DMG to include a "starter town".

[Mouseferatu]

It occurs to me to ask for clarification.
Are you rejecting my claim that most gamers are distinctly either one or the other?

Depends on how you're defining "most" in this instance.

If you mean "more than half," I'd say you're probably right.

If you mean "an overwhelming majority, to the point where exceptions are practically flukes of probability," then no, I don't agree. I'd say that, in my own experience, roughly 20% of gamers are pretty comfortable flitting back and forth between the two roles, and do so on a regular basis.

 

[mattcolville]

Crap. More hand holding.



I mean, even if you are a new DM, how many times are you going to use the same starting town? And are you going to be a new DM forever? Either you stop needing this thing or it does a piss-poor job of moving you past "new". Either way it is the gift that stops giving real fast.

Can't they just do a separate new DMs guide instead of wasting page count in a book that should be used for many years by a wide range of DMs?

Is there a difference between hand-holding and time-saving? I'm an experienced GM and I love it when they give me stuff already done, that I can tweak or use as I see fit.

The thing I like about this is that a whole generation of D&D players will have this communal experience to talk about. That's something key from OD&D that was missing from subsequent editions. We all went through those classic modules and it turned us into a community with shared experiences.

 

[WyzardWhately]

That's a shame, beacuse it's one of the single best modules ever made by TSR. Really, it should have been a small boxed set since it was by itself a complete introduction to D&D and campaign creation. It had a huge double-sized poster map that had Threshold, the area map, several location maps on it and then on the back was a map for one of the scenarios. I think it even had cardboard counters for that huge encounter where you defend an inn from goblin wolf riders.

That sounds pretty damn sweet. I may have to look into this.

 

[Friadoc]

But we can not keep ignoring the big picture.
It seems that hand holding is showing to be a major driving force of 4E design.
And that could very easily drive a lot of the established base away.
From talk I hear, I'm far from the only person who feels that he may be part of the "fired" old guard.

Well, not to jump in the middle of this, but I'm going to jump into the middle of it, 3e held hands, 4e will hold hands, and most successful RPGs have places where they hold hands.

Heck, let us look at a non-d20 RPG that is quite successful and holds peoples' hands with introductory material in its main books - The Storyteller System/World of Darkness.

I don't know about you, but I remember reading in 1st Edition Vampire where it discussed the rules, setting, the tone, ambiance, and all sorts of stuff including the points where it outright states "Don't do any farther unless you are going to be the storyteller" and then it explains the Storyteller's job, how to do it, and methods to use.

RPGs should never, ever assume that the person picking up the game is a veteran.

In the 27 years that I've played RPGs, not only did I pick up ideas on how to DM/GM/ST from others, but I also picked it up from books.

While I'm sure that this is not the case for everyone, I'm willing to presume that it is the case for at least HALF the people who have made the switch from being a player to running a game.

GURPS gives advice on how to run games, samples of things, including building races, vehicles, settings, and so forth.

Heck, GURPS gives out worksheets to run their games, track campaigns, and character development - in other words, they lent the new GM a hand.

In fact, unless the book is a follow up book or advanced book, I'm pretty sure most core books in most RPGs offer what some would call handholding.

Big deal, if it was good enough in 1st edition AD&D with all it's fancy charts that gave a quick method to randomly produce things, instead of forcing me to rely on my imagination, then I think it is good enough for everything else that comes down the pike, too.

 

[hectorse]

I love this, I wish I had something like that with the 3E basic set

 

[FadedC]

Something that I thought might put a few things on the current argument in perspective is that the current version of the 3.5 DMG contains aproximately 40 or so pages off stuff that one might also consider hand holding, ie sample npcs, adventure ideas and locations, ideas for new cultures, ideas for roleplaying NPCs. While there is no sample town, one would certainly not be remotely out of place. Many of the splatbooks contain far more of these types of things.

So I'd propose that is neither a new move to bring in additional players nor is it a trend towards increased handholding. It's just the exact same thing we have always seen in the D&D books.

 

[AdmundfortGeographer]

I'm hoping Threshold, expecting Hommlet.

 

[Friadoc]

Something that I thought might put a few things on the current argument in perspective is that the current version of the 3.5 DMG contains aproximately 40 or so pages off stuff that one might also consider hand holding, ie sample npcs, adventure ideas and locations, ideas for new cultures, ideas for roleplaying NPCs. While there is no sample town, one would certainly not be remotely out of place. Many of the splatbooks contain far more of these types of things.

So I'd propose that is neither a new move to bring in additional players nor is it a trend towards increased handholding. It's just the exact same thing we have always seen in the D&D books.

Personally, I'd like a sample town, with a walk-through on designing one, but that's me.

While I consider myself an experienced gamer, both as a player and a DM of numerous systems, technically even a professional gamer since I've been paid to run games (demos and such), but I know I do not know everything about playing or running a game.

Heck, my books are full of sticky tabs, post-it notes, and other methods of reminding me where to look in which book for a key piece of information that I never remember.

The index works, too, and it's not handholding (no, I will admit that this one comment is a very weak, lame semantic argument *grins*).

 

[RigaMortus2]

Talk about bending over backwards to take offense. What if Perkins had said "innovation" instead of "experiment"? Would you be similarly aggrieved about WotC "innovating" on you? :\

Perhaps it is all in their (poor) choice of words.

 

[Rechan]

Of all the things to complain about.

Looking in my 3.5 DMG, I see Four Pages devoted to Familiars (pg 200-2004).

I can't believe this is an issue. Oh wait, internet, message board. Say no more.