Favourite D&D edition that’s not 5E

[pemerton]

The thing with 4e is, for those of us who are veterans of 1st, 2nd and 3rd edition, it felt too different.

See, the problem is, you assume that 4e players aren't veterans of other editions. That simply isn't true. At the very least, most 4e players cut their teeth on 3e. And, a very large chunk of them gamed earlier editions as well.

I learned to play with B/X, played a large amount of AD&D, very little 3E, and 4e is my favourite version of D&D. I've often said that it actually delivers what the foreword to Moldvay Basic promised (the hero liberating the land from the dragon tyrant with the sword bestowed by a mysterious cleric).

I'm not saying that everyone who liked classic D&D should like 4e. But clearly I do. And I suspect therefore that many others can.

 

[Aldarc]

The thing with 4e is, for those of us who are veterans of 1st, 2nd and 3rd edition, it felt too different. No more like D&D than any of the many other fantasy roleplaying games (e.g. Runequest, Tunnels and Trolls) that tried to jump on the D&D bandwagon in the 1980s.

For anyone who started on 4e that simply isn't an issue, and indeed it is 5e that doesn't feel like the D&D they know.

I was a veteran of 3e (and a smattering of 2e), and 4e felt like D&D to me.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

"it felt too different" has more to do with how things were presented than any actual objective changes.

I wouldn't dispute that, but you say is like presentation doesn't matter, when presentation is by far the most important factor.

Tunnels and Trolls only differed from D&D in terms of presentation : fairy as a core race, Magic Missile renamed Take That You Fiend (TTYF).

I might of liked 4e, but when I tried reading the rules they simply didn't make sense to me - I couldn't visuallise how the game was played. 5e though - that reads and plays pretty much the same as 1st edition (with lots of the unneeded complications thrown away).

 

[Hussar]

I wouldn't dispute that, but you say is like presentation doesn't matter, when presentation is by far the most important factor.

Tunnels and Trolls only differed from D&D in terms of presentation : fairy as a core race, Magic Missile renamed Take That You Fiend (TTYF).

I might of liked 4e, but when I tried reading the rules they simply didn't make sense to me - I couldn't visuallise how the game was played. 5e though - that reads and plays pretty much the same as 1st edition (with lots of the unneeded complications thrown away).

I'm sorry, but I just don't get this.

Plays the same as 1st edition? How? Virtually none of the mechanics are even remotely close, in 5e, nearly all of the classes are casters, heck, nearly nothing translates from 1e to 5e directly. That's like saying a Model T and a Toyota Prius only differ by presentation. Yup, they're both cars, but, other than having 4 tires, there's pretty much nothing the same about them.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

Because in a story telling game it is only presentation that matters. What goes on under the hood is relevant only to engineers.

 

[Aldarc]

Because in a story telling game it is only presentation that matters. What goes on under the hood is relevant only to engineers.

Hooray for goal posts that shift to exclude 4e from D&D however it can!

 

[fjw70]

Put me down as someone that started with B/X and 1e, but loved 4e. Prior to 5e my favorite editions were 4e and B/X. 5e came along and became my favorite with 4e gaining the second spot. I have no need for B/X anymore. 5e does basic D&D better for me.

I see how the presentation of 4e was different. It was a more mathematical presentation that I loved but I see how that can turn people off.

 

[oreofox]

I can agree with those who say it didn't look like D&D. Pathfinder looked more like D&D to me than 4e did. Every time I wanted to give 4e a shot, I'd crack open the PHB and then close it about a minute later. I, personally, couldn't get past how it was presented. From reading forums, there's a lot of things 4e did that sounded great. I honestly really enjoyed the minion thing, and wish 5e would have brought that back (which I did, but would have been nice for a more official thing. Though I changed the HP to 4 instead of 1. They still die in 1 hit, though). The whole "role" thing like striker, leader, brute, artillery, etc just really put me off, and sounded like they were trying to capitalize on the MMORPG boom with the whole tank/dps/healer crap (not trying to call 4e an MMORPG, but the whole role thing screamed that to me). I do like the elite/solo strength monsters, and I assume the legendary and lair actions of some monsters is supposed to represent that in 5e? Again, I don't know much about 4e, so not sure.

Was 4e a bad edition? No, it objectively was not. It did seem to wane in popularity quite quickly, being officially supported for only 4 years (2008 until 2012 when Next playtest was announced, and I think they stopped making books about that time?). It was a bad edition for me, though. I feel that way about Pathfinder now, but that's only because of the actions of many players I had the misfortune of playing with that killed the system for me. 5e came at the exact perfect time for me.

 

[Hexmage-EN]

TBH, I'm not shocked about 4e's popularity in the poll. Everyone forgets that even back when 4e was a thing, every single poll showed that 4e was the most played (or if not the most played, certainly the equally played) RPG out there. The market with 4e was about 30 million (give or take) and without shrunk to about 12 million. 4e was still the gorilla in the room, just not the dominant one with Paizo bringing up a very close second and later in the edition, first rank. But, that wasn't so much due to Paizo continuing to grow but, rather, 4e just shrinking.

Even now, you look at online play and 4e and Pathfinder are pretty close in number of games played.

So, really, it shouldn't come as a shock to anyone that 4e is hovering around the 1/3 mark when you take 5e out of the equation. That's exactly where it was when it was the latest edition.

My question then is why did 4E only last four years, and why were so many of its innovations stripped from 5E? Did WotC put out content at an unsustainable pace, did they cave due to vocal 4E detractors, etc?

The Rick & Morty vs Dungeons & Dragons comic series even skipped talking about 4E, with Morty questioning why and Rick replying with "we don't talk about fourth edition". This after the comic criticized both 1E (too deadly) and 3E (wizards dominate).

 

[MockingBird]

I bought 4e when it launched. I talked my non gamer friends into giving it a go. I did my best but no one really dug it. I'm sure I was running it wrong. I was still in the mind frame of 2e and 3e. I never played mmo's so I didnt understand that roles where present. I just let people play what they wanted but it was so different from what I was use to. It's not a bad game by any means but it's not for me. I couldn't get into the whole powers thing. It just felt too cartoony to me. I gave it a fair shot I even picked up the Essentials line hoping it would have been simpler. 5e just hit all the right buttons. It was way easier to get new people into. It was easier to run in my opinion. I'd have to say 5e is my favorite edition followed up by 2e. I think 4e would have been successful if it would have been called something else like D&D tactics or something.