Let’s start this essay with a couple of quotes from “Volume 1: Men & Magic” regarding ranged combat. First, from the Alternative Combat System attack matrices on page 20:
Missile hits will be scored by using the above tables at long range and decreasing Armor Class by 1 at medium and 2 at short range.
To put this rule in context for those who aren’t familiar with OD&D, allow me to explain: Both melee and long-range missile attacks use the same attack matrices. But at medium distances missiles receive a +1 bonus and at short ranges they receive a +2 bonus to hit.
Compare and contrast this with 3rd Edition. Here both melee and ranged attacks use the same Base Attack Bonus, but at medium and long ranges the missile fire suffers penalties.
One critique of 3rd Edition is that ranged combat specialists are at a significant disadvantage compared to melee combat specialists. How many of those complaints would disappear if you implemented an OD&D-style system of giving bonuses for close range missile attacks instead of penalties for distant missile attacks?
(And how many more would disappear if you took the equally radical step of giving ranged attacks a Dex-based bonus to damage like the Strength-based bonus that melee attacks receive? All of them. But I digress.)
(EDIT: It has been pointed out that the word “decrease” might actually mean that Armor Class is improved against missile attacks at medium and close ranges. I hadn’t really considered that possibility because it seems natural to me that the closer something is, the easier it is to hit with a missile weapon, but it’s certainly true. This, by the way, is why I don’t miss the “lower AC is better” days in the least. Is that +2 a bonus or a penalty? Only her stylist knows for sure.)
And here’s another quote from “Men & Magic”, this one from the “Bonuses and Penalties to Advancement due to Abilities” table (which, like many things in OD&D, is only partly about what it says it’s about):
| Dexterity above 12 | Fire any missile at +1 |
|---|---|
| Dexterity below 9 | Fire any missile at -1 |
To understand the importance of these entries, you first have to understand one other thing: There are no equivalent bonuses (or penalties) for melee attacks.
So, once again, we see OD&D giving a significant advantage to ranged combatants compared to their melee brethren. In doing so it stands in contrast with 3rd Edition (where ranged combatants require special equipment, class abilities, and/or feats to even begin equalizing with melee combatants).
It stands in even starker contrast with 4th Edition, where ranged combat has been completely nerfed for the convenience of the miniatures game. And this is slightly ironic because I suspect one of the reasons that OD&D is so friendly to ranged combat is because of its roots in the Chainmail wargame: Chainmail needed to cope with the reality that charging ranged attackers Agincourt-style is, historically speaking, a really dreadful idea. One that people have been willing to repeat time and time again throughout history (World War I, I’m looking at you), but a really dreadful idea nonetheless.
PALIMPSEST INVERSION
Of course, all of this goes out the window if you interpret the OD&D rules slightly different. Here’s a quote from “Volume 2: Monsters & Treasure”:
Attack/Defense capabilities versus normal men are simply a matter of allowing one roll as a man-type for every hit die, with any bonuses being given to only one of the attacks, i.e. a Troll would attack six times, once with a +3 added to the die roll. (Combat is detailed in Vol. III.)
This little paragraph is incredibly confusing for many reasons: First, the basic combat system is largely detailed in Volume 1. It is not meaningfully discussed in Volume 3 (only Aerial Combat and Naval Combat are given any substantive treatment there).
Second, based on its formatting and context the passage appears to be referring to an “Attack/Defense” entry on the table immediately preceding this text… but no such entry is to be found. It’s actually referring to Hit Dice. (A troll has 6 + 3 HD, hence the +3 bonus it receives.)
Third, the most literal interpretation of the paragraph is “monsters attack like men once for every HD they have”. There are two problems with this: First, the Alternative Combat System has separate attack matrices for men and monsters — so if monsters end up attacking “as a man-type”, what’s the point of the attack matrix for monsters? Second, the text only refers to monsters… which means that monsters get 1 attack per HD, but the PCs don’t. I don’t really see any way for that to be viable, do you?
For the most part, as far as I can tell, this passage is almost universally ignored. Or used only when the Chainmail rules are used for mass combat.
But one way in which it has been interpreted is that everyone (monsters and men alike) get 1 attack per round per HD.
However, by combining that with certain rules from Chainmail, another interpretation also arose: Everyone (monsters and men alke) get 1 attack per round per HD… but only when engaged in melee.
Which, of course, immediately shifts the pendulum of power away from ranged combat and places it rather firmly and definitely in favor of melee combat.
CONCLUDING THOUGHTS
In lump sum, therefore, OD&D serves — in its many-faced way — as excellent fodder for a discussion of how ranged and melee combat should relate to each other.
But this also speaks to one of the broader themes in these reactions to OD&D: There are many who like to talk about “old school” gaming as if it was some sort of unified style of play, but could there be any larger bifurcation of play styles than those created by the disparate interpretations of the mechanics we’ve seen here?
In one set of mechanics, ranged combat has a distinct edge. Smart use of a sling or bow is strongly advantageous, leading to combats being conducted from the maximum possible distance. (And even when the combat tightens up, there’s still every reason to continue using your ranged weapon if you can.)
But in the other set of mechanics, the melee fighters grind up the battlefield — completely outclassing the damage-dealing capabilities of the ranged combatants through their sheer number of attacks per round.
“(And how many more would disappear if you took the equally radical step of giving ranged attacks a Dex-based bonus to damage like the Strength-based bonus that melee attacks receive? All of them. But I digress.)”
How radical a step would this actually be? Unbalancing?
What about giving DEX-based melee classes a similar bonus?
One of the things that has always irked me about D&D rules is the power disparity between STR and DEX for melee. Even if your class relies on DEX, and you take all the pertinent band aid feats, STR is still always better.
Maybe there is an obvious reason why this is, but if so, it has evaded me for the last 10 years.
This is one of the reasons I like the Fighters attacking 1/level against creatures of less than 1 HD. You can plow through those men at arms and kobolds in 1EAD&D without it costing you two+ feats it does in 3rd+. and since there is no limit on using special polearm abilities the same rules apply to dismounting goblins from their Warg mounts with a Ranseur as well.
(very belatedly) @Hudax:
I think the goal was to make every class have a need for every stat, with the class’s role making it lean on some harder than others. A dex-based character still wants strength for melle for the same reasons that a str-based one still wants dexterity for ranged combat. And AC, which is one possible reason why str benefits its attacks more than dex does its own – dex also gives you another thing.
I have mostly played 3e, with some 5e and Basic, and I think this paradigm of “every stat is good for every character” is the correct one. I wish that later editions had worked to make that more true, rather than the path they actually took in the opposite direction.
A decade after Hudax made that post, we’re in a world where every class cares about two scores: The One They Use For Everything, and Constitution. Wisdom gets some general utility (because of perception) and Charisma gets some in the unlikely event that someone wants face skills but didn’t take one of the four Cha-based classes. But what 5E character ever invests in both Str and Dex? Who besides the Wizard ever even looks at their Int, a stat which has generally just become a tax on people who cannot bring themselves to make their character “stupid,” however little actual impact that has?