D&D General Does D&D (and RPGs in general) Need Edition Resets?

[Parmandur]

Which are board games.
One a pure strategy game.
Another a rigged trash that causes fights and heartbreak.

And even so. They make money by selling to people once. Or if they lose their old copy.

When Chess and Monopoly attempt to have continuous customers, they create versions with whole new rules... New editions if you will.

D&D mostly doesn't sell to continuous customers, though...just a few books, and most people have all they ever need. Longterm fans aren't the main market....new batches of teens are.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

Folks keep saying incremental changes is equivalent to nothing and that's not correct.

It's not nothing. I explicitly said so above (bold added for emphasis):

Now, don't mistake me. I get that this is a prediction of future trends, and I am no fortuneteller. But if past is prologue, and if 5.5e is as minimally changed as I expect it to be, then it isn't alarmist in the least to say that five-ish years from now, there will be rather more criticism than there is today, and much of it will center on things that can't be fixed iteratively or gradually.

Which was my thesis.

I even explicitly said, repeatedly, that a balance between stability and change is needed. Too much change and you drive people away. Too much lack of change and people slowly get fed up. Iterative change tries to have its cake and eat it too, and in fairness it actually does a decent job at that. But there are some things it cannot fix, even in principle—and as those things remain fixed points for longer and longer stretches, they will chafe more. That is the nature of the beast.

In order for criticism to center on things that can't be fixed iteratively or gradually, there must be things iterative/gradual change can fix that, as a result, won't get criticism...because they were fixed! "Iterative change...actually does a decent job[....but] there are some things it cannot fix." There is no sense in which I, or as far as I can tell anyone else, has argued that iterative change does genuinely, absolutely nothing. It can do quite a lot, even! But there are things it just can't fix.

I had already presumed that iterative change would be fixing the things it can fix. Hence, attention will focus on those things that iterative change can't address. Such things will thus remain mostly static over time if only iterative change is permitted. Unchanged things suffer two problems. One, if someone has encountered them early (like, say, me), then the fact that they remain unchanged over a long period of time will chafe. Two, the longer they remain, the more chances anyone who hasn't seen it will eventually see it. The rate may be slow or fast, but unless you're actually losing customers, it ain't negative.

Yes, well my point was D&D has never had a competitor for the number 1 spot that wasn't created by D&D itself.

Sure. First-mover bias. You can see similar things, for example, with IBM. What we now call "PCs" are actually PC-alikes, because IBM originally developed the (trademarked) Personal Computer. In creating a standard that was then widely adopted by competitors, IBM created their own competition--and eventually outcompeted within their market. Sometimes you see a very similar phenomenon in game development, where Company A creates a prominent game or franchise, but then fires/lays off significant chunks of the original development team, who go on to create competing products, some of which can even eclipse their original work.

And, because I have to say this every single time or else someone will get their knickers in a twist, no that is not the only reason things are successful. But it is an extremely strong force in many cases, alongside many other factors not strictly related to quality or every single specific characteristic or detail about something, e.g. network effects are a pretty huge deal especially for stuff like tabletop gaming where it literally doesn't work unless you have multiple people all using the same system.

(Which, incidentally, that was why they made such grandiose proposals for what "modularity" would do back in the Next Playtest. If it had, in fact, actually been the case that you could play a character that felt and played like a 1e character in the same game as Pat's character that felt and played like a 4e character, and Chris's character that felt and played like a 3e character, then the problem of "need everyone on the same system" becomes a hell of a lot less painful--if pretty much everyone can get a really good match for what they want out of the experience, then there's a very compelling reason to join up. Sadly, 5e completely gave up on any amount of "modularity" remotely like that, and defaulted to wishy-washy "advice" that usually amounts to, "Some people prefer X, while others only want not-X. You'll have to decide what you want to do!" Quite often without any actual recommendations for HOW to do that, beyond just stating the concept.)

 

[payn]

(Which, incidentally, that was why they made such grandiose proposals for what "modularity" would do back in the Next Playtest. If it had, in fact, actually been the case that you could play a character that felt and played like a 1e character in the same game as Pat's character that felt and played like a 4e character, and Chris's character that felt and played like a 3e character, then the problem of "need everyone on the same system" becomes a hell of a lot less painful--if pretty much everyone can get a really good match for what they want out of the experience, then there's a very compelling reason to join up. Sadly, 5e completely gave up on any amount of "modularity" remotely like that, and defaulted to wishy-washy "advice" that usually amounts to, "Some people prefer X, while others only want not-X. You'll have to decide what you want to do!" Quite often without any actual recommendations for HOW to do that, beyond just stating the concept.)

Im bummed about the modularity too (though I never thought 1E next to 3E across from 4E PCs at the same table was ever possible). Modularity is still on the table and likely a stronger tool int he incremental tool kit. They just haven't had to reach for it yet.

 

[payn]

Buddy buddy
That's the point.

If you don't reset, you can't steal other RPG's good ideas.

You need to reset to add advantage/disadvantage? Buddy, you aint convincing anybody.

 

[mamba]

No, this is a general discussion on the possibility of incremental change retiring the idea of edition changes. You are hung up on the specific BX example. Also, an odd notion that it would be exactly the same today without any changes.

I am not hung up on it being the same, only on incremental changes not changing as much as new editions could. If they did, then there is no reasonable difference between the two, as I said repeatedly by now.

Your argument seems to be 'we can do all the changes without calling it a new edition', which just means you make zero distinction between the two.

 

[payn]

I am not hung up on it being the same, only on incremental changes not changing as much as new editions could. If they did, then there is no reasonable difference between the two, as I said repeatedly by now.

Your argument seems to be 'we can do all the changes without calling it a new edition', which just means you make zero distinction between the two.

No, you are not listening. I am saying a game can be incrementally changed over time and be successful. Others say fundamental resets are necessary. The distinction is clear.

 

[mamba]

That is the point in contention:

it is

I don't think that's true.

Consider the best selling board games on the planet: Chess and Monopoly.

That assumes that BX was the equivalent of chess rather than Mills / Nine Men's Morris or something like that, and I am not convinced it was.

Also, the market share of chess or Monopoly is significantly lower than that of 5e in the TTRPG space. If you are ok with selling at maybe twice the OSR space (to account for the name and marketing), I think you can do so without new editions.

 

[mamba]

No, you are not listening. I am saying a game can be incrementally changed over time and be successful. Others say fundamental resets are necessary. The distinction is clear.

yes, I know you say that, and I would like to know where you draw the line between an incremental change and a new edition. Because to me it looks like you just make the same changes without calling it one.

I asked you a few posts ago and never got an answer, I am still interested in it

So let's see what you consider incremental change to BX and what not

1) not having races as classes
2) removing racial class limits
3) adding skills and feats
4) adding cantrips to vancian casting
5) unified XP progression
6) subclasses

 

[payn]

yes, I know you say that, and I would like to know where you draw the line between an incremental change and a new edition. Because to me it looks like you just make the same changes without calling it one.

I asked you a few posts ago and never got an answer, I am still interested in it

2014 5E to 2024 5E is incremental. 3E to 3.5E to PF1 was incremental. 3E to 4E to 5E were resets.

 

[mamba]

2014 5E to 2024 5E is incremental. 3E to 3.5E to PF1 was incremental. 3E to 4E to 5E were resets.

agreed, but that did not really answer my question with the specific examples, unless you answer is that almost all of them would require a reset when starting with BX - and if they do then I stick to my BX with incremental changes would not be as successful as 5e, by far