Falling out of love with your game

[Cadfan]

What do you mean by "Coasian philosophy"?

Are you referring to the work of Nobel Laureate economist Ronald Coase?

Yes. Specifically his argument that any protection of your rights is by definition an infringement of my right to violate your rights. Its a totally correct proposition, although I'm not a fan of what he went on to do with it.

 

[Dice4Hire]

Well talking about D&D, I jsut simply moved on with each edition, though with 3.5 it has taken 18 months. When 1E came out, the red and blue books were over, 2e, 1E is over, etc up until 4E and 3.5 where I have spent 18 months on the fence and have not decided what to do. Get off on one side or the other or stay perched......

Eventually, I will probably end up on the 4E side.

For me the reason to move on was options. Each edition had more options for character creation and development. And I liked that. I still like some of the insanity 3.5 is capable of (Savage Species, anyone?)

But it is starting to seem clear that 4E better matches what I want. Options, plus a more human level of power. 3.5 develops gods, seriously powerful gods with god like abilities. 4E still ahs characters actually walking from here to there at level 30. I like that.

 

[Barastrondo]

Honestly, no...I haven't. I'm not even sure how that's possible. I wouldn't mind hearing an explanation if you would like to give an example. I definitely know I am a more easy going player (I can't say the same as DM) than the majority of players I have had to DM. So I simply adjust to the campaign setting. But rules have never kept me from doing what I expected my PC to be able to do in that world.

A good example would be a skill point system, I figure. I've frequently seen players who have issues with just not having enough skill points to spend on things that are useful and things that are characterful. This is particularly true for fighter-types or other concepts without much Intelligence. "But ho," you may say, "if they're fighters, doesn't that mean they have few skills outside of their martial discipline?" Well, that's the thing: if their concept is "fighter built with the limitations of a skill point system in mind," they might be fine with that. If their concept is "most dangerous pirate on the seas," then not having the skill points for mathematics, navigation, athletics and other requisites of being a fighting Jack Aubrey type is a problem. Having to take levels in another class just to get skill points is a real problem unless, as I say, you have a certain predisposition to the system assumptions. If you like multiclassing, you're golden. But without that predisposition, you may be asking myself "Why do I have to take sneak attack and a d6 hit die just so my Guan Yu homage can have the skill points to be lettered in the Spring and Autumn Annals?"

This is a case where the setting is permissive (sure, you can build the most dangerous pirate on the seas as a fighter, so you're a seriously dangerous swordfighter), but the rules are not so much (you better take some rogue with that fighter if you want to be any good at the various skills that would represent being competent at the non-fighting parts of your job). Same for the Guan Yu or Musashi type: in some games, warriors are Not Supposed To Be Scholars, no matter what the role models outside the game might be.

It's not always a game-breaker in and of itself. But is it one of those things that adds up, more and more. And I honestly don't think it's fair to assume that people who grow disenchanted with a game system are interested in "power-ups" instead of roleplaying. Many are excellent roleplayers who love to immerse themselves in their characters, but they have an easier time of it in a system that embraces some of their predilections instead of contradicting them.

 

[Ourph]

I can't say I've ever gone from loving a game to hating it. I have gone from ambivalence to dislike to hatred for several games however. It's not unusual for repeated exposure to an annoyance to cause a stronger reaction over time.

 

[Snoweel]

The rules, edition, or whatever don't make the game for me. My characters, my ability to roleplay in character, and the DMs ability to make me believe my character is living in his world is what keeps me interested in the game. It won't matter what rules I use to do it as long as I am able to do it. I don't really ever fall out of love with my game...unless I catch it cheating...then I go all crazy & throw it's supplement books out the window, burn dice, & flirt with other games at the store for payback.

I never feel the need to change editions or games just because I'll get to use new rules or new eye candy. If I have a good understanding of the rules and I am able to use them to roleplay my character, then I have no problems. I think people focus way to much on the rules and way to little on their characters in-game lives. But I understand not everyone approaches the game the way I do, so I am not saying that as a bad thing. But I do wonder if people would stay interested in a game more if they focused more on roleplaying out their characters life (beyond just simply leveling & gaining new powers).

Is it worth reporting posts like this?

Insulting our intelligence is still insulting us. Thanks.

For example, I loved the 3e idea of monsters and characters generated with the same procedural rules, permitting me to combine, mix, and match monster and pc information with a procedural system. Now, having experienced a herculean effort towards creating a game based on that idea, I'm not so convinced that the idea had as much merit as I thought.

This.

At first I totally loved the idea, but after so much prep work I began to grow tired of it, even as early as about 2003.

It also led to the idea amongst many gamers that any option the DM made available for NPCs should also be available to PCs. I even got into flamewars on this very board over it - as though PCs should have some kind of right of audit over the DMs NPCs (who ultimately only exist so the players at the table can have a good time).

I think what turned me off 3e is the whole legalist mindset that the DM should shoehorn his setting into the PC-balance-straightjacket that is only really intended to keep PCs from outshining each other.

When applied to monsters and NPCs it just turned into a book-keeping nightmare that was just about never worth the time and effort investment of DM prep-work.

 

[Oryan77]

Is it worth reporting posts like this?

Report it for what....being awesome?

Insulting our intelligence is still insulting us. Thanks.

When did I ever insult anyone's intelligence? WTF? 99% of the posters on Enworld are way smarter than I am. All I have are my good looks...and that's not a great tool to have when posting. Give me a break.

The OP asked the question and I was trying to be logical about a possible reason. I have no desire to insult any fellow gamers....it's not that serious to me. Chill out man, I meant no disrespect to anyone.

And I honestly don't think it's fair to assume that people who grow disenchanted with a game system are interested in "power-ups" instead of roleplaying. Many are excellent roleplayers who love to immerse themselves in their characters, but they have an easier time of it in a system that embraces some of their predilections instead of contradicting them.

I'm sure that's true. I'm making my assumption based on my experience gaming with dozens of players in my time. That's what, 0.001% of the gaming population? Maybe my opinion is unfair, but that doesn't mean there are not gamers that fit in that category. Nor am I trying to say that a lot of players fit that category. It was just a thought I had about why some people might be switching games and a suggestion for what might make them not switch. Thanks for the explanation though....it makes sense.

 

[Starfox]

I had this kind of relationship with the TORG game by West End (anyone remember that?). There was kind of a mini-game in TORG involving cards; you got cards by doing "approved actions" and then you could play cards to gain bonuses or give cards to other players. Our game group became VERY good at this metagame, so good that we could do really amazing things with it - and in the end it came to overshadow the "normal" game. That, and that with supplements and house rules, the whole game became unweildy, especially at higher levels made me lose patience with it. And the "laser sight" effect - there were so many small side bonuses you could get to almost everything, that the base game values started to matter less and less.

After six years of TORG, we moved on. We still think/talk of it fondly, but no-one really seems to want to go back to it.

This is the most clear-cut example, but I've had similar experiences with ADD1, Rune Quest, ADD2, Star Wars (also by West End), Pendragon, DnD3, and now DnD4. In the end, all games get worn out, and few can stand really long campaigns without starting to burst at the seams.

 

[Jhaelen]

What happened was that, prior to 2005, we rarely, if ever, played the game above 10th level. Right in 2005, we started playing 10th level and up campaigns... a LOT. And I began to see some chinks in the armor of 3E that I couldn't reconcile well. Even today, below 10th level, with minor exceptions, 3E plays just fine (both 3E AND 3.5).

This is one of the two most important reasons I can think of.

A game can play very different at low levels than at high levels and this is not something you'll learn by just reading the rules. You have to get there by actually playing the game through those levels.

The second important reason is system mastery:
When you start playing with a new system everything's great. Then you discover some things don't work as well as others in actual play. With every new character you make, you'll find out new things that work and others that don't.
Eventually, you'll reach the point where you find that the plethora of options the system seemed to offer in the beginning mostly just aren't 'viable'.

When one of the players in my 3e campaign recently had to roll up a new character he told me he wasn't really interested in doing anything different than with his last character. He had tried several classes and found the one that was most fun to him and he also had found an optimized build that he didn't want to deviate from.

While I don't share his view, I can understand the notion. Unfortunately, that's a sure sign to me that the system's lifetime has expired.

I'm quite sure the same thing will happen in 4e, too. It's just a question of when, not if. I also believe that things like the CO boards actually accelerate a system's demise. By (over)analyzing a system and finding 'optimal' builds they kill every sub-optimal option in the game (at least for players who care about that kind of thing).

That also highlights the purpose of supplements: they're an attempt to prolong a system's lifetime by providing more (and eventually better) options.

 

[Barastrondo]

I'm sure that's true. I'm making my assumption based on my experience gaming with dozens of players in my time. That's what, 0.001% of the gaming population? Maybe my opinion is unfair, but that doesn't mean there are not gamers that fit in that category. Nor am I trying to say that a lot of players fit that category. It was just a thought I had about why some people might be switching games and a suggestion for what might make them not switch. Thanks for the explanation though....it makes sense.

And absolutely there are gamers who want to switch because they aren't happy with the power levels they have with a current edition, same as there are gamers who hate to switch editions because their favorite class, build, tribe or whatever has been "nerfed." I simply objected to the idea that most people who don't switch are more interested in the roleplay side of things, because it implies that those who grow weary of a system aren't interested in roleplay. (Hence, why Snoweel may have seen an insult implied; if I grow tired of game/edition X, are you saying I don't like roleplay as much as you do?)

I think they're two different axes. Which brings the question of why people grow tired with systems down to personal reasons rather than a trend -- pretty much like the reasons that people choose D&D over Vampire, and vice versa, in the first place.

 

[Nai_Calus]

With me, it was finally realising just how much fun I wasn't having with game x. To be fair to it, I had some awful DMs/groups for it. But all in all, it was just too bogged down in rules, too easy to make an irreparably awful character, too difficult to make a viable character, and the general style it seemed to encourage wasn't what I wanted. I tried running game x and good lord the bookkeeping and mess and sheer number of splatbooks to try to get my complete noob players vaguely in line with each other powerwise...(Awful class and Godtier class in the same party, kill me now, merciful Corellon, I'm ready to go home to Arvandor)

Once I tried game y, it all snapped into place and I realised that I was much, much happier with game y and that so much of my experience with game x had been unfulfilling, and what I like best about RPGs is just as present in game y, without the BS of game x. I can pretend to be an elf just fine in any game. Just, I realised that in game y, I could do it without pulling my hair out and screaming half the time.

Actually, you know, I think I really hated game x pretty much from the beginning but just didn't put my finger on it, or just didn't want to admit, because I like pretending to be an elf, damn it, and game x was at the time the only way for me to do it.

Game x2 didn't help at all with game x's problems, either, so it's game y for me, and I have no regrets.