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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Raven Crowking" data-source="post: 3906541" data-attributes="member: 18280">So, if you don't think adding "dung" as a prefix to every name is a good idea, or recasting everything to look like it should be sculpted from dung, the game deserves to be broken?    <img src="http://www.enworld.org/forum/images/smilies/laugh.png"  class="smilie" loading="lazy" alt=":lol:" title="Laughing    :lol:" data-shortname=":lol:" />   Sorry, but this is a non-argument to me.  The only way it is true is if "all things are equal", and that premise is clearly false (at least, I imagine, to most of us, or else we'd all be happy with one race, one monster, one class, and one treasure).Remathilis:Interesting and thought-provoking OP.  However, I always thought thatthe best of D&D's "mythology" (and by that term, I mean the trappings of the world, society, races, magic, gods and monsters) has always been shameless ripped off from other fantasy sources. Tolkien's races. Vance's Magic. Moorcock's Alignment. Merlinesque wizards next to Leiberian thieves, next to Howardesque barbarians facing monsters from Greek myth, Norse epics, and Lovecraftian nightmares. was the game's greatest strength.  Even you say it is the "best" of D&D's "mythology".I understand the desire to brand things, and I agree with you that this is probably what WotC is doing with 4e.  But branding things isn't always in the best interest of the thing itself, nor does throwing out the "best" of what has come before make something stronger.From its roots, D&D was a game where you could read any novel, watch any movie, see any television show, and translate parts of it into your game.  Everything was grist for the mill.  It was easy to stat up new monsters, easy to stat up new spells and magic.  That was an incredible strength.  It meant that the DM could be inspired by just about anything.  The game was invigorating to play, to run, even to prep.I sort-of agree that D&D needs a new edition, and I sort-of agree with some of the changes that WotC is making.  The idea of faster prep time & faster combat, for instance, is a good one.  But, when in my quest for the perfect game, as I homebrewed 3.x, I discovered that there was a lot of good in the earlier editions that has been lost in the game's current incarnation.  And hodge-podging the strength of 3.X rules with the ideas of those earlier editions -- and especially 1e -- creates a great game.  Frankly, from what I've seen from the Design & Development columns (and I admit that is scanty evidence indeed), I believe it makes a much, much better game than ditching the past.It should also be remembered that some of the alternative fantasy games out there have "instantly recognizable content" because, in the days of T$R, people who produced content too similar to that of D&D were liable to get a notice from T$R's lawyers.  You are probably right that this is all about devising unique elements that can be "branded" and trademarked.But, while branding may be good for WotC, and branding may be good for cattle, I am not at all convinced that branding makes a stronger game.RC</blockquote>

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