Gaming Generation Gap

[Cadfan]

So, again, I ask, what is this "own thing" that D&D does?

The thing that's my thing and not your thing. Obviously.

 

[coyote6]

It's definitely not "Our Thing", either. That was Gangbusters' thing, I think.

 

[Doug McCrae]

So, again, I ask, what is this "own thing" that D&D does?

Kill things and take their stuff. The things come from the mythology of many cultures, from fantasy, sci-fi, movies, comic books and Gary's fevered mind. But they are all there to be killed. There's also lots of ways to kill them and lots of stuff to take from them, neither as numerous as the things or from such a diverse array of sources.

You can do other things with D&D if you want. For example you can use it to simulate the life of a courtesan in 16th century Florence. But that's not as well supported by the game text.

 

[Gentlegamer]

Easy solution for what? The generation gap? If so, wouldn't an alternate solution be for all the people of the older generations to go play the videogames Final Fantasy 7, Final Fantasy Tactics, and Chrono Trigger? Of course, that would take a lot more time than reading a few short stories...

Your remedy is for everyone to experience level grinding? :cheeky:

 

[Gentlegamer]

Twenty years from now many may consider some version of D&D to be a perfect representation of their fantasy inspirations because they all grew out of D&D.

We better all read The Worm Ouroboros so we can be prepared for this event.

 

[Gentlegamer]

I guess this is my generation gap...you talk about simulation and realism, yet prefer 1e. Seems like (never played, just read threads on it) 1e is incredibly unrealistic. People talk about going through PCs like a fashionista goes through clothes. "Tom died when he opened the door and all the water came rushing out and smashed him against the wall. Then Bill...aww man. He fumbled with his great axe and decapitated himself. It was amazing! Johhnny...he actually got through 3 rooms of the dungeon before walking into that invisible green slime." The high death rate and rotating roster of PCs is realistic? I know adventuring is dangerous, but...wow. It makes me wonder why these people didn't just line up to walk into a meat grinder and get it over with faster.

If I may be forgiven for cross-posting, I'd like to post a link to a video game forum that touches on a similar theme (and may tie into some of the video game discussion in this thread):

I tormented my uncles kids with MEGAMAN 9

 

[Henry]

Seems like (never played, just read threads on it) 1e is incredibly unrealistic. ...I know adventuring is dangerous, but...wow. It makes me wonder why these people didn't just line up to walk into a meat grinder and get it over with faster.

Part of it is the culture gap - D&D in the first decade was as much about excelling at the game aspect as it was about story. Also, when so many of us tell those old meat-grinder stories, we're not talking about the success of our characters at the end, so much as we tell about our success as players in the end - and a good misfortune story is always more fun than some boring success story, anyway.

Speaking to the culture gap, I feel the same way, when a group of younger gamers starts throwing out Rorune Kenshin, or Escaflowne, or Zenki, or (insert random collection of syllables here). I look at most Manga like most people look at Tolkien (not that Tolkien was a fave for me anyway), and the only manga I ever managed to enjoy was Cowboy Bebop - the English Dub is what sold it, and every other program I tried just lost me out the gate.

 

[Ariosto]

Colorful demises can be counted on to be entertaining, and the incident has a clear END.

Otherwise, "Once Upon a Time in D&D" has a tendency just to rattle on; "you had to be there" is usually true.

There's a reason Knights of the Dinner Table is mostly comedy; and, in the words of Carol Burnett, "Comedy is tragedy plus time."

 

[Achan hiArusa]

...

I have no idea how you connected Final Fantasy and Record of Lodoss War, other than the fact that both were originally inspired by D&D. One is a videogame series that started off as a D&D rip-off, the other is the animated version of what was originally a D&D campaign. I'm not sure what you are getting at, exactly...

RLW came out a full year before the original Final Fantasy.

...
As for your previous post, I think the fact that you referenced non-D&D products, campaign settings that have not been supported for over a decade, and various other dubious suggestions, shows that D&D itself hasn't really supported non-traditional fantasy settings to a great extent. And please don't try to pass off d20 Modern and especially Alternity as being compatible with D&D. I've played both. I know exactly how different they are.

Oh, and please support your statements. I want line item. Just note you are talking to someone who did Vampire the Masquerade conversions to d20 long before Monte Cook ever thought of it.

...
I'm getting tired of everyone assuming that I am saying that it is "impossible to such and such" with D&D. That is not what I have been saying. As such, saying "you can do such and such with D&D right now!" or "such and such has been done before!" doesn't really address any of my comments so far. I'm not speaking out a position of ignorance. When I say that D&D hasn't quite done what I want it to do, it means that even with all of the things brought up in this thread taken into consideration, D&D still doesn't do the things I wish it did.

Then do them yourself and stop depending on the publishers.

 

[StreamOfTheSky]

Your remedy is for everyone to experience level grinding? :cheeky:

Heh heh. I don't remember CT having too much level grinding, but Ill agree on those other 2. Once again, I put forth Suikoden. It actually actively discourages level grinding -- the xp you get is greater the lower level you are. A new character brought into a late game area can be within 2 levels of the other party members in half an hour or sooner. If you continue to grind away, you eventually get a bare minimum amount of xp (5, needing 1000 to reach each level up).

Not saying D&D should copy that and let a level 1 guy that manages to survive a session of 5 CR 14 fights level up like crazy or anything. But oftentimes the game does seem overly punitive on lower level people just trying to catch back up. Possibly because character power seems to increase exponentially with level, not linearly, at least in 3E.

Oh, and in FFT's defense, it may have involved a lot of level grinding. But my god, you actually got returns for it. Not small minute little benefits. The plot battles had enemies at fixed levels. And every little action you did gave you both xp and job points to get new class abilities. More so than in any other game I've played, a few hours of grind in FFT could turn a tough plot battle into a cake walk, which I enjoyed. I used to pride myself on making a fight with only one enemy remaining last for 3+ hours if I needed it to, gaining 2-4 levels and probably maxing each character's job class in the process. I usually stopped after 1 1/2 hours because it was so tedious. But it was rather efficient.