non-4e D&D Players . . .

[Stormonu]

Actually the MM3 for 4E and HS1 Slaying Stone got me to look back at the 4E game, and I plan to pick up the red box for essentials, if for nothing but a bit of nostalgia. I'm certainly not keeping up with the line - or the main line like I did with previous editions.

4E is nowhere near my preferred version of D&D - Pathfinder/3E takes that prize. As a "different" game, it's okay in small forays.

 

[pogre]

No. I honestly do not think we are the target players. WOTC is aiming at new and lapsed players. The lapsed players are folks who just are not playing a rpg, not folks content with pathfinder, trailblazer, 2e, or 1e. Most folks on ENWorld are not lapsed D&D players in that sense.

My group playtested 4e, ran a decent-length campaign and in the end made an educated judgment that it was not our style. Fine game, but just not our style.

I am encouraged that WOTC is reaching out this way. Efforts at expanding and reinvigorating the D&D player base is a good thing.

 

[Ainamacar]

I will end up buying at least some of the Essentials material, but my gaming group will almost certainly not move back to 4e. We tried and failed to be passionate about 4e and decided not to move back to 3.5, and for the last 7 months have been making a system we enjoy from scratch, and it will go on.

Echoing several others, if Essentials had been the original form of 4e it might not have happened this way. For me, the single most disappointing thing about 4e was the identical (and in my opinion thematically troublesome) at-will/encounter/daily progression and the explosion of sometimes barely differentiated powers it entailed. Playing with that was almost instantly the focus of my mechanical tinkering. Otherwise, I found a lot to like about 4e. With Essentials I applaud Wizards for branching out more radically than I expected without sacrificing the interoperability of the game, so far as I can tell from the previews (YMMV). In a year I think there will not be much residual furor, and enough people enjoying the game with Essentials classes that even those existing 4e players who didn't prefer its design direction will accept it as basically good for the game. All it takes is one good gaming friend falling in love with one of the new builds, just enjoying the heck out of it right at your table.

 

[Torpedo]

No. My gaming group has continued to play 3.5 Dungeons & Dragons. I have grown a little weary of the cracks in 3.5 though, namely high level play being a pain in the @$$ to prepare for and endure, as well as an over emphasis on grid / miniature play. 4th edition may have solved the high level problem (maybe not), but it definitely increased the emphasis on grid / miniature play.

I'm heading in a different direction. I'm taking the things I like about D&D, mostly from Basic, 1st, and 3rd editions, and plugging them into a house-ruled version of the SAGA system used in the DragonLance: Fifth Age Dramatic Adventure Game. I'm going off the grid, so to speak, and returning to a quick action / combat resolution system that emphasizes story over strategy.

 

[Hunter In Darkness]

No, I have no interest in that system and I am good with the game systems I have now. To many games I would enjoy and like to try to try one I know did not change enough for me to want to play it.

That ship has sailed, been boarded by pirates, looted and scuttled at this point.

 

[crazy_cat]

No, I have no interest in that system and I am good with the game systems I have now.

This.

The game that is now D&D produced by WOTC and the 'D&D' I want to play are now very different things and are headed in different directions of development.

Thanks, but no thanks, when it comes to D&D I'm happy with Pathfinder, my old 3.5 books, and various other OGL materials.

 

[merelycompetent]

I have not looked at the Essentials line beyond a few blurbs elsewhere, and a few posts here at Enworld.

There's not enough there to make me want to try 4E again. I already sank too much money into it with the original core 3 books, and too much time trying it out, for something I didn't enjoy.

A close friend in my current group *might* be able to persuade me to take a look at it, but we all seem pretty happy with our 3.5/Pathfinder hybrid, even at high levels (going on 18th in the next couple of sessions).

Don't get me wrong, tho. I think WotC is making a good move with the Essentials line, as a business decision. And I do hope that it maintains and increases the active number of players/DMs.

 

[IronWolf]

I don't think I have ever seen this much agreement on a gaming forum ever.

 

[Wicht]

I don't think I have ever seen this much agreement on a gaming forum ever.

Its almost scary and makes me wonder if Essentials is really going to succeed as hoped. I don't wish anyone ill and truly hope WotC does well, even if I'm not going to support them financially.

 

[Chainsaw]

No. I honestly do not think we are the target players. WOTC is aiming at new and lapsed players. The lapsed players are folks who just are not playing a rpg, not folks content with pathfinder, trailblazer, 2e, or 1e. Most folks on ENWorld are not lapsed D&D players in that sense.

Even these lapsed players may be tough to attract given how technical the game has gotten. A buddy from high school called a while back, telling me he wanted to get back into RPGs, to DM a game for his friends. He looked at 4E, but ended up going with S&W. He said he didn't have time to "learn all those new rules" and that it was "nothing like he'd remembered" and "what was all this new terminology - powers, at-will, shifting, etc?"

WotC underestimates how intimidating and overcomplex 4E can seem to new or long-retired players. I don't see how fixing a few bugs (that only hardcore junkies ever noticed) and calling it "Essentials" us going to change that.