But, here's the thing. I dig 4E & always felt that 3.x was more Rolemaster than D&D. I missed OD&D, AD&D 1E, BECMI, B/X all of that. C&C is cool, but misses the mark for me. I used to vehemently disagree with ANYONE who felt that Feats & Powers stifle roleplaying. But I dont now. Its not intended in design, but if you make a Feat, to balance you can't let someone narrate that effect. Its not fair to the person who took the feat. And Powers, IMHO are cool & flashy, but instead of focusing on doing cool stuff our group just resource manages our abilities. Now we're all spellcasters. The ideal thing is that we can choose all these different rules that are, originated from, or were inspired by these different editions of D&D or Chainmail. So, our group has played 4E for awhile now & we're looking at trying something less constrained, in our humble opinion. We want to let our imaginations, not Feats or Powers guide our fates. I think 4E is whats best to bring younger players in. Its slick & has terms they understand. I'm apparently a newly formed grognard, because I want to say "I'm doing X." And my DM can say well then add your Level or don't add your Level & let's see what happens, not look over my sheet for the Feat it requires or see which Power to use next.

On rpg.net, regarding "AD&D 3rd Edition"

Mind = Blown

Go suck on your THAC0

Thieves and Traps

"One of the interesting peculiarities about the Supplement I (and Holmes) thief class is that, while it possesses a "remove traps" ability, it does not possess a "find traps" ability, which wasn't introduced until the AD&D Players Handbook and also adopted by the Moldvay rules. (As an aside, it's worth noting that the Cook/Marsh Expert Rulebook lists only "remove traps" as a thief ability on its class tables, although one presumes this is just an editorial glitch). I surmise that the thief lacked an explicit "find traps" ability, since it was simply assumed they had the same chance to find them while searching as any other character class (1 in 6). Thus, thieves were adept only at overcoming traps once found but lacked any special skill in finding them."

From Grognardia

Old School Maps with Excel

http://www.gnomestew.com/tools-for-gms/mapping-for-the-rest-of-us

Initiative and Movement

"In a nutshell, it's an approach that uses variable action speed combined with a cyclic initiative queue to serve as a "positioning" mechanic; i.e., instead of depending on your position on a battlemat, the tactical subsystems are designed to depend on your position in the queue. Most of your options revolve around fiddling with the initiative order; for example, instead of having effects that slide your opponent around the battlefield, you have effects that mess with their position in the queue, generally to their detriment. This is how most turn-based CRPGs out of the last fifteen years have handled tactical positioning."