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Message: <blockquote data-quote="matthulhu" data-source="post: 5924996" data-attributes="member: 97783">Specifically in the playtest and our discussions about it here, it comes to my mind that a lot of people seem to want to use D&D as a game of generic fantasy (or, sometimes, not even a game, but a storytelling tool, which I don't even want to start in on, God help me). This seems to drive a lot of the suggestions I see for/about the playtest: making concessions for this or that contingency to make the whole more palatable for "any conceivable" campaign.But D&D is not generic fantasy, and never has been, and never really can be- EXCEPT if we consider that what is now considered "generic fantasy" is hugely colored by years of D&D being the starting-point of so many lives devoted to "fantasy" as a genre (which explains to me why you see things like Paladins in Diablo and WarCraft). Pop culture makes references to "+1" items, a D&D concept to the core. This stuff is ingrained.Even from the original little books by Gygax and Arneson, right through to the 4th edition (which itself had a wildly different assumed setting but plenty of it, and in great lava gulps), this is a game that has been dripping with implied setting to various degrees. That implied setting might be a mish-mash of inspirations and rip-offs, but it is there nonetheless. Clerics? Paladins? Bards? Magic-users with spell slots and spells that start with "Bigby's"? These aren't generic fantasy, they are D&D through and through. They transcend their literary antecedents at this point. "Bards are based on rea..." yadda yadda no one cares, every bard in every video game is based on the lute-strumming D&D bard who is D&D to the core.I don't see why anyone would want to make D&D a "generic fantasy" toolkit, game, storytelling tool or anything else for that matter, except that people seem to be drawn to the name "Dungeons & Dragons" even above the game sold under that title. The truth is there are generic fantasy gaming systems out there (many inspired by D&D in turn, naturally) but D&D is basically incapable of being one. What is generic about a cosmology that includes the alignments? What is generic about a vorpal sword or a bag of holding? ("Let's remove alignments from the system, they don't fit the world I want to play in!" Well, or, you could play a different game entirely that never had alignments to begin with. There are plenty to choose from. Why should D&D have to become one?)D&D grew to become iconic and survive to playtest a fifth edition (which isn't even the fifth edition but more like the sixth or seventh) specifically because it was never generic. It has presented a very specific framework for adventure gaming that has been highly malleable- but NOT N O T N-O-T generic. It was never about infinite character concepts, acting out any role you could imagine- this is a game about a class of people whose lives consist of going into dangerous locations, answering violence with violence, and hauling out treasure. You shouldn't expect D&D to bend over backwards to make room for your pacifist noble with an allergy to coins and no discernible talent outside of playing the spoons. The game does not owe your character anything, especially if your character isn't made to do what D&D expects him to do- go out and earn experience points, however your preferred edition awards them, to become better at earning experience points, lather, rinse, repeat.Going forward into the playtest and the edition it will spawn, I think it is important to remember this point. D&D is not and never has been a go-to toolkit for telling fantasy stories; it is a game of adventure in a fairly specific mode and in a fairly specific kind of world- right down to the concept of class & level, which itself says something about the setting (there are people who go out and adventure, and each one is highly proficient in a specific useful area towards the goal of acquisition of treasure and as they adventure, they become better at it, eventually beyond the ken of their erstwhile "unclassed" peers). Dungeons & Dragons is a game for exploring "D&D Worlds." D&D Worlds can look very, very different from each other on the surface and even for a few layers below that, but they are still D&D Worlds at their cores- until you stretch them so far they ~POP~ and you're left with something alien (but not intrinsically worthless). This is how some of the post-D&D fantasy rule sets were born, after all!When we try to turn D&D into generic fantasy, something to tell our individual fantasy stories, it kind of breaks down. D&D is good at being D&D, and not much else. And that, I think, is why it is STILL the biggest fantasy adventure game on the block in terms of brand recognition. But could that recognition falter if D&D is made to be more generic, more adaptable, and extricated further from the concepts it made so iconic they are now regarded as staples of our modern notions about the fantasy genre?</blockquote>

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