D&D General [rant]The conservatism of D&D fans is exhausting.

[Gus L]

Gus - some ghost rules create cover for a variant playstyle (perhaps more supported in another edition) hence their undeath ?

also a game design can be incompetent and not support the playstyle it purports to espouse

Of course ... the right referee can make most anything work .... but that doesn't get to what I'm talking about here - 1) I think a high level of design complexity without clear instructions is both messy for old hands like us, and too nuanced/confusing for people who are new to the hobby. 2) A ghost mechanic isn't a fruitful void or an alternate play style - it's a spectre haunting the system - for a most referees its a confusing addition that makes play more complex while adding next to nothing and distracting them from the important parts of the system. For those who want the old or alternate play style ... it's a sad intangible reminder.

To be less melodramatic ... when I introduce someone to OD&D I tell them "My game is about dungeon crawling in a dangerous world where life is cheap - play a bit like you're in a horror movie or spy thriller, not a video game or fantasy anime and you'll likely have a better time."

I wish flagship products by WotC (and a lot of indie games to be fair) did something similar rather then saying "This is the D&D/RPG experience". Now if 5E had done what some of the early design discussions suggested and had create a sort of bare bones d20 system with setting and play style creating additions - I think that would have been amazing. One could have had a warbands/tactical skirmish system set in Spelljammer land with space crews battling each other, a heroic wilderness game on Arathas, a Greyhawk high lethality dungeon crawl to demesne game system and a Forgotten Realms fantasy heroes light tactics game... rather then simply the last promising to deliver all the others if one just imagined hard enough.

More generally I don't like designers trying to smuggle multiple play styles into their games - either with half baked vestigial rules, or even effort to make some kind of general universal roleplaying game system. Own how you want your game to play and build towards it with mechanics, setting and adventure design ... but most of all let the reader/referee know what you are putting down and why.

 

[Remathilis]

I don’t see why OSR gets so little credit for fixing (or attempting to fix) what so many edition warriors are upset about.
New adventures for prior additions.
New setting material for prior additions.
New player options for prior additions.
New optional rules for prior additions.
Attempts at rebalancing rules in prior additions.

I think it comes down to the fact the OSR itself narrowed down what they mean by OS to basically 1977 - 1983 B/X and 1e with Gygaxian dungeons and sandbox play. The vast majority of material keeps to that area and there is little beyond that. There is exactly one 2e retroclone and it's widely panned. No one is producing settings like Ravenloft or Forgotten Realms, just Greyhawk clones. Story-based narrative play is shunned, and Hickman's revolution is seen rather negatively.

Basically, a lot of it is people attempting to reinvent the wheel in the same space using different types of rubber. I will admit I am not as keyed into the movement as I was a while back (the wilderness years for me between 3.5 and 5e), so IF someone is making 2e adjacent clones with gothic horror settings, I probably missed it. But OSR just seems to focus on one section of OS play at the exemption of all others, so I can see why it doesn't get recognition you are describing. It's either your vibe or it does nothing for you.

 

[mamba]

But, see, that's the thing. Someone complains about 5e - whatever the complaint. Someone says, "Well, here's exactly what you want, all nicely packaged for you". And the response inevitably is, "No, that's not good enough. It MUST be from WotC. It MUST be for 5e D&D. Accept no substitutes!!"

maybe the issue is that people want slight changes to 5e, not a 1e, and you just assume that is what they want?

At least for me 1e is not any closer to what I want than 5e is. There is no way I go back to 1e. 5e with some tweaks however… it’s just that 2024 moved in the wrong direction relative to what I am looking for

 

[FrozenNorth]

The complaint isn't about the rules existing. We know how to run the kind of game we want. The complaint is that WotC sets the tone for most of the community because of brand and therefore is relevant whether we like it or not.

How is that different from « WotC must cater to how I play the game »?

 

[Gus L]

I don’t see why OSR gets so little credit for fixing (or attempting to fix) what so many edition warriors are upset about.

As someone who was part of the OSR starter in in 2011 ... frankly there's a lot of jackasses using the label.

The best of OSR design is exactly as you say, and this has carried on into many Post-OSR communities where people are just excited to make things and help others make things. There was a smaller portion of the OSR, and a part of the POSR that want to gatekeep and put people down for the way they play elfgames. This is unfortunate and has poisoned the OSR "brand" for a lot of people whose first experience was some jerk telling them that they were having fun wrong.

Also as someone who was part of the OSR back in the day ... "you're all having fun wrong" ... but only because real fun is driving a big-rig in 1978 with a chimpanzee sidekick. Only you and your furry buddy against the vast soulless wilderness of the pre-internet American heartland... roadhouse, bootleggers, arm wrestling contests, and the plaintive roar of the lonely highway.

 

[Incenjucar]

I think we can fairly assume that everyone is less happy when the things they like are less available.

 

[CleverNickName]

I don’t see why OSR gets so little credit for fixing (or attempting to fix) what so many edition warriors are upset about.
New adventures for prior additions.
New setting material for prior additions.
New player options for prior additions.
New optional rules for prior additions.
Attempts at rebalancing rules in prior additions.

I think it's because OSR games are considered to be competing with Xth Edition, and are therefore the enemy of all who favor Xth Edition.

Edition wars have never been about "fixing" anything; it's always been about digging in and defending a beloved favorite against all other options.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

How is that different from « WotC must cater to how I play the game »?

Which is precisely why, when I sit down to examine design questions, I ask what state or position is difficult to achieve if it has to be built from scratch by a lone GM putting in design work. I then further ask, how much can we support that thing, while also supporting (inasmuch as one can) its opposite or at least things which are orthogonal to it. E.g. a game where the math is actually quite balanced and thus rewards qualitative reasoning far more than quantitative reasoning? That's hard as balls. A brutally difficult game is easy to produce if you already know what's supposed to be difficult most of the time and what's supposed to be easy most of the time. That's a case where my preferences are the more difficult thing to achieve. Conversely, having a reasonably extensive and reliable set of skill DCs for typical tasks adventurers are likely to undertake is hard for the lone GM, while the alternatives are relatively easy to come up with, so even though I don't much care for such "encyclopedic" design, as I call it, starting from that is the better game design choice.

With elbow grease and creativity, it's quite possible to make a D&D that actually achieves many of the goals all its different players want, not just catering to one group or another. It's certainly not a trivial task, but it's much more achievable than some folks like to think. A huge part of making it work, though, IS giving up the "WotC must cater to how I play" and instead be actively thinking about how to cater to playstyles one specifically does not care for.

 

[The Firebird]

See, but, that's what I don't get. There are other communities out there. Honest. I've been playing Ironsworn for the past several months. Took a break from D&D to give it a try. And, imagine my surprise when I found several quite healthy Ironsworn sites. Helpful people who want to discuss the game and exchange ideas. Fantastic.

Now, I'm pretty sure that there are all sorts of these communities just a quick search away. But, instead, we see poster after poster who gleefully proclaim that they DON'T play 5e, heck, might not even be playing D&D at all, but still want to drive the conversation in a 5e D&D chat forum around the fact that they hate D&D.

I just don't get it. There's lots of games I don't like. But, I just don't talk about them.

I'm thinking about in-person gaming. It sounds like you're talking about finding folks online? If so, yeah, that's not too difficult for the majority of systems. But if you want to sit down at a table?

Ok, I mean, I don't know your situation. But if you have people willing to play older games, then it shouldn't be hard.

If the problem is not finding people willing to play, that's going to happen no matter what game we're talking about.

No, that won't happen regardless of what game we're talking about.

I'll give you some context. I like running a lot of public games; I like the community RPGs offer, I like meeting new people, screening new players, and such. So I play (well, run really) at the FLGS of whatever area I'm in. I move around a fair bit. Whether you're in a big city or a small one, its super easy to find a 5e game this way. Most shops have a regular community already, they have a warhorn or the like, you can jump in.

But even in the big cities (I mean LA), you can't do this for anything other than 5e. I see people come in and try to advertise their PbtA or Blades or Dune or OSR game, and they get very little interest.

I've been able to get those games running, but you need to know the players first. The most reliable way is to network with the community, playing 5e exclusively, for several months, and then offer to run something new.

In the small cities I've been in, it takes longer.

 

[Hussar]

More generally I don't like designers trying to smuggle multiple play styles into their games - either with half baked vestigial rules, or even effort to make some kind of general universal roleplaying game system. Own how you want your game to play and build towards it with mechanics, setting and adventure design ... but most of all let the reader/referee know what you are putting down and why.

But, you have to understand, WotC tried to do exactly that with 4e and got crucified for it. One of the biggest criticisms of 4e was that it pushed a specific playstyle too hard. After the spanking that WotC took over 4e, there is zero chance that they will make that mistake again. The fandom has spoken loud and clear - they WANT these half baked vestigial rules. Tamper with them at your peril.