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Message: <blockquote data-quote="delericho" data-source="post: 5344159" data-attributes="member: 22424">It would certainly be a mistake to simply recreate the past. Suggesting there have been no improvements in the last 30 years seems rather short-sighted. More to the point, even if there have not been, the original books are still available used, and there are retro-clones out there.However, it would also be a mistake to simply discount the past out of hand. Not every change has been an improvement. 4e is only one of many possible evolutions of 3.5e (with SWSE and Pathfinder being two others). Where mistakes have been made, the designers should not allow their pride to prevent them from rolling back the changes.Case in point: in our last session, we spent an hour and a half (out of a 3 hour session) on a simple fight with some bandits. That same fight would have been over in 20 minutes in 2nd Edition. What was that about "cumbersome and slow"?I do agree that 4e is, on balance, a better game than 2nd Edition. But the combat grind that dragged out even that simple encounter is really not an improvement IMO.(And the argument "it's not a problem, because you can change it" is a non-starter in this discussion, by the way. That's like suggesting hamburger is the perfect food because if I don't like it, I can change it. But if I don't like meat (tactical movement on the grid) and I don't like bread (the Daily/Encounter/At-will powers paradigm), then the changes I have to make are such that I'm no longer eating hamburger.)As with my comments about older editions, I believe it would absolutely be a mistake to simply ignore WoW, board games, and anything else when charting the future of D&D. If there are good things that can be adopted from any of these things, D&D should shamelessly rip them off.At the same time, it would also be a huge mistake to challenge WoW on its own terms. If D&D simply becomes "WoW without the PC", then I have to ask why I shouldn't just play WoW - it has better graphics, it has lower setup requirements (no reading 832 pages of hardback books, no creating an adventure...), it handles all the tedious number crunching for me, and I'm not beholden to the schedules of five other people.So, by all means look for inspiration, but don't try to compete on WoW's terms.WotC have to be careful in how much they alienate the existing fanbase. Without a really good Starter Set (which D&D hasn't had since 1991), they're reliant on existing players bringing new blood into the fold. Alienate those 'lifestyle gamers', and you lose that entry route and kill the game.And it's not as if we need anything from WotC to continue gaming. I got my Expert Set (the "Blue Box") in 1989, and since then I haven't actually needed to buy anything more for my gaming hobby, ever. Even assuming I only run pregenerated adventures, I have now accumulated so many adventures that I haven't run that I could happily game for the rest of my life without running out.</blockquote>

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