Why do you play games other than D&D?

Aldarc · Jul 11, 2019

Morrus said:
I was only asking about players. My question was prompted by that tweet, but it isn't the same question. The question I wanted to ask is the one I posted.

My apologies then.

jasper · Jul 11, 2019

I larp as NPC clerk for a retirement fund business.
There are no other games.

Blue · Jul 11, 2019

Why do I play games other than D&D? Okay...

I play 13th Age because I feel it gives me the best "D&D experience" of any game. I play 5e - my favorite D&D version ever - more because it's easier to find players. This is no knock on D&D 5e - it's a fantastic game.

I play other games for either genre or feel. Or both. For example I know there are plenty of superhero games out there, but having played a bunch of them I always return to Champions (well, to Hero System, but to misquote Billy Joel, "It'll always be Champions to me".) On the other hand, I've tried Fantasy Hero and there are a lot better systems for a fantasy game. Though I do want to get into a Marvel Heroic Roleplay game to give it a try.

There are a lot of systems that I haven't tried and I want to, always for the feel but also for how that feel is supported by the mechanics. Blades in the Dark, Dogs in the Vineyard, Apocalypse World (not Dungeon World!), etc. Over my long years in the hobby, I find myself more attracted to rules that don't just allow a setting, but actively support it. Vs. generic rulesets. I know that seems a bit odd when I mention Champions as a favorite, but it was made first and foremost as a supers system and it shows. Even the general applicability of FATE or FAE is very easy to customize the ruleset to support a specific feel.

Venley · Jul 11, 2019

I play other games in the same way that I eat other breads than sliced white plastic.
Other games are tastier: they are my granary, soda, onion, cheese and rye breads.
Sometimes I want a basic bit of toast and for that sliced white is nicest and sometimes I want a basic generic fantasy and for that D&D is best.

But most of the time I want the glorious tastes that other games provide: eg.gritty, low-magic, science-fiction or historical.

I dislike classes and levels and put up with them for the simple nostalgic pleasure of D&D. I particularly dislike the focus on levelling and players who are all about plotting out where their character needs to go to get x ability rather than engaging with the story and world right now.

MNblockhead · Jul 11, 2019

In the 80s, when I spent A LOT of time gaming, my friends and I just tired of it and we play many different systems, including those we made up ourselves.

Now, 5e is my main game and I just don't have much time to game. I do still play other systems, but generally as one shots.

At conventions, I like to try games I've never played, just for the novelty and variety.

I run the Expanse because I like the hard-science theme paired with the easy to run and cinematic AGE system that the Expanse is built on.

I run Paranoia because it is the only player v. player TTRPG that I've found to be consistently fun and because I love the flavorful fluff of its humorously distopic setting.

I play and hope to run soon Dialect, because it is the most consistently moving and meaning experience I've had with a TTRPG.

I play and run InSPECTres when I want to enjoy beer and pretzels party-type game with a group of extroverts who aren't afraid to let their inner thespians out.

I play Pathfinder when that's what the DM is running (no interest in running it).

I play Dungeon Crawl Classics and Mutant Crawl Classics when I want an OSR-with-a-twist feel. Never ran either, probably won't, but have enjoyed playing them and browsing the books.

I'm sure that there are more games that I would love playing. But I'm a father and at the peak point in a highly-demanding career and have other interests than just TTRPGs. So, when I do try new games, it is usually because someone else it running it as a one shot, usually at the one convention that I go to each year.

Sadras · Jul 11, 2019

Umbran said:
I play games that aren't D&D for the same reason that I eat foods that aren't haggis.

I also watch TV shows that aren't Star Trek, read books that aren't A Song of Ice and Fire, go to movies that aren't Marvel Cinematic Universe, and listen to music that isn't American Top 40.

I do this because a monotonous diet of anything is BORING.

Here we see Umbran, in his natural habitat, calmly raging against serial monogamy.

Maxperson · Jul 11, 2019

I don't often get the chance to play other games, so when I do get that chance, I jump on it. The chance of pace is refreshing and I get to see how other games do things.

Jer · Jul 11, 2019

Heh. I play D&D because it's what other people want to play, mostly. My friends want to play heroic fantasy characters facing epic threats against the world, so we play 13th Age. The kids I run games for specifically want to play D&D because it's what they have access to and what their friends at school talk about, so they wanted to learn it specifically. Mostly what people want to play is some kind of D&D, so we play some kind of D&D.

When we play something else it's because we're looking for a change or because someone can't show up to our regular game and we don't want to play without them, so we'll do a one shot of something. We'll play Torg because I had a long-running Torg game in high school and have a lot of fond nostalgia for the game and my players like the mash-up idea of it, or we'll play Icons because the kids are interested in playing a superhero game and I can run Icons off the cuff pretty easily, or we'll play Timewatch because I enjoy running investigative games and we like Gumshoe as a system but my players don't really enjoy horror games all that much (though I can sometimes talk them into a Fear Itself horror one-shot around Halloween when folks are more in the mood).

When I go to cons I try to play whatever I can get into with friends. I used to try to play a lot of different systems because I had grand designs about being able to actually run lots of games. Now that I'm old and generally only get to play once a month with my main group, that's less important but I still like the novelty of trying different systems.

drl2 · Jul 11, 2019

I'm a little bit of an outlier in that my relatively recent return to tabletop gaming (been away since the early 80s) actually started with a non-D&D game (Mighty Protectors) and ended up leading me into 5e. Partly because I wanted to do something in the fantasy genre, and partly because D&D with its vast body of supporting material and lower-crunch factor just makes it so incredibly easy to throw a weekly session together given limited prep time.

We'll do a few weeks of D&D sessions from some published adventure, which gives me time to put together a set of NPCs, villains, and scenarios for a few weeks of MP sessions. Lather, rinse, and repeat.

(That said, I'm currently also punishing myself by planning for a homebrew D&D setting which will toss a lot of that ease-of-prep stuff out the window after we finish the current campaign, and I'm flirting with the idea of adding something on the SF side to satisfy my Traveller itch...)

Zhaleskra · Jul 11, 2019

Having been part of a roleplaying game group in college, I experienced several games, and unfortunately had something of a bad reputation as a D&D supremacist.

Although I'm older, I won't claim I have less time to learn new rules. In playing and reading other games, I have come to appreciate what I consider an elegance in the rules: simplicity of mechanics if not simplicity of options. The easier it is to keep the commonly used rules in my head, the more likely I am to run or play that system. I'll still play D&D if that's what someone's running, but I've just gotten tired of edition chasing. When 4e came out, I went to Pathfinder as it was similar enough to 3.5. At some point, I had to ask myself "how many times am I going to buy the same game?" (wish I'd done that with all the versions of "Street Fighter II"), even though starting at 3.0, new editions haven't really been the same game.