Is D&D "Rubbish"?

[captnq]

I still pull out my first edition DM's Guide because of the tables and guides.

 

[TrippyHippy]

RuneQuest is a better system - when you acclimatise yourself to the changes, you end up saying ‘that makes sense’ and ‘ooh, that’s clever’ quite a lot - but D&D was the first and it’s what most gamers are used to. It’s also accessible. Things like Classes, Levels, Racial Templates, Vancian magic and so on are often criticised, but in all cases they give very clear and simple options and concepts that gamers can quickly latch on to. However, other games become favourable if and when D&D starts to feel a little jaded or too simplistic.

 

[Tony Vargas]

You are entitled to an opinion. It's not objective. You are entitled to pick a favorite.

Opinions are subjective, but you can find objective measures of quality. For instance, if a ruleset contradicts itself, that's a problem. Or if it presents rules that don't make sense or can't be deciphered. Early versions of D&D suffered from a lot of those sorts of quality issues, making them, objectively, pretty bad.

That was just because they were a completely new kind of game being done in an industry not particularly more sophisticated than the small-press 'zines of the 70s.

Look at modern games, including D&D in the 21st century, and you don't see so much of that. 5e has some rule ambiguity here or there - intentionally, a choice to encourage DMs to be more flexible - and 3.x/Pathfinder, after 14 years and so /much/ material has issues, but aside from that, you see some fairly competent, well-executed game design. Not always appreciated, but present.


Other games - sure, including Chaosium's RuneQuest and related games - may have risen to that level earlier, but to claim that modern D&D is still 'rubish' in comparison to RQII requires a lot of bias.

 

[TrippyHippy]

Other games - sure, including Chaosium's RuneQuest and related games - may have risen to that level earlier, but to claim that modern D&D is still 'rubish' in comparison to RQII requires a lot of bias.

To be fair, I’m mainly comparing the latest editions of D&D (5th) and RQ (6th). I do like D&D, a lot, but RQ is still a lot more logical and flexible. There is a RQ campaign coming out sometime this year about the Fall of Constantinople. I wouldn’t even dream of attempting to do that sort of thing with D&D - where you’d have to ignore vast portions of D&D tropes to be able to even begin considering it. That’s my point really.

 

[Tony Vargas]

To be fair, I’m mainly comparing the latest editions of D&D (5th) and RQ (6th). I do like D&D, a lot, but RQ is still a lot more logical and flexible.

To be fair, D&D being 'illogical' in that sense is a design choice that plays well to it's fanbase.

 

[Celebrim]

To be fair, I’m mainly comparing the latest editions of D&D (5th) and RQ (6th). I do like D&D, a lot, but RQ is still a lot more logical and flexible. There is a RQ campaign coming out sometime this year about the Fall of Constantinople. I wouldn’t even dream of attempting to do that sort of thing with D&D - where you’d have to ignore vast portions of D&D tropes to be able to even begin considering it. That’s my point really.

Runequest's following (and even its creation) is almost entirely among people who do historical reenactment and who want nice easy non-abstract correspondence between the mechanics and individual actions. It's pretty much only that crowd that tends to "oooooh" and "aahhhhh" about how clever Runequest is. I'm happy for them, however it really has nothing to do with whether D&D (or Runequest) for that matter is a good system.

I wouldn't dream of trying to do a D&D style game with the RQ system either.

 

[TrippyHippy]

Runequest's following (and even its creation) is almost entirely among people who do historical reenactment and who want nice easy non-abstract correspondence between the mechanics and individual actions. It's pretty much only that crowd that tends to "oooooh" and "aahhhhh" about how clever Runequest is. I’m happy for them, however it really has nothing to do with whether D&D (or Runequest) for that matter is a good system.

Which isn’t entirely true. A lot of people like RuneQuest for it’s mythical feel. A lot of people just feel it’s better for adapting fantasy fiction - like Game Of Thrones for example - without having to get bogged down in artificial arguments about what Class a character is, and so forth, or fixated on gaining XP and levels. And for that reason it has everything to do with whether D&D is as good a system for fantasy as others that are available.

I wouldn’t dream of trying to do a D&D style game with the RQ system either.

I have. It works really well - notably there will be a supplement called ‘Classic Fantasy’ coming out soon that addresses that precise need.

 

[Man in the Funny Hat]

I remember seeing these videos many moons ago. Must have kept my responses to other message boards. Certainly it's a rant and not an actual critique or review. He's all over the place with his objections which ultimately seem to revolve around the fact that no edition of D&D is actually Runequest and therefore they are all junk. There are a few valid observations about various editions of D&D but not much worth really responding to given the, "It's not what I personally want so it's by definition unusable crap," perspective he brings to the "discussion".

 

[Zhaleskra]

[MENTION=6731904]SirAntoine[/MENTION], I have a small selection of favorite games/settings, probably in the 4-6 range. There is some crossover, especially when the system is the setting. The point I was raising is that me declaring a system "best" for everyone would be wrong.

 

[SirAntoine]

@SirAntoine, I have a small selection of favorite games/settings, probably in the 4-6 range. There is some crossover, especially when the system is the setting. The point I was raising is that me declaring a system "best" for everyone would be wrong.

I don't think anyone would dispute that.