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There are some very interesting youtube videos and articles out there about game design from a video game perspective. Do a search with the phrases: Players will optimize the fun out of a game How Game Designers Protect Players From Themselves All of WotC's D&D survey's have been very player...

This is why it is better not to plan but let such things evolve organically. You get the exact same effect, with less effort, and even better - less wasted effort. And the player the 'curveball' is now a feature that you riff off of - not a bug that destroys 'plans'. (Not that said plans...

Never plan a "Big Adventure". What you are doing is great - A GM should never be able to plan more than 1 session ahead. Maybe 2... Because you never know what your players are going to do. If you have an established locale, and a few adventure hooks - then you are off to the races. "Big...

That was very charitable. I was very uncharitable after watching the postmortem videos linked to in this thread, and marveling at the 5e's designers cognitive dissonance over their own design goals. Along with the issues you listed. Stuff like Mearls going on how they wanted to make combat...

Mort fixed this for you: Yes, he is your friend. But sometimes RPG's with friends just doesn't work out. Yes it S.U.C.K.S.... But you need to look at it as ripping off a band-aid: A quick sharp pain now in exchange for much less ongoing pain down the road.

11 years and a manuscript with no art or layout. Not even a PDF yet... McCracken is an RPG creating machine by comparison. GMS game design better deliver, if not, the punchline that is Far West will become more legendary in the retelling...

Say what you will about synnibarr as an rpg, McCraken has managed to write and release three editions of the game. Far West however...

I will say that they were certainly trying. I am currently going through the video's, and while giving some answers - they have generated a much longer list of questions... Except that it is ingrained as you proved with your response to DEFCON 1's post. You admit that you immediately assumed...

I find this exchange interesting in that level up = HP Bloat seems ingrained in the mentality of many D&D players and GM's so much so that they do not mentally separate increasing HP from character advancement. DEFCON 1's HP bloat solution is nothing more than the static HP model used by...

So that's a solid No then on any link to relevant quotes where he Apologizes, and then repudiates his previous statement: "I still don't think what we did was wrong. But society does, unfortunately." Got it.

There is some sympathy to be had for him. As my impression is only superficial due to knowing about him only through books and documentaries: He had the lightning in a bottle idea, but seemed to lack the wherewithal to communicate it beyond his group of friends. It seems that Gygax was the...

By all means, please link to the relevant quotes where he Apologizes, and then repudiates his previous statement: "I still don't think what we did was wrong. But society does, unfortunately."

Those salon articles should see more circulation: For all the Flack Arneson and especially Gygax get for their past actions - People forget that Peter Adkison was no angel: https://www.salon.com/2001/03/23/wizards/ "...We would build an alt-culture workplace of smart young people. We would...

Any new edition will split the fanbase to some degree. 5e had the benefit of coming on the heels of an edition that really split the fanbase, so it could specifically target design elements to bring that fanbase back together... PF2 has more of an uphill road because PF1/3.x D&D had basically...

In my opinion, the only thing going on here is that Pazio is finding their natural level in relation to 5e D&D in a post 4e world. Pathfinder took the number one RPG spot from 4e, but once 5e came out Paizo began to hemorrhage market share back to WotC like a bleeding swimmer in a shark frenzy...

The 5e version could have been the 2e Symbaroum. (I have it.) But they wussed out, and played it safe... They could have taken their roll under d20 rules, and converted them to roll high d20 - mapping it over to the six ability scores, AC, and largely Fixed HP, but keeping the player facing...

They toned down Ravenloft - so highlighting the wacky seems par for the WotC course these days... If mining nostalgia to generate enthusiasm was the goal, Dark Sun, Drangonlance, Greyhawk or even a re-vamped Oriental adventures all sold better and had wider followings than Spelljammer...

No. AC would stay the same. I did not specify any changes to AC. You absolutely keep the six ability scores, AC, HP, Saves, and there is still tons of design space to work with. That is the fine line that would have to be walked. It is more risky. Which is why everyone but the Dark Souls...

We disagree. In my opinion: Making your own classes that follow the 5e class to subclass model is firmly within the "mapping the setting into the 5e mechanics" safe playbook. (And you can spot a lot of the re-skinned class and subclass abilities from 5e that were just moved around to different...

From what I have seen, this is a result of every '5e conversion' taking the setting and mapping it to fit the 5e mechanics, rather than taking the 5e mechanics and modding them to fit the setting... Dark Souls is the one 5e 'conversion' to take a real stab at the latter, but its release was...