OD&D Is a Chainmail Variant

You can’t play OD&D without CHAINMAIL. To put it in other way, if you’re not using CHAINMAIL, you’re not playing OD&D.

And now, thanks to AlchemicRaker, we finally  have all the receipts gathered in one place. Thanks to modern social media technology, I have either shamelessly stolen or selflessly preserved here for posterity, depending on how generous your spirit is.

Frankly, the only thing I can add here is the obvious conclusion that Raker is the foremost leading authority on CHAINMAIL. There isn’t anyone in the hobby who understands the details and practical application of the rules like him, and who has the dedication and writing ability to reach those of us who want a better appreciation of the game.

For decades CHAINMAIL was a mysteriously complex and just out of reach experience for most hobbyists. Analysis was limited to a few out of context passages lightly analyzed using a modern RPG lens by poindexters more interested in burnishing their credentials as an OSR historian. Today, we have an actual practitioner of the game with a complete understanding, not of the words, but how those words translate to the table, to the experience of playing the game.

We are fortunate to live in such times, and to finally comsign the dark ages of the cargo cult OSR to the dustbin of unplayed history.

What follows is entirely his work, and I take no credit for any of it.

The prevailing belief is that the ACS included in OD&D replaces Chainmail

What is missed is that the “normal” combat system in Chainmail is its Mass Combat, while the derived systems are given clear titles like “Man to Man”.

Chainmail begins by launching into its “normal” / core combat system, which is what we tend to qualify as “mass combat”. While it never receives a name, we can recognize it by certain cues, such as referring to 1:20 or 1:10 figure scale combats.

The normal / core combat system in Chainmail is the most thorough when it comes to rules.  Turn Sequence, Movement, Ranged Combat rules, Morale, etc, these are given thorough, multi-page definitions in the “default” system which is simply referred to as “Chainmail”.

Missile Fire (ranged combat) gets only a single paragraph of revision. Ranks Firing, Firing Arc, Cover, etc, are all inherited.

Notice how it is only adjectivally referred to as “the standard ___” or “___ for 1:20”.

Within the Fantasy Supplement, we are given the stats for creatures which can be used for either 1:20 or 1:1 combat.
Note Elves utilizing (normal) “Combat Tables” for 1:20 troop combat, and the Fantasy Combat Table for Heroic-tier 1:1 matchups.

We must briefly touch on the rules for Fantastic Combat. Two dice are rolled when attacking, with the results being Nil, Falls Back, or Killed.

In OD&D Book I, we open with a reference to Chainmail Fantasy Rules (note the Fantasy Rules qualification!). OD&D is replacing the Fantasy Rules (supplementing actually, but we’ll get to that).

OD&D tells us that the “equipage listed” here will provide a “basically complete” experience for all levels of fantastic “wargame play”. Figures are noted to be a positive addition, but are OPTIONAL, and hence NOT listed in the “Recommended Equipment”.

In the Races, we begin to see that these rules are augmenting Chainmail’s rules, for instance the significant Elven advantages versus certain fantastic creatures shown earlier in this thread.

OD&D Book I gives us Fighting Capability for every individual level, allowing this Even Better Fantasy Supplement to be used in both “normal” and “Fantasy” Chainmail combat!

This is not deprecating Chainmail wholesale.  It is simply replacing Chainmail’s Fantasy Combat Table.

Curiously scores are not given for every character level, so there are larger gaps.

Throughout the remainder of OD&D, things like spells and creatures continue to refer to Chainmail with augmentary information, as though it expects you to be using Chainmail – not with any of the other missing details for if you’re NOT using it.

OD&D Book 2 spells it out for us again: Special Abilities of fantasy creatures in Chainmail are used BY DEFAULT, and ONLY new, contradictory information in these books will take precedence over those.

It acts as attacks using the Man to Man table!

Information like this is perfectly opaque and useless unless you’re familiar with and using Chainmail.  But if you’ve been paying attention in this thread, you know exactly what this next entry means now, and how easy it would have been to miss or disregard otherwise.

Conduct Melee with Book I (ACS) or Chainmail’s combat (noting “Drive Back” or “Kill” – this is Fantasy Combat!).
Larger battles can be fought at 1:20 ratio (normal Chainmail), with some additional considerations for 1:1 figures.

In Aerial Combat we get notes like this – referencing the initiative order between two figures in 1:1 melee. This initiative order is not detailed in OD&D, but can be found in Chainmail’s Man to Man combat:

When you understand Chainmail and then read OD&D, you recognize that OD&D is a Chainmail expansion. OD&D primarily expands on the Fantasy Supplement, adds an Alternative Combat System (for Fantasy combat), as well as totally new Naval and Aerial Combat systems for Chainmail.