FLGS and DnD?

[Morrus]

Very odd for that to come from a Mod. All my ENWorld views (on work PC, home PC, Mac laptop and iMac) all appear with a black background and white text, so the light blue shows quite well. But here you go:

There are many ways to access EN World. Not only different styles selectable on-site (presumably you have it on "black") but mobile and Facebook apps, Tapatalk, and so on.

In general it's best to stick to the default text colours which change automagically with style; when you force a specific text colour, you never know what colour background had reader might be seeing it in.

A lesson I learned the hard way when I spent a few weeks a few years ago posting news in a colour that many people couldn't read. Unfortunately for me, it took three weeks before anyone actually told me!

 

[Shemeska]

The whole "But it's not D&D" warcry has seemed to have died an ignominious death some time ago. At least, it's not one I see on En World very often. Still see lots of people who don't like 4e, and that's groovy. No worries there.

The statement has largely gone away yes, (which is good for the community) but perhaps not the sentiment. It's just that with thriving alternatives on the market, and a sense that with their success, 4e isn't a threat to those playstyles it doesn't emphasize, there's no need to rage against 4e and its tropes to the same extent.

Which is worse? To be villified or to be ignored?

 

[TheAuldGrump]

The statement has largely gone away yes, (which is good for the community) but perhaps not the sentiment. It's just that with thriving alternatives on the market, and a sense that with their success, 4e isn't a threat to those playstyles it doesn't emphasize, there's no need to rage against 4e and its tropes to the same extent.

Which is worse? To be vilified or to be ignored?

I'm sorry, did you say something? I wasn't paying attention.

I said much the same - there is less incentive to be combative.

The Auld Grump

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

I think a lot of that 'but it's not D&D' died away when Pathfinder proved popular - the kind of game that is D&D (to me) is flourishing, it just changed it's name and moved to another city.

And then there's people like me & my group. At @12 gamers strong, we play a variety of boardgames and RPGs. Only one guy in the group has less than 10 years of D&D under his belt, most have over 20, and I'm the wheezing geezer at 34 years in the hobby. Most RPG campaigns feature 40-60% of the group; none has full participation.

For a lot of us, 4Ed doesn't feel like D&D...and yet we still enjoy it as a FRPG. For others, they won't touch 4Ed at all.

But the oddity- relative to ENWorlders and according to sales figures- is that of all the gamers in the group, I remain the sole purchaser of any of the 3.X games. Nobody is interested in shelling out $$$ for D&D's cousins save myself.

Personally, I think the 3.X games have a lot to offer...but everyone else is content with 3.5Ed as-is. To a goodly number of them, D&D is out of print, completely. To others, 3.X offers not enough difference to be worth an investment in time and effort.

 

[TheAuldGrump]

And then there's people like me & my group. At @12 gamers strong, we play a variety of boardgames and RPGs. Only one guy in the group has less than 10 years of D&D under his belt, most have over 20, and I'm the wheezing geezer at 34 years in the hobby. Most RPG campaigns feature 40-60% of the group; none has full participation.

For a lot of us, 4Ed doesn't feel like D&D...and yet we still enjoy it as a FRPG. For others, they won't touch 4Ed at all.

But the oddity- relative to ENWorlders and according to sales figures- is that of all the gamers in the group, I remain the sole purchaser of any of the 3.X games. Nobody is interested in shelling out $$$ for D&D's cousins save myself.

Personally, I think the 3.X games have a lot to offer...but everyone else is content with 3.5Ed as-is. To a goodly number of them, D&D is out of print, completely. To others, 3.X offers not enough difference to be worth an investment in time and effort.

I think that WotC could have prevented a lot of ill will by marketing 4e as a separate game, while continuing with the 3.X architecture. Call it D&D Essentials to tie it in with the older property, and market the new game as an adjunct or alternative. The market might still have split, but WotC would have controlled both sides of the divide.

The Auld Grump

 

[Shin Okada]

I think that WotC could have prevented a lot of ill will by marketing 4e as a separate game, while continuing with the 3.X architecture. Call it D&D Essentials to tie it in with the older property, and market the new game as an adjunct or alternative. The market might still have split, but WotC would have controlled both sides of the divide.

The Auld Grump

Could have been an option. But I doubt it was actually practical. When WotC changed to 4e, they have already released so many supplements and were running out of new things to release. Unless, say, they have released something like 3.75e, they could not wrote more supplements which sells well, IMHO.




Personally, I both love and hate 3.Xe. While it is a good game, playing 13+ level games are too complex. During those 10 or so of years, I have actually ran several campaigns which started at L1-4 and reached to the higher levels. One of them actually reached to L21+. They were fun, I say. But if you ask me, I don't want to do it again.

And I do love 4e. Yes, the game has new problems of it's own. And it lost something 3.5e had. But 4e is still a good game and, for me, frankly speaking, MORE D&Dish. Because, my first D&D was BECM D&D and not AD&D.

Regarding Pathfinder, well... I am ignoring it completely. It is too similar to 3.5e and seems not having much improvements. On the other hand, Pathfinder is too different from 3.5e that they cannot be mixed easily. And actually, I strongly dislike some of the changes made in Pathfinder.

When I want to play a 3.Xe style game, my 3.5e books serve me well. I don't want to buy new bunch of books again, just to play something slightly different from 3.5e but not a true improvement.

 

[ShinHakkaider]

On the other hand, Pathfinder is too different from 3.5e that they cannot be mixed easily.

Yeah, everything else that you said I was fine with up until this statement.

I've been running Pathfinder since it's release. The AP I'm running now is actually an 3.5 AP (Curse of the Crimson Throne). I'm using resources from 3.5 pretty much with little modification with my game and have been for the past few years. So the whole "cannot be mixed easily" thing? Hasn't been my experience at all.

 

[billd91]

Yeah, everything else that you said I was fine with up until this statement.

I've been running Pathfinder since it's release. The AP I'm running now is actually an 3.5 AP (Curse of the Crimson Throne). I'm using resources from 3.5 pretty much with little modification with my game and have been for the past few years. So the whole "cannot be mixed easily" thing? Hasn't been my experience at all.

That is my experience as well. I too am running CotCT (albeit slowly because it's play by post) and I've run a couple of modules. I'm even integrating some PF stuff with a 3.5 campaign I'm still running on occasion. I've had absolutely no problem integrating the two easily.

 

[Rechan]

Aren't PF characters more powerful than 3.5 characters? By that I mean a 4th level barbarian in both systems, the stronger is the PF one? And if this is true, it would mean the challenges in a 3.5 module would be weaker for a PF group.

 

[billd91]

Aren't PF characters more powerful than 3.5 characters? By that I mean a 4th level barbarian in both systems, the stronger is the PF one? And if this is true, it would mean the challenges in a 3.5 module would be weaker for a PF group.

The difference isn't particularly large. It's little different than modifying adventures for a more optimized party than the original expected iconic 4.