Are people still mad about . . .

[evildmguy]

More good stuff! Thanks!

I vaguely remember the GSL but since I am a consumer, not producer, it didn't affect me. I will say this. I bought Mouseferatu's extra player's guide but was the only one in the group. Since it wasn't in the DDI, and we all use that, it didn't get used. It's too bad.

Further, except for a few handout type things from Paizo, I don't really look at 3pp products anymore. They might be great but I really like the electronic support. So, I don't use them.

I don't like the comparison of 4E to MMOs. While I can't argue there are some ideas that look like they are from the MMO world, most of what they used fits my style and group well. But, this isn't a computer. It's a pen and paper game and when I find something doesn't work, the players don't wait for a patch!

I do agree that 4E is a different game. I think that while I could play older editions, if I was DMing them, a lot of 4E would influence how I run it. No, 4E isn't perfect nor am I claiming that. But I do think it's a completely different game.

Thanks!

edg

 

[Celebrim]

As for one issue Celebrim doesn't mention -- WOTC pulling pre-4e PDF's, that issue makes me "not mad, just disappointed", since I've found a substitute source that makes me even more happy than a PDF would have done. That is, buying old stuff from Noble Knight. 99% of the time, they have what I'm wondering about, and I prefer real printed versions anyhow.

Half Priced Bookstore for me. I don't like pdf's much. Nothing beat paper for reading, and by the time you pay to get a pdf printed up it costs as much or more than a book.

I've managed to get quite a few nice treasures from used bookstores. None of them are in collector's condition, but they are still more servicable than I find pdf's.

So it's hard for me to get excercised about them taking away something I've no real interest in anyway.

 

[outsider]

I'm still ticked that people consider character roles a mmoism despite the fact players had been acknowledging roles in D&D for decades. It's like everybody that disliked 4e developed selective amnesia.

 

[Hunter In Darkness]

I was ticked about a lot, the only thing I really am still and most likely always will be ticked off about is the treatment of the Forgotten realms. Mainly killing the setting I have used for 16 or more years and replacing it with a whole new setting with some of the same names.

A note: I am not here to debate the new realms setting or start a war over it, that's how I feel and nothing anyone says is gonna change it.

 

[Vyvyan Basterd]

4e is GSL and not OGL.

I still feel a minor bit ticked that some people feel entitled to an OGL (not necessarily you Voadam as I could see one being annoyed without feeling entitled). Yes, the 3E OGL was a great and generous gift. But how many game publishers offer that? Not TSR for OD&D, BD&D or AD&D. I'm not aware of any other publisher that opened their game to the point that others were distributing their material verbatim for profit. Others please step in and name any other game than 3E D&D that was truly OGL that wasn't already a d20 derivative. I'm sure others exist, but I'm also sure there aren't that many.

 

[Siberys]

3) Printing a 4e of a game which is utterly incompatible with the prior three editions of the game to the extent that is fundamentally a different game.

This just honestly confuses. I mean, I can understand the other points, even if personally I think they're exaggerated or unfounded; they're mostly subjective things, so, whatever. C'est la vie.

This, though - Why? 3e wasn't backwards-compatible with 2e (anyone who's tried a conversion knows that). Even PF requires a bit of work to update, and that had BC as a specific design goal. Why expect the new edition to be backwards-compatible?

::

The only thing I'm still ticked about is the DDI suite - I want it to better handle house rules and 3PP materials. The PDF debacle bugs me, too, I guess. I may not play 2e, but it's a great fluff mine.

 

[Shemeska]

About the only thing that still bugs me is the ludicrous assertion of how insulting the dev-blogs were. Looking back at those posts, particularly the "Cloud Watching" one, it takes some serious mental gymnastics to take offence at those.

It doesn't take any "mental gymnastics" to be offended when someone calls something you liked, "the antithesis of fun" in a blog post, and later in a podcast multiple devs mock other things you like, while apparently not knowing much about it to begin with. It's frustrating and the sort of thing that makes someone go from "not interested in the game, not my thing" to "I actively dislike this game".

 

[Piratecat]

A gentle reminder, not aimed at anyone in particular: remembering some of these things is enough to make anybody cranky. Please don't take that out on other people in this thread.

Thanks.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

This just honestly confuses. I mean, I can understand the other points, even if personally I think they're exaggerated or unfounded; they're mostly subjective things, so, whatever. C'est la vie.

This, though - Why? 3e wasn't backwards-compatible with 2e (anyone who's tried a conversion knows that). Even PF requires a bit of work to update, and that had BC as a specific design goal. Why expect the new edition to be backwards-compatible?

Well, 2Ed was fairly compatible with 1Ed, for instance.

And as for 3Ed, while it wasn't perfectly compatible,

• WotC was kind enough to publish a 2Ed to 3Ed conversion manual that made conversion very easy
• The degree of incompatibility from 2Ed to 3Ed was MUCH less than from 3.X to 4Ed.

By way of example, I'm part of a group that has run a campaign since 1986 or so. We converted...well, really, alloyed 1Ed & 2Ed, and when 3Ed came out, we started converting to that. Now, I know I had problems with converting some multiclassed PCs, but none with single or dual classed ones. And even the multiclassed ones didn't really lose functionality or capabilities, they just lost a class because the remaining ones did the job nearly as well.

There simply wasn't a PC we couldn't model in 3Ed out of the box. The only question was fine details.

But converting from 3.X to 4Ed? Not a chance!

Certain classes & races that were either core to D&D from the beginning or were part of the earliest supplements of 1Ed given were simply absent from 4Ed until much later. To convert would have required extensive retconning of the campaign because certain events couldn't have happened the way they actually did. Gone were the Druids & Barbarians, the Gnomes, most Planetouched and others. Gone were certain abilities- combat or non-combat- that were key to the campaign's history. Gone were PCs with more than 2 classes...especially those who weren't half-elves.

 

[Roman]

Let's see:

1) Terminating print Dragon and Dungeon magazines

I was surprised to hear it happen at the time, since I heard these were gaming staples, but I was never a subscriber to either of these, so I was not personally mad at all. That said, I could definitely sympathize with those who were subscribers.

Verdict: NOT MAD

2) 4E having a GSL rather than an OGL

I was definitely negatively surprised at the time, though mad might be a strong word. Since it turned out I don't like 4E, I don't care and am no longer mad.

Verdict: NOT MAD

3) The GSL fiasco of delays, hyper-restrictions, more delays...

By this time it was clear I didn't like 4E, but I was still entertaining a vague hope that maybe, just maybe an enterprising third party publisher will fundamentaly transform the game into something I would like, so I was a little dissapointed at the delays/restrictions. Even before the license was released in semi-usable format for third party companies, however, I came to the conclusion that I am better off just stopping to follow it altogether - I still have other D&D editions to use - no need to waste my time following the possibility of a fundamental transformation of the 4E system of which the likelihood was very small indeed.

It also seemed like an underhanded way of clearing the field of publishers without taking the blame - just drain them through delays...

Verdict: NOT MAD

5) 4E marketing

Yes, I did find it somewhat patronizing, though not nearly as much as a lot of other gamers. I never took it too personally, though, and made a conscious effort to write it off as bad marketing.

Verdict: NOT MAD

6) 4E ditching of legacy D&D flavor

I was definitely not amused by this. Mad is really too strong a word to use about anything that happened on these messageboards for me - I did not, for example, go about participating in flame wars about this or other issues, but I still don't like it. I recognize that I have alternatives and that's great, but WotC, particularly with its D&D brand, with its market power, creates a general millieu and trends for gaming, including the biggest player network, so the nature of the most recent version of D&D still matters and there is the emotional attachment to D&D as well. Thankfully, the version of D&D I prefer is still going strong - I assumed that it was more threatened with disappearance, but it appears more resilient than I thought (though no doubt time will continue to take its toll on the player base), which makes me less uncomfortable about favoring an out of print game (+ there is Pathfinder) meaning I am somewhat less concerned with 3E versions/variants being pushed out of the gaming scene in the near future.

Verdict: DISAPPOINTED

7) Making 4E a mechanically entirely and radically new game, rather than it building on the previous editions

Pretty much the same as point number 5.

Verdict: DISAPPOINTED

Well, there we have it. If WotC came up with a product I were interested in, yes, I would still be willing to buy it, but that remains unlikely, as the next version of D&D is likely a long way off and in any case, it is by no means certain if I would find it better than the previous editions and I would need a lot of convincing that the new direction had been fundamentally altered.