Hacking 2e: Roll-Under Mechanics – Part 1

The inconsistency of die mechanics in AD&D is often cited as one of the more confusing parts of the game. Putting aside the cacophony of die types (death to the percentile roll), the main issue is roll-under vs roll-over and where the modifier goes. This can seem arbitrary on first glance, but there is some consistency. Here are (most of) the rolls one can make, the ‘goal’ of that roll, and what’s being modified:

Modifier for…	Attempting to…	High or Low	Modifying
Saving Throw	Beat a Static Value	High	Roll
Surprise	Beat a Static Value	High	Roll
Attack Roll	Beat a Static Value	High	Roll
Damage	Get a High Number	High	Roll
Reaction	Place on a Spectrum	High (if you fix it)	Roll
Initiative	Get a Low Number	Low	Roll
Nonweapon Prof.	Beat a Static Value	Low	Ability Score
Thieving Skill	Beat a Static Value	Low	Thieving Skill Score
Morale	Beat a Static Value	Low	Morale Rating

Note: The assumption in this breakdown is that we’re gunning for the ‘desirable’ result for the PC.

You can see that we’re mostly trying to beat a value, whether that number is based on rolled attributes, level-based tables, more-than-three, or whatever number THAC0 spits out (depending on how one uses THAC0). Damage and Initiative are just seeking straight-up results from the dice. Reaction is our outlier, as it’s used to determine the temperature of the NPCs.

There’s correlation here: you add the modifier to the roll if rolling high, and you add the modifier to a static value if rolling low. Initiative is the weirdo, being the only time you modify the roll while also trying to roll low.

As I’ve made clear in previous discussions, I’m in favor of making everything into a roll-under mechanic. This chart shows that in order to do that, I’ll need to add modifiers to the values rather than the rolls. We’ve already got three rolls with that setup (NWP, Thieving Skills, and Morale), so let’s do the rest.

What is This Blog Anyway?

The following post is self-indulgent state-of-the-blog stuff. You’ve been warned.

I wasn’t sure what this blog was going to be when I started out a few months ago; I just wanted to start writing again. I’ve tried writing fiction and short stories for some time, but it tends to end with a whimper rather than a completed work, and I always seem to come back to games.

When I really started digging into 2e, I found myself all over the web, discovering blogs, forums, and OSR hacks as I tried to better understand this unique game. Through those blogs and forums, I got the itch to write in the nerdiest way possible. Through the hacks, I knew that I wanted to tear 2e apart and put it back together again in my own image.

So I guess I really am making a game.

Since I’ve just spent the past few months ripping apart the Ability Scores and Saving Throws, let’s interlude to discuss what the goals are here. 

Hacking 2e: Saving Throws – Part 2

In Part 1, I looked at issues with the current 2e saving throw ruleset. This time, I’ll be desecrating a beloved game mechanic to ‘fix’ those issues. I hold no deep affection or nostalgia for the original construction of these saving throws, but I absolutely adore the concept of saving against a threat over the modern design of saving with an ability. The following is an attempt to preserve that feel, but in a way that makes sense to me and that serves the game I seek to build from 2e’s design. 

Hacking 2e: Saving Throws – Part 1

He's a big boy.

Judging by how often they’ve changed through the history of the game, the rules for saving throws might be the least sacrosanct of the D&D mechanics. For more details on the origins and changes throughout the editions, DM David and Grognardia talked about that years ago, but the rundown is this: TSR-era D&D uses saves against specific perils, with static values based on class and level. OD&D, AD&D, and Basic each have different groupings and values for these saves, with Paralyzation wandering about the table as the years passed. WotC threw it all out with 3rd Edition and created Fortitude, Reflex, and Will saves, now adjusted by your ability score. 4e turned these three into static defense numbers on par with AC, and used saving throws as a state-tracking mechanic. Finally, 5e reintroduced saving throws as a reactionary tool, but just made them modified ability checks. In short, the saving throw mechanic managed to save vs Petrification over the past 50 years.

The OSR approach to saves is anywhere between reverential and heretical. The faithful go no further than renaming the categories and maybe tweaking some numbers (though a notable exception is Swords and Wizardry, which cut saves down to a single column). The hacks, and other OSR content not wed to the sacred texts, just use 3e or 5e save mechanics or excise saves entirely. The dividing line is compatibility to older material; if you want your game to work with X1 or whatever, you’re going to make sure it has a ‘save vs Poison’ of some sort. Otherwise, keeping this system can only be a preference, either due to familiarity or in an attempt to evoke ‘the old school.’ Without such a need, a designer might discard them in favor of ‘better’ approaches.

Dolmenwood serves as an interesting case study in having your cake and eating it, too. Here, the Basic D&D saves are presented in an altered form: Doom, Ray, Hold, Blast, and Spell. The categories have been simplified in their presentation to the player, yet still retain their original assigned purpose – Doom still covers Poison and Blast still includes Dragon Breath. More than this, they’ve been expanded to include new meanings (Hold for falling rocks, Blast for explosions, etc.), moving beyond specific, proscribed events. In this way, the game maintains technical compatibility (well, at least with saves) while forging its own path.

I think that’s sufficient to say we have a bit of room to play around in this space. First, let’s look at some problems present in the 2e Saving Throw system. 

Hacking 2e: Charisma

The primary ability of bards and face-characters across many editions, Charisma gets a fair shake here, with three adjustments that tie to “a character’s persuasiveness, personal magnetism, and ability to lead.”

Of course, this is assuming your game uses henchmen, morale, and reaction rolls. Online discussion makes it clear this was not always the case. The 90s was the era of story-driven games and director-DMs, the age of Vampire: The Masquerade. Rules that inflated the party or harkened back to D&D’s wargaming roots were no longer in vogue. The 2e core books themselves present morale and reactions as optional (while not calling them that), encouraging DMs to make calls on how the NPCs behave based on common sense, rather than relying on random rolls.

Obviously, if these rolls do not exist and these extra NPCs are not available, Charisma becomes the ultimate dump-stat, useful only to meet the prerequisites of the paladin and bard. It also threatens to turn Charisma into the ‘make them like me’ ability check, wherein the player may expect to ‘beat’ social interaction via direct check, since there is no mechanic to adjudicate this otherwise. As these are both undesirable outcomes, retaining these adjustments requires reinforcement of the rules which they modify. That comes later; for now, we’ll address the columns as they stand.

Hacking 2e: Wisdom

Wisdom has always been an odd bird. In OD&D this ability doesn’t do squat, serving only as the prerequisite score for Clerics and their access to an XP bonus. There’s not even a description of what Wisdom is until the Player’s Handbook drops in ’78. Yet that edition’s description didn’t remain static in the same way that Strength has always represented physical power or Intelligence has represented learning. To see how this has changed over the past five decades, let’s look at the keywords each edition uses to describe Wisdom:

Edition	Description of Wisdom
AD&D 1e	enlightenment, judgement, wile, will power, intuitiveness
Basic D&D (81)	inspiration, intuition, common sense, shrewdness
AD&D 2e	enlightenment, judgement, guile, willpower, common sense, intuition
D&D 3.5e	willpower, common sense, perception, intuition
D&D 4e	common sense, perception, self-discipline, empathy, willpower
D&D 5e	awareness, intuition, insight, perception, willpower

This doesn’t take into account 2e’s nonweapon proficiencies, which tie Wisdom to animal skills, sensing direction and weather, tracking, healing, religion, and… mining. However, it’ll serve for our discussion.

There’s some interesting takeaways here. ‘Willpower’ is common in all editions except Basic, though this is only implied in 4e with its contribution to Will defense, while 5e shoves the concept exclusively into the DMG. ‘Intuition’ is also common aside from 4e. ‘Common sense’ is another baseline that appears everywhere aside from 1e and 5e. Many Charisma-like descriptions are applied to Wisdom as well, such as wile (1e), shrewdness (Basic), guile (2e), and self-discipline and empathy (4e).

Of course, the most notable change is ‘perception’ in 3rd Edition, which carries on into all later editions. As these editions had strictly defined skills, Wisdom became a tool for auto-finding (Spot, then later Perception) and lie-detecting (Sense Motive, then later Insight). Much gnashing of teeth and rending of garments has occurred over this by those who portray it as the natural end-game of the ability check, devolving the game into thoughtless, push-button ‘rollplay.’ This, in my opinion, is bunk – you can read my thoughts about that argument here.

It makes sense that this ability would eventually find its way toward an actionable definition. Aside from the entirely reactive Constitution score, the other scores allow you to lift, push, sneak, steal, remember, solve, command, and schmooze. Meanwhile, AD&D gives Wisdom only the static ‘willpower,’ which can only serve as an adjustment to saving throws, and the utterly useless ‘intuition’ and ‘common sense,’ which is the purview of the player rather than the character.

In other words, much of Wisdom is stored in the character’s head and doesn’t translate well to play in the same way as the other mental scores; using Intelligence to remember or know something provides an excellent opportunity to distribute an occasional lore-dump, but using Wisdom to use one’s gut can only serve to give up information that the player should be figuring out for themselves.

In short, I don’t find the shift surprising, and given that it has become an acknowledged domain of Wisdom for the past quarter century, we should probably retain it.

Well, that’s a hideous amount of preamble, but I wanted to peg down this ability before we moved on to the columns. I have no idea if I’ve done that. Onward!

Hacking 2e: Intelligence

 

I’m not a fan of this table, as it provides only two things: wizard limits and languages. For an ability that claims to represent “a character’s memory, reasoning, and learning ability,” it has a very narrow mechanical scope. It’s no wonder that it ended up being the easy dump stat for everyone except wizards and polyglots.

This section is also an example of how no one at TSR ever figured out the line between Intelligence and Wisdom. The text indicates that a semi-intelligent character (Int 3 or 4) is “apt to react instinctively or impulsively.” Wouldn’t that be a function of Wisdom, which dictates “judgement [and] common sense?” I’m not suggesting that this line is clear (it’s anything but), yet I’m hoping we can do a better job.

This ability is one of the few to get examples for the scores, which is found in the Monstrous Manual:

0	Nonintelligent or not ratable
1	Animal intelligence
2-4	Semi-intelligent
5-7	Low intelligence
8-10	Average (human) intelligence
11-12	Very intelligent
13-14	High intelligence
15-16	Exceptional intelligence
17-18	Genius
19-20	Supra-genius
21+	Godlike intelligence

 

Alright, let’s get into it.

Hacking 2e: Constitution

The sick man of the ability scores. It is occasionally suggested that Constitution’s role as a measurement of “physique, fitness, health, and physical resistance” is unnecessary, as it impacts only hp and some edge cases, and one could implement a distinct sub-mechanic to determine overall health.

Certainly it’s an odd ability score; unlike its siblings, it has no easily actionable interpretation. You can be strong with Strength, wise with Wisdom, or charismatic with Charisma, but you can’t be constitute with Constitution. For ability checks, you’ll end up using it for actions which push beyond the limits of normal endurance, such as holding one’s breath underwater or forced marching, but these are reactive; they determine if you don’t drown or collapse. As a result, Con checks become a new saving throw.

Still, I can’t bring myself to cut it out of the group. Sure, it represents a static attribute rather than a true ability, but it represents a personalized difference in the character that isn’t directed by class and level, which is the hallmark of ability scores. As such, I can make peace with this ability saving score throw. Instead of extricating it from the game, let’s try to improve its benefits and clean up the table.

Hacking 2e: Dexterity

Now that I’ve dissected Strength beyond recognition, I’ll move onto Dexterity.

The PHB states that this ability affects reaction speed, ranged attacks, and dodging. Dexterity also affects a rogue’s “professional skills,” which the book leaves for yet another table.

As with Strength, we’ve got another eight-range dead zone, this time between 7 and 14 – though this is minimized on the thieving skills table. The low hanging -1 AC bonus at a score of 15 makes Dex the obvious 2nd choice for most players that rolled well, while possibly even being a better choice over Strength for the fighter that rolled a 13 and a 15. Why not get the AC bonus if Strength gives you nothing for your trouble? Yet for the thief with a 13 or 14 in Dex, there’s nothing here; the score becomes an empty space, good only for ability checks. Dexterity is both too strong and too weak.

Adjusting Strength should help with the first issue, but for the nerf let’s look at these columns. 

Hacking 2e: Strength – Part 2

I was busy in the last post being critical of AD&D’s Strength table and ruining it at the same time, so let’s keep going and really break some stuff. 

Hacking 2e: Strength – Part 1

Since we were talking about Ability Scores in the past few entries, I thought I’d review each of the individual scores, while providing a few bad takes and tweaking everything. Let’s break this as though I were developing my own hack.

It starts, as with every edition of the game, with Strength. This is the ur-ability, the stat that reaches back to Arneson’s Blackmoor. (As this won’t be a history of the scores, go here if you want to learn more about the origins.) In AD&D, Strength is described as the “measure of a character’s muscle, endurance, and stamina.” This vague mandate results in the huskiest ability score table of the lot, with 30 scores and 6 derivative values.

As you can see, there’s a lot of bizarre specifics here, so let’s look through them column by column.

Ability Score Improvements

ASI with no balance issues whatsoever

It is my uncontroversial opinion that as a character gains levels, that character should improve. This is already the case in AD&D for saving throws, attack rolls, proficiencies, and spells, but it excludes Ability Scores and the values derived from them. PCs can become better combatants mechanically, but they never become stronger or more agile. They can improve in the mysteries of their religion or the finer points of etiquette, but never become wiser or more charismatic.

But, do they need to? In modern D&D, the ability score is the number from which you derive all other modifiers, so of course it must improve. This is not the case for early D&D, wherein the scores were descriptive markers, something that let you know what kind of class you should play based on the gated prime requisites. Any bonuses for high scores provided only moderate benefits, if any at all. Do characters really need to improve their base stats when increasing Dexterity from 13 to 14 does absolutely nothing?

Ability Scores and Checks – Part 2

I3-5: Desert of Desolation, 1987

In Part 1, I did my best to explain why the ‘push-button’ argument is crap, but it’s not the only concern people have with the Ability Check mechanic. Three other objections were mentioned.

1. Characters with very high scores reap all the benefits, while mid-tier scores see increased failures.

Yes, that’s the design. A higher ability score means a higher chance for success. If the PC has a 10 in any ability score, then they fall in the middle of the range, equivalent to a normal person. They should only have a 50/50 shot at difficult tasks that require that ability. If the task isn’t something a normal person could fail at half the time, then the check needs modifiers, the ability score target needs adjustment, or the roll doesn’t need to occur.

Ability Scores and Checks - Part 1

AD&D 2e Glossary

The ability scores of D&D have remained consistent from ’74 onward, albeit the final reordering only occurred in 2e. How one uses these scores for adjudication has evolved with every iteration, and I won’t waste time relating a history that has already been well researched by others.

Ability Checks, wherein you attempt to roll under your ability score with a d20, were still considered nonstandard by 1989. 2e shoved them into the glossary and begrudgingly noted that you can use them as saves. Yet, the Nonweapon Proficiency system of 2e uses ability checks as the base for that mechanic; when you’re rolling a Navigation check, you’re just rolling an Intelligence ability check with a -2 penalty to the ability score. It’s as messy as its ludicrous name suggests.

To Hit Descending AC

In the last entry, I discussed why I like descending AC and some of its advantages. I left the disadvantages for later, and so we have arrived.

My argument is simple: the bad parts of descending AC are the complicated ways used to determine how one beats the numbers, and ascending AC is therefore identified as the superior method only because it resolves the annoying math. However, I do not believe that one necessarily follows from the other; you can have descending AC without the complications. Before we get to that, let’s run through some of these methods and see where they cause friction, starting with the two methods that were used during AD&D’s run: To-Hit tables and THAC0.