Does PH(N), DM(N) and every class expansion book turn you off?

[foolish_mortals]

book buyers,

I'm just curious if there are people out there that would rather see more campaign stuff instead of these endless streams of player books coming out. I'm ok with player books coming out every once in awhile but having Martial Powers 3 and Spellcasters 6 makes my head spin. I think it probably brings a quicker demise to a game to follow this path. Which of these darned books do I need????

what's yer opinion?
foolish_mortals

 

[Stormonu]

Fewer player books = less headache for DM
More adventures = happier DM
More monsters (and minis!) = even happier DM

I'm all for options and being able to make the character you want, but do we really need 10,000 ways to express X[W] damage and target suffers Y consequence?

The publish-or-die model for RPGs needs to be turned on its head. Give the players and DM a small core of books and then sell them consumables - adventures, campaign worlds, dice, premade character packs, minis, etc.

 

[Crazy Jerome]

The books themselves don't bother me. Books with "filler" bother me, once the "filler" reaches a certain percentage. Most of the supplements of that nature have at least flirted with that percentage, and a few took it out for drinks and a movie. Admittedly, my sample is erratic, because I don't buy more than about a third of such books, if that many.

I will say that the worst offenders were some Fantasy Flight 3E supplements that I picked up for $5.00 each on sale. I've got eight of them, and there might be about $40.00 worth of non-filler in the lot. I shudder to think of the percentage bought at MSRP.

 

[Ahnehnois]

I think it needs to be clear to a beginner what's necessary to play the game. Your "complete X" (or splatbooks, speaking generically) are obviously for advanced players, and that's alright. Having multiple books with the PHB/DMG label is more problematic.

Rules bloat and power creep are significant issues as well.

 

[Greg K]

I don't like Player Handbook [n] or the 3e style Complete Books.

I prefer the format of the 2e Complete Handbooks and Green Ronin Master Class series or 3e- one class or race per book and give it a good an in-depth treatment. No more of what we had in 3e with sorcerer Heritage feats: dragon in one place, infernal in another, fey in another (ok, I know 2 of them were in one book, but you get the idea).

 

[thedungeondelver]

One of the biggest turn-offs in 3e and 4e for me were, and are, multiple DUNGEON MASTERS GUIDEs and PLAYERS HANDBOOKs. I liked how 3rd edition seemed to be handling it with ... I'm guessing the term is "splatbooks"? - expansions, but not essential.

I didn't care for multiples of the MONSTER MANUAL and by and large the FIEND FOLIO isn't anything to write home about. The minions and in some cases downright fightable critters in DEITIES & DEMIGODS are OK as they sort of make each pantheon more filled out (there are some "can be handled by low/mid-level parties" critters in the ol' D&DG), but monster books I can understand. As you get more creative stuff coming from modules (the aspis in A1 SLAVE PITS OF THE UNDERCITY, for example) and they build in numbers you want to have them in one place, it saves us DMs having to tear our hair out trying to remember where the insert for S4 got to - dammit it has the critical information for the behir!

But DUNGEON MASTERS GUIDE 2 (and indeed 3 PLAYERS HANDBOOKs)...eh, not so much. I think a well-written DUNGEON MASTERS GUIDE should have all you need in it.

That is a thing that needs to Go Away. If you've rewritten the rules to the extent that another 200+ pages are required to grok them, haven't you rewritten your game, by and large? And if they're not new rules, but "just optional" stuff, and you tell your customer base "Oh hey no, no, the game is totally playable with just the three", you're submarining your own product and Big Hasbro Is Watching.

So the multiple iterations of core books, that's something I don't think much of.

...now with that said...

A "domesday" or "omnibus" D&D edition that does support many D&D playstyles...well, it just might need 3 PLAYERS HANDBOOKs! "Splatbooks" might not be enough to cover the customization settings for a guy who wants a full {EDITION} game versus whatever the default settings are.

Much food for thought!

 

[Incenjucar]

As a DM and a Player, I enjoyed the 4E PHBs. Fully realized, carefully-considered new classes are great. I always knew the books better than any of my most savvy players, so I never encountered any issues I couldn't smirk at and flatten.

2E complete books were pretty awesome in their time, and I own almost all of them (none of the green ones ), but they were of varying quality. The Elf one remains hilariously absurd. It's actually a very interesting way to introduce a class, too, and perhaps would have been a better way to introduce some of the classes that struggled for recognition during 4E, even those with good mechanics.

I missed out on the 3E DMGs, but the 4E DMG2 was fantastic. I'd love to see more of that, perhaps as "Heroic DMG" "Paragon DMG" and "Epic DMG" instead of the numbering system, or whatever 5E's version of the divide will be.

 

[Kaodi]

I think Pathfinder has a pretty good distribution of books. They essentially have 5 PHBs, 2 DMGs, and 3 MMs, which is about half the number of PHBs 4e has (where PHB obviously means a book focused on player options). I think Pathfinder is pretty well set with its PHBs and DMGs for now. After Advanced Race Guide is done I would expect a Bestiary 4 and maybe even a 5 or a second Game Mastery Guide might be a good move before going back for more player options...

A slightly different way to put it might be that player oriented books should not exceed the combined number of dungeon master focused books (discounting setting books).

 

[nnms]

Generally I don't like a lot of rulebooks with core stuff in them. I like core rules + optional expansions.

I'll give the 4E PHB2 a pass though as it was the first clear demonstration that the designers had realized their mistakes in class design in the PHB1. Not a single multiple primary attribute class in there. And the powers in PHB1 got errata'd way, way more heavily than PHB2.

It's like 4E's design and development finished somewhere between the release of their first books and PHB2.

The DMG2, on the other hand, is totally optional. It's awesome. But it never, ever struck me as a must have book or something you need to have the whole game.

 

[Stormonu]

I agree with most of what thedungeondelver says, but I have to admit to being a monster manual freak (and I actually like the FF).

One of the most amazing books that's ever come out for D&D is the Rules Cyclopedia. It is a complete D&D game in one hardback book. In a way, I'm hoping that the core D&D Next game could be a one book game, and then everything else is just gravy. Let consumers buy to their level of satisfaction how far and much they want to expand their game.

And trust me, if it's half-way decent, D&D has proved folks will buy it.