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A long and winding road...

But if I may be so gauche, I would say that your relationships with various editions could be like relationships with significant others. For some people, 3e is the girlfriend you realize you didn't appreciate like she deserved at the time, and only dating someone else makes you realize that. For others, it's like the girl you have no regrets about, who just wasn't the one. And for some, they talk about it like it's the psycho ex that you have no idea why they were dating in the first place.
I don't have such an intense relationship with the games I play. :p I generally prefer the computer metaphor or the car metaphor.
 

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Well, I'm going to be in a Pathfinder game next week as a player. A buddy of mine is wanting to run it, and asked me to play. I have reservations about it- 3e was by far my least favorite version of D&D, and after buying the Pathfinder book and giving it a readthrough, I don't see improvements on many of the core issues I had with 3e. Nevertheless, the guy is a good DM, and I'll give it a shot.

Going back to 3e though is something I don't think I could stomach. It jarred so badly with my playstyle and DMing style that I never truly enjoyed the system. I enjoy simulationism in a game, and while 3e supposedly was "more simulationist", we found it to just be wonky, with very little internal consistency and weird gameplay issues we haven't had with any other editions of D&D before or since. From about 2005 until 4e was released, we swore off 3.x D&D and instead branched out and played other games we really enjoyed (WHFRP2, Savage Worlds, NWoD, Dark Heresy, Kult).

However, my groups and I still revisit AD&D 1e/2e a couple times a year, with no problems. NWPs don't really bother me, but then again those games tend to be one-time games rather than long-running games. I don't recall ever having problems when running 1e/2e with being frustrated with the system- although the caster power level disparity bugged me, it also took a LOT more XP to level up for them. However, 4e is just so much better than the previous versions of D&D for my groups, that I can't imagine really going back to run a long-term D&D game with any other system. We've even gotten the 1e "dark and brutal" feel back by limiting healing surges somewhat (only regain 3 HS per extended rest, and HS only bestow back 1d8/1d10/1d12+Con mod hp per use in heroic/paragon/epic tiers), and my players LOVE it.

So yeah, for my groups 3e was definitely the needy, clingy, jealous, psycho ex-gf Barastrondo mentioned in his post. :p It still is referred to in our groups as "the edition that shall not be named".
 
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I hope to be lured back to 3E one day, but Paizo still has a lot of fixing to do to make that happen. In the mean time I subscribe to a lot of Paizio, including their rules book line, despite not being interested in playing it.

After 60+ hours of playing 4E I still find it to be a very "ho hum" game. I'll keep playing it, but only on game days and the like. So I guess this is my closest thing to a return to D&D.

I played 1E at Gen Con, had a lot of fun, despite playing a wizard who had to wait until critical times to do anything. So going back to 1E is a possibility.

Played Swords and Wizardry a few weeks ago and had a lot of fun with that, despite really hating how spells were scaled. So that is another possible route for me to return to D&D.


For now I will continue to stick with C&C as my primary fantasy RPG. Too busy playing other RPG's to really worry about it. Twilight 2013, Aces and Eights, Qin, Traveller, Star Wars SAGA, Shadow Run 4E, L5R, Mutants and Masterminds, etc...

So I am not too concerned about things for now.
 

Never left 3.5 behind at all, but also enjoying running 4E at conventions (7 slots of SPEC 1-3 in LFR... 9 PC kills for the weekend -- insert evil DM laughter here). Finding that 4E nearly runs itself, and the designers' goal of less prep time and easier running have largely been met. My homebrew continues to push forward with lightly houseruled 3.5, and shows no signs of slowing down (but, that is in large part due to my awesome players).
 

I'm running it. After quite a long break I dusted off my 3.5 books this spring, contacted everyone I knew who I'd played with before, built the best group of players I could and am having a blast. Party level ranged between two and four, I've had four character fatalities, and the majority of my adventures are converted from AD&D. I'm simultaneously running a 4e game that just hit level 12 and while it's interesting I just don't get the rush from it as much as I do from 3.
 

Into the Woods

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