We need a unified optional game system or this hobby's gonna die

[Lord Zardoz]

Although, companies not producing 4E compatable material are making a smart move by not signing the new licensing stuff, I think this hobby is in the works for some new game systems.

I know there are good ones out there, but nobody seems to be talking about them and there dont' seem to be any heads turning and if there are neither of those things, likely there's not much play of those sytems anymore. I don't think that bodes well for the hobby. We're down to only a few choices:
1. 4e
2. 3e with dwindling "membership"
3. Other game systems that don't have much interest or players out there
4. Quit this crap and become a xenophobic, basement, headset computer gamer.

Just surveying the discussions here and at other groups, I worry that even if a smattering of new companies come up and produce another 18 new game systems, that therein lies the problem. You either have THE ONE (D&D) or micro-brew games.

What the "OTHER" game companies need to do is GET TOGETHER AND COME UP WITH A DIFFERENT SYSTEM. I'm not talking about rehashing 3e. WHy can't GR, Necro, and the others get together and develop THE OPTION TO D&D and start putting out their own stuff? ONE SYSTEM (besides D&D), multiple companies. No licensing gimmicks.
Any other option just leaves us with dwindling player bases. BTW, there isn't even a category for NON-D&D games here at enworld.

Thoughts?
..

I suspect you are making quite a few assumptions which do not necessarily hold up.

First, the GSL license, regardless of what its terms may be, does not necessarily have any impact on how good a game 4th edition is. What will ultimately drive the success of D&D under the 4th edition is how widely that game is adopted. Though the GSL terms may cause a non trivial portion of the player base of D&D to avoid it, the actual quality of the game on its own merits will have a far greater impact on that.

At this time, I suspect that the Worst Likely scenario for the hobby as a whole would be that enough people avoid 4th Edition products that WotC is unable to profit from making books for it, and that the 3rd party content publishers stick to 3rd edition based products. If this comes to pass, than the hobby will probably shrink in terms of commercial impact. Dedicated users will continue to sustain OGL content online, and eventually someone with a whole lot of money will purchase the rights to D&D, and try creating a new edition of the game.

Now, what I expect to actually happen is one of two things.

1) 4th edition is successful without 3rd party support. The companies unwilling to produce GSL content either go out of business or they eke out some measure of profit by supporting 3rd edition derived games. Some companies choose to back the GSL anyway. People buy and play whatever it is they prefer.

2) The lack of 3rd party support hurts the profits of 4th edition enough that it is not as sustainable as Wizards would like. The combination of financial and fan pressure force Wizards to modify the GSL to make it worthwhile for the holdouts to back it. Then the game will then return to profitability.

Either way, I do not expect the hobby to die out any time soon. Considering that 1st edition games are still being run despite years of no official support and having to hold out without any internet based fan support, I do not think the modern incarnations of the game will die out.

END COMMUNICATION

 

[jmucchiello]

I wish I understood what the difference was. Why has it never been hard for me to find people who will play other games?

It most likely has to do with location. Where do you live? Large city? Or a place with several (or one large) universities near by? Are you in an area with multiple LGS or one of those places where you need to drive 50 miles to find one?

Alternatively, the common geek profile includes low social skills. Finding a game would be a charisma check.

Seriously, the people who can find games with frequency of plummeting chapeaus: what do you think makes it so easy? Are you just members of a play group that's really open? Do you have a great FLGS? Where and how do you find these games so easily?

Similarly, folks who can't even find a stationary hat: what roadblocks exist to prevent you from finding other folks?

 

[pemerton]

again, if your aware of teh announcement, he's only going to support 4e if he can get a revised GSL or seperate deal.....

I think what Clark actually said is that he wants either clarifications or changes.

 

[renatoram]

However, this is the General RPG section, have you read the title and whats underneath it? Now in practice its generally all D&D, that doesn't mean it has to be and I'm pretty sure Morrus isn't trying to drive away non D&D discussion

Yeah, but if you don't play DnD you are not likely to know about ENWorld, at all. And if you know it you won't bother subscribing, or even reading this forum.

I know: it was my situation until 2 months ago. And I've played rpgs for 20 years now.
(my join date is from 2007 because I voted for the ENnies last year, I think)

I vaguely knew that enworld existed, and that it was "the biggest dnd forum". So, not playing dnd, or having any interest in it, I never even came. When in the past I've opened this forum, I lost interest quickly because it was all DnD stuff.
Now I'm playing 4E, because finally, after all these years, it looks like a fun game to alternate with other stuff. Thus, I've joined. I still only skim the boards, because I'm not interested in 90% of the concerns (or settings) that seem to be very close to the heart of many players here (like character optimizations, rules nitpicks, new classes and feats, and so on).

Just face it: people that don't play DnD don't come to ENWorld, because there's nothing here for them. Not even enough other people that don't play dnd, obviously enough
Not to mention that your average dnd grognard seems to be pretty aggressive to people showing different tastes from him.

If they are regulars of some internet forum it will be rpg.net and/or story-games.com, probably. Many simply don't talk about games on the internet.

 

[Dragon Snack]

...

 

[Dragon Snack]

I know plenty of people who will only play D&D. My Sunday group for example. Half the group keeps shooting down playing Savage Worlds, despite the fact that I think they would like it better than D&D (since, as DM, I've noted their playing style). That's not even counting the people I've met at Cons or one of the LGSs...

I don't see "the industry" banding together around a unified system to take on D&D either. If they don't want to ride someone elses racehorse, why would they ride some elses nag (even if they have partial ownership)?

 

[JDJblatherings]

. It was never the most well crafted, innovative, creative, etc. rpg,

It most certainly was the best crafted, innovative, creative and etc rpg on the market... it was the ONLY game on the market. It created and defined the market. The original monster manual was the first hardcover gamer book ever. It was the concept and market leader from day 1. No surprise it still dominates the market.


That aside there was a time when a new game concept made it clear RPG was a subset of a larger hobby games market (like the wargaming market it devoured earlier) with the releases of MtG and a storm of imitators and innovators following that.

Hobby gaming is alive and here to stay until they pry the dice from our cold dead hands. We the game players are the hobby, not one company and certainly not just one once amazingly innovative game.

 

[Arnwyn]

Any new system requires an investment in time and brainspace to learn the rules, and some folks are more adept at that than others. My current group has three players that have been playing D&D for two years now, and they're still a bit unsure of all the rules. The investment in time and energy and knowledge has been immense; it took us perhaps a year just to learn the game well enough that we could then use it to tell a story. Do we really want to switch to a new system and spend another year spending half of every night untangling whatever-its-equivalent-of-grapple-is? Better be a million times better than what we've got. Otherwise . . . naw, thanks. We've paid our dues, we want to game now.

Any new system requires an investment in time and energy to learn.

So. High risk, high cost, low support. Uncertain payoff.

Sir - I like the cut of your jib.

 

[RFisher]

It most likely has to do with location. Where do you live? Large city? Or a place with several (or one large) universities near by? Are you in an area with multiple LGS or one of those places where you need to drive 50 miles to find one?

1980s: Houston suburbs
1990s: Austin
2000s: Austin suburbs

Seems like wherever I live, the LGS situation is a constant sine wave between one and half-a-dozen.

Alternatively, the common geek profile includes low social skills. Finding a game would be a charisma check.

Which—with my charisma—I would expect to always fail. ^_^

Seriously, the people who can find games with frequency of plummeting chapeaus: what do you think makes it so easy? Are you just members of a play group that's really open? Do you have a great FLGS? Where and how do you find these games so easily?

Well, I didn’t really say anything about how easy or hard it was to find other gamers. I said that very nigh all the ones I have found are willing to play any game someone is willing to run.

Edit: OK, I did phrase it that way, but I shouldn’t have. ^_^

 

[Philotomy Jurament]

I said that very nigh all the ones I have found are willing to play any game someone is willing to run.

That's been my experience, as well. And since I'm almost always the GM, I've never had much problem playing the game I want to play. As to where I've lived:

Wichita, KS (late 70s/early 80s)
St. Peters, MO (early-mid 80s)
Honolulu, HI (mid-late 80s)
Sagami Depot, Japan (late 80s-early 90s)
Converse, TX (early 90s)
Selma, TX (early to mid 90s)
Houston, TX (mid 90s to late 90s)
Spring, TX (1999 to present)

As you can see, I've moved around a lot, which means I've had a lot of different players. I was *forced* to find players. Most (but not all) of the time, I tended to make friends, and then turn those friends onto gaming, rather than finding gamers and becoming friends. There are exceptions to that, of course, and it's not as true these days.