3E & 4E Love and Hate Polls - What does it mean?

[MrGrenadine]

It is sad, though absolutely predictable, that the 4e haters are going to try to use my fond rememberance of 3e to run down 4e and WotC. 4e is a much, much better game.

First of all, disliking 4e does not equate to running down WotC. I play Pathfinder and 4e, and I just don't like the way 4e plays. That doesn't mean WotC is a bad company, and I'm not judging anyone who likes it--diff'rent strokes, and all.

Second, you see how your last statement is merely opinion, and not fact, right? This is part of the problem with the whole edition war garbage--why is it so hard for folks to say that they like one version or the other, without trying to make their personal preference some sort of universal truth.

4e is is not a better game. It is a better game for you.

 

[TheAuldGrump]

First of all, disliking 4e does not equate to running down WotC. I play Pathfinder and 4e, and I just don't like the way 4e plays. That doesn't mean WotC is a bad company, and I'm not judging anyone who likes it--diff'rent strokes, and all.

Second, you see how your last statement is merely opinion, and not fact, right? This is part of the problem with the whole edition war garbage--why is it so hard for folks to say that they like one version or the other, without trying to make their personal preference some sort of universal truth.

4e is is not a better game. It is a better game for you.

Not to mention there being a fair amount of disagreement with his basic premise.... Stating '4e is better - it roxxors!!!111' does not clarify the situation better than '4e suxxors!!!111' - no matter how much I may disagree with the former and/or agree with the latter.

In all honesty a more accurate pair of statements in my case might be 'GSL Suxxors!' and 'OGL Roxxors!' - the licenses being quite aside from the rules themselves. While I am not a fan of the 4e rules, I feel a great deal less antipathy to them than I do their license, or the rules for F.A.T.A.L. for that matter. Sort of negative-neutral.

For that matter, I hate 133t more than I do the 4e rules.... But it does make a vehicle for satire.

I really miss the large amount of third party support that 3e enjoyed, it made customizing my game a very pleasant experience.

The Auld Grump,

 

[Umbran]

So what does this mean? Again, we all know that EN World is not an accurate cross-section of the total D&D playing populace, but it may be relatively representative of the serious-to-hardcore D&D playing minority, which in turn buys a significant portion of the game books published.*

Even if we set the question of whether we represent a useful sample of the D&D and/or gaming populace, the method used to gather the data was not what a statistician would find acceptable practice.

I'm with Crothian - we cannot reliably draw conclusions or interpretations from these numbers. It is for entertainment purposes only, not solid enough for analysis.

 

[Dice4Hire]

I agree that it is impossible to draw any conclusions from the two polls, expecially "stunning" ones. When you ahve such a self-selecting base, you do not get good results.

But that said, it is obvious that there is still a deep divide between 3.x abnd 4E (plus t\ose who do other systems) based purely on the commentary.

But it seems to me that the edition war hatred is toned down a bit, as the two threads have skirted it a bit, but except for one poster, have managed to not go deep into that territory.

Congrads everyone.

 

[Theo R Cwithin]

I don't think the polls shed any light at all on general player preferences, nor that they even suggest any sort of 3e/4e divide*.
Aside from being unscientific, obviously, I suspect the just phrasing of the thread titles themselves biased the results by steering different "personality types" to each poll.

*Edit: I don't even believe the commentary points to a divide. There's only 25 posts at this point. All that is shown is the same thing that is always shown when edition preferences are brought up: that some people have strong opinions on the matter.

 

[Hussar]

There's another problem as well with drawing conclusions.

There are many 4e players who played 3e. It's quite possible that they liked 3e (or else, why were they playing it?) but have chosen to play 4e because they like it better.

That would skew the 3e poll (assuming that person posted to both polls) in that 3e would get more "I like it" responses. Presumably, someone who plays 3e does so because he or she prefers it to 4e, thus making, "I don't like it" an easier choice.

 

[ExploderWizard]

Heh. A thread about poll results from other threads. Hilarious.

 

[Mercurius]

If (and it's a big if) those results are indicative of the gamer population in general, it would seem to indicate that few people are lukewarm on 4e - many really like it, and some absolutely hate it.

Even if we set the question of whether we represent a useful sample of the D&D and/or gaming populace, the method used to gather the data was not what a statistician would find acceptable practice.

I'm with Crothian - we cannot reliably draw conclusions or interpretations from these numbers. It is for entertainment purposes only, not solid enough for analysis.

I did not say that they are indicative of "the gamer population in general"--in fact, I said that they were clearly not. I also did not mean to imply that we can "reliably draw conclusions" or that they were akin to what a statistician would find acceptable.

However, I don't think it is either/or but somewhere in-between reliable/meaningful and unreliable/meaningless. I disagree with the sentiment that it is one or the other. EN World is one of the largest online RPG communities and I think that a poll with 500+ votes and counting means something. As I said, it is a cross-section of the gaming populace that is very serious to hardcore, and thus spends a ton of cash on game books. As I said before, it is my contention that a smallish minority (somewhere between 10 and 20%, I would guess) spend the majority (I would guess 60-70%) of the money spent on RPGs. I think EN World (and RPG.Net, Wizards.com and a few other places) at least somewhat represents that minority.

To put it another way, let's say that the poll gets up to an even 1,000 votes and that the average cash spent per year on RPG books for those 1,000 people is $300 (just for the sake of discussion). That's $300,000 we're talking about right there; if you multiply that number by the constituents that the poll does represent then you are talking about a significant amount of cash for a relatively small industry.

Even if the margin of error in terms of representing the "serious-to-hardcore gamer demographic" is 5 or more percent, which it likely is, it is still worthwhile to take note of.

I think the polls are good, but there is an issue in the "love" and "hate" language.

I voted that I "hate" 4E. That doesn't mean that I want to punch it in the face, any more than the fact that I "love" Classic Traveller means that I want to marry it and make babies inside of it. The language sounds very strident but when I used it I just mean that, having played 4E, I would rather not play any game at all than play that game. Whereas, to me, "dislike" means that I might play it grudgingly or for some other benefit.

OK, fair enough, and good point.

 

[pawsplay]

One conclusion that can safely be drawn is that one variety of prediction was wrong. A number of people claimed the 3e holdouts were destined to convert at some point, but that does not seem to have occured. At least on this site, a sizeable minority definitely prefer 3e and have stuck with it and variations on it.

 

[MrGrenadine]

There are many 4e players who played 3e. It's quite possible that they liked 3e (or else, why were they playing it?) but have chosen to play 4e because they like it better.

That would skew the 3e poll (assuming that person posted to both polls) in that 3e would get more "I like it" responses. Presumably, someone who plays 3e does so because he or she prefers it to 4e, thus making, "I don't like it" an easier choice.

Not to mention the fact that many 3e players have played 4e, and like 4e but like 3e better, which would skew the 4e poll, as well.

Wait...what?