Something got on my mind today while lounging at the pool in 90 degree weather today...

What was wrong with 1st edition? Why was a 2nd edition necessary? Was the original d100 system broken?

1st edition was pretty cool. I remember seeing the advertisement in DRAGON magazine and just beginning my fascination.

What was so wrong with it that it needed a 2nd edition?

jh

Just because a company makes a new edition of a game, doesn't mean there was anything "wrong" with the prior edition. However, any system that never sees a revised edition over a course of years would qualify as stagnant in my view.

You either let things stay the same forever and gamers forget about you except for the grognards, you keep frankenstein-ing rule changes onto the old framework and get a complete mess, or you periodically produce new editions of the game.

Emirikol said:

I was actually flipping through my first edition book last night and even though I've always thought the rules were clunky (they were fine for the 80s, but there you go, improving the rules is one reason for a new edition), it just oozes style. It still remains the benchmark for the Warhammer flavour – dark and gritty, yes, but also very disturbing. Those full colour plates, especially "The Enemy Within" are just wonderful at evoking the sense of how deranged this world is.

And looking through that book I wondered about a lot of stuff that has been dropped. What happened to the Gods of Law? They were supposed to be few and not worshipped but in constant battle with Chaos I know it's not particularly original, but that was a really good idea that added such a subtle aspect to the Warhammer world. And that tied in with humans and their gods being Neutral (and not at all Good). I know we've moved away from alignments these days, but that was such a nice take on things (compared to AD&D at the time). And the Fimir? A nasty enemy almost never heard of again (was in very early WFB and at least once in WD but didn't last the distance). And Malal the renegade Chaos god, what happened to him (there was a comic with a Malal warrior, that was cool)? And back then Sigmar was considered a lesser deity!

It didn't help that years went by without supplements. In the end there was a fair bit of stuff published, but it varied in quality. I guess 2nd edition, beside improving the rules (still clunky in my opinion), was able to bring forth new material about aspects of the Warhammer world that were hardly touched on in 1st edition (eg. Bretonnia). But then again, in doing that (and obviously the intellectual property was directed by Games Workshop), they brought the WFRP version of Warhammer closer to the WFB's version, and that took away the subtleness of the setting and diluted it's more disturbing aspects.

I can understand why a lot of people are perfectly happy to keep playing 1st edition. I'm not sure of their reasons of course (I'm not one of them), but it wouldn't surprise me to learn that it has less to do with system, and much more to do with flavour.

This is really a very interesting conversation.

I got into the game already at second edition. I started playing RPG in the 90s and here in Brazil Warhammer wasn't known at all. There must have been some obscure groups playing it, but I never knew about them or the system until a friend of mine introduced me to the second edition in 2007, I think. Or even 2008!

At that time I was completely at lost with RPG. I never got much into D&D 3ed, I was always against a system that required much more attention than the story. Imagine my frustration when they announced the 3.5! And I was already tired of Vampire: The Masquerade, in a world where, with so many sobrenaturals, to find a human in a city was like a miracle!

Of course, there was always amazing RPGs. Most of them I never knew, but I do love Falkenstein, and I always enjoyed gamemastering Changeling, even if I had to make my own views about the World of Darkness. The list goes on, but that is not the point...

When I learned about Warhammer 2nd Ed, I discovered a great RPG, with simple rules, a progression to the PCs that were much more related to the story, being focused in careers instead of classes, and an amazing world, full of terrors. And it was a Fantasy RPG!

I just fell in love.

But I do think my way of seenig Warhammer's world always tended to expresse the more subtle aspects of everything, or, at least, keep narrating Chaos and misteries as obscures things. Even when national wide wars were being fought, I left the gargantuan aspects, while existing, in the place of being myths among the population.

And we also adapted some of the rules, not much, just to be more confortable with them. I never knew 1st ed, but the RPGs from the 80s had too much intricated rules. I know Warhammer was never a GURPS, Call of Cthulhu or such, but I do enjoy a revision, IF it is not towards a system demanding RPG.

Warhammer waited 20 years for a revision. It's just my guess, but I think it was well done.

Pedro Lunaris said:

Pedro, that's such an excellent summary/critique of Vampire the Masquerade .

heptat said:

hahahahahahahah, thanks!

I actually mixed up some portuguese in "sobrenaturals".

2nd Edition came about because there was a major change to the WFB game at that time. They then decided it was a good time to revamp the rules a bit and incorporate the background changes made by the Storm of Chaos.

I never got to play 1st edition, but I think I would have liked it too.

Even 3rd edition is starting to grow on me.

There were some fundamental issues with 1st edition. The often-cited Naked Dwarf Syndrome (you could play a dwarf who, if you pumped his Toughness enough, could easily shrug off all but the most insane amounts of damage without resorting to any armor at all). Every freakin' skill had its own subsystem. The careers were wildly unbalanced. Etc. But yeah, essentially there was nothing *wrong* with it. I played my first book into shreds and squeezed a good deal of use out of a second.

2nd edition fixed the clunky combat system (and by fixed I mean adjusted it to more closely resemble the crunchtastic D20 stuff that was all the rage at the time). It turned into a pretty good tactical game, actually. They throttled back on the UBERness of the non-humans and overall made it a much tighter game. I didn't get to play it much (one or two campaigns), but I always felt that mechanically it was a definite improvement. Magic especially I loved the Tzeenchy miscast rules. Fluff-wise, meh. I liked the grim-n-gritty with a splash of insanity vibe that I got from 1e better, but the folks I played with weren't WFB scholars. I felt free to use historical Bretonia and fimir and to ignore the Storm of Chaos.

That said, I think one of the biggest reasons for the 2nd edition, really, was the HUGE freakin' upswing in money to be made from RPGs during the D20 boom years. WFRP was, aside from Runequest, *the* alternative to D&D back in the day. Resurrecting it was a great move. Us old grognards had suffered through a long dry spell, the dark times when years and years would go by without a release (I waited 16, in fact, for Realms of Sorcery to come out for 1st edition it was promised in the original book). Heck, if you didn't know of or have access to Warpstone or Strike-to-Stun, there were some dang lean times for WFRP players. The time was right. The stars were aligned.

CaffeineBoy said:

Yeah, that covers most of it. The game was certainly very playable, but the system was somewhat haphazard and poorly thought out. 2nd ed tidied up the system nicely.

Skills were given a unified mechanic.

Talents were tidied up.

The careers were better balanced and more options were provided for non-combat characters (in v1 the advancement route was generally starting career to combat career as fast as you can, then from combat career to assassin as fast as you can).

Advancement was evened out a little, so you didn't have characters over-specialised in one area.

The magic system was completely rewritten to bring it into line with the new WFB fluff. I'm not sure I'd really call it an improvement. The old magic system was bad, but the new one was.... well, I found it extremely limiting and dull.

Naked Dwarf Syndrome was toned down, though not entirely removed.

Fortune points were added - these gave players more options in play, so that success and failure becomes as much a matter of their choices as the luck of the dice.

Interesting subject indeed. I notice that the real "old-school-players" havent yet find this conversation... This subject is always interesting - THE debate between WFRP versions is probably neverending, and hatred that some WFRP1 players have for the "changed" warhammer is just huge.

In these debates in the past most forget that you might considere judging TWO values: GAME SYSTEM and the actual SETTINGS.

• Game System : WFRP1 had great system pack in the day, but needed reboot. It had faults and every WFRP1 player has huge number of extra fan-rules and careers to spice up the system. WFRP2 nicely updated the system and I think this is what I like in WFRP2.
• Settings : This is more troublesome issue. WFRP1 had great setting and then WFB changed the world. In a way world developed ... But true WFRP1 fan will never accept this! Some things developed to totally different direction that they were first and this wasn't all that good (common subjects are: Color Magic, Bretonnia, timeline changed meaning TEW ending...). WFRP2 idea was also to bring the SETTING updated with the rest of the Warhammer products. WFRP3 doesnt change the world to different direction. Its just new reboot the GAME SYSTEM, but SETTING is the same.

WFRP1 was created 1986. It's really long, long time ago. Now there is three versions of the RPG game system, 8 versions of WFB, Online computer Game, card games, other games, countless novels and so much fan-stuff. I think certain amount of development should be accepted.

Pedro Lunaris said:

Yes, but I still knew what you meant

jackdays said:

I had one houseruled mechanic, ever. Not sure why you feel the need to tell us all about the true v1 fan, and to villify him, and accuse him of hatred. Maybe you should think about your own attitude, instead.

macd21 said:

Not entirely fair. What your refering to as 'the new WFB fluff' had been in place for at least thirteen years by the time Black industries had published Second ed. For that matter it had already had first edition treatment in Realms of sorcery, by hogshead. By this point, the collages of magic and winds metaphysics has been around for more than half the life of warhammer.

zombieneighbours said:

Er, so? I didn't object to it being brought into line with the WFB fluff. That wan't the problem. The problem was that the new system was boring.

In your opinion, I personally much prefered it. The only real issue I ever had was that unsanctioned magic and minor magic never got as good a treatment as the collages. I would have loves to see Necromancy, dark magic, demonology, as well as the magic of tillia and araby get more of a lot in.

The main reason is, Black industries wanted to make money,

but it was good thing because 1ed sucked.

Don't get me wrong I loved it, but only for the setting and TEW.

• It had such a marvelous and nice handouts (for those how might remember the orkish letters in Fire in the mountains)
• The german names were awesome - an inventor named Kugelschreiber ( ballpen)
• The players aren't hero - they were everyday people (rat-catcher,...)
• incredibly fluffy spells ( protection from rain)
• corruption (they hadn't got rules for it unless you played a dark wizard

but

the sucked

• the naked dwarf
• unbalance of the races (to transport it to 3e: stripp all the goodie of humans character creation page 23 except the fate) and gives dwarfs and elves 25 creation points also. Halflings ( in that time a core race.) Strenght an toughness of 1, agil and fellowship of 3, 15 creation points and have 4 fortunes points. That's a bit rough but in that direction.
• somebody said it: unbalanced careers
• W% -system
• no skill System to speak of
• spells that where eiterh use less (zone of ...) or way to powerfull Firebolt

And that is even without looking in my HC book.

So I was pretty happy with 2ed though it destroyed a lot of 1ed fluff ( but that's DM role to bring) and kept to a lot of crappy heritage.

Greetings WK

zombieneighbours said:

The old system was riddled with problems. The new one was serviceable, but dull.

Again...in your opinion.

As I said before, I liked the second edition system. I found it to be more fun and interesting, as well as more stable as a system. Realms of sorcery took the basics, layered on cool setting details and added depth to the spell list, it was a great book.

zombieneighbours said:

Of course, it's his opinion. How tedious would it be if someone posted 'in your opinion' after everything you posted? I think we can take it as read that people post their opinions.

No, you can't take it as read, because it is possible to make statements of fact, for instance;

'The light which most humans see as red, falls within a range of about 630 and 740 nm.'

We use different language to describe something that is a fact, and something that is an opinion.

For instance;

'I personally prefer second edition WFRP to third edition, for a range of reason' - expression of Opinion

'Second edition is better than third.' - Expression of 'fact'

Mac is using the language of fact, to lend authority to his opinion, we all do it sometimes. But just because we do use such language, does not make it so.

Saying 'The old system was riddled with problems. The new one was servicable, but dull' does not make it true, any more than saying 'Second edition is better than Third' makes the statement true. The technique adds nothing to debate, and I consider it something of a cheap linguisitc trick. That is why I try to avoid it myself(not always successfully), and am pulling Mac up on it here.

zombieneighbours said:

In your opinion.

zombieneighbours said:

Er, no. That's ridiculous.

Oh, sorry - that's ridiculous, in my opinion.

What were those problems with 1st and 2nd edition I guess is my point?

2E just didn't have a good release schedule (in my opinion, there wasn't much to the initial releases. It was a very scanty ruleset at the outset, but still fun to play. 2e also removed a lot of the adult content and kind of dumbed the world down imo), but I'm just not /that/ familiar with 1e anymore to remember why 1e was so horrible they needed another system.

jh

2nd edition added (in my oppinion), nothing but a different setting, and upgrades to some broken its and bits of 1st edition rules, which many had allready ammended with house-rules.

It did revieve the game somewhat, I for one had sold all my 1st edition stuff, and took a 7'ish year break from rpg's. So naturally I bought 2nd edition, which I found a nice product, but again (in my oppinion...) it did not add anything to the game for me, since I just kept using 1st edition setting.

3rd edition was a huge rule overhaul, one which I find (in my oppinion.......) is a (for me) revolutionary way of playing rpg's, one which I very much like.

But to keep to the 1st vs. 2nd. To me 2nd edition rules were better, but same result would have been achieved by using the many house-rules flowing around.

Did there need to be something wrong with the earlier system in order for a 2nd edition to be published? Need there be any motivation except the commercial imperative? Not to cut short people's comparisons of the systems, which is actually quite interesting (in my opinion), for someone who played 1e and now 3e, but never played 2e.

If the 2e system in any way resembles Dark Heresy, which I have played quite a lot of, then it would seem to be a fairly solid system (in my opinion). Does that mean that 3e, in turn, was a needless or pointless update, since there is nothing wrong with the previous system?

At the end of the day, whether or not such an update was necessary or the previous system deeply flawed seems somewhat irrelevant (in my opinion), since it has led to the development of a fantastic system that is extremely interesting and flavoursome (in my opinion). None of that has stopped me buying up 1e and 2e books where I can in order to harvest fluff, adventures and ideas from some (in my opinion) very well-written material in order to supplement FFG's official releases.