{Hypothetical Thought Exercise} A cosmic being annihilates your favorite version of D&D...

[Serendipity]

Soooo...the Beyonder just cosmically edited Swords & Wizardry Complete out of existence? No problem, I'll play OD&D, BECMI, or 1e AD&D. And houserule it. Problem solved.

 

[Balesir]

If 4E were nuked I'd probably switch to 13th Age, if you'd accept that as a "type of D&D" (and I think it's kinda similar to Pathfinder in that respect). Failing that I'd honestly probably go with non-D&D RPGs - maybe Burning Wheel or DragonQuest. As well as HârnMaster, of course (which I also play now, alongside 4E).

 

[edemaitre]

If D&D went away....

I'm currently running two adventuring parties using the D20 Basic Fantasy Role-Playing Game, with bits from other retro-clones, AD&D1 Oriental Adventures, and FATE. My groups' second or third choice for traditional fantasy would likely be Pathfinder. I have dozens of sourcebooks and modules for past editions and other systems, so these work best for my homebrew sandbox settings.

Since the advent of D&D4e, which many of my gamers found to be too tactical and not as flavorful as past editions (but YMMV), we've been quite happy playing everything from FATE to Savage Worlds, so if the brand somehow went away or D&D5e/Next doesn't capture our imagination and attention, we'll be just fine.

 

[GreyLord]

HAHAHAHAHAHAH

Old School Gamers for the WIN!!

So, if you kill 1e, I play 2e core...and the best thing...it's at least close enough to 1e that it's almost the same thing!!!

Much closer than any of these other "editions" that came later.

BX and BECMI also have this advantage...sure it might not be exactly the same, but close enough that you can basically play the same game with BECMI that you were playing with BX overall.

 

[Scrivener of Doom]

If 4E was nuked, I'd go with 13th Age. If 13th Age was nuked, I would grab Swords & Wizardry White Box and use that as the basis for a homebrewed version of 1E heavily flavoured by 3.5E. If that was nuked, I suppose I would go back to 3.5E but run it as E10.

Or I would play Elric!.

 

[Lindeloef]

I'd be pretty sad if D&D4e would be eradicated from existence...

Maybe I would give 13th age a try, though more likely I would try out a new non-D&D related System. Iron Kingdoms probably.

 

[Kinak]

If Pathfinder went away... probably Iron Heroes, to the extent that's a version of D&D. Then a whole list of retroclones or houseruled Rules Cyclopedia. Then E6. Then heavily houseruled 3rd or 4th.

If Paizo wasn't destroyed by the Beyonder in this retcon, I'd consider whatever they were working on too. Chances are pretty good I'd play whatever is being supported by their adventure paths.

Cheers!
Kinak

 

[Ramaster]

If Pathfinder and 3e were to be hit with a Maximized Empowered Mythic Disintegrate (CL 20), then I would be more than happy to give 13th Age a go. Reading the Core rulebook got me quite excited and the amount of support the developers are giving to the game is encouraging.

 

[Man in the Funny Hat]

1E is my rules base of choice. I'd replace it with... well, gosh I have a lot of choices actually. 2E or OSRIC are the immediate go-to's. I've thought about an E6 game a fair amount. I could also do something like E6 with Pathfinder. I have an Original Box reprint on order and I'm thinking more and more of starting some kind of a game with that. I've never actually PLAYED 4E but I have the core books to do it with. I could make do with just a vanilla 3.5 game or go full-on Pathfinder, or drag out my old Holmes and put it to work, or wait to see what 5E really brings. I've wanted to get my hands on a Rules Cyclopedia for some time now...

Wait, was this supposed to be a hard question to answer?

 

[saskganesh]

If I could not play anything at all resembling an OSR game anymore, I'd just go back to Rolemaster 2nd ed and then strip it down.