D&D General Kobold Press Going Down a Dark Road

[BrokenTwin]

I have no issue with calling 1DD a new edition of D&D 5E. Just like I don't actually have any issues with calling Essentials a new edition of D&D 4E. They are both the cumulative results of the changes made since the original edition was released wrapped up in a new package. Just like World of Warcraft: [Whatever expansion they're on now] vs release-date World of Warcraft. Broadly compatible, but so much has been tweaked from one to the other that they provide very different experiences. Not as different as, say, World of Warcraft and Call of Duty, but still different. And just like WoW, there's a lot of clones from other developers, many of which are better than the original product, but few with long-term staying power because they lack the branding and reach.

Honestly, if WotC's handling of the word edition wasn't such a mess I doubt this would even be a conversation. Nobody argues about what is and isn't an edition of Call of Cthulhu.

 

[Imaro]

could not say it better... in offical sanction Adventures at cons you could play a phb1 fighter and the guy next to you play an essentials fighter and it didn't involve any work... nothing was replaced

Yes as long as you played the classes as they were laid out in the individual books... and Essentials did in fact include changes to the rules from the original core books... one example being the skill challenge rules. To be clear I'm not arguing Essentials is a new edition, I don't think it was... but it does hit the criteria laid out earlier for 5e and one D&D being different editions.

 

[GMforPowergamers]

It took a entirely different approach to many of the classes.

without replacing them... they were completly addative. you could use a phb1 fighter and a essentials fighter and there were even rules for mixing them on the same character (taking the power strike as an encoutner power, or tradeing out a power strike for an encounter power)

Was Skills and Powers D&D 2.25? 2.5?

funny story (I know I have told before) by 1998 I knew a group calling those books 3e... when 3e came out they would (at least for a few years) call 3e 4e

 

[GMforPowergamers]

didn’t they provide new cleric/fighter/… classes in the essentials, thereby theoretically replacing the 4e ones (unless you let them exist side by side).

So essentials should be as much a departure from 4e as 1DD is from 5e, wherever you land on this

nope called out as optional builds like subclasses.
You pick when you make a fighter to make a (now named weapon master) phb1 fighter or a slayer or a knight... and you could mix and match parts of them, and the feats interacted with them the same.

cleric more so was just new subclasses

 

[Imaro]

nope called out as optional builds like subclasses.
You pick when you make a fighter to make a (now named weapon master) phb1 fighter or a slayer or a knight... and you could mix and match parts of them, and the feats interacted with them the same.

cleric more so was just new subclasses

They used totally different mechanics though... You could not pick say a Knight's aura power for your weapon master fighter and you also needed the Essentials books to know what the new powers did and how they worked. Just like with 5e and 1D&D some things were interchangeable or the same and some things were totally new or changed. The distinctions you're making doesn't seem to hold.

 

[GMforPowergamers]

I always find this argument weird... it's been booming since 2014... that's almost 10years without slowing down and in fact steadily picking up.

2014 wasn't a big boom... it was a bunch of (but not all I know) pf1 players coming back and most (again I know not all) 4e players moving over with a few new players... WotC didn't start talking boom until after stranger things...end of 2016.
That "and steadily picking up" is stranger things and then covid... both caused large growths. had it been 4e, or 3e, or 2e or 1e rules nothing in stranger things would have changed (they were not really useing rules at all) and as such as many people would have come to D&D.

To claim it's only a result of a zeitgeist of popular culture seems to be simplifying to a point that doesn't line up with reality.

saying anything else feels like it doesn't line up with reality.

IMO 5e has allowed the creation of a true D&D zeitgeist vs the 80's nostalgia zeitgeist that allowed it to gain a foothold but in no way accounts for it's continued success.

sorry don't see it

 

[GMforPowergamers]

They used totally different mechanics though...

no they didn't

slayers still marked, they just traded there daily powers for the ability to add dex to damage on all weapon attacks and they got pre selected encounter power of 'power strike' (I want to say the dex thing scaled and there was 1 other difference but I don't have the books handy and it is the hardest edition to look up onliine)

You could not pick say a Knight's aura power for your weapon master fighter and you also needed the Essentials books to know what the new powers did and how they worked.

I don't remember the knight as well as the slayer but what did the aura replace? and yes you would need martial power 2 if you wanted a power from martial power 2 as well.

Just like with 5e and 1D&D some things were interchangeable or the same and some things were totally new or changed. The distinctions you're making doesn't seem to hold.

nope... at least not as we have seen.

If I showed up with a PHB (now named weapon master) fighter that was a dwarf from the phb1 to a game that was useing essientials there was no change. If on the other hand I take a 2014 mtn dwarf bard to a 1D&D game (based on what we know) there are a ton of changes

 

[Oofta]

without replacing them... they were completly addative. you could use a phb1 fighter and a essentials fighter and there were even rules for mixing them on the same character (taking the power strike as an encoutner power, or tradeing out a power strike for an encounter power)

I agree. But you could also have just picked up only the essentials rules to play the game. It doesn't really qualify as either a supplement or "new" edition. In theory that's what the 2024 edition will be as well and why I'm not sure if I care what we call it. I'm assuming it's more like the 3.0 to 3.5, we'll see how much they change of course.

funny story (I know I have told before) by 1998 I knew a group calling those books 3e... when 3e came out they would (at least for a few years) call 3e 4e

I actually have fond memories of S&P, primarily because I played a barbarian that had the "I always tell the truth" flaw in order to get some benefits and actually leaned into it. But you needed the other books in order to use it

 

[Imaro]

sorry don't see it

I am not surprised... It's cool to have biases but like I said simplifying 10 years of steady growth for a product down to... it got advertised on a netflix show... just doesn't click for me, especially when D&D was featured on shows previous to that.

 

[Parmandur]

I think it's poorly worded and banking on 5e players doing what 3.5 players did when 4e came out and bought out most of the 3.5 stock of core books that could be found in most places making costs go way up on those books for a long time in secondary markets. I know I sold mine for $80 a piece about 6 months after 4e came out. With WOTC playing the shell game with 4e and having shown signs of the shell game with the OGL for a few weeks, KP probably drafted this and it was exactly what everyone was thinking and that 1D&D was going to be like 4e. 1D&D hasn't exactly been greeted enthusiastically either.

Yeah, I can see that was their aim, but given what we've seen of OneD&F it is weirdly out-of place.