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Man, that's tough. For me, I'd place -PF2 as a D&D variant but on the outer fringe -Shadow of the Demon Lord is not a D&D variant although it's very "D&D-ish", and Weird Wizard even more so. -Dungeon World echoes D&D tropes but is not a D&D variant. -13th Age is right on the cusp. It's the...

The classes they’re revising are NOT in the core book. The revision is just the second round of playtesting for those classes. All 4 classes currently being tested on Void are new.

Ok, but let's be clear on where the objection flows from. This has nothing to do with the fiction as fiction. This is an aesthetic concern about the metagame process by which the GM introduced the fiction. If the GM had defined the rune prior to the roll, and the roll was to determine the...

And thus the exhausting, essential conservatism. There's no looking for a path towards realizing any sort of play goal, there's just reflexive defense of "playing the way I've always played and feels normal to me."

Yes. The fact that D&D is so commonly used for a simulationist agenda (or play with no particular CA agenda that has simulationist trappings) does not mean that the game engine itself is oriented towards sim. There are better games out there that are more oriented towards sim as an explicit...

Agreed. The most important point is that a DM who wants to try winging it shouldn’t feel some kind of imperative to spend multiple hours writing up encounters, like they’re doing it wrong if they don’t. If it turns out that heavier prep is indeed something you need to feel comfortable, at...

Is “mental prep” prep? I don’t feel like it is, but I can understand the opposite viewpoint.

I also think "zero-prep" is probably being used in several different ways, and it's probably important to be clear on the distinctions. I don't do "zero-prep" in the sense that I show up to session zero or one with nothing created at all. I will normally present some kind of campaign frame and...

Pretty sure @DEFCON 1's post was about humanity in the aggregate, not specific populations. I mean, everyone around in 1825 is worse off in 2025 because they're all dead. :)

Honestly, I'm not really sure. I feel comfortable doing little prep for most systems once I have a basic familiarity (or if I didn't feel comfortable, I wouldn't run them), so I can't say I've ever sought out a game specifically checking if it has that claimed feature.

Agreed. I've read a concept before, for disaster prep and emergency response, about the importance of doing visualization. You should take a few minutes to imagine exactly what you do if your residence caught on fire, as an example. Or your place of work. Or if there was a tornado, or an...

I have “liked” this post as a team-building exercise.

Agreed. You describe everything in terms of concepts and ideas; once you get to a point where the mechanics get involved is when you start tracking some mechanical baselines. My default D&D baseline is also built around easy encounter building; consumables and weak magic items are common to...

I dunno…it’s hard to explain how not to do something. I don’t quite “zero-prep”; I usually think of an encounter scene or two on the drive over to the game when I’m DMing. But otherwise I just riff on what the PCs want to do. If they seem to be fumbling, I’ll create some kind of conflict or...

DO they say that, though? I mean, obviously they should.

No elves, no dwarves, but do have other races is a bit tough. Worlds without Number + Atlas of Latter Earth is a detailed, fairly serious setting without elves and dwarves having much of a role. Shadow of the Weird Wizard is also pretty serious; it does have elves and dwarves but they are...

I think that could be an interesting design, but spell availability would be key. If they have combat spells, than choosing a "mode" is an interesting and complex decision. But if they have access to a bunch of non-combat/utility magic, then they simply have a spellcast-OOC mode and a...

I think any game design (that is, a set of rules and procedures created to push for a certain play experience) can push more or less strongly towards a certain play agenda. But any creative agenda can't be realized without a bulk of the participants having some kind of willful drive to achieve...

I'm not against that. This sounds like the standard discourse around "balance" that has existed for decades. Squashing diversity of mechanical concepts over concerns around an illusory balance has never made much sense to me. Assuming we're making this around an alt-Warlock chassis, I'd put...

2e: Player's Option: Spells and Magic. Arabian Adventures. The Complete Book of Villains. 3e: Forgotten Realms Setting. Book of Nine Swords. Magic Item Compendium. 4e: Dark Sun Campaign Setting. Neverwinter Campaign Setting.