RPG Crawler Reviews - Castles & Crusades (part 1)
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- Опубликовано: 3 ноя 2020
- A look at the d20 based rpg Castles & Crusades. Is it an OSR system? Or just a decent fantasy system?
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My "AD&D 3" of choice.
I love Castles and Crusades. I bought it at soon as it came out and ran it for years, mostly on account of how tired I was of the complexity of 3e. I love Fifth Edition D&D for the same reason. Sometimes I want to go back to C&C and run Castle Zagyg, which was half the reason I wanted C&C. :)
I was learning about this system. When I saw that they were doing the 8th printing. My dad is running an AD&D 1st eiditon game that I am in. It has been fun and different but as always my dad always add alot of stuff to this game. So it is not base 1st edition but still fun. I told my dad he will like this system and it may help one of our players that is use to 3rd edition and up. I love the covers that they have the 8th printing and Castle Keeper guide, the Tribute Covers to 1st edition AD&D players handbook and DMG.
The problem with waiting for the 8th printing are the legendary TLG delays. The Castle Keepers Guide is already 6 months late and likely won't be out until summer. So that means that the new Players Handbook and other supplements, which I also want and are slated for this coming June, likely won't be out until the end of the year. So you might look for cheap copies on ebay or something if you want to get started soon.
@@sunsin1592 i won't be starting any game soon. If I did start a game I would be starting a Mutants and Masterminds game or 5th edition D&D.
27:10 You know, a sentient Bag of Holding actually sounds like something a GM could have some fun with. Must mull this over for the blog. :)
Thanks for the review. Never actually tried this one, although I dimly noted it seemed to be doing well with the continuing series of updates and new printings.
Thanks for watching! And yeah, the sentient miscellaneous items kind of open up all sorts of interesting ideas. I mean, fundamentally a lot of the extra powers are still similar, but a little homebrewing could give you a sentient utility item with a bunch of 'quality of life' style powers. It's just the idea itself that's fun.
And yeah, it seems castles and crusades has been around quite some time now, with constant little revisions and new printings. From what I can tell it's situated to continue that path for some time to come as well. Makes me glad to see a product with a product cycle that's not just 8 years.
@@rpgcrawler My take on the "intelligent Bag of Holding" is up on the blog over at:
sanctumreconditesage.blogspot.com/2020/11/curious-containers.html
Thanks for the inspiration. :)
Awesome! Thanks.
Is the surprise rules rolling a d6 as in 1e or is it purely situational / stealth?
I really appreciate your videos and your system overviews are second to none on YT.
I've been wanting to get a new system for my group, and may just go with C&c.
Thanks! I appreciate it, and I do try to do a thorough overview without going TOO far into the weeds. As for the the surprise rules, they start as situational, but if it's a case where there's some doubt, then it goes to a wisdom check using the standard check rules of the system.
I bought my castles and Crusades collection back in 2008-9. But alas I got no one to play with. A few players around here only fancy D&D. I think it returns to a more Role Playing type of playing rather than a power play game. Gary Gigax was associated with the Troll Lords Games so this says a lot. I like the system but because is relatively unknown casual players dont give it a chance.
I have the same problem with a number of systems I use. Everyone just wants to default to the basic D&D 'because they don't want to learn a new system' or something. Fortunately I have a few options to basically cobble together a group to play with on any one system, though it may take a while. I recognize not everyone has that option though, so the best I can suggest is to try to find an online group. Castles & Crusades is supported by a number of virtual tabletop options thankfully.
Hello. You should be able to find online games at the Troll Lord Games Twitch channel.
Well-done video. Thank you.
Thank you for watching!
So much better than 5th edition wizards and wokery. An excellent game.
It's definitely one of my favorite systems along with general B/X clones at the moment. I just wish their editing were more on point. Ah well, can't have everything I suppose.
Good luck finding players though. D&D 5e is the 800lb gorilla, that applies to what attracts the players.
@@simonfernandes6809 just tell them it's dnd and play using whatever system you like.
I've been to Troll & Lords site. I'm looking at converting my AD&D 2ed game to this because of how shifty WOTC is being with the OGL. What books do I need to get to run it??? None of them are the same edition... and they seem to have a separate spell book.
Yeah that's the only thing about the castles & crusades. They go through a bunch of 'editions'. That having been said, those are more like 'printings' than editions. The system itself doesn't change, although a few monsters might be tweaked over time. You can use a mid 2000s era Castles & Crusades player's handbook with a brand new product and they'll be all compatible. As for the minimum needed to run it, I'd say the Player's handbook (The 8th printing has two covers, the one you see in this video and a newer one) as well as the Monsters & Treasures guide (the 8th printing has all the monsters from the old version plus some from the additional setting specific add ons). The Castle Keeper's Guide, while useful, is not critical like it is in other games. So those two books alone should work. Everything else is just additional material. I haven't got the separate spellbook, although I believe it's a compilation of additional alternate spells from other material they've published over the years, and I know the Tome of the Unclean covers various fiends and undead. Other stuff is just 'more material' and optional rules.
just bought the player book bundle and been wondering what EV means? I know the system rule for equiptment but what does EV stand for?
Encumbrance Value.
I love this system but I will admit I have completely over hauled the entire engine mainly due to the junk of the seige engine. I mainly did this so I could use classes and monsters in C&C without having them get nerves or be wildly overpowered. I try to stick to the spirit of the original feel of the game with the changes and my players enjoy the "simple-complexity" of it where they can play just about anything with any class and not be completely locked into one role and every fight is a challenge.
One of the better parts about these sorts of systems is that it can be relatively easy to do that sort of overhaul. I personally like the stock castles & crusades, but if I needed to adapt it for a particular type of game, I could see myself doing that easily. Compare that to say, even 5th edition, where I had to collect almost another small phb worth of material to cover the tweaks and changes I wanted to do for one particular game.
@@rpgcrawler yeah i pretty much have an entire supplement just to make the damn thing run smooth as glass. It's just running it stock you come into instants when players get completely hosed, and to a ridiculous degree and I've ran the system since 2011 and that was the thing that just kept popping up time and time again. Some throws for saves get to where they literally have to roll and 18 plus just to not die from a papercut. The way I have it now, it's more fun, more balanced.
@@vakash hey Phil, would you mind sharing a quick idea of what you changed please?
@@dungeondumbo well for one I ditched the 6 save system for a 2 of Physical and Mental saves. (We will have to have a private chat for more detail on that). Added a skill system that uses a d10 instead of a d20. Put feats back in. Ditched the 12/18 for the +6 base 15 system. There is a lot of be happy to go into it in a discord with you. Just not here because it could easily flood the comments.
@@vakash hi Phil, that’s cool cheers…I get the gist of what you’ve done from that. The Physical/Mental thing makes sense and unifies things with creature saves. Bringing the base to 15 is probably a good move if you found things too deadly sometimes. I’m not a fan of feats so that wouldn’t be my thing…it’s actually a big selling point of C&C that it leaves them out…same with skills…I like the simplicity of relying on the stats and the prime mechanism. I think I’ve found my favourite version of D&D in the new 3rd edition of Hyperborea…I really like it…but C&C modded or not wouldn’t be a bad choice if I had to choose another 😎👍
We played this for a couple years awhile back but found that the Siege Engine mechanic kind of breaks down at the middle levels. Then we got tired of trying to keep track of which save you needed, what was the prime etc. After things kept getting bogged down, we just switched over to Labyrinth Lord since we were all 1e vets and it was just a smoother experience. One other niggling issue was the awful editing that plagues all TLG products. Not a terrible game at all, but didn't suit our group long term.
Yeah, I personally prefer Labyrinth Lord given the choice between the two systems, I just wish my gaming group agreed. And I totally agree on the editing issue.
@@rpgcrawler Ironically, this review got me thinking and about a month ago I went back into the Troll Lord forums and decided to revive our abandoned C&C campaign with plans to start a new one. This was partly because we added a new player. We played a bit of DCC with him, but I found that involved too much table referencing. But he grasped the basic mechanics of the d20 system so I decided to revive C&C as a compromise. More spells & options, but smoother mechanics. So now I'm delving deeper into my old collection and adapting some old MERP modules to C&C.
I guess you like ThAC0 then.
@@sunsin1592 This game is so much easier to play than 5th. You can spend hours going through feats to min max a character in 5th. The challenge rating means that even at high level the game mechanic doesn't break down and the combat system avoid THACO which is rather slow.
Great game. Poor editing and attention to detail by the publisher. Whatever you do...don’t buy the recent limited edition box set of booklets...it is full of mistakes and missing information.
The editing in the Castles & Crusades products is almost painful. Because otherwise it's a solid game, but it just falls down and hits most of my pet peeves on basic editing and even basic copywriting a lot of times.
@@rpgcrawler yes…great game, just wish they could slow down a bit and improve the editing, layout and some art (for example…the figure on the Monsters & Treasure Complete cover is awful). I am still mystified why they think a club should be a 1d6+1 damage weapon! I do keep coming back to it though…it’s a good system.
@@dungeondumbo a club is usually a one hit in real life.
@@diogenesstudent5585 If somebody attacked me with a Roman Gladius (shortsword 1d6 damage)…I’d be more worried than if somebody attacked me with a baseball bat (club 1d6+1 damage). I’d argue that a dagger would be more frightening too than a basic club. That +1 damage is a big deal especially for low level characters. At 1st level it’s entirely possible to have a character with only 1 or 2 hit points…the one with 1hp is dead with both club and dagger (1d4 damage)…however the character (or monster) with 2hp…has 75% of surviving a blow from a dagger. But…has 0% chance of surviving the club attack. That is a MASSIVE difference in the power of the weapon. If you look in the Arms & Armor supplement the club gets a different damage rating. I think 1d6+1 for club damage is a typo…which brings me back to my point about bad editing. They’ve had 8 printings to fix stuff like this! I love the game system and I like the folks at Troll Lord games but they are super sloppy in their production of this game. I recently bought the little white box set….it is awful. Honestly, the editing is off the chart bad. Missing information all over the place. As a curio to stay on the shelf it looks nice…but as a complete game in a box it fails. Anyway…whatever…I’ve had fun with C&C and I like it more than most OSR style games.
@@dungeondumbo right on
Great Review; Boring game.
As someone who is _neutral_ in taste for Old School or new school RPG's, there is not much here. Not enough to switch systems. If you really want something different then D&D, then there are so many other choices that are actually different. Sure some things sound like a good *homebrew ideas* for D&D but not enough to convince players to switch. At worst this seems an excuse for people to use it to say " _Yeah, I play OSR games because I'm better then you!_ ".
... But this Review is really excellent. Other reviews say " _oh it's great, I recommend it_ " or " _Oh it's worth a buy for sure_ ". Yeah OK, but that's not enough info. It's like they're selling something. I don't care if they recommend it. Thus I look for other videos. But this video was honest. I can see *WHY* someone may or may not recommend it. & the end of the video was the best. An honest sum up. I am not getting this book, but *I am giving this video a Like & Subscribing* .
I appreciate the view, and the feedback. When I do these, whether it be for tabletop or computer RPGs, my primary goal is to give people the information they need to make their own call. Everyone has different tastes on what they'll enjoy playing, after all. When I do recommend something, it will usually be qualified as 'for a certain genre' or something similar. Some say it makes my style a bit boring, but I find that I'd rather be boring and useful.