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<blockquote data-quote="Luce" data-source="post: 5724810" data-attributes="member: 29760"><p>There are many factors in those disagreements and it is often hard to put into words the reasoning for one's opinions.</p><p>Here are a few as I see them: (many are Gm centric, but I see the GM as the driving force behind having a game)</p><p>1. If you are already having a good game you may not have a reason to look further. After all as all hobbies there is a limited amount of free time we can dedicate to it.</p><p>2. Sunk cost. A long time GM (and players) usually have an established amount of material be it campaign notes, edition specific rulebooks or other odds and ends. Even if your campaigns do not last for years and years, re usability of material is important. If you (as GM) had spend several hour detailing a inn (map, personalities etc) you will probably would like to re-use at least some of it down the line. With years of gaming the amount of such material grows. Not all of this can be easily ported between editions.</p><p>3. Depth vs breath. While trying new things never gets old, IME the process is as follows: Initially there is a greater amount of experimentation (breath) trying different setting and genres. Eventually the group finds its preferences and pursuits them. That does not mean a rant necessarily(always playing the sticky hand thief) but more of mood and setting (depth). People start to want more and more support for what they already know (2ed fluff filled setting books)</p><p>4. System mastery. Once editions change your accumulated amalgam of house rules, which fixes the game to what you like goes poof if you change. And as a player, one one hand it can be refreshing to discover the world anew, but also frustrating since often you have to un-learn some of what you know first.</p><p>Ok, a bit of an aside. Do I think 4rd have some improvement-defiantly. But until I have about a year worth of experience running a game in it, it was actually faster to run a 3rd edition game since I already (after 8 years) committed a lot of the rules to memory.</p><p></p><p></p><p>Again it is a matter of personal opinion, but I can see some of the points in the quoted article as valid. Combat in 1st and 2nd was faster so rolling every round (which is by the way only one of 3 initiative variants in the 2nd DMG) does not slow it down that much. IME non boss fights rarely went over four round or 20 minutes of game time. Magic spells were very powerful, but easily disturbed (bringing (the other type of) RPG to a sword fight, if you managed to get a shot -good otherwise you are skewered) That make magic very powerful but also unpredictable and dangerous to use (eg. fireball in a 20 foot room with 10 foot ceiling). I am not attached to THAC0, but it does not bother me either. A lot of modifiers and options can slow down the game however. You see, while bless, aid and chant priest spells (and buff spells in non core books) were present in the previous editions before 3rd those were rarely used due to the low number of available slots.</p><p>In the end it comes down what you are looking to get out of the game, each editions have its flavors. Play to your taste and let other play to theirs.There is no one true way. The only wrong way is to not have fun.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Luce, post: 5724810, member: 29760"] There are many factors in those disagreements and it is often hard to put into words the reasoning for one's opinions. Here are a few as I see them: (many are Gm centric, but I see the GM as the driving force behind having a game) 1. If you are already having a good game you may not have a reason to look further. After all as all hobbies there is a limited amount of free time we can dedicate to it. 2. Sunk cost. A long time GM (and players) usually have an established amount of material be it campaign notes, edition specific rulebooks or other odds and ends. Even if your campaigns do not last for years and years, re usability of material is important. If you (as GM) had spend several hour detailing a inn (map, personalities etc) you will probably would like to re-use at least some of it down the line. With years of gaming the amount of such material grows. Not all of this can be easily ported between editions. 3. Depth vs breath. While trying new things never gets old, IME the process is as follows: Initially there is a greater amount of experimentation (breath) trying different setting and genres. Eventually the group finds its preferences and pursuits them. That does not mean a rant necessarily(always playing the sticky hand thief) but more of mood and setting (depth). People start to want more and more support for what they already know (2ed fluff filled setting books) 4. System mastery. Once editions change your accumulated amalgam of house rules, which fixes the game to what you like goes poof if you change. And as a player, one one hand it can be refreshing to discover the world anew, but also frustrating since often you have to un-learn some of what you know first. Ok, a bit of an aside. Do I think 4rd have some improvement-defiantly. But until I have about a year worth of experience running a game in it, it was actually faster to run a 3rd edition game since I already (after 8 years) committed a lot of the rules to memory. Again it is a matter of personal opinion, but I can see some of the points in the quoted article as valid. Combat in 1st and 2nd was faster so rolling every round (which is by the way only one of 3 initiative variants in the 2nd DMG) does not slow it down that much. IME non boss fights rarely went over four round or 20 minutes of game time. Magic spells were very powerful, but easily disturbed (bringing (the other type of) RPG to a sword fight, if you managed to get a shot -good otherwise you are skewered) That make magic very powerful but also unpredictable and dangerous to use (eg. fireball in a 20 foot room with 10 foot ceiling). I am not attached to THAC0, but it does not bother me either. A lot of modifiers and options can slow down the game however. You see, while bless, aid and chant priest spells (and buff spells in non core books) were present in the previous editions before 3rd those were rarely used due to the low number of available slots. In the end it comes down what you are looking to get out of the game, each editions have its flavors. Play to your taste and let other play to theirs.There is no one true way. The only wrong way is to not have fun. [/QUOTE]
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