D&D 4E Ben Riggs' "What the Heck Happened with 4th Edition?" seminar at Gen Con 2023

[Zardnaar]

Can't argue taste. Tome of Battle, Tome of Magic, PHB2, Incarnum, Complete Mage and Complete Champion all saw a decent amount of play at our tables. Especially since we didn't switch over to PF1 until 2012.

I had PHB2 and Comple Nage (meh book).

Towards the end though it was "I'm barely using what I have why buy more". Had most of the DR stuff, 1st 6 or 7 complete books, UA etc.

Most groups I saw outside mine were core books and maybe 1 or 2 splats. University club.

Thats all they had. 2002 was when I started to suspect the internet hicemind was wrong.

Most fans then and now are casuals.

 

[pemerton]

Rereading it now barely used the 50-60 books I owned.

I believe that the technical term is bookends.

 

[Zardnaar]

I believe that the technical term is bookends.

Well they got some minimal use but it's enough material for decades of gaming. 2E something similar. And we played a lot back then (6-8 hours being typical 27 hours the record).

Bookends are more like Numenera which got read once and left on the shelf.