innerdude
Legend
Thanks everyone, that's quite helpful.
It looks like another category that has come up in the discussion is:
4) They aren't ready (haven't finished a current campaign, waiting for the system to mature)
Also:
5) The've moved on from D&D
I didn't really focus on 5, because that's a whole different thing. I personally love trying and playing a variety of non-D&D games. I'm mainly thinking from the perspective of "what do you play when you play D&D?" I'm counting Pathfinder and retroclones in that mix, but not much else. (I don't know much about 13th Age, but the impression that I get is that it doesn't easily fit into the D&D family of games.)
Well, I don't know if it's a "totally different thing," but it's exactly where I am right now. I'm just completely off the D&D bandwagon in any form. That said, if I were to choose a preferred "version" of D&D to play or GM, it would probably be either 5e or Fantasy Craft . . . . but the actual D&D game itself is probably somewhere around 8th or 9th down the list of games I'd prefer playing or GM-ing.
The games in front of any variety of D&D for me:
- Savage Worlds
- The One Ring
- Night's Black Agents
- Fate Core
- Burning Wheel
- Firefly
- Star Wars Force and Destiny
- Runequest
- Star Wars d6
And even then, I'm pretty sure if I was going to try a d20/D&D variant at all, it would pretty much be a tossup if I wanted to go with Fantasy Craft first or 5e. I think 5e might have a slight lead, but still...... That's like trying to decide between your 9th and 10th favorite ice cream flavors. Once you're past #6, does it really make any difference?
Number 4 is an interesting one, because it's something that should change in the next couple of years. In that time, most of those who aren't looking into 5e will have finished up with what they have going on. They may or may not go for 5e, but at least 4 will mostly be off the table.
I'd say the love of the greater granularity/crunchiness/tactical possibilities/character options of 3e or 4e is probably halfway between #2 and it's own category.
So it makes me wonder how the demographics are breaking down. I correctly guessed that fans of D&D in general would adopt it, as well as going over well with pre-3e fans. But I had also expected a lot of non-diehard 3.5e/Pathfinder players to adopt it (perhaps "adopt" is a better term than "switch to"). The anecdotes don't appear to be supporting that prediction. It might be reason #4 that is holding that group back. I think what howandwhy99 said about not wanting to lose particular things one has is a bigger deal with the 3e-4e crowd than the older edition fans, and that may also play into it. One thought that occurs to me is that perhaps there is a lot higher percentage of die-hards in the 3e/Pathfinder fan-base than I had expected.
Again, thanks for the participation, and feel free to continue sharing thoughts.
Not surprising to me at all, considering that Paizo has consistently gathered good will from its customers over the past 5-6 years, and WotC has not, up until the 5e release. Plus, clearly 5e and Pathfinder are serving very different audiences, those who prefer heavy crunch versus those who don't.