D&D 5E D&D and who it's aimed at

[Haiku Elvis]

Only liking grim-dark and rejecting "childish" things is a very 12 year old mentality.

I refute this entirely. My son loves grim dark 40K and he's 10.

 

[Minigiant]

If there's anyone who gets to complain about D&D not aiming at them, it is people who want post level 10 content.

 

[Hexmage-EN]

Well let me check out what's coming out then...View attachment 155832View attachment 155835View attachment 155834View attachment 155831Yup, back to my OSR games I go. Have fun with your totally grown up D&D...

The first image is just an adventuring party, the second are classic Spelljammer creatures, the third is a miniature giant space hamster (which has long been a thing), and the fourth is just a parade of some kind (I'm honestly confused why this one in particular screams "kiddy" to you).

Did you like the original Spelljammer at all? The only adventure I have from that setting features stubborn intelligent pegasi that you have to argue with, a living constellation who thanks you for retrieving a lost star, and a ship helmed by a wizard who prefers stage magic shows to actual spells and staffed his crew of rabbits polymorphed into humanoids. Spelljammer is just a silly setting.

 

[Haiku Elvis]

Did you like the original Spelljammer at all? The only adventure I have from that setting features stubborn intelligent pegasi that you have to argue with, a living constellation who thanks you for retrieving a lost star, and a ship helmed by a wizard who prefers stage magic shows to actual spells and staffed his crew of rabbits polymorphed into humanoids. Spelljammer is just a silly setting.

Hey there're some serious looking steampunk space hippos here that have some beef with that opinion.

 

[Hexmage-EN]

A small sample of things featured in the original Spelljammer:

• Giant Space Hamsters.

• Variations on the Giant Space Hamster that include the Carnivorous Flying Giant Space Hamster, the Fire-Breathing Phase Doppelganger Giant Space Hamster, the Two-Headed Lernaean Bombardier Giant Space Hamster, and the Tyrannohamsterus Rex.

• Autognomes programmed to defend babies and children of all species.

• Bionoids, which are blatant knock-offs of the anime character Guyver

• This.

• The talking Pegasi called the Inaii from "Heart of the Enemy", who are described thusly on the Spelljammer wiki:

The Inaii are lazy, self indulgent, and indifferent to the welfare of others. They are naive, even a bit stupid, and are only interested in eating, sleeping, and gossiping. They also enjoy playing simple games, such as flying races, hide and seek, and tag.

To be clear, I'm on board with all of this. I'm just showing these as examples that silliness existed in D&D well before now.

 

[Haiku Elvis]

Are you sure you don't need to add a content warning given the mature adult not-for-kids nature of all that vintage D&D goodness.

 

[Hexmage-EN]

Looking at it, someone on the original Spelljammer team must have been a big fan of Japanese pop culture. Bionoids are clearly based on Guyver, there are Spirit Warriors that are insect-like mecha that characters can enter and pilot, and giant space turtles called gammaroids that spin like the kaiju Gamera (to make the reference even more obvious, one adventure location inside a hollowed-out gammaroid shell is called Gamero Base).

 

[Vaalingrade]

"I don't like this shift toward cute and silly! O, for the days of dignified D&D where the Flail Snails and Flumphs roamed! Where the Grey Renders followed halflings around like big Hulk puppies! Where goblin cowboys had magic missile six shooters! I shall soundly mock you for liking literally the same thing done in modern art! That's what makes ME an adult!"

 

[Micah Sweet]

Yes. I too demand that the game where I pretend to be an elf has all the gritty seriousness that's a fit for a mature man such as myself.

Going back to, "it's just an elf-game" is the laziest argument this forum can produce. Not very respectful either. I'm really tired of seeing it.

 

[Grendel_Khan]

A small sample of things featured in the original Spelljammer:

This is a slam dunk, and a great reminder of what Spelljammer has always been about.

I wonder if some of the people turned off by that unabashed silliness are just overly caught up in mapping their RPG identity and interests to a single publisher? There's more to fantasy RPGs than just D&D. Hell, there's more to D&D than just WotC. And cherrypicking one's memory of past D&D stuff that aligns with your tastes is kind of a problem. Hindsight isn't actually 20/20, and neither is nostalgia.

I also wonder if part of the issue is the way products are announced and discussed now, compared to whatever era someone might remember as their golden/formative age of D&D. When Spelljammer was first released there were no forums for breathless anticipation and guesswork about every single upcoming D&D product. And when something did come out, it was easy enough to look at the cover and say, Huh, guess that's not for me, and move on. There was less hype, in part because there were fewer ways to broadcast and consume hype. For example, I never saw Spelljammer space hamster art back in the day, because I noped past Spelljammer without even cracking it open. But I also wasn't feasting on hype and speculation--not because I had better things to do, mind you. That just wasn't an option.

To me, being disappointed that WotC isn't living up to your specific expectations, but continuing to closely follow their every release, hoping things will turn around...that seems like a self-inflicted wound.