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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Li Shenron" data-source="post: 6055669" data-attributes="member: 1465">I totally agree with this, but unfortunately this is even worse to make D&D more popular.Now the question might be: do we really want D&D to be popular, or do we want it to be an elitists hobby? [Note that from a business point of view, the answer it not really obvious at all, which one is more profitable depends on a lot of factors]I think that D&D has always generally leaned towards being more an elitists hobby than a popular one, but since the concept of "system mastery" introduced by 3ed, it has become more elitist because of a higher entry barrier. Personally I heard a lot of people telling me "yeah I'd be interested in trying it out, but I don't want to spend time learning all those rules".The problem is that there are A LOT of people who would like to play a game where they are required to THINK but much fewer who like being required to KNOW or remember, before they can start enjoying the game. There are many more people who like playing games where they have to "solve problems" by being smart rather than by being experts.Those people are cut-off from D&D as soon the game is totally focused on combat (which generally requires to know the details of a lot of rules) and marginally focused on exploration (which many times requires more common-sense or rules-light reasoning rather than rules-heavy) and story/interaction (which indeed requires the least "mastery" among the pillars). And if the D&D rules support "combat as sport" much more than "combat as war", then again this makes it even more rules-dependent therefore elitist.But many D&D fans insist on devaluing the people we call "casual gamers" by assuming that they are superficially interested or don't want to put any effort in playing, not understanding that instead they remain "casual" just because a rules-heavy game does not allow them to put the effort where they want, i.e. on "smart" and creative problem-solving.And yet what are the most common nuisances at the gaming table? Rules-lawyers, munchkins, power-gamers (all of which are "system masters" not "casual gamers") and players who drag the game down because they are bored or incompetent... but is really their fault or is it thanks to the required "system mastery"?</blockquote>

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