+6 damage flaming greatsword ("huge")
> +4 mace ("giant-sized")
> +4 plate mail
> +3 hammer
> +3 battleaxe
> +3 ring of protection (x2)
> +2 red dragon slaying longsword ("determine abilities randomly")
> +2 plate mail
> +2 shield
> +1 axe
> +1 morning star (x4)
> +1 longbow
> +1 arrows (x20)
> javelin of lightning (x4)
> -2 shield of missile attraction ("giant-sized")
> -2 longsword
> white dragon hide cloak
> hellhound cloak
> mirror that shows invisible or magically changed creatures in their real form
> gauntlets of ogre power
> ring of invisibility
> ring of contrariness
> ring of commanding water elementals
> ring of delusion "with contact poison inside (die, no saving throw)"
> ring of three wishes
> ring of shooting stars
> rod of cancellation
> pipes of the sewers
> lesser purple tentacle rod
> lesser russet tentacle rod
> greater purple tentacle rod
> gem of controlling fire elementals
> wand of viscid globs (79 charges)
> potions: fire giant control (x2), delusion, mammal control, ESP, extra-healing (x3), invulnerability, undead control, poison, dimunition, healing, human control, philter of love, philter of persuasiveness, poison, polymorph self, fire resistance (x4), speed (x2), plus four randomly determined
> demon staff
> amulet of the planes
> tome of clear thought
> bolt of power (x3)
> cleric scrolls: detect lie, true seeing, continual darkness, cure critical wounds, symbol of persuassion, word of recall, gate, unholy word, restoration
> magic-user scoll: wish, plus 7 spells ("any")
> "a scroll with feet randomly determined 7th level spells---cleric, druid, or magic-user, matching the class of the first such character who examines it" [sic]
> scrolls: protection from lycanthropes
> "12 potions and eight scrolls, determined at random, but no poison, delusion, cursed, or otherwise harmful items"
> "One black cloak, one pair of black boots, (man-sized), give 75% chance to be invisible/move silently in dungeons"
> 7 carved statues (each gives a -1 curse on "hits, damage, saves, etc.", cumulative)
> +5 chainmail (x3 - drow item)
> +4 short sword (drow item)
> +4 mace (drow item)
> +3 dagger (drow item)
> +3 shield (x3 - drow item)
> +3 buckler (x9 - drow item)
> +3 short sword (x2 - drow item)
> +3 chainmail (drow item)
> +3 mace (x2 - drow item)
> +2 short sword (x9 - drow item)
> +2 chainmail (x16 - drow items)
> +2 shield (x18 - drow items)
> +1 short sword (x55 - drow items)
> +1 chainmail (x40 - drow item)
> +1 shield (x19 - drow item)
> +1 plate mail (drow item)
> +1 shield (drow item)
> +1 dagger (x46 - drow item)
> 
> 
> *AD&D1 party finishes at:* (653,268 xp each)
> Fighter 10
> Paladin 9
> Cleric 10
> Magic-User 11
> Illusionist 11
> Thief 12
> 
> *D&D3 party finishes at:* (108,139 xp each)
> Fighter 15
> Paladin 15
> Cleric 15
> Wizard 15
> Illusionist 15
> Rogue 15



The AD&D1 party averages level 10.5, and the D&D3 party averages level 15. 4.5 levels difference.

If we add in the 10% bonus for prime requisite ability score(s) above 15, the paladin, cleric, and illusionist would gain a level.

Quasqueton


----------



## MerricB

> Ironically, until this week, I'd never heard of the 'measure of challenge' stuff in 1E. If you killed an orc you got like 10xp, regardless of how tough it was to do so.




I'd heard of it, but never used it.



> I never knew a GM who split XP up with henchmen. They fought, sometimes, but only PC's ever gained XP.




We didn't use henchmen that much - but I would do the split if it happen.



> Also, I've _never, ever _ seen people get XP for treasure or gold found. Ever. As in, not even once. Those columns might as well have not existed in the DMG. The _only _ XP we ever got was for killing things, or, later on, for solving particularly knotty problems if you had a nice GM or one who ran a lot of non-combat stuff.




XP for gold was definitely part of my experience. I detested 2e removing that rule and not giving a proper guideline as to its replacement.

(Q. - please note the Gygax quote a few posts back you were asking for!)

Cheers!


----------



## Baron Opal

*Fighting giants is hard*

One thing that I would like to throw out there is that the levels for the D&D3 party are rather appropriate given their environment. We see the party at 9th for the Steading, 11th for the Rift, and 13th for the Hall. I would say that this is even at the lower level of survivability for characters in this environment, translated to 3rd edition.

I ran a translation of the Steading for 15th level characters under 3.0. It was easy for them, but they still took a beating at the end. I guessed that after the fact a party at 12th level, again at 3.0e, would be the optimal starting level for a challenging game. It would be _tough_ to run the Steading with a party of 9th level characters.


----------



## Quasqueton

MerricB said:
			
		

> Q. - please note the Gygax quote a few posts back you were asking for!



Yes, I saw it. Thanks much for posting it.

***

Regarding the “drow item” notation in the Fire Giant adventure: I identified these items because they are “special” cases. They will lose power and corrode over time, outside of the underdark, but so long as the party delves into the Depths of the Earth after the drow, the items will work just fine. So, for the rest of this series of adventures – _Descent to the Depths of the Earth, Shrine of the Kuo Toa, Vault of the Drow, Queen of the Demonweb Pits_ – those 3 suits of +5 chainmail, that +4 mace, and all the other +1, +2, +3, and +4 stuff can be used by and fully functional for the PCs. But, technically, they aren’t truly “permanent” items.

Quasqueton


----------



## Quasqueton

Looking at the data for this iconic AD&D1 adventure series:

Below AD&D1 “name level,” the PCs were gaining levels at about a [AD&D1] *1:1* [D&D3] ratio.

After AD&D1 “name level,” the AD&D1 level advancement started slowing down, while the D&D3 level advancement stayed about the same rate, something like a [AD&D1] *.5:1* [D&D3] ratio.

Quasqueton


----------



## Lanefan

WayneLigon said:
			
		

> I never knew a GM who split XP up with henchmen. They fought, sometimes, but only PC's ever gained XP.



On the surprisingly rare occasions when a PC in my game bothers with a hench, the hench (usually) gains half ExP if-when it finds itself involved in an encounter.  I say "usually" because on the very rare occasions when the hench's contribution is critical (e.g. luck of rolls where hench can't miss while boss is flailing away at nothing) it'll get full ExP.

That said, how often do people find henches being used in their games?

Lanefan


----------



## Rothe

Lanefan said:
			
		

> On the surprisingly rare occasions when a PC in my game bothers with a hench, the hench (usually) gains half ExP if-when it finds itself involved in an encounter.  I say "usually" because on the very rare occasions when the hench's contribution is critical (e.g. luck of rolls where hench can't miss while boss is flailing away at nothing) it'll get full ExP.
> 
> That said, how often do people find henches being used in their games?
> 
> Lanefan




In my experience we used them rarely, often much more of a hassle than they were worth, again IME.  We often fought not to get those pesky apprentices and followers.   I realize that for others they were quite common.  

What you describe is what I've experienced and used for henchmen counting as 1/2 people for xp unless they are kept in the back/protected then nothing for henchmen.  When we did use henchmen losing one was awful, (1) playing good aligned character's we felt we had some responisibilty to them so heal spells were used on them, (2) people back in town ask questions when they don't come back, then there is the wereguild, and name-calling, then you were unlikely to get more  unless they were the scum of the earth; and then they would stab you in the back at the first chance.  Never good in IME, so we angled for trained war dogs and mules.   With a druid to talk to animals some trained dogs can be quite good..."What is it boy? Timmy's trapped in a well? No, oh you smell a demon from hell! Time to run."


----------



## Montague68

Interesting data, but not really surprising.

IME the main three variants from 1st ed AD&D "by the book" campaign modules to homebrew adventures were:

1.  No xp for gold

2.  Reduced treasure handed out.

3.  More "realistic" treasure - i.e. no Gem of Seeing inside an Ankheg gizzard, no orc grunts walking around with 200 gp gems.

Nobody wanted to run a Monty Haul campaign, so invariably a DM would run a module, get to the treasure part and raise an eyebrow and mutter to himself "That can't be right..."

The problem, if there really was a problem, was that DM's would alter their adventures as above but not compensate in other areas. This indeed made progression in the 1E games I played in much slower than today.


----------



## Quasqueton

*AD&D1 - Descent to the Depths of the Earth - Descent to the Depths of the Earth*

Delving into the Underdark.


> *Descent to the Depths of the Earth - Descent to the Depths of the Earth* by E. Gary Gygax
> 
> *AD&D1 party begins at:* (653,268 xp each)
> Fighter 10
> Paladin 9
> Cleric 10
> Magic-User 11
> Illusionist 11
> Thief 12
> 
> *D&D3 party begins at:* (108,139 xp each)
> Fighter 15
> Paladin 15
> Cleric 15
> Wizard 15
> Illusionist 15
> Rogue 15
> 
> 
> *Total gp value:* 324,458 gp
> 
> *Total xp value:*
> AD&D1: 511,476 xp (not including the xp value of using or selling magic items, nor the 10% bonus for ability scores over 15)
> D&D3: 60,751 xp
> 
> *Total magic treasure:*
> +3 ring of protection
> +2 bastard sword
> jug of alchemy
> javelin of lightning x2
> rope of entanglement
> lurker cloak
> cleric scrolls: find traps, neutralize poison (x2), tongues, cure critical wounds, heal, stone tell, cure light wounds, tongues, conjure animals
> potions: healing (x3), polymorph self, extra healing (x3), plant control (x4), longevity
> portable hole
> dust of sneezing and choking
> staff of striking
> scarab of protection from evil clerics
> magic-user scrolls: knock, tongues, minor globe of invulnerability, wall of ice, stone to flesh, charm plants, symbol of fear
> scarab of death
> scrolls: protection from undead, protection from demons
> poisonous cloak
> bead from a necklace of fireballs (9-die fireball)
> Plus lots of +1 through +5 drow weapons and armor
> 
> 
> *AD&D1 party finishes at:* (738,514 xp each)
> Fighter 10
> Paladin 10
> Cleric 11
> Magic-User 11
> Illusionist 12
> Thief 13
> 
> *D&D3 party finishes at:* (118,139 xp each)
> Fighter 15
> Paladin 15
> Cleric 15
> Wizard 15
> Illusionist 15
> Rogue 15



After the descent down to the "doorstep" of the kuo toa's shrine, the AD&D1 party averages level 11.2, and the D&D3 party averages level 15 (still).

The descent adventure is ~90% low- to mid-level enemies. Bugbears, troglodytes, trolls, and most of the drow are just worth 0 xp for the 15th-level D&D3 party, but still add up enough (with their treasure) to keep the 9th- to 12th-level AD&D1 group advancing a little.

The _Descent to the Depths of the Earth_ adventure module [D1-2, which includes _Shrine of the Kuo Toa_ (not yet included in this data)] says, on the cover, "An Adventure for Characters Levels 9-14." This closely matches the levels this party came out of the Giants series at, (levels 9-12). The _Vault of the Drow_ adventure module says it is for levels 10-14, and that is probably what this group will be when they reach that adventure. So it seems that Gygax pretty well figured the level gains an AD&D1 party would be making through these adventures. And that makes sense, since he ran these for his personal campaign, and saw them run through tournaments.

It should be noted that the descent adventure was designed to have a lot of random encounters along the way. But random encounters are just that - random. So I didn't/couldn't include them in this data. The above numbers are just from the set encounters.

Quasqueton


----------



## kaomera

First of all: Wow, Quasqueton, quite an undertaking. I am impressed, and this is very thought-provoking...

I can't say that I'm incredibly surprised by the results. IMHO, AD&D "tops out" at a lot lower level than 3.x; specifically "name level" (10 to 14) tended to be the end-game, rather than approaching Epic (16-20).

Having said that (and aside from the real point of this topic, I know) I'd like to say that there are some very significant (IMHO) differences in AD&D / 3.x that don't show up directly in the numbers. First of all, 3.x tends to be more standardized. There are specific expectations built into the game as far as how many encounters are needed to level and PC wealth / magic item levels. A core-rules magic-item creation system is one of the big ones, you just didn't see many non-retired / NPC Magic Users in AD&D making any kind of magic items. Also, between the XP caps on going up more than one level at a time and training requirements (both of which I saw used in maybe 80%+ of the AD&D games I was involved with, IIRC) and the fact that most published modules did not seem to assume that PCs would uncover every last bit of treasure and/or play through every last encounter, I think that there was a lot more room in AD&D for deviations from the norm. (Of course, given that, the norm is still just that...) And in both systems I did (and still do) prefer a larger group, 6 to 8 being optimal, but don't expect every player to show up for every session.


----------



## Quasqueton

*Complication in treasure calculations*

I'm working on another AD&D1 adventure module, and I've come to a complication in figuring gp values. Several treasure hoards in this adventure include unpriced gems and jewelry. For instance:







> 7,000 sp, 9,000 gp, 800 pp, 21 gems, 2 pieces of jewelry, 1 potion of . . .



To determine the gem and jewelry value, I have the charts on pages 25-26 in the AD&D1 DMG.

Gem base value chart summary:







> 01-25 = 10 gp base value
> 26-50 = 50 gp base value
> 51-70 = 100 gp
> 71-90 = 500 gp
> 91-99 = 1,000 gp
> 00 = 5,000 gp



This chart just gives the _base_ value. A second chart determines if the gem in question is actually of higher or lower value than the base. (Interestingly, the odds are better that the value will increase than decrease.) But for this data collection, I'm just going to use the base value. Going further in the randomness is too complicated.

Jewelry base value chart summary:







> 01-10 = 100 - 1,000 gp base value
> 11-20 = 200 - 1,200 gp base value
> 21-40 = 300 - 1,800 gp
> 41-50 = 500 - 3,000 gp
> 51-70 = 1,000 - 6,000 gp
> 71-90 = 2,000 - 8,000 gp
> 91-00 = 2,000 - 12,000 gp



This chart, too, just gives the _base_ value. After the base is determined, more rolls (a d10, a d8, and a d6) can increase (considerably) the value of the piece of jewelry (but never decrease). But, again, for this data collection, I'm just going to use the base value. Going further in the randomness is too complicated.

Now, I have a question for any and all probability gurus in the audience:

Looking at the two charts above, what would be the average value of a gem, and what would be the average value of a piece of jewelry?

Usually, I've been assuming an average roll for any random values -- say an item is said as "3 pieces of jewelry valued at 200 - 1,200 gp each", I'd use 700 gp each as the average. But when no value is given in the adventure text, the DMG charts are a bit more complicated.

I could just assume an average roll on the d% (51 or 55?), and then an average roll for the base value (3,500 for jewelry). This would mean all gems are worth 100 gp, and all jewelry are worth 3,500 gp. But would this be accurate?

Any math help would be appreciated.

Quasqueton


----------



## Olgar Shiverstone

Use a weighted average.  

Gem chart: 275 gp.

Jewelry chart: weighted average of the mean value for each roll result, = 2910 gp.

Edit: 

Just in case weighted averages need explaining, for the gems it is:

[(25 instances of 10 gp) + (25 x 50) + (20 x 100) + (20 x 500) + (9 x 1000) + (1 x 5000)] divided by 100 instances = 275 gp average.


----------



## Slife

I'll give them a weight based on their % chance of coming up, and average the jewelry's ranges.

For gems I get

(250 + 1250 + 2000 + 10000 +9000 + 5000)/100

= an average of 275 gp per gem.


For jewelry

Average values of range :
01-10 = 550
11-20 = 700
21-40 = 1050
41-50 = 1750
51-70 = 3500
71-90 = 5000
91-00 = 7000

(550+700+2100+1750+7000+10000+7000)/10

= 2910 gp average.


----------



## Olgar Shiverstone

One more difference that the treasure analysis makes me wonder about: how closely distributed is the treasure in published modules to the "treasure standard" as reflected by the treasure tables in the DMGs?

I know the 3E designers (at least early on) took great pains not only to make sure encounter levels were appropriately distributed, but also that the treasure provided was appropriate to the EL.  On the other hand, I've never really felt that the treasure distribution in 1E modules followed any sort of rule, and I suspected it didn't abide by the treasure tables -- it always felt more individually placed.  But I'm not sure that is fact.

So the question is: at the end of each adventure, would the characters have wealth appropriate for their level, and does the treasure placement hold with the treasure type assignments?

I expect the first question can be answered from the data at hand, but the second requires in-depth analysis of individual encounters and is probably too tough to do.


----------



## 00Machado

Quasqueton said:
			
		

> If getting from 1st to 8th level took 40 game sessions, as I suggested above, (1 level per 5-6 game sessions), they could reach level 10 in about 52 game sessions, just as EGG said was proper in his mind/intention/experience.
> 
> The “release notes” from WotC on the reformulating of the D&D xp chart and rate, said that they wanted a group to be able to reach level 20 within 2 years. That would mean the group could reach level 10 in 1 year (52 weekly game sessions). (I’ve heard “2 years” and “18 months”, but I can’t find the information on the WotC Web site right now.)




I'm curious to know if this correlates to actual experience by those whove played the Paizo adventure paths. How long has it taken people to get through those? What was the frequency and duration of your play sessions?


----------



## the Jester

Olgar Shiverstone said:
			
		

> One more difference that the treasure analysis makes me wonder about: how closely distributed is the treasure in published modules to the "treasure standard" as reflected by the treasure tables in the DMGs?
> 
> .... >snip< ....
> 
> So the question is: at the end of each adventure, would the characters have wealth appropriate for their level, and does the treasure placement hold with the treasure type assignments?
> 
> I expect the first question can be answered from the data at hand, but the second requires in-depth analysis of individual encounters and is probably too tough to do.




Not necessarily!  You could look for creatures that were supposed to have treasure types that were somewhat specialized, such as Q (gems only) or T (scrolls only)... and if the creatures with those treasure types had other types of treasure, then you know that in that instance it didn't follow the tables! 

I've been running a 1e pickup game from time to time lately, and I've been using the treasure tables a lot.  It's fun.


----------



## SWBaxter

00Machado said:
			
		

> I'm curious to know if this correlates to actual experience by those whove played the Paizo adventure paths. How long has it taken people to get through those? What was the frequency and duration of your play sessions?




Dunno about the adventure paths, but I found the pace was pretty accurate in _Return to the Temple of Elemental Evil_, which spans about 10 levels (4th to 14th or so) and took my group about a year to get through it (spread over two calendar years, we took breaks to play other stuff).


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## xmanii

Interesting read, thanks for doing this.


----------



## Ridley's Cohort

Baron Opal said:
			
		

> One thing that I would like to throw out there is that the levels for the D&D3 party are rather appropriate given their environment. We see the party at 9th for the Steading, 11th for the Rift, and 13th for the Hall. I would say that this is even at the lower level of survivability for characters in this environment, translated to 3rd edition.
> 
> I ran a translation of the Steading for 15th level characters under 3.0. It was easy for them, but they still took a beating at the end. I guessed that after the fact a party at 12th level, again at 3.0e, would be the optimal starting level for a challenging game. It would be _tough_ to run the Steading with a party of 9th level characters.




We went through Giants in a 3.0 game starting at 8th level with a ~8-9 PC party.  We got butchered.  The DM showed some mercy because the rate of losing XP from deaths was on average comparable to our rewards from victories, so he eased up on the death XP penalty and pushed us all up to 11th for G2.

I cannot brag about our performance in G1.  The DM upped the difficulty slightly in a few ways.  But I can say that a party of merely 6 9th level PCs can easily _fail_ to complete this module.  The combination of player mistakes being rewarded extremely swiftly with PC deaths at the hands of offense-heavy giants, and the fact you may get almost nothing in terms of monetary rewards until you secure the treasure trove means that the party may degrade in effectivenes as the module grinds on.

That campaign is on a back burner, but havign ground through about half the module, I can say 8 11th level PCs is about right for G2.  6 11th level PCs would have to play extremely smart play or they might fail outright, too.

The upgrading of the giants under 3e rules makes a huge difference.  

Your average Hill Giant in 1e has 9d8 hit points and can theorectically be killed by a single lucky Fireball, certainly he will be dead or on death's door after 2 Fireballs.  Your average 3.0 Hill Giant weighs in at ~100 HPs, and higher still in 3.5.  Even with the harsher saving throws in 3e, the typical Hill Giant can survive 3 Fireballs (giants have enough HD that have a high likelihood that they will succeed in at least 1 of the 3 Reflex saving throws).

The bottom line is that a 3.0 Wizard (ab)using 3.0 Haste and tossing direct damage is not more effective overall than a 1e Wizard fighting 1e Hill Giants.  Under 3.5 rules, direct damage is simply hopeless and you absolutely have to exploit other spell tactics.


----------



## Quasqueton

Thanks Olgar Shiverstone and Slife. Of course, it’s just my luck that those numbers don’t come out to nice round figures for easy mental computing.

Quasqueton


----------



## Ghendar

Quasqueton said:
			
		

> I will probably be adding data from other classic adventures as well.




Look at B5 Horror on the Hill. That module has a BOAT LOAD of treasure and magic.

I guess the level 1-3 pcs needed all that stuff to defeat the dragon at the end of the module. yes, that's right a level 1-3 adventure with a dragon at the end.


----------



## MerricB

Ridley's Cohort said:
			
		

> The upgrading of the giants under 3e rules makes a huge difference.




Just a note: Giants were upgraded under 2e rules. They didn't actually change that much in 3e from 2e. They gained a lot of hit dice in 2e.

Cheers!


----------



## Delta

Random Comments:

- Yes, giants changed radically from 1st-->3rd Edition. 2E about doubled their hit dice. 3E piled on another factor from huge Constitutions. When I did a 3E conversion, I noted lots of EL 11, 13, 15 encounters in G1-3, with one each about EL 16-17 per module. Quasqueton, are you using 3E-style giants for the 3E XP? Because it's a very different adventure from the AD&D giants.

- Drow weapons in AD&D do decay in sunlight. But they also decay after 30 days, even in the underdark, anywhere other than the Vault. So in saying they're good throughout D1-3, you are assuming no more than 30 days of adventuring time.

- Using gem & jewelry "base value" expected values is the best thing. The increase/decrease table, by the book, was never included in modules -- by RAW you were supposed to be making those rolls on all the stuff listed in modules anyway.


----------



## TerraDave

*It has been said before*

This is such a *great* thread. I am really looking foward to more adventures being included. Just thought I would share.


----------



## Quasqueton

> Quasqueton, are you using 3E-style giants for the 3E XP? Because it's a very different adventure from the AD&D giants.



I don't understand this question.

The AD&D1 giants give AD&D1 xp to the AD&D1 characters.

The D&D3 giants give D&D3 xp to the D&D3 characters.

Where you thinking I was giving AD&D1 xp to the D&D3 characters, or D&D3 xp to the AD&D1 characters?



> Drow weapons in AD&D do decay in sunlight. But they also decay after 30 days, even in the underdark, anywhere other than the Vault. So in saying they're good throughout D1-3, you are assuming no more than 30 days of adventuring time.



The adventure text merely says, "They lose their power if exposed to sunlight."

The AD&D1 _Fiend Folio_ says, "When these are exposed to direct sunlight, irreversilbe decay starts and the items will become totally useless in 2-12 days. If protected from sunlight, they will retain their special properties for 31-50 days before becoming normal items; and if exposed to the radiations of the Drow homeland for a period of 1 week out of every 4 weeks, the items could remain potent indefinitely."

Many of the drow-made items in the adventures are found outside the drow homeland. And so far in the adventures I've covered, the PCs are headed for the drow homeland. So, it is quite possible that these items will continue to function as magical for the extent of this entire series of adventures (from the time they are acquired). But anyway, it is rather redundant, as the PCs have plenty of magic items other than the drow-made stuff.



> Using gem & jewelry "base value" expected values is the best thing. The increase/decrease table, by the book, was never included in modules -- by RAW you were supposed to be making those rolls on all the stuff listed in modules anyway.



The adventure module that prompted my questions on this subject actually uses the term "base value" for some gems and jewelry treasure. Plus there's all those treasures that merely say "X gems" and "Y jewelry" that pretty much requires the DM to roll on the DMG charts.

Quasqueton


----------



## SWBaxter

Quasqueton said:
			
		

> I don't understand this question.
> 
> The AD&D1 giants give AD&D1 xp to the AD&D1 characters.
> 
> The D&D3 giants give D&D3 xp to the D&D3 characters.
> 
> Where you thinking I was giving AD&D1 xp to the D&D3 characters, or D&D3 xp to the AD&D1 characters?




I would guess he was wondering if you were using AD&D giant stats for the D&D3 encounters, which would make an individual hill giant around CR 2 or 3, rather than 7.


----------



## Quasqueton

> I would guess he was wondering if you were using AD&D giant stats for the D&D3 encounters, which would make an individual hill giant around CR 2 or 3, rather than 7.



I am truly stunned at the confusion someone must have about this data to even conceive of this kind of question. (I mean no offense to anyone.)

I am not _running_ the adventures.

I'm simply looking at the encounters, adding up the gold values, noting the magic items, and figuring up the xp.

If an encounter has 4 hill giants:

I'm figuring up the AD&D1 xp for those 4 [AD&D1] hill giants (using the AD&D1 formula, including the xp for whatever non-magic-item treasure they have) and adding it to the AD&D1 xp for the AD&D1 characters.

Then I figure up the D&D3 xp for those 4 [D&D3] hill giants (using the D&D3 formula) and adding it to the D&D3 xp for the D&D3 characters.

Basically, it is a straight comparison -- how much xp would an AD&D1 party get against 4 [AD&D1] hill giants, compared to how much xp would a D&D3 party get against 4 [D&D3] hill giants.

Quasqueton


----------



## MerricB

Quasqueton said:
			
		

> I am truly stunned at the confusion someone must have about this data to even conceive of this kind of question. (I mean no offense to anyone.)
> 
> ...snip...
> 
> Basically, it is a straight comparison -- how much xp would an AD&D1 party get against 4 [AD&D1] hill giants, compared to how much xp would a D&D3 party get against 4 [D&D3] hill giants.




The problem being, of course, that AD&D Hill Giants aren't the same as D&D3 Hill Giants. They're different monsters. (If you compared AD&D2 Hill Giants against D&D3 Hill Giants, it'd be closer).

Cheers!


----------



## Delta

Quasqueton said:
			
		

> I am truly stunned at the confusion someone must have about this data to even conceive of this kind of question. (I mean no offense to anyone.)




Geez, why do you have to be so antagonistic everything?

One option when converting the modules is to turn AD&D1 8HD hill giants into D&D3 12HD hill giants (CR 7). But then the required PC levels are different, the other monsters weaker in relation, etc. 

A second option is to turn AD&D1 8HD hill giants into custom D&D3 8HD hill giants (CR 5). Lots of people do this to great efficacy. ( http://home.gwi.net/~rdorman/frilond/rul/dm/hillgiant.htm )

But whatever. Apparently I'm talking Greek.


----------



## SWBaxter

Quasqueton said:
			
		

> I am truly stunned at the confusion someone must have about this data to even conceive of this kind of question. (I mean no offense to anyone.)




Well, I was able to conceive of it while also understanding what you had actually been doing, so I don't think I'm particularly confused about the data. 

I don't really think the question is so far beyond the pale, as the rate of XP gain is pretty significantly affected by substituting more powerful critters in to face the higher level 3E party. Your study of D1 demonstrates this - if all the Drow, Troglodytes, etc. had gone through the same powerup between editions as the giants, the 3E group might have gotten a lot more XP. OTOH, I can also see that trying to account for those changes would be a ridiculous amount of work, added to what is already a pretty significant task, and wouldn't necessarily improve the usefulness of the results at all.

To me, the most enlightening part of your experiment is the rate at which the 1E group is advancing. It's still a fascinating exercise, hope to see more.


----------



## Hussar

I think there's a BIG point to remember.  For 1e characters, the vast majority of xp comes from treasure.  Kill xp is just bonus.  You could half or even quarter the kill xp and it wouldn't significantly change the outcomes.


----------



## Quasqueton

> Geez, why do you have to be so antagonistic everything?



I’m not being antagonistic. I’ve not said anything antagonistic. I don’t feel any antagonism.



> The problem being, of course, that AD&D Hill Giants aren't the same as D&D3 Hill Giants. They're different monsters. (If you compared AD&D2 Hill Giants against D&D3 Hill Giants, it'd be closer).



There is no “cross-edition” combat going on, so I don’t see how a difference in stats between the editions matters.

Unless you are saying that the hill giant-to-PCs power/difficulty/danger ratio is significantly different within their respective editions. Are D&D3 hill giants significantly more or less powerful/difficult/dangerous to D&D3 8th-level PCs than AD&D1 hill giants are to AD&D1 8th-level PCs.

And even if this is the contention, I don't see what it matters when adding up the xp awards for the given challenges. So the D&D3 PCs had a harder/easier time with a particular challenge -- they still just get the book value xp award.

I can completely leave out the D&D3 xp data if it is causing this much confusion.

Quasqueton


----------



## Garnfellow

Quasqueton said:
			
		

> I’m not being antagonistic. I’ve not said anything antagonistic. I don’t feel any antagonism.




I think the work you're doing is great, and I really hope to see more of it. But you might take a second look at some of your responses to recent questions -- maybe you had completely different intentions, but your answers sound pretty defensive, if not downright testy, to what are probably just innocent questions. Just keep in mind, it can be really hard to read people's minds on this intarweb thingie.


----------



## Quasqueton

> But you might take a second look at some of your responses to recent questions



Can you quote a particular response that read as antagonistic?

Quasqueton


----------



## Garnfellow

Quasqueton said:
			
		

> Can you quote a particular response that read as antagonistic?




Sure thing. 



			
				Quasqueton said:
			
		

> I am truly stunned at the confusion someone must have about this data to even conceive of this kind of question. (I mean no offense to anyone.)




That little parenthetical note at the end cannot begin to counterbalance the offensiveness of your first sentence, in which you seriously question the intellect of a previous poster. It's like when someone adds a cute smilely emoticon at the end of a nasty insult. I don't think you really meant to be rude, but that's certainly how it came across.

Look, I don't want to derail this thread into a discussion about netiquette  or tone -- there are too many, much more interesting things here to post about.


----------



## Quasqueton

> I would guess he was wondering if you were using AD&D giant stats for the D&D3 encounters, which would make an individual hill giant around CR 2 or 3, rather than 7.





> Originally Posted by Quasqueton
> I am truly stunned at the confusion someone must have about this data to even conceive of this kind of question. (I mean no offense to anyone.)





> That little parenthetical note at the end cannot begin to counterbalance the offensiveness of your first sentence, in which you seriously question the intellect of a previous poster. It's like when someone adds a cute smilely emoticon at the end of a nasty insult. I don't think you really meant to be rude, but that's certainly how it came across.



Someone was wondering if I was using AD&D1 giant stats for the D&D3 encounters. For them to wonder this, they must think I’m actually running the adventure, and that I might be using AD&D1 stats for the D&D3 version of the run.

How is that thought not born of terrible confusion of what is presented in this thread?

Confusion does not mean stupidity. Pointing out that a thought is very confused is not questioning the thinker’s intellect.

My statement was not meant to be offensive, it was not a nasty insult, and the parenthetical note after it was meant to confirm that.

Quasqueton


----------



## Quasqueton

*AD&D1 - The Lost Caverns of Tsojcanth*

Here is the treasure (gold and magic) from another AD&D1 adventure. But this one is outside the "adventure path" of ToEE and GDQ. Since the xp issue seems to be such a troublesome point for many people, I didn't bother figuring it up for this module.







> *The Lost Caverns of Tsojcanth* by Gary Gygax
> An adventure for character levels 6-10, for AD&D1.
> 
> *Total gp value:* 293,960gp
> 
> *Total magic treasure:*
> dagger +2 longtooth
> bracers of defense AC 5
> arrows +1 (x4)
> cloak of poisonousness
> boots of levitation
> boots of dancing
> magic boat*
> lens of detection
> bag of holding
> horn of fog
> ring of protection +1
> battle axe +2, +4 vs. undead and negative plane creatures
> cursed broadsword +1(yes, that's plus one)**
> necklace of missiles (one 9HD missile)
> wand of magic missiles (100 charges)
> battle axe +2
> ring of warmth
> bracers of defense AC 7
> candle of invocation (Chaotic Good)
> serpentine owl
> short sword +1
> scale mail +2
> spear +2
> periapt of proof against poison +3
> wings of flying
> horseman's pick +1
> cloak of elvenkind
> boots of elvenkind
> rug of smothering
> Keoghtom's ointment (x2)
> brooch of shielding
> scrolls of protection: elementals, possession
> potions: healing, vitality, green dragon control, water breathing (x2), extra healing, dimunition, poison, polymorph self, plant control, clairvoyance
> magic-user scrolls: slow, stone to flesh, phase door (17th level), write, fool's gold, magic mouth, dispel magic, distance distortion, statue, darkness, forget, fly, animal growth, cloudkill
> cleric scrolls: resist fire, remove curse, raise dead, heal
> illusionist scrolls: color spray, non-detection, maze
> bastard sword +4 (Chaotic Evil)
> plate mail +2
> slippers of spiderclimb
> Daoud's wondrous lanthorn
> prison of Zagyg
> Demonomicon
> manual of bodily health
> manual of gainful exercise
> manual of quickness of action
> tome of clear thought
> tome of leadership and influence
> tome of understanding
> 
> * Moves and stops on command, and shrinks to 10% size on command.
> 
> ** "The cursed broadsword is absolutely neutral in alignment, and it has the power to generate illusion (as a wand) even though it has no discernible intelligence. Such illusions last for 1d4+4 melee rounds, and operate periodically after an interval of from 3d6 turns."



Interesting note in the Afterward:







> During the course of several game sessions, player characters may accumulate enough experience points to qualify for an increase in level. Because the caverns are so far from any place where characters can train, the DM may allow player characters to advance without prior training, _provided_ that the quality of play has been very high. Regulating the amount of time and treasure needed to train is important in the proper handling of a campaign. If you choose to allow player characters to advance in level without training, it should be because of their playing skill, and the special circumstances of this module. Advancement without training should be regarded as a reward for excellence rather than as a normal part of the campaign.
> 
> Poor play does not merit special consideration. Players will not improve if the DM pampers rather than challenges them. If your players perform badly, do not allow their characters to increase in experience level. Be most judicious in how you handle awards to player characters. Allowing foolish and ignorant players to advance their characters to high levels reflects badly upon the game and even more so upon the Dungeon Master who allowed such a travesty to occur. In effect, it is the excellence of the DM which is judged when the caliber of play by any group is discussed. Keep yours high!



Quasqueton


----------



## Philotomy Jurament

Quasqueton said:
			
		

> My statement was not meant to be offensive, it was not a nasty insult, and the parenthetical note after it was meant to confirm that.



You felt such a parenthetical note and confirmation was a necessary addition to a completely inoffensive post?  Just say'n...


----------



## shilsen

Quasqueton said:
			
		

> Interesting note in the Afterward:






> During the course of several game sessions, player characters may accumulate enough experience points to qualify for an increase in level. Because the caverns are so far from any place where characters can train, the DM may allow player characters to advance without prior training, provided that the quality of play has been very high. Regulating the amount of time and treasure needed to train is important in the proper handling of a campaign. If you choose to allow player characters to advance in level without training, it should be because of their playing skill, and the special circumstances of this module. Advancement without training should be regarded as a reward for excellence rather than as a normal part of the campaign.
> 
> Poor play does not merit special consideration. Players will not improve if the DM pampers rather than challenges them. If your players perform badly, do not allow their characters to increase in experience level. Be most judicious in how you handle awards to player characters. Allowing foolish and ignorant players to advance their characters to high levels reflects badly upon the game and even more so upon the Dungeon Master who allowed such a travesty to occur. In effect, it is the excellence of the DM which is judged when the caliber of play by any group is discussed. Keep yours high!




Damn! That sounds like something you might tell a teacher about grading and student behavior and improvement. 

As a teacher myself, let me just say - yeesh!


----------



## Quasqueton

> You felt such a parenthetical note and confirmation was a necessary addition to a completely inoffensive post? Just say'n...



That conversation and controversy is 6 months old. Can we move past it?

Quasqueton


----------



## molonel

I, for one, want to echo the "This thread is really interesting" sentiment expressed already, and encourage people to lay their swords down and not derail the thread.


----------



## Quasqueton

> One more difference that the treasure analysis makes me wonder about: how closely distributed is the treasure in published modules to the "treasure standard" as reflected by the treasure tables in the DMGs?



Here's a thread related to this question: http://www.enworld.org/showthread.php?t=182808

Quasqueton


----------



## Naidim

Please continue WITH xp calculations. I'm looking forward to the D3 and Q1 results.


----------



## Jer

Naidim said:
			
		

> Please continue WITH xp calculations. I'm looking forward to the D3 and Q1 results.




I agree with this sentiment.  Some folks may be less interested in the XP comparisons, but I find them fascinating.  I never handed out XP for treasure, and I always thought tripling the XP for combat would be enough, but these comparisons and the discussion that they have brought out are fascinating.  Speaking for myself, I really appreciate the amount of work you've put into this to give this set of insights.


----------



## thedungeondelver

Quas am I understanding you correctly that you do not use any magic item XP awards in your calculations?


----------



## zoroaster100

I think that one powerful factor affecting XP earned in 1st edition is that in 1st edition modules much of the best treasure was so ridiculously well hidden in all sorts of arbitrary ways in the dungeon that it really would be unfair to assume any party would be getting all or even most of the treasure.


----------



## Slife

zoroaster100 said:
			
		

> I think that one powerful factor affecting XP earned in 1st edition is that in 1st edition modules much of the best treasure was so ridiculously well hidden in all sorts of arbitrary ways in the dungeon that it really would be unfair to assume any party would be getting all or even most of the treasure.



Of course, the best treasure is magical, and since, IIRC, Quas isn't including magical treasure in XP calculations, it evens out.


----------



## Quasqueton

> I think that one powerful factor affecting XP earned in 1st edition is that in 1st edition modules much of the best treasure was so ridiculously well hidden in all sorts of arbitrary ways in the dungeon that it really would be unfair to assume any party would be getting all or even most of the treasure.



I’ve read this assertion before, but I haven’t seen this in the adventure modules I’ve gone through. The vast majority of treasure is not hidden. And that treasure that is hidden, is not much, and only rarely “ridiculously” or “devilishly” (as someone else said) well hidden.

The Moathouse's "hidden" treasure:

1- in the belly of a giant frog = a 100gp gem

2- "the brigands have buried a chest. . . Three turns of digging" = 265gp value, +1 arrows (x4)

3- "in the litter of its nesting" = 850gp value

4- In a lone wall cresset, a "nondescript torch stub is a silver baton" = 30gp value

5- "[The giant lizard] has previously swallowed a shield +1, easily found if appropriate actions are taken after the battle." = +1 shield

6- "hidden behind a loose stone" = 500gp value

7- "intermixed with the old carpeting and rags of [the ogre's] bedding" = elven cloak

8- in a pool of water, under a skull = a pin worth a total of 2,000gp

9- in the "mess" of a ghoul nest = 40gp value, 1 potion, 1 scroll

10- "hidden in a cabinet" in the BBEG's chamber = 15,000gp piece of jewelry [Is this actually "hidden", in the context of this discussion? Just in a cabinet.]

Total of 3,785 gp value (out of 30,938gp) not immediately or obviously discoverable. Plus a 15,000gp piece of jewelry "hidden in a cabinet" in the BBEG's chamber, which "If seriously threatened, Lareth will offer all his non-magical treasures---jewelry, coins, and all else---as ransom for his life."

Quasqueton


----------



## molonel

zoroaster100 said:
			
		

> I think that one powerful factor affecting XP earned in 1st edition is that in 1st edition modules much of the best treasure was so ridiculously well hidden in all sorts of arbitrary ways in the dungeon that it really would be unfair to assume any party would be getting all or even most of the treasure.




Quas already addressed this, but I'll add my two coppers. Whenever we played a module in my 1st Edition campaigns, our party would stay for a few weeks afterward and search every room top to bottom. Just in case.

And since the DM would usually pitch the module afterward, or let us read it, I can definitely say that we rarely missed a thing.

This is a very good thread, Quas, and very timely. I think it factually dispells some of the claims we've been seeing lately about earlier editions of the game.


----------



## Mark CMG

Quasqueton said:
			
		

> I’ve read this assertion before, but I haven’t seen this in the adventure modules I’ve gone through. The vast majority of treasure is not hidden. And that treasure that is hidden, is not much, and only rarely “ridiculously” or “devilishly” (as someone else said) well hidden.
> 
> The Moathouse's "hidden" treasure:
> 
> 1- in the belly of a giant frog = a 100gp gem
> 
> 2- "the brigands have buried a chest. . . Three turns of digging" = 265gp value, +1 arrows (x4)
> 
> 3- "in the litter of its nesting" = 850gp value
> 
> 4- In a lone wall cresset, a "nondescript torch stub is a silver baton" = 30gp value
> 
> 5- "[The giant lizard] has previously swallowed a shield +1, easily found if appropriate actions are taken after the battle." = +1 shield
> 
> 6- "hidden behind a loose stone" = 500gp value
> 
> 7- "intermixed with the old carpeting and rags of [the ogre's] bedding" = elven cloak
> 
> 8- in a pool of water, under a skull = a pin worth a total of 2,000gp
> 
> 9- in the "mess" of a ghoul nest = 40gp value, 1 potion, 1 scroll
> 
> 10- "hidden in a cabinet" in the BBEG's chamber = 15,000gp piece of jewelry [Is this actually "hidden", in the context of this discussion? Just in a cabinet.]
> 
> Total of 3,785 gp value (out of 30,938gp) not immediately or obviously discoverable. Plus a 15,000gp piece of jewelry "hidden in a cabinet" in the BBEG's chamber, which "If seriously threatened, Lareth will offer all his non-magical treasures---jewelry, coins, and all else---as ransom for his life."
> 
> Quasqueton





Most of that treasure should be found by careful searching.


----------



## JustinA

I think the biggest revelation I'm coming away from this thread with is that my personal experience (that advancement in previous editions was considerably slower) was apparently based entirely on the fact that my groups ignored the XP for GP rules.


----------



## Quasqueton

What is the "appropriate action" after a battle to discover a shield in the belly of a giant lizard? ;-)

There are at least three adventures I can think of off the top of my head that had treasure inside a monster's belly -- these two instances in _The Village of Hommlet_, the _ring of regeneration_ inside the dinosaur in _The Isle of Dread_, and the gems inside the storoper in _Aerie of the Slavelords_. What prompted module designers to place treasure in such a place? And how many Players thought to cut open the monsters to find the treasure? Was gutting monster corpses a regular action for many groups? And did monsters ever have non-valuable/magic junk in their bellies?

Quasqueton


----------



## Slife

Quasqueton said:
			
		

> What is the "appropriate action" after a battle to discover a shield in the belly of a giant lizard? ;-)
> 
> There are at least three adventures I can think of off the top of my head that had treasure inside a monster's belly -- these two instances in _The Village of Hommlet_, the _ring of regeneration_ inside the dinosaur in _The Isle of Dread_, and the gems inside the storoper in _Aerie of the Slavelords_. What prompted module designers to place treasure in such a place? And how many Players thought to cut open the monsters to find the treasure? Was gutting monster corpses a regular action for many groups? And did monsters ever have non-valuable/magic junk in their bellies?
> 
> Quasqueton



Where do you think CRPGs got the idea?  Wolves don't have anywhere else to keep hundreds of GP.


----------



## molonel

Quasqueton said:
			
		

> What is the "appropriate action" after a battle to discover a shield in the belly of a giant lizard? ;-)
> 
> There are at least three adventures I can think of off the top of my head that had treasure inside a monster's belly -- these two instances in _The Village of Hommlet_, the _ring of regeneration_ inside the dinosaur in _The Isle of Dread_, and the gems inside the storoper in _Aerie of the Slavelords_. What prompted module designers to place treasure in such a place? And how many Players thought to cut open the monsters to find the treasure? Was gutting monster corpses a regular action for many groups? And did monsters ever have non-valuable/magic junk in their bellies?
> 
> Quasqueton




I can remember gutting stuff for treasure, yeah. Especially in a wilderness adventure if the DM tracked rations.


----------



## Mark CMG

We gutted anything without a humanoid face.


----------



## T. Foster

Giant frogs, giant lizards, and dinosaurs are all specifically capable of swallowing characters whole, so it's not unreasonable for players to surmise they might have swallowed something interesting in the past that might still be there if they gut it (after all, if it swallows one of the characters whole, all of his treasure will be in there...).

As for the gems in the roper's "gizzard," that's a standard feature of the monster that makes no sense in-milieu or out and is presumably only there to serve as an "easter egg" for players who've read the MM and have good memories. The storoper is just following that pattern.

In neither case do I think the game is either explicitly or even implicitly encouraging players to gut and dissect every monster they defeat.


----------



## jdrakeh

J Alexander said:
			
		

> I think the biggest revelation I'm coming away from this thread with is that my personal experience (that advancement in previous editions was considerably slower) was apparently based entirely on the fact that my groups ignored the XP for GP rules.




I think that has a lot to do with it. I know that this is true for me and my old 1e group. If we'd been giving away XP for GP (and GP value of treausure) we would have rocketed through the levels. As it was, we actually preferred the slower progression that ignoring the XP for gold rules provided. Treasure should, IMO, be its own reward.


----------



## JustinA

jdrakeh said:
			
		

> I think that has a lot to do with it. I know that this is true for me and my old 1e group. If we'd been giving away XP for GP (and GP value of treausure) we would have rocketed through the levels. As it was, we actually preferred the slower progression that ignoring the XP for gold rules provided. Treasure should, IMO, be its own reward.




That was pretty much the thinking in all the groups I played in. (And we're talking about 9-12 different groups stretched over a wide swath of geography.)

I've been slicing 3rd Edition rewards in half for several campaigns now. It's working well. It takes longer for everyone to get to 20th level, but players get 3-6 sessions at each level to actually learn what they can do and get comfortable before powering up again. And it gives us 15-20 sessions within a given range of power, so that larger and more epic adventures don't end up stylistically disjointed (where at the beginning of it you're struggling with rats and a couple days later you're slaying dragons).


----------



## Quasqueton

*AD&D1 - Descent to the Depths of the Earth - Shrine of the Kuo Toa*

This post continues the original "adventure path" (_The Temple of Elemental Evil_, _Against the Giants_, _Descent to the Depths of the Earth_). Clearing out the Kuo Toa Shrine.







> AD&D1 party begins at: (738,514 xp each)
> Fighter 10
> Paladin 10
> Cleric 11
> Magic-User 11
> Illusionist 12
> Thief 13
> 
> 
> *Total gp value:* 417,795 gp
> 
> *Total xp value:*
> AD&D1: 518,793 xp (not including the xp value of using or selling magic items, nor the 10% bonus for ability scores over 15)
> 
> *Total magic treasure:*
> boots of speed
> ring of protection +3 (6 charges for saving throws, then useless)
> trident of submission
> ring of invisibility
> manual of gainful exercise
> tome of understanding
> grim grimoire
> helm of underwater vision
> gauntlets of swimming and climbing
> cleric scroll: lower water, true seeing, restoration
> potions: water breathing (x12)
> short sword +2 (drow)
> dagger +2 (drow)
> 
> 
> AD&D1 party finishes at: (824,980 xp each)
> Fighter 11
> Paladin 10
> Cleric 11
> Magic-User 12
> Illusionist 12
> Thief 13



The party's next steps take them into the drow kingdom. _Vault of the Drow_ is for characters levels 10-14, and that's pretty much right where they are.

Quasqueton


----------



## Quasqueton

> I think the biggest revelation I'm coming away from this thread with is that my personal experience (that advancement in previous editions was considerably slower) was apparently based entirely on the fact that my groups ignored the XP for GP rules.



At the end of the Giants adventures, the party has 653,268 xp each -- 3,919,608 total.

Of that total xp, 1,172,750 xp was from monsters, and 2,746,858 xp was from gp (not counting magic item xp, either direct or from gp when sold).

That's 70% xp from gold, and only 30% from monsters.

This makes for an interesting situation when using any AD&D1 "adventure path" series. For instance, going through the Temple of Elemental Evil *without xp for gp*, you get:

*After the Moathouse:*
AD&D1 party (1,202 xp each)
Fighter 1
Paladin 1
Cleric 1
Magic-User 1
Illusionist 1
Thief 1

*After the Last Tower and Upper Rubble:*
AD&D1 party (1,743 xp each)
Fighter 1
Paladin 1
Cleric 2
Magic-User 1
Illusionist 1
Thief 2

*After Dungeon Level 1:*
AD&D1 party (3,938 xp each)
Fighter 2
Paladin 2
Cleric 3
Magic-User 2
Illusionist 2
Thief 3

*After Dungeon Level 2:*
AD&D1 party (10,741 xp each)
Fighter 4
Paladin 3
Cleric 4
Magic-User 4
Illusionist 4
Thief 5

*After Dungeon Level 3:*
AD&D1 party (18,485 xp each)
Fighter 5
Paladin 4
Cleric 5
Magic-User 4
Illusionist 5
Thief 5

*After Dungeon Level 4:*
AD&D1 party (27,499 xp each)
Fighter 5
Paladin 5
Cleric 5 - 2 xp from level 6 (that's *two* xp)
Magic-User 5
Illusionist 5
Thief 6

Without the xp for gp, the AD&D1 party probably couldn't really handle each next level of the dungeon as they finished one. Could a level 1.3 (four level 1s, two level 2s) party really survive the first level of the ToEE?

*Note:* To repeat what a lot of people miss in this data -- this xp is not including any magic item awards (base or gp sell value), and no bonus for above average ability scores.

And without xp for gp, the AD&D1 party definitely wouldn't be ready for the Giant's series when they finished the Temple adventure. The ToEE module states that the PCs can/should be 8th level when they finish it (the proper level to begin AtG).







> . . . a complete campaign adventure which will take beginning characters from 1st all the way to 8th level and possibly beyond!



*With* xp for gp, the AD&D1 party is:
Fighter 8
Paladin 7
Cleric 8
Magic-User 9
Illusionist 9
Thief 9
-- ready for the Hill Giant adventure.

Quasqueton


----------



## Quasqueton

*AD&D1 - Vault of the Drow*

Adventuring in the Vault of the Drow.







> _Vault of the Drow_ by E. Gary Gygax
> 
> *AD&D1 party begins at:* (824,980 xp each)
> Fighter 11
> Paladin 10
> Cleric 11
> Magic-User 12
> Illusionist 12
> Thief 13
> 
> *Total gp value:* 1,507,717 gp
> 
> *Total xp value:* 2,414,001 xp (not including the xp value of using or selling magic items, nor the 10% bonus for ability scores over 15)
> 
> *Total magic treasure:*
> magic-user scrolls: charm monster, invisible stalker, lightning bolt, passwall
> potions: healing (x4), plant control (x2), poison, extra healing, flying, frost giant strength (x2), invulnerability (x2), plus 25 more determined randomly
> wand of viscid globs
> wings of flying
> +1 ring of protection
> oil of etherealness (x3)
> cloak of poisonousness
> pipes of the sewers
> ring of spell storing: animate dead, knock, maze, polymorph self
> +1 arrows (x8)
> wand of polymorph (2 charges)
> +2 mace
> gauntlets of ogre power
> +3 crossbow bolt (x72)
> ring of polymorph into troglodyte
> scroll of protection from elementals
> javelin of lightning (x15)
> death lance (x8)
> scroll of protection from magic
> scroll of protection from demons
> cleric scrolls: 17 determined randomly
> ring of water walking
> wand of magic missiles (50 charges)
> demon staff (x2)
> lurker cloak
> spider wand (x2) (50 charges)
> ring of antivenom (20 charges)
> amulet vs. crystal balls and ESP
> +1 ring of protection
> ring of invisibility
> dust of disappearance (x3)
> talisman of lawfulness
> Plus BUNCHES, LOTS, TONS, BUTTLOADS of drow weapons and armor from +1 to +5
> 
> AD&D1 party finishes at: (1,227,315 xp each)
> Fighter 12 (2% away from 13)
> Paladin 11
> Cleric 13
> Magic-User 13
> Illusionist 14
> Thief 15



Note: I did not include the treasure and xp from the drow city of Erelhe-Cinlu. This omission includes the main defensive wall and the noble houses (map areas 9-17). The city proper is just too random to calculate (not to mention it is 8,000-9,000 drow). The noble houses are given only a general overview with instructions to roll up treasure randomly, and the house leaders are given only basic stats without gear (DM is to assign weapons or armor "commensurate with rank").

The xp numbers also do not include xp for defeating Lolth, herself, although it is possible to encounter her in the temple.

After this adventure, the PCs are entering the Demonweb Pits. Q1 is labeled for "Character Levels 10-14", and that's pretty much right where the PCs are (average: 13). It's pretty impressive that Gary Gygax so well designed/predicted the level advancement through these adventures. They finish one right at the appropriate level to start the next in the series.

Quasqueton


----------



## Quasqueton

I forgot to include the magic items from the Vault of the Drow. I just added them in.

Quasqueton


----------



## Sandain

Fantatsic, I cant wait for more!

For the record, my groups always made liberal sue of detect magic and those wands of detect gems that use to be common in 1E.  Treasure was very seldom missed.


----------



## Quasqueton

---


----------



## Quasqueton

Teaser:

I finally got around to going through Q1 - Queen of the Demonweb Pits. I have the raw data (xp, gp, magic) and I'll post the results for this last module in the original adventure path for AD&D1 in a day or two.

I'm looking forward to finishing this iconic adventure series.

Quasqueton


----------



## AdmundfortGeographer

Awesome!

Quas, any plans for some more BX D&D comparisons someday?


----------



## Quasqueton

*AD&D1 - Queen of the Demonweb Pits*

Finishing the series by chasing Lolth into her Abyssal home!


> _Queen of the Demonweb Pits_ by David C. Sutherland III with Gary Gygax
> 
> *AD&D1 party begins at:* (1,227,315 xp each)
> Fighter 12 (2% away from 13)
> Paladin 11
> Cleric 13
> Magic-User 13
> Illusionist 14
> Thief 15
> 
> *Total gp value:* 290,628 gp
> 
> *Total xp value [not including Lolth]:* 522,112 xp (not including the xp value of using or selling magic items, nor the 10% bonus for ability scores over 15)
> 
> *Total magic treasure:*
> scrolls: cure serious wounds (x3), burning hands, ESP, fear, Leomund's trap, Otto's irresistable dance, push, find familiar, ice storm, dispel magic, dispel evil, protection from evil, sanctuary, spiritual hammer, cure blindness, glyph of warding, heal
> crystal ball
> mace +2
> amulet of protection from werewolves
> rope of climbing
> potions: gaseous form, invulnerability (x2), poison, treasure finding (x2), healing (x9), delusion (x4), fire resistance (x2), heroism, invisibility, undead control, extra healing (x3), flying, dimunition, fire giant strength, speed, sweet water, clairvoyance, stone giant strength
> dagger +1
> ring of antivenom (20 charges)
> mirror of opposition
> javelin of lightning (x3)
> wings of flying
> wand of frost (8 charges)
> bag of holding
> ring of protection +2
> boots of speed
> ring of contrariness
> two-handed sword +1
> ring of protection +1
> deathlance (x2)
> scroll of protection from lycanthropes
> longsword +1, +2 vs. magic-users and enchanted monsters
> pendant of truth (3 balls*)
> leather armor +1
> plate mail of vulnerability
> wand of negation (35 charges)
> chime of opening
> longsword +2 giant slayer
> plate mail +2 (drow) (x5)
> short sword +1 (drow) (x4)
> short sword +2 (drow)
> short sword +3 (drow) (x2)
> short sword +4 (drow)
> plate mail +4 (drow) (x5)
> mace +3 (drow)
> flail +2 (drow)
> 
> * when a ball comes within 5' of an illusion or a magically trapped item or area, it will burst -- 50% chance of dispelling whatever triggered it.
> 
> *AD&D1 party finishes at:* (1,316,167 xp each)
> Fighter 13
> Paladin 11
> Cleric 13 (2.6% from 14th level)
> Magic-User 13
> Illusionist 14 (0.3% from 15th level -- just 3,833 xp!)
> Thief 15 (0.3% from 16th level -- just 3,833 xp!)



The above does not include the xp for defeating/killing Lolth. Defeating the demon lord* on her home plane (where this entire module takes place) is worth 124,700 xp.

I did not include her xp value in the above because I knew some folks would claim that killing her is not likely -- even though she has only 66 hit points! But the module itself explains what will happen if she is slain. In fact, the module discusses three endings for this adventure: 
"A. The characters perish in the Demonweb Pits." 
"B. The characters defeat Lolth, but she escapes through one of her mirrors." 
"C. Lolth is slain on her home plane."

With Lolth's xp added to the end award, the party finishes at:
Fighter 13
Paladin 11 (4.5% from 12th level)
Cleric 13 (1% from 14th level)
Magic-User 13
Illusionist 15
Thief 16
-- Only the illusionist and thief get another level (because they were so close to it before).
-- If the paladin and cleric have prime ability scores of 16 or better, they, too, would gain a level (12th and 14th respectively).

* In this adventure, Lolth is a demon lord: First sentence of her description: "The demoness Lolth is a very powerful and feared demon Lord." The text mentions making her a lesser goddess as an option:







> OPTIONAL ABILITIES
> 
> As a lesser goddess, Lolth has certain attributes common to all divine beings. The DM may choose not to use these in this module, since a properly-played Lolth will easily destroy most invaders. However, should these abilities be desired or needed for confrontations with a high-level party, the DM may include them in Lolth's abilities. Note that if these optional abilities are used, changes in Lolth's spell selection should be made.



The above also does not include anything in the other-world portals the PCs can go through from the demonweb (areas A through G). Those are essentially extraneous and seperate adventures.

So, to recap this ending: 

Not counting Lolth's xp, a 6-member AD&D1 party could end at an average of level 13.2.

Counting Lolth's xp, the party could end at an average of level 13.5.

With bonus xp for high prime ability scores, the party could end at an average of level 13.8.

So, if I were to call it, I'd say PCs going through the ToEE-GDQ adventure path would end the epic adventure at 13th-14th level. The PCs can retire and rest on their laurels.

Quasqueton


----------



## Quasqueton

> Quas, any plans for some more BX D&D comparisons someday?



I'd love to do this, but this kind of thing takes a lot of time that I just don't have as much of now as I did when I started this project.

Heck, it took me over a year to get around to finishing with this last module of the AD&D1 series.

If I find some time, I'll try to do another adventure or two.

Quasqueton


----------



## Quasqueton

If I were to make time to do a Basic/Expert D&D adventure path, what would be the quintessential modules? I've done B2 - Keep on the Borderlands, and the PCs could finish that at 3rd level. What would come next?

I've always thought X1 - Isle of Dread would come next, but that is a convoluted module for this kind of tracking. Exploring the island is a lot of random encounters, yes?

I think it would be best to track dungeon-style adventures. What are the such iconic B/XD&D modules? What's the iconic B/XD&D adventure path?

Quasqueton


----------



## AdmundfortGeographer

Any of the B1 through B4 to start seem to be iconic.

Then X2 Castle Amber. (Levels 3 to 6)

The Master of the Desert Nomads sequence (X4, X5, X10) seems to be an iconic Expert path. (Levels 6 to 14)

Companion level play was much more freeform so the iconic published adventure are difficult to fit in to a classic Adventure Path. The iconic Companion adventure is CM1 Test of the Warlords, that introduced PCs to the region of Norwold. But it is not a traditional adventure, it is a mini campaign with a framework about what PCs might trigger. Still, there are more than a few traditional encounters built in to it with War Machine battles at the finale. Still CM1 lead into CM2 and CM3 which were traditional adventure taking PCs up to 22nd level. A great deal of Companion-level play was about dominion management, though it did focus on the PCs new realms in Norwold under King Ericall. Master-level play introduced plane hopping and back to more, but also mostly loosely linked around their liege King Ericall of Norwold.

Not sure if there are "iconic" Master level adventures, most players seemed to have wanted to start over at level 1 with new characters rather than continue on higher and higher, that or DMs were freestyling it. Going wiht published adventures, follow with M5, to M1, to M3. Ought to take PCs up to level 36. If PCs are short of XP before M3, then toss M2 somewhere after M5.

That's an attempt at something of an adventure path. There is a clear mini-path in there with the popular Master of the Desert Nomads sequence. The rest are stand alone adventures tacked around. While it would be interesting to see how compare high level play in BECMI vs. any other edition, I'm not sure is going beyond level 14 (where Expert ended) would be worth much effort.


----------



## Bullgrit

Did anyone who played through Q1 - _Queen of the Demonweb Pits_ actually slay Lolth?

If so, did the DM give 10x XP for her defeat on her home plane?

What did the PCs do after this adventure/series? Did they retire, or did they find other high-level adventure?

Bullgrit


----------



## jgbrowning

Bullgrit said:


> Did anyone who played through Q1 - _Queen of the Demonweb Pits_ actually slay Lolth?
> 
> If so, did the DM give 10x XP for her defeat on her home plane?
> 
> What did the PCs do after this adventure/series? Did they retire, or did they find other high-level adventure?
> 
> Bullgrit




I did not play through it, but my older sister did (losing one of her two oldest characters in the process if I'm remembering properly). They managed to slay Lolth and then returned to their respective dominions. They were all landowners and mostly retired characters before they went through that adventures and returned to the same.

joe b.


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## Crothian

Bullgrit said:


> Did anyone who played through Q1 - _Queen of the Demonweb Pits_ actually slay Lolth?




Yes, we did.  it was an odd adventure and not all that fun.



> If so, did the DM give 10x XP for her defeat on her home plane?




I think so but it was a long time ago



> What did the PCs do after this adventure/series? Did they retire, or did they find other high-level adventure?




Went on to something else.  I thin k after that we went to Underdark.


----------



## MerricB

Bullgrit said:


> Did anyone who played through Q1 - _Queen of the Demonweb Pits_ actually slay Lolth?




My favourite (apocryphal) story about slaying Lolth was the high-level thief who managed to backstab her for quadruple damage... only Lolth had a _fire shield_ spell active. Lolth died, but the thief took double the damage _he'd_ dealt and died as well!

Alas, I've never run or played Q1.

Cheers!


----------



## Ariosto

Reading from Post #1 ...


			
				Quasqeton said:
			
		

> This is the level (and xp) that the party of adventurers begin the adventure module.



Of course, characters pre-3E had different XP/level sequences, and also tended to acquire XP at different rates. A singular "party level" could be at best an average. The original tournament characters for D1, for example, ranged from 7th through 13th.



> The total value of items that had a value listed for them ... does not include the value of mundane armor, weapons, and equipment taken from fallen foes.



Depending on circumstances, those could be notable contributions to XP; so, potentially, could be things not priced in the module. A bigger point is that just what treasure the characters secure is going to depend upon the players' choices (in combination with luck).

This may be a misleading methodology if returns are less variable in play of the 3E modules selected.



> [Total XP value] will not include xp for using or selling the magic items (an AD&D1 rule only).



Again, this is a notable oversight ... but still begs the question of the _actual_ XP value accruing to a given group or individual.



> [Total magical treasure] does not include non-treasure magic items, like what the captain of the guard in the town might have.



The very phrase "non-treasure magic items" bears heavy assumptions. One man's (or dark elf's) treasure is often another's, after they have met.



> This is the level (and xp) that the party of adventurers come out of the adventure module.



This is confirmation of my worry! How do you know what events shall transpire?



> It seems that Gygax and TSR based their "large party" assumption on their personal experiences ... and tournament gatherings (having 6-9 Players in a game).



The Giants and Drow modules were _DESIGNED_ as tournament scenarios!

The PHB advice merely suggests that players "consider how well the party playing will suit the needs it has engendered", including adequate numbers of hirelings and/or henchmen. A benchmark might be inferred from DMG p. 175, treating NPC adventuring parties in the dungeons: "There will always be from 2-5 characters in a character group, with men-at-arms or henchmen to round the party out to 9."

Smaller parties should be of higher average level, and in D1, "Judging from test play, a relatively small party can succeed only if they can return periodically to some base in order to recover and regain spells and equipment."

Variations in party composition can affect sheer survival, as well as the gross and distribution of treasure among survivors -- and the XP awards adjusted for level, and the number of XP needed to attain a level.

In AD&D, there is also the matter of training. That requires not only enough XP but also enough GP and time, and (until attaining "name" level) a higher-level trainer.


I will read on to see what develops, but these are, I think, important caveats to such statistics.


----------



## Storm Raven

Ariosto said:


> Reading from Post #1 ...
> Of course, characters pre-3E had different XP/level sequences, and also tended to acquire XP at different rates. A singular "party level" could be at best an average. The original tournament characters for D1, for example, ranged from 7th through 13th.




Perhaps you should read the rest of the thread before commenting. All of your concerns are addressed by the methodology.


----------



## Raven Crowking

Storm Raven said:


> Perhaps you should read the rest of the thread before commenting. All of your concerns are addressed by the methodology.




Not by my reading, they are not.  Not by a long shot.

3e has an "If it is there, they will find it" mentality.  4e is even worse:  "If it is there, they will find it, or the DM will keep moving it until they do".  1e had no such concept, and the expectation that the players will automatically find whatever is available is wonky at best.

A more accurate methodology would be:

1.  Determine area that must be searched.
2.  Determine time required to search area.
3.  Determine total number of average wandering monsters during searching.
4.  Determine average use of resources for dealing with said wandering monsters.
5.  Determine rest time required to restore resources.

You now know how many days, weeks, or years it will take to get everything out of the dungeon.....assuming that encumbrance isn't an issue (which means that the DM has been generous indeed with bags of holding and portable holes!).

Determine how long you believe the average party will take in the dungeon, and assume an appropriate % of the treasure on that basis, adding +25 to +50% (on the basis that treasure in obvious areas requires less searching).

Now take a look at the module layout.  Are there hidden areas that the party will not necessarily find?  Determine some average odds of finding that area, and deduct a % of the treasure hidden in that area accordingly.  Be sure to use the same % time for searching this area when determining how long the party must spend to find the treasure. 

You can also go through the module and look for "equipment reducers".....things like fireballs and rust monsters, and then make some determination of average equipment loss from these.  Subtract from total treasure.

_*Then*_ (and only then) you might have some idea as to the average haul from a given module.  (Assuming that the module was a tournament module, check the scoring section as well.....it might give you a hint as to what players were expected to accomplish easily, and what was only expected to be gotten by the "best of the best".)


RC


----------



## Storm Raven

Raven Crowking said:


> Not by my reading, they are not.  Not by a long shot.
> 
> 3e has an "If it is there, they will find it" mentality.  4e is even worse:  "If it is there, they will find it, or the DM will keep moving it until they do".  1e had no such concept, and the expectation that the players will automatically find whatever is available is wonky at best.






> _*Then*_ (and only then) you might have some idea as to the average haul from a given module.  (Assuming that the module was a tournament module, check the scoring section as well.....it might give you a hint as to what players were expected to accomplish easily, and what was only expected to be gotten by the "best of the best".)




This has been addressed in the thread, and it turns out the "hidden" treasure in 1e modules amounts to a trivial percentage of the total haul available, and furthermore, the hiding places are in many cases so obvious that only a party compsed of idiots would miss them.

For example, Lareth has jewelry "hidden" in the cabinet in his quarters. No one would ever think to open up that cabinet would they? Further, the text says that Lareth will use this as a bargaining tool if his life is threatened. So much for the treasure being hidden.

But the real key here is that the bulk of the treasure in 1e modules isn't hidden at all. Looking through them, the amount of treasure that is "hidden" turns out to be a trivial portion of the total. Even discounting that amount changes the overall haul by such a modest amount that it isn't worth worrying about.

In other words, your objections have been raised before in this thread, investigated, and found to not match reality.


----------



## Ariosto

A load of 20,000 coins is 400 pounds of encumbrance in 3E; in AD&D, it is a short ton -- five times as much!

Moreover, the AD&D characters depend on treasure for most of their XP. They _must_ get it home (and get what prices they can for gems, jewelry, objets d'art, etc.) before getting the XP.

So, unless the XP figures being compared are *strictly* those for defeating monsters, the undertakings seem to me utterly incommensurate.



			
				Post #1 said:
			
		

> For AD&D1 and B/ED&D, it includes the standard 1gp = 1xp.


----------



## Raven Crowking

Storm Raven said:


> This has been addressed in the thread




Inadequately.  AFAICT, it is addressed as a claim without real data to back it up.

Raising a single example and then claiming that it relates to all treasure, as you do, would allow me to claim that all treasure is hidden so as to be unlikely to ever be found.

It is an invalid argument.

Perhaps you could point to the post(s) offering something more substantial.


RC


----------



## Storm Raven

Ariosto said:


> A load of 20,000 coins is 400 pounds of encumbrance in 3E; in AD&D, it is a short ton -- five times as much!
> 
> Moreover, the AD&D characters depend on treasure for most of their XP. They _must_ get it home (and get what prices they can for gems, jewelry, objets d'art, etc.) before getting the XP.
> 
> So, unless the XP figures being compared are *strictly* those for defeating monsters, the undertakings seem to me utterly incommensurate.




If you look at the actual lists of treasure provided, you will find that the bulk of mundane treasure lootable from most modules is in the form of relatively easily transportable gems, jewelry, and other modest encumbrance items. There are relatively few instances in which a pile of coins is lying about to be looted. The concern over the supposed vast weight of treasure to be carried seems to me, based upon a review of the actual treasure found in the modules, to be highly overblown.


----------



## Raven Crowking

Ariosto said:


> A load of 20,000 coins is 400 pounds of encumbrance in 3E; in AD&D, it is a short ton -- five times as much!
> 
> Moreover, the AD&D characters depend on treasure for most of their XP. They _must_ get it home (and get what prices they can for gems, jewelry, objets d'art, etc.) before getting the XP.
> 
> So, unless the XP figures being compared are *strictly* those for defeating monsters, the undertakings seem to me utterly incommensurate.




Now, now, Ariosto.  This thread is about proving that nothing has changed.  Don't go bringing facts into it.  (Unless you slant them properly, of course.   )


RC


----------



## Storm Raven

Raven Crowking said:


> Inadequately.  AFAICT, it is addressed as a claim without real data to back it up.
> 
> Raising a single example and then claiming that it relates to all treasure, as you do, would allow me to claim that all treasure is hidden so as to be unlikely to ever be found.
> 
> It is an invalid argument.
> 
> Perhaps you could point to the post(s) offering something more substantial.




Perhaps you should, as I pointed out earlier, read the thread. Quasqueton addressed this issue pretty directly (in Post 119):



> _I’ve read this assertion before, but I haven’t seen this in the adventure modules I’ve gone through. The vast majority of treasure is not hidden. And that treasure that is hidden, is not much, and only rarely “ridiculously” or “devilishly” (as someone else said) well hidden.
> 
> The Moathouse's "hidden" treasure:
> 
> 1- in the belly of a giant frog = a 100gp gem
> 
> 2- "the brigands have buried a chest. . . Three turns of digging" = 265gp value, +1 arrows (x4)
> 
> 3- "in the litter of its nesting" = 850gp value
> 
> 4- In a lone wall cresset, a "nondescript torch stub is a silver baton" = 30gp value
> 
> 5- "[The giant lizard] has previously swallowed a shield +1, easily found if appropriate actions are taken after the battle." = +1 shield
> 
> 6- "hidden behind a loose stone" = 500gp value
> 
> 7- "intermixed with the old carpeting and rags of [the ogre's] bedding" = elven cloak
> 
> 8- in a pool of water, under a skull = a pin worth a total of 2,000gp
> 
> 9- in the "mess" of a ghoul nest = 40gp value, 1 potion, 1 scroll
> 
> 10- "hidden in a cabinet" in the BBEG's chamber = 15,000gp piece of jewelry [Is this actually "hidden", in the context of this discussion? Just in a cabinet.]
> 
> Total of 3,785 gp value (out of 30,938gp) not immediately or obviously discoverable. Plus a 15,000gp piece of jewelry "hidden in a cabinet" in the BBEG's chamber, which "If seriously threatened, Lareth will offer all his non-magical treasures---jewelry, coins, and all else---as ransom for his life."_




So, about 10% of the nonmagical treasure plus a handful of extremely minor items (four +1 arrows, an elven cloak, one potion and one scroll, plus a +1 shield that though hidden is "easy to find"). The only one that seems difficult to find is the buried bandit treasure. The others range from mildly difficult to easy to locate. And they amount to a fairly inconsequential volume of the treasure. Looking through other 1e modules, this pattern is replicated over and over. Most of the treasure is easy to find. A small percentage is hidden in ways that range all over the place in terms of difficulty to locate.


----------



## Ariosto

The Drow modules (and perhaps some others) are fortuitously rich in gems and jewelry that make for convenient carrying off.

On the other hand, they are also fairly non-linear scenarios -- especially relative to some other tournament rounds, of course, but also compared with what I have seen of 3E adventures (which I suppose might not be representative).

A simple structure may appear at a very gross level, but the "pearls" on the "string" turn out on closer examination to resemble a wilderness adventure more than a dungeon.

The Temple of Elemental Evil has some problems as a proper campaign dungeon, but it is not _terribly much_ lacking in number of possible paths -- no few of which can end in death rather than gold and glory.


----------



## Fifth Element

Raven Crowking said:


> Inadequately.  AFAICT, it is addressed as a claim without real data to back it up.
> 
> Raising a single example and then claiming that it relates to all treasure, as you do, would allow me to claim that all treasure is hidden so as to be unlikely to ever be found.
> 
> It is an invalid argument.
> 
> Perhaps you could point to the post(s) offering something more substantial.



Invalid, if the single example were the only argument, which it is not. The remainder of the argument lies previously in the thread. If you have indeed read the thread, you should know what is being referred to here.


----------



## Raven Crowking

Fifth Element said:


> Invalid, if the single example were the only argument, which it is not. The remainder of the argument lies previously in the thread. If you have indeed read the thread, you should know what is being referred to here.




Invalid, if examples are insufficient, or do not demonstrate what they are claimed to demonstrate.


RC


----------



## Ariosto

> This thread is about proving that nothing has changed.



That may be. It may even be fair to say that in some respects modules have not much changed.

I suppose that could be a fine buzzing distraction from consideration of how the games as presented in the books have changed ... or even from the fact that in my experience (which may not have been unusual), module play was generally something quite distinct from campaign play.

If modules (tournament scenarios, even) are taken today as the normative measure of the game, then that itself may indicate a change.


----------



## Storm Raven

Raven Crowking said:


> Invalid, if examples are insufficient, or do not demonstrate what they are claimed to demonstrate.




So, basically you have no argument other than to repeatedly state that treasure in 1e modules was really hard to find, despite the evidence presented that this wasn't actually the case.

The only people posting contentless rants at this point are you and Aristoi. You've asserted that the treasure in 1e modules should be vastly discounted because it was _soo_ very hard to find. This assertion has been investigated and refuted with concrete examples.

Where are the facts to back up your assertion? Your say-so?

Sorry, but you need something more. Show us the 1e module in the examples with most of its treasure cleverly hidden from discovery. Go ahead. We can wait.


----------



## Storm Raven

Ariosto said:


> That may be. It may even be fair to say that in some respects modules have not much changed.
> 
> I suppose that could be a fine buzzing distraction from consideration of how the games as presented in the books have changed ... or even from the fact that in my experience (which may not have been unusual), module play was generally something quite distinct from campaign play.




Which is why most modules that had been used as tournament modules had expanded campaign versions in the commercially available products. You think Quas is using modules that were tournament only and somehow _not_ used in many home campaigns?



> _If modules (tournament scenarios, even) are taken today as the normative measure of the game, then that itself may indicate a change._




The modules available during the 1e era are a decent indicator of what the standard version of play was intended to be. They are also the only neutral baseline we have to evaluate the way the game was intended to be played at the time they were released. If you don't like tounrament modules, then I'm sure a series of 1e adventures can be created taking characters from 1st level to high levels that use entirely non-tournament modules.


----------



## Ariosto

I have not asserted that most treasure in modules was cleverly hidden from discovery!

Even in a campaign dungeon, it should be true of only a small portion of the value (primarily "incidental" treasures directly guarded neither by monster nor by trap, although some especially desirable ones might pose all three challenges).


----------



## Storm Raven

Ariosto said:


> I have not asserted that most treasure in modules was cleverly hidden from discovery!
> 
> Even in a campaign dungeon, it should be true of only a small portion of the value (primarily "incidental" treasures directly guarded neither by monster nor by trap, although some especially desirable ones might pose all three challenges).




You may not have, but Crowking certainly has.

But your other questions have been addressed. For example, you stated that the comparison might be flawed because of 1e's varying experience point charts, and thus you could only come up with an "average level" for the party as a whole. But that's not how Quas did the survey. He created what he believed to be (and in my opinion, his belief was pretty good) a representative party of characters and tracked their individual level progression using the gained experience from the modules.

And so on. The quibbles you have are addressed in the thread. I recommend reading it and then deciding if you have an issue with Quas' survey.


----------



## Ariosto

> The modules available during the 1e era are a decent indicator of what the standard version of play was intended to be.



What is the basis for this claim? Is it just circular logic? It is certainly no claim I recall being made on the modules' behalf by the man who designed the game.



> They are also the only neutral baseline we have to evaluate the way the game was intended to be played at the time they were released.



Why the presumption that the game was meant to be played otherwise than the books indicated? Such much-debated minutia  -- confused by poor editing -- as how to handle initiative are not about to be cleared up by reference to modules; nor do they appear to be the subjects at hand.


----------



## Ariosto

Anyhow ... I will get on with reading on!


----------



## Storm Raven

Ariosto said:


> What is the basis for this claim? Is it just circular logic? It is certainly no claim I recall being made on the modules' behalf by the man who designed the game.




The basis is that the modules present us with an indication of what the publisher of the game, whose writers made up the core group that produced the game, thought were appropriate challenges and rewards for a part of adventurers of a level range indicated on the adventure. You think there is some hidden alchemy at work here?



> _Why the presumption that the game was meant to be played otherwise than the books indicated? Such much-debated minutia  -- confused by poor editing -- as how to handle initiative are not about to be cleared up by reference to modules; nor do they appear to be the subjects at hand._




The books don't give an indication of what the desingers thought were appropriate challenges and rewards were for a party of adventurers. Sure, there are treasure types, but using those usually gives _even more_ treasure than the modules hand out (sit down and do the work one of these days. You will be surprised). The modules give us a concrete example of adventure design as it was intended by Gygax and his core of writers in the 1e era.

No one is talking about mechanics like initiative. Merely what a successful party of adventurers playing through a representative series of adventures from the era is likely to receive in terms of rewards.

The key element that this survey reveals is that the "slow leveling" that many people remember from 1e was not actually from the 1e rules. It was a side effect of a common house rule that treasure did not give experience. In the modules, the bulk of the experience gained is derived from treasure, not from defeating monsters. Further, using this house rule would have the side effect of making many of the module series extraordinarily difficult to complete, as the characters would not advance in level sufficiently swiftly to be prepared for the challenges of the later adventures.

But you will see that when you read the thread.


----------



## fanboy2000

Raven Crowking said:


> Now, now, Ariosto.  This thread is about proving that nothing has changed.  Don't go bringing facts into it.  (Unless you slant them properly, of course.   )



This thread isn't about proving nothing changed. Quasqueton compiled data about old modules, using famous adventures from different era's of D&D and compared them to running the same adventure using 3e rules.

The idea was to bring facts into the argument, specifically facts about how the designers intended older D&D to be ran. Why not do the same thing? Take an AD&D module and find out how much magic, xp, and gold an AD&D party get and compare it to what a party of 3e (or 4e) characters get? 



Quasqueton said:


> Observations I've made based on the data:
> 
> Magic items were not rarer in AD&D1 than they are in D&D3. In fact, by the same levels, a party will probably have quite a bit more magic in AD&D1 than in D&D3. But D&D3 allows the PCs to tailor and customize their magic items to better suit their needs. An AD&D1 fighter may have a +1 broadsword, a +1 spear, a +1 handaxe, and a +2 dagger at 5th level, but the D&D3 fighter might have his preferred +2 greatsword at 5th level. (A quantity vs. quality issue?)
> 
> And especially things like potions and scrolls. Note how the poor AD&D1 illusionist in this data doesn't find a scroll until about 6th level, and it has only one spell. A D&D3 spellcaster can have a handful of chosen spell scrolls by 3rd level, either by purchasing them or scribing them personally. But AD&D1 spellcasters just got what they found.
> 
> The D&D3 characters are not leveling up appreciably faster than the AD&D1 characters. I suspect that what many people remember as very slow leveling in AD&D1 is a result of DMs not including as much treasure in their campaigns as the official adventures (and the rules as written) include (and assume). For instance, an official adventure might have 1,000xp worth of monsters and then 9,000gp as treasure (for a total 10,000xp). But an individual DM's adventure may have 1,000xp worth of monsters and only 2,000gp as treasure (for a total 3,000xp). Thus leveling was slowed greatly. But this is an effect of the DM, not the rules.
> 
> I remember doing this when I ran an AD&D1 game. It was not my intention to slow advancement, but thinking back on it now, that was a byproduct of my style.
> 
> Anyone else's experience support this?




So, I'm curious, RC what were your experiences with AD&D1?

And another question: If you were to run an AD&D game one day and an D&D 4e game the next, what would the difference be aside from the rules? (Feel free to interpret this question in any way that makes sense to you.)


----------



## Raven Crowking

Storm Raven said:


> So, basically you have no argument other than to repeatedly state that treasure in 1e modules was really hard to find, despite the evidence presented that this wasn't actually the case.




If the goal of your argument is to convince me, then it is relevant that your "evidence" is not well enough supported to do so.  If you don't want to convince me, my opinion is irrelevant to you.

Upthread, Q agreed that there were a number of things that he couldn't take into account in his analysis.  There is nothing in his evidence, AFAICT, that suggests that more than a percentage of wealth/XP possible would ever be gained by a party going through any of these modules.



> You've asserted that the treasure in 1e modules should be vastly discounted because it was _soo_ very hard to find. This assertion has been investigated and refuted with concrete examples.




A concrete example would require detailing what is necessary to find said wealth, both in terms of where the wealth is and in terms of where the wealth is not.  Something does not have to be _soo_ very hard to find, if there are other factors that prevent you from finding it.

As a simple example, if there is a 100% chance of finding X if you look in the right square, then the chance of finding X is determined by the number of possible squares compared to the number of squares you look in.  I.e., if there are 10 squares, and you look in 1, then the chance is 1 in 10.  Likewise, if there are 100 squares, and you look in 1, then the chance is 1 in 100.  The item may not be more cleverly hidden in either square, but the odds of finding it have changed.

The more linear a path a module assumes, the greater the chance that you will investigate any given square.  Thus, for example, treasure hidden in modules like Keep on the Borderlands or Forge of Fury are less likely to be found than treasures hidden in, say, Barrow of the Forgotten King.....or the really linear Slave Lord module with the aspis (Something of the Slave Lords). 

The use of wandering monsters in earlier D&D intentionally prevented most parties from searching every square inch of a place.  Similarly, some modules (Inverness, Tomachan) used other time constraints to prevent the PCs from searching everything.   Stay in the Ghost Tower too long and you disappear with it.  Stay in the Shrine too long and the poison kills you.  These factors prevent PCs from having the time needed to search everything, everywhere.

If there is a 1 in 6 chance of a wandering monster after every combat, and a 1 in 6 chance of a wandering monster every hour, and it takes 10 minutes to cut open a monster and search its insides, one soon realizes that, if the DM is following the DMG guidelines, not every monster's tummy is going to be turned out on the off chance that there is a bit of amber in its lower intestine.  



> 7- "intermixed with the old carpeting and rags of [the ogre's] bedding" = elven cloak




How likely is this to be found?  Depends very much on the DM.

PC:  We search the ogre's bed.

DM:  It seems to be made of old carpeting and rags.  Ten minutes searching uncovers no hidden bags or chest.  (rolls for wandering monster, a 4, so there is no encounter).

or possibly

PC:  I'd like to take a closer look at those rags.  There might be a magical cloak or robe in there!

DM:  Going through all of the bedding will take you about an hour.

PC:  Never mind.

or possibly

PC:  I think we can spare the hour.  Bob, you go watch the door.

DM:  You spend about an hour.  Everything is pretty filthy and torn (rolls die for effect), although there is one cloak that looks like it could be usable if laundered.  It smells pretty badly right now.  (Rolls wandering monster die, a 1.)  Bob, while you are watching at the door.....



> 8- in a pool of water, under a skull = a pin worth a total of 2,000gp




How likely are the PCs to investigate everything in the pool of water?  Even if they do so, how likely are they to find the skull?  The pin?  Again, this is non-quantifiable......._*but is nonetheless significant when determining what is likely to happen in actual play*_.

On top of which, the notes in modules like Steading of the Hill Giant Chief and Keep on the Borderlands make it clear that, should the PCs attack and retreat, the treasure (and the monsters) might not be there when they get back.  The Hill Giant Chief, for example, could fall back and reinforce the Frost Giant Jarl.  Mostly defeated humanoids in the Caves might leave while the PCs are resting up, taking their treasures with them.

I don't deny that Q's thought experiment provides interesting and thought-provoking data.  I do deny that it is relevant to actual play experience.  Moreover, my experience having played some of these modules with several groups suggests to me that Q's conclusions about rate of advancement and treasure gain are wrong.

When I say that I am unconvinced, it is because Q has not demonstrated evidence sufficient to address my objections (as described above), nor to overide my firsthand experience with (some of) the modules in question.


RC


----------



## Raven Crowking

Storm Raven said:


> No one is talking about mechanics like initiative. Merely what a successful party of adventurers playing through a representative series of adventures from the era is likely to receive in terms of rewards.




I don't think that even Q is making this claim.

What a successful party of adventurers playing through a representative series of adventures from the era *is likely to receive *in terms of rewards =/= what a successful party of adventurers playing through a representative series of adventures from the era _*may possibly receive*_ in terms of rewards.


RC


----------



## Storm Raven

Raven Crowking said:


> A concrete example would require detailing what is necessary to find said wealth, both in terms of where the wealth is and in terms of where the wealth is not.  Something does not have to be _soo_ very hard to find, if there are other factors that prevent you from finding it.




Which means you missed the main thrust of the argument which is this: _the bulk of the treasure isn't hidden at all_. Out of 30,000+ gp worth of mundane treasure about 3,700 is "hidden". Out of the magic items, a handful are hidden, and those are the weakest and least useful items in the bunch.

In other words, even if you assume _every single "hidden" item is not located, the adventurers will come away with 85% of the treasure in the module_.



> _The more linear a path a module assumes, the greater the chance that you will investigate any given square.  Thus, for example, treasure hidden in modules like Keep on the Borderlands or Forge of Fury are less likely to be found than treasures hidden in, say, Barrow of the Forgotten King.....or the really linear Slave Lord module with the aspis (Something of the Slave Lords)._




The modules with the aspis is _A1: Slave Pits of the Undercity_. The campaign version of the module is anything but linear. if you want a linear adventure in that series, you need to look at _A3: Assault on the Aerie of the Slave Lords_. But neither is truly relevant here, since they weren't part of the survey.



> _If there is a 1 in 6 chance of a wandering monster after every combat, and a 1 in 6 chance of a wandering monster every hour, and it takes 10 minutes to cut open a monster and search its insides, one soon realizes that, if the DM is following the DMG guidelines, not every monster's tummy is going to be turned out on the off chance that there is a bit of amber in its lower intestine. _




Except for things like frogs, dinosaurs, giant lizards, and other creatures that swallow their food whole. Note that these are the monsters that usually have treasure inside their stomachs. I can't think of an example of an ogre or bugbear with treasure in its gizzard. And in the example given, the treasure that has been swallowed amounts to a +1 shield and a 100 gp gem, a tiny percentage of the total. The lizard's bounty is explicitly listed as being "easily found".



> _How likely is this to be found?  Depends very much on the DM.
> 
> PC:  We search the ogre's bed.
> 
> DM:  It seems to be made of old carpeting and rags.  Ten minutes searching uncovers no hidden bags or chest.  (rolls for wandering monster, a 4, so there is no encounter).
> 
> or possibly
> 
> PC:  I'd like to take a closer look at those rags.  There might be a magical cloak or robe in there!
> 
> DM:  Going through all of the bedding will take you about an hour.
> 
> PC:  Never mind.
> 
> or possibly
> 
> PC:  I think we can spare the hour.  Bob, you go watch the door.
> 
> DM:  You spend about an hour.  Everything is pretty filthy and torn (rolls die for effect), although there is one cloak that looks like it could be usable if laundered.  It smells pretty badly right now.  (Rolls wandering monster die, a 1.)  Bob, while you are watching at the door....._




An hour? How big do you think that pile of bedding is? I am married and have two kids. You could pile every bit of clothing, bedclothes, and towels the four of us own into a single pile and it wouldn't take an hour to look through.

I guess there is simply no defense against a DM being a dick.



> _How likely are the PCs to investigate everything in the pool of water?  Even if they do so, how likely are they to find the skull?  The pin?  Again, this is non-quantifiable.......*but is nonetheless significant when determining what is likely to happen in actual play*._



_

No, it isn't. Since the treasure involved is a tiny percentage of the total in the module. You keep arguing that the treasure involved is a huge deal, when it has been shown to be almost trivial in volume and value.

In the end, your argument simply doesn't hold up because it assumes that the value of the treasure that is "hidden" is huge. Even if you assume that the PCs will miss every piece of hidden treasure, the resulting difference is trivial. And that's why your argument is entirely incoherent._


----------



## Raven Crowking

fanboy2000 said:


> This thread isn't about proving nothing changed.




I hope you read the bit from Quasqueton that you quoted, where he makes the claims that neither magic treasure nor speed of advancement have changed.

There are three things I'm going to have to do once I get done with the RCFG Player's Guide and have a bit more time.

(1)  Go through the pre-3e Dragons where the first 3e hints are coming up.  If memory serves, WotC's market research showed that people like leveling, but often didn't reach high levels because older edition leveling was too slow.  It was actually an explicit design goal to speed up rate of leveling, again, if memory serves.

I remember as well that there was a leveling comparison where the number of orcs a fighter had to slay to get from 1st to 2nd level was compared between 2e and 3e, and the 3e fighter was at a real advantage.  More than a factor of 10.

EDIT:  Please note that, although Q isn't looking at 2e modules or rates of advancement, unless one is arguing that 2e has slower advancement than 1e (and, by Q's argument, 3e) it is relevant.

(2)  Perform what I would consider a thorough analysis of one or two of the same modules chosen by Q, showing explicitly what would be required in order to gain the benefits he lists.

(3)  Give a complete answer to this question:



> So, I'm curious, RC what were your experiences with AD&D1?
> 
> And another question: If you were to run an AD&D game one day and an D&D 4e game the next, what would the difference be aside from the rules? (Feel free to interpret this question in any way that makes sense to you.)




Frankly, due to rules, I'd rather run RCFG than either of those games.  I still haven't run Keep on the Shadowfell using RCFG, although I have now run some of the classic Gygax modules.

But.....1e would run much more quickly, especially combat.  This means a higher encounter rate, and therefore more willingness on the players' part to spend time dealing with what might seem like minutia.  I.e., exploring the setting.  It would be easier to make any 1e combat seem relevant enough for the time spent, because so little time would be spent on that encounter.

OTOH, characters in the 1e world would take more in-game time to deal with the same encounters, because their damage would be more lasting, and because they would need to take more care with in-game resources on a broader level (as opposed to merely within the combat sub-game).

1e is also more firmly rooted in the tropes of S&S, which makes for a game more suited to my tastes.

I am sure I could hodgepodge 4e into something I'd want to run, but I'd get a lot more bang for my buck with 1e.  And RCFG would give me best value.

YMMV.

RC


----------



## Storm Raven

Raven Crowking said:


> I remember as well that there was a leveling comparison where the number of orcs a fighter had to slay to get from 1st to 2nd level was compared between 2e and 3e, and the 3e fighter was at a real advantage.  More than a factor of 10.




Of course an 1e AD&D fighter "suffers" when the comparison is "how many monsters does he have to kill to advance". His experience gain was something on the order of 80% biased in favor of experience gained from treasure.

Let's compare how much experience the 3e and 1e fighters gain from treasure. On no! The 1e fighter has an _infinite_ advantage over the 3e fighter. Dude! The 3e fighter is simply not going to be able to compete!

You may note that Quas isn't comparing 2e to anything.


----------



## Raven Crowking

Storm Raven said:


> Which means you missed the main thrust of the argument which is this: _the bulk of the treasure isn't hidden at all_.




Please note, in my argument above, "if there is a 100% chance of finding X if you look in the right square".  The ground area of a module is relevant, as is how much of that ground area the PCs need to search to succeed.  For example, in Keep on the Borderlands, is it assumed that the PCs will go to each wilderness area?  Clean out each cavern?  If other things are happening in the campaign world -- if there are other hooks to draw them away -- this is unlikely to happen.  I've never actually run a game in which the PCs have cleaned out the caves.

"Sitting on the floor" is still hidden if you never enter the room it is sitting in.



> The modules with the aspis is _A1: Slave Pits of the Undercity_. The campaign version of the module is anything but linear. if you want a linear adventure in that series, you need to look at _A3: Assault on the Aerie of the Slave Lords_. But neither is truly relevant here, since they weren't part of the survey.




I was thinking about the layout of the dungeon, and how you need to progress through rooms in order to accomplish a goal.  I.e., how linear is the map?  How likely is it that you will actually reach all of the encounter areas before doing something else?

I note, btw, that all of those old tournament modules were originally _*timed*_, and that the treasure was not only a means of scoring, but also a means of _*preventing the players from finishing in the time allotted*_ if they forgot what their goals were.



> Except for things like frogs, dinosaurs, giant lizards, and other creatures that swallow their food whole.




If you, as a player, were reading Gary's modules, you would start to look there, sure.  But as a novice player, how likely were you to recover these treasures if the DM didn't twig you to it?  Honestly?  IME, very few "gut" treasures are ever recovered.  

Multiple states, two countries, hundreds of players, same conclusion.

The lizard's bounty is explicitly listed as being "easily found" if one takes the appropriate steps, but this is obviously because a shield is much larger than a gem.  You still have to twig to opening 'em up.



> An hour? How big do you think that pile of bedding is? I am married and have two kids. You could pile every bit of clothing, bedclothes, and towels the four of us own into a single pile and it wouldn't take an hour to look through.




Cool.  Take those clothes.  Let a hobo sleep on them for a year or so.  Don't launder them.  Soil them.  Tear them up.  Now go back and tell me how long it will take _*someone who has never seen these particular items before*_ to determine if there's anything worth keeping in the pile.  One hour is a conservative estimate.



> I guess there is simply no defense against a DM being a dick.




Read the example of play in the 1e DMG.



> In the end, your argument simply doesn't hold up because it assumes that the value of the treasure that is "hidden" is huge.




You (intentionally?) misunderstand what is meant by "hidden" within this context.

Besides, if you don't agree with me, that's no skin off my nose.  I'm not trying to convince you; I'm merely trying to prevent you from mischaracterizing my argument.


RC


----------



## Raven Crowking

Storm Raven said:


> On no! The 1e fighter has an _infinite_ advantage over the 3e fighter. Dude!




If it is your intent to carry on civil discourse, by all means do so.

If you are already starting the hysterics, please understand why I am not accompanying you on this journey again.


RC


----------



## Ariosto

Ah, Tamoachan, temptation is thy deadly name!

_Excellent_ with the tournament-style setup, too, in my opinion. Unfortunately, my current group (perhaps really just one particular player) would balk at anything so far from their quasi-Tolkien concept of "standard" D&D. The "fun house" Inverness or White Plume seems more likely to get a go someday.


----------



## Fifth Element

Raven Crowking said:


> If it is your intent to carry on civil discourse, by all means do so.
> 
> If you are already starting the hysterics, please understand why I am not accompanying you on this journey again.



Sometimes certain message board rhetorical techniques (hysterics, pedantry) are called for, I think you'll agree.


----------



## fanboy2000

Raven Crowking said:


> I hope you read the bit from Quasqueton that you quoted, where he makes the claims that neither magic treasure nor speed of advancement have changed.



Oh, I read it. But those are his conclusions he came to in post 11, after he had compiled data based on the conditions he gave in post one. To me, the point of the thread is to get the data. Anyone can come to their own conclusions or compile different data using different conditions. The existence of the data is more important than any conclusions.



> There are three things I'm going to have to do once I get done with the RCFG Player's Guide and have a bit more time.
> 
> (1)  Go through the pre-3e Dragons where the first 3e hints are coming up.  If memory serves, WotC's market research showed that people like leveling, but often didn't reach high levels because older edition leveling was too slow.  It was actually an explicit design goal to speed up rate of leveling, again, if memory serves.



I didn't read pre-3e Dragon. On similar lines though, Monte Cook said that leveling was one of the reasons D&D continues to be successful. It's on his blog, somewhere.



> (2)  Perform what I would consider a thorough analysis of one or two of the same modules chosen by Q, showing explicitly what would be required in order to gain the benefits he lists.



This I look forward to. But I have to wonder why you would bother given the following:



> Frankly, due to rules, I'd rather run RCFG than either of those games.



Since you're writing your own RPG, and prefer it over AD&D1 and 3d, why does it matter what the rate of advancement is in AD&D1 vs. 3e D&D? It sounds to me like you've solved the problem.



> I still haven't run Keep on the Shadowfell using RCFG, although I have now run some of the classic Gygax modules.
> 
> But.....1e would run much more quickly, especially combat.  This means a higher encounter rate, and therefore more willingness on the players' part to spend time dealing with what might seem like minutia.  I.e., exploring the setting.  It would be easier to make any 1e combat seem relevant enough for the time spent, because so little time would be spent on that encounter.
> 
> OTOH, characters in the 1e world would take more in-game time to deal with the same encounters, because their damage would be more lasting, and because they would need to take more care with in-game resources on a broader level (as opposed to merely within the combat sub-game).
> 
> 1e is also more firmly rooted in the tropes of S&S, which makes for a game more suited to my tastes.
> 
> I am sure I could hodgepodge 4e into something I'd want to run, but I'd get a lot more bang for my buck with 1e.  And RCFG would give me best value.



Thank you for your answer.


----------



## Jhaelen

Umm, why was this thread resurrected?

Anyway, in my totally unscientific opinion based on purely anecdotal evidence, official 1e adventures contained loads of treasure, probably more, but certainly at least as much as 3e adventures. It's particularly noteworthy that the concept of balancing treasure based on party levels did not seem to be one of the design goals back then.

2e adventures weren't much different in this.

When I DMed 1e/2e I mostly used homebrew adventures or modified official adventure modules to restrict treasure to what I considered more reasonable.


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## Ariosto

D1: Quasqueton's group starts at an average level of 10.5 -- close enough to that of the 9 sample characters in the D1-2 (1981) edition, which is 10 exactly.

A party with only 6 members, though, rather than 7 to 9, should (in the designer's own view) have a hard time succeeding in the depths of the earth, regardless of level, making some "elven aid" needful. That is all the more likely if the emphasis is on what profits 3E characters most, and AD&D ones least: combat.

In terms of the different "power curves" in the different games, 15th level is probably about right for 3E.


----------



## Ariosto

Average Values of Gems and Jewelry:
Gems: 287.5 g.p.
Jewelry: 2910 g.p.

... except that I don't recall how many iterations of potential increases I considered. I think, though, that going further than however far that was is unlikely to make much difference.


----------



## Storm Raven

Raven Crowking said:


> Please note, in my argument above, "if there is a 100% chance of finding X if you look in the right square".  The ground area of a module is relevant, as is how much of that ground area the PCs need to search to succeed.  For example, in Keep on the Borderlands, is it assumed that the PCs will go to each wilderness area?  Clean out each cavern?  If other things are happening in the campaign world -- if there are other hooks to draw them away -- this is unlikely to happen.  I've never actually run a game in which the PCs have cleaned out the caves.




Which is as likely to apply to a 3e adventure as to a 1e adventure. In other words, your objection is a wash. And thus irrelevant to the comparison.



> _I was thinking about the layout of the dungeon, and how you need to progress through rooms in order to accomplish a goal.  I.e., how linear is the map?  How likely is it that you will actually reach all of the encounter areas before doing something else?_



_

Slave Pits of the Undercity as a non-tournament module is incredibly nonlinear. There are four different ways to enter the complex, there are multiple paths to take within the complex. The tournament version is highly linear, but the campaign version is decidedly not.




I note, btw, that all of those old tournament modules were originally *timed*, and that the treasure was not only a means of scoring, but also a means of *preventing the players from finishing in the time allotted* if they forgot what their goals were.

Click to expand...



Which is entirely irrelevant to the discussion here, as we are not talking about tournament play. Saying "there's time pressure in a tournament situation" has no bearing on how the adventure plays in a campaign environment. In the tournament series, the PCs are prohibited from leveling up too. Who cares about that rule in a campaign game?




If you, as a player, were reading Gary's modules, you would start to look there, sure.  But as a novice player, how likely were you to recover these treasures if the DM didn't twig you to it?  Honestly?  IME, very few "gut" treasures are ever recovered.

Click to expand...



Or someone with a basic knowledge of how lizards, birds, and other similar animals eat.




Cool.  Take those clothes.  Let a hobo sleep on them for a year or so.  Don't launder them.  Soil them.  Tear them up.  Now go back and tell me how long it will take *someone who has never seen these particular items before* to determine if there's anything worth keeping in the pile.  One hour is a conservative estimate.

Click to expand...



Not even close. Torn items can be set aside quickly for example. Assuming that the pile is as large as the entire volume of clothing in my house is also ridiculous. The pile is probably not much longer or wider than the orge, so it is maybe nine feet long and four feet wide. Let's be generous and say it is a foot deep. That's not that much.

And it is entirely irrelevant. The volume of treasure that is "hidden" in 1e modules is trivial, and T1 clearly demonstrates this._


----------



## Storm Raven

Raven Crowking said:


> If it is your intent to carry on civil discourse, by all means do so.
> 
> If you are already starting the hysterics, please understand why I am not accompanying you on this journey again.




You are the one who decided to cite a completely useless and incoherent comparison as something significant. When you compare apples to buicks don't be surprised if people make fun of the comparison.


----------



## Ariosto

The 1E DMG, at page 171, suggests that fully 60% of all randomly distributed treasures (the more common, non-Treasure-Type sort used to fill in less detailed regions of a campaign dungeon) should be hidden. That is a bit high for my taste, especially considering that it applies either concealment or trapping to _all_ such troves. I am less likely to apply either to treasures with monstrous guardians.

The really big hauls, if literally hidden, should at least have some intelligence as to their magnitude and general location available to discerning delvers.


----------



## Orius

Raven Crowking said:


> How likely is this to be found?  Depends very much on the DM.




Which could mean either the stuff is found easily if the DM chooses to be generous, or not at all, if the DM wants to be picky and tight-fisted about it.  The biggest difference with 3e is that the Search skill gives a hard and fast method of determining whether a hidden treasure is found or not.  Whether or not this invovled a great deal of work on the PC/player's part or not was really up to the individual DM as always, though.  In my own games, I never revealed things players didn't bother to look for.



Raven Crowking said:


> (1)  Go through the pre-3e Dragons where the first 3e hints are coming up.  If memory serves, WotC's market research showed that people like leveling, but often didn't reach high levels because older edition leveling was too slow.  It was actually an explicit design goal to speed up rate of leveling, again, if memory serves.
> 
> I remember as well that there was a leveling comparison where the number of orcs a fighter had to slay to get from 1st to 2nd level was compared between 2e and 3e, and the 3e fighter was at a real advantage.  More than a factor of 10.
> 
> EDIT:  Please note that, although Q isn't looking at 2e modules or rates of advancement, unless one is arguing that 2e has slower advancement than 1e (and, by Q's argument, 3e) it is relevant.




It may have been.  I'm fairly sure 2e's XP tables for the various classes weren't significantly changed from the 1e ones.  However, XP for treasure found was relegated to an optional rule that was somewhat discouraged.  Because of this, XP for monster kills in 2e were different (higher I think) than they wer ein 1e.  But I think level advancement by the book was still slower, even if one took into account optional XP bonuses.  Going by the introduction to _Night Below_, Sargent strongly recommends the DM to put the XP for treasure rule into play so the PCs can get the levels needed to survive the ampaign.  This is one of the few main 2e modules, so it would seem that 2e's default advancement (just XP for kills) was fairly slow.  In any case, 3e design considerations apply to how 2e was being played in the late 90's and not how 1e was being played in the early '80s.


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## Quasqueton

It seems to me that most of the arguments against the data in this thread are due to the comparison between AD&D1 and D&D3. Had I just listed the level advancement for the AD&D1 party through the adventures, most everyone would have just nodded their heads and said, "Yeah, that's about right."

I mean, after all, the data/calculations on the party's level advancement pretty much completely follows what the author (Gary Gygax) seemed to expect, predict, and plan and design for. He wrote these modules to follow one after the other (the original "adventure path"), and the party comes out of one adventure at pretty much perfectly the appropriate level for the next adventure in the series.

I find it funny that instead of folks saying, "Well, of course, Papa G planned it that way," folks are saying, "Impossible, your numbers must be wrong." I guess folks didn't have much faith in Gygax that he knew what he was doing when he "placed xp" in the adventures and planned the next adventure.

To be honest, I didn't have faith that Gygax planned it that well. But I learned that he apparently did at least put some thought into the xp to be gained in each adventure. The level advancement rate works perfectly through the series.

If the PCs didn't advance at least close to what is shown in this data, they wouldn't be powerful enough to take on the next level of the dungeon or the next dungeon in the series. Essentially, the series -- written by the game system designer, himself -- wouldn't work the way they were planned to follow.

But then also remember, that through many levels in AD&D, the xp needed for a level is double that needed for the previous level. So, in many cases, even if you cut the xp gained in half (50%), the level difference would only be one level.

I really should not have presented this data as a comparison between AD&D1 and D&D3. I should have merely presented the data on just AD&D1. There wouldn't have been nearly as much argument.

For instance, check out the answers in this thread:
http://www.enworld.org/forum/general-rpg-discussion/243299-party-comes-out-other-side-t1-4-will.html
When asked what level PCs come out of ToEE, the answers all match what my data in this thread showed. Ironically, those anecdotes were accepted without argument, but my hard data -- showing the exact same answer -- is considered suspect.

Something I take from what the data and calculations here show, is that Gygax planned pretty darn well for the levels his adventures would produce. I find it somewhat humorous that so many people are essentially arguing that, no, Gygax was wrong, the adventures cannot produce the levels he planned for the next adventure in the series.

Quasqueton


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## Ariosto

I for one take no issue with the data considered simply for what they are -- and that may falsely characterize the points some others have raised as well.

Statistics, however, readily lend themselves to rhetorical purposes that put partisanship ahead of scholarship. It is easy to come up with rationales for dismissing some considerations, and elevating others, when what is really in play is confirmation bias. The lawyer's mode of argument may or may not be more hard-wired in our brains than the scientist's, but it seems to me more normative in society. Advertising and other propaganda permeate our environment, disinterested reporting not so much.

The other side of the coin is that it _requires_ context to interpret data, and our brains _are_ wired to construct narratives and internally consistent (if not always objectively accurate) conceptual worlds. It is not a process one can do without; one can only do it more or less mindfully of the pitfalls.

Without interpretation, Quasqueton, the products of your hard work would be mere senseless trivia sterile of meaning. Part of the necessary fuller analysis is consideration of the methodology, of just what is being represented and what is not.

By page 5, I have encountered no claim of error in arithmetic or transcription -- which should in any case be subject to independent verification.  It is not a matter of your numbers being wrong. It is a matter of pondering what they might or might not _mean_.


----------



## ST

I think it was more "Oh hey, if I stir up some controversy, maybe people will download the game in my .sig", to be honest.


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## Quasqueton

> what is really in play is confirmation bias



If you are suggesting that the results of this data conform to my pre-research expectations -- that is, they confirm my personal bias -- you are incorrect. I have stated in this thread that I expected different results. The data didn't confirm my bias, it showed me how my bias was incorrect.



> I have encountered no claim of error in arithmetic or transcription



Yes, no one has claimed an error in arithmetic or transcription. What has been claimed is the impossibility of the exercise and results.

No one has said that 2 + 2 = 4 is an incorrect formula. They are saying that 2 is impossible, 2 is impossible, and 4 is impossible. Reading some arguments in this thread could lead one to think that level gain in AD&D1 was actually never experienced. The variables and obstacles are too numerous and powerful.

They look at the ending levels for adventuring in ToEE (for instance), and say level ~8.5 is too high. But looking at the actual adventure encounters and monsters, I don't see how PCs could survive the last parts of ToEE at lower level. A party of 5th level PCs (even a dozen) would be overwhelmed by the denizens of the bottom level of the temple.

Quasqueton


----------



## Ariosto

> If you are suggesting that the results of this data conform to my pre-research expectations ...



I am not.


----------



## Pale Master

The only objective way to have any meaningful comparison between different editions is to count every bit of treasure and every bit of xp. It cannot be assumed that a party running through a third edition module will, across the board, garner a greater proportion of the available treasure and experience than would a party running through a first edition module.

I think Quasqueton's methodology is sound.


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## Ariosto

How much of the potential XP is likely to be secured is a matter to investigate in another way. It is not irrelevant to a realistic comparison of "leveling". One might wonder, for instance, whether 3E characters were more likely to go through conversions of old Basic and Advanced Modules or through 3E modules -- and vice-versa. Speaking of which, it is a bit curious that when we got to an (or at least the first; I'm not done reading) actual 3E module, there was no write-up of the data for 1E characters.

Are the Caves of Chaos likely to get cleaned out? Eventually. By one small group of low-level adventurers? Not so probable, I think; for one thing, a good few are likely to die along the way. How does that compare with the Sunless Citadel?

Going Against the Giants, the punitive expedition very well could produce pretty comprehensive plunder. The Descent into the Depths of the Earth, by contrast, is one into a subterranean wilderness, leading eventually to a great city -- all potentially deadly for intruders who draw too much attention to themselves. Just seeing everything (and surviving the roundabout tour) might be a stretch, much less taking home every souvenir to be found.


----------



## Ariosto

Just to clarify: Literal concealment of treasure is not a big issue in most (not merely the sample) 1E modules. It probably would not be very telling even if frequent, if we are assuming the leisure to get at everything in the first place.

What could make a very significant difference is how predictable it is that players shall encounter in the first place a source of XP, and in the second place actually score the points. That is rather more predictable, I think, when

-- scenarios are so linear that characters can scarcely avoid stumbling onto the monsters
-- the encounters are carefully calculated to be "appropriate" challenges
-- simply defeating the monsters secures the XP

Because the apparent bigger issue (at least to some) is the impression in some quarters that characters in 3E tend to advance more rapidly than characters in 1E, this is a question that goes beyond modules.

The (1st ed.) Advanced game, as text and as tradition, is concerned not only, or even primarily, with mere modules but with full-fledged dungeons, as described in the previous works with which familiarity is largely assumed (with dungeons via play, if not with the books via reading). If most play follows that model, then its nature is not conducive to calculations of the sort at hand.

Is there such a disjunction between, say, Sunless Citadel and what is normative 3E play? To what degree are the old concepts current, in the books and in the culture? To what degree does the very necessity for such terms as "sandbox" and "mega-dungeon" reflect a shift in norms?

There might even be different trends when comparing the whole field of modules for each game, although I think the form itself almost of necessity imposes certain constraints.


----------



## billd91

Storm Raven said:


> And it is entirely irrelevant. The volume of treasure that is "hidden" in 1e modules is trivial, and T1 clearly demonstrates this.




T1 clearly demonstrates that the volume of treasure hidden *in T1* is relatively trivial. It demonstrates no more than that.


----------



## billd91

Pale Master said:


> The only objective way to have any meaningful comparison between different editions is to count every bit of treasure and every bit of xp. It cannot be assumed that a party running through a third edition module will, across the board, garner a greater proportion of the available treasure and experience than would a party running through a first edition module.
> 
> I think Quasqueton's methodology is sound.




It's an interesting comparison, but if someone tries to use it to interpret that 1e characters necessarily advanced as fast as 3e characters, then they are using Q's methodology wrong. Characters, under optimal treasure conditions, could advance at a similar rate for a number of modules. This includes one major assumption - that treasure was obtained and removed at a rate comparable to the kill rate of the dungeon denizens. While there was no reason to assume that the kill rate would differ significantly between 1e and 3e, that's only part of the story for 1e characters that must be considered if you really do want to compare rates of advancement between 1e and 3e.

In other words, using Q's data to compare advancement rates assumes maximum kill rates for both editions AND a maximum treasure removal rate for 1e. And that injects more error into the mix on the 1e calculations that should be recognized.


----------



## Hussar

The thing that ALWAYS gets lost in this discussion is the fact that Q did NOT include the xp for magical treasure in the calculations.  Not at all.

Considering that a single +1 sword, when sold, netted what, 2500 gp and thus 2500 xp, and you could find multiple +1 swords, any loss of cash would be more than made up for by the magic items.  

I recall actually bumping a level based solely on our magical treasure after playing through the G series.

You can complain about the methodology all you like, but the fact that Q's estimate is probably low by at least half for the 1e modules, pretty much clinches any nit picking over whether or not they find the 300 gp gem in something's gullet.


----------



## Storm Raven

Ariosto said:


> What could make a very significant difference is how predictable it is that players shall encounter in the first place a source of XP, and in the second place actually score the points. That is rather more predictable, I think, when
> 
> -- scenarios are so linear that characters can scarcely avoid stumbling onto the monsters
> -- the encounters are carefully calculated to be "appropriate" challenges
> -- simply defeating the monsters secures the XP.




As to the first, most 1e modules were incredibly linear. Free-for-all sandboxes like _B2: Keep on the Borderlands_ (which was a Basic module to begin with) were much rarer than linear railroads like _C1: Hidden Shrine of Tamoachan_ or _A3: Assault on the Aerie of the Slave Lords_.

The others seem to be not particularly telling to me. Most encounters in old modules are "appropriate", as much as in newer modules, especially since the newer modules often tried to incorporate challenges that were "too tough" for the recommended levels of the adventure (such as the roper encounter in _The Forge of Fury_.

In my experience, anything not nailed down was likely to be looted. If the treasure was there, the adventurers would probably take it with them. Saying "they had to take the treasure too" is not a very persuasive argument, since adventurers pretty much did that reflexively.



> _Because the apparent bigger issue (at least to some) is the impression in some quarters that characters in 3E tend to advance more rapidly than characters in 1E, this is a question that goes beyond modules._




I believe for the most part that impression is derived from three sources: (1) people used house rules in 1e to eliminate the XP gain from treasure (or merely reduced the amount of treasure called for), (2) people remember 1e with rose-colored glasses, and (3) people remember advancements rates in 2e more clearly, where treasure did not equate to XP.

And I think the thing is that 2e is the outlier in D&D editions for the rate of expected advancement. XP for treasure was abolished in the rule set, but nothing was done to alter the XP from defeating opponents, resulting in a vastly slower advancement rate than 1e or even OD&D had. And people got used to that. On the other hand, from many accounts, 2e was the least commercially successful edition of the game.



> _The (1st ed.) Advanced game, as text and as tradition, is concerned not only, or even primarily, with mere modules but with full-fledged dungeons, as described in the previous works with which familiarity is largely assumed (with dungeons via play, if not with the books via reading). If most play follows that model, then its nature is not conducive to calculations of the sort at hand._




Huh? What do you think most 1e modules were other than "full-fledged dungeons"?


----------



## Storm Raven

billd91 said:


> T1 clearly demonstrates that the volume of treasure hidden *in T1* is relatively trivial. It demonstrates no more than that.




I've said this before, and I'll repeat myself here: show us the 1e module with substantial amounts of its treasure hidden. Until you do, there's _nothing_ backing up the assertion that 1e modules had lots of hidden treasure.

All we have on the "1e treausre was hard to find!" side of the argument now is a buch of grognards mad that 3e comes off relatively well in a comparison to "old school" gaming howling on without providing any support for their position. Provide the data to support your position and it will be more persuasive than it is now.

Because right now, the grognard argument has a persuasive value of zero, and falling.


----------



## AllisterH

How about we tackle another adventure?

B3: Palace of the Silver Princess (I'm up to help).  Reason why I choose this one is because everyone has access to it and it is something of a well known but not extensively played module I suspect among those of us who played 1e modules.


----------



## Ariosto

> Most 1e modules were incredibly linear.





> What do you think most 1e modules were other than "full-fledged dungeons"?



I think they were dungeon *modules*. "A good dungeon," per _The Underworld & Wilderness Adventures_, "will have no less than a dozen levels down, with offshoot levels in addition, and new levels under construction so that players will never grow tired of it."

The original Basic Set's sample cross-section showed 7 levels (the seventh an underground lake or sea with a domed city in its midst); the text noted that the introductory module (In Search of the Unknown) "will be usable for initial adventuring as well as provide ideas for dungeon construction", to which end the Dungeon Geomorphs were also recommended. The sample floor plan in the rule book was indicated as being but "Part of First Level" of the dungeons of Zenopus.

The 1E _Dungeon Masters Guide_, addressed as it was to "advanced" players, largely took for granted familiarity with the essentials of D&D. Those lacking such acquaintance might note, though, that the Dungeon Random Monster Level Determination Matrix (p. 174) extends to dungeon levels "16th and down."


----------



## Ariosto

Strictly speaking, most 1E "modules" were tournament or other scenarios that might provide (in pieces) grist for the mill of creating what the DMG called "your main dungeon", but were as written really another species altogether.



> ... challenges that were "too tough" for the recommended levels of the adventure (such as the roper encounter in _The Forge of Fury_.



The scenario was for levels 3-6. A "very difficult" (NOT "too tough") encounter is EL 1-4 higher than party level. A roper is a CR 10 monster, a single such being indicated as appropriate for EL 9, 10 or 11.


----------



## Storm Raven

Ariosto said:


> The 1E _Dungeon Masters Guide_, addressed as it was to "advanced" players, largely took for granted familiarity with the essentials of D&D. Those lacking such acquaintance might note, though, that the Dungeon Random Monster Level Determination Matrix (p. 174) extends to dungeon levels "16th and down."




I think it interesting to note that the only published adventures that seem to comport with this definition were produced well after the 1e era (i.e _Undermountain_, which was for 2e, and produced in several installments; _Castle Whiterock_ and _World's Largest Dungeon_ produced for 3e).

And practice doesn't seem to match with your assertions, even in the text of the 1e DMG. Yes, the random monster tables go to "Level 16", but this is not necessarily a literal "16 levels of dungeon are needed" thing. As pointed out in the first pages of the DMG (if I recall correctly), the word "level" means many things, and when applied to a monster it does not mean "level of the dungeon". But the DMG gives all kinds of rules for overland travel, moving between encounter areas, and other things. Gygax's examples of early play often feature the Castle Greyhawk dungeon, but more often they do not.

The idea that modules aren't proper dungeons is simply so bizarre it is almost impossible to conceive of how silly a position that it. Especially when you consider that many modules formed a linked series of adventures that would fit the kind of scenario you assert as being necessary for a "proper dungeon", albeit often in multiple locations. If you think that is a big distinguishing characteristic, then I can only say your argument seems to be based entirely on semantics and is one I would consider to be entirely irrelevant.

Because the question is why would this matter? Characters in the modules advance as the designers of the game presumably thought people should advance, no matter where they adventure. Why would it be substantially different if they were making repeated forays into Castle Greyhawk or driving their way though _All That Glitters_?


----------



## Raven Crowking

Fifth Element said:


> Sometimes certain message board rhetorical techniques (hysterics, pedantry) are called for, I think you'll agree.




Frequently, making sure that people are on the same page in terms of terminology (pedantry) is called for....especially when two meanings of a term are conflated as though they meant the same thing.  

(For example, when one imagines that the relationship between XP and level is as direct in 1e and 3e, which is not the case, as 1e has rules limiting how XP can turn into level advancement, such as training, that 3e does not.)

If I thought hysterics were a called for rhetorical technique, though, I'd not have apologized in the other thread.


RC


----------



## Storm Raven

Raven Crowking said:


> (For example, when one imagines that the relationship between XP and level is as direct in 1e and 3e, which is not the case, as 1e has rules limiting how XP can turn into level advancement, such as training, that 3e does not.)




Is there _any_ 1e adventure presented in this thread in which the PCs would not have the ability to undertake training when called for?

I thought not.

(I'll also note that another very common house rule in 1e was to eliminate training costs and time).


----------



## Raven Crowking

fanboy2000 said:


> This I look forward to. But I have to wonder why you would bother given the following:
> 
> Since you're writing your own RPG, and prefer it over AD&D1 and 3d, why does it matter what the rate of advancement is in AD&D1 vs. 3e D&D? It sounds to me like you've solved the problem.




My concern here is over revisionist history.

Also, this thread came up in one of those "If your DM wants to run it like 1e, tell him it's changed.  If he thinks it should be more like 1e, tell him nothing's changed." arguements.  Frankly, I am not impressed by this sort of "reasoning".



> Thank you for your answer.




Thanks for your civility!  



Jhaelen said:


> Umm, why was this thread resurrected?






ST said:


> I think it was more "Oh hey, if I stir up some controversy, maybe people will download the game in my .sig", to be honest.




ST, you might want to check who resurrected the thread before making remarks like this.

Just saying.


RC


----------



## Ariosto

> The word "level" means many things, and when applied to a monster it does not mean "level of the dungeon".



Indeed. In the context of that table, *monster* levels are not on the Arabic number scale but on the Roman I through X. For instance, the normal range of encounters on the 2nd-3rd dungeon levels is with monster levels I through V.


----------



## Storm Raven

Raven Crowking said:


> My concern here is over revisionist history.
> 
> Also, this thread came up in one of those "If your DM wants to run it like 1e, tell him it's changed.  If he thinks it should be more like 1e, tell him nothing's changed." arguements.  Frankly, I am not impressed by this sort of "reasoning".




Where is the revisonist history in this analysis? Are you truly surprised that in 1e PCs would level fast anough that they would be of an appropriate level to meet the challenges in the next step of a series of adventures (i.e. T1-8, UK1-3, and so on)?


----------



## Raven Crowking

Storm Raven said:


> You are the one who decided to cite a completely useless and incoherent comparison as something significant. When you compare apples to buicks don't be surprised if people make fun of the comparison.




Storm Raven, the next time I read a post from you that seems to actually contribute to the conversation, I will respond to you directly.  Until then, well, you know why I haven't responded.

BTW, for those who are interested, there is a wonderful thread by Melan somewhere on EN World (I will see if I can find the link) that examines the structure of older module maps vs. newer ones.  

One thing it demonstrates most clearly is that you are far, far less likely to hit every spot on many of the older maps than you are on many of the later ones.  This isn't a universal truth, though.....some of the early 3e maps are wonderfully complex.


RC


----------



## Ariosto

> Why would it be substantially different if they were making repeated forays into Castle Greyhawk?



Because the space in that case would be one with a countless number of possible paths through it even on a single occasion -- and an even greater number of possible "stories" considering the changes in that dynamic environment between one expedition and the next.


----------



## Storm Raven

Raven Crowking said:


> Storm Raven, the next time I read a post from you that seems to actually contribute to the conversation, I will respond to you directly.  Until then, well, you know why I haven't responded.




Since the only contribution to the conversation you appear to be willing to accept is one that says "RC you are clearly right in your unsubstantiated arguments concerning the nature of 1e!" I'm guessing you wont be saying much of value from here on out.

Here's the thing: I've played D&D for a long time. Possibly longer than you. I played OD&D, 1e, 2e, and 3e. I have the modules commented on in this thread, and numerous others, and your assertions concerning them and how they played are, in my experience from actual play, completely incorrect. And the position oppsing yours has been substantiated with some actual data, while yours basically amounts to howling shrieks of indignation that level advancement in 1e could be anything other than wildly slower and more difficult than 3e backed by nothing. I'll take the position backed by data that conforms to my actual play experiences with 1e, thank you very much.


----------



## Storm Raven

Ariosto said:


> Because the space in that case would be one with a countless number of possible paths through it even on a single occasion -- and an even greater number of possible "stories" considering the changes in that dynamic environment between one expedition and the next.




But that has no bearing at all on the rate of expected advancement. Which makes me wonder why you think it is somehow a significant element.

I'll also note that from over a decade of playing 1e on three seperate continents, I never once found a single campaign in which the action was focused on a single mega-dungeon as you describe. I did encounter and participate in some campaigns in which published adventures were used (and some in which they were not).

I also fail to see how a single mega dungeon is somehow different from a collection of smaller dungeons. That scenario also has multiple possible paths to completion. Where is the substantive difference here?


----------



## billd91

Storm Raven said:


> I've said this before, and I'll repeat myself here: show us the 1e module with substantial amounts of its treasure hidden. Until you do, there's _nothing_ backing up the assertion that 1e modules had lots of hidden treasure.




G1 and G3 both have substantial amounts of hidden treasure. Hey! That's 2 modules to 1 (T1). I guess by the logic you've been arguing, the grognards win this debate. Of course, this really goes to show that looking at a single data point (or even 2) is not very helpful when trying to determine a trend...

The treasure hauls of the A series as well as G2, G3, and the D series are futher complicated by the challenges of getting it out of the dungeon. As some of us have pointed out, not only is there the question of looting *everything* as the methodology assumes, but there's also the complication of moving it so that it counts for XPs.


----------



## Storm Raven

billd91 said:


> G1 and G3 both have substantial amounts of hidden treasure. Hey! That's 2 modules to 1 (T1). I guess by the logic you've been arguing, the grognards win this debate. Of course, this really goes to show that looking at a single data point (or even 2) is not very helpful when trying to determine a trend...




Perhaps you would care to substantiate that claim? The total treasure survey for those modules is already included in this thread. Go through them and show how much of the treasure is actually hidden.



> _The treasure hauls of the A series as well as G2, G3, and the D series are futher complicated by the challenges of getting it out of the dungeon. As some of us have pointed out, not only is there the question of looting *everything* as the methodology assumes, but there's also the complication of moving it so that it counts for XPs._




Most of the treasure in those modules is pretty easily transportable from my experience (especially for a high level party with access to high level magic and magic items). Perhaps you could demonstrate why you think it is not.


----------



## Ariosto

> the next step of a series of adventures (i.e. T1-8, UK1-3, and so on)



Of "T1-8", only T1 (_Village of Hommlett_) was ever published separately, and the rest is the Temple -- so that's rather a misnomer. Of the UK modules, I think that only UK2 and UK3 (_The Sentinel_ and _The Gauntlet_) are linked by anything more than being of British origin (as are U1-U3, which _do_ form  a continuous plot-line). C4 and C5 combine 8 RPGA tournament rounds into a narrative, as does the Paul Jaquays I12 (a bit clumsily) to Frank Mentzer's R series of originally separate scenarios.

Some other "series" -- including other parts of those same coded lines -- have no internal relationships at all. A module may well be recommended for _higher_ levels than one later in numerical sequence!


----------



## Ariosto

> But the DMG gives all kinds of rules for overland travel, moving between encounter areas, and other things.



So does _The Underworld & Wilderness Adventures_. So what?


----------



## Storm Raven

Ariosto said:


> Of "T1-8", only T1 (_Village of Hommlett_) was ever published separately, and the rest is the Temple -- so that's rather a misnomer. Of the UK modules, I think that only UK2 and UK3 (_The Sentinel_ and _The Gauntlet_) are linked by anything more than being of British origin (as are U1-U3, which _do_ form  a continuous plot-line). C4 and C5 combine 8 RPGA tournament rounds into a narrative, as does the Paul Jaquays I12 (a bit clumsily) to Frank Mentzer's R series of originally separate scenarios.




Sorry, I meant U1-3. UK2 and UK3 are linked, but that's not what I meant. But many series of adventures were explicitly linked: T1-8 (the fact that they were published together doesn't change the links), A1-4, G1-3, the aforementioned U1-3, and of course, DL1-10. Why would anyone find it surprising that these modules allowed characters to advance quickly enough to deal with the challenges in the later installments?


----------



## Raven Crowking

billd91 said:


> The treasure hauls of the A series as well as G2, G3, and the D series are futher complicated by the challenges of getting it out of the dungeon. As some of us have pointed out, not only is there the question of looting *everything* as the methodology assumes, but there's also the complication of moving it so that it counts for XPs.




Not to mention the assumption that the party can perform partial looting, training, and then return to complete the looting without anything having changed during said training time.  

Yet, if this is not possible, as has been pointed out repeatedly, much of that treasure may well not count toward XP, as the PCs reach their "cap".

The question has never been whether or not training is available, or whether or not the XP are available under optimal conditions, or whether or not every square inch will be checked, or whether or not it is possible to find everything within a module.  

The question, as far as _*actual play experience goes*_ has always been "What is the cost of getting those XP".  Note that, in some cases (as with level "caps" and the chance of treasure simply not being there on the next foray; or with most of the possible treasure XP being end-loaded), this is a cost that the PCs are effectively paying in XP.....coming directly off the top of what is available in the module.

In some ways, the "apples to buicks" phrase is apt.  Q's initial analysis may be viewed as "apples to apples", but by failing to take this sort of thing into account when drawing conclusions, the comparison becomes "apples to buicks".


RC


----------



## Storm Raven

Ariosto said:


> So does _The Underworld & Wilderness Adventures_. So what?




Why would they be included if the standard play style was assumed to be one giant underground complex?

You've cited some fairly flimsy evidence that the game assumed that everyone would be playing in giant multilevel underground complexes. The text itself supports a variety of other styles, in many cases much more substantially than a random dungeon generator included as an appendix. Why should the text supporting the other play styles be discounted?


----------



## Storm Raven

Raven Crowking said:


> Not to mention the assumption that the party can perform partial looting, training, and then return to complete the looting without anything having changed during said training time.




No one has made that assumption. In fact, most modules provided contingencies for how the inhabitants of a dungeon complex would deal with such a foray and retreat. In many cases, the monsters would _gain_ in strength during the down time, which would mean _more_ XP for the PCs to obtain. Or the monsters would redeploy - making the encounter more difficult but not changing the ultimate reward (or both options). rarely, the adventure would state that the surviving monsters would vacate after a certain point, in G1, Nosra would relocate the G2 with anyone and anything he could take with him, leaving the rest behind. So the benefits would simply be put off until then, not eliminated.



> _Yet, if this is not possible, as has been pointed out repeatedly, much of that treasure may well not count toward XP, as the PCs reach their "cap"._




And for the most part, this is a trivial problem for PCs in most of the adventures presented.

I'm left to wonder why you think it is intended that the adventures were desinged so badly that they didn't allow the PCs to be ready for the next in the series? Surely Gygax knew the rules of the game and designed them to be played in a reasonable manner - but every interpretation you come up with assumes that Gygax was a moron of a dungeon designer who made an adventure series that clearly would result in the PCs being horribly overpowered as they reached the latter stages of the series.


----------



## billd91

Storm Raven said:


> Perhaps you would care to substantiate that claim? The total treasure survey for those modules is already included in this thread. Go through them and show how much of the treasure is actually hidden.




In G1, the monetary value of the treasure hidden in a secret area behind a decoy treasure room is 71,635 gp according to my printing. That's 28% of the cash value. It also includes the +2 arrows, the +3 spear, and the two intelligent flametongues. A pretty good chunk of the total.

In G3, about 206,000 gp worth is stashed in a single secret chamber (about 20%) including the ring of three wishes, a dozen potions, 8 scrolls.



Storm Raven said:


> Most of the treasure in those modules is pretty easily transportable from my experience (especially for a high level party with access to high level magic and magic items). Perhaps you could demonstrate why you think it is not.




The treasure in the hidden chamber in G3 is in chests and trunks 5-7 feet long and more than half that wide. Each coin is 1/10th of a pound (the copper coins alone weigh 8800 lbs, add in the silver and you're over 15,000 lbs) in encumbrance. Try slogging that down from the remote volcanic region that is the Hellfurnaces. Or get those large tusks down off the frost giant jarl's glacier.


----------



## Ariosto

> Why would anyone find it surprising that these modules allowed characters to advance quickly enough to deal with the challenges in the later installments?



I don't know that anyone does find it surprising; I certainly do not.

Your personal experience of having never encountered a traditional dungeon, to the extent that you seem even to doubt that Gygax intended it to be normative, is suggestive. I think that 1E modules are on average closer to 3E modules than they are to the sort of campaign assumed in the rules-books -- so the question of how much modules inform play experience is key.

If people are taking the modules as a guide, then Quasqueton's (admittedly but preliminary) work suggests that -- up to "name" level or so -- rates of advancement should be roughly comparable to those in 3E. Skimping on treasure, or reducing (even abolishing) XP for it, would certainly slow advancement. It seems to me that advancement in 2E must be slow, if XP come only from monsters, story awards at most matching awards for monsters, and individual bonuses as per the 2E books.



> Why would they be included if the standard play style was assumed to be one giant underground complex?



Because the underworld was not the ONLY element of the campaign! Is this really so difficult to understand?

There is a difference between the "D&D campaign" as dealt with in Gygax's works and the "adventure path" that seems to have been normative for a while. For how long and to what extent? Your experience is a small sample, but so is my very different one.


----------



## Storm Raven

billd91 said:


> In G1, the monetary value of the treasure hidden in a secret area behind a decoy treasure room is 71,635 gp according to my printing. That's 28% of the cash value. It also includes the +2 arrows, the +3 spear, and the two intelligent flametongues. A pretty good chunk of the total.




The problem is that the map to G2 is located in that secret treasure area as well. It is the only way to get to G2, so unless the DM wants the adventure path to end with G1, they have to find the room.



> _The treasure in the hidden chamber in G3 is in chests and trunks 5-7 feet long and more than half that wide. Each coin is 1/10th of a pound (the copper coins alone weigh 8800 lbs, add in the silver and you're over 15,000 lbs) in encumbrance. Try slogging that down from the remote volcanic region that is the Hellfurnaces. Or get those large tusks down off the frost giant jarl's glacier._




The total value of the copper pieces in that 8,800 lb. of metal is 220 gp, or 220 xp. Trivial by any measure for 10th level characters. The silver is slightly more valuable, about 3,100 gp. But that's such a tiny portion of the total as to be almost negligible (less than 1.5% of the total treasure).

As for the tusks and so on, I suppose you've never heard of _Tenser's floating disk_ or _bags of holding_?


----------



## Storm Raven

Ariosto said:


> Your personal experience of having never encountered a traditional dungeon, to the extent that you seem even to doubt that Gygax intended it to be normative, is suggestive.




Here's a question, since you assume it was to be the norm of play that there would be a superdungeon as the centerpiece of a campaign: why did TSR never publish any supplement of this nature in the 1e era?



> _Because the underworld was not the ONLY element of the campaign! Is this really so difficult to understand?_




And the problem with the megadungeon assumption you seem to think is in the books is that the material focusing on that is limited at best, and for the most part confined to appendixes. Whereas the material suggesting otherwise is much more extensive and part of the main body of text.


----------



## Raven Crowking

Ariosto said:


> Your personal experience of having never encountered a traditional dungeon, to the extent that you seem even to doubt that Gygax intended it to be normative, is suggestive.




Yeah, that's _*extremely*_ weird.  

I can easily understand folks not playing that way (I often did not), but to not realize that it was intended to be normative is strange indeed.  Of course, it might be related to which early rulesets one had available (with varying DM advice), as well as what contact one had through Dragon and other sources with these ideas.

Certainly, I would imagine that most folks knew Gary's campaign focused on Castle Greyhawk.  Ed Greenwood's campaign included both Undermountain and the Ruins of Myth Drannor as mega-complexes (and this was a 1e campaign setting before being purchased by TSR and, eventually, becoming the 2e flagship).  World's Largest Dungeon was certainly an attempt to harken back to those days.

(I find a multi-mega-complex campaign to be optimal these days, myself.)


RC


----------



## billd91

Storm Raven said:


> As for the tusks and so on, I suppose you've never heard of _Tenser's floating disk_ or _bags of holding_?




I'm not about to assume that everybody's got one or the other or even a portable hole - or that they have enough capacity with the ones they have. That seems to me to be a very strong assumption to make about any random campaign using these modules. It also underlines my point - there are two separate ways to earn XPs in 1e compared to one in 3e tracked in this survey and that injects more potential error to the 1e results because you must make more assumptions to reach the XP total.


----------



## Ariosto

> Why did TSR never publish any supplement of this nature in the 1e era?



It does not lend itself to the medium, and Gygax doubted that there would be much interest among DMs in buying someone else's campaign. (It took Judges Guild's sales to prove him wrong about the potential even of work of such nature as did in fact get published.) The Temple of Elemental Evil is darned close, but even that was handed off to Frank Mentzer for finishing.


----------



## Eridanis

Please tone down the attacks on one another and stay on topic..


----------



## Storm Raven

billd91 said:


> I'm not about to assume that everybody's got one or the other or even a portable hole - or that they have enough capacity with the ones they have.




The problem with the assumption that Pcs wouldn't be able to move treasure is that characters have so many options for transporting it. _Tenser's floating disk_ is a 1st level spell. _Leomund's chest_ is another option. _Teleporting_ it from the dungeon to a place of safety is another, and so on. And I haven't even begun to go through magic items, or simply hiring henchmen and hirelings to help schlep the loot. Any reasonably prepared 1e party will have ways to move stuff out of the dungeon. To me, the odd position is the one that assumes they will not.


----------



## Ariosto

> Yeah, that's _*extremely*_ weird.



I don't know about that. By "suggestive", I meant that it suggests -- if common -- a reason why 1E play might commonly be modeled on (or even primarily via) modules. Quasqueton's sample is not necessarily representative of such play, but his survey seems provisionally to indicate that it might not be very different, in terms of XP accrual, from play of 3E modules.

As I observed (in agreement with those who noted it earlier), that would suggest that the perception of rapid early advancement in 3E might well be in comparison with skimpy awards "house ruled" into 1E, or with "standard, by-the-book" 2E practice.


----------



## Storm Raven

Ariosto said:


> It does not lend itself to the medium, and Gygax doubted that there would be much interest among DMs in buying someone else's campaign. (It took Judges Guild's sales to prove him wrong about the potential even of work of such nature as did in fact get published.) The Temple of Elemental Evil is darned close, but even that was fobbed off onto Frank Mentzer.




That still doesn't answer the question. Once TSR did begin publishing adventures, why not publish one or more of the big mega adventures that you claim they assumed everyone wanted to play in?

I just find the whole idea that megadungeons were the rule and the assumed play style to fly in the face of known facts. Yes, Gygax used one in his campaign. But he apparently didn't think it would be popular enough to publish, while the "small" G series was? I think that says they thought the market was rather different than what you claim it was.


----------



## billd91

Storm Raven said:


> The problem with the assumption that Pcs wouldn't be able to move treasure is that characters have so many options for transporting it. _Tenser's floating disk_ is a 1st level spell. _Leomund's chest_ is another option. _Teleporting_ it from the dungeon to a place of safety is another, and so on. And I haven't even begun to go through magic items, or simply hiring henchmen and hirelings to help schlep the loot. Any reasonably prepared 1e party will have ways to move stuff out of the dungeon. To me, the odd position is the one that assumes they will not.




The assumption isn't that they *don't* have any of these items or methods, but that they *may not*, and that whatever they have they probably don't have enough to shlep out all of it without spending a lot of time and energy that they might not want to spend.
I do find it an odd assumption that a reasonably prepared 1e party will have the ways to find and move *all* treasure of value out of the dungeon.


----------



## Ariosto

> Why not publish one or more of the big mega adventures that you claim they assumed everyone wanted to play in?



It's not really "an adventure" that can be published (although an account of an expedition could be that).

A campaign dungeon typically consists of a great mass of notes that for the most part would be terribly laconic, if not positively cryptic, to anyone but the DM, and an even greater volume of information located nowhere but in the DM's head! Moreover, it is not a static but an ever-changing situation, so that at best one can provide to others only a "snapshot" of its state at some arbitrary moment.

To make even a portion of that into such a polished product as would meet Gary's standards would require a staggering amount of work.

And, contemplating that, Arneson and Gygax, Kuntz and others among the early Dungeon Masters would wonder ... "Why have us do any more of your imagining for you?"

Making up one's own stuff was a big, big PART OF THE FUN!

Modules were for convenience, as starting points or one-offs, for tournaments and other convention play. They're sort of like one-day cricket, a comic-book "limited series", or a movie spun off from a TV show.


----------



## Storm Raven

billd91 said:


> The assumption isn't that they *don't* have any of these items or methods, but that they *may not*, and that whatever they have they probably don't have enough to shlep out all of it without spending a lot of time and energy that they might not want to spend.
> I do find it an odd assumption that a reasonably prepared 1e party will have the ways to find and move *all* treasure of value out of the dungeon.




No one is saying they will move _all_ of the treasure out of the dungeon, just that the amount that won't be found and moved will usually be a fairly small percentage of the total. Any party that doesn't go into a dungeon without some plan for extracting a huge volume of treasure simply hadn't been paying attention. By the time a party was 10th level (and thus playing the G series), they would have almost certainly planned ahead for removing stuff from the dungeon, and had probably gotten very good at rummaging through anything and everything to find whatever discarded piece of wood happened to be the axe handle of a _+3 battleaxe_ or the trigger for a door into the secret treasure room.


----------



## Storm Raven

Ariosto said:


> It's not really "an adventure" that can be published (although an account of an expedition could be that).




That's a reasonable position, except that when push came to shove, it turned out it was _very_ possible to publish such an adventure: _Undermountain_, _Castle Whiterock_, _Rappan Athuk_, and _World's Largest Dungeon_ (heck, throw in _Return to the Temple of Elemental Evil_ too)are all examples. And all post-date 1e, most by many years.



> _And, contemplating that, Arneson and Gygax, Kuntz and others among the early Dungeon Masters would wonder ... "Why have us do any more of your imagining for you?"_




So they just published the other kinds of adventures because they were goofing around? I don't buy it. Your explanation requires all kinds of convoluted logic that TSR was marketing stuff that was not intended to be used the way the game was "supposed" to be played. It is a simpler, and much more convincing explanation that the market simply wasn't receptive to a megadungeon because that's not how most people were playing the game.


----------



## Hussar

While straying away from AD&D for a moment, the "mega-dungeon" certainly wasn't the assumed norm in Basic/Expert D&D.  You did dungeons for levels 1-3 and then you went out into the wilderness with Expert rules.  Then on to ruling kingdoms with Companion rules (but, I never played those).

I think it's very telling that a large number of older gamers started with Basic/Expert rules before going on to AD&D.  That might account for the apparent discrepency in approach.  For a B/E player, mega-dungeons weren't the norm at all.  Dungeons were where you adventured at very low levels before you moved on to outdoor style adventures punctuated by the occassional dungeon.

While I loves me mega-dungeons now, I never played one until 3e.


----------



## Ariosto

Storm Raven, the deal with dungeons is just what Gygax, et al., related -- and what I and other DMs know from experience. Another bit is that TSR in those days went in for publishing (sometimes expanded or reworked) tournament scenarios as a way to get more return on investment. Maybe Frank Mentzer or Tim Kask would give more answers to your questions -- or, concerning later decisions, people who were involved in making them.

You seem to come at the artifacts (modules and books) from a perspective isolated from the context (introduction via play, reading The Dragon, going to club meets, attending conventions, etc.) that informed practically every D&Der I met 25-30 years ago. Things that from inside that context amount simply and concretely to the way things were when we were there seem doubtful and merely theoretical to you.

That's a pretty frustrating phenomenon with which to deal; fortunately, the heyday of D&D is not among the more serious affairs of 20th-century history!


----------



## Hussar

Ariosto said:
			
		

> attending conventions




Something I want to point out here.  The convention going population of gamers is dwarfed by the non-con going population by a whole bunch.  There were supposedly a couple of million gamers in the early 80's.  How many people would attend a big convention like Gen-Con?  Couple of thousand?  Ten thousand?  Hell, twenty?  Of the total con going population of gamers, where would you peg the percentage?  1%?  5%?

If the total con going population of gamers ever reached 10% after 1980, I'd be utterly stunned.

Same goes for gaming club meets.  How many people belonged to an actual gaming club, as opposed to a small group of friends who met once every so often to play?  

You are painting your experience onto the general just as much as Storm Raven is.  Sure, everyone you met 30 years ago was a con goer- that's because that's what you were doing.  Until the 1990's, after I'd been playing for about ten years, I had never met anyone who had been to a con.

Whose experience is more common?  I have no idea.  But, I do know from my experience, that the giant dungeon a la Greyhawk was certainly not the norm for anyone I'd ever talked to.

Sounds like a forked poll to me.


----------



## Hussar

And here's the forked thread

I suggest we stop polluting this one with our little discussion.


----------



## Storm Raven

Ariosto said:


> Storm Raven, the deal with dungeons is just what Gygax, et al., related -- and what I and other DMs know from experience. Another bit is that TSR in those days went in for publishing (sometimes expanded or reworked) tournament scenarios as a way to get more return on investment. Maybe Frank Mentzer or Tim Kask would give more answers to your questions -- or, concerning later decisions, people who were involved in making them.




I am certain that Gygax played using a megadungeon - many of the anecdotes he relates center on one. But to make the leap from that to the idea that TSR expected that this would be the play style runs directly counter to the materials TSR actually marketed.



> _You seem to come at the artifacts (modules and books) from a perspective isolated from the context (introduction via play, reading The Dragon, going to club meets, attending conventions, etc.) that informed practically every D&Der I met 25-30 years ago. Things that from inside that context amount simply and concretely to the way things were when we were there seem doubtful and merely theoretical to you._




You seem to forget that I was there too. Given that I've been playing D&D since the 70s, there's a chance I've been playing longer than you. I read _The Dragon_, I was introduced to the game via play, and so on. And yet no one assumed that megadungeons were the order of the day. In fact, those that considered them at all regarded them as a silly archaic artifact best left in the dustbin. You don't have some sort of superior insight here. You have a limited anecdotal experience that demonstrates virtually nothing (as Hussar points out, how many people attended conventions and went to gaming clubs compared with how many people purchased products).


----------



## Ariosto

> Whose experience is more common?  I have no idea.



Neither have I!

It certainly could make a difference in figuring out whence the idea that low-level 3E characters level faster came.

As to conventions, though, I have never been to a Gen Con -- only local affairs, including SF cons with a gaming contingent.

I still must wonder how someone could be completely oblivious to the dungeon and campaign concepts, unless perhaps he leaped right into AD&D via the books without any prior grounding in the traditions of D&D. I can hardly imagine what one might in such a case have made of the advice in the PHB! I am not sure whether the 2E books did a better job of explaining those matters to the novice; I seem to recall that they devoted a lot of text to other modes of play.


----------



## Hussar

Ariosto said:


> Neither have I!
> 
> It certainly could make a difference in figuring out whence the idea that low-level 3E characters level faster came.
> 
> As to conventions, though, I have never been to a Gen Con -- only local affairs, including SF cons with a gaming contingent.
> 
> I still must wonder how someone could be completely oblivious to the dungeon and campaign concepts, unless perhaps he leaped right into AD&D via the books without any prior grounding in the traditions of D&D. I can hardly imagine what one might in such a case have made of the advice in the PHB! I am not sure whether the 2E books did a better job of explaining those matters to the novice; I seem to recall that they devoted a lot of text to other modes of play.




Thus my earlier point Ariosto.  I think a very large percentage of AD&D players came into AD&D from Basic/Expert.  The much vaunted Boxed Sets of the late 70's and early 80's.  I know that's how I got into it.  Considering those still remain the best selling RPG products of all time, I think it's safe to say that I wasn't alone.

And, if you came to AD&D from Basic/Expert, then the mega-dungeon concept ran pretty counter to your expectations.  While Basic D&D centered on the dungeon, Expert made it pretty clear that a good campaign featured both dungeons and wilderness.

Again, look at The Isle of Dread, which is probably one of the most loved and well known modules.  Small dungeon crawls sprinkled over a large wilderness map.  I think this colored people's approach to the game easily as much as EGG's DMG.


----------



## Ariosto

> a silly archaic artifact best left in the dustbin



Did you start with C&S?


----------



## Ariosto

> Expert made it pretty clear that a good campaign featured both dungeons and wilderness.



So did the Original boxed set. I really don't know what to make of your harping on this -- especially considering that the wilderness should be only *more* unpredictable an environment than a campaign dungeon!

_That's_ the salient point in this context: the relative reliability of returns from a more versus a less constrained scenario.

On the other hand, those could well be reliably _low_ if AD&D DMs are stingy with XP for treasure.


----------



## Hussar

Ariosto said:


> So did the Original boxed set. I really don't know what to make of your harping on this -- especially considering that the wilderness should be only *more* unpredictable an environment than a campaign dungeon!
> 
> _That's_ the salient point in this context: the relative reliability of returns from a more versus a less constrained scenario.
> 
> On the other hand, those could well be reliably _low_ if AD&D DMs are stingy with XP for treasure.




I'm harping on this because you stated that mega-dungeon play was the baseline assumption of AD&D play.  You're the one who stated:



			
				Ariosto said:
			
		

> Your personal experience of having never encountered a traditional dungeon, to the extent that you seem even to doubt that Gygax intended it to be normative, is suggestive.




Which started off this whole tangent.  If the mega-dungeon is not the standard assumption, or rather even if it was, but wasn't widely played, then questioning Quasqueton's results based on mega-dungeon play isn't valid.  The arguement on the table, as far as I know, is that the idea of going from dungeon to dungeon (in this case in module form) is not how people played back in the day.  At least, that's the sense I'm getting from you.

Is that mistaken?


----------



## Ariosto

Hussar, you seem with some frequency to construct radically extreme dichotomies -- and to misrepresent the views of others as occupying one or other of the antipodes.

The Cook and Marsh Expert D&D set included expanded monster and treasure stocking tables for dungeons of 8+ levels. It is rather curious (to say the least) to conclude that dungeons so deep were somehow incompatible with the simultaneous existence of a wilderness to explore, complete with castles, caves, ruins, wizards' towers and assorted little labyrinths.


----------



## The Shaman

Hussar said:


> I think a very large percentage of AD&D players came into AD&D from Basic/Expert.



_AD&D_ was already out for years before the Moldvay edition, so on what do you base this claim?







			
				Hussar said:
			
		

> I think this colored people's approach to the game easily as much as EGG's DMG.



If you were to look at the sales figures for _Isle of Dread_ and the _DMG_, which do you think would be higher?


----------



## Hussar

The Shaman said:


> _AD&D_ was already out for years before the Moldvay edition, so on what do you base this claim?If you were to look at the sales figures for _Isle of Dread_ and the _DMG_, which do you think would be higher?




Well, considering the Moldvay edition is the highest selling RPG product of all time, I'd say that the Isle of Dread probably was seen at more tables than a 1e DMG because it came with the boxed set.  Same reason for the Keep on the Borderlands.

So, yeah, I do believe that lots and lots of gamers came to AD&D through the boxed sets.  



> The Cook and Marsh Expert D&D set included expanded monster and treasure stocking tables for dungeons of 8+ levels. It is rather curious (to say the least) to conclude that dungeons so deep were somehow incompatible with the simultaneous existence of a wilderness to explore, complete with castles, caves, ruins, wizards' towers and assorted little labyrinths.




Yup, 1 page out of 64 is devoted to dungeons.  How many pages are devoted to designing a wilderness?

Y'know, people accuse me of misrepresenting their arguements, but, only at certain times.  I wonder why that is?  What am I getting wrong?  You said that the standard of play in 1e is the mega-dungeon, true or false?  You said that Q's ideas don't reflect how the game was actually played because of this.  Again, am I wrong here?

My point is, the mega-dungeon was not the way the game was played back then because most people came from Basic/Expert where the mega-dungeon most certainly WASN'T the baseline expectation of a campaign.  

To me, Q's appraisal of how the game was played follows pretty well how a great many people played AD&D.  The poll I put up is still in its infancy, but, out of 12 votes, not a single person has voted for mega dungeons.  Certainly not conclusive by any stretch, but, do you think that mega-dungeon play is going to top that poll?


----------



## Storm Raven

Ariosto said:


> So did the Original boxed set. I really don't know what to make of your harping on this -- especially considering that the wilderness should be only *more* unpredictable an environment than a campaign dungeon!
> 
> _That's_ the salient point in this context: the relative reliability of returns from a more versus a less constrained scenario.
> 
> On the other hand, those could well be reliably _low_ if AD&D DMs are stingy with XP for treasure.




They could be low if an AD&D DM was stingy with treasure. But that's not the question being asked. The question being asked is what did the publisher of the game appear to expect the rate of advancement to be, and the way to figure that out is to look at the materials the publisher provided for the game.

Assuming that the publisher intended that the game would be played in an entirely different manner because of a few throwaway lines and tables in an appendix when everything else points the other way is simply not a coherent argument. Further, assuming that a mere change of venue would radically alter the expectations the designers had for advancement is completely unsupportable.


----------



## Storm Raven

Ariosto said:


> The Cook and Marsh Expert D&D set included expanded monster and treasure stocking tables for dungeons of 8+ levels. It is rather curious (to say the least) to conclude that dungeons so deep were somehow incompatible with the simultaneous existence of a wilderness to explore, complete with castles, caves, ruins, wizards' towers and assorted little labyrinths.




Here's a question for you: you keep making a big deal about the tables showing monsters in a Nth level dungeon (where N is some fairly large number) and citing this as evidence that dungeons were expected to be 10, 15, or 20 levels deep.

_Steading of the Hill Giant Chief_ is a two level complex. It is stocked with monsters and treasure that would appear on the 8th through 10th level monster and treasure tables. Yet it is _not_ deep below the ground. Somehow, it is a high level adventure not below the ground, that appears to be using something akin to the tables you claim are evidence that such dungeons were _de rigeur_.

How do you explain this dichotomy?


----------



## Doug McCrae

Ariosto said:


> Your personal experience of having never encountered a traditional dungeon, to the extent that you seem even to doubt that Gygax intended it to be normative, is suggestive.



What evidence is there that it was intended to be normative?


----------



## Hussar

Ariosto, sorry to dogpile on you here, but, I would like an answer in light of both Storm Raven's and Doug McCrae's posts.  How is my line of discussion different from theirs and why are you claiming that I'm revising the argument and not directing the same criticism at them?


----------



## Ariosto

Moldvay/Cook/Marsh came out in 1981, and from all I have seen was a huge seller. The last printing of the white box D&D set was in 1979, the Basic and Expert sets apparently being considered its replacement.

In my estimation, nothing since the Original so clearly conveyed the principles of dungeon design, although Holmes (with B1) was not too bad. The later B/X sets offer the tools of tables for stocking, but I can understand how on their own they might be inadequate. Module B2 very well demonstrated the complimentary "home base" and wilderness aspects of starting a campaign. The Gygaxian AD&D books took some grounding for granted -- which may no longer have been possessed by people teaching themselves from books in the 1980s. That the DMG in particular suffered from less than stellar editing -- and the author's technical writing was, not unusually among game designers, not as polished as his creative writing -- may have contributed to a tendency among many DMs to skip much that was not immediately clear.

So, some trends for which later editions often take heat may in fact have been set in motion at the turn of the decade. That "dungeon modules" so rarely fit that description literally, and in other ways inadequately met the need for examples of the kind of campaign play for which the rules had been designed (Isle of Dread, packaged with both Expert sets, ranking among the better), hardly helped matters.


----------



## Storm Raven

Ariosto said:


> So, some trends for which later editions often take heat may in fact have been set in motion at the turn of the decade. That "dungeon modules" so rarely fit that description literally, and in other ways inadequately met the need for examples of the kind of campaign play for which the rules had been designed (Isle of Dread, packaged with both Expert sets, ranking among the better), hardly helped matters.




So, your argument is that TSR intentionally published items that were incompatible with the style of game that was intended to be played, and never gave anything more than cursory countervailing instructions in their products?

And further, that somehow, despite the scantest direction given in the products to this end, the norm was for people to figure out that they were "supposed" to play using megadungeons and do so?

I find this implausible in the extreme.


----------



## Hussar

Ariosto said:
			
		

> That "dungeon modules" so rarely fit that description literally, and in other ways inadequately met the need for examples of the kind of campaign play for which the rules had been designed (Isle of Dread, packaged with both Expert sets, ranking among the better), hardly helped matters.




Again, I have a bit of a problem with this.  The Expert rules are almost entirely written based on wilderness adventuring.  The only mega-dungeon stocking tools that you are given are a single page near the back of the book.  The Adventure section, OTOH, runs for 4 pages, and does not mention dungeons a single time.  

Heck, from the "Scope of the Rules" on page X3:



			
				Cook Expert Rules Page X3 said:
			
		

> The Dungeons and Dragons Expert Set continues the material presented in the DD Basic Rulebook.  that booklet covered dungeon expeditions and allowed characters to progress to 3rd level.
> ...
> Adventures will take place outside the dungeon.  A "wilderness" area will be an even greater challenge to players with stronger monsters and greater wealth to be won.
> 
> ...
> Through the rules ofhte D&D Expert Set, the campaign area can be extended to cover an entire world.  This wider world is limited only by the creativity of DM's and players.




Doesn't seem to me that for B/E D&D at the very least, the mega-dungeon campaign was even on the radar.


----------



## Ariosto

There is really not much to say about the false dichotomy. "First, you say that a horse has four legs; then you say it has a head and a tail; which is it?"

The sum of my previous post is that I can see how the text might be inadequate outside the tradition; a failing of AD&D, regret for which I think Gygax expressed in later years.

However, the matter of dungeon and campaign is in my experience so widely lucid to those who started with OD&D, or were taught by those who had, and so often attested over so many years by Gygax and others, that I cannot pretend the misunderstanding is on the part of the "traditionalists" rather than the "exegetes".

That the misunderstanding might be widespread, and that it -- in combination either with willful disregard for the guidelines, or with ill-considered guidelines promulgated later -- might produce a situation in which character advancement is reliably slow, is another matter.


----------



## billd91

Storm Raven said:


> They could be low if an AD&D DM was stingy with treasure. But that's not the question being asked. The question being asked is what did the publisher of the game appear to expect the rate of advancement to be, and the way to figure that out is to look at the materials the publisher provided for the game.
> 
> Assuming that the publisher intended that the game would be played in an entirely different manner because of a few throwaway lines and tables in an appendix when everything else points the other way is simply not a coherent argument. Further, assuming that a mere change of venue would radically alter the expectations the designers had for advancement is completely unsupportable.




A significant problem comes up even when trying to figure out what the publisher thought the default mode of play was (or giving out treasure) because the modules are not necessarily in accord with the treasure-designing guidelines. 

I did a little number crunching for G3 and, based on the tables in the back of the Monster Manual, treasure types of monsters involved, and numbers of creatures, the monetary treasure in the G3 haul (as calculated by Q) is *FAR* above what the tables would suggest, on average. I calculated in the neighborhood of 300,000 gp, assuming the rolls averaged out to approach the expected values and virtually everything counted as being in its lair (including the mind flayers, who presumably were not).

So that leads back into Hussar's poll in the other thread. Did the DM make up his own adventures and use the Treasure Type tables? Or did he use modules that packed in a higher treasure value than the Monster Manual prescribed norm? Did he use modules that might have skimped on the treasure?


----------



## billd91

Hussar said:


> Again, I have a bit of a problem with this.  The Expert rules are almost entirely written based on wilderness adventuring.  The only mega-dungeon stocking tools that you are given are a single page near the back of the book.  The Adventure section, OTOH, runs for 4 pages, and does not mention dungeons a single time.




The Expert rules may have focused on wilderness, but the Basic ones did not. And I'd be willing to bet the Basic edition sold quite a bit more copies than the Expert rules did. It's natural with any series. People check out the first, it grabs them or not, those in grabs buy the next installment, those it does not don't progress up the chain.

But I don't think that points to the "mega"dungeon as the expected form of play, just dungeoneering in general, whether small, medium, large, or supersized. That would further be reinforced by modules in the whole (A)D&D line, the majority of which were dungeons rather than wilderness like Isle of Dread.


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## Ariosto

Module play is not "incompatible" with campaign play, any more than an exhibition ball game is incompatible with league play. A wilderness, scattered with keeps, steadings, shrines, enchanted caverns, etc., is not only not incompatible with a dungeon but an assumed compliment to it.

The books provided all (apart from paper, pencil and imagination) that was necessary to create a dungeon. The Geomorphs and Monster and Treasure Assortments were additional aids.

Creation was part of the game! Drawing maps and stocking them was part of play, part of the FUN.

"Hey! We'll sell you the makings of a super fudge banana split ice cream sundae -- and someone to *eat* it for you!"

Yes, apparently it took a new generation of game designers to grasp that plan.


----------



## Storm Raven

_Double post_


----------



## Storm Raven

Ariosto said:


> There is really not much to say about the false dichotomy. "First, you say that a horse has four legs; then you say it has a head and a tail; which is it?"




It is a dicthotomy. You claim that having tables that show lists of (for example) ninth level monsters and treasure is clear evidence that this should be used for making megadungeons. But we have adventures that seem to use this material without this being part of a megadungeon. Rather, it uses it to provide for an adventure for high level characters without regard to the venue.

In other words, the evidence you claim supports your position doesn't actually seem to do so. Rather, based upon the available information, it supports the idea that the tables could be used to provide opposition for higher level characters without regard for the setting that opposition takes.



> _The sum of my previous post is that I can see how the text might be inadequate outside the tradition; a failing of AD&D, regret for which I think Gygax expressed in later years._




But that doesn't do anything to support your as of yet entirely unsupported claim that megadungeon delving was the norm. Or that it was intended to be. TSR and Gygax had plenty of opportunity to make this clear, yet for dozens upon dozens of published products released over the course of several years they simply did not do so. There weren't any campaign design articles in _The Dragon_ (a wholly controlled organ of TSR at the time) that gave megadungeon design advice (in point of fact, all the ones I can remember were decidedly _not_ megadungeon campaigns). One can only conclude that they did not intend to make such a clarification.


----------



## Bullgrit

From post #30:


			
				E. Gary Gygax a.k.a. Col_Pladoh said:
			
		

> The number of XPs given to rise a level was initially intuitive, later on based on the play of my campaign group. I think that 52 sessions to reach 10th level is about right if the time per session is about four hours. Longner sessions would reduce the number accordingly.





			
				E. Gary Gygax said:
			
		

> If play was intensive dungeon crawling, the 52 play sessions might take up only a few weeks of game time, with several adventure sessions being the continuation of a single day of delving.



Bullgrit


----------



## Storm Raven

Ariosto said:


> Module play is not "incompatible" with campaign play, any more than an exhibition ball game is incompatible with league play. A wilderness, scattered with keeps, steadings, shrines, enchanted caverns, etc., is not only not incompatible with a dungeon but an assumed compliment to it.




No one is saying you _couldn't_ play using a giant megadungeon. What is being disputed is that TSR intended that this should be the norm, and that it actually was the norm.

The materials provided by TSR didn't point to this conclusion at all. The fact that most campaigns seemed to not take this up as the style of play is consequently completely unsurprising to me. You've made claim, and haven't supported it at all. You've cited flimsy evidence in the text that doesn't actually support what you claim, ignored countervailing text, and ignored the actual publishing history of the company. You've claimed special knowledge based upon your supposed greater experience (which I have pointed out is not actually greater than me or the other posters here). Thus far, you are just pounding the table, and that's just a dog that won't hunt.


----------



## Ariosto

> In other words, the evidence you claim supports your position doesn't actually seem to do so.



You arbitrarily ignore the far greater volume of evidence that in fact instructed me before ever I encountered the DMG. The textual fundamentalist waves "proof texts" at the orthodox traditionalist who is assuredly not about to chop off most of his understanding and "argue" from a feigned position of ignorance!

You make much of "TSR". I do not very much care how the Bloom brothers or other corporate functionaries conceived of D&D, when it comes to the matter of how it was designed to be played.

As I recall, there were _plenty_ of articles in The Strategic Review and The Dragon concerned with designing dungeons (and towns, and wilderness areas).

The most fundamental matter is not whether one's "dungeon" has but 2 levels or 20 (although vertical mobility is indeed important) -- but whether it is an RPGA-style railroad, a big and extremely non-linear and dynamic environment, or something in between.

Where it, and its wider context, lies on that spectrum has much to do with *the probability that any given adventure is going to "clean it out"*.


----------



## Raven Crowking

I looked through the 1e DMG last night, and the only reference I could find to "your main dungeon" was in the appendixes, as part of the intro for the random dungeon level generator.  So, while I know that the "campaign dungeon" was an expected norm then, and I know that I knew this then, I am not at all certain how this information was actually communicated.

Weird.  I wonder if it was via osmosis?

RC


----------



## Storm Raven

Ariosto said:


> You arbitrarily ignore the far greater volume of evidence that in fact instructed me before ever I encountered the DMG. The textual fundamentalist waves "proof texts" at the orthodox traditionalist who is assuredly not about to chop off most of his understanding and "argue" from a feigned position of ignorance!




Such as _Chainmail_? You aren't the only one with access to those sources. They offer no support for your claims.



> _You make much of "TSR". I do not very much care how the Bloom brothers or other corporate functionaries conceived of D&D, when it comes to the matter of how it was designed to be played._




Interesting. You cite the Blumes (father and son, not brothers, by the way), who didn't take over TSR until well after the PHB and DMG were published. _Steading_ was published in 1978. The Blumes didn't replace Gygax as head of the company until 1982. That's four years during which the company helmed by Gygax continued to pump out material entirely different than what you claim the style of intended play was.

Your claim is simply untenable.



> _As I recall, there were plenty of articles in The Strategic Review and The Dragon concerned with designing dungeons (and towns, and wilderness areas)._




Cite one that suggests that DMs should by preference build megadungeons because that is the expected normal style of play. There is a thread on this board in which all the _Dragon_ issues are being read in order. Go to the older ones listed and show us where that article is.


----------



## Storm Raven

Here's the problem with the "megadungeons were intended to be the norm" argument in a nutshell. The whole idea is based on this supposed mystic cabal of people "in the know" who got their training presumably from some secret network of people who could tap directly into Gygax's brain and divine what he intended instead of what he actually produced for people to use.

But then we have at least seven years of publishing from the inception of the game as a finished and published product until Gygax left his position as president and CEO of the company in which the published materials run entirely the opposite direction from the "megadungeons are the norm", with the only textual support being a very vague reference in a set of table in an appendix.

So, how are the masses of players who _weren't_ part of the mystic cabal to divine this as the norm of play? The mystic cabal is clearly a tiny subset of those who will buy the books, meaning those who don't have the secret knowledge will vastly outnumber those who do. In the end, the secret knowledge will not be the norm of play. The norm of play will become what the books and the published supplements point towards: episodic dungeons of modest size. Just like modules.


----------



## Ariosto

Storm Raven, thanks for correcting the spelling, etc., of the Blumes. I do not see how that makes any less tenable my claim that I have little regard for their views (or those of others similarly divorced from it) when it comes to the question of Gary's intent in designing the game. More precisely, I have absolutely zero reason to think that it was designed to sell "modules". It was hardly something to avoid, from a business perspective, once Judges Guild proved the market -- but that is not the same thing!

As Raven Crowking notes, and as I have repeatedly, the Gygaxian AD&D books assumed much prior understanding on the supposedly "advanced" reader's part. "Osmosis" is a fair characterization of the process by which that was often learned.

Especially with Holmes as aid, it was certainly possible to gain an adequate understanding of OD&D; I know of some folks who even "got" the original set unassisted. A background in war-games in miniature was a help, and indeed war-gamers were the initially expected audience (hence the billing on the covers of the box and booklets). The basic premise, though, was set forth on page 5 of Volume 1: 







> First, the referee must draw out a minimum of half a dozen maps of the levels of his "underworld", people them with monsters of various horrid aspect, distribute treasures accordingly, and note the location of the latter two on keys, each corresponding to the appropriate level.



The first to acquire the booklets followed the instructions and set up campaigns, actual play therein being the way in which the next "generation" learned the game. Thus, even if one never read the seminal text, its essential concepts had been transmitted via oral tradition.


----------



## Storm Raven

Ariosto said:


> Storm Raven, thanks for correcting the spelling, etc., of the Blumes. I do not see how that makes any less tenable my claim that I have little regard for their views (or those of others similarly divorced from it) when it comes to the question of Gary's intent in designing the game.




The fact that the Blumes didn't take over TSR until 1981, well after all the modules we are talking about had been published is what makes your claim untenable. Gygax was running the show from 1975 to 1981. What TSR produced was what he wanted the company to produce. Hence, your disdain for the Blumes is entirely irrelevant to the question at hand.



> _As Raven Crowking notes, and as I have repeatedly, the Gygaxian AD&D books assumed much prior understanding on the supposedly "advanced" reader's part. "Osmosis" is a fair characterization of the process by which that was often learned._




And yet they gave actual advice that was cmarkedly different than the advice you assert was to be gleaned via "osmosis". That's what makes your claim untenable. Gygax could have given instructions about building multilevel megadungeons. Instead of that, he gave a handful of throwaway lines and a pile of non-megadunegaon advice and adventures. Effectively, you are claiming that the only ones who got it "right" were those with the ability to read Gygax's mind, and this mind-reading ability was supposeduly widespread enough to make this style of gaming the "norm".

I find this claim to be entirely unbelievable.


----------



## Bullgrit

I’m not seeing how the current debate [mega-dungeon or adventure path: which was the expected norm] is in any way related to the overall original topic of the thread.

Edit: the current debate has gone on for 5 pages.

Bullgrit


----------



## Ariosto

Storm Raven, I don't much care even what might be inferred on this count from the transactions of "TSR Gary" as opposed to "Dungeon Master Gary"! I see absolutely no reason to give the one persona greater weight when treating matters with which the other was chiefly (and previously, and subsequently) concerned.

Gygax did indeed "give instructions about building multilevel dungeons" in the DMG. Appendix A is a revision of a magazine article that was in turn an elaboration on the basic stocking methods in OD&D (and present in the later Basic and Expert sets as well). The encounter and treasure tables also were expansions of material from the original set.

What would be unbelievable anywhere but an Internet forum is the determined pressing of an "argument" so obviously incapable of convincing.

It seems in any case to have gone beyond even telescope range of the thread's topic -- so I will treat it here no more.


----------



## Storm Raven

Bullgrit said:


> I’m not seeing how the current debate [mega-dungeon or adventure path: which was the expected norm] is in any way related to the overall original topic of the thread.




Ariosto has claimed that somehow, adventuring in a megadungeon makes the acquisition of experience and treasure incredibly different from adventuring in a series of smaller dungeons. I have asked him to explain why, and thus far his responses have been entirely unconvincing.

I've also pointed out that the textual evidence he claims is exceedingly flimsy, and doesn't actually say what he claims. And that the entire publishing history of TSR is contrary to what he asserts the "expected style of play is". He continues to harp on the same piece of evidence (a set of tables in an appendix) while referencing magical mind-reading ability.


----------



## Storm Raven

Ariosto said:


> Storm Raven, I don't much care even what might be inferred on this count from the transactions of "TSR Gary" as opposed to "Dungeon Master Gary"! I see absolutely no reason to give the one persona greater weight when treating matters with which the other was chiefly (and previously, and subsequently) concerned.




So now it isn't just that the Blumes somehow got their grubby corporate hands on the decision making (a claim which has been factually disproven concerning the modules and other products being discussed), now it is that Gygax simply acted in bad faith when he ran TSR?

Your argument gets sillier and sillier.



> _Gygax did indeed "give instructions about building multilevel dungeons" in the DMG. Appendix A is a revision of a magazine article that was in turn an elaboration on the basic stocking methods in OD&D (and present in the later Basic and Expert sets as well). The encounter and treasure tables also were expansions of material from the original set._




No, as I pointed out before, the tables you rely on are evidence that there were monsters considered appropriate opposition for high level parties. The fact that published material used that for things other than megadungeons shows that that was not necessarily their intended use. Given that just about everything _other_ than the tables you cite directs DMs to design campaigns in a radically different way than a megadungeon, and the tables are at best ambiguous, one wonder why you think your argument could ever be considered convincing.

Your argument only makes sense if you assume that Gygax intentionally produced materials during his tenure as head of TSR that were incompatible with what the people playing the game were "normally" using it for. That's just ridiculous.

P.S. You do realize there is a forked thread on this topic, don't you?


----------



## Raven Crowking

As far as the numbers go, Q is spot on.

As far as the conclusions some draw from it, I have asked them to explain why, and thus far their responses have been entirely unconvincing.

The problem is that this is like the moon landing.  I was there, and involved in playing 1e.  I know what leveling was like at my table.  I played 1e in several US States, with over 100 individual players and DMs.  I know what leveling was like at those tables.  By extension, since those players were involved with other games, I know what they said about those other games as well.

My experience is that, at least within that dataset, approximately 1/3 of all treasure in a module was missed _*within the areas explored*_ and that, most frequently, some portion of a module was not explored.  Even recently, running KotB using 3e Search rules, we had the same rough ratio.  The group explored less than 1/6th of the caverns, and left 1/3 of the treasure unfound in the areas they did explore.

Within my own games, the highest level PCs (earned legitimately) were 16th and 14th level....and they both belonged to the same player.  One of those PCs (the 14th level fighter) is now a deity in my campaign setting (Julius Invincible), while the other was his father, a magic user.  Examining the back of the 1e _*Rogues Gallery*_ further demonstrates the comparatively low level of the game's "Big Names".  If everyone leveled in 1e as in 3e, surely Gary Gygax would have gotten at least one character to 20th level by the time that book came out....... 

Now, I know a guy who thinks that the moon landing was faked.  He'll bring up photographic evidence, and he'll claim that this shadow or that reflection "proves" his assertation.  When I point out that there are other potential interpretations of that same data -- and ones that much better gibe with my experience -- he acccuses me of being unwilling to accept the evidence.  

"Daniel has determined the answer," he says, "and shall not be moved from it."

And, when we reach that point in the discussion, he, too, starts with the insults:  "Your argument gets sillier and sillier.", "One wonder why you think your argument could ever be considered convincing.", "That's just ridiculous."

But here is the thing.  Maybe the moon landing was faked.  It is not impossible that the moon landing was faked.  However, it is irrational to believe that the moon landing was faked unless the weight of evidence -- including how that evidence is interpretted -- is greater than the evidence against.  And personal experience can and does count as evidence against.  Just as Neil Armstrong would be harder to convince that the moon landing was faked.

When the evidence presented is insufficient to convince someone, merely repeating "Yes it is" is unlikely to change their mind.  

OTOH, if you look upthread, I have described _*exactly*_ what kind of analysis would change my mind.  If you wanted to convince me, you would just have to supply the (correct) numbers.


RC


----------



## Storm Raven

Raven Crowking said:


> As far as the numbers go, Q is spot on.
> 
> As far as the conclusions some draw from it, I have asked them to explain why, and thus far their responses have been entirely unconvincing.




Which conclusions do you dispute? That levelling in 1e modules didn't comport with the expected gain one would have to have to continue along a particular linked set of adventures? Or that the rate of levelling per adventure in 1e wasn't very similar to the rate of levelling in 3e?

Your claims that 1e was _much_ harder to advance are based on two assertions (1) lots of treasure in 1e modules was hidden or otherwise hard to get unlike 3e adventures, and (2) 1e modules assumed you would not go to every part of the adventure, but 3e adventures assume you will.

But both of these claims are pretty easy to discredit on the 3e side. For example, in _The Sunless Citadel_, and entire section of the adventure, leading to the transformed troll-priest and a decent chunk of treasure, is hidden behind a non-obvious secret door leading to a series of rooms. It is just as likely that the PCs will miss that entire segment of the adventure as it is the PCs will miss the hidden gems in the _Village of Hommlet_ foray into the Moathouse. In other words, the claim that they are dissimilar because everything in 3e is expected to be found can be easily disproven by looking at the modules. So that element is a wash, and we still end up with advancement that is likely to be relatively even.


----------



## rkwoodard

*just to clarify*



Raven Crowking said:


> As far as the numbers go, Q is spot on.
> 
> As far as the conclusions some draw from it, I have asked them to explain why, and thus far their responses have been entirely unconvincing.
> 
> 
> RC





The point of the thread is to show the treasure available in the 1st edition adventures and show that by comparison to 3rd edition, leveling would be the same or could be faster ?

The contention seems to be that just because the treasure is there you can not assume that the group gets it so therefore the leveling comparison's are not valid.

Is that correct?

RK


----------



## Bullgrit

Raven Crowking said:
			
		

> As far as the numbers go, Q is spot on.
> 
> As far as the conclusions some draw from it, I have asked them to explain why, and thus far their responses have been entirely unconvincing.



What specific conclusions are you questioning? I can explain my conclusions, but it may not be my own you are asking about.

Bullgrit


----------



## Raven Crowking

rkwoodard said:


> The contention seems to be that just because the treasure is there you can not assume that the group gets it so therefore the leveling comparison's are not valid.
> 
> Is that correct?
> 
> RK




Pretty much correct.

I suggest that there are factors other than the presence or absence of treasure that are equally important in determining whether or not treasure is found:  Area avaible for exploration, the size of the area that can be avoided while still accomplishing a main goal, factors that cause one to speed exploration (wandering monsters, limited light supply, poison gas, the Ghost Tower disappearing in the morning, etc., etc.).

In addition, rules can make a difference as to how you level.  For example, in AD&D 1e, characters who gain enough XP to level cannot gain any more until they have trained.  Nor can they gain enough XP in a single session to gain more than one level.  Placement of treasure in such a setup can easily create cases where the PCs gain the treasure, but do not gain full XP value for it.  This is especially true where time constraints exist that prevent the PCs from spending one or more weeks on training and then returning.

To make this last bit clearer, imagine you needed 10 XP to gain a level, and could only gain up to 19 XP at a time.  Once you have gained 10 or more XP, you cannot gain more from further sessions until you level.  Leveling requires a minimum of 1 week.

In such a setup, I can include 10,000,000 XP available in a single encounter, and you can still only gain one level.

Conversely, in a system where you automatically level whenever you have the XP to do so, you would be 1,000,000th level after that encounter.

Factors like this are as important to rates of leveling as the raw XP available are.  Leaving them out of your calculations leaves a big hole in your conclusions.


RC


----------



## Raven Crowking

Bullgrit said:


> What specific conclusions are you questioning? I can explain my conclusions, but it may not be my own you are asking about.
> 
> Bullgrit




Bullgrit,

Please see the above post.

In addition:  

(1)  Characters are expected to follow linked series of TSR 1e modules sequentially without any additional adventures between them.  Note that when these modules were originally presented, many (if not all) were published seperately with a space of time between their publication.

(2)  Hidden treasure in 3e modules has the same impact on XP as in 1e modules.

As stated upthread, I very much agree that earlier 3e adventures were closer to 1e adventures in terms of layout and structure......certainly moreso than many 2e adventures.  But I am not convinced that this has the same impact on leveling in 3e as it does in 1e.

Another way to look at it might be:  In 3e, how many encounters do you need to "defeat" before leveling?  In 1e, how many?  If a module like KotB is a mini-campaign, meant to be played over many sessions, how does that compare to some of the later 3e modules?  Is a "module" even the right unit of comparison?


RC


----------



## Storm Raven

Raven Crowking said:


> (1)  Characters are expected to follow linked series of TSR 1e modules sequentially without any additional adventures between them.  Note that when these modules were originally presented, many (if not all) were published seperately with a space of time between their publication.




Oh, I think characters were supposed to follow a linked series in order, without additional material between them. What you are citing is merely a practical issue concerning the nature of publication. Some of the adventures, such as G1-G2-G3 and A3-A4 are clearly intended to follow directly one after another.



> _(2)  Hidden treasure in 3e modules has the same impact on XP as in 1e modules._




3e has entire hidden areas in many modules that include encounters. That should have much the same effect as hidden treasure in a 1e module.



> _Another way to look at it might be:  In 3e, how many encounters do you need to "defeat" before leveling?  In 1e, how many?  If a module like KotB is a mini-campaign, meant to be played over many sessions, how does that compare to some of the later 3e modules?  Is a "module" even the right unit of comparison?_



_

In 3e, the ratio suggested is 13 encounters per level.

Let's look at the Moathouse, where the Pcs are likely to go from 1st to 3rd level in 1e (so they can be even remotely ready for the Temple). The encounters listed (more or less in order) are:

1. Giant Frogs
2. Giant Spider
3. Bandits
4. Giant Snake
5. Giant Tick
6. Giant Lizard
7. Green Slime
8. Zombies
9. Ogre
10. Bugbears
11. Gnolls
12. Ghouls
13. Giant Crayfish
14. Lareth's Guards
15. Lareth

Doing the comparison "by encounter" makes it look like it may have been easier to level in 1e than 3e, since it only took 15 total encounters to potentially go from 1st to 3rd (and it is only 15 because I split Lareth from his guards, assuming he would stay holed up in his room until the PCs burst in on him, otherwise it would be 14 encounters).

Somehow I doubt this is what you expected._


----------



## Obryn

OK, I'm really confused by the shifting arguments here.

First off, I am going to guess that there's an argument about some imaginary Platonic Ideal of 1e that probably never existed.  I mean, if 30% of groups (a made-up number) used the rules about training and only advancing one level per adventure, is it really a rule of AD&D 1e?  I mean, I know it's a rule, but is it a rule that mattered?  (Ditto, the ABCD grading...)

Were they not really playing AD&D if they ignored that rule?  I think they were; it's a tradition of the game to house-rule, the DMG's admonitions against house-ruling notwithstanding.  Of everything you could do, it's rather minor, IMO.

So honestly, is it a surprise that plenty of groups had fast levelling and found a lot of treasure, while other groups have slow levelling, use the training rules, and left half the loot in the dungeon?  And other groups were somewhere in-between?  And others never gave gold for XP so ended up advancing at a snail's pace?

I guess I'm confused because I don't even know if anyone is actually discussing the same game as anyone else in this thread.

I know that in my 1e game I'm running right now, my group pretty easily got to levels 3 or 4, depending, after finishing up the Moathouse.  Of course, I'm not strict on the training rules because I'm running a ToEE campaign, not a full-scale AD&D sandbox.  If I were strict on it, things would probably be different.  But I don't think the fact that I'm not using the training rules means that I'm not playing AD&D.  What's more, I'd hazard a guess that the training rules were some of the most-frequently-disregarded ones in the game.

So yeah.  I think the data is very interesting, but I don't know that all of this matters, and I think it's completely plausible that 10 groups would have played in 10 different ways.

-O


----------



## Raven Crowking

Obryn said:


> So honestly, is it a surprise that plenty of groups had fast levelling and found a lot of treasure, while other groups have slow levelling, use the training rules, and left half the loot in the dungeon?  And other groups were somewhere in-between?  And others never gave gold for XP so ended up advancing at a snail's pace?
> 
> I guess I'm confused because I don't even know if anyone is actually discussing the same game as anyone else in this thread.




I gave you XP too recently to do so again, but you deserve XP for this post.

(Now we can discuss EN World leveling.....)


RC


----------



## Bullgrit

Bullgrit said:
			
		

> What specific conclusions are you questioning? I can explain my conclusions, but it may not be my own you are asking about.






			
				Raven Crowking said:
			
		

> Characters are expected to follow linked series of TSR 1e modules sequentially without any additional adventures between them.



This isn’t a conclusion. It’s a base assumption.

The PCs in this study followed the linked series of modules because it was:

1- A logical progression of play – T1-4 is one adventure, GDQ is a linked series, all written by the same author, and the levels follow appropriately.

2- The apparent assumption/expectation of the adventures, themselves – T1-4 is one adventure, GDQ is a linked series, all written by the same author, and the levels follow appropriately.

I don’t see how this could provoke an argument from anyone.



			
				Raven Crowking said:
			
		

> Hidden treasure in 3e modules has the same impact on XP as in 1e modules.



This isn’t a conclusion, either. I don’t know that anyone has even argued this idea.



			
				Raven Crowking said:
			
		

> Please see the above post.



The other post doesn’t list any conclusions, either. It only has statements of your own views.

I’m willing to explain my conclusions, but you have to actually identify, directly, the conclusions you take issue with.

Bullgrit


----------



## MerricB

Raven Crowking said:


> I gave you XP too recently to do so again, but you deserve XP for this post.
> 
> (Now we can discuss EN World leveling.....)
> 
> 
> RC




I've done it for you, RC. 

Cheers!


----------



## Doug McCrae

Obryn said:


> I guess I'm confused because I don't even know if anyone is actually discussing the same game as anyone else in this thread.



We have to have some common ground or communication is impossible. That common ground can only be textual - rules, modules, articles in Dragon, etc.

Memory is faulty, very faulty. It ends up being hopelessly tainted by personal prejudices or nostalgia or all our other human irrationalities. I started playing D&D 27 years ago and I can barely remember 10% of how we played then, at best. For example I know I played G1 in the early 80s but I can remember absolutely nothing about it from that time.


----------



## Storm Raven

Storm Raven said:


> Oh, I think characters were supposed to follow a linked series in order, without additional material between them. What you are citing is merely a practical issue concerning the nature of publication. Some of the adventures, such as G1-G2-G3 and A3-A4 are clearly intended to follow directly one after another.
> 
> 
> 
> 3e has entire hidden areas in many modules that include encounters. That should have much the same effect as hidden treasure in a 1e module.
> 
> 
> 
> In 3e, the ratio suggested is 13 encounters per level.
> 
> Let's look at the Moathouse, where the Pcs are likely to go from 1st to 3rd level in 1e (so they can be even remotely ready for the Temple). The encounters listed (more or less in order) are:
> 
> 1. Giant Frogs
> 2. Giant Spider
> 3. Bandits
> 4. Giant Snake
> 5. Giant Tick
> 6. Giant Lizard
> 7. Green Slime
> 8. Zombies
> 9. Ogre
> 10. Bugbears
> 11. Gnolls
> 12. Ghouls
> 13. Giant Crayfish
> 14. Lareth's Guards
> 15. Lareth
> 
> Doing the comparison "by encounter" makes it look like it may have been _easier_ to level in 1e than 3e, since it only took 15 total encounters to potentially go from 1st to 3rd (and it is only 15 because I split Lareth from his guards, assuming he would stay holed up in his room until the PCs burst in on him, otherwise it would be 14 encounters).
> 
> Somehow I doubt this is what you expected.




Looking at the Moathouse, I note that I missed one encounter (that's what I get for working from memory): between the bandit encounter and the giant snake encounter there are some stirges, so there are sixteen total encounters in the Moathouse (fifteen if Lareth and his guards are consolidated).

Interestingly, we have a 3e example of the Moathouse. When Troika made a CRPG for _Temple of Elemental Evil_, they did it using the 3e rules (3.5e actually), and followed them pretty closely. It is interesting to note that Troika felt they had to add some story experience and minor encounters to be played _before_ the PCs tackled the Moathouse in order for the PCs to have enough experience as they would need after finishing it to be able to move on to Nulb.


----------



## Vegepygmy

Storm Raven said:


> Looking at the Moathouse, I note that I missed one encounter (that's what I get for working from memory): between the bandit encounter and the giant snake encounter there are some stirges, so there are sixteen total encounters in the Moathouse (fifteen if Lareth and his guards are consolidated).



I can't seem to find these stirges you're talking about, but that's not really important...

The real issue is that the 15 or 16 "encounters" you're talking about don't translate into 15 or 16 "encounters" as 3e uses the term.  3e's "13 encounters per level" standard presupposes that the encounters are *EL 1* encounters.   To compare, just _one_ of the 15-16 "encounters" you cite (11. Gnolls) is actually an *EL 6* encounter in 3e.  What was considered _one_ "encounter" in 1e terms is considered _six_ "encounters" in 3e.


----------



## Storm Raven

Vegepygmy said:


> I can't seem to find these stirges you're talking about, but that's not really important...
> 
> The real issue is that the 15 or 16 "encounters" you're talking about don't translate into 15 or 16 "encounters" as 3e uses the term.  3e's "13 encounters per level" standard presupposes that the encounters are *EL 1* encounters.   To compare, just _one_ of the 15-16 "encounters" you cite (11. Gnolls) is actually an *EL 6* encounter in 3e.  What was considered _one_ "encounter" in 1e terms is considered _six_ "encounters" in 3e.




No, that's not quite right. By the time the PCs will have encountered the gnolls, they will likely be 2nd level. Also, the 3e award set up presumes a 4 character party, which is a _lot_ smaller than a typical 1e party was expected to be. If you add two or three PCs (or more, 1e adventures were often listed as being for 6-10 or 8-12 PCs), then the comparison become very similar.

Using the 3e rules, it would take 26.66 encoutners for PCs to get from 1st to 3rd level. The Moathouse, with 15 encounter areas does this for the 1e PCs. I don't see this as being a significant difference in the editions. In the Trokia CRPGS conversion, 3e PCs get to 3rd level just as they finish dealing with Lareth. That seems pretty close to where the 1e PCs would be.


----------



## Raven Crowking

MerricB said:


> I've done it for you, RC.
> 
> Cheers!




Thank you, Sir.

You are a gentleman and a scholar.


----------



## Raven Crowking

Storm Raven said:


> No, that's not quite right. By the time the PCs will have encountered the gnolls, they will likely be 2nd level. Also, the 3e award set up presumes a 4 character party, which is a _lot_ smaller than a typical 1e party was expected to be. If you add two or three PCs (or more, 1e adventures were often listed as being for 6-10 or 8-12 PCs), then the comparison become very similar.




But you will have to stop using Q's numbers & provide your own, as Q's numbers are based on parties of the same size (6 characters)



			
				Q said:
			
		

> AD&D1 party begins at: (0 xp each)
> Fighter 1
> Paladin 1
> Cleric 1
> Magic-User 1
> Illusionist 1
> Thief 1
> 
> D&D3 party begins at: (0 xp each)
> Fighter 1
> Paladin 1
> Cleric 1
> Wizard 1
> Illusionist 1
> Rogue 1





RC


----------



## Raven Crowking

Storm Raven said:


> Using the 3e rules, it would take 26.66 encoutners for PCs to get from 1st to 3rd level. The Moathouse, with 15 encounter areas does this for the 1e PCs. I don't see this as being a significant difference in the editions. In the Trokia CRPGS conversion, 3e PCs get to 3rd level just as they finish dealing with Lareth. That seems pretty close to where the 1e PCs would be.




And, this may have changed in 3.5, but in my 3e DMG, I note that you don't use a new column until the characters have gained 4th level for determining XP.  So, having gained 2nd level doesn't change the 3e characters' XP for a tougher encounter.

Using the 3e rules, it would take 26.66 _*CR 1*_ encounters for PCs to get from 1st to 3rd level.  It would take significantly fewer CR 6 encounters.


RC


----------



## Storm Raven

Raven Crowking said:


> And, this may have changed in 3.5, but in my 3e DMG, I note that you don't use a new column until the characters have gained 4th level for determining XP.  So, having gained 2nd level doesn't change the 3e characters' XP for a tougher encounter.
> 
> Using the 3e rules, it would take 26.66 _*CR 1*_ encounters for PCs to get from 1st to 3rd level.  It would take significantly fewer CR 6 encounters.




EL is not the same as CR.


----------



## Storm Raven

Raven Crowking said:


> But you will have to stop using Q's numbers & provide your own, as Q's numbers are based on parties of the same size (6 characters)




That actually biases things downward for the 3e party. In other words, they should not, at 1st level, be expected to defeat 13.33 EL 1 encounters to gain a level. Rather they should be expected to defeat 13.33 EL 1.5 to EL 2 encounters to do so. At second level they would be expected to defeat 13.33 EL 3 to 4 encounters to reach third level. So the fact that some of the encounters in the Moathouse would be EL 5 or 6 is balanced by the fact that some would be EL 1, which would be a "less than equal" challenge for a 6 person party.


----------



## Raven Crowking

Storm Raven said:


> That actually biases things downward for the 3e party.




Not so.

If the 3e party in Q's example splits XP 6 ways, and the average 3e party splits the same XP 4 ways, the average 3e party gets half again the XP in Q's example.


RC


----------



## Storm Raven

Raven Crowking said:


> Not so.
> 
> If the 3e party in Q's example splits XP 6 ways, and the average 3e party splits the same XP 4 ways, the average 3e party gets half again the XP in Q's example.




But the larger 3e party has to face tougher challenges for the opposition to be appropriate. Instead of an EL 1 encounter at 1st level, they should be facing EL 2 encounters.

Since we are comparing "relative encounters to level" for the 1e and 3e party, the fact that the Moathouse encounters may be a little tougher than one would expect for a 1st or 2nd level party is offset by the fact that the example 3e party would be expected to be fighting tougher than normal encounters due to its larger than expected size. So the objection that the gnolls (an EL 5 encounter by the way, not 6) would be tougher than the expected 3e encounter of an "average" party is offset by the fact that the sample 3e party would be expected to face tougher than normal ELs anyway.


----------



## AllisterH

Well, then again, there's the issue of how strong the opposition. See much earlier in this thread when people were talking about the Giants and the encounters with them.

For example, depending on gear and stats, for a 1e party, the encounter with the giants could be trivial whereas for the 3e party, the giants can still get lucky and outright kill a PC in one turn.


----------



## Raven Crowking

Storm Raven said:


> But the larger 3e party has to face tougher challenges for the opposition to be appropriate. Instead of an EL 1 encounter at 1st level, they should be facing EL 2 encounters.




But we are talking about modules, not hypothetical encounters.  The minute we bring in hypothetical encounters, we can lower the 1e treasure level, and the entire analysis goes up in a poof of smoke.


RC


----------



## Storm Raven

Raven Crowking said:


> But we are talking about modules, not hypothetical encounters.  The minute we bring in hypothetical encounters, we can lower the 1e treasure level, and the entire analysis goes up in a poof of smoke.




Yes. We are talking about the Moathouse at present. You (IIRC) wondered how many encounters it took for a 1e party to advance in level compared to the 13.33 that a 3e party is assumed to need.

I pointed out the various encounters in the Moathouse, of which there are 15 (or 16 depending on how you split them up). Someone else objected saying that the encounters are not all the equivalent of EL 1 encounters, which they are not. But they would not have to be, since the sample 3e party (and the sample 1e party) are oversized by the 3e standard. The 3e party would therefore be expected to face higher EL encounters in their 13.33 encounters to advance in level. Which means that the "problem" that the Moathouse encounters would not translate to a series of EL 1 (and later EL 2) encounters is rendered moot.


----------



## Storm Raven

AllisterH said:


> Well, then again, there's the issue of how strong the opposition. See much earlier in this thread when people were talking about the Giants and the encounters with them.
> 
> For example, depending on gear and stats, for a 1e party, the encounter with the giants could be trivial whereas for the 3e party, the giants can still get lucky and outright kill a PC in one turn.




This is also true: 1e monsters were often far less dangerous than their 3e counterparts. In other words, a collection of 11 3e gnolls is far more dangerous to a 3e party than a collection of 11 1e gnolls would be to a 1e party.


----------



## Vegepygmy

Storm Raven said:


> EL is not the same as CR.



Correct, but the distinction is irrelevant here.  Nine CR 1 gnolls are worth 2700 XP to a 1st-3rd level party, the same as one CR 6 opponent.


----------



## Vegepygmy

Storm Raven said:


> So the objection that the gnolls (an EL 5 encounter by the way, not 6)...



You must have a different 3.5 DMG than me.  Table 3-1 in _mine_ says that 7-9 CR 1 creatures are an EL 6 or EL 7.


----------



## Vegepygmy

Storm Raven said:


> Which means that the "problem" that the Moathouse encounters would not translate to a series of EL 1 (and later EL 2) encounters is rendered moot.



Only if the 50% larger-than-expected party is facing encounters that are commensurately (i.e., 50%) more challenging...which is not at all the case.  The gnolls, for example, are *500%* more challenging.

"Moot," my butt!


----------



## Storm Raven

Vegepygmy said:


> Only if the 50% larger-than-expected party is facing encounters that are commensurately (i.e., 50%) more challenging...which is not at all the case.  The gnolls, for example, are *500%* more challenging.
> 
> "Moot," my butt!




Moot.

By the time the PCs get to the gnolls, they will likely be 2nd level, and thus the oversized party will be expected to be facing EL 3 or 4 encounters on average. Hence the encounter is only 1.5-2x what one would expect them to face on average.

The Giant Crayfish isn't in the SRD. The closest monster in the SRD would be a Large monstrous scorpion without the stinger. With no poison and one fewer attack, the CR 3 monster becomes at most a CR 2 one, and possibly a CR 1 one. This is a lower encounter than a group of 6 2nd level characters should face on average, offsetting the gnoll encounter.

Plus, the 3e party would be expected to face 26.66 EL appropriate encoutners to reach 3rd level by the end of the Moathouse. The Moathouse has 15 encounters, so one would expect that a number of them would be more difficult than normal.

So, as I said, moot. Your objection has been noted, and found wanting.


----------



## Raven Crowking

Storm Raven said:


> So, as I said, moot. Your objection has been noted, and found wanting.




As has yours.  

As much as you might like to be, you are not the arbiter of what is a good/compelling argument, except in terms of what convinces _*you*_.

Can you show me any evidence that any argument has ever changed your mind, no matter how compelling the evidence/argument presented?  Where you ever said X and then, on consideration, realized not-X?


RC


----------



## Storm Raven

Raven Crowking said:


> As has yours.
> 
> As much as you might like to be, you are not the arbiter of what is a good/compelling argument, except in terms of what convinces _*you*_.
> 
> Can you show me any evidence that any argument has ever changed your mind, no matter how compelling the evidence/argument presented?  Where you ever said X and then, on consideration, realized not-X?




Sure, I've changed my mind on things. Not incredibly often though. And certainly not on this question.

If you have 15-16 encounters, and they are intended to take the PCs from first to third level, then in the 3e rules, about ten of them will have to be at least double the average EL appropriate for the party. If some of the encounters are below the average EL appropriate for the party, then more encounters will have to be double, or some of the encounters will have to be more than double.

The situation with the Moathouse, comparing a 3e party going through it (using a converted version) with a 1e party going through it, one finds that they level up after about the same number of encounters. You might not like the information (as you seem to be heavily invested in the idea that level advancement in 1e was almost impossible, and required the PCs to walk through miles of two foot deep snow uphill both ways, while 3e PCs step on a butterfly and go up a level), but that's what it is.

All of the complaining about how the comparison isn't apt because it doesn't account for treasure being hidden, or for training time and so on is basically small beer. Why? Because Q didn't include experience from selling mundane gear (and in low level dungeons, that's often as valuable as the "treasure") and didn't include experience from acquiring magic items (or selling them). In other words, he left out of the 1e comparison a significant amount of material that would _increase_ the 1e rate of advancement. So to quibble over whether the Pcs would have gotten 80% or 90% or 100% of the treasure is simply rearranging the deck chairs as the Titanic sinks.


----------



## Raven Crowking

Storm Raven said:


> Sure, I've changed my mind on things. Not incredibly often though.




Can you point to even one post, prior to this date, that where you've done so?  Because, AFAICT, this is about ego for you.  Certainly the constant stream of insults re: people of other opinions seems to point this way.



> And certainly not on this question.




Then why would anyone bother to credit your opinion on it?  It is my general observation that only in questions where one is open-minded does one have anything valuable to contribute.  This applies to myself as well; where I am most close-minded, I am also least valuable as a person to speak to.

And despite your hyperbole to the contrary, I have said more than once _*exactly*_ the type of evidence needed to convince me I am wrong.  If you really wanted to do so (rather than merely wanting to insult me [as well as other people]), you could run the numbers.  

You haven't done so.

I wonder why?


RC


----------



## Raven Crowking

For fun, I just reread Page 1 of this thread.  Here are a few things that I noted:

In KotB, the 3e party gains 5th level to the BD&D party's average 3rd.  In BD&D, that's 3/5th the leveling of 3e.

In VoH, Q assumes that all treasure is valuable for XP, which has been pretty thoroughly debunked in this thread.  Because the treasure is end-loaded in VoH, there is significant XP loss.  Factor this in, and we again see something more in line with KotB.  

This will change the starting XP for Q's analysis of ToEE as well, and therefore the final XP totals.

Q doesn't actually tell us the XP a 1e party would gain from Sunless Citadel, which greatly limits the value of his math here.  We _*know*_ that the 3e modules end where they say they will; surely this isn't a controversial finding.  What we need to know, for adequate comparison, is where the AD&D party ends when the same module is converted.


RC


----------



## Storm Raven

Raven Crowking said:


> Then why would anyone bother to credit your opinion on it?  It is my general observation that only in questions where one is open-minded does one have anything valuable to contribute.  This applies to myself as well; where I am most close-minded, I am also least valuable as a person to speak to.




I didn't say I wasn't open minded on this issue. I said that I haven't changed my mind. Based upon the information presented thus far, I see no reason to.



> _And despite your hyperbole to the contrary, I have said more than once *exactly* the type of evidence needed to convince me I am wrong.  If you really wanted to do so (rather than merely wanting to insult me [as well as other people]), you could run the numbers._




And despite the fact that your assertions have been repeatedly looked at and assessed, the fact that they haven't led the the conclusions you want them to has led you to discount the results and instead throw up some other supposed problem. And you are saying other people are being disingenuous?

You said lots of treasure was hidden in 1e modules. It was shown that this is not the case. You have said that treasure was hard to move in 1e modules, and it was shown that this amounted to a tiny amount of treasure. You have said that in 3e modules the PCs will be expected to get everything, and this was shown not to be the case. You have quibbled over the implied ELs of 1e encounters, and this was shown to not be a problem because of the larger assumed party size and lmore limited number of actual encounters.

Thus far, I fail to see any reason presented to dispute Q's analysis. I don't see any reason to change my opinion on this issue, because you haven't given any reason for anyone to do so. It is clear that you have a conclusion that you want the data to show, and until you can massage it into that conclusion, you won't be happy.


----------



## Raven Crowking

Storm Raven said:


> And despite the fact that your assertions have been repeatedly looked at and assessed, the fact that they haven't led the the conclusions you want them to has led you to discount the results and instead throw up some other supposed problem. And you are saying other people are being disingenuous?




No.  I am saying thier assessment is extremely inadequate.

Thus far, I fail to see any reason presented to accept you conculsions drawn off Q's analysis.  I don't see any reason to change my opinion on this issue, because you haven't given any reason for anyone to do so. It is clear that you have a conclusion that you want the data to show, and until you can massage it into that conclusion, you won't be happy.

OTOH, I'll be happy with the specific data that I specifically asked for, rather than someone else's assessment of the relevance of said data.  

And, BTW, there is a difference between saying that Q's analysis does not prove conclusion X, and saying it does prove conclusion Y.  I am not saying that conclusion Y -- what my experience was -- need be the normative case.  I am saying that the data does not prove that your conclusion (X) was the normative case.


RC


----------



## Storm Raven

Raven Crowking said:


> No.  I am saying thier assessment is extremely inadequate.




The problem is that you aren't contesting assessments, but rather facts. When the facts don't match what you want, you call them assessments. Its a nice rhetorical dodge, but it isn't very convincing.



> _Thus far, I fail to see any reason presented to accept you conculsions drawn off Q's analysis.  I don't see any reason to change my opinion on this issue, because you haven't given any reason for anyone to do so. It is clear that you have a conclusion that you want the data to show, and until you can massage it into that conclusion, you won't be happy._




I don't care what the conclusion is one way or the other. I played 1e, I played BD&D, I played 2e, I played 3e. I was there in the old days. I have no reason to want one conclusion over the other. But the data points towards one conclusion, and thus far nothing you (or any other poster objecting to the conclusions) has said points away from that conclusion when the objections are assessed by referencing the source material.



> _OTOH, I'll be happy with the specific data that I specifically asked for, rather than someone else's assessment of the relevance of said data._




I doubt it. Every time someone has provided you with relevant data, you've gone on to raise some other objection, or to claim that the data is somehow wrong (without giving anything specific).

If you think there is critical data missing, let's see it.


----------



## Raven Crowking

Thankfully, neither you nor I is arbiter of what is "relevant", nor what is "fact".


----------



## Storm Raven

Raven Crowking said:


> And, BTW, there is a difference between saying that Q's analysis does not prove conclusion X, and saying it does prove conclusion Y.  I am not saying that conclusion Y -- what my experience was -- need be the normative case.  I am saying that the data does not prove that your conclusion (X) was the normative case.




No one is saying that. It would be impossible to do so given the volume of house rules that were used. In point of fact, several times in this thread people have commented that the varying experiences demonstrated are based in large part on the impact of what appear to have been fairly common house rules (for example, removing the GP = XP rule).

The intent is to find out what the publisher of the game appears to have thought the play experience would be like. Whether their expectations matched reality is not the question. But if you look through the modules with and eye to what a sample party would derive from it using the baseline rules you can get an idea of how they thought these adventures would work in actual play. In other words, what were the expectations TSR (or WotC) had concerning how these modules would play out. I think that Q has done an excellent job doing that.


----------



## billd91

Storm Raven said:


> No one is saying that. It would be impossible to do so given the volume of house rules that were used. In point of fact, several times in this thread people have commented that the varying experiences demonstrated are based in large part on the impact of what appear to have been fairly common house rules (for example, removing the GP = XP rule).




The experience implied by being able to loot the entirety of these modules and gather all of the kill value XPs implies some pretty heavy house rules in place as well as has been alluded to here and discussed a bit more fully in this thread.

1e is chock full of ways to waste potential experience point awards while adventuring and unable to train up for the next level barring house rules to prevent it. Any analysis that assumes no or insignificant waste injects error.


----------



## Bullgrit

billd91 said:
			
		

> 1e is chock full of ways to waste potential experience point awards while adventuring and unable to train up for the next level barring house rules to prevent it. Any analysis that assumes no or insignificant waste injects error.



This concept was addressed early in the thread.


			
				Quasqueton said:
			
		

> Any xp that might be lost . . . can be more than made up for by adding in the magic item xp (for using or for selling). A +1 sword (for example) is worth 400 xp to the character using it, or it can be sold for 2,000 gp which would be translated to 2,000 xp for the whole party.
> 
> So, for example, the Moathouse magic treasure is worth 9,600 xp if used (more than the total monster xp), or 33,800 gp/xp if sold (over 4 times the total monster xp). Selling the items increases the xp award from 38,148 xp to 71,948 xp.
> 
> The Dungeon Level 1 (ToEE) magic treasure is worth 12,610 xp if used (559 xp short of the total monster xp), or 76,400 gp/xp if sold (almost 6 times the total monster xp). Selling the items increases the xp award from 42,855 xp to 119,255 xp!



There was a lot of xp left out of the AD&D1 calculations. Is it enough for people to consider it balanced out versus what would have been lost or wasted?

Bullgrit


----------



## Storm Raven

billd91 said:


> The experience implied by being able to loot the entirety of these modules and gather all of the kill value XPs implies some pretty heavy house rules in place as well as has been alluded to here and discussed a bit more fully in this thread.
> 
> 1e is chock full of ways to waste potential experience point awards while adventuring and unable to train up for the next level barring house rules to prevent it. Any analysis that assumes no or insignificant waste injects error.




The analysis didn't assume "no or insignificant waste". In fatc, the analysis understated the available experience to be garnered in each 1e module. If you assume that the adventurers would miss out on or otherwise "waste" a quarter of the available experience, the experience gained just from having gained magic items would compensate for that leakage.

And that's not the point. The point is to stand up modules from each era and see how they would play out if played to their full potential. If one assumes that you would have substantial wastage in the 1e modules, one has to also make similar assumptions about the 3e modules. 3e players are just as likely to skip encounters, miss treasure, and otherwise lose out on potential experience. So, if you are going to discount the 1e totals, you have to do the same for the 3e ones. And so it coumes out as more or less a wash.


----------



## Raven Crowking

Storm Raven said:


> No one is saying that. It would be impossible to do so given the volume of house rules that were used.




If you are making a claim that it is _*possible*_ using these 1e modules to level in 1e as in 3e, then Q's numbers demonstrate this to be true.  

If you are making a claim that it is _*likely*_ or that the publishers imagined it to be likely, Q's numbers fail to demonstrate this.  Unless, of course, one accepts some of the same assumptions Q does.  Q seems to acknowledge this in Post 25.  In this regard, the quotes in Post 30 would be more telling than Q's numbers, if they were linked so that we could read them in context.

Insofar as what Gary thought was likely, a linkback to the post those quotes were taken from might be sufficient evidence as to what TSR considered normative in 1e, depending upon the context the quotes were taken from (as far as I am concerned at least).

Q's analysis would still be at a great variance from my experience, though it may be that my experience -- though widespread -- wasn't Gary's expected norm.  (Shrug.)  In which case, I am luckier than I thought I was.


RC


----------



## Raven Crowking

BTW, this would also demonstrate that WotC failed to meet one of their 3e objectives.  Although they didn't realease data as to average rates of leveling (AFAICT without actually digging up the pre-release Dragons), they did intend 3e to level significantly faster than its predecessors.


----------



## billd91

Bullgrit said:


> There was a lot of xp left out of the AD&D1 calculations. Is it enough for people to consider it balanced out versus what would have been lost or wasted?
> 
> Bullgrit




Not really, no. Since there's a big difference in XPs awarded for kept items vs XP awareded as treasure XP and a significant likelihood of lots of the magic item treasure XP being up for easy loss due to selling it after XPs are awarded, assuming that they balance is a HUGE assumption.


----------



## Storm Raven

Raven Crowking said:


> BTW, this would also demonstrate that WotC failed to meet one of their 3e objectives.  Although they didn't realease data as to average rates of leveling (AFAICT without actually digging up the pre-release Dragons), they did intend 3e to level significantly faster than its predecessors.




Well, 3e _does_ level faster than 2e did. And in practice probably faster than 1e did, since it seems that many people didn't use the GP = XP comparison (which would have skewed the way the modules played by far more than any assumption that PCs would miss treasure, or have to deal with training).


----------



## Storm Raven

billd91 said:


> Not really, no. Since there's a big difference in XPs awarded for kept items vs XP awareded as treasure XP and a significant likelihood of lots of the magic item treasure XP being up for easy loss due to selling it after XPs are awarded, assuming that they balance is a HUGE assumption.




As has been shown the XP awarded for keeping magic items amounts (in the modules given) to about as much XP as gained from killing monsters. if sold, the XP gain goes up to something like two to three times the total amount of XP gained from all other sources.


----------



## billd91

Storm Raven said:


> The analysis didn't assume "no or insignificant waste". In fatc, the analysis understated the available experience to be garnered in each 1e module. If you assume that the adventurers would miss out on or otherwise "waste" a quarter of the available experience, the experience gained just from having gained magic items would compensate for that leakage.
> 
> And that's not the point. The point is to stand up modules from each era and see how they would play out if played to their full potential. If one assumes that you would have substantial wastage in the 1e modules, one has to also make similar assumptions about the 3e modules. 3e players are just as likely to skip encounters, miss treasure, and otherwise lose out on potential experience. So, if you are going to discount the 1e totals, you have to do the same for the 3e ones. And so it coumes out as more or less a wash.




Again, we come back to the question of reasonable error. In order for the 1e modules to be played up to full potential, a lot more behaviors and variables must be assumed than for the 3e modules. For the 3e modules, you just have to assume that all encounters are satisfactorally dealt with. Making a comparable assumption in 1e may not even get you the kill XPs because of the potential for loss. To net the other XPs for treasure, even more assumptions of timing, thoroughness, and transport capacity must be made.

Making inferences about character advancements for typical play need to keep that in mind.


----------



## Obryn

I'd say probably the core issue is that you're looking at what are probably the two most-often-houseruled parts of AD&D.

*Tons* of people didn't use gp for xp.  I mean, it's understandable why not - getting money doesn't make you a better fighter!

*Tons *of people also didn't use training rules.  Isn't that what you just did in the dungeon, after all?  What's better training than killing orcs?

They were such common houserules that they were mutated beyond recognition by the time 2e hit.  And completely absent by 3e.

So yeah.  I'll go back to what I said before - for the sake of this discussion, you're not even talking about the same game.  If you change any of these variables - and from what I can see on this thread and others, changing at least one was normal - the whole equation skews.  You're not going to convince the other person, because you're not going to convince them that their experiences never happened.  And you've moved past convincing any readers on either side, I think.

-O


----------



## Umbran

Storm Raven said:


> The problem is that you aren't contesting assessments, but rather facts. When the facts don't match what you want, you call them assessments. Its a nice rhetorical dodge, but it isn't very convincing.





That one cuts both ways.  It is just as much a rhetorical dodge to assert a thing is a fact as to assert it isn't.  Real facts speak for themselves.  If you have to insultingly lean on people to get them accepted, you have already lost, sir.

So, how about you and RC disengage.  Stop responding to each other in this thread.  It is clear you aren't going to change each others' minds, so just agree to disagree and stop badgering each other.


----------



## Storm Raven

billd91 said:


> Again, we come back to the question of reasonable error. In order for the 1e modules to be played up to full potential, a lot more behaviors and variables must be assumed than for the 3e modules. For the 3e modules, you just have to assume that all encounters are satisfactorally dealt with. Making a comparable assumption in 1e may not even get you the kill XPs because of the potential for loss. To net the other XPs for treasure, even more assumptions of timing, thoroughness, and transport capacity must be made.




Well, the problem with worrying about this element is multifold. First off, the amount of treasure "hidden" in modules has been shown to be a fairly small portion of the total. The amount of trasure shown to be incredibly cumbersone and difficult has been shown to be almost trivial (if you look back at the horde used as an example from G3, the 15,000 pounds of copper and silver amount to only about 3,320 gp value out of a horde with total worth of 206,000 gp - less than 1.5% of the total). So the only thing you are left with that might have a significant impact is the assumption that the PCs will lose out on XP due to training, but since Gygax has asserted he never played using those rules, it is unlikely that TSR assumed others would either.

And the issue here is that the modules _aren't_ being assumed to be played optimally, at least insofar as the XP calculations go. The calculations explicitly exclude XP for magic items, which even if not sold, amounts to a huge chunk. The PCs could literally miss a quarter of the monsters and treasure in an adventure and still come up with as much (if not more) experience as listed in the examples due to the gain from magic item XP. If the examples assumed that the PCs would play through the adventure optimally, then the XP calculations would be much higher, and the 1e PCs would advance even faster than they are shown to be doing.


----------



## Raven Crowking

billd91 said:


> Again, we come back to the question of reasonable error. In order for the 1e modules to be played up to full potential, a lot more behaviors and variables must be assumed than for the 3e modules.




This is true.

It is also true that, if we can only go by texts, then we have to assume that the training rules, search time rules, wandering monster rules, healing rules, etc. were in force.


RC


----------



## Raven Crowking

Storm Raven said:


> First off, the amount of treasure "hidden" in modules has been shown to be a fairly small portion of the total.




You keep saying this, but this is untrue.

First off, it presupposes that your definition of what "hidden" means is a valid one.

Second, it presupposes that the single module you allowed for is a large enough sample to be statistically significant.  The second module examined, you dismissed the significant amount of "hidden" treasure (although you agreed it was hidden) on the basis that the PCs would "have to" find it to get to the next adventure in the series.  This in itself presupposes that the DM has no other means of getting the PCs to that region, and that the DM is unwilling to allow them to fail (and simply not go there).

Likewise, your sample set for cumbersome treasure is limited, which you need to assume to be of statistical importance to draw the conclusions you do.

Finally, you need to assume that Q's offset (his not including magic items) is equal to the offset for suboptimal play.


None of these assumptions are ones that I am willing to make on the basis of the evidence supplied.



RC


----------



## Storm Raven

Raven Crowking said:


> You keep saying this, but this is untrue.




I am only responding to refer you to Umbran's post.


----------



## Raven Crowking

Storm Raven said:


> I am only responding to refer you to Umbran's post.




Sorry.  Missed it.  Thank you for pointing it out to me.

RC


----------



## kitsune9

Quasqueton said:


> The iconic first adventure for AD&D1.
> So the AD&D1 party averages level 3.33, and the D&D3 party averages level 3.
> 
> Quasqueton




This is cool stuff. Thanks!


----------



## fanboy2000

Quasqueton said:


> As another note, from the original designer himself:
> 
> 
> 
> 
> E. Gary Gygax a.k.a. Col_Pladoh said:
> 
> 
> 
> 
> The number of XPs given to rise a level was initially intuitive, later on based on the play of my campaign group. I think that 52 sessions to reach 10th level is about right if the time per session is about four hours. Longner sessions would reduce the number accordingly.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> If getting from 1st to 8th level took 40 game sessions, as I suggested above, (1 level per 5-6 game sessions), they could reach level 10 in about 52 game sessions, just as EGG said was proper in his mind/intention/experience.
Click to expand...


This was my experience in 3e, 3.5, and now 4e. All those games have approximately 4 hour play times, and advanced to about level 10 in a year.



Quasqueton said:


> The “release notes” from WotC on the reformulating of the D&D xp chart and rate, said that they wanted a group to be able to reach level 20 within 2 years. That would mean the group could reach level 10 in 1 year (52 weekly game sessions). (I’ve heard “2 years” and “18 months”, but I can’t find the information on the WotC Web site right now.)



 Two years is about what I experienced as a DM in 3e. My longest running D&D game was over two years and the players got to about level 20. The group took occasional breaks to play different games, so it was probably 104 actual 3e game sessions to level 20. (The campaign's last adventure was the _Bastion of Broken Souls_).



Quasqueton said:


> Also note:
> 
> 
> 
> 
> E. Gary Gygax said:
> 
> 
> 
> 
> If play was intensive dungeon crawling, the 52 play sessions might take up only a few weeks of game time, with several adventure sessions being the continuation of a single day of delving.
Click to expand...


This is also consistent with my experiences with editions 3 on up.


----------



## Raven Crowking

Fanboy2000, I would find these quotes rather more convincing than the rest of the thread, if there was a link-back to the original quotes, so that they could be read in context.


RC


----------



## fanboy2000

Raven Crowking said:


> Fanboy2000, I would find these quotes rather more convincing than the rest of the thread, if there was a link-back to the original quotes, so that they could be read in context.



Quasqueton quoted Gygax back in post thirty (page 2). The blue square will get you back to _that_ post.  Though, I suspect you want the link to the quote from Gygax. That I don't have. Quasqueton might be able to tell you where he got them.


----------



## Bullgrit

> I would find these quotes rather more convincing than the rest of the thread, if there was a link-back to the original quotes, so that they could be read in context.



I doubt it, but here:
http://www.enworld.org/forum/archive-threads/125997-gary-gygax-q-part-ix-108.html#post2766231
http://www.enworld.org/forum/archive-threads/125997-gary-gygax-q-part-ix-108.html#post2766491

Bullgrit


----------



## fanboy2000

Bullgrit said:


> I doubt it, but here:
> http://www.enworld.org/forum/archive-threads/125997-gary-gygax-q-part-ix-108.html#post2766231
> http://www.enworld.org/forum/archive-threads/125997-gary-gygax-q-part-ix-108.html#post2766491
> 
> Bullgrit



The guy who asked the original question beat me to it! That said, while I was searching I also found this tidbit: Quasqueton asks Gygax about adventure design at TSR.


----------



## Doug McCrae

3e is more Gygaxian than by the book 1e, due to the training rules, which Gary didn't use.


----------



## Raven Crowking

Bullgrit said:


> I doubt it, but here:




Why do you doubt it?  

Or is this simply an attempt to be "slyly" insulting?


RC


----------



## Raven Crowking

Doug McCrae said:


> 3e is more Gygaxian than by the book 1e, due to the training rules, which Gary didn't use.




Is the impression you got from Gary that he thought 3e more Gygaxian?  AFAICT, he wasn't overly fond of it.  


RC


----------



## Raven Crowking

Looking at Gary's quotes in context, it seems clear , within his own campaign, that he expected the average player to take 52 4-hour sessions to get from level 1 to 10.  IOW, 208 hours of game play.

Somewhere upthread, someone quoted what WotC expected in terms of character growth in a year's weekly sessions.  Can anyone point me to that post?

If the goal is really to find out what WotC and TSR considered the expected norms to be, these are (IMHO) the important posts.  If WotC concurs that a year's play in 3e should lead to level 10, I am convinced.

(Not within their expectations, mind you, but convinced that Q is correct as to what their expectations were.)

RC


----------



## fanboy2000

Raven Crowking said:


> Somewhere upthread, someone quoted what WotC expected in terms of character growth in a year's weekly sessions.  Can anyone point me to that post?
> 
> If the goal is really to find out what WotC and TSR considered the expected norms to be, these are (IMHO) the important posts.  If WotC concurs that a year's play in 3e should lead to level 10, I am convinced.



Here is the closest I could find: Monte Cook comments on the final draft of the XP section of the 3e DMG.

Several important points:

Character are supposed to level up every 13 or 14 encounters.
Or, and here's the important part, *about every 4 sessions or so*.
However, he also states *that the math hasn't changed from 2e at all*.



			
				Monte Cook in a very old article said:
			
		

> Mathematically, you’ll notice similarities between the progression of a given CR’s worth in this system and the previous system’s Challenge Level reward progression. That’s because the amount of XP needed to gain a level did not change between these two systems, nor did our desired advancement rate (gaining a level about every four sessions, or every 13 to 14 encounters appropriate to your character). A 1st-level character in a group of four players is going to get 75 XP per level-1 encounter, just as in the previous system.



Clearly, neither Mr. Cook nor  Wizards of the Coast anticipated that, nine years later, people would be debating the rate of advancement between 1e and 3e.

Bastards!


----------



## billd91

fanboy2000 said:


> Here is the closest I could find: Monte Cook comments on the final draft of the XP section of the 3e DMG.
> 
> Several important points:
> 
> Character are supposed to level up every 13 or 14 encounters.
> Or, and here's the important part, *about every 4 sessions or so*.
> However, he also states *that the math hasn't changed from 2e at all*.




Well, no. He's saying that math hasn't changed from some previous system. But the way he describes it, it's clearly not either 1e nor 2e. There must have been something else they were experimenting with or had previously presented in some other source. 
The dead give away is the statement that the amount of XP needed to advance hadn't changed. The XPs needed between 2e and 3e did change, substantially.


----------



## fanboy2000

billd91 said:


> The dead give away is the statement that the amount of XP needed to advance hadn't changed. The XPs needed between 2e and 3e did change, substantially.



Thanks, that was confusing the heck out of me. I'm completely unfamiliar with 2e's xp system, so I didn't see that. This is a link to some of the previous xp system's they were experimenting with. I didn't look at them because I was focused on  what actually went into the game.


----------



## Raven Crowking

fanboy2000 said:


> [*]Or, and here's the important part, *about every 4 sessions or so*.[/LIST]




I agree with you that this is the important part, and expectations can be examined in light of it.

52 divided by 4 = 13, indicating that WotC expected one to reach approximately 13th level over the course of 52 sessions (barring any statements located that dispute Monte Cook which are deserving of more weight than this....something I find unlikely unless they are later statements by Monte himself).

Gary expected one to reach approximately 10th level in the same period.

So we can see, based on this information, that the expected rate of advancement  (by these parties) for 3e is greater than that for 1e, although not too greatly so.  (3e characters have 1.3 the expected advancement of 1e characters.)

That is less disparity than I would have expected (I would have expected a 1.5 variance, or 15 levels in 3e to 10 levels in 1e).  My mileage certainly varied in actual play experience with 1e, and I imagine that others have had their mileage vary with 3e as well.


RC



EDIT:  BTW, this is at some variance with Q's work, I note, which demonstrates in the AD&D modules that the 1e character rate of advancement was slightly higher than that of the 3e rate of advancement.....IOW, opposite of what the linked statements show was expected.  I do, therefore, contend that I was correct not to accept the conclusions as "proven" on that basis.  YMMV.

RC


----------



## Hussar

Note RC, you are taking the 4 sessions thing as a literal statement.  That's not what the quote says.  The quote says "around" four sessions.  True, it could be three, but, it could be five or six as well.  

13 in a year vs 10 in a year is pretty much exactly the same AFAIC.  At least close enough for government work.

And, funnily enough, fits my play experience almost perfectly.  Who'da thunk?

You're not going to get exact parallels here.  There's far too many variables to get exact numbers.  For example, if a group actually did clean out all those modules, then flogged all but a few of the magic items, they'd be a couple of levels higher, quite possibly.

Strangely enough though, they could miss out on almost half the treasure that Q outlines and the difference is only 1 level.

As I said 13 and 10 are pretty close.  Not a huge variance anyway.  Splitting hairs is not going to prove anything.

I guess the most accurate conclusion would be:  Leveling in 1e and 3e, assuming that you play pretty close by the rules, will result in very similar leveling over the first ten levels or so.


----------



## Raven Crowking

Hussar said:


> Note RC, you are taking the 4 sessions thing as a literal statement.




No.  "Around four sessions" means an average of four sessions.  One time it might be 3, one time it might be 5, another time it might be 1, and yet another time it might be 6, but the expectation is the average.

Likewise, when Gary said that a character should reach around 10th level in the same period, he might be 9th, or 6th, or 13th., but the expectation is the average.

There is no value in pulling up quotes stating what the designers expected to be the average, and then denying them simply because, when examined, they prove not to be what either you nor I expected.  



> As I said 13 and 10 are pretty close.  Not a huge variance anyway.




I said as much.  I expected 15 and 10.  Those numbers are different than what I was espousing.



> I guess the most accurate conclusion would be:  Leveling in 1e and 3e, assuming that you play pretty close by the rules, will result in very similar leveling over the first ten levels or so.




No, the _*most accurate *_conclusion would be:  Leveling in 1e and 3e, assuming that you meet the designer expectations, will result in the 3e character gaining 1.3 levels for every level gained by the 1e character.  

BTW, it has been noted in this thread that Gary didn't use the training rules, and, if this is true, then one would have to assume that if you play pretty close by the rules, the 1e character will in fact level _*more slowly*_ than Gary's expectations would indicate.  Now, barring a linked quote from Gary, I am willing to assume that he did use the training rules, and that the "1.3 to 1" ratio is accurate (rather than my expected 1.5 to 1 ratio).

Removing the numbers doesn't making the conclusion more (but rather less) accurate, just as a recipe saying "1 tsp" is more accurate than a recipe saying "a small amount".

And I certainly don't expect anyone else on this thread to say, "Hmmmm.....those numbers look different than what I was espousing", because, frankly, this is the InterWeb, and it is apparently a great loss of honour to do so.  




RC


----------



## Doug McCrae

2e is the real outlier, with no xp for gold. In many ways, 3e was a return to an earlier style of play. Less emphasis on story and setting, back to the dungeon and good clean monster bashing fun just like Gary used to make.

The longest D&D campaign I've played in was a 2e game. It went on for years and we got to, I think, 7th level by the end. Damn, that game was boring.


----------



## Raven Crowking

Doug McCrae said:


> 2e is the real outlier, with no xp for gold. In many ways, 3e was a return to an earlier style of play. Less emphasis on story and setting, back to the dungeon and good clean monster bashing fun




If you stop here, we agree, excepting that "xp for gold" isn't part of WotC-D&D (although it was part of the XP scheme in 2e, albeit just for rogues, if memory serves).

Gary wasn't happy with 3e, but AFAICT, the unhappiness was largely due to a combination of "big rulesification", break from traditional sources (pokemounts, artwork), and (perhaps most seriously) loss of control over his baby and bitterness over how that happened.

I think that 3e offered a lot of good things to the game, which is why my own ruleset isn't a "retro-clone", but rather a "fusion" of what I think is good in both the old-school movement and the SRD.


RC


----------



## Hussar

RC said:
			
		

> BTW, it has been noted in this thread that Gary didn't use the training rules, and, if this is true, then one would have to assume that if you play pretty close by the rules, the 1e character will in fact level more slowly than Gary's expectations would indicate. Now, barring a linked quote from Gary, I am willing to assume that he did use the training rules, and that the "1.3 to 1" ratio is accurate (rather than my expected 1.5 to 1 ratio).




I've noticed this get mentioned once or twice and I'm sorry, my 1e rules-fu isn't all that good.

Why would training rules slow down advancement?  You still got the xp for money even though you spend it - it's not like you have to keep it in order to keep the xp.  I could see it adding some in game time, but, why would it slow down leveling?


----------



## billd91

Hussar said:


> I've noticed this get mentioned once or twice and I'm sorry, my 1e rules-fu isn't all that good.
> 
> Why would training rules slow down advancement?  You still got the xp for money even though you spend it - it's not like you have to keep it in order to keep the xp.  I could see it adding some in game time, but, why would it slow down leveling?




In early levels, you may not have the money to pay for your training. That means you have to adventure for more money, likely qualifying for XPs you'll lose, particularly if you manage to get enough XPs to reach the next level. You'll be stuck at (XP for next level) - 1 and unable to gain any more, no matter what you kill or what treasure you find, until that training obligation is complete.

Meanwhile, leaving the adventure site to train for at least a week may change the state of the adventure site. If you've been running roughshod over the opposition, they'll probably leave and take any loot they can grab with them. Lost opportunities depending on how static the DM leaves the adventure in the PCs' absence.

These factors assume that training is even possible in the environment. In a place not far from a good-sized city - the dungeons under Greyhawk - training would be easy because friendly trainers would abound. In a hostile environment like the Pomarj where the A series takes place, this is a bit harder. Again, you may be adventuring at a frozen level and XP amount, unable to take care of your training obligations.

Those are a few major issues with not being able to simply "ding" up a level when your XP meter hits the right amount.


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## Raven Crowking

billd91 said:


> In early levels, you may not have the money to pay for your training. That means you have to adventure for more money, likely qualifying for XPs you'll lose, particularly if you manage to get enough XPs to reach the next level. You'll be stuck at (XP for next level) - 1 and unable to gain any more, no matter what you kill or what treasure you find, until that training obligation is complete.




Caveat.

"(XP for next level) - 1" means the level after the one you have XP for, so that a level 1 character can gain XP to reach level 3, less 1 XP.  However, if I remember correctly, there is a significant catch.

If you gain enough XP in any session to reach "(XP for next level) - 1", they you are stuck there.

If you gain enough XP to gain the next level, but less that "(XP for next level) - 1", you are stuck there instead.  Once you've received XP, and can gain another level, you can gain no further XP until you do so, but the XP you received can put you almost at the next level from the one you need to train for.



RC


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## Raven Crowking

Raven Crowking said:


> And I certainly don't expect anyone else on this thread to say, "Hmmmm.....those numbers look different than what I was espousing", because, frankly, this is the InterWeb, and it is apparently a great loss of honour to do so.





I am not at all surprised to be correct here (at least thus far).


RC


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## ST

RC just isn't going to drop this until someone says he's right so: You're right, you win, thank you for your expert analysis.


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## Raven Crowking

Let us just say that I am not at all surprised by the hypocrisy, ST.


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## Umbran

ST said:


> RC just isn't going to drop this until someone says he's right so: You're right, you win, thank you for your expert analysis.






Raven Crowking said:


> Let us just say that I am not at all surprised by the hypocrisy, ST.





Right.  Not 30 posts back, I warned a couple of people to stop butting heads.

Now we get this personal nonsense?

This is why we cannot have nice things on this board.  With 18 pages in this thread, I think it has run its course.  

THUNK.  Thread closed.


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