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Do you play with "casual" gamers, and how should D&D Next accomodate their needs?
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<blockquote data-quote="Keldryn" data-source="post: 5930619" data-attributes="member: 11999"><p>Absolutely. However, I'm a gamer who is not interested in system mastery, but I spend a lot of time outside gaming sessions reading about, thinking about, and posting about gaming. I certainly wouldn't call myself a casual gamer, although I'm sure that some dedicated gamers would probably apply that label to me.</p><p></p><p>Case in point: I recall reading on a WoW discussion board, during the brief period of time that I was playing it a bit, a rant about those "casual" gamers, which the posters defined as someone who spends 15 hours per week or less playing WoW.</p><p></p><p><em>That's a part-time job.</em></p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p>"Easy" might be a better word. When I say simple I don't mean simplistic, and there is a distinction.</p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p>I wasn't using it as a put-down and I hope it didn't come across in that manner. After all, my wife is one of the casual gamers in my group!</p><p></p><p>Definitely. My sister's boyfriend was playing with us for a while in our 4e game; he had little interest in it, but was joining in because my sister wanted to play. He wasn't enjoying it, and he was having trouble sustaining interest through hour-long combats in particular, so he gracefully bowed out.</p><p></p><p></p><p>I completely agree. My wife wouldn't choose to play D&D if I wasn't already running a game, nor does she give the game much thought outside of the game session. She started off enjoying our 4e game, but was getting fatigued by the long combats and round-by-round fiddly modifiers. After ditching 4e and playing some Basic D&D, and now DDN, she's always having a lot of fun during the game. She gets pretty engaged in the game world and comes up with a lot of creative ideas. I'm never going to catch her reading my D&D books for fun, but she brings a lot to our gaming sessions.</p><p></p><p>And yeah, by far the worst attitudes tend to come from the more zealous gamers, in particular ones who develop tunnel vision when it comes to certain aspects of the game.</p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p>I agree on ease of play at the table. My general experience with RPGs is that complex character generation usually results in complex character sheets, which inhibit ease of play at the table. I haven't played much Hero (and it's been a very long time since I did play it), but I've had that experience with GURPS. More stuff on the character sheet -- especially numbers -- tends to make it harder to use during play.</p><p> </p><p>I like character generation to be quick and simple for everybody's sake. <img src="data:image/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAIAAAAAAAP///yH5BAEAAAAALAAAAAABAAEAAAIBRAA7" class="smilie smilie--sprite smilie--sprite2" alt=";)" title="Wink ;)" loading="lazy" data-shortname=";)" /></p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p>Absolutely. If you need to track all of the numbers that go into determining the total modifier on a skill, attack bonus, AC, etc, then keep all of that on a separate "worksheet" and not on the main character sheet. It's just more visual clutter that generally isn't needed during play and just makes the game look more complicated than it is.</p><p></p><p>I agree about the learning curve. I think that's where the 3e and 4e "starter sets" really failed; after about 3rd level, it was assumed that players were now ready to make the leap to the full-on game system, and I think it can take a lot of more casual players longer than that to really warm up to the game. If the game starts to feel like homework, you're going to lose those players.</p><p></p><p>Not having to memorize all of the rules is another great point, and that's also a good illustration of how 4e wasn't the right game for casual players. To play a fighter (simplest character sheet) in BD&D or AD&D, there was a pretty small subset of the rules that you needed to know to get started and play through a combat encounter. 4e retains those basic concepts but adds a great number of concepts that a new player needs to know right from the start or which are very likely to come up within the first few minutes of play (tracking hit points versus tracking hit points, healing surges, and temporary hit points is a good example).</p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p>That was my experience as well. My opinion on 4e might be different had I played it with a group of players who were all invested in the game and knew the rules well. I only had one (out of 4) of those in my 4e group, so the experience was just short of being a train wreck. One of the players (my sister) was a fairly experienced gamer, but she had become more of a casual gamer over time and didn't care to buy and read yet another set of rulebooks.</p><p></p><p>Yes. My wife's take after starting with 4e and then playing some Basic D&D: "in 4th edition, it felt like we were just interacting with numbers and rules. In this game, it feels like we're interacting with the world and actual characters. Now I'm starting to understand why you like playing these games."</p><p></p><p>Absolutely.</p><p></p><p>I am in complete agreement. I find it jarring when mechanics aren't tied to the in-game reality, and I've seen the casual gamers in my group really struggle with that. It pulls them out of the game and back to "interacting with the rules" instead of "interacting with the world."</p><p></p><p>*I* couldn't tell you the difference between Daze and Stun without looking it up.</p><p></p><p>Game mechanics need to go back to modeling in-game concepts. There's always been a bit of it going the other way, but creating in-game concepts to represent a mechanic seemed to really gain momentum in 3e and come out in full force in 4e.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Keldryn, post: 5930619, member: 11999"] Absolutely. However, I'm a gamer who is not interested in system mastery, but I spend a lot of time outside gaming sessions reading about, thinking about, and posting about gaming. I certainly wouldn't call myself a casual gamer, although I'm sure that some dedicated gamers would probably apply that label to me. Case in point: I recall reading on a WoW discussion board, during the brief period of time that I was playing it a bit, a rant about those "casual" gamers, which the posters defined as someone who spends 15 hours per week or less playing WoW. [I]That's a part-time job.[/I] "Easy" might be a better word. When I say simple I don't mean simplistic, and there is a distinction. I wasn't using it as a put-down and I hope it didn't come across in that manner. After all, my wife is one of the casual gamers in my group! Definitely. My sister's boyfriend was playing with us for a while in our 4e game; he had little interest in it, but was joining in because my sister wanted to play. He wasn't enjoying it, and he was having trouble sustaining interest through hour-long combats in particular, so he gracefully bowed out. I completely agree. My wife wouldn't choose to play D&D if I wasn't already running a game, nor does she give the game much thought outside of the game session. She started off enjoying our 4e game, but was getting fatigued by the long combats and round-by-round fiddly modifiers. After ditching 4e and playing some Basic D&D, and now DDN, she's always having a lot of fun during the game. She gets pretty engaged in the game world and comes up with a lot of creative ideas. I'm never going to catch her reading my D&D books for fun, but she brings a lot to our gaming sessions. And yeah, by far the worst attitudes tend to come from the more zealous gamers, in particular ones who develop tunnel vision when it comes to certain aspects of the game. I agree on ease of play at the table. My general experience with RPGs is that complex character generation usually results in complex character sheets, which inhibit ease of play at the table. I haven't played much Hero (and it's been a very long time since I did play it), but I've had that experience with GURPS. More stuff on the character sheet -- especially numbers -- tends to make it harder to use during play. I like character generation to be quick and simple for everybody's sake. ;) Absolutely. If you need to track all of the numbers that go into determining the total modifier on a skill, attack bonus, AC, etc, then keep all of that on a separate "worksheet" and not on the main character sheet. It's just more visual clutter that generally isn't needed during play and just makes the game look more complicated than it is. I agree about the learning curve. I think that's where the 3e and 4e "starter sets" really failed; after about 3rd level, it was assumed that players were now ready to make the leap to the full-on game system, and I think it can take a lot of more casual players longer than that to really warm up to the game. If the game starts to feel like homework, you're going to lose those players. Not having to memorize all of the rules is another great point, and that's also a good illustration of how 4e wasn't the right game for casual players. To play a fighter (simplest character sheet) in BD&D or AD&D, there was a pretty small subset of the rules that you needed to know to get started and play through a combat encounter. 4e retains those basic concepts but adds a great number of concepts that a new player needs to know right from the start or which are very likely to come up within the first few minutes of play (tracking hit points versus tracking hit points, healing surges, and temporary hit points is a good example). That was my experience as well. My opinion on 4e might be different had I played it with a group of players who were all invested in the game and knew the rules well. I only had one (out of 4) of those in my 4e group, so the experience was just short of being a train wreck. One of the players (my sister) was a fairly experienced gamer, but she had become more of a casual gamer over time and didn't care to buy and read yet another set of rulebooks. Yes. My wife's take after starting with 4e and then playing some Basic D&D: "in 4th edition, it felt like we were just interacting with numbers and rules. In this game, it feels like we're interacting with the world and actual characters. Now I'm starting to understand why you like playing these games." Absolutely. I am in complete agreement. I find it jarring when mechanics aren't tied to the in-game reality, and I've seen the casual gamers in my group really struggle with that. It pulls them out of the game and back to "interacting with the rules" instead of "interacting with the world." *I* couldn't tell you the difference between Daze and Stun without looking it up. Game mechanics need to go back to modeling in-game concepts. There's always been a bit of it going the other way, but creating in-game concepts to represent a mechanic seemed to really gain momentum in 3e and come out in full force in 4e. [/QUOTE]
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