The people who think that their way to pretend to be a make-believe gumdrop elf needs to be imposed on all of everyone or they won't play it are people that, IMO, the hobby can afford to lose. Those folks are better off making a hobby of getting some frickin' perspective on life and checking their irrational need for authority and self-validation at the door.
I agree with you...to me, if it's got the four iconic classes, levels, hp, spells, magic, dungeons, monsters, exploration, RP and combat...I can probably have fun playing it. I'll play it RAW until I understand it, then I'll suggest changes to my group to make it suit our needs and play style.
However...the people who feel strongest about this stuff are also the people who are most likely to spend time and money and evangelize the hobby.
I coach youth ice hockey. I've played since I was 6. For those of you who don't play hockey (or a sport) what makes more sense to you for introducing small children to the sport:
1) play on a small portion of the ice rink with a small group at your home town rink where kids are on the ice and actively playing/touching the puck A LOT, spending no more than 20 minutes in the car for an hour or more on the ice actively playing and each "game" costing about $5-10 per kid
OR
2) Spend 3-5 hours in the car to play on full ice with 12-15 players per team so each kid only gets about 15 minutes on the ice per game and each game costing $20-$30 per kid (plus gas and food for trips to far away places).
To me, the first option makes the most sense. It's semi-organized pond hockey (which is what I played growing up) and the equivalent of sandlot baseball or back yard football. Kids get good at the basic skills by doing them over and over while having fun doing it. Unfortunately ice hockey is run and funded by volunteer parents. The most dedicated die hard parents (the ones who will volunteer) WANT to travel 3-5 ours so their little ones can play "real" hockey...They don't want little Johnny playing with losers who can barely skate...the think that in order to get good, their 7 year old must play with other "NHL/NCAA bound" 7 year olds. (it doesn't occur to them that their little one has a better chance of becoming a doctor or lawyer than to play even a single game in the NHL) so anytime someone tries to organize something sensible, those parents take their ball (or puck) and go elsewhere, leaving no one to volunteer to run the local program (seriously...we have local families that drive 2 hours away on school nights just for practice).
D&D is like that. The designers have to make a core game that keeps the die-hards happy because it is the die-hards that will recruit newbies into the game. But they have to make a game that newbies will find fun as well and that means keeping it exciting and simple which die hards (many) immediately reject because it doesn't validate their version of how the game should work.
Not all die-hards, obviously. But to me, as soon as someone says they can't have fun playing this game because XYZ, my eyes roll...I've never encountered a game system that I left intact for long...I play it RAW until I feel like I understand it, then I mod it to suit my tastes (and the tastes of who I play it with). RPGs, table top war games...hell, we modified Monopoly!
As for HP...HP are abstract. If you like to pretend it's a physical hit that does phyiscal damage, knock yourself out. I like to make it whatever makes sense at a given moment...that's why it's abstract. If you want slow healing, then by all means...spend days, weeks doing RP stuff. My group doesn't meet very often...we're a beer and pretzels group...we want to get to the dungeon crawl and fight the BBEG. As long as I can do that with DDN, I'll probably play it.
