Spirit of 1974

I've had a lot of opportunity lately to talk about my gripes with Fifth Edition Dungeons & Dragons, especially since the RPG community has been abuzz about Daggerheart. The child of Critical Role's enormous success, the game seeks to capitalize on the familiarity of 5e and the narrative engines of games better suited to their playstyle - a combination that I firmly think does not work. But my issues with Daggerheart are a separate topic - for now, I'd like to focus on my core criticism of D&D 5e. Simply put, the game does not have a mechanical identity, only a brand identity.  The success of 5e is beyond dispute; the announcement plastered on every book that it is the "World's Greatest Roleplaying Game" is unquestionably true in terms of market share, brand recognition, public awareness, and the very fact that "Dungeons and Dragons" is a genercization of the genre. This success comes partially from a successful marketing campaign, partially f

In the AD&D Character Sheets published by TSR as product code 9029 , a section exists allowing the PC to write a will. As I drafted the campaign rules for my current game of Arden Vul, I mentioned this to a player who was considering transferring his GP from session 1 to a new character, since the character he had been playing was imported from a B/X game with worse ability scores than could have been rolled at the AV table. The player thought I was referring to the culture of the campaign milieu - after all, we are primarily relying on OSRIC where this is not in the character sheets or to my recollection the rulebook. In order to defend my reference, I jumped into the original first editions books to support what, to me, was the obvious implication of an old Character Sheet I had seen. To my surprise, the concept was mentioned in passing in the 1st Edition Players Handbook and given no actual rules. I expected something in the Dungeon Master's Guide, where simulationist mechan