Many people are returning to the First and Second Editions. This all mixes with the BX, White Box, 0E, and other old-school gaming crowds, so the movement is vast and mostly cross-compatible. I get the feeling Shadowdark kicked this off, with the 5E players discovering the amazing old-school play style, becoming addicted to it, then wanting something more profound, going to higher levels of play, and adding more crunch and depth.
The only place you go after Shadowdark is BX or the First Edition. White Box and Zero Edition are also strong choices, but if you want to find the heart and soul of the hobby, you will pick up a copy of OSRIC or For Gold & Glory and stick to the classic TSR version of the game as we knew it in the 1980s and '90s.
I support the community edition games, not the reprints, since I support those who use these systems to write expansions, adventures, and create new content for these classic games. This is not possible with either AD&D 1E or 2E. So, either OSRIC or For Gold & Glory are my jams —what I talk about and what I play, even though I can get (flawed) POD reprints of the originals.
First Edition is what the Stranger Things kids would have been playing, not 5E. If the whole series followed 5E rules, then none of them would die, and they would be multiclassing to hell to break reality. Most of them would be warlock/paladin characters with a level of fighter to get action surge. Money would be meaningless, and they would be stopping the show every 10 minutes to rest.
Yes, there are level limits for non-human characters in First and Second Edition, but remember, non-humans are the only ones who can multiclass, splitting their XP between two classes and advancing in each. Yes, you have level limits for non-human characters, but you get to break the rules in fantastic ways. By the time Wizards released 3E, this went away; we lost much of the appeal of non-human characters, and it began the slow progression towards the current "races are meaningless marshmallow shapes" trend we see today and the blandification of D&D.
How non-human races and multiclassing worked is an original Gygaxian design feature, not a mistake. This has its roots in the original "race as class" system in the original B/X rules, and it was significantly expanded in First and Second Editions. Instead of Elves being only fighter/mages, they can be a cleric, fighter, mage, thief, or ranger; and Elves can also multi-class as fighter/mage, fighter/thief, fighter/mage/thief, or mage/thief. So, in BX, they only have one option, whereas in 1E/2E, they have 9 options, 4 of which are compelling multi-class choices.
Non-human racial multiclassing is the expanded BX race-as-class system and is meant to be balanced by racial level limits; otherwise, a multiclass Elf would reach an insane power level. There is something to be said for raising the non-human level limits on single-class choices, but the system defaults to multiclassing for PCs, while more single-class options are available for non-human NPCs.
As for choosing between the First and Second Editions? Start with OSRIC and the First Edition. If you want bards and to lose Half Orcs, assassins, and gold-based XP, go for Second Edition with For Gold & Glory. We stopped playing First Edition, and picked up the Second Edition, and liked it much better because of the "Story XP" as the game's default. The game had moved away from the rampant greed of the original and shifted more toward adventure and storytelling, closer to the novels and tales of heroism.
The tonal shift between First and Second Edition got us back into the game. Yes, this is nearly the same set of rules, but the change in tone was significant and a statement of what the game expected from you as heroes (or villains). Monster XP was dramatically raised, and it told us to "get out there and fight!" All of a sudden, we were no longer avoiding fights or stealing bags of gems; my party was getting into dangerous, thrilling, stand-up fights with dragons and other monsters.
Since "story XP" often equaled (but could not go above) the XP gained from fights, if you were fighting monsters as a part of a goal, story arc, or plot, you essentially doubled your XP by taking missions. Gold was still valuable for trading for magic items, spell research, and other costs, but it was not the driving force behind the game anymore. You could be a lone wanderer, finding magic items, and going around helping towns like Robin Hood, and not have much wealth, and still gain levels like you were wandering around an RPG or MMO.
The effect of this change was dramatic, pulling us back into AD&D.
The game was about storytelling and heroism again.
We ran a Second Edition Forgotten Realms campaign for years, and that was a fun game. The Forgotten Realms died for us with D&D 3E, and Greyhawk and its super-characters had returned. By the time D&D 4E came around, the Forgotten Realms was a zombie corpse ambling around and trying to find its head. We never played a 5E Forgotten Realms campaign, and Baldur's Gate 3 is not the world I knew, nor one I really want to experience, having played the original.
Starting with 3E, the game's focus shifted dramatically from the adventure-oriented storytelling of 2E to hardcore personal power. It has gotten worse and worse over the years, to the point where the sole driving motivation behind D&D these days is individual power, character builds, damage per turn, and character builds designed to cheat the rules.
If you played in the 1E and 2E eras, you know that the game was completely different. And let's not talk about the 2.5E era right before the end of TSR, when they were throwing everything and anything at the game to try to revive the system before the company's bankruptcy, and the insane amount of rules bloat introduced in the Options books.
If you started with 3E, you probably have no clue about the subtle shift between 1E and 2E regarding motivation and the game's tonal focus. You were on board the "character power train" from the start and probably think 5E is the best version ever. Because 5E gives you "the most power."
The game was never about that.
For us, 2E gave us "the most story," and that is what we wanted.
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