Grognard good...grognard bad

[Umbran]

At the moment, this thread seems to be going nowhere mighty fast. It seems to have devolved from discussion to bickering.

So, let's make it simple - the bickering is going to stop now. We'd prefer it would stop by your collective exertion of common sense, politeness, and good taste.

 

[The Shaman]

I got back into gaming after a thirteen-year hiatus with 3.0 D&D, which I played for a few years. I'm not a big fantasy fan, however, and I quickly gravitated to d20 Modern when it came out. I played Mutants and Masterminds, some Sidewinder: Recoiled, some d20 CoC, a little Grim Tales.

One day I got to thinking about the 1001 Characters supplement for Traveller (the "classic" tag is superfluous). I discovered the FFE reprints and picked them up, and after flipping through those pages I hadn't seen in almost twenty years, I realized how much I still liked the system. I put together a Traveller one-shot, which lead to a (regrettably short) campaign.

When Mongoose announced it acquired the Traveller license, I was cautiously optimistic: a new edition which coincided with the release of a couple of new lines of Traveller minis plus the ongoing support from BITS made for a Traveller renaissance which sounded pretty good.

I didn't really pay much attention to the playtests, though there was a dice mechanic which didn't really appeal to me, but I picked up the 'goose Trav' core rules a couple of months after they were released. I was disappointed with quite a bit of it; it seemed like they'd taken most of the variant rules published for Traveller in the Eighties, in the run-up to MegaTraveller, and made them core, frex armor-as-DR and unified skill mechanics. The new combat system missed both the simplicity of the LBB system and the tactical complexity of Snapshot.

My disappointment was even worse with 760 Patrons: it wasn't a book of patron encounters at all, but rather a book of random encounters, some of which might involve patronage but most of which do not. The book didn't provide what I wanted from a book of patron encounters for Traveller.

Here's the thing: I didn't dislike 'goose Trav' because it was new, or because it represented a change. I don't like it because I don't like it. The final product gives me less of what I want than the original. It incorporates rules I didn't like for Traveller twenty years ago, and rules I don't like for any roleplaying game now.

That doesn't make it a bad game; it simply makes it a game I don't care for.

The problem is, when I say that I prefer Traveller to 'goose Trav', I immediately get 'grognard' thrown in my face as an epithet. It doesn't seem to matter that I have what I think are informed reasons based on experience for preferring the older edition to the newer one. No, as some posters have done in this thread, it's enough for me to say that I don't care for the newest edition to be insulted for what I prefer, by taking a word which long had at worst neutral, usually favorable connotations - I'm an actual gaming grognard, getting my start with tabletop miniatures wargames back in the mid-Seventies, years before I ever heard of D&D.

So I say to all of you who want to make grognard an insult: you can't have that word. It doesn't mean what you think it does, and it won't mean what you want it to, no matter how hard you work to make it so.

And for the record, I have no opinion on 4e. Never played it, never even cracked open one of the books, and not because it's new, not because it's different, but because I don't like fantasy roleplaying games nearly so much as I do other genres. If there's a 4e-based modern system, I'll give it a look, and if it knocks my socks off I'll play it happily. But if it doesn't, I have plenty of older games which I still enjoy, and if you feel the need to insult me over that choice, well, that's your problem, not mine.

 

[Ranes]

The problem is, when I say that I prefer Traveller to 'goose Trav', I immediately get 'grognard' thrown in my face as an epithet. It doesn't seem to matter that I have what I think are informed reasons based on experience for preferring the older edition to the newer one. No, as some posters have done in this thread, it's enough for me to say that I don't care for the newest edition to be insulted for what I prefer...

I had the same problem with Trav. I've bought numerous editions over the years but found none as satisfying as the original. I checked out the Mong version and found it wanting, for reasons similar to your own. The thing is, I'd been telling some of the younger members of our D&D group about Traveller and they were keen to play it. When Mong edition appeared, some of them snapped it up. They didn't have anything (Traveller-wise) to compare it to and were mostly accepting of it. I had to bite my tongue so many times so as not to spoil others' enjoyment. After every game, I'd be asked how it compared to the original. I was almost relieved when the ref moved away and wound up the game.

I wish I still had my little black books.

 

[Imaro]

Except "your" opinion is not relevent to that group though and should be dismissed, henced avoiding conflict and/or "feeding the trolls". Trying to impress one's opinion on that group is what some say is the mark of a grognard. Yes, one's negative, irrelevant opinion (forcibly) interjected in to a discussion about the positive aspects of the topic at hand is the heart of grognardia. (regardless of the topic at-hand)

What are you talking about? I'm talking about the way opinions are mischaracterized so that they can be more easily dismissed as "nonsense" when in fact it is the very reasoning behind this dismissal that is "nonsense".

You however are creating some hypothetical situation which I in no way commented on, full of assumptions that I haven't stated... so have fun with that imaginary situation (When was it established that this only happened in "positive" threads... and if you don't want to hear the negative and positive, well why are you posting something in a discussion forum?) and the "nonsense" it allows one to use as justification for closed-mindedness (is that a word?? ). As far as "the heart of grognardia" goes... so now I'm a grognard (or a troll) if I don't drink the kool-aid that 4e is the do-any-and-everything, one true perfect game? Sometimes I think alot of my negativity towards 4e is related to some of it's fans as opposed to the game itself.

 

[Herschel]

There you go trying to be offended. And you turn around using incendiary terms like "drinking the kool-aid" saying that people who like 4E are mindless sheep. My comment wasn't directed at you, if you read it properly, but apparently if the shoe fits....

And no, your opinion doesn't matter for 4E to anyone who likes it, nor does my or anyone's opinion of 3E matter to those who like it. It works for any game, any platform.

 

[Umbran]

Apparently, my previous warning was somehow unclear.

Stop bickering. Stop getting personal.

That should be clear. No? Well, let me give you some inducement to understanding: One person has already gotten booted from the thread. Next person who continues with argument gets a vacation from the site.

Consider your words carefully before you hit submit.

 

[Silverblade The Ench]

sigh, sorry, wasn't my intent to start a war :/

 

[Diamond Cross]

Well, just keep in mind, being right is serious business. That is always what starts a war.


Mod edit: And failing to let it go is what makes the war continue. So, everyone, do your part, and let it go.

 

[pemerton]

I think it's pretty reasonable to sort things into classes -- including "stinks to me just from reading a precis" -- without undertaking the unrealistic task of playing them all.

Agreed.

Where I have seen quite prominently an insistence on plain chronological superiority is among those fixated on the notion of "progress" in RPG design, confusing changes in fashion with objective improvement. Those who are familiar with the early scene, that of the 1970s-80s, are accustomed to there being a wide variety of things at once, different things for different tastes -- including the taste for one kind of thing on one occasion and another kind on another day.

I agree that chronology is not a measure of superiority. At least in my opinion, Rolemaster is in many respects - though not all - a better game than HARP, although 20 years or so older. Runequest is just a good game full stop, though older than RM. And I prefer 1st to 2nd ed AD&D.

On the other hand, I think that modern designers have access to a wider range of techniques to apply to their games. Interestingly, applying some of these techniques can help diagnose the failure of chronology to equate to progress - for example, the more sophisticated vocabulary for analysing the game/metagame relationship helps reveal some of the problems with HARP compared to RM.

Speaking of resisting change....I very much doubt that those mean old grognards who are resisting change would have said "Boo" about 4e had it been named "Wizard of the Coast's Fantasy Game" instead of "Dungeons & Dragons".

<snip>

So why not fully embrace change, and change the name of the game? Solves everyone's problems, right? Right?

I'm quite happy that WotC kept the name "D&D" for their flagship game, because it helps make the game a financial success, and hence supported with new mechanical and flavour elements, in a way that a different name would probably not have.

I think the "is it still D&D, though?" question is hard to answer because D&D is used by different people to refer to so many different things: mechanics, overall flavour of the game, lists of monsters or treasures or spells, etc.

For many years I GMed Rolemaster and not D&D, and yet the vast majority of threads about D&D play on this website that are not concerned with the minutiae of character building or action resolution mechanics are applicable to my experience with Rolemaster. In that sense, 4e is not a different game, because neither is Rolemaster. Experiences with one edition can be meaningfully compared to experiences with the others.

On the other hand, I regard it as obvious that playing 4e to its strengths will produce a game different from 3E played to its strengths. Whether it will be different from a game of AD&D 1st ed or T&T played to its strengths I think is a bit harder to answer, because the strengths of AD&D and T&T are (in my view) less intimately connected to the minutiae of their character build and action resolution mechanics. In that sense, at least, I think they could be meaningfully described as "rules light". 4e is not rules light in the same way - its mechanical minutiae seem to me to push in the direction of a particular sort of gaming experience.

ideas on how to deal with the problem http://www.therpgsite.com/showpost.php?p=167673&postcount=1

I think this is going beyond a claim that "I don't like 4e" and more into "4e - like comparable 'modern'/'indie' RPGs - is a damaging cultural influence".

I've got no general objection to diagnosing damaging cultural influences. Personally, I wouldn't be starting with RPGs, which have a pretty minimal influence on the culture, and which, given this minimal influence, I suspect tend to follow rather than lead broader trends. And there's always a risk of causing offence when you diagnose a damaging cultural influence, as such a diagnosis does tend to have implications for the moral calibre of those who participate in, promote and/or enjoy the culural artefact in question. Also, there's the risk of simply appearing to be a reactionary.

Whether "grognard" should be considered a synonym for "RPG reactionary" I'm not sure of. I always thought that "grognard" had at least an ironic hint to it, especially when embraced by those it labels, which is at odds with being genuinely reactionary.

 

[Ariosto]

The issue at hand is "grognard = bad". It is not really concerned with "old and new games". It is concerned with 'editions' of one particular game.

The insulters, as far as I have seen, do not care how much fun a 'grognard' has playing Small World or Lost Cities, The Stars Are Right or The Isle of Doctor Necreaux, The Campaigns of King David or Unhappy King Charles!, Field of Glory or Lasalle.

That delight in a new game counts for nothing. Neither does the insulters' dismissal of "old" games just because they were published prior to some date, or are out of print, or are not marketed as widely as (e.g.) WotC-D&D.