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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Ulrick" data-source="post: 6018190" data-attributes="member: 775">My older brother introduced me to D&D in 1989 with AD&D. This of course was just as 2e came out. I was hesitant at first, given that I really hadn't much of a chance to explore 1e (my brother eventually just gave me all of his books when he went to college).Now, I liked 2e. It consolidated a lot of the rules from 1e. And my friends and I had a lot of fun with it, even with splatbooks and Skills and Powers and all that. I loved some of the campaign settings. Still, I drew much of my inspiration from the AD&D books. I used the 1e DMG because I thought it was a lot better than the 2e DMG.Maybe I am part of the "lost generation." I certainly felt that I was part of some sort of waning in enthusiasm for D&D in 1990s. It seemed harder to get players, but that could have been just my location growing up in Smalltown Iowa. It also didn't help that the "Satanic Panic" from the 1980s still held over where I lived. In high school, my best friend's parents discovered his D&D books. They took him and his collection out someplace in the country. They burned his books while they prayed for him. Given that I was often the DM for my group of friends, my best friend's parents had a dim view of me.My high school group resisted the trend that seemed to happen elsewhere--Magic: The Gathering breaking apart D&D groups. Suddenly the few hobby shops in Iowa seemed occupied with Magic players. The D&D stuff got pushed to the side. I even remember even in Dragon occasionally somebody would make a comment on this. When I came to college in the late 1990s, I couldn't wait to meet new players--but everybody was into Magic, Vampire: The Masquerade, or even Shadowrun. D&D just seemed outdated to themI do remember when my Dragon Magazines stopped coming. I was really concerned about TSR. Even though I felt that the content in Dragon had slipped, I still didn't want to see my favorite game go away. Paradoxically, when 3e game out. I had initially trouble finding players for it. Suddenly, it seemed that 2e had become vogue again.Still, this was just my experience and may not represent trends elsewhere.EDIT: I just thought of something. I've mentioned the article "The Auld Alliance," by Arthur Collins, in Dragon 216 here before. But it bears citing again (emphasis added):"It troubles me to see what seems to be a major shift among the young gamers of today in how they use the RPG format. We always had seen the rules and game constructs (e.g. the cleric character class) as mere convenience; what we did with them was to enter the world of fantasy.... These kids read the rule books before they read stories that inspired the game. That means their palates have been trained in some strange ways." Could that be part of the definition of the Lost Generation? D&D had been around for 15 years when 2e came out. The books that inspired the game came out to thrill the generation before mine. As a kid, I was an avid reader before I discovered D&D. But I certainly didn't read any Appendix N stuff (except for the Hobbit). I was too young. As I got older I broadened my horizons. But I shamefully admit that in high school I thought the Dragonlance novels were great ("Wow, they're just like a "D&D" game!")Does anybody else have similar experiences or thoughts?</blockquote>

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