Goodman Games

There's just something cool (call it nostalgia if you will) about the truly old school saving throws from AD&D... Basic D&D, too, right? Even though I don't recall using them more than a handful of times, just seeing that list sort of brings me back.

http://hackslashmaster.blogspot.com/201 ... ction.html

I thought this was an insightful blog post. My comment at the end briefly describes a "third side" possibility: have the old school saves be directly influenced by a character's ability scores.

Thoughts on anything to do with saves in DCC, D&D, or a retro-clone? How about the idea that D&D 5e is going to have a save for each ability score, so there will be a charisma based save just as there's a constitution based save (fortitude). Makes sense, doesn't it?

VS

I disagree with the blog because the author assumes that fortitude, reflex, and will saves cannot be abstracted as easily as the older (much more specific IMO) saving throw values. Additionally, saves were complimented in the older editions with the myriad of attribute based scores (reaction adjustment, bend bars/lift gates, etc.) and class abilities. Don't get me wrong, I love the OSR and wax poetic about the earlier versions of dnd, but I really like what Goodman Games has done with combining the feel of the older systems with modernized rules mechanisms, saves included.

thAC0 is the other mechanism that is fun to look back and joke about with the other beardos in the room, but we can definitely leave in the last millennium. Ascending AC values are simpler and easier to keep consistent with the other bookkeeping required during play.

evocative topic though, thanks for sharing the link

I like THACO.

I also like the old saves.

The new way is easier.

The old way has a mystical, powerful ley line, arcane and occult feel to it.

Never ever liked the old saves personally. The revised saving throw system was one of the biggest things that sold me on 3.0 when it was released. It just makes so much more sense. What? A character with high dexterity is more likely to dodge a fireball than a slow bookworm of a wizard? What a novel concept.

The old saving throw method was certainly cool, but I agree that the logic of which classes got which numbers was somewhat obscure. I'm an old school D&D'er but I think that the 3E saves system was a definite improvement over the OD&D one.

The other cool thing about the 3E saves is that the letter for the save matches somewhat the letter of the class that should do it best.

F = fortitude (fighter)
R = reflex (rogue)
W = willpower (wizard)

That's kind of how I remember what each save does.

I don't mind "reflex, fortitude, will" but I do like that AD&D saves have some bigger differences between the classes: fighters have a spell save of 17, whereas magic-users only need a 12.

Rather than just house-rulling a bump in the DCC saves of some classes, I was thinking of a house-rule for lucky saving throw, so that luck spent on a save gives a +2 bonus per point of luck burned. At first I thought just to assign a lucky save type to each class, so that wizards get will and warriors get fortitude and so on, but then I thought it might be neat to let players just pick one, so your necromancer-themed wizard might have a lucky fortitude save instead of will. But I'm leaning instead toward assigning the lucky save to the first time a player rolls a natural 20 on a saving throw, and then making that category his lucky save category -- though this house-rule doesn't exactly fulfill the purpose of differentiating more between the saving throws of low level characters. Still thinking about it....