D&D: Essential Game or Sacred Cow?

[Felix]

Is D&D really necessary any more? I mean, we have so many alternatives today that we didn't use to have, and really we've only been playing it because it's the game we played back in 1977. Doesn't that mean it's a sacred cow and we can do without it?

Literary history shows us that d20-based mideval fantasy role playing games have little precident. Is a made-up game from the 70's really what we want to play? Doesn't it misrepresent the archetype geek/dork occupation: mad science? I suggest that we can all play our games of make-believe and mad science without the contrivances of a game that only exists because it's been terribly popular for 30 years.

So, is D&D an essential game, without which we would slowly turn into sedentary and sarcastic versions of hong? Or is it a Sacred Cow we should expose?

 

[Odhanan]

I disagree that D&D wouldn't have value as a genre of its own. There doesn't need to be some "literary precedent" to make a genre worthwhile, and D&D is a genre of its own (the combination of several styles of fantasy in fact, which separations and classifications are themselves the fruit of nit-picky fandom some would call "geek", whatever that actually means).

The fact is, there is no RPG that would provide a "D&D experience" (i.e. exploring dungeons with characters whose abilities combine to overcome the obstacle, then kill stuff, loot and "do it the next week all over again", like some have said) better than D&D already does. THAT is the strength of D&D.

Ergo, D&D does have a particular quality/identity that separates it from other, later tabletop RPG products. There is thus worth in D&D itself. It is not a sacred cow.

 

[Doug McCrae]

So, is D&D an essential game, without which we would slowly turn into sedentary and sarcastic versions of hong?

That's the only reason I play it.

 

[Piratecat]

When there too many threads on a similar topic, starting a new one to mock it is actually not particularly funny. Interesting topic, perhaps - but bad timing.

Klunk.