If you’ve been following me closely on social media, you’d know that I’m running a 5E game at the FLGS. Yes, I still have a love for those OSR games as well as others like Savage Worlds but it’s the game du jour and it’s pretty darned good.
A couple of the players are pretty new at the whole D&D thing. 5E is simple enough that they don’t have any problem grasping the basics of the rules. That will come in time. What’s really cool is to that bit of wonder, imagination, and fear that appears in their eyes when a “new” monster shows up. They don’t have the Monster Manual memorized. Some of the stock monsters they’ve never faced before. All that old stuff (even though it’s a new edition) is new to them.
Sometimes us old grognards forget that wonder we felt back in the day. The first time we faced a gelatinous cube or a troll. When we didn’t know the standard strengths and weaknesses of monsters. When it was new and weird. So yeah. Maybe sometimes it’s good to forget those things you’ve learned over the years and look at the old “classics” with wonder that we once had.

Roll Dice
Kill Monsters
Take Their Stuff.
Have fun.