What is OSR about?

[Mark]

1 - I never suggested the OSR was the invention of a single person. I have, in fact, been saying the exact opposite in this thread.

2 - The point I am making is that the release of 4e was not a major impetus in the development of the OSR, not that nobody on the face of the earth was every disillusioned by 4e and decided to go back and play pre-2000 editions of D&D.

3 - If you disagree with #2, please point out a few of the significant OSR blogs, message boards or product lines whose owners/creators specifically credit the release of 4e as a significant impetus for their renewed interest in talking about, playing and producing material for OS games.

No need for number three since if 4E had been a retro-clone of 1E AD&D the OSR movement would likely have stopped in its tracks. Your original statement "The OSR exists because people were ALREADY alienated from WotC's version of D&D ca. 2005. Really, no really, it has nothing to do with 4e." is about why it "exists" and part of that is because of 4E being how it is (along with other non-D&D games not filling the needs of OSR pundits). I even say further that if there were non-D&D alternatives that already did what retro-clones do, people would have turned to them rather than (re)inventing impersonations of wheels. Furthermore, it has to be noted that the mere proliferation of all the retro-clones that exist, from C&C to S&W to LL to OSRIC to the game that Joseph Goodman is playtesting proves that not only can no single game scratch the itch but, inversely, no single game can have caused the itch to exist and need scratching. It's like saying that a new beverage came into existence because people don't like Coke when obviously they must also not like Pepsi or any number of other existing beverages to not simply turn toward one of the alternatives.

 

[Ourph]

No need for number three since if 4E had been a retro-clone of 1E AD&D the OSR movement would likely have stopped in its tracks.

If you think WotC reproducing 1e AD&D would have meant the "end" of the OSR, then we obviously have a very different perspective on what the OSR is. I think in most people's opinion, the world's biggest RPG publisher going back to an old school ruleset as their flagship game would have been seen as the biggest OSR triumph imaginable.

Your original statement "The OSR exists because people were ALREADY alienated from WotC's version of D&D ca. 2005. Really, no really, it has nothing to do with 4e." is about why it "exists" and part of that is because of 4E being how it is (along with other non-D&D games not filling the needs of OSR pundits).

Then please, point out bloggers, authors or publishers involved in the OSR who specifically credit the release of 4e as a major impetus in their decision to play, talk about or write for OSR games. I could claim that the Saints winning the Superbowl this year was a major impetus for the OSR but saying it doesn't make it so.

no single game can have caused the itch to exist and need scratching.

I never said that a single game "caused the itch". The cause of the itch is that old school games are cool games and people still enjoy playing them after 20-30 years.

What I am saying is that a single game (4e) was not a major impetus for the OSR as others have claimed.

 

[Ariosto]

From what I have seen, Advanced/Basic/Original players and 3e players overwhelmingly parted ways long ago. I can think of one exception who stuck with 3e until 3.5, then gave C&C a try, then went back to AD&D -- and ended up discovering and adopting OD&D tailored to his taste.

No doubt there have been other "late abandoners", and even some folks who decided their "new edition" would be an old one or retro-clone instead of 4e.

However, the online reaction that I saw, at "old school" sites, to the announcement of 4e was pretty much a dismissal of "more of the same". The significant differences from 3e just meant that -- where there had been some conversion of 3e modules -- the new game apparently offered nothing of practical interest. There was a brief upturn in WotC-bashing, mostly recycling the same old complaints.

Nothing of any great import in the "OSR" comes to my mind as having squat to do with that blip on the radar.

Some of us "oldies" play 4e on occasion. There may have been a slight increase in people "coming over" from 3e. Then again, it might just be an upward fluctuation in the frequency of those who right away wheel out their proposals to "improve" the old game by making it more like 3e.

Quite apart from, and oblivious to, the OSR, there are of course players playing what they like to play. In my current face-to-face group, a couple have never played a WotC edition. Another has a collection of WotC's plastic miniatures, but has played 3e only once and 4e not at all. About all they know is what they see when they go to conventions, and that doesn't look like what they want.

 

[Mark]

If you think WotC reproducing 1e AD&D would have meant the "end" of the OSR, then we obviously have a very different perspective on what the OSR is. I think in most people's opinion, the world's biggest RPG publisher going back to an old school ruleset as their flagship game would have been seen as the biggest OSR triumph imaginable.

I think that if WotC were giving certain OSR D&Ders the D&D they wished to play as a contemporary game and supporting it (and doing it well) then the OSR would not exist as we know it now, except maybe as the OSRPGA.

Then please, point out bloggers, authors or publishers involved in the OSR who specifically credit the release of 4e as a major impetus in their decision to play, talk about or write for OSR games. I could claim that the Saints winning the Superbowl this year was a major impetus for the OSR but saying it doesn't make it so.

If the OSR was only about bloggers and authors and publishers your request would make sense. My beverage analogy is an apt one.

I never said that a single game "caused the itch". The cause of the itch is that old school games are cool games and people still enjoy playing them after 20-30 years.

What I am saying is that a single game (4e) was not a major impetus for the OSR as others have claimed.

If that last line was what you wrote in the first place, we would not be haivg this divergent discussion. What you said was that 4E has nothing to do with why the OSR exists. "The OSR exists because people were ALREADY alienated from WotC's version of D&D ca. 2005. Really, no really, it has nothing to do with 4e."

 

[Ariosto]

Furthermore, it has to be noted that the mere proliferation of all the retro-clones that exist, from C&C to S&W to LL to OSRIC to the game that Joseph Goodman is playtesting proves that not only can no single game scratch the itch but, inversely, no single game can have caused the itch to exist and need scratching.

The original D&D set of 1974 started the contagion that has been spreading ever since, and there are as many ways to scratch as there are individuals.

D&D in turn started as Dave Arneson's "house rules" for Gygax's and Perren's Chainmail, in a hobby that had up to that point been made up of very little other than "house" rules sets -- and to this day produces even more than the ever-flowing stream to be found online.

With the computers, Internet, print on demand, and so on that we have today, publication is extremely easy!

The OGL, and the material released under it, also helped a bit in opening floodgates that were more tightly held back in the days of Dave Hargrave's Arduin Grimoire.

 

[Reynard]

I think we are using the "OSR" term in different ways and therefore causing some confusion, so I'll clarify my ealier statement:

While there have been people "keeping the flame alive" of original editions since they were first replaced, it was a confluence of events including EGG's death, and the announcement of 4E and revelations of its inherent differences -- even moreso than 3E -- from "traditional D&D", that brought a big enough portion of the fanbase out into the open to create something resembling a movement. If 4E had hewed more closely to its roots, or if EGG had lived longer and continued to produce work with Troll Lords, the "OSR" would have remained on the fringes, apparent only to those that already had an interest in Old School gaming, and we wouldn't be talking about it, because it wouldn't have a name as such.

 

[JohnRTroy]

The OSR exists because people were ALREADY alienated from WotC's version of D&D ca. 2005. Really, no really, it has nothing to do with 4e. The people blogging about OS games and making retroclones were alienated by 3e, not 4e.

Keep in mind I am talking about the "R"--the reference to revival-Renaissance. The term OSR only appeared a few years ago, I don't even believe it was used before Gygax's death. I never heard it before that. And I used the term "critical mass"

This is an interesting analysis. It skips over people like myself who began playing D&D when it first came out (and who were gamers of other games [wargames, miniature wargames, etc.] prior to the advent of D&D in 1974). It is interesting to me, when I go to play at Gencon, GaryCon, and other small conventions and gamedays, or when I glance over the many OSR blogs, to see that there is a gap in the references and language between my own memories and nostalgia (not a bad word) and that of the OSR

I remember Ryan Dancey saying that there were a few generations of D&D player, and he mentioned the two first ones were yours (those that were wargamers who saw D&D rise from that environment), and the generation of gamers who came from the rise of TSR and entering the recently established RPG market. And if we assume most of the wargaming hobby consisted of older gents, there's definitely a generation gap involved.

I skipped that generation because I think it's mostly people from the 2nd generation who are part of this revival. Keep in mind the whole OSR term itself seems to have been coined from the fans themselves, and I am not sure if it's an accurate description of what's going on. (For instance, did the movement get "bigger" or is there just more activity from bloggers and self-publishers).

 

[Ariosto]

If 4E had hewed more closely to its roots, or if EGG had lived longer and continued to produce work with Troll Lords, the "OSR" would have remained on the fringes, apparent only to those that already had an interest in Old School gaming, and we wouldn't be talking about it, because it wouldn't have a name as such.

That, I think, is just bizarre. From what I have seen, the movement was and is mostly made up of people who care no more about ENworld's recognition than ENworlders typically care about their stuff getting mentioned at Dragonsfoot. The notion that people posting about it here somehow validates it as a "real" movement is absurd.

I don't know for sure when or where the OSR name first caught on. The earliest usage of the phrase "old school renaissance" I found in a quick search at DF was a post of June 25, 2005 in the thread "Is True 20 Mustling In on C&C's Turf?":

An old school renaissance could be on the horizon.

.

The next was on July 22, 2006, in a thread on "old school art":

Yeah, we've seen a lot of really good art recently -- the OSRIC cover and 'art festival' stuff, gleepwurp's stuff, the art in BFRPG and recent DF publications, and of course Jason Braun and Jim Holloway's art in RJK's new module. After, essentially, 20+ years in the desert, it's nice to see this sudden flood of new art that "gets it," and not just from 1 or 2 artists, but from lots of different folks. It's almost enough to make me think that this "old school renaissance" might turn out to be the real thing after all...

The year 2006 saw, if memory serves, the first widely published versions of BFRPG and OSRIC. Labyrinth Lord followed in 2007, Swords & Wizardry in 2008.

WotC announced 4e at GenCon in August of 2007.

 

[Ourph]

it was a confluence of events including EGG's death, and the announcement of 4E and revelations of its inherent differences -- even moreso than 3E -- from "traditional D&D"

What you're saying is that the OSR basically gained strength through negativity. I've never seen that. In fact, most of the OSR blogs and messageboards had a few posts/threads about 4e right after it first came out and everybody was talking about it and then dropped the subject to focus on the games that OSR people actually care about.

The OSR is based on people who think the old games are still awesome and who still have fun playing and writing about them. Since WotC isn't a publisher for those games, they really haven't been a player in the OSR. The one thing that WotC have done that really affected the OSR was releasing the OGL/SRD, which made the retroclones possible. Other than that, I don't think the OSR is really that cognizant of what WotC is doing.

The fact that Mike Mearls and some of the other 4e designers have been rediscovering OD&D in the past few years even argues that it's the OSR influencing WotC, rather than the other way around.

 

[darjr]

I know quite a few people, on line and locally, that went back to look at older D&D in part because of 4e, not in spite of it.

It often gets dismissed in the strum and tumult on the internet, but I think there are a great many of us that appreciate old school D&D and 4e. In fact I know it goes right to the heart of the 4e design team itself. It seems that those of us who do are dismissed in many, not quite correct, ways, but we undeniably exist.