D&D General Did D&D Die with TSR?

[Bolares]

I guess I've never played D&D before then....

In fact, most people who play D&D today never played D&D. The things we have to read...

 

[Neonchameleon]

The game looked different too. The art style was no longer based in fantasy illustrations, rather than "this is D&D 'dungeon punk' and it can't represent a character from history, fantasy fiction, etc."

I'm confused. Which out of 3.X or AD&D could represent characters from history or fantasy fiction?

If Dragonsfoot is right then this is what AD&D Conan's stats were according to Gygax:

Str-19 (30)​

Int-18 (50+)​

Wis-15 (70)​

Dex- 20 (25)​

Con-18 (15-50)​

Chr-18 (40)​

Fighter-24 (40)​

Thief- 12 (30)​

HP-167 (40)​

And here's a younger version according to Zeb Cook:

Note the "luck points" (aren't those hit points), a special surprise rule, and how you can't get from one set of levels to the other - and some very odd human multiclassing.

In my experience due to the inflexible nature of the class system (and especially the two different multiclassing versions) and just how distinctive AD&D magic was the only characters you could reasonably translate were either broad brushstrokes or (like Aragorn and the the ranger) explicitly based upon the character. Even there as with the Grey Mouser casting spells from scrolls things often didn't work well; 4e's addition of ritual casting (continued in 5e) was excellent for this.

 

[GreyLord]

Considering I never played anything before 3.0, i'd be interested in knowing what I have been playing for almost 20 years

Ideas....

D20...

Or D20 Fantasy?

Afterall, things licensed under it were either OGL or D20...

Take your pick?

If looking at hindsight rather than what it was at the time

Could also be Pre-Pathfinder or Pre-OGL PRD games...

Then came the game many refuse to call Dungeons and Dragons...so...it' is the anti-D&D? (seriously though, I actually love 4e, though I know many do not).

And now, finally, the game I call...Proficiency Bonus Fantasy...

All of them are based off of D20 though (even the system many refuse to aknowledge as having roots in it is actually just a simplified D20 system at it's core with a bunch of powers baked onto various classes), including the most recent incarnation...so I suppose one COULD call them...

D20 Fantasy
D20 Modern
D20 Modern - Future and Urban
D20 Star Wars
D20 Tactical Fantasy
D20 - Essentials Fantasy
D20 - Simplified Fantasy

 

[Willie the Duck]

As others have mentioned, there seem to be a lot of errors made in the description of 5e, so perhaps the OP has a rather skewed view of at least one endpoint of the comparison, but I thought I'd point out this one as well:

5) Passive Perception
Finding traps and spotting enemies required paying attention to the fiction, the DM's description. Interacting and asking questions. Now, you don't even have to roll a die. You can play on your phone, scroll through social media.

I noticed this because, in oD&D, mechanical rules for finding things (hidden doors for elves and sloped passageways for dwarves) were the first two existing mechanical perception abilities in the game book (pre-dating the thief class by a year), and were completely passive. So, oD&D: mixes active and passive checks, mixes game rules and interaction with fiction/DM description; D&D 5e: mixes active and passive checks, mixes game rules and interaction with fiction/DM description.

Perhaps moreso I am noticing this:

5) Passive Perception
Finding traps and spotting enemies required paying attention to the fiction, the DM's description. Interacting and asking questions. Now, you don't even have to roll a die. You can play on your phone, scroll through social media.

This non sequitur is hard to ignore and definitely makes me wonder if the real issue isn't that the game has changed, but perhaps the audience, the gaming, or the overall play experience is what has changed. Thing is, that's a universal situation, unconstrained by whether the produced game is meaningfully different or not. Summer blockbusters, new crushes, the holidays, rock&roll -- none of it's going to feel the same as when you were ____teen or whatever.

In my opinion:
D&D "Died" in 1986 when Gygax lost control.

For all his business failings, he at least had a personal stake in what the game meant to people, and a fairly consistent vision of what it should be.

His lack of control was mitigated a bit in the Williams era of TSR because a lot of employees who worked directly under Gygax still had input into the game.

If we're going to go with creator vision, one could argue that D&D died when it hit store shelves* and the typical purchaser ended up being not a seasoned wargamer like Gygax, Arneson, and their friends but instead some college kid with a dissimilar background. The gameplay experience he ended up promoting for the next 12 years was wildly different from what he originally thought he was bringing into the world.
*Or earlier, if we include things like he supposedly included a lot more Tolkien into the game than her personally would have liked, simply because he knew people would want it.

I've heard that the Golden Age of D&D ended about 3/4 of the way through the first session of modified Chainmail that EGG ever ran. It's been downhill ever since.

That too.

Anyways, with regards to the OP question -- D&D has been evolving and changing since before it saw print, and has continued to do. Some things have done so gradually, some in jagged fits and starts. Some things have changed with editions, some have changed during editions (the tail end of each edition often resembles the next edition more than the beginning of its own edition; and I still think the largest shift the game ever had was within oD&D -- just the LBBs compared to LBBS + supplements + magazines). If you want to frame that in an incendiary term like the game at some point 'died,' I certainly can't stop you, but I certainly don't consider it a particularly fruitful framing. Especially considering that two groups of gamers often have had wildly different play experiences even while using the exact same ruleset during the exact same timeframe (so discussions about 'this is not my D&D'/'these D&Ds are not same in kind' do not need such a distinction to be the case).

 

[Neonchameleon]

I've heard that the Golden Age of D&D ended about 3/4 of the way through the first session of modified Chainmail that EGG ever ran. It's been downhill ever since.

You must have been talking to young whippersnappers. It's been downhill ever since Gygax looked at Arneson's game!

 

[Dausuul]

D&D is a root from which many stems have grown. At any given point, one of those stems is being nurtured by the owner; the others rely on their communities to sustain them. Some of them are moribund, but none of them is dead.

To me, there are four main trunks from which the stems of D&D spring:

• Chainmail-era D&D--that is, the white box and the various supplements published for it.
• TSR-era D&D. The stems from this trunk include BD&D/BECMI, 1E, and 2E.
• Wizards-era D&D, which might also be called "OGL D&D." The stems from this one are 3E/3.5E and 5E*.
• 4E, which is its own unique beast.

The purchase of TSR by Wizards was certainly a turning point; the sprouting of a new trunk is a big deal. But it was no more the "death of D&D" than the end of the Chainmail era had been.

*Many elements from the 4E trunk were grafted onto 5E, but the core of the system is the same as 3E.

 

[Staffan]

I do think the weirdness and risk taking did take a hit when WOC took over. TSR weren’t really beholden to anyone which meant they could do pretty much what they wanted. Dark Sun, Ravenloft, Planescape, Al Quadim, Maztica, Birthright, Council of Wyrms...all came in a relatively short period of time.

And that's a big part of what killed TSR – flooding and dividing the market. I mean, it's not the only thing, but it definitely contributed. Someone running Dark Sun would not be particularly likely to buy a Planescape adventure, for example.

 

[Staffan]

Probably deep in their website where no one will find it.

I think Gleemax has it.

 

[Plaguescarred]

D&D died with TSR, then was ressurected with WoTC, then polymorphed.

Or no edition of D&D ever died in spirit for as long as it's still being played, but every one of them has died of support, whenever a new edition of D&D rolled out.

Is OD&D still alive?
Is BECMI still alive?
Is AD&D still alive?
Is AD&D 2nd edition still alive?
Is 3E still alive?
Is 3.5 still alive?
Is 4E still alive?
Is Pathfinder a doppleganger?

One who wears a robe of many eyes could have different ways to see this....

 

[Jaeger]

Considering I never played anything before 3.0, i'd be interested in knowing what I have been playing for almost 20 years

I guess I've never played D&D before then....

In fact, most people who play D&D today never played D&D. The things we have to read...

If the game you played had D&D on the cover, then you played D&D.

Even 4e...

Is it the D&D game that would have developed if Gygax stayed in control of the IP until his death?

Probably not.

And if that doesn't bother you, it's all good.

Because what "D&D" means to people has always depended on when they got into the game.