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View Full Version : Is DnD Dying? The Non-Flamebait/Edition War Version



obliged_salmon
2011-04-13, 07:38 AM
So I saw a similar-titled thread pop up earlier and it quickly devolved into dredge and got locked. Let's try again, a little more civil this time, shall we?

So my question is NOT "is DnD becoming worse with each new edition" but rather, "are many of the interesting fringe/independent games and their ideas outshining DnD and other more mainstream games (Shadowrun, White Wolf, GURPS)?" Roughly speaking, are they showing up the old standard?

Let's talk a bit about some of the independent games on the market, and what they do differently from DnD, and why it might be better.

Burning Wheel/Mouse Guard: My current favorite, these games by Luke Crane say DnD got it wrong. You should put everything on the table, give characters their own agendas to pursue, rather than a GM-driven storyline, and make them fight for their beliefs.

Apocalypse World: While it has "classes" and "experience," this game spells it out for the GM and players. There's only one way to play this game, and it drives with an intensity and electric current that may leave DnD gasping for breath in its wake.

InSpectres: Jared Sorensen's lighthearted mystery/ghost hunting game, where the players can call timeout to do a reality TV style confessional, in order to tell the story before it happens.

Does a game's design have an impact on how player's roleplay? How about game theory? Not the GNS one, the math one. Has anyone played one or two of the many, many independent games growing out there, and found that DnD no longer appeals to them? Has anyone seen/played a few indie games and decided they don't hold up to DnD after all? Where IS our hobby going, and where CAN it go?

DeltaEmil
2011-04-13, 07:44 AM
You ought to change the thread title, because your opener is about a question that is different from your title, and people are going to think you were going to talk about the financial success of D&D (all it's incarnations) instead of if other rpg-systems have more 'interesting' options...

pasko77
2011-04-13, 07:49 AM
Personally, becoming old and grumpy:smalltongue:, I've started to define DnD "not a RPG, but a strategy game", and switched to rules-light system (risus, fudge). Mainly because none in my group is really interested in strategy and we are all content to delegate to a "roll high, win" and a description our conflicts.

I'm not sure wheter the Burning Mouse :smallamused: is correct about giving mechanics to "motivations", but sure is something to try.

I also like WHFB 3rd edition's idea to have a "group sheet" to which all players contribute, so the group is an alive entity. Though I sincerely despise that edition for everything else in it.

The hobby is not changing, per se, it is simply more mainstream than it was 20 years ago. There have always been games in which motivations and whatnot are more important than stats (On Stage, WoD to some extent). Different games stress different parts of the hobby (strategy, recitation, daydreaming, ...)

Totally Guy
2011-04-13, 07:55 AM
I don't think it is.

D&D has one remarkable game theory property. The systems increase in value with the number of players playing them.

It's not just about playing the game it's also about talking about it, finding players, identifying ones self as part of a community.

So the more players of D&D there are, the easier all these periphery elements come together and reinforce each other.

It's these peripheral properities that smaller independent games struggle to gain at all. It's why Monopoly is a household name, and a board game like Puerto Rico (high ranking game on Board Game Geek for years) is unheard of.

Sarco_Phage
2011-04-13, 08:00 AM
D&D has one remarkable game theory property. The systems increase in value with the number of players playing them.

This is something that all the other better systems also have, you know. It's not unique to DnD.

As for myself, I think DnD only survives nowadays because it is the iconic RPG. When the average person sees an image of nerds huddled in the back of a gamer's shop rolling dice, likely he'll assume they're playing DnD. The d20 is strongly associated with both the gaming medium and DnD. For most people, the only RPG they've ever heard of is likely DnD.

It'll coast along on brand recognition and because we, as a commnity, resist change virulently. There are much better systems out there, they're just not Dungeons and Dragons, you know?

Yora
2011-04-13, 08:02 AM
Is dungeon crawl with expendable characters fading into the background and giving way to games about character motivation?

Certainly, and that's happening for decades.

Totally Guy
2011-04-13, 08:05 AM
This is something that all the other better systems also have, you know. It's not unique to DnD.

Oh yeah. That's true.

But D&D, with the biggest player base, carries the most power.

I guess that's why we get edition wars. That power is being juggled. And that's a bit scary.

I suppose this phenomenon is probably why there was the big ol' glut of D20 conversions back in the old days.

valadil
2011-04-13, 08:19 AM
Burning Wheel/Mouse Guard: My current favorite, these games by Luke Crane say DnD got it wrong. You should put everything on the table, give characters their own agendas to pursue, rather than a GM-driven storyline, and make them fight for their beliefs.


I do all those things in DnD. Did I get DnD wrong?

Obrysii
2011-04-13, 08:23 AM
Honestly, I would say that 4th Edition, WoTC's restructuring of their website to Gleemax (is that still around?), and the killing of the paper Dungeon and Dragon magazines, did more to harm the D&D property than anything else.

I know my group, and my extended group, have not purchased anything from WoTC since 4th Edition came out.

Comet
2011-04-13, 08:24 AM
I do all those things in DnD. Did I get DnD wrong?

You can do all those things, but the system itself is built for other things, namely a chain of combat and skill conflicts with clear victory conditions.

That's the problem, the division between 'crunch' and 'fluff'. A good system, in my opinion, doesn't have such a division. The story and the characters should be an intergral part of the design of the game, not just something you can throw on top of mechanical win/lose encounters if you feel like it.

Erom
2011-04-13, 08:24 AM
D&D has one remarkable game theory property. The systems increase in value with the number of players playing them.

Network effect! (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Network_effect)


and a board game like Puerto Rico (high ranking game on Board Game Geek for years) is unheard of.
Or that might be because Puerto Rico is the worst game ever designed :P

Personal preference of course, but Dominion/Caracassone/Settlers all >> Puerto Rico.

Totally Guy
2011-04-13, 08:26 AM
I do all those things in DnD. Did I get DnD wrong?

Absolutely not!

This article by Chatty DM (http://critical-hits.com/2011/02/18/mouseburning-it-hacking-a-rpgs-skill-system-small-press-style/) talks about how he uses Dungeons and Dragons to do those kinds of things and compares them directly to the games Obliged Salmon and I like.

I met chatty at a con a while back. He was a great guy. But I didn't know it was even him until I got back home and found he'd blogged about our encounter!

Edit:

Dominion/Caracassone>> Puerto Rico.

I'd agreed with that but I didn't think anyone would know them. Which was kind of the point...:smallredface:

Eldan
2011-04-13, 08:27 AM
Burning Wheel/Mouse Guard: My current favorite, these games by Luke Crane say DnD got it wrong. You should put everything on the table, give characters their own agendas to pursue, rather than a GM-driven storyline, and make them fight for their beliefs.

:smallconfused:

What? I mean, I don't know what you usually do in D&D, but that's exactly what my games are about. I just set a scene. The characters act.

Jan Mattys
2011-04-13, 08:28 AM
Back in the days, D&D = Roleplay.

Now, D&D is simply the most iconic brand, but a brand nonetheless. Other brands (Vampires, GURPS, you name them) have achieved the legitimate status of acceptable, or even better suited, alternatives for roleplaying.

D&D is still a synonym for Roleplaying Game in the minds of the uninformed, but its prominence in the eyes of the gamers is less evident.

Not that there's anything intrinsecally wrong with D&D: it is not a decaying brand, and it's not jumping the shark. It's just that the potential market expanded and competitors jumped in.

Basically, it's like Microsoft Explorer: back in the days, 95% had explorer, and 5% had Netscape Navigator. Today, 55% use Explorer, 26% use Firefox, and another 20% Safari, Opera, Chrome, etc...

D&D opened the path and still remains strong, but different choices arose for the gamers, and dominating the market became impossible.

As for me, I've been playing and DMing for years now, and my group finally settled for an homebrew version of the WhiteWolf system. We use the dots system for modern roleplay, fantasy roleplay, everything. It's light, extremely customizable, very easy to manage, and very, VERY balanced.
And we successfully played Cyberpunk, Sword&Sorcery, Pirates of the Caribbean, Modern warfare and Call of Cthulhu settings with it.

Just perfect.

Yora
2011-04-13, 08:30 AM
I know my group, and my extended group, have not purchased anything from WoTC since 4th Edition came out.
Just yesterday I bought the Manual of the Planes.

3rd Edition. :smallbiggrin:

Sacrieur
2011-04-13, 08:34 AM
Honestly, I would say that 4th Edition, WoTC's restructuring of their website to Gleemax (is that still around?), and the killing of the paper Dungeon and Dragon magazines, did more to harm the D&D property than anything else.

I know my group, and my extended group, have not purchased anything from WoTC since 4th Edition came out.

I know a lot of people trash WotC for 4e (myself included), but you gotta hand it to them. 4e is a lot more organized and better written than 3.X. And much more streamlined. I say 4e is a step in a good direction for WotC.

obliged_salmon
2011-04-13, 08:35 AM
Certainly DnD is the "iconic" RPG. The layman probably wouldn't even recognize something like 3:16 Carnage Among the Stars as a game unless they flipped through it. Heck, probably not even something like Vampire the Masquerade. Still, those games are getting shelf space not only at FLGS's, but big chain book stores. But might there be a point when DnD loses its iconic status, in favor of all these new ideas?

@valadil: Certainly, you CAN do all those things in DnD, but it's not common. In BW, it's coded into the game rules. For instance, each PC has three or four beliefs/goals on their character sheet, and they get in-game rewards for pursuing them.

Comet
2011-04-13, 08:38 AM
On D&D dying:

I sincerely hope that D&D will live on. It might not be my favourite system, but the presence of a clear giant in the roleplaying market makes it much easier for newcomers to get into the hobby.
If, instead of Dungeons and Dragons, they would only run into a dozen independently produced games at the local game shop, the threshold to pick one up and start playing would be pretty high.

I began with Dungeons and Dragons, the old Red Box I got as a gift mind, and it really made the whole process that much easier. I know because we tried to play with other systems with my mates back then, before we got D&D, and they did a really poor job of explaining what the whole thing was really about. It was all very occult and so we gave up, until I got lucky and scored the aforementioned Red Box.

I really don't want to see this hobby become even more of an esoteric affair, with dozens of mysterious rulebooks and an impenetrable field of alternatives and niche games to wade through. D&D is an easy entry point and the more accessible this hobby is, the better.

Cartigan
2011-04-13, 08:51 AM
So I saw a similar-titled thread pop up earlier and it quickly devolved into dredge and got locked. Let's try again, a little more civil this time, shall we?

So my question is NOT "is DnD becoming worse with each new edition" but rather, "are many of the interesting fringe/independent games and their ideas outshining DnD and other more mainstream games (Shadowrun, White Wolf, GURPS)?" Roughly speaking, are they showing up the old standard?

Let's talk a bit about some of the independent games on the market, and what they do differently from DnD, and why it might be better.

Burning Wheel/Mouse Guard: My current favorite, these games by Luke Crane say DnD got it wrong. You should put everything on the table, give characters their own agendas to pursue, rather than a GM-driven storyline, and make them fight for their beliefs.

Apocalypse World: While it has "classes" and "experience," this game spells it out for the GM and players. There's only one way to play this game, and it drives with an intensity and electric current that may leave DnD gasping for breath in its wake.

InSpectres: Jared Sorensen's lighthearted mystery/ghost hunting game, where the players can call timeout to do a reality TV style confessional, in order to tell the story before it happens.

Does a game's design have an impact on how player's roleplay? How about game theory? Not the GNS one, the math one. Has anyone played one or two of the many, many independent games growing out there, and found that DnD no longer appeals to them? Has anyone seen/played a few indie games and decided they don't hold up to DnD after all? Where IS our hobby going, and where CAN it go?

This is the first time I have ever heard of two of those and only barely heard of the third (Mouse Guard). On the other hand, I can pick up D&D games in a big box store (for a change)

I think it's winning still.

Yora
2011-04-13, 08:53 AM
But might there be a point when DnD loses its iconic status, in favor of all these new ideas?
Yes. I think that is pretty much uncontested.

Sacrieur
2011-04-13, 09:04 AM
D&D is certainly not dying, perhaps you should take a look at this (http://www.google.com/trends?q=D%26D%2C+burning+wheel%2C+mouse+guard%2C+ Apocalypse+world%2C+inspectres&ctab=0&geo=us&geor=all&date=all&sort=0).

Yora
2011-04-13, 09:07 AM
That chart is missing lables, but it does look like a drop of about 50%.

obliged_salmon
2011-04-13, 09:09 AM
On D&D dying:

I sincerely hope that D&D will live on. It might not be my favourite system, but the presence of a clear giant in the roleplaying market makes it much easier for newcomers to get into the hobby.
If, instead of Dungeons and Dragons, they would only run into a dozen independently produced games at the local game shop, the threshold to pick one up and start playing would be pretty high.

I began with Dungeons and Dragons, the old Red Box I got as a gift mind, and it really made the whole process that much easier. I know because we tried to play with other systems with my mates back then, before we got D&D, and they did a really poor job of explaining what the whole thing was really about. It was all very occult and so we gave up, until I got lucky and scored the aforementioned Red Box.

I really don't want to see this hobby become even more of an esoteric affair, with dozens of mysterious rulebooks and an impenetrable field of alternatives and niche games to wade through. D&D is an easy entry point and the more accessible this hobby is, the better.

To some extent, I really agree with this. DnD does a good job of bearing its responsibility of "game new players are most likely to encounter." Some games do not assume new players, and specifically say so at the front of the book, then dive into the heavy stuff. BW is great, but it took me the better part of a year to really wrap my head around it.

However, does DnD teach bad habits to new players? My first game was 3.5 DnD, and it quickly taught me a few important lessons. First, that optimization was the only way I could assert control in the game context. Second, that the closer my character's goals aligned with the GM's story, the more fun I had. Third, that social encounters will be resolved in a way that's almost entirely dependent on the DM, so suck up to him in those situations.

Yes, I also learned that roleplaying is awesome, but at what cost? I wouldn't recommend new players jump into something like Dogs in the Vinyard, but maybe Mutants and Masterminds? 7th Sea? I guess it also depends on the genre you're looking for.

Eldan
2011-04-13, 09:14 AM
That sounds more like D&D failure than anything else, though.

Also, on the D&D chart: look at worldwide. That's a massive, continuous drop.

Sarco_Phage
2011-04-13, 09:15 AM
D&D is certainly not dying, perhaps you should take a look at this (http://www.google.com/trends?q=D%26D%2C+burning+wheel%2C+mouse+guard%2C+ Apocalypse+world%2C+inspectres&ctab=0&geo=us&geor=all&date=all&sort=0).

That graph proves the opposite of your point, buddy.

potatocubed
2011-04-13, 09:19 AM
I think D&D's survival is something to do with the 'second-best' phenomenon (probably not its actual name).

As in, games can be largely divided into three tiers:

1. Your Favourite Games. You want to play these so bad it burns.
2. Whatever. Sure, you'll play if that's what your group wants.
3. No Way. You'll walk if these games come up.

D&D, I think, sits in most people's 'Whatever' tier. It's easy to get your group to play D&D because, while it might not be stupendously amazing, it's good enough for most things. It's an easy compromise when you're pitching the next campaign.

Plus, there's the previously mentioned stuff about brand recognition and the network effect, plus support: D&D has countless modules for when you can't think of an adventure, and the answer to any rules question is a 30-second Google search away.

AslanCross
2011-04-13, 09:27 AM
Perhaps other games are more well-made. Perhaps I'm relatively new to RPing and thus have much to learn. Perhaps other systems are cheaper, or free, or worth the money. I still play D&D. It works fine for me.

No, I don't think D&D is dying.

Sarco_Phage
2011-04-13, 09:28 AM
Perhaps other games are more well-made. Perhaps I'm relatively new to RPing and thus have much to learn. Perhaps other systems are cheaper, or free, or worth the money. I still play D&D. It works fine for me.

No, I don't think D&D is dying.

How many players have you found locally recently? :smallamused:

It took me years to find a group in Paranaque.

Cartigan
2011-04-13, 09:31 AM
That graph proves the opposite of your point, buddy.

Search trends don't really mean a lot. It implies some stuff, but that's about it. D&D is still head and shoulder above those games he mentioned - even on a downward slope. Besides Mouse Guard, they don't even register.

Sure, Chrome is pulling off percentages of the browser market from Firefox, but Firefox is still the second largest browser market in the world, even losing a few percentage points. And while on a downward trend, IE will ALWAYS be number 1 because businesses use it.

Sarco_Phage
2011-04-13, 09:33 AM
Search trends don't really mean a lot. It implies some stuff, but that's about it. D&D is still head and shoulder above those games he mentioned. Besides Mouse Guard, they don't even register.

Ahhh, compared to the ones in OP's post? Well, yeah, by any metric DnD is doing a lot better.

I'm just saying, the graph indicates a decline, rather than an increase. I thought he was just trying to say DnD's popularity had increased.

Cartigan
2011-04-13, 09:35 AM
How many players have you found locally recently? :smallamused:

It took me years to find a group in Paranaque.
Compared to what? Pathfinder? Mouse Guard? The entire World of Darkness? Exalted? Mouse Guard? Shadowrun? Scion? Legend of the Five Rings? The games he mentioned that I have never heard of?

AslanCross
2011-04-13, 09:36 AM
How many players have you found locally recently? :smallamused:

It took me years to find a group in Paranaque.

My group's been around for 3 years. After I played it, some of my younger students started their own group.

It's a niche interest, sure, and definitely so in this country, where people prefer...other forms of entertainment, but I don't think it says that D&D in particular is dying.

The Neutral Grounds stores I buy my books? People are still actually buying the old 3.5 stock, as well as the 4E stock. Someone still buys the miniatures. Evidently there is still enough interest to move merchandise, and that's in a country where the the tabletop gaming demographic is truly tiny.

T.G. Oskar
2011-04-13, 09:36 AM
and a board game like Puerto Rico (high ranking game on Board Game Geek for years) is unheard of.

Or that might be because Puerto Rico is the worst game ever designed :P

I just read this out of context, and I had to laugh. If only because it applies so badly to the political/economical/social situation of the island itself. In so many ways.

I have half a mind to sig this. For the lulz, of course. Just for the heck of it; is it really that bad? I've heard that it isn't, but that's probably because BGG is the only place I ever heard of it, and because it's a generic piracy/Spanish colonial setting.

Anyways, on to topic:
I don't really believe D&D is dying, if only because of brand-name recognition as many have stated, and probably because it's the first contact with a tabletop RPG most people have. While that wasn't my case (the first contact in my case was with GURPS), there's a good segment of the tabletop role-player population that started, or has played with, any edition of the D&D rules and their changes.

Thing is, 4e marks a change in the paradigm that ruled D&D up until recently. 3.5 shifted things a lot, made things easier and most people got used to it, but it still had a lot of baggage from the earlier systems. 4e, compared to AD&D, is almost unrecognizable.

On the other hand, when such a change in paradigm happens, people start to find something else out of a desire to supplant their original passion. White Wolf games exist since quite some time (roughly while AD&D was right at the top) and it has remained as a competitor for some time. GURPS, on the other hand, is largely unheard of, and it has already three revisions to the rules. However, market-wise, WotC dominates because of the promotion it has, and inherently had. Most other games were promoted in geek culture media (mostly Dungeon and Dragon magazines, in rare occasions on other 'zines such as Wizard), but WotC expanded on the media and got a good chunk of the people that currently play RPGs. Be it through panic or through marketing, D&D has always been on the minds of people everywhere.

So, considering it through that POV, D&D hardly has to fear regarding its stability, because it has the better marketing media. White Wolf and Games Workshop have started to diversify their media, by making videogames (something D&D had ever since the 2nd Gen/3rd Gen consoles) and products aside their main selling point. White Wolf has, IMO, successfully adapted and placed its influence over the years regarding the supernatural, to the point that vampires, whose lore has supplanted from their original zombie-like state to the seductive bloodsucker, are almost intricately tied to their portrayal of tragedy (or angst, depending on how you see it) explained on Vampire games. Said portrayal has shifted recently with Twilight, Vampire Diaries and partly thanks to Anne Rice, but again, here's where the Vampire games show their adaptation, because you can make those kinds of characters, and then just bash them with around a dozen different portrayals of the vampire.

On the other hand, Games Workshop has appeared as a recent competitor thanks to, largely, expies. Warhammer and WH40K wouldn't be the same without their two expies, the better known Blizzard ones (Warcraft/Starcraft) and their direct expy competitors (Hordes/Warmachine). Seeing how WotC and White Wolf have exploited out-of-media marketing, they got Dawn of War and WHFRPG Online, and they've realized their shares have increased.

However, despite that and the advent of the Internet in terms of publishing, WotC was and to an extent still is ahead of their times, and that is integral to the survival of the D&D brand. What happens within us, the players who know D&D pretty much to the core, is that to an extent we're either growing up from the fad, or wishing to experiment something different. The first people probably wished that 4E was an improvement over 3.5 or simply explored everything 3.5 (and earlier editions) had to offer; the latter still prefer the system because it's what they're most familiar with, but now realize there are different systems because of how the Internet promotes them and seeks to experiment. None of these are real threats to the stability of WotC or D&D as a brand to the extent that they're diversifying the market, and making people realize there's something of worth regarding different systems. Most people make their systems with the idea of separating a bit from the concept of D&D, and probably go a bit further into the Gamist or Narrativist conceptions instead of the Simulationist conceptions of roleplaying. But, in the end, when people look for THE brand of RPGs, they'll probably be conditioned to say "D&D" much like Square-Enix has done to most Americans (on the continental context) regarding console RPGs.

So, in a nutshell: not really; it's quite alive. It's probably that most of the people who are wondering this are looking for something new. However, just go around any FLGS, and you'll see most people going either WotC, White Wolf or Games Workshop, with the rare people going GURPS, RIFTS or any of the other companies. I'd say that perception is mostly personal rather than observational, if only because after 3.5, most of the people who started there and don't like 4E that much are the people who most likely are questioning themselves whether D&D is dead. The newcomers? They are too busy playing the newest edition; wait until 5E and they'll probably make the same question.

Besides, if you have any questions about whether D&D is dead, just ask Buhlman and Paizo. Or the guys who do OSRIC, Castles & Crusades, or any of the LARPers that base their systems on AD&D, actually. They may deliver a different answer (the brand has evolved, but the rules are still alive).

Sarco_Phage
2011-04-13, 09:38 AM
Compared to what? Pathfinder? Mouse Guard? The entire World of Darkness? Exalted? Mouse Guard? Shadowrun? Scion? Legend of the Five Rings? The games he mentioned that I have never heard of?

A decline compared to itself in previous years, dude. Based on that graph alone, people are searching for DnD less than they were years ago, which was the opposite of what I thought he was implying. I didn't even notice the other ones when I opened the link the first time.

Oh and you should totally try Dogs in the Vineyard, it's badass.

Cartigan
2011-04-13, 09:41 AM
A decline compared to itself in previous years, dude. Based on that graph alone, people are searching for DnD less than they were years ago, which was the opposite of what I thought he was implying.
Which effectively means nothing.

SPoD
2011-04-13, 09:41 AM
Yes. I think that is pretty much uncontested.

Oh, I contest that. Very much.

D&D will outlast every other roleplaying game currently in existence. What actually constitutes "D&D" will change, but it will still be going in twenty years, and all those independent systems will not. Because D&D is owned by a massive corporation that doesn't care that people on a message board complain about it. It still sells to people who have never heard of this message board. In a few years, they'll put out a 5th edition, then a 6th, then so on. Even if it dies off in popularity, it'll just wait 10 years and stage a comeback, filled with nostalgia for the Good Old Days of D&D. It's a cultural touchstone. No other roleplaying game has that kind of staying power.

Will there still be independent systems in 20 years? Of course. There will always be independent systems. But they will never rise to truly challenge D&D's dominance. They will always be short-lived alternatives. The term "roleplaying games" does not exist to the mainstream public. Or it does, but it's referring to console RPGs like Final Fantasy. If you walk up to someone and say "roleplaying games," they will be confused until you say, "You know, like D&D." That confusion means that any given tabletop roleplaying game can only ever be less popular than D&D.

Sarco_Phage
2011-04-13, 09:43 AM
Which effectively means nothing.

Well, yeah. It comes down to me misunderstanding what he was using the graph to indicate.

Sacrieur
2011-04-13, 09:43 AM
That graph proves the opposite of your point, buddy.

Ever since 2008, the search index hasn't changed much. A slight decrease, but it is more of a level off than anything. Right now if you fit the data to a function it would be modeled by some rational function that would decrease less and less.

Sarco_Phage
2011-04-13, 09:45 AM
Ever since 2008, the search index hasn't changed much. A slight decrease, but it is more of a level off than anything. Right now if you fit the data to a function it would be modeled by some rational function that would decrease less and less.

No no, I didn't notice what you were trying to actually indicate with the graph earlier, which is why I thought it indicated the opposite.

Sacrieur
2011-04-13, 09:46 AM
No no, I didn't notice what you were trying to actually indicate with the graph earlier, which is why I thought it indicated the opposite.

Well, I didn't want to take it out of context and go, "LOOK THERE SEE!" Anyway, it also shows the sheer difference between those other RPGs and D&D, which I believe was a point in topic in this thread.

Sarco_Phage
2011-04-13, 09:47 AM
Well, I didn't want to take it out of context and go, "LOOK THERE SEE!" Anyway, it also shows the sheer difference between those other RPGs and D&D, which I believe was a point in topic in this thread.

Yeah, that's the thing I didn't notice. :P

obliged_salmon
2011-04-13, 10:01 AM
Okay, so let's assume that DnD CAN continue to dominate the market indefinitely. Should it? Are there games out there that might make better icons for our hobby, if given the chance? Or does DnD work for what it is: a gateway drug for some, a steady rock for others?

Sarco_Phage
2011-04-13, 10:02 AM
Okay, so let's assume that DnD CAN continue to dominate the market indefinitely. Should it? Are there games out there that might make better icons for our hobby, if given the chance? Or does DnD work for what it is: a gateway drug for some, a steady rock for others?

Not really, I've always been fine with DnD as the introductory factor. Especially with the advent of a more simplified edition, it allows more people into the hobby.

It's like, when you're teaching someone to bike, you usually give them training wheels. DnD can be the training wheels.

I don't think anyone is going to argue that DnD in any edition is objectively the best face of the hobby or even objectively the best system, though.

Vladislav
2011-04-13, 10:04 AM
D&D is not dying. It's just mutating.

potatocubed
2011-04-13, 10:07 AM
Honestly, I think video games and tabletop wargames are the 'gateway drug' - GW has a street presence far in advance of anything roleplaying-related, and that pales next to the sales of computer RPGs.

P.S. I love Puerto Rico. The game. I've never been to the island. I also can't stand Carcassone. YMMV.

Totally Guy
2011-04-13, 10:07 AM
I think that D&D can continue to develop in such a way that it can incorporate the best of the new ideas into itself.

The biggest obstacle to this is the dogmatic nature of a lot of players.

potatocubed
2011-04-13, 10:08 AM
The biggest obstacle to this is the dogmatic nature of a lot of players.

No it isn't!

...:smalltongue:

I've seen it referred to elsewhere as the Wall of Nerd, which is as good a title as any.

Bagelz
2011-04-13, 10:10 AM
1 puertorico is an improvment on settlers. I feel bad for those who haven't realized it yet.

2 You can role-play with sufficiently with any system out there. Heck you don't need a system, its called make believe, but we have rules so that everyone can have similar expectations and a manner to settle disagreements. (how many 5 year olds have we seen arguing about whether his super duper special armor would protect him from the other 7 year old's super duper special weapon).

If you think a system will limit your ability to portray a character (it might limit your ability to be a disruptive source of rediculousness), then I feel bad for you. If you need rules to force other players to play in the same manner as you, then you should find a different group, or grow up and realize you don't need to play the same way.

I have a feeling that some people have a problem with the type of player dnd has attracted lately (ie the more mainstream computer gamers) and because of that haven't given it a chance.

I've noticed that most 3.x players i know still play 3.x or pathfinder, and most 2e or adnd players i know have moved to 4e, because 3.x was too complex when it came out. I can't find players for world of darkness or warhammer, or any other system, so i'm stuck with dnd (and even then a group can be difficult to find). So I prefer to dm 4e because its easier, and I prefer to play 3.x because its more varied.

SPoD
2011-04-13, 10:10 AM
Honestly, I think video games and tabletop wargames are the 'gateway drug' - GW has a street presence far in advance of anything roleplaying-related, and that pales next to the sales of computer RPGs.

Agreed. Computer games are the gateway, D&D is the first addiction. Indie games are the hardcore stuff you start trying when you can't get your roleplaying high from D&D anymore. They'll never appeal directly to people who aren't already hooked.

Reverent-One
2011-04-13, 10:11 AM
I don't think anyone is going to argue that DnD in any edition is objectively the best face of the hobby or even objectively the best system, though.

Which is probably mostly because you can't really say those things objectively about about something as subjective as game system preferences.

Sarco_Phage
2011-04-13, 10:12 AM
Agreed. Computer games are the gateway, D&D is the first addiction. Indie games are the hardcore stuff you start trying when you can't get your roleplaying high from D&D anymore. They'll never appeal directly to people who aren't already hooked.

What does that make high-priced tabletop wargames like Warmahordes or 40k?

I'm pretty sure they count as Ecstasy, except they don't feel as good.

Ernir
2011-04-13, 10:28 AM
I don't know what the dominant tabletop RPG of the future will be like, but I know it will be called D&D.

Sacrieur
2011-04-13, 10:33 AM
I don't know what the dominant tabletop RPG of the future will be like, but I know it will be called D&D.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n94E3IeBquY

Jan Mattys
2011-04-13, 10:33 AM
I don't know what the dominant tabletop RPG of the future will be like, but I know it will be called D&D.

Which, in itself, is the same as saying that D&D is not a game any more. It is a brand.

The brand won't die, but the thing that was called "D&D" won't be D&D any more.

If the only thing you are sure will identify D&D in the future is the brand name, it can be assumed that you accept the fact that it can chage in many a different direction.

Some could well say that extreme shapechange equals death, because nothin about the original is there any more.

Sarco_Phage
2011-04-13, 10:38 AM
Which, in itself, is the same as saying that D&D is not a game any more. It is a brand.

The brand won't die, but the thing that was called "D&D" won't be D&D any more.

I fail to see the problem with this.

Zaydos
2011-04-13, 10:43 AM
1. Race for the Galaxy is more fun than Puerto Rico.

2. D&D isn't dying or going anywhere.

3. D&D is about role-playing not stats unless you make it about the latter.

4. It's still the most popular among my IRL friends, even though they occasionally play HackMaster, WoD, Pathfinder, GammaWorld, Paranoia, they play them in addition to D&D not in replacement of; and Pathfinder got complaints (haven't played it myself). Nobody plays all of the above, but pretty much everyone who plays any of them plays D&D.

Sarco_Phage
2011-04-13, 10:45 AM
3. D&D is about role-playing not stats unless you make it about the latter.

You can say that about almost any tabletop RPG, though.

stainboy
2011-04-13, 11:21 AM
I suspect D&D the brand is in trouble because of WotC's marketing strategy for 4e.

Everyone here knows 4e isn't for everyone, right? If this were 15-20 years ago, we'd probably have a whole set of optional rules to make it into the game we wanted. We wouldn't play 4e core, we'd play AD&D 4e Player's Option, but we'd still buy D&D products.

If this were 10 years ago and 4e were an OGL game, we'd also have options Either a 3rd party publisher would put out a Core rebuild, or WotC would do it themselves because if they didn't someone else would.

WotC's new strategy is to tell people what they want. No optional rules expansions, no third party support, nothing outside of the one true way to play 4e. That makes it possible to sell the Character Builder and it might work for a niche game with a small loyal audience. But it doesn't work for a brand that has traditionally dominated the hobby.

Reverent-One
2011-04-13, 11:51 AM
No optional rules expansions,

What do you call splatbooks, especially stuff like the Essentials line?


no third party support,

Huh, guess that 3rd party 4e material I've seen (and used) was just a figment of my imagination.

Cartigan
2011-04-13, 12:20 PM
I suspect D&D the brand is in trouble because of WotC's marketing strategy for 4e.

Everyone here knows 4e isn't for everyone, right? If this were 15-20 years ago, we'd probably have a whole set of optional rules to make it into the game we wanted. We wouldn't play 4e core, we'd play AD&D 4e Player's Option, but we'd still buy D&D products.

If this were 10 years ago and 4e were an OGL game, we'd also have options Either a 3rd party publisher would put out a Core rebuild, or WotC would do it themselves because if they didn't someone else would.

WotC's new strategy is to tell people what they want. No optional rules expansions, no third party support, nothing outside of the one true way to play 4e. That makes it possible to sell the Character Builder and it might work for a niche game with a small loyal audience. But it doesn't work for a brand that has traditionally dominated the hobby.
What makes it possible to sell the character builder is you get access to every game rule ever created before the point of purchase and a character creator.

Sarco_Phage
2011-04-13, 12:23 PM
If this were 10 years ago and 4e were an OGL game, we'd also have options Either a 3rd party publisher would put out a Core rebuild, or WotC would do it themselves because if they didn't someone else would.

Ehhh, you can blame the BoEF for souring WotC on OGL content,

John Campbell
2011-04-13, 12:24 PM
My experience is that most of the games around these parts that are being called "D&D" these days aren't really anymore. They're usually Pathfinder core with 3.5 supplements, though the amount of 3.5 is decreasing as more pure-Pathfinder material comes out. And I know a lot of people who bought the 4E books, but I don't know very many who are actually playing it. The plural of "anecdote" is not "data", of course, but that's what I'm seeing.

On the flip side, if I want a game that's not D&D/d20-based, I still have to run it myself.

stainboy
2011-04-13, 12:35 PM
What do you call splatbooks, especially stuff like the Essentials line?

Huh, guess that 3rd party 4e material I've seen (and used) was just a figment of my imagination.

If that was unclear, I'm not talking about additional material using the same rules. I'm talking about, say, the difference between the 2e Player's Handbook and Skills and Powers, or the 3e Player's Handbook and BESM d20 or Arcana Unearthed. (Or Unearthed Arcana, for that matter.)

Third parties are not allowed to rebuild the core rules under the GSL, so no third party content fits those criteria.



What makes it possible to sell the character builder is you get access to every game rule ever created before the point of purchase and a character creator.

Which would be useless if every group allowed different options. You couldn't publish a paid character builder for AD&D2e. Would it use Skills & Powers? NWPs? Wild Talents? Encumbrance? Kits? How would you even generate your stats?

3e would be a little easier, but 3e has so many build options and very few groups use all of them. You'd get characters who picked all their feats out of Complete Champion and then found out Complete Champion was banned.

DeltaEmil
2011-04-13, 12:42 PM
I've never used third-party supplements, and I doubt that many others do either. It's because most just think that third-party material must obviously be overpowered or imbalanced in some way. Others might think that they aren't 'official', so they're banned anyway if they go to a new group.

I personally just didn't care for them, and I don't want to go search for the good material amongst the bad ones.

Tyndmyr
2011-04-13, 01:09 PM
Honestly, I would say that 4th Edition, WoTC's restructuring of their website to Gleemax (is that still around?), and the killing of the paper Dungeon and Dragon magazines, did more to harm the D&D property than anything else.

I know my group, and my extended group, have not purchased anything from WoTC since 4th Edition came out.

Would agree. My group played one campaign with 4th ed. Then everyone sold off their books. I think going price was about $5 per, since they were sufficiently undesired among people we know.

However, on the plus side, we bought a lot of older 3.x books, some 2nd ed, and a couple of us branched off into pathfinder. Pathfinder hasn't really replaced 3.5 for us, but enough of us consider it a useful resource that lots of it gets bought.

I don't think that 4th ed is a bad game, but I think that it's release was terrible for D&D, because it split the market down the middle. Either a dramatic flop and rollback to 3.5 or an epic win and transfer of most players would have been better for WoTC. As it is, they basically handed half their customers to Pazio. Poor business move.

They should have called it something else instead, and developed D&D separately. 4e is sufficiently unique to have pulled it off, and still be successful.

Edit: It IS rare to use third party supplements. I make an exception for pathfinder...but while I own a fair number of third party books for D&D specifically, I almost never use them. The average quality of those books is low.

Reverent-One
2011-04-13, 01:20 PM
If that was unclear, I'm not talking about additional material using the same rules. I'm talking about, say, the difference between the 2e Player's Handbook and Skills and Powers, or the 3e Player's Handbook and BESM d20 or Arcana Unearthed. (Or Unearthed Arcana, for that matter.)

And 4e has the Essentials line serving as it's Unearthed Arcana, with alternate class builds that work differently than the standard ones, random treasure tables for those that don't like the parcel system, ect.


Third parties are not allowed to rebuild the core rules under the GSL, so no third party content fits those criteria.

Leaving aside the whole 3rd party material doesn't seem to be commonly used due to quality reasons concern, what benefit is there to a 3rd core rules rebuild? Obviously the 3rd party benefits from being able to make a profit with 75+% of the work already done for them (which is why it's understandable that WotC doesn't want others to mooch off their work), but beyond that, what?

stainboy
2011-04-13, 01:54 PM
And 4e has the Essentials line serving as it's Unearthed Arcana, with alternate class builds that work differently than the standard ones, random treasure tables for those that don't like the parcel system, ect.

Acting as an optional 4e ruleset was never Essentials' goal. Even if it does have occasional compatibility issues.

More importantly, do you believe Essentials achieved its goal of appealing to a broader audience, or addressed anyone's concerns with 4e? I've seen people express interest in it as a source of new classes for 4e, but I've never seen anyone say "I didn't like 4e, but this Essentials thing is awesome!" If nothing else I guarantee that Essentials offers nothing to 3.5 holdouts.



Leaving aside the whole 3rd party material doesn't seem to be commonly used due to quality reasons concern, what benefit is there to a 3rd core rules rebuild? Obviously the 3rd party benefits from being able to make a profit with 75+% of the work already done for them (which is why it's understandable that WotC doesn't want others to mooch off their work), but beyond that, what?

We're talking about whether WotC's marketing direction is good for keeping D&D as the dominant game in the hobby, not whether it makes financial sense. (I'm not sure it even makes financial sense, but that's a separate argument.)

DeltaEmil
2011-04-13, 02:00 PM
Enworld and rpgnet had people who did say they didn't like 4th edition, but when Essentials came out, they switched.

Of course, there are also some who do like 4th edition, but not Essentials.

In the end, all that matters is if Wizards of the Coast still makes some money with D&D. Appearently, it does, especially with that D&D online compendium stuff. And if that is true, then this is good business, as the d20srd is still hugely popular (especially for its free content), and there seems to be enough people who do pay money to get all the rules (and officially updated as soon as possible).

Reverent-One
2011-04-13, 02:18 PM
Acting as an optional 4e ruleset was never Essentials' goal. Even if it does have occasional compatibility issues.

More importantly, do you believe Essentials achieved its goal of appealing to a broader audience, or addressed anyone's concerns with 4e? I've seen people express interest in it as a source of new classes for 4e, but I've never seen anyone say "I didn't like 4e, but this Essentials thing is awesome!" If nothing else I guarantee that Essentials offers nothing to 3.5 holdouts.

I've never seen anyone say "I don't like 3.5, but Unearthed Arcana is awesome!", so I don't see how that's relevant to this discussion.


We're talking about whether WotC's marketing direction is good for keeping D&D relevant to the vast majority of gamers, not whether it makes financial sense. (I'm not sure it even makes financial sense, but that's a separate argument.)

Hence why I asked what the benefit of third parties writing core rebuilds was, which I notice you avoided answering.

Sarco_Phage
2011-04-13, 02:21 PM
I've never seen anyone say "I don't like 3.5, but Unearthed Arcana is awesome!", so I don't see how that's relevant to this discussion.

You mentioned, I believe, that Essentials is the Arcana to 4E. However his point is that people would actually choose Essentials over 4E because it is meant to stand alone; however they don't. UA is not. It's really just a supplement to 3.5.

I think. I haven't read Essentials.

Reverent-One
2011-04-13, 02:25 PM
You mentioned, I believe, that Essentials is the Arcana to 4E. However his point is that people would actually choose Essentials over 4E because it is meant to stand alone; however they don't. UA is not. It's really just a supplement to 3.5.

Ah, but he said UA was not just a supplement to 3.5 (since supplements are just "additional material using the same rules"), it was something that 4e (apparently) lacks any version of.

stainboy
2011-04-13, 02:41 PM
Hence why I asked what the benefit of third parties writing core rebuilds was, which I notice you avoided answering.

Much as I love a good edition war thread, this isn't supposed to be one. In the interest of keeping it that way I'd rather not list things that could be offered in such an optional ruleset. If you want a list of reasons people still play 3.5, use the Search function.


You mentioned, I believe, that Essentials is the Arcana to 4E. However his point is that people would actually choose Essentials over 4E because it is meant to stand alone; however they don't. UA is not. It's really just a supplement to 3.5.

Other way around, actually. Essentials is 100% compatible with 4e, or at least it's supposed to be. It's the same 4e ruleset, just presented differently. The new classes are simpler, but you can play an Essentials slayer alongside a PHB1 fighter.

Compare to Pathfinder vs 3.5, or Combat & Tactics/Skills & Powers vs AD&D core, or AD&D vs BECMI. Different rulesets. (And again, if I seem like I'm being evasive about why this would broaden 4e's appeal, it's because I'm trying to stay out of edition war territory.)

DeltaEmil
2011-04-13, 03:21 PM
I do play 3.5, but it has definitely nothing to do with 3rd-party-material.

candycorn
2011-04-13, 03:38 PM
@valadil: Certainly, you CAN do all those things in DnD, but it's not common. In BW, it's coded into the game rules. For instance, each PC has three or four beliefs/goals on their character sheet, and they get in-game rewards for pursuing them.

Quest and Goal experience is discussed in 3.X's DMG. Not sure about 4ed, as I haven't tried it... But I know that Objective and Goal experience is brought up.

I, as a player, and a DM, swear by it. In my groups, every character has their own goals that are part of a character's backstory. The group also has goals, based on character agreement.

When progress is made on a group goal (Identifying the creature responsible for the dissention that the group has been hired time and again to quell, for example), everyone in the group gains XP.

When progress is made on a personal goal (a pc manages to track down someone who was involved in the burning of his childhood homestead, and successfully gains information about those responsible), then the player involved gains XP.

Nero24200
2011-04-13, 03:52 PM
If this were 10 years ago and 4e were an OGL game, we'd also have options Either a 3rd party publisher would put out a Core rebuild, or WotC would do it themselves because if they didn't someone else would.

To be fair it's hard to really blame WotC for not having a decent OGL for 4E. They had one for 3.5 and as a result they now have a another competiter (Paizo) that's using their game as a base and making a fair bit of money off of it. Pathfinder isn't like Iron Heroes which offers a different feel for the game, people who buy it are likely to buy it instead of D'n'D.

It's just plain common sense to axe idea's that will get other companies rich at your expense.

Don't get me wrong, I think they should make it easier for 3rd party publishers to get involved, but it's hard for me to blame them when they don't.

Bagelz
2011-04-13, 03:54 PM
I never thought of it before, but I think the UA comparison is very apt. or even a the tome of battle comparison (only backwards).

Essentials was created because people complained that encounter/daily powers didn't make sense for martial characters, so they went and gave them stances and class abilities instead of powers at every level, making them more like 3.x fighters/rangers/rouges.
They are completely compatible and the only reason some people (myself included) don't like it is that they removed the consistency of the system. I couldn't tell you how to build an essentials character because it depends on the character.

There are people who love and who ban tome of battle, there are people who love and hate essentials.

CarpeGuitarrem
2011-04-13, 04:01 PM
Quest and Goal experience is discussed in 3.X's DMG. Not sure about 4ed, as I haven't tried it... But I know that Objective and Goal experience is brought up.

I, as a player, and a DM, swear by it. In my groups, every character has their own goals that are part of a character's backstory. The group also has goals, based on character agreement.

When progress is made on a group goal (Identifying the creature responsible for the dissention that the group has been hired time and again to quell, for example), everyone in the group gains XP.

When progress is made on a personal goal (a pc manages to track down someone who was involved in the burning of his childhood homestead, and successfully gains information about those responsible), then the player involved gains XP.
There's a somewhat biggish deal made out of them in 4th Edition, but in the end there's not much else in the system to support it. There's nothing to really back up advancement beyond combat. There's a mechanism to provide an "XP budget" for combat encounters, but nothing to really flesh out the idea of non-combat advancement.

It's possible in D&D, but these other systems (like Burning Wheel and even World of Darkness) are taking alternative methods of advancement and working them into the rules in a far more fluid way that encourages advancement in non-combat ways.

Gamgee
2011-04-13, 04:17 PM
No it's not dieing. Our local hobby ship has weekly games of 4e and nWod and one other system. Along with table top war games. Hell they have a forum for local people to start games and play on. Or at least organize to meet in store or anywhere.

It took me roughly.... 3 months to get a reply when the site was new. I post an advertisement now it can take a few weeks. This is a vast improvement over the nothing and zero presence the game had before. Given what people are saying about their own towns/cities I feel sort of lucky now that I realize I have such a great network of interested players.

Not to mention the store brings in lots of nerds from various walks of nerdom. So there's always a good chance new players will show up. Hell at one point I got asked if I was interested in running a game in the store for them to help with a promotion. I declined, deciding to stick with my friends, but it's a network I can draw upon if I need it. And the store owners know me half decently. So all is well.

stainboy
2011-04-13, 04:34 PM
To be fair it's hard to really blame WotC for not having a decent OGL for 4E. They had one for 3.5 and as a result they now have a another competiter (Paizo) that's using their game as a base and making a fair bit of money off of it. Pathfinder isn't like Iron Heroes which offers a different feel for the game, people who buy it are likely to buy it instead of D'n'D.

I don't think 4e would be competing with Pathfinder if WotC was open to a version of 4e that would appeal to 3.5 holdouts. With WotC's resources (not least of which is the legal right to put "Dungeons & Dragons" on their covers) they shouldn't have any serious competition from OGL publishers. They never really did in 3e.

The same marketing strategy that inspired the GSL (stopping 3rd parties from rebuilding 4e) also keeps WotC from rebuilding 4e. They don't want different versions of their game. They want one universal 4e system that works with the Character Builder and RPGA sessions. WotC not wanting an "Advanced D&D 4e" or whatever has nothing to do with a third party writing it. They don't want it to exist at all.

Oracle_Hunter
2011-04-13, 04:34 PM
Does a game's design have an impact on how player's roleplay? How about game theory? Not the GNS one, the math one. Has anyone played one or two of the many, many independent games growing out there, and found that DnD no longer appeals to them? Has anyone seen/played a few indie games and decided they don't hold up to DnD after all? Where IS our hobby going, and where CAN it go?
So many questions! :smallbiggrin:

Well, as has been noted, the answer to the Thread Title is no - D&D is not "dying" by any reasonable measure. The power of the Network Effect
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Network_effect) gives market leaders a huge advantage. Plus, as we've seen with the latest round of Edition Warz, Switching Costs (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Switching_costs) are sufficient to keep people who grew up on rules-heavy systems like D&D within that system regardless of perceived efficiencies in different systems.

Next, the issue of "Indie RPGs." One thing I've discovered through playing Indie RPGs is that they general lack the scope of rules-heavy systems. Yes, you can play a billion variants of any rules-light system but the lack of mechanical grit just makes them feel less substantial somehow. I'm not sure exactly what the root of this feeling is, but it's there (IMHO). So I honestly don't think Burning Wheel will ever unseat the Shadowruns and D&Ds of the world.

The final question, "where are we going" reminds me of the following quote (http://www.schlockmercenary.com/2003-01-01): "Evolution is not towards something. Evolution is away from something." With that in mind, I'd argue that RPGs are moving away from attempts to "simulate" real things - we no longer require Players to know a dozen ways to find traps, nor do we require Players to build scale models of trebuchets before their Characters can build them. In general, these sorts of rules have been disfavored for more dramatically or mechanically appropriate ones - rules that reflect a certain genre or simply ones that play better in the context of a game.

Reluctance
2011-04-13, 04:36 PM
Saying that these alternative games are better than D&D misses two things.

First, the good alternagames are usually designed to be good at one thing (at best, a small number of things) that the creator choses to focus on. That's all well and good and probably produces a superior product if you can find what matches your tastes, but causes market fragmentation by its very definition.

Second, even when just looking at 3.5, build/mechanics discussions are the most popular topics. Final Fantasy games are the iconic CRPGs for a reason. At the end of the day, there's something to be said for gamism and high fantasy heroics. There's definitely room for people who have other interests, but I don't think you'll be upsetting the general trend any time soon.

The Big Dice
2011-04-13, 04:51 PM
D&D isn't dying. It's dead. What we have nowadays bears little resemblance to the product TSR had on the market. In much the same way that a brand new Impala isn't really anything to do with the classic muscle car of the 60s. It's a completely different beast that has evolved far from it's roots.

But, like the idea of the Impala, D&D doesn't seem to want to go away. And in a weird way, that's a good thing. You see, back in the mid 90s, a lot of us were worried that RPGs were going to vanish in a puff of their own self importance. White Wolf had come along and turned a fun hobby into something elitist and emo. That, combined with the death of TSR and the rise of CCGs, as well as the growing capability of personal computers, seemed to spell the end of the Traditional Table Top (TTT) RPG.

BUt then this company called Wizards of the Coast made huge amounts of money from one of the games we all thought would kill roleplaying. And it turned out that the director of the company had played D&D at college. He bought the rights to it and lo, 3.0 was born.

This brought the OGL, and a new wave of interest in TTT games. OF course, 3.5 tripped that up, but the seeds were sown for a decade of growth and diversity that hadn't been seen since the 80s.

Now I think things are drifting a little. A new paradigm is needed, one that carried on the legacies of the past while bringing something new to the table. And in a strange way, it's all due to a horrible game that has never really been that great. But somehow, those three words are always going to be right there at the front of the public face of the hobby.

stainboy
2011-04-13, 04:59 PM
It's possible in D&D, but these other systems (like Burning Wheel and even World of Darkness) are taking alternative methods of advancement and working them into the rules in a far more fluid way that encourages advancement in non-combat ways.

About White Wolf, Vampire the Masquerade is 20 years old, and their game design philosophy hasn't really changed since. They were a real competitor to D&D in the 90s and they get credit for popularizing story-focused gaming, but if White Wolf was going to replace D&D it would have happened while Kurt Kobain was alive.



White Wolf had come along and turned a fun hobby into something elitist and emo.

I don't remember much emo, mostly ass-kicking with vampire powers, but they were definitely elitist. I still hold a grudge over that. It's why I still like to remind people that White Wolf's system isn't very good. Maybe they should have listened to all those "fat dorks in Xena t-shirts" they thought they were better than. (Justin Achilli, on D&D's demographic.)

The Big Dice
2011-04-13, 06:02 PM
About White Wolf, Vampire the Masquerade is 20 years old, and their game design philosophy hasn't really changed since. They were a real competitor to D&D in the 90s and they get credit for popularizing story-focused gaming, but if White Wolf was going to replace D&D it would have happened while Kurt Kobain was alive.
This is very true. And to be fair, they did codify something that games had been doing for several years without really putting a name to it. Which was the Storyteller idea. Sure, it was put across in a pompous way, but the idea of RPGs as more than a game of kicking in doors and killing things, while not new, did need labelling.


I don't remember much emo, mostly ass-kicking with vampire powers, but they were definitely elitist. I still hold a grudge over that. It's why I still like to remind people that White Wolf's system isn't very good. Maybe they should have listened to all those "fat dorks in Xena t-shirts" they thought they were better than. (Justin Achilli, on D&D's demographic.)
All that "Woe is me, for I am playing an undead badass that can kick seven bells out of any mere mortal that dares cross my path. So I must wear guyliner and listen to lots of Fugazi, despite never having heard the Marillion album of the same name" stuff seemed very popular in the gaming store near me, back when we had a gaming store. Bear in mind, this was around '95 or so. The Old World of Darkness was in full swing by then and D&D was just waiting for someone to put it out of it's misery.

dsmiles
2011-04-13, 06:07 PM
Oh and you should totally try Dogs in the Vineyard, it's badass.You know, that's not the first time I've head that. I going to have to pick up a copy.

stainboy
2011-04-13, 06:47 PM
All that "Woe is me, for I am playing an undead badass that can kick seven bells out of any mere mortal that dares cross my path. So I must wear guyliner and listen to lots of Fugazi, despite never having heard the Marillion album of the same name" stuff seemed very popular in the gaming store near me, back when we had a gaming store. Bear in mind, this was around '95 or so. The Old World of Darkness was in full swing by then and D&D was just waiting for someone to put it out of it's misery.

Oh, yeah, I know White Wolf courted mall goths pretty hard but you never had to buy into it to play. I guess they did have stuff like Humanity so could roll to see how mopey you were, but we never bothered and it didn't break anything.

dsmiles
2011-04-13, 06:52 PM
Oh, yeah, I know White Wolf courted mall goths pretty hard but you never had to buy into it to play. I guess they did have stuff like Humanity so could roll to see how mopey you were, but we never bothered and it didn't break anything.I used to play a lot of OWoD, since I have a relative at the company, and all that gothy-emo stuff still never caught my eye. Come to think of it, none of my OWoD group was even close to that side of the spectrum.

Fhaolan
2011-04-13, 07:35 PM
Yeah the goth and the emo subcultures (technically separate groups that are visually similar, according to my goth and emo friends), took to Verb: The Nouning quite heavily. In the areas I lived, however, they almost immediately migrated to the LARP versions and away from the table-top versions. As such they were still a rarity in the gaming stores.

As for D&D dying, unlikely. As long as there is RPG gaming there will be something sufficiently similar to D&D to be called that name. As people have mentioned before D&D isn't a game. It's a brand. There have been around seven different 'editions' of this game, and nearly each one is distinct from the other in fundamental ways. The system behind AD&D 2nd is as similar to the original white box set as 4e is to 3.0.

Reverent-One
2011-04-13, 07:45 PM
Much as I love a good edition war thread, this isn't supposed to be one. In the interest of keeping it that way I'd rather not list things that could be offered in such an optional ruleset. If you want a list of reasons people still play 3.5, use the Search function.


So they could broaden their audience by making entirely different games (like 3.5), while true, at that point they aren't expanding 4e, but rather just making more games. Which they're doing already with Gamma World.

dsmiles
2011-04-13, 07:54 PM
Which they're doing already with Gamma World.Which is so much FREAKING FUN that I never want to stop playing. :smallbiggrin:

The Big Dice
2011-04-14, 04:30 AM
As for D&D dying, unlikely. As long as there is RPG gaming there will be something sufficiently similar to D&D to be called that name.
D&D will always be around in the same way that this car:
http://www.chevypic.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/10/impala.jpg
Is the same as this car:
http://chevroletimpala.net/wp-content/uploads/2009/12/2009-chevrolet-impala.jpg
And both of them are the same as this car:
http://image.streetrodderweb.com/f/9097588/0703sr_01_z+1958_chevrolet_impala+.jpg
In other words, as time goes on, it has less and less to do with it's origins and people complain how they like the old one so much better despite the new one having much better features. Despite having to do so much work to get the old one to keep running the way you like it.

Jan Mattys
2011-04-14, 04:34 AM
D&D will always be around in the same way that this car:
http://www.chevypic.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/10/impala.jpg
Is the same as this car:
http://chevroletimpala.net/wp-content/uploads/2009/12/2009-chevrolet-impala.jpg
And both of them are the same as this car:
http://image.streetrodderweb.com/f/9097588/0703sr_01_z+1958_chevrolet_impala+.jpg
In other words, as time goes on, it has less and less to do with it's origins and people complain how they like the old one so much better despite the new one having much better different features. Despite having to do so much work to get the old one to keep running the way you like it.

Good post, except for the part I fixed for you
A new generation car has objectively better brakes, performs better in terms of speed and endurance, has undeniably better comfort, has undeniably better and more advanced technology, pollutes considerably less.

In short, one can miss the nostalgic feeling of the old car, but can't reasonably argue against the new one being *better* at pretty much anything.

A game on the other hand... well, it is all about personal taste. So using "better" like you did is... wrong? :smallwink:

The Big Dice
2011-04-14, 04:56 AM
A game on the other hand... well, it is all about personal taste. So using "better" like you did is... wrong? :smallwink:
Not really. You can argue that WotC editions of D&D are more consistent, more clear in the writing and have better layouts in the books. Plus the massive online support, making modern RPGs objectively better than their predecessors.

Of course, that's not always the case in subjective terms.

Eldan
2011-04-14, 04:59 AM
On the other hand, the older books had massively more interesting fluff. Wizards books may have 30 prestige classes per book, but if only one of these is interesting, I'd have preferred if they had spent the other 60-90 pages on some world explanation.

Also, there's very little modern D&D art I like.

The Big Dice
2011-04-14, 05:03 AM
On the other hand, the older books had massively more interesting fluff. Wizards books may have 30 prestige classes per book, but if only one of these is interesting, I'd have preferred if they had spent the other 60-90 pages on some world explanation.

Also, there's very little modern D&D art I like.

Have you seen the art in the Tom Moldvay edition of D&D? *shudder*

Though I have to say, Larry Elmore and Clyde Caldwell, with some help from Jeff Easley shaped how I think D&D people should look.

As for the fluff in older editions, I still get cold sweats at how the original DMG opened up with a multi page discussion of probability.

Eldan
2011-04-14, 05:05 AM
Well, I can't say I'm familiar with really old D&D, so I'll give you that. But I have bought a few AD&D 2nd books on Ebay, and I love them.

Tiki Snakes
2011-04-14, 10:20 AM
Actually, considering that some older cars can actually out-perform modern ones hands down, I think the car analogy is probably not that bad.

The different editions all have their comparative strengths and benefits, and can often be better in one or two ways than the others. More modern ones have a number of features that make them more suited to modern thinking, and nostalgia is a large part of the pull of the older editions.

And at the end of the day, Rarity and the simple reality of physical wear and tear are often the larger reasons for the decline of the older editions, leaving enthusiasts who are much more careful with their stuff and of course people who settle for reproduction models.

Tyndmyr
2011-04-14, 10:27 AM
To be fair it's hard to really blame WotC for not having a decent OGL for 4E. They had one for 3.5 and as a result they now have a another competiter (Paizo) that's using their game as a base and making a fair bit of money off of it. Pathfinder isn't like Iron Heroes which offers a different feel for the game, people who buy it are likely to buy it instead of D'n'D.

It's just plain common sense to axe idea's that will get other companies rich at your expense.

Don't get me wrong, I think they should make it easier for 3rd party publishers to get involved, but it's hard for me to blame them when they don't.

Er, your causality is backward on that. 4e came out, then pathfinder game out. I don't think the announcement for PF had even happened before 4e came out, and if it did, only just.

Pathfinder is the reaction to 4e and the lack of usable OGL, which caused huge waves in the third party market. A LOT of people said "screw it, we're sticking with 3.5". Pathfinder just hit it big.

When you tell all the third party folks to take their ball and go home, you risk them dragging customers with them. Big mistake on WoTC's part. They should have tried to get all the third party folks on the 4e bandwagon.

Cartigan
2011-04-14, 10:48 AM
On the other hand, the older books had massively more interesting fluff. Wizards books may have 30 prestige classes per book, but if only one of these is interesting, I'd have preferred if they had spent the other 60-90 pages on some world explanation.

There are dungeons. And dragons. That is base D&D.

Eric Tolle
2011-04-14, 11:20 AM
Well, as has been noted, the answer to the Thread Title is no - D&D is not "dying" by any reasonable measure.

One can argue that the hobby as a whole is dying the death of a thousand paper cuts, but that gets into a whole 'nother debate, with it's own potential for wangsting.

But by the scale of numbers, the hobby is basically D&D, and some outliers.


Next, the issue of "Indie RPGs." One thing I've discovered through playing Indie RPGs is that they general lack the scope of rules-heavy systems

For the most part, that's intentional. One of the big precepts of the Forge-based indie movement is that a game should really be about ONE thing. Which is oddly, why Forge types like classic D&D better than Vampire. Seriously, there was a big rant about how Vampire should be about humanity loss, and all the rules should be oriented toward that direction, and how the rules that allowed for completely different types of games caused brain damage.

From my perspective, the indie types have got things completely backwards; one of the measures of a successful game is that it allows for multiple types of gaming- in the case of Vampire, angst-based games are possible, but also political games, splatterpunk, Near Dark imitators, etc.. Broad appeal for people who have different ideas about what makes a fun vampire game.

It's unlikely that a focused game will appeal to the majority of players. This is why I'm kind of "Meh" about highly focused games like say, Polaris or Bliss Stage. On the other hand, I love the flexibility of systems like FATE and PDQ. And on the other other hand, the game mechanic is tempted to see how focused games can be twisted, like say, a kit bashed "My Life with Vader" game.



This is very true. And to be fair, they did codify something that games had been doing for several years without really putting a name to it. Which was the Storyteller idea. Sure, it was put across in a pompous way, but the idea of RPGs as more than a game of kicking in doors and killing things, while not new, did need labelling.

It was a nice marketing move, though that style of play dated back to Runequest and Traveller and Empire of the Petal Throne. Honestly, indie games and different play styles have been around almost as long as D&D has, and the main thing that White Wolf did was to loudly encourage a particular style.

The main difference between then and now to my mind is that the systems generally have improved (yes, as a player of old Traveller and Champions, I do think system thought has improved, and) there are some damn good general games out there, even as the narrow focus of the indie movement has affected the design of 4E.


[All that "Woe is me, for I am playing an undead badass that can kick seven bells out of any mere mortal that dares cross my path. So I must wear guyliner and listen to lots of Fugazi, despite never having heard the Marillion album of the same name" stuff seemed very popular in the gaming store near me, back when we had a gaming store.

Plus they had those, those things that arent' guys...g...gir...girls! GIRLS! GIRLS playing rpgs! Blasphemy!

Seriously, if there is one thing that White Wolf did right, it was to help with the huge gender imbalance in gaming. Things are much better now, though there is still a long way to go in dealing with sexist and racist elements in gaming.

Fhaolan
2011-04-14, 11:35 AM
D&D will always be around in the same way that this car:
http://www.chevypic.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/10/impala.jpg
Is the same as this car:
http://chevroletimpala.net/wp-content/uploads/2009/12/2009-chevrolet-impala.jpg
And both of them are the same as this car:
http://image.streetrodderweb.com/f/9097588/0703sr_01_z+1958_chevrolet_impala+.jpg
In other words, as time goes on, it has less and less to do with it's origins and people complain how they like the old one so much better despite the new one having much better features. Despite having to do so much work to get the old one to keep running the way you like it.

Yes, the different versions of D&D have as much to do with each other as the different versions of the Impala. You can't use the Eldritch Wizardry booklet with a 4e game anymore than you can pull the tranny out of the 1958 Impala and stick it in the 2009 Impala.

For that matter, 4e D&D has as much in common with Original D&D as it does with Paladium, Warhammer, or other Class-based Fantasy RPGs. Any one of them could be merged into the D&D brand at the whim of the publishers and be just as valid and 'real D&D'. Heck, there's a series of booklets that are specifically for GURPS to give it the templates necessary to replicate class-based fantasy RPGs. That could be the basis for 5th edition D&D for all we know, if Hasbro buys out Steve Jackson Games.

However, I disagree with the implication that the newer games/cars are intrinsically better than the old ones. Older games/cars tend to be simpler to maintain as experience shows where they break, where new games/cars break down in new, somewhat unpredictable ways and when you are least prepared.

The Big Dice
2011-04-14, 12:47 PM
One of the big precepts of the Forge-based indie movement is that a game should really be about ONE thing. Which is oddly, why Forge types like classic D&D better than Vampire. Seriously, there was a big rant about how Vampire should be about humanity loss, and all the rules should be oriented toward that direction, and how the rules that allowed for completely different types of games caused brain damage.
That strikes me as very amusian and somewhat hypocritical of the Forgists. By GNS standards, Classic D&D is so incoherent that it's practically a babbling fool that is guaranteed to cause brain damage if you play it. All it is good for is being the baseline by which the mythical Fantasy Heartbreaker (I never saw a system like that, but it's a nice name) is measured against.

Still, these are the people who use chess as an example of a Gamist RPG. And aren't quite sure what Simulationist means. Though it might have something to do with umbrellas. Or exploration or something.


From my perspective, the indie types have got things completely backwards; one of the measures of a successful game is that it allows for multiple types of gaming- in the case of Vampire, angst-based games are possible, but also political games, splatterpunk, Near Dark imitators, etc.. Broad appeal for people who have different ideas about what makes a fun vampire game.
I completely agree with this. Games that go on to have multiple editions in print are more often than not the kind of games you can do all sorts of different sub genres with. Just as you can go from Anne Rice inspired goth-ness to Blade-like epic beatdowns with Vampire, games like D&D, Traveller, Call of Cthulhu, Legend of the Five Rings et al don't restrict you to just one thing. They let you use the trappings of the genre as a framework you can hang your own ideas from.


It was a nice marketing move, though that style of play dated back to Runequest and Traveller and Empire of the Petal Throne. Honestly, indie games and different play styles have been around almost as long as D&D has, and the main thing that White Wolf did was to loudly encourage a particular style.
Even Games Workshop got in on the Story gig. Go check out the Enemy Within campaign, if you can turn up a copy. There's damn good reasons why that is considered a classic, and why the double team of Shadows Over Bohenhafen and Death on the Reik are head and shoulders above just about every module that came before them.

The problem with White Wolf is, they didn't just encourage a particular style. Especially as games like Warhammer and Cyberpunk had been espousing the story first style for several years. The problem was, they had a really dismissive attitude towards the action and adventure approach to gaming. And yet I'd say most gamers want a balance between the two.


However, I disagree with the implication that the newer games/cars are intrinsically better than the old ones. Older games/cars tend to be simpler to maintain as experience shows where they break, where new games/cars break down in new, somewhat unpredictable ways and when you are least prepared.
In terms of mileage, features, handling, safety, reliability (though some are better than others for this) and comfort, new cars tend to far outstrip old ones. Ans the metaphor does hold true for games too. It's a lot easier to go find 4th ed D&D material than it is to find a Moldvay B/X set.

But you are absolutely right when you say that the older vehicle (or game) is much more of a known quantity. The places that go wrong are clearly identified, and a little shopping around specialists can get you all sorts of new and old stuff to keep your vintage model on the road.

CarpeGuitarrem
2011-04-14, 12:52 PM
All that "Woe is me, for I am playing an undead badass that can kick seven bells out of any mere mortal that dares cross my path. So I must wear guyliner and listen to lots of Fugazi, despite never having heard the Marillion album of the same name" stuff seemed very popular in the gaming store near me, back when we had a gaming store. Bear in mind, this was around '95 or so. The Old World of Darkness was in full swing by then and D&D was just waiting for someone to put it out of it's misery.
This actually reminds me of something interesting that Eddy Webb (who's now the Content Manager or something for White Wolf) posted recently, about what he personally found in Vampire...

More Punk Than Gothic (http://eddyfate.com/2011/04/08/more-punk-than-gothic/)

On another note, I disagree on the idea that it's bad to have a "narrow scope" game. After all, we don't go into books or movies expecting a broad, please-everyone mentality. Well...okay, maybe not. There is Michael Bay, after all, who continues to generate action-based mindless kick-in-the-door-and-blow-stuff-up flicks. Then again, that's not too far off from the sort of game that D&D can easily devolve into, given its limited ruleset.

But the good ones, the ones that stick with you? They hammer into a specific niche, and then explore the depth of that niche. The problem with a lot of Forge-ish games (which are definitely not the sole component of "indie" games. I wouldn't even say that Burning Wheel is the most indie out there...definitely not as much as something like Fiasco, although from what I hear, Fiasco is quite well-written, not pretentious, and enjoyable. More on that later) is that they can be shallow as well as narrow, that they never really explore that depth of the question they address.

See, it's that depth which gives such a wealth of options to a non-traditional game. In a toolkit game like D&D or even the World of Darkness titles, the wealth of options comes from the wide scope, depth optional. In a non-traditional game, the more you delve into the topic, the more cool stuff you discover about it. Most Forge-ish games don't.

The other problem, which I mentioned, is that Forge-ish games are all trying to invent the wheel. Not enough of them are concerned enough with making an enjoyable game so much as a revolutionary experience. They need to loosen up. Heh. Again, I'd look at Fiasco, which appears to be doing just that. Those guys seem like they're having fun, and not trying to make something revolutionary. Oddly enough, Fiasco wound up being pretty revolutionary anyway.

stainboy
2011-04-14, 01:11 PM
stuff about Forge indie game development

That whole board generally needs to stop trying so hard to impress each other. (Edit: Ok, maybe just Ron Edwards.)

Also, they need to acknowledge that they like single-purpose rules-light games because they are easy to write. I'll use Exalted as an example. Exalted is basically the opposite of the Forge philosophy. Complex, lots of subsystems, "incoherent" or whatever Ron Edwards calls it. And while Forge-ites may point out some real flaws in games like Exalted, the reason they don't write games like that is because it'd be too big a project for a basement developer. Pretty convenient that the design choices they dismiss are also the most work.

obliged_salmon
2011-04-14, 01:39 PM
There's something really interesting here worth exploring. Normally, when we think of "casual gaming," we think of really simple, rules lite systems. RISUS, for example, would be the tabletop equivalent of Bejeweled. And yet, one of the heavier products out there is DnD, which is also universally the most famous and most consistently played. Why is that?

Another relevant analogy would be, say, the board game Taboo vs. Settlers of Catan. Which is more well known and popular? The simpler one.

Also, thought I'd chime in about game theory as opposed to GNS. GNS is about GNS, and little else. Game theory is about modeling player behaviors through rules. One could claim that DnD as a game encourages optimization of character build, because combat is primarily rewarded (RP xp does exist, but instructions for awarding it are nebulous at best). Other games use game theory to encourage other kinds of behaviors, frequently with a focus on behaviors relevant to the game's setting. I.E. Burning Wheel encourages Tolkienish game situations involving elves, orcs, and dwarves, based on the Grief, Hatred, and Greed mechanics, respectively.

Oracle_Hunter
2011-04-14, 01:46 PM
For the most part, that's intentional. One of the big precepts of the Forge-based indie movement is that a game should really be about ONE thing. Which is oddly, why Forge types like classic D&D better than Vampire. Seriously, there was a big rant about how Vampire should be about humanity loss, and all the rules should be oriented toward that direction, and how the rules that allowed for completely different types of games caused brain damage.


Also, they need to acknowledge that they like single-purpose rules-light games because they are easy to write. I'll use Exalted as an example. Exalted is basically the opposite of the Forge philosophy. Complex, lots of subsystems, "incoherent" or whatever Ron Edwards calls it. And while Forge-ites may point out some real flaws in games like Exalted, the reason they don't write games like that is because it'd be too big a project for a basement developer. Pretty convenient that the design choices they dismiss are also the most work.
This is an interesting debate right here.

Like I said, the "Forge Philosophy" is what keeps Indie RPGs from ever supplanting Big RPGs (e.g. D&D) in the marketplace; indeed they don't have to thinks to market segmentation. In the same way that people spend their "entertainment dollars" on things ranging from books to live theater, you can spend your "gaming dollars" on several different types of game. Personally, I can only run a single D&D4 game at a time but I'd be happy to run a Bliss Stage or Mountain Witch adventure on the side. They're very different products and they serve different consumer needs.

The fact that Forge Games are "easy to write" actually means that "basement developers" have a Comparative Advantage (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparative_advantage) at writing them: you don't need (or want!) a massive, multi-author enterprise to produce such a limited game and relying on individual genius simply has a higher payoff.

That said, I don't think rules-light "Big RPGs" are really the way to go either. It's just another variant of the GURPS model that, IMHO, produces toolboxes instead of games. It's good to have a toolbox when there aren't any finished products available, but the current marketplace in RPGs has a finished system tailored to practically any playstyle you're looking for.

Tyndmyr
2011-04-14, 01:47 PM
That whole board generally needs to stop trying so hard to impress each other. (Edit: Ok, maybe just Ron Edwards.)

That's....so true. The level of self-importance there is initially rather amusing, but it gets old pretty fast. I'll take any level of hostile criticism or sarcasm regarding design errors on my part, but I've got little patience for ego trips.

Game theory in a non-GNS sense is certainly useful. I think one of the reasons D&D is so popular is that it does something that people tend to want to do. It gives players a great deal of power, in a fantastical way. With a game like Bunnies and Burrows, you'll always have the guy who just doesn't see the appeal in playing that...but a combat game with fantasy superpowers tends to have very broad appeal.

Fhaolan
2011-04-14, 01:47 PM
In terms of mileage, features, handling, safety, reliability (though some are better than others for this) and comfort, new cars tend to far outstrip old ones. Ans the metaphor does hold true for games too. It's a lot easier to go find 4th ed D&D material than it is to find a Moldvay B/X set.

New cars also trend to blandness, as in order to improve efficiency and reliability they share design philosophies, parts and distribution networks. While there are exceptions, it's pretty tricky to tell the difference between one 2011 sedan and another no matter who the manufacturer is.

The same with RPGs. :smallsmile:

DontEatRawHagis
2011-04-14, 01:48 PM
I have a problem with Planar Travel and the Feywild. I dont know when these came into the game, but they aren't my favorite thing about DnD.

For one I just like a simple world that has players fighting creatures that are either summoned from hell or from another kingdom. Gods get their own pocket dimension to rule from and thats it.

The problem stems from the idea of a shared universe. I just don't understand the need to have players jump from Ebberron and Greyhawk and Ravenloft.

erikun
2011-04-14, 01:52 PM
No, I do not see D&D dying. I do, however, see it becoming more specialized.

D&D has traditionally been the generic fantasy setting. Yes, it did have its own flavors such as Vancian spellcasting and mounted paladins, but it was roughly generic fantasy. If you wanted elves and dwarves and talking centaurs, they you included them - if not, you didn't. If you wanted liches and undead deities, you included them. If you wanted rust monsters and mind flayers and floors that ate you, go ahead and put them in. Pretty much everything was offered as optional, and with a lot of options available, you could play mostly whatever style of fantasy game you chose.

For 4e - since let's face it, we're talking about the change with 4e - it feels like the focus have shifted. I don't see D&D focused on being a generic fantasy for whatever design you have in mind. Rather, I see it being shifted to becoming very newbie-friendly and very flashy. Newbie-friendly, by laying out the options in most/every situation and allowing them to choose, rather than the older "do whatever you think is appropriate". Flashy, in that most of the things you can do are "cool" and intentionally interesting - something they no doubt picked up from Exalted.

I don't see it as a bad thing, just a shift in focus. D&D has been the starting point for most gamers, after all, so making it easy to get into makes sense. Giving the player a lot of fun options is a good idea too. I don't see this as causing a problem for the hobby as a whole either, given that D&D was kind of hard to move away from anyways. Someone switching from 4e to World of Darkness might want to know where their power cards are to determine choices in combat, but someone switching from 2e/3e to WoD frequently ended up asking where their classes were and how they determine their level. It's just as large of a shift.

Fhaolan
2011-04-14, 02:59 PM
I have a problem with Planar Travel and the Feywild. I dont know when these came into the game, but they aren't my favorite thing about DnD.

Planar travel has been around since the publications of the Grayhawk and Blackmoor supplements for the original white-box edition of D&D. Feywild was introduced to D&D back in AD&D 1st edition as part of the Forgotten Realms. It was only a vague mention as to 'where the sun and moon elves came from', but it evolved from there.

So both are pretty old concepts with respect to D&D. :smallsmile:

stainboy
2011-04-14, 05:11 PM
Really? I thought the Feywild was new to 4e. The name at the very least.

I know FR has fey trods and stuff, which go through some kind of extraplanar or extradimensional space, but they're mostly ignored because they don't jibe with the Great Wheel cosmology. Is that the same thing?

Yora
2011-04-14, 05:13 PM
In 3rd edition material it was completely absend and even in AD&D 2nd edition it is very rarely mentioned, if at all.

Though somehow the Feywild is the one thing I like about 4e. Don't think there's anything else I like about it, but it's pretty much what I intended to create shortly before it was announced.
And now I look like I copy 4e. :smallsigh:

DeltaEmil
2011-04-14, 05:22 PM
There was a plane called fairy (not really imaginative) in 3rd edition. It was not really fleshed out, as the Abyss and Baator were more important it seems during 3rd edition (because you can get fat lootz there). Also, with most fey being good-natured (evil fey came later and later), there really wasn't a need to flesh them out as opponents, because you wouldn't get fat lootz from them (at least that's what WotC thought).

With movies and literature all starting to introduce more evilish or wicked fairy-beings over the time, of course, Wizards of the Coast also started to create more evil fairy (or fey) beings, and the Fairy Realm (now called Feywild) in its current incarnatiion was born to have an adventure setting where you can get fat lootz from evil fairy kings (or evil misshapen giant kings, in that case).

Fhaolan
2011-04-14, 05:50 PM
Really? I thought the Feywild was new to 4e. The name at the very least.

I know FR has fey trods and stuff, which go through some kind of extraplanar or extradimensional space, but they're mostly ignored because they don't jibe with the Great Wheel cosmology. Is that the same thing?

The *name* is new, but yeah there was a bunch of stuff in FR that implied something of the kind, and it got named 'Plane of Faerie' in several places. It very slowly got expanded, but was basically ignored until 4e suddenly brought it forward into the 'big leagues'.

Ed Greenwood (the primary author of Forgotten Realms) said at one point that it was always there, based on the "Wood Between the Worlds" idea from C.S. Lewis with suppliments from various European faerie tales. I also remember Faerie-lands mirror planes coming up a lot in old White Dwarf magazine articles (pre-issue #100 when it switched over to pure Games Workshop products)

Odin the Ignoble
2011-04-14, 05:54 PM
Dnd is sort of a gateway drug. Its what most players experience first before moving on to other games. Once you've played a few games of Dnd, you know what you like and dislike about it. From that point, you can jump to systems better suited to your tastes.

If I ever game with a new group of players. I'd probably play our first campaign using DnD, before moving on to something like Hero System.

Thalnawr
2011-04-14, 06:14 PM
We could always go by this (http://www.schlockmercenary.com/2007-11-11) interpretation of how D&D will continue to exist... He was right about genetically engineered salmon and holographic bands after all...

Odin the Ignoble
2011-04-14, 06:28 PM
We could always go by this (http://www.schlockmercenary.com/2007-11-11) interpretation of how D&D will continue to exist... He was right about genetically engineered salmon and holographic bands after all...

Now I want dice with usb ports that contain all relevant Dnd source books.


http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_evq-uFVSAyk/TD3SDlzGhcI/AAAAAAAAMeo/4EkvC8_0fgQ/s400/flashdice1.jpg

Lord Vampyre
2011-04-14, 06:54 PM
Like most things the D&D has a cyclical lifespan. If D&D were going to truly die, it would have done so back in the late 90's when TSR was beginning to die.

Many of us were thankful that our favourite gaming "brand" was saved by the creators of MtG. There wasn't the uproar about 2nd edition going to 3rd edition, like there is today with 3.0 or 3.5 going 4th edition. This probably has a lot to do with the fact that we most of us understood that D&D would have died otherwise. On the other hand, 4th edition seemed like a betrayal when there were those of us that felt that 3.5 was still alive and going strong.

Now, having played 4th edition and not having been as in tune with WotC's bottomline. I think WotC was really trying to avoid the near catastrophe that TSR almost ran into, by trying to get a new player base. I know my wife prefers the simplicity of 4th edition, even if I don't.

I'll never truly like 4th edition, but I will play it on occassion.

Is D&D dying? Like all things, it started to die upon its conception, and can only hope that it will be survived by its decendants. May the family name live forever (aka brand name).

randomhero00
2011-04-14, 07:03 PM
I think D&D will be around in one form or another (say, including PF) for quite awhile. I don't think its dieing. Maybe a temporary lax in sales because of the 4e conundrum.

ken-do-nim
2011-04-14, 07:44 PM
There was a plane called fairy (not really imaginative) in 3rd edition. It was not really fleshed out, as the Abyss and Baator were more important it seems during 3rd edition (because you can get fat lootz there). Also, with most fey being good-natured (evil fey came later and later), there really wasn't a need to flesh them out as opponents, because you wouldn't get fat lootz from them (at least that's what WotC thought).

With movies and literature all starting to introduce more evilish or wicked fairy-beings over the time, of course, Wizards of the Coast also started to create more evil fairy (or fey) beings, and the Fairy Realm (now called Feywild) in its current incarnatiion was born to have an adventure setting where you can get fat lootz from evil fairy kings (or evil misshapen giant kings, in that case).

I heartily applaud this. The #1 novel that D&D is based on, I think, is Three Hearts and Three Lions, by Poul Anderson, and it features evil fairies. In fact, from my reading of Irish and Scottish folklore, fairies were called "the good folk" because people didn't know when the fairies could hear them and when they couldn't, and didn't want to piss them off, but they were pretty wicked creatures.

Eric Tolle
2011-04-14, 08:11 PM
I heartily applaud this. The #1 novel that D&D is based on, I think, is Three Hearts and Three Lions, by Poul Anderson, and it features evil fairies. In fact, from my reading of Irish and Scottish folklore, fairies were called "the good folk" because people didn't know when the fairies could hear them and when they couldn't, and didn't want to piss them off, but they were pretty wicked creatures.

Fun novel, and right up there with Dying Earth as far as influence on D&D.

As far as I'm concerned, there's a lot of D&D critters that appropriately belong in the Feywild, such as ogres, goblins, giants, dragons, merfolk, sea serpents and the like. I'll also happily toss in redcaps, selkies, and a bunch of other traditional story critters. When I've used them in 3.X, I've made Fey creatures lawful neutral instead of chaotic; fairy tale creatures are all rules. That's why you need to remember your manners.

Britter
2011-04-14, 08:39 PM
I think DnD is going to keep going strong, as ever. I also think that the indie rpg will continue to occupy a niche, but I doubt that they will ever become huge.

I think DnD is evolving in a way that is ironically similar to those indie games, however. Most indie games do a very focused sort of thing, as has been mentioned before, dialing in on or two aspects of a game world or an idea or whatever. To me, 2nd and 3rd edition DnD seemed the opposite of this. They allowed a great deal of flex and exploration, and they supported a wide variety of games. 4e, on the other hand, is really a game that is all about killing things in dungeons. Yes, you can stretch it, with effort, to accommodate different types of games, but at the core it is about the dungeon crawl. Imo, it doesn't do anything else very well.

I think the role of the flexible game system that has a theme but can run a variety of types of game, variants on the theme as it were, will fall on the heads of the medium sized game companies, like Catalyst and Paizo and White Wolf et. all. Many of these companies have been around long enough to develop quite a following and show they have some staying power. They are also using some fairly established brands for recognition (Vampire, Shadowrun, Call of Cuthulu, GURPS...etc)

I think the real innovation, however, is going to come from the small-press rpg publishers. I count Luke Crane and Burning Wheel in this lot - too big to be indie but not by much, with games designed to do more than indie games while remaining more focused than mainstream stuff, and a lot less of a focus on any "GNS" style malarkey in favor of strong mechanical design and innovation. The physical book for Burning Empires, for example, is simply one of the prettiest, most well bound, and best indexed hard-cover game books I have ever owned, and I have a bout $8-10k worth of game books within 10 feet of me (and that is not all of my book either). The game itself is really impressive as well, able to do exactly what it claims to do (evoke the feel and style of the Iron empires graphic novels and the stories told therein) and it could be used to do a few different models of space/sci-fi RPing if you took some time to hack it a bit. As publishing technology begins to deliver the ability for even small companies to put out a good product, and along the way allows them to devote more time to actually designing innovative rules, I think a strong small-press market will develop. And if it lasts for another 10 or so years, it will be about where White Wolf, for example, is today. Around long enough to be known by some and to be a little influential. BW has been around for 7 years, so if they can keep going for another 13 and be moderately successful, they will have proved my point.

So, in short, I think that DnD is going to continue to evolve in the direction of a highly focused Dungeon-Crawl style game. It might even jump to full-fledged board game at some point. It will remain remarkably popular. And even indie-loving elitists like me :smallamused: will continue to play it so we can strut around the table after rolling a crit and doing massive damage to a beholder, because really, thats a lot of fun.

The middle-market guys will keep turning out solid performers that have their own distinct flavor, different from DnD.

The tiny guys will keep cranking out niche games, some excellent, some less so, and will likely remain very elitist.

And the small-press guys will start to slowly gain momentum, cranking out stuff that is right on the border between the indie and mainstream, where in my opinion the real meat of RPG innovation lies.

Heliomance
2011-04-15, 12:21 AM
Fun novel, and right up there with Dying Earth as far as influence on D&D.

As far as I'm concerned, there's a lot of D&D critters that appropriately belong in the Feywild, such as ogres, goblins, giants, dragons, merfolk, sea serpents and the like. I'll also happily toss in redcaps, selkies, and a bunch of other traditional story critters. When I've used them in 3.X, I've made Fey creatures lawful neutral instead of chaotic; fairy tale creatures are all rules. That's why you need to remember your manners.

Fairy tale creatures are all rules because they're mystically bound by those rules. They're chaotic by nature, but if you extract a promise from one, it is literally unable to not fulfil that promise, not matter how much it may wish to. They don't follow rules because they believe in them, because they have strict moral codes or whatever; they follow rules because, for whatever ancient and forgotten reason, they are fundamentally incapable of not. The rules are shackles they can't break, not behaviours they impose upon themselves.

WitchSlayer
2011-04-15, 04:20 PM
VERY LONG POST CLIPPED OUT

If you want Dungeons and Dragons: The Board game, check out Return to Castle Ravenloft and Wrath of Ashardalon. Both use the same rules but have different tilesets and monsters and the like. You can even combine them together.

AND you don't even need a DM!

Britter
2011-04-15, 04:32 PM
If you want Dungeons and Dragons: The Board game, check out Return to Castle Ravenloft and Wrath of Ashardalon. Both use the same rules but have different tilesets and monsters and the like. You can even combine them together.

AND you don't even need a DM!

Yup. I've played Castle ravenloft, and I was surprised at how close to 4e (albeit a VERY striped down version) it was. I really expect to see things develop more in that line as regards the DnD product.

Eric Tolle
2011-04-15, 11:10 PM
Fairy tale creatures are all rules because they're mystically bound by those rules. They're chaotic by nature, but if you extract a promise from one, it is literally unable to not fulfil that promise, not matter how much it may wish to. They don't follow rules because they believe in them, because they have strict moral codes or whatever; they follow rules because, for whatever ancient and forgotten reason, they are fundamentally incapable of not. The rules are shackles they can't break, not behaviours they impose upon themselves.

And woe betide the mortal who breaks a promise.

I have to say though, that I still think lawful really counts for Fair Folk. The way they limited in their habitats and habits (you really don't see a Dame Vert decide to leave her woods and travel to the city) and the way they are bothered by humans doing weird things like wearing jackets inside-out all that speaks to an inherent rigidity beyond mortal laws.

Talakeal
2011-04-15, 11:49 PM
You know, Shakespeare once asked "What's in a name?". Just because WoTC owns the trademark dungeons and dragons, that doesn't mean they can define what something is or isn't. In my opinion 2nd, 3rd, 3.5, and pathfinder all feel very much like Dungeons and Dragons, fourth edition does not.
Not saying that 4th ed is a bad game, but saying that it is true D&D because it currently has the name on it is a rather shallow view.

gooddragon1
2011-04-16, 12:07 AM
You know, Shakespeare once asked "What's in a name?". Just because WoTC owns the trademark dungeons and dragons, that doesn't mean they can define what something is or isn't. In my opinion 2nd, 3rd, 3.5, and pathfinder all feel very much like Dungeons and Dragons, fourth edition does not.
Not saying that 4th ed is a bad game, but saying that it is true D&D because it currently has the name on it is a rather shallow view.

I agree with this mostly because 4e feels like just a bunch of numbers with much of the non-number stuff removed. I've frequently said to others that I could just play Diablo 2 at that point or something similar.

EDIT: Like the designers just gave up on trying to balance interesting stuff and went with bland but balanced.

dsmiles
2011-04-16, 08:42 AM
I agree with this mostly because 4e feels like just a bunch of numbers with much of the non-number stuff removed. I've frequently said to others that I could just play Diablo 2 at that point or something similar.

EDIT: Like the designers just gave up on trying to balance interesting stuff and went with bland but balanced.I still don't understand the "video game feel" reference. Sure the mechanics are different from previous editions, but OD&D was different from BD&D, which in turn was different from AD&D, which had an upgrade called AD&D 2e, both of which were different from 3e, which had the 3.5e upgrade, both of which are different from 4e. Where does the mechanics stay the same between editions? (Note: I don't consider 2e and 3.5e full editions, they were basically upgrades and/or simplifications to the previous edition.)

Who needs more than the mechanics in the books? Fluff can come from anywhere. I don't use WotC fluff it there is any way to avoid it (up to and including spending sever hours a day writing my own), because it's the worst fluff I've ever read. The 3e/3.5e fluff may as well not be in the books as far as I'm concerned, I don't use a bit of it.

Yora
2011-04-16, 10:05 AM
What really makes me dislike 4e are daily and per encounter powers. With purely magical attack, I might be able to accept that it has to recharge after each use and the proccess takes too long to hope it's recharged within the same encounter or day.
But as I understand it, there are also classes that have no supernatural element at all, but still limited use powers. So you can hit someone in the face really hard or aim an arrow really well only once per day? That just doesn't make any sense. I hate such abilities in 3rd Ed as well (Stunning Fist and the like), but I could ignore them. 4e relies in this mechanic heavily and it's not optional.

Something like this I've never seen in other PnP games (though I havn't plaed many), but I've seen it quite a lot in online games. It doesn't make any sense there either, but I've come to accept that those games are meant to be games about timing and resource management.
But when I play an RPG, that just seems too odd to me.

Talakeal
2011-04-16, 12:13 PM
You know, I actually like the fourth edition fluff, what little there is anyway. It is much more coherent than previous editions, seeming like an actual world where everything has a place instead of just a mish mash like previous editions.

As to the video game feel, I think this is because many of the mechanics, for example healing surges and encounter / daily powers are purely game mechanics and don't make sense as a simulation of a realistic fantasy world, which is something RPGs generally shied away from but video games embrace.

Also the characters are very defined, much like an mmo but in many ways even more strict. You have your roll clearly laid out for you, without even effective hybrid classes or alternate specs like in WoW, and although you can pick your stats, there are only a couple of "best" ways to do it, and you will never see a smart fighter for example.

In Warcraft for example, I know they always say that game mechanics trump fluff, and D&D has taken the same idea. I can easily see why someone would say it feels like a video game, although in my mind it does not do these aspects as well as a video game does and should not be focusing on it.

Tyndmyr
2011-04-16, 12:14 PM
I still don't understand the "video game feel" reference. Sure the mechanics are different from previous editions, but OD&D was different from BD&D, which in turn was different from AD&D, which had an upgrade called AD&D 2e, both of which were different from 3e, which had the 3.5e upgrade, both of which are different from 4e. Where does the mechanics stay the same between editions? (Note: I don't consider 2e and 3.5e full editions, they were basically upgrades and/or simplifications to the previous edition.)

Who needs more than the mechanics in the books? Fluff can come from anywhere. I don't use WotC fluff it there is any way to avoid it (up to and including spending sever hours a day writing my own), because it's the worst fluff I've ever read. The 3e/3.5e fluff may as well not be in the books as far as I'm concerned, I don't use a bit of it.

Well, despite attempts to do so, no game really quite got the feel of an actual game of 3.5 down....the system is sufficiently open ended that clever players can do all sorts of wild things by creatively combining abilities. Consider things like the tippyverse or the wightpocalpyse. It's extremely hard for video games to be that flexible, by their very nature.

However, the resource management used throughout 4e for power is...very frequently used in video games. Other abstractions, like powers affecting square things, even when the name is say, a fireball, definitely bring to mind many a video game that did the same thing.

And of course, the developers explicitly stated that rules decisions were made based on how easy it would be to turn the system into a video game. This was because they initially promised that you'd be able to play 4e online...something that later, sadly, got cut.

I'm not at all surprised by the video game comparisons. I am a bit more confused as to why so many folks seem to equate "video game" with "bad".

Reverent-One
2011-04-16, 12:20 PM
And of course, the developers explicitly stated that rules decisions were made based on how easy it would be to turn the system into a video game. This was because they initially promised that you'd be able to play 4e online...something that later, sadly, got cut.

Actually, the Virtual Tabletop didn't get cut, just delayed. It's in beta now.

Tyndmyr
2011-04-16, 12:25 PM
Actually, the Virtual Tabletop didn't get cut, just delayed. It's in beta now.

Good to hear. I'd kind of given up hope on it since it'd been a while.

It's a bit of a shame, really...I don't enjoy 4e at all, but the concept of the virtual tabletop is pretty fantastic. I might still try it out to see how adaptable it is.

DeltaEmil
2011-04-16, 12:34 PM
I'm not at all surprised by the video game comparisons. I am a bit more confused as to why so many folks seem to equate "video game" with "bad".True dat.

If only pen and paper D&D any edition was just like a video-game, it would finally be perfect.
http://fast1.onesite.com/capcom-unity.com/user/planchonino/426486daa4b4a4d5974bfd16c67bfeb5.jpg?v=265500

stainboy
2011-04-16, 12:59 PM
I'm not at all surprised by the video game comparisons. I am a bit more confused as to why so many folks seem to equate "video game" with "bad".

Not just video games, MMOs specifically. 3e cribbed from video games, but they were single player RPGs one generation removed from tabletop. I don't remember much complaining about feats being stolen from Fallout.

This is getting awkwardly close to the thing we're not supposed to talk about in this thread, I admit.

gooddragon1
2011-04-16, 09:29 PM
Video games aren't bad. I'm a gamer who plays RPG's and cheats at them for fun using a hex editor if no other cheats are available.

The problem is that I can do that much better with a video game than D&D (even D&D 4e). So why would I waste my time or want good design ingenuity wasted on something that video games could do better? I want something that does what video games can't, and for what basically amounts to a huge a block of numbers... 4e doesn't deliver.

dsmiles
2011-04-16, 10:17 PM
Actually, the Virtual Tabletop didn't get cut, just delayed. It's in beta now.Plus, the new installment of Neverwinter is supposed to be 4e-based.

Savannah
2011-04-16, 11:20 PM
Plus they had those, those things that arent' guys...g...gir...girls! GIRLS! GIRLS playing rpgs! Blasphemy!

That is hilarious! Mind if I sig it?

I don't really have anything to add to the discussion (sorry), although it has been fascinating to read.

Indon
2011-04-17, 11:15 AM
Well, I can't speak for in-general, but it sure seems to be dying in my town. The people I know who used to play D&D now play Pathfinder or other games. The college gaming club was, 100%, playing board games when I showed up and started an Exalted campaign. I have yet to meet anybody at all here who got their start playing D&D with 4E and stayed in the hobby.

I'm sure there's an RPGA segment running somewhere in my town, though - they probably just don't have social contact with the town's gaming community at large.

Now, you could argue that Pathfinder is essentially D&D, in which case pretty much nothing where I live is changing regarding the hobby.


I still don't understand the "video game feel" reference.

I find a lot depends on how the game is approached. I've played in two different 4E games, one an in-depth and enjoyable campaign (based on a Civilization IV scenario that was in turn based on a D&D campaign), and the other an RPGA game which seriously was an MMO dungeon run but on a table with dice.

The difference was that the campaign was being played for fun, and the RPGA game was clearly being played for the sake of progression in whatever global RPGA hierarchy there is - so it really was like running through a video game dungeon with a bunch of people who just wanted to get the loot at the end.

Bang!
2011-04-17, 10:22 PM
From games I've played and people I talk to, I get the impression that rules-heavy games in their current form are fading out for more beginner- and "pickup"-friendly games.

It's been years since I've played D&D. Warrior Rogue and Mage is just so much easier to teach, so much faster to run and so much free-er to acquire that D&D just doesn't seem worthwhile. And Burning Wheel and Polaris provide a stronger framework for roleplay, require less learning time and gameplay is less concerned with rules limitations than D&D, serving as a better platform for more straightfaced fantasy games.

My group was talking about playing a Spycraft game for a while, because the 2.0 rules looked a lot like what we'd been hoping for under the d20 label, but then we looked at the 500 pages we'd have to read, and all the setup we'd have to do to make it work, and we settled for John Wick's 15-page Wilderness of Mirrors instead.

We talked about a game of Rifts once (or Continuum, we hadn't quite narrowed that part down). But then we realized Savage Worlds gave more than we'd need for a streamlined time-travel game, with way less involvement. It wasn't even because of the Ron Edwards-style game-designed-for-a-purpose model, it was because the games allowed for quick preparation and play.

It sounds like WotC recognized this when they were building their 'digital gameboard' (or whatever it was called). Computer-Assisted Gaming allows for the rules-heavy sorts of games that support the unambiguous rulings and libraries of supplements that characterize the big names in rpgs without sacrificing ease-of-use. I don't expect D&D to die, rather I expect it to become increasingly digital.

---

...But then I walk by the local game store and see four tables full of hairy dudes playing different D&D games with D&D-brand miniatures and DM screens, so I'm pretty sure my experience isn't representative.

huttj509
2011-04-17, 11:50 PM
I don't really get the feeling that it's dying. Now friendly local gaming stores in general...man, that business really is rough to keep afloat, with more and more purchasing done online, or FLGS getting their supplements after the bigger bookstores (tip, if your FLGS owner is a friend of a couple of your roommates, and you make an impulse buy of the Book of Exalted Deeds while another friend was snaggin some manga...hide the book when FLGS guy stops buy one evening...didn't get ugly or anything, but I felt reeeeeally embarassed).

As to 4e feel, something that was deliberate in design, was a higher priority on "this is a game." I personally like that, as I personally had numerous issues with things like monk/wizard in the same party, both from the base book, but using wildly different rules, capabilities, and power levels, sheerly by accident. Due in part to those experiences, I feel that what they did in the first PHB accomplished a couple of things:

a) All characters follow the same rules. This makes it easier for multiple people to learn things at the same pace.

b) All characters are playing the same game. You don't really have characters as strictly focuses on non-combat, where when a battle starts they just stand around, and the combat-focused characters still have something to do outside combat besides watch the diplomancer shine. Now it was felt that explicit rules were more necessary for "did I hit the orc?" than "Can I outdrink the halfling?" A design choice which unfortunately leads to the assumption that all they expect players to do is hit orcs.

c) There have been classes that follow different rules, but they've been introduced outside the PHB. Psionic system (with boosting your at-wills to encounter level, for example), and essentials class design (focused on boosting basic attacks, for example) for examples. I think this helps because you still have a consistent set of mechanics in the PHB, and it remains the 'basic class mechanics,' while supplementary classes can get a bit different.

Sebastrd
2011-04-19, 11:13 AM
I realize you probably mean well, but some of these statements are simply not true.


Back in the days, D&D = Roleplay.

This fallacy seems to be becoming more and more common, but the fact is that D&D has always been about kicking in doors, killing monsters, and taking their loot. If you read about Gygax's early campaigns or check out some of the early modules, PCs were tools to overcome challenges presented to the players. Roleplaying was very much a secondary consideration.

Read the T1-4 module sometime. Every NPC character was listed with combat stats, treasure, and whether or not they could be recruited by the PCs. It was assumed that the PCs would try to kill or recruit everything in their path.

In the early days, greed was the most notorious PC killer, and all treasure was viewed with suspicion and skepticism because more often than not it was trapped. Loot and XP has always been the number one motivator in D&D.

The focus on roleplaying is a more modern evolution in gaming culture.


Now, D&D is simply the most iconic brand, but a brand nonetheless. Other brands (Vampires, GURPS, you name them) have achieved the legitimate status of acceptable, or even better suited, alternatives for roleplaying.

D&D is still a synonym for Roleplaying Game in the minds of the uninformed, but its prominence in the eyes of the gamers is less evident.

Not that there's anything intrinsecally wrong with D&D: it is not a decaying brand, and it's not jumping the shark. It's just that the potential market expanded and competitors jumped in.

Basically, it's like Microsoft Explorer: back in the days, 95% had explorer, and 5% had Netscape Navigator. Today, 55% use Explorer, 26% use Firefox, and another 20% Safari, Opera, Chrome, etc...

This is yet another common fallacy. "Industry insiders", such as we forum goers tend to extrapolate the online, hardcore community to the population as a whole.

The reality is that we are a tiny minority in the gaming community as a whole. Hardcore gamers tend to branch out and look for more niche games to satisfy their more refined tastes, but the vast majority of gamers are quite content with the one flavor they've become used to.

Your explorer comparison is right and wrong at the same time. Speaking as an IT professional, today the numbers are still 90ish% explorer and the rest something else. Within the industry, you'll find far fewer Explorer users. That's because we know a little something about security and we can make informed decisions about what browser we use. The vast majority of the public uses whatever comes on their prepackaged system - most often Explorer. In that respect, it is basically like Microsoft Explorer.

If you're a bit educated about game systems and know what it is you want out of your gaming experience, you'll find that D&D is rarely the best option out there. D&D's strengths lie in its famiarity, broad appeal, name recognition, and quick delivery of what its customers want - killing monsters for loot and XP.

In a way, 4E is the strongest incarnation of the game yet. One of its primary design considerations was cutting down on garbage time and getting players from start to fun as quickly and efficiently as possible, and it does so admirably.

Note: I'm not trying to single you out, Jan. As I said, these fallacies are extremely common online among gamers.

Sebastrd
2011-04-19, 11:18 AM
Honestly, I would say that 4th Edition, WoTC's restructuring of their website to Gleemax (is that still around?), and the killing of the paper Dungeon and Dragon magazines, did more to harm the D&D property than anything else.

I know my group, and my extended group, have not purchased anything from WoTC since 4th Edition came out.

Emphasis mine.

I vehemently disagree. My first thought when I received Paizo's notice about my subscription ending was, "Cool, that saves me a phone call." As time wore on the only things I found worth reading were the comics. The rest was mostly an adventure path that didn't interest me but took up real estate in both magazines. Count me among those not at all sorry to see them go.

Fhaolan
2011-04-19, 01:24 PM
Emphasis mine.

I vehemently disagree. My first thought when I received Paizo's notice about my subscription ending was, "Cool, that saves me a phone call." As time wore on the only things I found worth reading were the comics. The rest was mostly an adventure path that didn't interest me but took up real estate in both magazines. Count me among those not at all sorry to see them go.

I... sorta agree, and sorta disagree. I cancelled my Dragon subscription ages ago (and White Dwarf years earlier, and other gaming magazines as well), and didn't feel the loss when it finally was killed. So I agree that it being discontinued was not the 'death knell' of D&D.

The reason I unsubscribed though, was that the magazines didn't have anything in them anymore that interested me. In a way they had become too polished, too bland. Early Dragon was full of bizarre stuff, suprising articles, and interesting (if crude) art. Stuff that sparked my imagination and gave me ideas for games/characters/thingies. Somewhere in the midst of 3rd edition, that all seemed to fade away, leaving blandness behind that was a chore to read and filter out everyting but the maybe one interesting nugget per issue.

To me, Dragon was an animated corpse that Paizo finally put to rest. It had been dead to me for years.

Just_Ice
2011-04-19, 01:47 PM
Yeah, Dragon magazine was kind of a rag. It brought a lot of things to the table that I don't think anyone asked for. It was also asking to be abused by uncreative twinks and cheesers.

In all honesty, whoever said that old D&D was not about roleplay in the slightest is basically right. If some of the people I've played with are any indicator, that hasn't really changed, either. At the very least, it's very difficult to go through the game without mentioning hit points or feats or whatever. 4E doubles the difficulty of this, but it's still not an issue, really; you still called "21" when you had 21 unless you're nuts.

Is D&D dying? It depends what you define as D&D. I personally consider pathfinder to be D&D. Dungeons and dragons is not dying, but it sure is changing.

The Big Dice
2011-04-19, 01:50 PM
Read the T1-4 module sometime. Every NPC character was listed with combat stats, treasure, and whether or not they could be recruited by the PCs. It was assumed that the PCs would try to kill or recruit everything in their path.
You do realise that T1 was out for quite a considerable length of time before the T1-4 volume was published. And that 2-4 were never published separately?

Also, the simple fact that every NPC mentions potential as a recruit or betrayer says that not only was roleplay considered, but it was central to the premise of the modules.

LansXero
2011-04-19, 02:04 PM
Sorry for going on a tangent, I thought this may add to the discussion:

Perhaps some of the focus could be shifted away from if D&D as a brand is dying and into if PnP RPGs are dying. At least around here (south america) it has become increasingly difficult to get new people into the game as players get older and busier; finiding even 4E is tricky and the rest of the systems may as well not exist. So, if D&D goes down, would the hobby go down as well? I know the handful of RPG associations that once existed and FLGS are mostly gone / closed, and comunities are dwindling (once again, around my area) so also consider that.

Sebastrd
2011-04-19, 02:58 PM
You do realise that T1 was out for quite a considerable length of time before the T1-4 volume was published. And that 2-4 were never published separately?

Yes, I do, although I don't see what that has to do with anything.


Also, the simple fact that every NPC mentions potential as a recruit or betrayer says that not only was roleplay considered, but it was central to the premise of the modules.

I will concede that the information presented for each NPC did facilitate some actual in depth role playing.

However, the impression I got was that NPCs had to be specifically labeled as "no you cannot recruit this guy as a henchman to follow you into the dungeon and become cannon fodder". There were also some high level NPCs "hidden" around town to discourage the mass slaughter of civilians for the baubles hidden under their floorboards.

Jerthanis
2011-04-19, 06:44 PM
What really makes me dislike 4e are daily and per encounter powers. With purely magical attack, I might be able to accept that it has to recharge after each use and the proccess takes too long to hope it's recharged within the same encounter or day.
But as I understand it, there are also classes that have no supernatural element at all, but still limited use powers. So you can hit someone in the face really hard or aim an arrow really well only once per day? That just doesn't make any sense. I hate such abilities in 3rd Ed as well (Stunning Fist and the like), but I could ignore them. 4e relies in this mechanic heavily and it's not optional.

Something like this I've never seen in other PnP games (though I havn't plaed many), but I've seen it quite a lot in online games. It doesn't make any sense there either, but I've come to accept that those games are meant to be games about timing and resource management.
But when I play an RPG, that just seems too odd to me.

Well, the idea behind non-supernatural classes is that you're always fighting as hard as you can. Sometimes this comes across as a masterful sword stroke at just the right time that knocks them prone, does extra damage, or whatever. Sometimes they're ready for it and it's just a normal sword strike.

Once you use Sweeping Blow, if you miss, you're frustrated, your focus is shot and any time you try again, it'll just be a normal attack. If you hit, the other foes are expecting it and will know to evade the setup to the attack.

With Daily powers, it's a matter of inspiration, luck and circumstances coming together to give you a unique opening.

I'm not saying you're wrong in that it can be a little headscratching sometimes, but it's not like there CAN be no justification behind Martial Encouter/Daily powers.

I'm probably going to play a Trip-monkey character in an upcoming Pathfinder game, and the way that character is going to play, I'm going to wonder at some point why NO ONE is ever realizing that I'm going to try to trip them, and learn to sidestep, shift their weight or block the strike at their legs better. I'm going to trip someone, they'll stand up and I'll trip them again, again and again and again. All day. Doesn't that seem just as weird, in a way?

Curious
2011-04-19, 07:17 PM
While it does make a certain amount of sense to say that things line up just right for you, why would they only do so once a day? As a warrior grows more skilled, wouldn't he get more of these chances as he manages to outmaneuver his opponents? I'm fairly certain I remember a ranger ability that lets them shoot three arrows or so- once a day. Why can't he manage that feat more often? Do his hands hurt, or something? The fact is that no matter what justification you apply to it, the fighter is still casting a once-a-day spell under a different name, and no amount of fluff is going to disguise the mechanics of that.

Kylarra
2011-04-19, 07:39 PM
While it does make a certain amount of sense to say that things line up just right for you, why would they only do so once a day? As a warrior grows more skilled, wouldn't he get more of these chances as he manages to outmaneuver his opponents? In a sense, he does; by getting more dailies, the fighter gets to take advantage of those moments more often.

Jerthanis
2011-04-19, 08:04 PM
While it does make a certain amount of sense to say that things line up just right for you, why would they only do so once a day? As a warrior grows more skilled, wouldn't he get more of these chances as he manages to outmaneuver his opponents? I'm fairly certain I remember a ranger ability that lets them shoot three arrows or so- once a day. Why can't he manage that feat more often? Do his hands hurt, or something? The fact is that no matter what justification you apply to it, the fighter is still casting a once-a-day spell under a different name, and no amount of fluff is going to disguise the mechanics of that.

As already mentioned... they DO get more Dailies as they increase in level, so they DO manage to outmaneuver his opponents more frequently.

If you're talking about a Daily power where you load three arrows onto a bow and fire them as one... then yes... they can do it once, and if they try it again, the other two arrows fly wide and it's a normal attack. You just didn't get lucky again, the wind didn't die at just the right moment, in the heat of combat you didn't manage to grab the three arrows and line them up on the string with all their feathers oriented right... and on and on.

If it's a Daily power where he fires three shots in quick succession... you CAN try it a second time, it's just he doesn't quite manage to do it quite as well and it comes out as Twin Strike.

It doesn't matter how much justification I can come up with, because it is a situation that does to some degree require justification. Honestly I understand how it could break your immersion. I'm just saying that there is justification if you're willing to accept it.

However... I'd like to hear your justification for my Trip-monkey who will succeed at tripping pretty much any equal-level threat on a 2 or higher, and how that trick will work every single time. Because honestly, I can't imagine the ultimate tripping technique that would succeed regardless of what the opponent is doing in response.

Sine
2011-04-19, 08:34 PM
What really makes me dislike 4e are daily and per encounter powers. With purely magical attack, I might be able to accept that it has to recharge after each use and the proccess takes too long to hope it's recharged within the same encounter or day.
Honestly, Yora, that's my own explanation for all 4e's limited powers. "It's magic" is simple and easy to remember. A lot of my fellow 4e fans ascribe to the think-of-a-creative-explanation-for-each-weird-situation philosophy, and that's cool. Heck if I want to get a quick laugh, I'll say something like "The ooze is so stupid that it forgot that it can't be tripped. But now it remembers, so it won't work again." if the fighter knocks a jelly prone with a limited attack.

But to do that on a regular basis would be too much micromanagement. So as a general rule, I imagine that all 4e characters do magic. Even the "martial" ones cast spells with their swords, Li Mu Bai style. :smallcool:

(This also works as an explanation for certain "non-magical" abilities in other editions, like Stunning Fist.)

DeltaEmil
2011-04-19, 09:10 PM
No Edition War.

The thread opener is not about the differences between 3.x and 4th edition.

Curious
2011-04-19, 09:36 PM
The power system is one of my biggest complaints about the 4e system, but I won't get into the others right now because, as DeltaEmil stated, edition wars aren't allowed. I think I'll just agree to disagree on the mechanics of 4e.
For the tripping situation, I suppose it would just be taking advantage of your opponent being off-balance from having just picked themselves up. Being able to accomplish the roll on a 2 just means you are much better versed in striking your enemies to the ground, so I really don't have much of a problem with it. If you put a lot of effort into improving a skill, it should be reflected in your ability to accomplish tasks related to that.

joela
2011-04-20, 02:56 PM
So my question is NOT "is DnD becoming worse with each new edition" but rather, "are many of the interesting fringe/independent games and their ideas outshining DnD and other more mainstream games (Shadowrun, White Wolf, GURPS)?" Roughly speaking, are they showing up the old standard?

No, IMO. DnD, to me, is even more focused than ever to its roots as a class-based, level-based, hack and slash game with easy-to-learn ruleset.

Does a game's design have an impact on how player's roleplay? How about game theory? Not the GNS one, the math one. Yes to all.


Has anyone played one or two of the many, many independent games growing out there, and found that DnD no longer appeals to them? Yes and no. DnD still scratches an itch the others just...don't.
Has anyone seen/played a few indie games and decided they don't hold up to DnD after all? I thought I did after playing WoD, but realized the comparison's apples to oranges.
Where IS our hobby going, and where CAN it go? Will continue to be a niche while electronics, from hand-helds to Wii's and MMOs grow and prosper, taking what may have been future rpgers, in new directions. :smallbiggrin:

The Big Dice
2011-04-21, 05:31 AM
No, IMO. DnD, to me, is even more focused than ever to its roots as a class-based, level-based, hack and slash game with easy-to-learn ruleset.
Then explain the three volume set of rules that has been typical of the AD&D family of games. Basic D&D was simple, the games that followed the PHB/DMG/MM model never have been. And 4th edition is no different. They are all extremely complicated, needing huge amounts of reading and experiementing to get to a point where you can actually play the game with confidence and ease.

I wouldn't call any D&D since the original Rules Compendium 'simple' by any stretch of the imagination.

Tyndmyr
2011-04-21, 07:02 AM
The power system is one of my biggest complaints about the 4e system, but I won't get into the others right now because, as DeltaEmil stated, edition wars aren't allowed. I think I'll just agree to disagree on the mechanics of 4e.

Power system and skill checks. Now, don't get me wrong....I've seen skills misused in this way in 3.5, too...but "roll a d20 lots" does not, in itself, make for fun gameplay. I prefer a much more dynamic approach to skills challenges.

Being too complicated is not really something I see as a problem with 4e. I agree that 3.5 is also a quite complex ruleset. Certainly the most complicated one I actually play. 3e and 2e, the other editions I actually played(though I own older materials), are also not exactly simple. D&D has a long history of being a complicated game. The fact that it has this attribute, and is also the historical face of the hobby is probably an obstacle for a lot of folks, tbh. Doesn't faze me in particular, but I'm comfortable with far more complicated games than many.

One thing they did do quite well in 4e is formatting. I appreciate this a lot, probably more so than most players, and moving to more standardized layouts is something I'm fond of.

dsmiles
2011-04-21, 07:10 AM
One thing they did do quite well in 4e is formatting. I appreciate this a lot, probably more so than most players, and moving to more standardized layouts is something I'm fond of.
That, and no sample characters to not meet all the prereqs to be in the class that their in. :smalltongue:

Tyndmyr
2011-04-21, 07:11 AM
That, and no sample characters to not meet all the prereqs to be in the class that their in. :smalltongue:

Oh, that was definitely a pet peeve of mine about 3.5. I have nothing wrong with sample characters...but one done all wrong helps nobody.

So, rules aside, at least they're building the books better.

Grogmir
2011-04-21, 08:39 AM
For our group 3.5 was killing DnD and 4th edition saved it.

Their chaulk n cheese, for sure, and I can see why people like 3.5 therotically.

But for me, when I sit down at the table with my mates. There's only one thing I would want to eat - and it aint chaulk.

technoextreme
2011-04-21, 10:30 AM
Which, in itself, is the same as saying that D&D is not a game any more. It is a brand.

The brand won't die, but the thing that was called "D&D" won't be D&D any more.

This technically is a word for word exact example of the no true scotsman fallacy.

More importantly, do you believe Essentials achieved its goal of appealing to a broader audience, or addressed anyone's concerns with 4e? I've seen people express interest in it as a source of new classes for 4e, but I've never seen anyone say "I didn't like 4e, but this Essentials thing is awesome!" If nothing else I guarantee that Essentials offers nothing to 3.5 holdouts.
I've actually had multiple players tell me that they enjoy Essentials better than core 4e namely because it reminds them of a better implemented version of 3.5.

The Big Dice
2011-04-21, 10:40 AM
This technically is the exact form of the no true scotsman fallacy.
Only if you forget to consider cars. I used the Chevrolet Impala as an example of this early on in the thread. The cars that have been sold under the Impala name over the decades really don't have all that much to do with the original Impala.

D&D is no different. The TSR editions were closer to each other (White Box isn't really that different from the Moldvay edition, which isn't too far from Mentzer's red box, which isn't a million miles from Holmes edition B/X) and the two TSR editions of AD&D are also extremely close. Cross compatibility is high between all those editions of the game. But WotC editions of D&D aren't that compatible with the older versions, and are almost completely incompatible with each other.

I'd say there's a very strong case for saying that D&D is dead, but the D&D brand is going to be around in one form or another for a long time yet.

technoextreme
2011-04-21, 10:47 AM
Only if you forget to consider cars. I used the Chevrolet Impala as an example of this early on in the thread. The cars that have been sold under the Impala name over the decades really don't have all that much to do with the original Impala.

Do you actually know what the No True Scotsman fallacy actually is? Technically speaking you just invoked it again.

Tyndmyr
2011-04-21, 10:53 AM
While technically true, I don't think they're going for that specific statement. More clarifying what is meant by the broad(and ever widening) label of D&D.

dsmiles
2011-04-21, 10:56 AM
While technically true, I don't think they're going for that specific statement. More clarifying what is meant by the broad(and ever widening) label of D&D.
Up next: D&D the CCG!

Wait...they already did that...:smallamused:

Tyndmyr
2011-04-21, 10:58 AM
Up next: D&D the CCG!

Wait...they already did that...:smallamused:

Ok, now that made me pretty sad. I played magic, but RPGs and CCGs don't go together particularly well. Attempts to make them do so generally come across as blatant money-grubbing cross marketing efforts.

dsmiles
2011-04-21, 11:04 AM
Ok, now that made me pretty sad. I played magic, but RPGs and CCGs don't go together particularly well. Attempts to make them do so generally come across as blatant money-grubbing cross marketing efforts.Well, I understand the cards for Gamma World 4e. They were designed to be a part of the game from the start. They mix it up and make Gamma World 4e hilarious. I don't mind buying those, but for DnD? Really, WotC? If they were in it from the start, they'd get a lot less complaints about them.

Grommen
2011-04-21, 11:11 AM
Honestly, I would say that 4th Edition, WoTC's restructuring of their website to Gleemax (is that still around?), and the killing of the paper Dungeon and Dragon magazines, did more to harm the D&D property than anything else.

I know my group, and my extended group, have not purchased anything from WoTC since 4th Edition came out.

I don't think that hurt the industry, but it may have hurt D&D. 4th edition seems to be a very polarizing thing. So many new players started with 3rd edition that when Hasbro up and changed nearly everything it just shocked the world. Their "You'll support 4th ed or die!" approach didn't help. So we all hunkered down in our bunkers (what ever that be) and have decided to wait out the storm. It also created a hole that at least Pazio is filling with the Pathfinder game. Pathfinder is the adopted child of D&D. I know it has converted a great deal of people to it.

I'm sad that I no longer play Dungeon's and Dragon's but I too don't like 4th edition. I'm happy that someone does, and I hope that it goes on to make millions. The industry needs D&D to be strong. The times that D&D sucked (end of 2nd edition) the hole industry nearly imploded. We don't want that to happen again.

Conners
2011-04-21, 12:59 PM
Sorry to say that I couldn't be bothered reading through the thread before posting.


Is DnD dying... is it being out-shined...? I'd say yes, then no.

As time goes on, it seems that companies are needing to appeal to casual markets more and more. DnD seems to be trying, but I don't see it as succeeding at this--people are used to all their math being done for them, after all. They let people use calculators in school even...

With being out-shined... I don't really think that anything else on the market is doing a much better job. There might be some I haven't heard of, but generally it gets similarly complex, and some of the differences are more on preference rather than being good or bad.


Do I think there are problems with DnD? Yes and No at the same time... In one way, it's a game system, it's fun to play, that's all you need. In others, it often seems like they overcomplicated certain aspects, making it awkward to play. I like Baldur's Gate, Icewind Dale, and other such DnD system games--but I no longer find it worth the effort to play the tabletop version (or any tabletop game, come to think of it).
Oddly, I like complicated systems which are over-detailed... so it's more a matter of preference that DnD and other games don't appeal to me (I prefer realistic games).



VERDICT: DnD seems to be weakening, but I don't consider it outshined by other tabletop games.

Sine
2011-04-21, 01:03 PM
Do you actually know what the No True Scotsman fallacy actually is? Technically speaking you just invoked it again.
I had to look it up, and yeah, it's popping up quite a bit.

This reminds me of my friend who insists that episodes I-III "Aren't really Star Wars." Really, then what will you call them? 'The movies formerly known as Star Wars'? "I'll call them..." sputter fume rage...

Sometimes it's rather funny to watch.

Everyone's entitled to their personal taste and their opinions, but denying something that's written in plain English on the cover just makes me giggle.

Yora
2011-04-21, 01:12 PM
Is DnD dying... is it being out-shined...? I'd say yes, then no.

As time goes on, it seems that companies are needing to appeal to casual markets more and more. DnD seems to be trying, but I don't see it as succeeding at this--people are used to all their math being done for them, after all. They let people use calculators in school even...
As I see it the D&D brand will be around for a very long time, easily 10 to 20 or even 30 years. But I don't think it's market share will never be as it has been and probably continue to decrease.
But with a potentially growing market, that might still include some growth. It remains to be seen where the current owner of the brand wants to go with it in the future.

Conners
2011-04-21, 01:28 PM
As I see it the D&D brand will be around for a very long time, easily 10 to 20 or even 30 years. But I don't think it's market share will never be as it has been and probably continue to decrease.
But with a potentially growing market, that might still include some growth. It remains to be seen where the current owner of the brand wants to go with it in the future. Yes. If they were to change things, more in the direction of mini-DnD (was it called that? It was the super-simplified board-game type one), then they could potentially swap decreasing revenue for increasing or stable revenue.

Dying is a bit too strong a word for DnD's current state, if it were to remain this way--more stagnating, or weakening. Either way, it will be interesting to see how the company will change things, as the years roll on.

Tyndmyr
2011-04-21, 01:30 PM
Yes. If they were to change things, more in the direction of mini-DnD (was it called that? It was the super-simplified board-game type one)

4e.


I kid, I kid. In seriousness, though, there is a Castles of Ravenloft board game that is 4e based. It's like hybrid board game/RPG. I believe they attempted this once before, too. I'm not actually against the general idea of such things, but I don't think it matches the feel of D&D well.

The Glyphstone
2011-04-21, 01:31 PM
Up next: D&D the CCG!

Wait...they already did that...:smallamused:

On motorcycles?

The Big Dice
2011-04-21, 01:31 PM
Do you actually know what the No True Scotsman fallacy actually is? Technically speaking you just invoked it again.

Actually no. I compared a 50s, 60s and modern Impala. Technically, they are all the same car. In real terms, each is a very different beat from the other. Just like the different editions of D&D are.

If you don't believe me, go make a 4th ed character, I'll start up a Holmes edition B/X game and we can see how compatible your character actually is.

I can tell you now, it's going to have about eight things in common. And not be in the least bit compatible. Like putting a betamax video in a dvd player.

Scotsmen need not apply.

Tyndmyr
2011-04-21, 01:34 PM
If you don't believe me, go make a 4th ed character, I'll start up a Holmes edition B/X game and we can see how compatible your character actually is.

This is correct. 4e is not particularly backwards compatible at all. Previous editions had some level of backward compatibility...though with every edition change you took a character through, the less similar they would be. From start to finish? Not the same thing.

D&D is a label. Who controls it? The company, in entirety? Sure, they can control what's on the cover...but they can't really control what the customers accept. And love em or hate em, all editions of D&D are not really the same, or even terribly similar.

Conners
2011-04-21, 01:36 PM
4e.


I kid, I kid. In seriousness, though, there is a Castles of Ravenloft board game that is 4e based. It's like hybrid board game/RPG. I believe they attempted this once before, too. I'm not actually against the general idea of such things, but I don't think it matches the feel of D&D well. Board games in the more simplistic, monopoly style sense doesn't really match the "do anything" styled premise of DnD. I've felt that DnD has focused too much on encounters for quite some time now.

Tyndmyr
2011-04-21, 01:39 PM
Board games in the more simplistic, monopoly style sense doesn't really match the "do anything" styled premise of DnD. I've felt that DnD has focused too much on encounters for quite some time now.

That's the heart of it. Now, with creativity...you can get a board game a long way toward non-traditional things, and you can certainly do the same with D&D. But doing that constrains the game to a rather specific sort of adventure. The castle ravenloft game is probably great, as long as you enjoy that specific adventure.

But when you want to play something else entirely, it's no longer helpful. That's the great strength of an RPG, and it's really hard to make a setting independent board game-thing.

The Big Dice
2011-04-21, 02:07 PM
That's the heart of it. Now, with creativity...you can get a board game a long way toward non-traditional things, and you can certainly do the same with D&D. But doing that constrains the game to a rather specific sort of adventure. The castle ravenloft game is probably great, as long as you enjoy that specific adventure.
I felt that 4th ed moved closer to HeroQuest than it did to a game like Monopoly. But it's still got the freewheeling elements there. You can go off on some seriously random tangents, if that's how your group rolls. And because of that, D&D is still unquestionably an RPG.

Who knows, though. Maybe with the cutting of the D&D Minis line, there's work underway to move D&D away from the miniatures heavy angle the last few editions have taken. For my money, that wouldn't be a bad thing. I don't like being reliant on minis. I'd much sooner break them out for the big set piece than for every little encounter along the way.

Fhaolan
2011-04-21, 05:12 PM
Yes. If they were to change things, more in the direction of mini-DnD (was it called that? It was the super-simplified board-game type one), then they could potentially swap decreasing revenue for increasing or stable revenue.

Dungeons & Dragons: The Fantasy Adventure Board Game. Published 2002-2003. Had two expansion sets: Forbidden Forest and Eternal Winter.

Maxios
2011-04-21, 06:05 PM
Me personally, I don't think D&D is dying. I do think they've screwed around with things that didn't need to be changed. I personally dislike the At-Will, Encounter, and Daily power system. Now, you never need to make a basic attack because you have a power that's the equivalent to it AND gives you a +5 bonus to damage.
I also dislike how every class now fit's into a role. In 3.5 (the only other D&D edition I've played) classes somewhat fit into roles, but you could play a class any way you want. A wizard who focus on utility spells, a fighter who was a glass cannon, a rogue who could hold is own against more powerful enemies, etc
But in 4th edition, every fighter is designed as a tank. Every Wizard is designed for combat and controlling battlefields. Every rouge is designed for doing damage.
I also dislike how they're implementing cards into game play, such as the Luck (Or was it the Fate?) deck. I also dislike how in 4e, nearly all the rules are for combat. Heck, the complexity of previous editions was what made the game fun (In most cases), but now, they're making D&D more...simple. But hey, 4e has lots of good parts.
As I said before, D&D isn't dying, in fact, it's probably more popular then ever. I just hope that in 5e, they make it more like the old editions. I wish someday one of the RPGs I'm working on is nearly as popular as D&D.

DontEatRawHagis
2011-04-22, 10:32 AM
I feel that you have to ask several questions.


If Wizards of the Coast went out of business would DnD be picked up by another company?
Will console, PC, and handheld gaming die?
Do people still play Monopoly, Risk and Chess?


First is rhetorical.

Second, everyone thinks that the next big thing is going to kill the last big thing. PC gaming didn't die with consoles. In fact it can be argued that more people are playing PC gaming now then a few years ago. Handhelds are transforming into the smart phone games. And the current gen consoles are reaching or have reached their peak. Will DnD die? Based on this evidence no its just going to change, and by change I mean its still going to be pen and paper, but just different.

Third, DnD is a classic amongst the fan base. And every year it attracts more and more people who say to themselves, that looks like a cool game. Just like Monopoly and Risk you will see people playing it into the near future, even if its just older editions.

Tyndmyr
2011-04-22, 10:41 AM
I feel that you have to ask several questions.


If Wizards of the Coast went out of business would DnD be picked up by another company?
Will console, PC, and handheld gaming die?
Do people still play Monopoly, Risk and Chess?


Yes, no, yes.

These are all easy questions.

For 1, we have pazio and pathfinder. Even aside from the strong possibility that D&D gets sold as an asset in the bankruptcy proceedings, PF will continue from 3.5

For 2....perhaps handheld. Perhaps. And that's only if you don't count the games migrating to smartphones. Playing games on PCs and consoles is getting more popular, not less.

For 3. Board games are unlikely to actually die...they're just also unlikely to replace RPGs. They're good at different things.

Yora
2011-04-22, 10:49 AM
Boardgames are also multiplayer on the same table.

Find me some multiplayer games that can be played on the same PC or console, which are not beat em ups.
Though the industry could easily correct that, if they just wanted to.

Tyndmyr
2011-04-22, 11:03 AM
Boardgames are also multiplayer on the same table.

Find me some multiplayer games that can be played on the same PC or console, which are not beat em ups.
Though the industry could easily correct that, if they just wanted to.

You mean like every co-op shooter ever created? Or trivia games?

Yes, except for You don't know Jack, Mario Party, Army of Two, Army of Two:40th Day, all games with Call of Duty in the title, Castle Crashers, the Civilization games, Fable 2, most console flight sims, final fantasy nine, Gears of War, Gears of War 2, the Madden line, everything in the Rock Band and Guitar Hero lines, and almost every racing game ever made....

Yeah, nobody makes games like that.

Edit: That's just what I can think of offhand, most due to recent xbox play.

Reverent-One
2011-04-22, 11:08 AM
Boardgames are also multiplayer on the same table.

Find me some multiplayer games that can be played on the same PC or console, which are not beat em ups.
Though the industry could easily correct that, if they just wanted to.

Well,there's apparently 1683 games with shared/spilt screen multiplayer capabilties on the Xbox/Xbox 360. (http://www.xboxmp.com/Catalog.aspx?hs=1) I can't exclude beat-em-ups, but most on the first page aren't.

Lappy9000
2011-04-22, 11:14 AM
I wear d20 necklaces and even when I have to explain them to people, I get an "Oh yeah!" reaction as soon as D&D is mentioned.

When making games, I have to juggle as many as three groups of players, with plenty of others willing to join, despite there being no gaming stores within a half hour drive.

I see plenty of references to the system on TV, and perhaps more naturally in video games and conventions.

Dungeons and Dragons is the only system that I can reliably find in almost any mainstream bookstore around.

So, no, I do not believe D&D is dying.

Roderick_BR
2011-04-22, 11:59 AM
No, it's not.

Tiki Snakes
2011-04-22, 12:07 PM
You mean like every co-op shooter ever created? Or trivia games?

Yes, except for You don't know Jack, Mario Party, Army of Two, Army of Two:40th Day, all games with Call of Duty in the title, Castle Crashers, the Civilization games, Fable 2, most console flight sims, final fantasy nine, Gears of War, Gears of War 2, the Madden line, everything in the Rock Band and Guitar Hero lines, and almost every racing game ever made....

Yeah, nobody makes games like that.

Edit: That's just what I can think of offhand, most due to recent xbox play.

My prefered source of co-op related news and info is the Co-Optimus (http://www.co-optimus.com/) website, personally. Mostly because I much prefer a good local co-op game where possible to any of the alternatives, including and especially competitive multiplayer, online or otherwise.

[edit] Which is, I suppose, one of the things that attracts me to tabletop games, as they are usually strongly co-op focused rather than pvp.