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Perhaps that is so, for some folks. For me, it just...isn't cathartic. I deal with enough "is there any point to it all?" IRL. I don't need to be reminded of the idea that what you're doing can feel like it's pointless.

What are you looking for from the game, then? Because what you describe is precisely how I felt about 3e, and is more or less how I feel about 5e (it's a bit different but still similar). 4e was the exact opposite. It was finally a game actually doing the things I'd always wanted. Of course, I...

I vastly prefer settings of hope over despair. A setting of despair makes me despair. Like literally. It actually makes me think depressive thoughts more, inclines me to be a less-good person to the people around me, and heightens existing mental health concerns. A setting of hope doesn't do...

I believe I had replied. In brief, I believe 2e is your favorite (and I'm pretty sure you've specifically said so), and 4e is (by far) your least favorite. The rough order would be 2e (Big gap) 3e/5e Basic/OD&D/1e (Enormous gap) 4e Like if 2e is set at 100, then 3e/5e are in the 70s, Basic...

Would it surprise you to know I have had the same thought about your own reviews on things? And yes, I know most people who play 5e now are like that. Most people who play 5e were not the people who almost totally dominated the sample space when 5e was being developed. The 5e community today...

"All X must Y" claims of this kind are nearly always overblown in the first place, or are a bad, lossy gloss of a much more nuanced thought. "Greatsword is an especially strong weapon because it gets more out of its Style feat than other large weapons" is accurate. "All Fighters should use...

Then you are a highly unusual exception among those who professed such dislike for 4e. The vast majority of people who disliked 4e thought 5e was just the ticket.

I'm well aware that 5e is the apology edition.

No individual person's experience will be universal, sure. But "feel[ing] caster-y" should at least have a loose constellation of effects which all fit into that. If we get several distinct answers, we can try to find common threads. If we get several answers with a lot in common, then we've...

Answering this question requires that we identify what elements produce "feel[ing] caster-y". So--what does that feeling feel like? What visuals do you see when you're having that feeling? What actions can reliably pull it off? Are there spells that don't feel "caster-y" even when you are, in...

So the players can discover information about the world without you having to tell them? How do they do this?

This would be exactly the sort of thing I'm thinking of. You created pressure--but it lasted much longer than you intended it to. It wasn't the players out of the blue insert pressure, unprompted, no reason other than because they feel like applying pressure. You then needed to work with them...

"I'm not creating anything! I'm just completely controlling what players are allowed to know so they believe they're under pressure when they aren't! That's 100% on them!" Pull the other one, Max. If you lead them to believe it's pressure, that's your doing, not theirs.

As far as I can tell, they are. The issue seems to be that you want them connected only in one particular way, as in one specific form of logical/procedural explanation, and the actual explanation is different. Not bad, nor absent. I don't see what the misunderstanding is. Out of combat, you...

So you had no part whatsoever in their perception that time was of the essence? Given I know your attitude runs very old-school, when did the players actually create a pressure situation? Believing there is pressure when there isn't is not the same as creating actual pressure. People can fool...

Then I guess my response to that is: I know what I want out of pacing, and I, personally, cannot want "constant" pressure in the way you're describing it, where your only outlet is "it's not your turn". I know you've spoken previously about how "color" scenes are extremely important--and that...

I just would not be able to accept as realistic a world where nothing ever has a time limit on it. Again, I'm coming from a position where I'm very specifically saying: "Constant pressure is bad, it would upset most people." But just as I would be surprised at someone genuinely wanting to have...

I would not say that, as I presented it, it does. Some people are going to be good with lots of pressure almost all of the time. Some are going to be good with extreme pressure in bursts. Some, a slow and irregular oscillation. Some, a fast oscillation. But I think it's reasonable to say that...

I've called this out myself, very recently, within the last couple weeks at most. I was dismissed with, in brief, "It's in our imaginations, so that doesn't matter." I found that an unproductive, thought-terminating response, but I didn't see much point in digging further on that specific thing...

That's not what I was saying. What I was saying is that the GM does, in fact, need to apply pressure for there to be pressure. The way D&D--especially 5e, but all editions--is designed, it has to be the GM providing pressure, because the players functionally cannot pressure themselves, as they...