D&D General Folks Who Came Back With 5E: Did You Stay with 5E?

[Queer Venger]

What do you mean? If you buys something old as a pdf they cut out the parts they don't like? or is this a hypothetical?

I meant what I wrote!

 

[Longspeak]

With that out of the way: So you rediscovered D&D via 5E. My question is Did you then stay with 5E? Not necessarily exclusively, but just did 5E hold your interest? For how long?
If you left 5E, what did you leave it for? After how long? For what other game(s)?

Thanks.

I stopped playing D&D in 2e, about 30 years ago. Nothing drastic, I just found other games I enjoyed and spent years doing that. Shadowrun, Everway, TFT, Heroes Unlimited and Mage were the largest part, but I tried a LOT of others over the next 25 years.

In 2018, my daughter's then boyfriend invited my wife and I to play his D&D game for her birthday. This was a game both my daughter and son played. I was meh but joined in to celebrate my wife's birthday. Well the D&D I found was quite a change from my recollection of 2e. By no means perfect, but I've yet to find a game that is.

We ended up joining his series and played weekly. The campaign ended - actual conclusion - but it renewed my interest. in 2019 I returned to D&D as a DM. My games are just shy of their sixth anniversary.

 

[Hriston]

I played Holmes Basic and AD&D 1E in the early 80's. I continued playing a few non-D&D RPGs from the mid 80's to the late 90's (Villains and Vigilantes and MERP are the ones I remember by name), but by the end of the 20th century, I'd completely stopped RPGing for a while.

I wasn't drawn back to RPGing by 5E, but there was a certain coincidence with its release. What happened was that my son became old enough to become interested in an old copy of Fantasy Hero I had lying around. I had never played it, but he said he would like to, so I started thinking about how I could put together a game. I believe this was in late 2013. I still had my copy of MERP, and we started playing a game of that. It was about a group of orcs leaving Mordor, and I thought it would be fun to use B2 as part of the campaign. As I was doing some research online, I came across the D&D Next playtest version of The Caves of Chaos and learned about the public playtest. I pitched it to my son, and we made him a character like the one he wanted to play in Fantasy Hero, a wood elf rogue. I've been playing 5E ever since. You could say my son brought me back to RPGing which brought me back to B2 which introduced me to 5E which brought me back to D&D.

I'm not very interested in version 5.2, but would very much like to expand into playing OD&D, AD&D 1E, and B/X, as well as a few other games I have my eye on. I'm currently still playing version 5.0, which I consider the core books plus material published through January 2016 when the 5E SRD was released. I've allowed some options from XGtE into one of my games in the past but like to stick with 5.0 as long as the players are on board.

 

[zakael19]

I hadn’t played a TTRPG since 3.5 in high school (2002-2004ish). Came back to 5e in 2018, ran some games for the next few years, and got more and more distant from the painful combat system and dominant play culture. Really got into much more focused premise games with non-discreet mechanics (PBTAs etc along with exploring 4e and some other stuff) at the start of this year and have found games that make people “say interesting stuff” as Baker put it long ago.

 

[GM Lent]

I think I'm exactly who you're looking for; I started with 2e in 1994, played it obsessively (at one point running 3 campaigns and playing in 2-3 others). Switched to 3e and then 3.5 when they came out, though running only one game at a time (while occasionally playing in one or two others). I played other games too (I started my TTRPG experience with Earthdawn in 1993, fore example), but D&D has been my one true love since I first played. I also picked up the Rules Cyclopedia somewhere in the late 90s and loved it, but never actually used it at the time.

I stopped playing shortly before 4e came out, though that was mostly coincidence - I got married to someone who didn't even understand the concept, let alone the appeal, of RPGs. So I had a multi-year dry spell starting in 2007.

After my son was born in 2013, I played in the local Pathfinder Adventurer's League a few times, but I never really got into it and dropped it like a hot potato when the D&D Next playtests started.

I loved what I saw in the playtests, and I was one of the first in line to pick up the 5e Player's Handbook at my FLGS when it came out. I played in the local Adventurer's League mostly to vet players to poach for my own game, and ran (or occasionally played) 5e at least monthly, though generally weekly, for the next several years. And while I enjoyed running 5e, it never quite grabbed me as a player; in time I realized that I really, REALLY dislike the subclass system, especially as it applies to wizards. I actually started writing my own game, based on the old Rules Cyclopedia, when I stumbled across the Dungeon Crawl Classics Core Rulebook in mid 2017.

Simply put, DCC is everything I love in TTRPGs, from the game itself to the people who make it to the amazing community that has built up around it.

So yes, 5e brought me back into D&D (and RPGs in general) when it came out, and even helped kick off my longtime dream of being a game designer/publisher, but I do not play it anymore.

 

[greymist]

Yes.

I started in 1978, probably one of the Basic games, I don’t recall as I didn’t own any of the books or even the dice. Quickly moved into AD&D and mostly stuck with the 1E core rules for man years, adding in bits and bobs from 2E. Sometime in the 90's I stopped playing as the group drifted apart due to real life.

My first comeback was with 3E. One guy from the old group met some younger guys who had started playing 3E and I guess t recruited. Played 3E for a few years, but once again the group fell apart due to kids and marriages and the like.

Around 2018, give or take a year, I went to a wargaming meetup to play in a 1E game. That didn't last, but a couple of months later I tried 5E. That game lasted awhile before folding, but it led to any ther group which lasted a bit longer and hooked me on the rule set. I started DM'g a game just as COVID struck and we took it virtual. The core of that group is still playing regularly.

I plan on running my house-ruled 2014 games as long as I have people who will play. And, thanks to COVID, I started playing in some PBP games which is where I get to play old-school rules. I'm currently playing 1E and Labyrinth Lord in addition to some 5E.

 

[Belen]

Most of the players at one of my tables go back to AD&D but really got deep into D&D in the 2E era. They love 5E (2014) because it reminds them of "2E with better math," and they are sticking with it. They don't even seem interested in the 2024 version.

This is what brought me back. I had moved to Cypher after quitting during 4e.

 

[Belen]

For more info, I quit D&D for PF1 when 4e arrived. I stopped gaming entirely after my son was born and we moved to a new region soon after.

I did not game at all for 4 years and when I returned, it was an online Cypher The Strange game.

5e brought me back to D&D because it felt more like 2e and they had dropped so much of the crunch that burned me out as a DM.

I am sticking with 5.0 because they started back down the crunch train and 2024 is not the type of revision I wanted to see.

 

[Emerikol]

For more info, I quit D&D for PF1 when 4e arrived. I stopped gaming entirely after my son was born and we moved to a new region soon after.

I did not game at all for 4 years and when I returned, it was an online Cypher The Strange game.

5e brought me back to D&D because it felt more like 2e and they had dropped so much of the crunch that burned me out as a DM.

I am sticking with 5.0 because they started back down the crunch train and 2024 is not the type of revision I wanted to see.

I do think there is a tension between those wanting crunch and those exhausted by it. If I design a game, this would be a major focus of mine.

 

[Reynard]

I do think there is a tension between those wanting crunch and those exhausted by it. If I design a game, this would be a major focus of mine.

Peoples' capacity or desire for crunch also changes over time, depending on things like life circumstances and simple aging. That can mean a game that was perfect for you for 10 years can suddenly be untenable.