Basic and Expert D&D

This is what we want our 5E game to feel like. The 1980 version of the game. We want the strict turn order (B23), party roles (B19), mapping, caller, combat sequence (B24), and all the advice in the "Dungeon Mastering as a Fine Art" section (B60) to apply. We want the wilderness turn order structure (X23) to apply outside the dungeons. We want hirelings, specialists, and mercenaries. We want castles, construction, and sieges. We want to explore hexes and clear them of monsters and lairs. We want to get lost in the wilderness and underground, and for the maps to matter again.

We want to capture the best parts of these books while staying in 5E.

"In the D&D rules, individuals play the role of characters in a fantasy world where magic is real and heroes venture out on dangerous quests in search of fame and fortune. Characters gain experience by overcoming perils and recovering treasures. As characters gain experience, they grow in power and ability."

Dungeons & Dragons Basic Rules, Moldvay edition, 1980, page B3

That statement still holds true in 5E. I feel the designers have forgotten about these simple words and this powerful statement, and everywhere the modern version of the game goes wrong can be traced back to forgetting what these words meant.

Many players get tired of 5E and just return to these games. I don't blame them. After "falling out of reality," the rules of 5E begin to fight with logic and common sense, and all of a sudden, the "fake game world" begins to seem more like a video-game reality than something grounded in the real world. The rules of the game matter more than logic, and they become a "fake logic" under which the world operates.

You get tired of that, and it wears on your psyche.

It is like an MMO that feels like a wondrous, fresh, unbounded world when you first enter it, and six months later, knowing how the world really works makes it feel like a tiny, small, constricting space where you have no freedom and must obey the fake systems and rules to progress a fraction of a percent today.

I want an old-school feeling and game, but I want to stay in 5E. Why do we have to give up one for the other? Part of this is the jaded masses, the optimizers who tell us there is one true build to maximize damage, and that the world does not exist, only the rules. This is why the rules were simple back in the day: there wasn't much to your character sheet, and you could not escape the world through the rules. You were a fighter with 41 hit points and a THAC0 score, six ability scores, and that was it.

Figure out the rest from the referee's descriptions, and you can't interact with the world by saying you make a skill roll. And there weren't any skills, so you can't lean on them to do everything for you either.

D&D 5E has gotten lazy and tired in its old age. It makes the original game look fresh and new by forcing people to interact with the environment without a character sheet.

But we have to stop.

We need to ask ourselves, "What do we want?"

Especially in terms of the mythical old-school game. Is what we want a dungeon turn structure, resource expenditure, time tracking, light sources, interactive environment (sand skill rolls), and regular wandering monster check? Do we want the same thing for wilderness exploration turns? Do we want the players to draw the maps? If so, I can just set those as house rules and have it all in 5E.

A 1-in-6 wandering monster check every 20 minutes? A short rest is one hour? Fine, that comes out to a 42% chance of your short rest being ruined by wandering monsters every time you pull that in a dungeon. And you burn another hour of light, mark the torches off. Medical supplies, if anyone is healing. Rations if you have halflings. You don't have the supplies, so there's no healing and eating, and the halfling is gaining a fatigue level.

I can be hard on the resource and time tracking, no problem. I don't need BX for that.

The 5E players who think this is Diablo will complain that I am "dragging things out," but let them complain. They will moan about "needing to track stupid supplies and weight" and "being forced to go shopping," but those are very old-school things we used to enjoy. Do you have iron spikes and a hammer? Well, no jamming the door shut. Those things have uses, and you are not taking a short rest while being chased. Equipment in the old days used to have superpowers, but that was forgotten in newer games in favor of a character-centric approach.

The appeal of BX is its reduced focus on the character sheet as the solution to every problem. You can't cover your eyes and "skill check" your way through the world. You can't regain powers with a magical short rest and be all ready to fight at full strength. Magic can't solve every problem. The action economy won't save you.

I can fix that in 5E, too.

Skill checks are dependent on interaction with the world and roleplay. If I ever hear "I search the room," you are automatically rolling on a disadvantage, or I will make you automatically fail and stumble into a trap. Searching how? For what? Where? Looking for what? Are you being careful? You don't tell me what you are doing; you will likely fail. Same thing with "I roll persuasion." That stupid look on your face while you stand there silent isn't going to convince anybody of anything.

Give me a great plan or a masterful speech, then you may roll with advantage, and you may never need to roll in the first place. I will just give it to you.

Skill rolls require player effort.

That's the deal.

Yeah, there is a way to do all this in 5E without switching to BX. The interactivity can be the same or better in 5E. So we have a turn structure and interactivity? We can have mapping, too? This is 80% of the way there, with the final 20% being lethality.

And lethality is highly dependent on which rule system you pick, or what houserules you choose. Lethality is an easier problem to solve. So, we are about 80% of the way there, just in changing a few things about how we play, and slowing things down a little with structure.

The 10-Minute Exploration Turn

What a messy topic. I could deep-dive into this, but once you dig deeper, you realize that time and movement have always been D&D's fatal flaw. Early versions of the game had you moving 120 feet every 10 minutes while mapping and exploring, and when you figure out the actual rate of speed, you have people literally moving in slow-motion through a dungeon.

At 0.136 miles per hour, the three-toed sloth is faster than you at 0.17 miles per hour. But this is careful exploration and mapping, so you will explore at a sloth's pace. Of course, the 10-minute exploration turn was always an artificial game construct, and we never questioned it - it just worked.

This was "game time" and "game movement," and it aggregated a lot of activities into one clean turn of time, and a 10-minute window. This isn't GURPS with its one-second turns. Simulation games were a natural reaction to this aggregation back in the late 1980s and early 1990s, and the original Top Secret game in 1980 also had one-second combat turns.

And I know, if you are exploring that slowly and that carefully, how does anyone fall into a pit trap?  Every 12 feet you move, you take a minute checking the walls, ceiling, floor, and poking everything with a 10' pole. You poke the single foot of distance ahead of you for five seconds, then the next foot takes another five seconds, and so on, all the way down to 120 feet of hallway.

Then again, in real life, some things you would not expect to take an hour end up taking longer. When your life is on the line in a dungeon, I can see why many things all of a sudden take a lot longer to do.

AD&D had special multipliers for different types of movement. The game still used the 120' per 10 minutes for mapping and exploration, multiplied that speed by five for movement through known areas or using a map, and by ten if you were fleeing. Often, they kept the same movement on the map; they just reduced the time it took to move it, using fractions of a turn.

AD&D 2E tried reducing exploration rounds to a minute as cracks in the wall started to appear, and simulation games like GURPS and Champions started using real-world movement rates. The 10-minute turn was retained, but only for things like spell and torch durations.

D&D 3.0 and Wizards of the Coast removed the 10-minute exploration turn entirely. They used a system of "local movement" for 1 minute and "overland movement" per hour. "Tactical movement" was the combat per 6-second round.

D&D 5E is more of a freeform time tracking, whereas D&D 5.5E feels a little more structured and formalized. Dungeon movement is 200' per minute for slow, 300' for normal, and 400' for fast. All times are "as needed," so if searching a room takes 10 minutes, then it does. Movement is typically tracked per minute. Pulling in ToV and A5E: ToV tends to be like 2014 D&D, while A5E uses a journey system, but the movement rates are the same as in 5E.

Of all the 5E versions, D&D 5.5E has the cleanest exploration rules, with a dedicated section on the topic and suggestions for 1-minute and 10-minute blocks, depending on what is needed. D&D 2014 and ToV feel the softest on exploration structure, while A5E takes it on a more macro-scale and defines a journey for longer treks, while still keeping that softness at the lower scale.

All this to get to the point. What if you wanted to roll random wandering monster encounters every 2 BX-style dungeon exploration turns? In D&D 2024, this feels the easiest. Stick to one and ten-minute time blocks for movement and searching, keep an organized time record, and every 20 minutes roll for wandering monsters. The fact that D&D 5.5E has a dedicated section for exploration in the DMG helps a lot, and it allows me to easily slot this procedure in, along with a time tracker.

This can be easily extended to D&D 2014, ToV, and A5E. What makes D&D 2024 the winner among all other versions of 5E is that the game recognizes that structure is needed for running exploration and explicitly lays out a section to cover it. The earlier editions feel too soft on dungeon exploration (outside of A5E's structured journeys and the excellent rules for those), and that low-level, turn-by-turn, time-tracking, and torch-burning game just feels absent.

D&D 5.5E also adds more detail and structure to equipment, formalizing the in-game use of each item. This is likely the designers' experience with Pathfinder 2E coming up, with items needing discrete game uses and rules inside of them, rather than being more "loosey gooesy who cares" things you write on your character sheet to be used if the DM asks if you have something. D&D 5.5E also wins in terms of equipment rules, with a stronger set of rules to back them up.

Shadowdark, providing an excellent, tension-filled turn-based experience, likely influenced D&D 5.5E in tightening up the dungeon exploration rules and laying out the methods for those out in a section of the DMG. Competition here improved the game; the other 5E-based games were happy to stick with the very loose exploration system that felt more like narrative gaming.

What a messy, complicated subject!

So, in short, keep a tight time tracker for dungeon exploration, and track time in blocks rounded to the minute. If you rule, it takes 5 minutes to spike a door; mark 5 off the time tracker. One minute is the shortest measure of time tracked in the books outside of combat. Longer actions are best measured in 10-minute blocks.

Every 20 minutes, roll an old-school wandering monster check.

Every hour, another torch burns out.

Lanterns burn for 6 hours on one flask of oil.

It is easy to add detailed time-tracking to your game, along with old-school wandering monster encounters. What do you get for the effort? A ticking clock, forcing players to manage resources, spend time wisely, and it makes the environment come alive as wandering monsters creep about and hunt the characters in that maze of tight, twisting passages.

Morale

Morale is a solid rule. This kept most OSR combats from becoming the modern "to the death" affair we saw starting in D&D 3 to 4, and it continued into 5E (where morale was an optional rule in the DMG). People play 5E like Diablo, where every monster in a room must be killed, and that is not old-school play. The OSR games were not like that, and if characters beat a side down hard and fast, they would flee, fight a retreat, or surrender.

This is when alignment came into play. Lawful characters would not kill those who surrendered.

Morale in BX was rated on a 2-12 scale, with 2 meaning the creature will not fight, and 12 being the creature will fight to the death (and never check morale). This was checked on a 2d6 roll; if the roll exceeded the morale number, they failed. The number could be adjusted by a few points up or down, depending on the situation.

"In general, morale is checked in critical combat situations. Two recommended times for morale checks are:

1. After a side's first death in combat (either monsters or characters).
2. When half the monsters have been incapacitated (killed, asleep due to magic, and so forth).

Monsters that successfully check morale twice will fight to the death."

-Dungeons & Dragons Basic Rules, Moldvay edition, 1980, page B27

In 5E, we do have morale rules, as follows:

• D&D 2024: Fight of Flight, DC 10 Wisdown saving throw
• D&D 2014: Morale, DC 10 Wisdown saving throw
• ToV: Morale, DC 10 Wisdom Save (TOV GMG, p75)
• LU A5E: No morale system, relies on the bloodied condition and mental stress.

This is the first time Level Up A5E fails at a category, interesting. It is not all that hard to standardize on the DC 10 Wisdom save for all games, since they are pretty much the same. Morale in any 5E version will work just like BX when it is checked, and what happens on failure.

This will most likely make fights easier, since if the players can take out a substantial number of creatures, they may break, organize a fighting retreat, or surrender. This is usually balanced by wandering monsters, so don't worry about challenge; let the dice fall where they may.

Morale introduces complications and moral quandaries into the adventure. What do you do with prisoners? Do you let them go, with them possibly running off to tell others? Do you use your only rope to tie them up? Is it even ethical to leave goblins tied up in a dungeon full of monsters that can eat them? Do you lock them in a room and spike the door shut, using a spike and time, and making noise that could attract wandering monsters? Do you cast a sleep spell on them all and hope for the best?

This is why we had alignment.

The lawful paladin would never allow a chaotic thief to kill helpless prisoners (or sleeping creatures), so the system built in a simulation of morality, mixing roleplaying with tactical decisions that could affect survival.

It is easy to treat monsters as video game enemies; you simply kill them all, and they "poof." When monsters act with self-preservation in mind, it introduces a double layer of decisions into the game. Is how you are going about "clearing this dungeon" ethical and moral? And how do you handle the inevitable surrenders when you lack the resources, time, or people to address them?

BX did a lot for us, even though by today's standard, it was a simple game. The depth of ethical and moral choices it forced upon us during a session surprised us all, and brought out the best and worst in people we thought we knew. You don't get the raw, visceral reactions when playing online of seeing people's faces and body language as they make these choices. You do when you are in person.

Nothing is stopping us from implementing these morale rules in our 5E games; most games already have them, though they're mostly forgotten. Well, in our old-school 5E game, we adopt the classic BX systems and let them work their magic.

A Blog for Everyone

Why did I start a 5E blog?

This came to me after realizing that many OSR YouTubers were treating BX as a "solve every problem" game, leading people to believe that a rule system was the answer to why they had fallen out of love with roleplaying. This is the classic "game hopping" cycle that even I go through constantly, and if you are a reader of my main blog, you know how the winds change in my mind.

But something told me "BX is not the answer," but people were getting this wrong, at least a part of it. I had to ask myself, "Can I have BX-style play in ANY game I play?"

And the answer is yes, I can.

I just need to go back to BX, pick out the classic methods and procedures of play from that game, identify them, and show people how to use them in any game. Any game can play "like" BX. Is it as lethal and deadly if I use 5E? No and yes, it depends on how we play the game. There are TPKs in 5E, but in general, it is less lethal than a BX game, which has a higher default tension level.

But lethality aside, my 5E game can be played using a BX turn structure and feels just like an old-school game.

And I went out and got D&D 2024, even though I feel I don't need it, and wasn't positive about the changes they made. I am supporting the game for this blog so I can speak to those players. The fact that most of the in-store play in this area is D&D 2024 means in-person play is very strong, and it may be a VTT thing where the D&D 2024 softness is seen as the lock-in of D&D 2014 content on VTTs, which means many are hesitant to break what they built online in their digital libraries.

And yes, I will try to play D&D 2024. If I want in on those local games at the hobby store, to finally become real again and play with real people, I will learn the new game. I am not so much of an ideologue that I will refuse to try new things, and I can gloss over parts of the game I dislike or disagree with (such as the missing humanoids from the Monster Manual and some of the art).

And I play Tales of the Valiant, so that gets supported here, too. All versions of 5E, even 2014, are supported here. This is a big-tent site, and all versions of 5E are loved and supported, as long as the character-building we love is there, and they can be modded to support an old-school style of play.

And since this is still 5E, moving between versions of the game is super easy. The differences are minor, and when you look at the entirety of 5E, they are so compatible that they are all house-ruled versions of each other, with D&D 2014 as the source document. Even if you are mixing rules in your head between versions, it won't really matter too much, and your game will be fine.

Even the excellent Level Up Advanced 5E, a niche version of 2014 that just amazes me with how well designed the game is, and it goes in a new direction, supporting all pillars of play. That is supported here, too. This has so many old-school nods, and D&D 2024's support for the exploration pillar of play was likely influenced by this game. Those wilderness adventure rules did not come out of nowhere, and the lack of decent wilderness exploration rules in 2014 is a sore spot, leading people to think D&D was solely a tactical, dramatic combat game.

Level Up A5E is excellent, and I am still a fan.

And, yes, we also support the classic D&D 2014 game. I have friends who are so broke they can't afford new books, so why should we exclude them? If this is what you have and love, why are we excluding you? Welcome, 2014 players, and your six core books with all those rules patches. I love this version, too, classic, unbalanced, broken, double-casting, broken combos, but very OG cool.

Plenty of people still play patched and fixed versions of D&D 2014, and they are just as viable and playable as any alternatives.

What unites us is old-school play. We don't want to change games, like all the YouTubers are begging us to play BX and other games, because it would fix every problem we have with roleplaying, and we still want to be able to walk into a hobby store and play with others. While I love a great, tension-filled, harsh game of BX, the 5E players do not have to be excluded from that experience because they don't change their game.

We can adopt BX's core principles and apply them in 5E. Will our game be as deadly and tension-filled? Will we be playing by BX rules to the letter? No. I don't expect that out of this. But we will have an experience that is much closer to the heart of the game, instead of the narrative story game that modern D&D has wandered off into the narrative story gaming of YouTube live-play, and we love the classic, tension-filled, resource-tracking, players-make-the-map, absolute blast of classic D&D.

We can get pretty close to classic D&D by combining BX procedures with 5E rules. The rest we can houserule, and we don't lose the games we love, nor do we have to change systems.

The dungeon turn? Players making the map? The wilderness turn? Monster reactions? Morale? Interactive play that does not rely on skill rolls? Light and torch-tracking? Wandering monsters? Time tracking? Clearing hexes and building domains?

None of those are magically dependent on the BX rules.

I can port all those structures and procedures directly into 5E and end up with an old-school 5E game that feels much more authentic than a FATE-like narrative story game that uses the 5E rules. Those procedures and methods are universal truths that we should not forget, nor write out of the game.

We can still play 5E and have an authentic, old-school experience.

Will it be exactly the same? No.

The real game here is in the methods, structures, and procedures. This is our Rosetta Stone, our source of truth for roleplaying. The way we play is much more important than what we play. If we can preserve the old-school style in our play structure, any game we play will be more fun for us.

Yes, BX is amazing and fun. The OSR YouTubers are often right; that simple, deadly game is a classic.

But the way BX was played can enrich and enhance any game we play.

And to the BX YouTubers, you need to go beyond procedure and structure, and explain why the BX rules and math are better than 5E. The procedure and structure can be easily ported to 5E. I know what I love about BX, but consider this a challenge to go beyond the obvious and get deeper into the why.

It is easy to be negative.

It is much harder to be positive and constructive.

If I can help you find a fun way to play 5E, take this old-school style into a gaming store, and show a table of players there "the way" while still playing the store-preferred D&D 2024 game, then my work here has value and is worth the effort. If I can make the game more fun for you and keep you from burning out, then that is one less person who leaves the hobby. If it helps you see 5E in a new light, not as a game where "skills solve everything" and "wilderness is just a cut scene," then I will have helped open the door to you for new adventures.

You will still be playing D&D 2024. But you will be playing it exactly how we used to play the original. You get the best of both worlds. Your table may see the game in a new light. You will bring the magic back to the table and not shortcut or shorthand the procedures of play for expediency. There is a magic in these old, dusty tomes of BX D&D. Let me help you find it.

The way we played is an absolute truth.

What we play can change.

Wandering Monsters

While the turn structure says wandering monsters are checked for at the beginning of the turn, this page (B53) says they are checked for at the end of the turn. In any case, this feels like they are checked between turns, and they apply to the following turn if encountered.

Besides the monsters which live in rooms, characters may encounter monsters which wander about the dungeon. These monsters are known as "Wandering Monsters". At the end of every 2 turns, the DM should check for Wandering Monsters. To do so, roll Id6: a result of 1 indicates that the party will encounter a Wandering Monster in the next turn. The Wandering Monster will be 20-120 feet away from the party when encountered (roll 2d6, multiply the result by 10) in a direction of the DM's choosing, and will be headed toward the player characters.

Dungeons & Dragons Basic Rules, Moldvay edition, 1980, page B53

So, every two turns, we roll 1d6 to check for wandering monsters. We can do this in 5E, but a part of the problem is that not all adventures, especially the story-based ones, have wandering monster tables. This is going to be a problem in D&D 2024, where Wizards moved away from wandering monster tables and instead list monsters by CR in the Monster Manual.

I just realized that some of these games, most notably D&D 2024, lack a 10-minute exploration turn. I will get to this in a later article, since this will be a problem.

You will need a 2014 DMG or the 2014 Xanathar book; ToV and A5E also have these tables, with A5E having the best implementation. If you are in 2024 and don't have a table, use the Monsters by CR lists in the 2024 DMG, and pick one that makes sense, or use those lists to make your own table, if you have time.

This is the first real stumble for D&D 2024 when it comes to old-school play, but it isn't a huge one if the adventure has the tables, or you have access to another book. Most adventures have them, and those may work for you as well, or you can use an online tool.

The dungeon may have certain areas where Wandering Monsters are encountered more often (such as on a roll of 1 or 2). The dungeon may have areas where the DM checks for Wandering Monsters every turn, or where a monster will appear when a corridor is entered. Wandering Monsters should appear more often if the party is making a lot of noise or light, but should not be frequent if the party spends a long time in one out-of-the-way place (if they stop in a room for the night, for example).

Dungeons & Dragons Basic Rules, Moldvay edition, 1980, page B53

Okay, hold up! This is something that I do not see on the YouTube channels that push BX. The original rules mention that wandering monsters can be rolled for:

• Every turn
• At a higher chance (1 to 2 on a d6)
• Automatically, when entering a certain area
• At higher chances or frequency, depending on party activity

So, that bard playing music, the fireball exploding, or the dwarf running in full plate mail? Yep, you are going to up your chance of wandering monsters. There may be a "central hallway" where the chance is 1-3 on a d6 every two turns, or every turn. There may be a giant ant burrow where ants will always appear when characters come close (unless you toss a fireball in there). There may be a kobold warren where it is checked every turn.

There may be places where it is checked less frequently, such as once every three turns, once an hour, or longer. This is what a DM did in an old-school game. We called things as we saw them, and tweaked our sandbox to surprise the players and the DM.

And yes, resting in the dungeon was even mentioned back in 1980, which is more appropriate for a remote cave where nothing creeps by than it is a closet in an occupied Orc fortress. Still, if you attempt this, you'd better have a plan for who is on lookout and when, and make sure it is laid out with the DM before you even try. I may still check every two hours, just to see if something comes up for you.

And remember to choose a reaction or roll it randomly! Maybe that giant spider in the cave crawls in silently and snuggles up next to you while you are sleeping for body warmth. I will require a saving throw when you wake up, so as not to scream at Fluffy.

Note: Lots of wandering monsters will affect adventure balance! This is old-school sandbox play, and it is the ticking clock that punishes those who waste time in the dungeon. Every two turns, you roll. If a monster shows up, you choose or roll a reaction. This will, by default, make things harder. You may not survive, so you'd better have a plan to get in and get out, especially when you are slowed down carrying treasure back to the dungeon entrance.

And all of this can be done in 5E, whichever version you love. This is not exclusive to BX, and since Dungeons & Dragons started with these rules, we can use them as-is in our 5E games to add some old-school flavor.

We don't have to change our games to have epic wandering monster encounters and make them feel more old-school and cool. We can keep playing 5E, adopt these rules, and have an old-school game with the rules we love.

Monster Reactions

When any monster is encountered, wandering or room-keyed, you must roll Monster Reactions. You can always choose the reaction, but rolling is the way to do it if you don't feel like choosing the reaction.

MONSTER ACTIONS: Some monsters always act in the same way (such as zombies, who always attack). However, the reactions of most monsters are not always the same. The DM can always choose the monster's reactions to fit the dungeon, but if he decides not to do this, a DM may use the reaction table below to determine the monster's reactions (roll 2d6).

Dungeons & Dragons Basic Rules, Moldvay edition, 1980, page B24

And the 2d6 table works like this:

  2      Immediate attack

3-5     Hostile, possible attack

6-8     Uncertain, monster confused

9-11   No attack, monster leaves or considers offers

 12     Enthusiastic friendship

So, 28% of the time, monsters attack or are hostile. If you draw steel, they attack. Remember, a 3-5 is still a possible attack; they are hostile, but there is a chance of negotiation. The other 72% of the time? Well, they will attack if attacked, but they are either indifferent, confused, or would consider teaming up with you 3% of the time.

On any of these, they will attack if you start swinging swords and flinging spells. Remember, the DM can choose anything from attack to friendly, and common sense applies! If the characters were killing orcs throughout the entire fort, it is highly unlikely that any of the ones left would be that friendly, unless they were prisoners from another tribe or so unhappy with the warchief that they just want a chance to get out of there alive. If they are part of the warchief's elite guards, they will attack 99% of the time.

Roll anyway to see if something interesting comes up, and then decide if it makes sense.

This table is another key part of old-school play, and you do not need to switch rule systems to use it. Yes, playing BX is cool, but we don't need to change the game we are playing in to make it feel more old-school! If we like it, we can keep it. The book says "Dungeons & Dragons" on the cover, so don't feel bad about adopting this as an optional rule for your 5E games.

Note, the Monster Reactions table will likely mess with published adventures, overall making them easier since not all encounters will be fights, unless you choose them to be fights. You may see the party getting an unxelected ally of the ogre in room 8, and he follows along and smashes the rest of the monsters in the dungeon he is finally sick of, and the party on his side finally gives him the bravery to say "enough is enough" and take revenge for the abuse he has endured over the years. That extra help from the party is going to trash the rest of the encounters on this level, but wow, what a cool story.

Why are you missing out on this gameplay? This happened all the time back in the day, and it's partly why BX is considered a legendary game. You can do this in whatever version of 5E you love, and there is no need to get your table to switch games.

As for that ogre making things too easy, this is another thing the old-school DM does. You may want to up the challenge in a later room, and you may want a reason for the ogre to walk away and head to the hills after they leave the dungeon. The town likely won't accept an ogre, and he will need to return to his tribe. Maybe he walks away in a bittersweet moment, and perhaps he could show up again in some later adventure as a surprise friend to help out in a time of need.

Again, this stuff happened all the time in old-school games. The game wasn't just "characters and combat" but a mini-sandbox game the DM could have fun with. We had rules like this to surprise even the DM, and this emergent gameplay can be directly dropped into your 5E game.

Just use this rule; it makes your 5E game feel more old-school and is fun!

The Dungeon Turn

We want the classic Dungeon Turn in our old-school 5E game and to follow this structure during play. This will go a long way towards making our 5E game feel like a BX game, and while I know a turn structure can't get us there on its own, it will help with everything else we try to do. What is the Dungeon Turn?

1. The DM rolls for Wandering Monsters (1-in-6) every second turn.
2. The party moves, listens, and searches for 10 minutes of time.
3. If monsters are not encountered, the turn ends; otherwise, roll reaction. Combat may occur.
4. The party tracks resources, including:
1. Marching order changes
2. Encumbrance and changes in possessions
3. Mark off a turn on all light sources
4. Check spell duration
5. The party decides its course of action for the next turn.

That is it! Do not overcomplicate this, and you do not need a 200-page book from Amazon to tell you how to play an old-school game. It is essentially a wandering monster check, an action phase, then wandering monsters arrive, a resource phase, and a planning phase for the next turn.

Note the sequencing! Just because you enter a room on phase 2 and encounter the room's keyed contents does not exempt you from the results of a wandering monster check! You could get into a fight with the orcs, and the wandering monsters (carrion crawlers) could enter the fight, attracted by the noise, and attack both sides!

Also note, both the orcs in room 2 and the carrion crawlers will roll separate reaction rolls! They could both react positively, with the orcs wanting to negotiate, and the carrion crawlers wandering by and looking for food. The orcs could be friendly and the carrion crawlers hostile, and you could fight them together.

Also, note that we are not changing one rule in whatever version of 5E you play to get our game a long way towards feeling old-school and cool. We are making a simple change to adopt an old-school style of play and turn structure, while keeping our 5E game exactly as it is. All our character builds are intact. All our favorite moves and combos are still there. Resting has not been touched. We have not changed the death rules or even touched pop-up healing.

Everything in our 5E game remains the same, and our game has improved by 100% in tone and feel.

Resources are being tracked. Time is important. Movement speed and encumbrance should matter. Light is critical. Being punctual will keep you all alive.

Also note how this automatically balances the short rest. Taking an hour for a breather forces three wandering monster checks, a 1-in-6 chance every second turn (20 minutes). This is three 1-in-6 rolls, which comes out to a 42% chance of encountering a wandering monster during that hour, and if this turns into a fight, the short rest is ruined.

So short rests fail and mean an extra combat almost 50% of the time?

Those are now balanced, given they also burn up a torch.

While this does not give us the full BX or Shadowdark experience, this takes a "loosey gooesy" 5E narrative game and turns it into a tense, structured, old-school experience quite nicely.

And we did not need to change game systems.

Nor did we need to change the rules of the game.