D&D General "I'm glad to be back playing D&D."

[AbdulAlhazred]

With my group I try to show off other games and they are thankfully accommodating. I try to play some form D&D and then after that something different like Cyberpunk or Vampire or Paranoia etc.

About the time Dragonlance 5E came out I swore off DMing 5E until 5.5E came out and hopefully fixed some of my issues with the system (Yeah yeah hope for the best, prepare for the worst).

We instead played some CoC, AD&D 2E, some Shadowdark, and some Cyberpunk Red. Someday we will play some Star Wars which has been requested (isn't a new version coming out soon?)

CoC was a disaster. 2E and Shadowdark went fine though while most liked the ramped up difficulty they did not like feeling less powerful compared to 5E. Cyberpunk was okay but like CoC, it just isn't some of the players "thing".

Well, I wanted to get them back into their comfort zone and I had recently picked up the 3rd party adventure Rise of the Drow, so yeah back in the saddle for 5E... with some houserules. Like no multi-saves for things like turning to stone, it's one and done and a couple others to give it more AD&D feel.

I asked them when making characters to think more like Lord of the Rings and less Sponge Bob, so the party is a Warforged, Goblin, Tabaxi, Human, and Elf.

Anyways, to the point. Several times 3 of the 5 expressed "I am glad to be playing D&D again." Which kind of hurt my feelings. Which I don't know if they mean 5E or just to be back to "D&D like 2E and Shadowdark". Although one of the teens did say "I like this and 2E" Which did make me feel good.

I noticed they are back to playing in "5E mode" though. Rush into a room, not worry about traps or monsters due to ease of healing and/or a plethora of HP. As opposed to 2E and Shadowdark where they were more cautious. Maybe once they encounter a Basilik or something they will remember they aren't immortal.

Overall, I as a DM have been learning to try not to fit a square peg into a round hole. They (we) love D&D and trying to get them to play something wholly different like CoC and Cyberpunk might just not be for us. I'm not going to stop having us play OSR on occasion. Thankfully it's "close enough" to 5E, I may use Shadowdark or C&C for a Megadungeon at some point. But yeah I'm learning to "let go" when it comes to my expectations of non-D&D games because I want us ALL to have fun and as long as they are having a good time that should be enough for me as the DM.

I'm not giving up on them liking The One Ring either. Come on Moria book! Ran a campaign once but I didn't get the reward system. After like 2 adventures the party was pretty decked out it seems just from level up rewards. IDK.

Oh and I want them to try Avatar tLA, but so far that idea went over like a lead balloon. Plus the system seems pretty different to what we all used to. Oh well, fun to read anyways.

But yeah, guess I'm not done with 5E and that's not exactly a bad thing as I can fine tune it while keeping them happy and having fun.

What, you haven't channeled your inner @bloodtide and wiped them out for their lack of caution? Three or four good TPKs in a row should bang them right into shape! Don't dawdle, time is a wasting to make them into quivering masses of jelly true expert super players!

 

[Vaalingrade]

And yeah, “5E mode” is definitely a thing. It is very reminiscent of video games, to be honest.

One day, after decades of playing videogames, I will discover this mythical video games TTRPG players love to attack.

It's not like the most popular game genres today don't include - fantasy settings that kill you continually until you 'learn', war sims where you are continually griefed to death by other players, and survival games where you are griefed to death by the devs.

I used to think they were talking about JRPGs, but there's no kicking in the door there and it's where random encounters that serve no purpose grew up after being spawned by D&D.

Even perennial punching bag, WoW, doesn't match the stereotype for anyone who has ever done an instanced dungeon or raid where you will die repeatedly if you don't either grind to over level it or do the meticulous planning the Skilled Play set value.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

On a slightly less silly note: I note that ALL of the games mentioned by the OP, and I think all those discussed in the thread too, are highly trad 'GM runs an adventure' type RPGs. Maybe you just need to look further afield. I mean, not to bang the same drum constantly, but there are entire categories of RPG which are unlike any of the ones you mention. You might try exploring games like Apocalypse World, or Blades in the Dark. Fun games, but with a bit different player/GM dynamic that might freshen things up a bit.

Anyway, AW is certainly a game that is amenable to a one-shot or fairly short arc of play. It can support somewhat longer games, but you can get a lot more out of it in a session or two than you would out of something like D&D where most of the interest is in character progression and completing adventures.

 

[GrimCo]

It does take a different mindset, both for the players and the GM to run CoC successfully, and while it is probably the most successful RPG besides D&D, it isn't for everyone, even when everything goes right.

IMHO, for CoC and games that depend on mood and atmosphere in general, they not only require different mindset, but also play style. If you have a group that like semi serious "beer&pretzel" style games, atmospheric horror games are not good fit. Also, people need to relay immerse themselves in the game, and if you all came together at 9 pm, after work day and putting kids to bed, it's kinda hard to make that mental mind shift. They also play much better live, but, also, from experience, when people are concentrated, relaxed, in the mood and you don't have strict time clock on session length.

Yeah, I have given up on campaign play outside my favorites (PF1, Traveller) and really taken to bespoke system one shots and short campaigns. I think folks are more willing to give it a shot when the commitment is lower.

Low commitment is double valued when people have very little time to play. Like our group, we have only Sundays from 9:30 til maybe 13, 14 if we really stretch it, since Sunday family lunch is a big deal here, and even then, not every Sunday (FE school break is currently so our dm and one of the players is gone skiing with family and that's 2 Sundays without game). So, at best, people are wiling to try game for session or two.

 

[zedturtle]

VAlour rewards plus rewards from completing the adventure usually just seemed like a lot of "magic" items. I mean Aragorn had the sword and a cloak? My hobbit had like a magic sword, boots, cloak, and I believe i could keep adding abilties to them.

That sounds like maybe the Loremaster was in a D&D mind frame a bit too much.

Valour rewards should happen somewhat slowly and rolls to find magic items should be even more rare.

They may just have wanted to see the magic items in play, or felt that y'all expected it? Hard to say, of course.

 

[DarkCrisis]

That sounds like maybe the Loremaster was in a D&D mind frame a bit too much.

Valour rewards should happen somewhat slowly and rolls to find magic items should be even more rare.

They may just have wanted to see the magic items in play, or felt that y'all expected it? Hard to say, of course.

If I recall correctly, we'd gain something at "level up". Also for completing the quest the quest giver (Patron?) would give you all something. This was like a published intro adventure. After like 2-3 adventures I'd say we were doing pretty well.

Maybe the Moria adventure will give a better idea of it all

 

[zedturtle]

If I recall correctly, we'd gain something at "level up". Also for completing the quest the quest giver (Patron?) would give you all something. This was like a published intro adventure. After like 2-3 adventures I'd say we were doing pretty well.

Maybe the Moria adventure will give a better idea of it all

When you advance your Valour, you do get a Reward, but (unless you were focused on Valour to the exclusion of all else) that should have happened once with 2-3 adventures at most amounts of advancement points handed out.

The Starter Set adventures are Shire-focused, were you up to Hobbit shenanigans? Or something else?

 

[ezo]

With my group I try to show off other games and they are thankfully accommodating. I try to play some form D&D and then after that something different like Cyberpunk or Vampire or Paranoia etc.

About the time Dragonlance 5E came out I swore off DMing 5E until 5.5E came out and hopefully fixed some of my issues with the system (Yeah yeah hope for the best, prepare for the worst).

We instead played some CoC, AD&D 2E, some Shadowdark, and some Cyberpunk Red. Someday we will play some Star Wars which has been requested (isn't a new version coming out soon?)

CoC was a disaster. 2E and Shadowdark went fine though while most liked the ramped up difficulty they did not like feeling less powerful compared to 5E. Cyberpunk was okay but like CoC, it just isn't some of the players "thing".

Well, I wanted to get them back into their comfort zone and I had recently picked up the 3rd party adventure Rise of the Drow, so yeah back in the saddle for 5E... with some houserules. Like no multi-saves for things like turning to stone, it's one and done and a couple others to give it more AD&D feel.

I asked them when making characters to think more like Lord of the Rings and less Sponge Bob, so the party is a Warforged, Goblin, Tabaxi, Human, and Elf.

Anyways, to the point. Several times 3 of the 5 expressed "I am glad to be playing D&D again." Which kind of hurt my feelings. Which I don't know if they mean 5E or just to be back to "D&D like 2E and Shadowdark". Although one of the teens did say "I like this and 2E" Which did make me feel good.

I noticed they are back to playing in "5E mode" though. Rush into a room, not worry about traps or monsters due to ease of healing and/or a plethora of HP. As opposed to 2E and Shadowdark where they were more cautious. Maybe once they encounter a Basilik or something they will remember they aren't immortal.

Overall, I as a DM have been learning to try not to fit a square peg into a round hole. They (we) love D&D and trying to get them to play something wholly different like CoC and Cyberpunk might just not be for us. I'm not going to stop having us play OSR on occasion. Thankfully it's "close enough" to 5E, I may use Shadowdark or C&C for a Megadungeon at some point. But yeah I'm learning to "let go" when it comes to my expectations of non-D&D games because I want us ALL to have fun and as long as they are having a good time that should be enough for me as the DM.

I'm not giving up on them liking The One Ring either. Come on Moria book! Ran a campaign once but I didn't get the reward system. After like 2 adventures the party was pretty decked out it seems just from level up rewards. IDK.

Oh and I want them to try Avatar tLA, but so far that idea went over like a lead balloon. Plus the system seems pretty different to what we all used to. Oh well, fun to read anyways.

But yeah, guess I'm not done with 5E and that's not exactly a bad thing as I can fine tune it while keeping them happy and having fun.

As both long-time DM and player, I get it---but from their perspective.

I've played a lot of RPGs over the years, but D&D has always been my favourite. Not just the medieval-fantasy-swords-and-sorcery genre, but D&D specifically.

One of the players in my groups just branched off into Vampire. He's running a game for some others. I don't have any interest--the game bores me to death ( ), even though I like a lot of the WW mechanics, etc. Anyway, he's doing it to take a break from D&D, which he enjoys but doesn't want to play all the time.

All that being said, we tweak 5E very heavily in our games. The "5E easy mode default" setting is annoying. So much of the design is backwards. In the interest of making it "fun", they've removed most of the "risk". (Yes, we know you can just throw more powerful creatures at players.... but that is a band-aid solution at best.)

 

[Corinnguard]

You can lead a gamer to mountain dew, but you cant make them drink

If you offered one to me, I would drink it. Especially if it was a flavor of dew I hadn't tried before.

 

[Corinnguard]

Back in college (89' to 93'), I played 2e D&D and tried my hand at role-playing in several other RPG's (Mekton, Robotech, Chronicles of Amber and believe it or not, Ghostbusters ) After college, I mostly collected RPG material, but didn't have an opportunity to role-play any of it. It wasn't until June 2021 that I returned to D&D and began role-playing in 5e virtually.