Zardnaar
Legend
This thread is about had things gone differently in an alternative universe how D&D could have turned out differently to what we got. I will cover the transitions to 2E, 3E 4E and 5E and speculate how the game could have gone. I will put a point of divergence in reality to explain where I am coming from. Of course this is all purely hypothetical but if you watch Star Trek, Stargate etc who knows what has happened in an alternate reality.
1E to 2E
In this universe Gygax stays on at TSR past 1985. They use the golden age and manage the company properly and Lorraine Williams never comes on board. Gary seemed open to the idea at least that one day there would be a 2E, 3E etc of D&D. There are clones out there for Garys 2E and from what I know it would have been a cleaned up or tweaked 1E and the Monk would have been cut. This means we probably would not have gotten the various 2E settings (FR maybe, Greyhawk, Dragonlance probably, anything else who knows), but we probably also would have had better adventures as a lot of early 2E adventures were terrible. Had Garys 2E been a success or TSR was just managed better its unlikely WoTC would have acquired them but things like Magic the gathering still would have happened so who knows.
2E to 3E
The obvious one here is the new edition could have been AD&D 3E. Such a game may have finally used things like ascending numbers but it would have been an evolution of late 2E. Things like the Sorcerer or spell point type classes could still have happened but we would not have gotten 3.0 in the form we did. Another variance could have been something similar to 3.0 but still retaining more elements of 2E so more spells from 2E would be unchanged and less new ones while the classes etc would still look like 3.0 but perhaps with more 2E numbers and design elements in feats and spells. Either way the new edition would have more 2E and less 3.0 in it compared with what we got.
3E to 4E.
The obvious one here would be an evolution of 3.5 so 4E in its current form would not exist and Pathfinder never would either. They could have incorporated parts of 4E into is and a few people have looked at Star Wars Saga Edition as a potential 3.5/4E hybrid as a path the designers could have gone down. A more drastic departure would be a fixed 3.X where the broken stuff would have been either fixed our outright removed (looking at you natural spell) and some form of OSR/bounded accuracy numbers were used (or even 4E numbers but 3.X type classes). Such an edition would not have caused an edition war but may not have grown the game that much either but we could have still got to 5E via this edition IMHO especially if they used some 4E mechanics such as round structures and the half level thing (but not 4E type classes).
5E.
In this universe the point of divergence is 4E was well received and Pathfinder does not exist or was a small OSR type publisher for 3.X grognards. I think it could go one of two ways and would have launched around 2017/2018. The new 5E is a 4.5, and isn't to drastically different to 4E but with a decade of experience I think the changes would have been a bit more drastic as we still would have had 3.5 not do that well and WoTC doesn't seem to like .5 editions that much. The other option would be a streamlined version where the powers and AEDU would still exist but you could cut 90% of them and still behave a 4E type game, just like you could cut 90% of the feats and prestige classes from 3.X and achieve the same thing. Powers could be divorced from the classes and put int heir own chapter a'la spells or force powers and things like strikers would just get extra dice of damage build into the actual classes. A fireball is still a fireball if it comes from a Sorcerer or Wizard but the base class or archetype could modify that fireball. Same thing with twin strike (you could even just use the 5E weapon styles on various strikers and defenders). You could also cut the game down to 20 levels and have heroic/paragon/epic tiers at level 1-7, 8-14, and 15+.The idea is to cut down on the complexity and redundant powers and you won't need 1W, 2W, 3W etc as that stuff is built into the basic classes.
And that is it mostly. Generally I looked at the most obvious changes they could have made that would still be plausible as I doubt AD&D 2E would have gone skills based in any event.
1E to 2E
In this universe Gygax stays on at TSR past 1985. They use the golden age and manage the company properly and Lorraine Williams never comes on board. Gary seemed open to the idea at least that one day there would be a 2E, 3E etc of D&D. There are clones out there for Garys 2E and from what I know it would have been a cleaned up or tweaked 1E and the Monk would have been cut. This means we probably would not have gotten the various 2E settings (FR maybe, Greyhawk, Dragonlance probably, anything else who knows), but we probably also would have had better adventures as a lot of early 2E adventures were terrible. Had Garys 2E been a success or TSR was just managed better its unlikely WoTC would have acquired them but things like Magic the gathering still would have happened so who knows.
2E to 3E
The obvious one here is the new edition could have been AD&D 3E. Such a game may have finally used things like ascending numbers but it would have been an evolution of late 2E. Things like the Sorcerer or spell point type classes could still have happened but we would not have gotten 3.0 in the form we did. Another variance could have been something similar to 3.0 but still retaining more elements of 2E so more spells from 2E would be unchanged and less new ones while the classes etc would still look like 3.0 but perhaps with more 2E numbers and design elements in feats and spells. Either way the new edition would have more 2E and less 3.0 in it compared with what we got.
3E to 4E.
The obvious one here would be an evolution of 3.5 so 4E in its current form would not exist and Pathfinder never would either. They could have incorporated parts of 4E into is and a few people have looked at Star Wars Saga Edition as a potential 3.5/4E hybrid as a path the designers could have gone down. A more drastic departure would be a fixed 3.X where the broken stuff would have been either fixed our outright removed (looking at you natural spell) and some form of OSR/bounded accuracy numbers were used (or even 4E numbers but 3.X type classes). Such an edition would not have caused an edition war but may not have grown the game that much either but we could have still got to 5E via this edition IMHO especially if they used some 4E mechanics such as round structures and the half level thing (but not 4E type classes).
5E.
In this universe the point of divergence is 4E was well received and Pathfinder does not exist or was a small OSR type publisher for 3.X grognards. I think it could go one of two ways and would have launched around 2017/2018. The new 5E is a 4.5, and isn't to drastically different to 4E but with a decade of experience I think the changes would have been a bit more drastic as we still would have had 3.5 not do that well and WoTC doesn't seem to like .5 editions that much. The other option would be a streamlined version where the powers and AEDU would still exist but you could cut 90% of them and still behave a 4E type game, just like you could cut 90% of the feats and prestige classes from 3.X and achieve the same thing. Powers could be divorced from the classes and put int heir own chapter a'la spells or force powers and things like strikers would just get extra dice of damage build into the actual classes. A fireball is still a fireball if it comes from a Sorcerer or Wizard but the base class or archetype could modify that fireball. Same thing with twin strike (you could even just use the 5E weapon styles on various strikers and defenders). You could also cut the game down to 20 levels and have heroic/paragon/epic tiers at level 1-7, 8-14, and 15+.The idea is to cut down on the complexity and redundant powers and you won't need 1W, 2W, 3W etc as that stuff is built into the basic classes.
And that is it mostly. Generally I looked at the most obvious changes they could have made that would still be plausible as I doubt AD&D 2E would have gone skills based in any event.
