3E & 4E Love and Hate Polls - What does it mean?

[haakon1]

I think that is generally true, but also note that the polls are taking place in specific forums. I visit Genral rules and 4E rules exclusively (with a monthly look at gamers) so itf you put a poll about 3.5 and pathfinder in the pathfineder forum, I am not voting there.

Both polls were in the same forum -- the General Forum -- which gets by far the most traffic on the site, so far as I can tell.

I think most people using the site do use "General". It's the place I go 99% of the time.

 

[The Little Raven]

I'd bet money that 3E did a better job of growing D&D than 4E.

I'd take that bet.

You know how many non-D&D gamers I witnessed join the hobby during the 3e era? Zero. You know how many D&D players I saw turn to DMing in the 3e era? Again, zero.

In the 4e era? At least a dozen in both cases.

3e brought back a lot of lapsed D&D gamers, but 4e appears to be actually reaching beyond that aging demographic and bringing in new people.

I'm personally shocked many of the old timers enjoy it.

I'm not. It's fun. The entire idea behind playing the game is to have fun. Not every "old timer" is cast from the same exact mold as you. If there's one thing I've learned in all my time of playing RPGs is that trying to peg what someone will like based on the era they started playing is an exercise in futility.

It lacks so much in terms of creativity and verisimilitude compared to previous editions.

Different strokes. Some people found a lot of older fluff to be creative, while others found it to be hackneyed.

But 4E has thrown out every advancement made since basic to provide simple rules for better simulating real fighting scenarios. It did this to give the average gamer simplicity and balance, which I guess is more important to some.

Yeah, it attempted to make the game an actual game, not some mathematical exercise in "versimilitude," an attribute on which the community can find no consensus.

4E is a modular game which makes it lack the creativity you saw in 3E and previous editions in terms of what characters could do.

The amusing thing about this statement was the "modularity" was one of the big points of hype for 3e and d20.

But hey, every argument you're making is identical to ones being made 10 years ago about 3e by 2e fans, so, y'know, the more things change...

 

[StreamOfTheSky]

BTW though, since I didn't notice it myself until I'd already ranted here about how the polls aren't so bad and shouldn't be that far off (err, sorry!), the 3e poll was totally hacked, with a sudden 500 new "hate" responses after it had been running for days with a more believable set of answers. I haven't checked if the 4e poll was also vandalized.

So, the big problem NOW with these polls is hacking, which overwhelms the real responses from real people. I won't speculate on why the person who hacked it did it, since their opinion really doesn't matter in the scheme of things. Could be trying to "prove" polls are bad by making it so, could be Edition War childishness, or it could be just hacking because they can . . .

4E poll was also hacked, in the opposite way.

It would be nice, if in the OP for the 3E poll, at the very top, in big, bold letters you could state: THIS POLL IS NOT ACCURATE DUE TO HACKING. I know the polls don't matter anyway, but since they also haven't been buried by newer threads yet, it does kind of bother me that non-regulars could click on the thread, see the poll results, never look beyond the first page, if even past the first few posts (how many actually read through 5+ pages of a thread often?), and actualyl come away thinking those results are genuine. Yeah, one poll. Doesn't really mean anything or matter. And yet, it still irks me.

 

[Snoweel]

this is as neutral grounds as there is

lol

I bet if we ran a poll you'd find that the majority of this board are heavily pro-simulationist and pro-deep immersion RP.

Most if not all other D&D-themed messageboards have a far more gamist bent.

ENWorld seems to be the last refuge of the sensitive types, which may be either the cause or consequence of the heavy moderation here.

 

[Hairfoot]

I think most gamers would agree that 4E has brought in more new players than 3E, but the question is why: because it's a greater version of D&D, or because it's become a fluffier rip-off of Mordheim?

But that way lies the edition wars.

I bet if we ran a poll you'd find that the majority of this board are heavily pro-simulationist and pro-deep immersion RP.

Most if not all other D&D-themed messageboards have a far more gamist bent.

ENWorld seems to be the last refuge of the sensitive types, which may be either the cause or consequence of the heavy moderation here.

Actually, my experience is that lighter moderation correlates with fewer gamist players, especially because "gamist" mostly means "4E". The moderation here provide a cosy, soft-criticism environment.

You can try a poll of course, but you know what happens to polls around here if they threaten to be less than optimistic about 4E.

 

[Shemeska]

I think most gamers would agree that 4E has brought in more new players than 3E

I'd argue that 4e has brought in fewer people than 3e while also only bringing forward a smaller fraction of 3e players than 3e managed to bring forward from 1e and 2e. At least in my experience that's what I've seen: 4e's player base is smaller than 3e's was at a comparable period.

 

[Snoweel]

4E is a modular game which makes it lack the creativity you saw in 3E and previous editions in terms of what characters could do. It really to this day astounds me that anyone can begin to argue that 4E is as creative a game as previous editions.

As a 4e fan I'm inclined to agree with you.

I'd say though that the creativity advantage of 3e lies in its support to world-building.

With 3e, a lone DM at home (in his mum's basement, his own basement, or no basement at all) can while away more hours working on his setting. I used to do the same and I generally enjoyed it because I had virtually zero responsibilities and plenty of free time. But I also found so much of my world-building was lost on my players.

So when I started to take the advice of all the best DMs and stopped creating what was unnecessary I realised that 3e seemed to encourage creating the potentially unnecessary, since you needed to be extremely prepared in order to save time at the table.

That's why I find 4e just plain more fun at the table, for both players and DMs at least partly because less preparation is required. This encourages the DM to let the players drive the action without fear of them taking the game into the realms of I-HAVEN'T-STATTED-OUT-ANY-OF-THESE-PC-CLASSED-HALF-DRAGONS-YET!!!!

 

[Snoweel]

Actually, my experience is that lighter moderation correlates with fewer gamist players, especially because "gamist" mostly means "4E". The moderation here provide a cosy, soft-criticism environment.

You'll find gamist players don't take it so seriously. They just want to have a laugh and engage in some rough banter. Classic flamewar mentality.

You can try a poll of course, but you know what happens to polls around here if they threaten to be less than optimistic about 4E.

When has a poll ever been less than optimistic about 4e? They get all the attention and all the press. That's the only stat that matters.

People care about 4e. Even simulationists are breaking their backs trying to make it fit.

 

[Hairfoot]

When has a poll ever been less than optimistic about 4e? They get all the attention and all the press. That's the only stat that matters.

If you like, but I'm not sure other 4E fans share your optimism. Why bother to rig online polls if it's already so popular?

 

[Snoweel]

If you like, but I'm not sure other 4E fans share your optimism. Why bother to rig online polls if it's already so popular?

How many people does it take to rig an online poll?

One weak minded individual who cares about the opinions of a bunch of vocal haters means absolutely nothing.