D&D 2E How does the rollout of 4E teasers compare to 2e?

[Kwalish Kid]

I had a general impression that we knew a lot about 2e nearly a year before its release, so I wanted to figure out if it's true. I couldn't find the information on ENWorld, but I found an archive of Dragon Magazines and a 1989 Advanced Dungeons and Dragons 2nd Edition Preview pamphlet in my basement.

So how are we doing? There are a couple of benchmarks for comparison.

If we compare October 1988 with October 2007, we are doing okay. The information was still very piecemeal back then, and certainly a lot less detailed than I remembered.

But D&D 2E was released in March 1989, not May. If we look at time-from-release and compare the information available today, 7 months prior to the release of 4e, with what was available in September 1988, 7 months prior to 2e's release, we're in trouble, because I don't have that issue of Dragon. So let's look at November 1988, because that's an issue that I do have. It's got two pages from Dave "Zeb" Cook. And he thanks his playtesters!

Now that's some detailed "thank yous" for the playtesters of the soon-to-be-published game. It's got reports of the 3X5 cards that they filled out and mailed in, references to the RPGA, references to GenCon, and on and on and on.

But all of that came out at in a Dragon magazine, where people got to try out new 1st Edition and DC Heroes articles for the first time. The information available when AD&D 2nd Edition was announced in January 1987, over a year prior to that issue, was much less specific. Worse than today, and not that detailed.

So we'll get our real previews in the December teaser books, and the details of the 4e system will be leaked from those attending D&D Experience, aka Winter Fantasy. It seems like another real difference will be the timing of the actual book release - in May rather than March, done to facilitate things at Gen Con. And that is a good thing. The worst part of the 2e rollout was the spring of 1989, when we pretty much knew nothing of what the rules were like, so we couldn't quite play yet.

All in all, though I started this expecting to find the current teasers very far behind the curve, at the end of it I'm willing to cut WOTC a little more slack, and be a bit more patient with the 4e teasers.

 

[Lackhand]

But D&D 3e was released in March 1989, not May.

I think that I have found your error for you.

 

[MerricB]

"...because I don't have that issue of Dragon."



Very nice indeed.

Cheers!

 

[BASHMAN]

But the differences between 1e and 2e were so minor they practically didn't matter at all. They got rid of Barbarians & Monks & half-orc PCs. They added non-weapon proficiencies. Other than that, the two editions were like 99% compatible. You could run 1e monsters in a 2e game with no problems at all. Use items from the 1e dmg, etc.

The most important change of 2e-- they had $ to spend on GOOD art and pretty layout/design. 2e LOOKED better than 1e-- that was the major change.

 

[hazel monday]

But the differences between 1e and 2e were so minor they practically didn't matter at all.

True that. Back in the day, my group played with some folks using 1E PHBs and some using 2E PHBs. There was never a problem with rules issues concerning that.

 

[Oldtimer]

If we look at time-from-release and compare the information available today, 7 months prior to the release of 4e, with what was available in September 1988, 7 months prior to 2e's release, we're in trouble, because I don't have that issue of Dragon.

In September 1988 I actually had the manuscripts of PHB and DMG in my possession, so personally I'm a lot worse off this time...

 

[TerraDave]

Pretty far in advance we knew no assasins, nonweapon proficincies and weapon specialization, bard as core class (maybe), monster binders instead of books, and that a "fighter book" would be coming to replace the need for barbarian and cavalier.

But we, or at least I, had no idea what that "fighter book" would lead to...