D&D General How has D&D changed over the decades?

[billd91]

Here I have to agree. I grew up with the much tougher, more adversarial version (1e in the 80s) and in my heart still tend to favor that style of D&D, but I just went with the flow of what everyone else seemed to want when I got back into the game, right? And in all that time, not once have I said to myself, "This sucks--we need more character deaths and sobbing players." No. No, we don't.

But how else will I get the Bitter Tears of the Players that I thrive on? They're SO delicious!

 

[AnotherGuy]

The debate only exists as long as the illusion that each side plays on the extremes. We dare not risk advocating the grey, what will then become of hyperbolic wit. It is like that for many a discussion. We are all guilty.

Perhaps a poll is in order.
How many characters deaths does a killer DM make? or What frequency of character turnover is necessary for that title?

 

[tetrasodium]

Goodness gracious. Of course we don't know if you're running something specific as a DM because this is a discussion that involved hypotheticals. If we were actually in your game you would have already told us about what you were intending to run. So it's really unfair to react to someone posting about a hypothetical as if a real-world situation wouldn't have more context to inform it.

And if the players lose interest in what you have to say about the game world, maybe it's because it's not an interesting game world. Why do you assume it must be a problem with the players? If every player at your table has no interest in your game world, that sounds like your game world just isn't interesting to them. Maybe try another game world.

You are missing a few important details regarding how the discussion started and what was being discussed when his Thorin example came up. To be blunt, at no point has it ever been about vetting REMATHALIS'S character or hashing it out into an acceptable form for my games. Not even the post where I was explaining problems with the character was about hashing out REMATHALIS'S character. I can see how you'd be mistaken in assuming otherwise given how in 1213 REMATHALIS seems to be lamenting that nobody is making an attempt to hash out a workable character with a hostile player in a thread about how d&d has changed over the decades. If you go back to 1091 you can see that the discussion going on when REMATHALIS quoted it &asked about thorin in 1092 the discussion was about tools that GMs used to be able to rely on to stroke the lizard brain to incentivize cooperation & interest from players.

You would think that simply saying "this is an $specificSetting game" is all a GM would need to say to ensure that there is at least some shred of an attempt at ensuring characters & their backstories fit that particular setting & any mistakes there could be easily corrected with statements along the lines of

Spoiler: these

• " I tend to use dragons more like eberron's dragons & this conflicts."
• "Most of my games take place in eberron, this is kind of an FRism, it's not going to be goblin tribes because they have real problems."
• "There may have been a keep razed by someone during the last war, but it's going to be someone thatmakes narrative sense given the location"
• " It would probably be a good idea to regularly be on the lookout for ways you could proactively say things like "this group of karrnathi bandits seems to have some military ties from what it sounds like, is it possible they were related to the soldiers who seized my ancestral keep?" & "hey bossnpc/patron who hired us, do you have any dealings near my ancestral keep that need attention from folks like us?"

Except that was not the case where simply saying X is the setting is enough. The very idea that a GM might engage in that sort of shaping over a character's backstory was so heretical that there were vows of being a murderhobo who cares nothing for the world. I mentioned earlier that I've seen people bring up thorin & other Tolkein inspired dwarves for my eberron games many times over the years, the reaction is rarely one of mea culpa & a good faith effort to learn about the setting or reshape their initial plans in a way that fits acceptably. Typically the reaction is to dig in & disruptively make efforts to shovel it onto newer more conflict averse players.*

* I've literally seen one of these players jump in after I explained something about the place of giants in eberron's ancient history & the much more recent dwarven arrivals to some other player who was not them with "no that's not right, the dwarves were the first race & then giants came along & got language from them so the giant language uses dwarven runes not draconic ones" in a jaw dropping example of how deeply entrenched the mindset of players who demand total control over the worldbuilding they do with their "backstory" often seems to be.

edit: Just because @Ovinomancer was unsure if @Ovinomancer did things he didn't do REMATHALIS is substituted in place of pronouns

 

[jasper]

I'm no longer going to debate this point by point because I no longer feel there is any attempt to find consensus. Enjoy knocking down your strawmen about those wicked players who don't appreciate your genius. I spent years playing under a DM whose game philosophy bordered on gaslighting because he was my friend, and I have no desire to ever be subject to the tyranny of God-King DMs enthralled with their own greatness again.

Have fun screaming into the void.

To find a consensus you need to add.
I have no desire to experience the tyranny of God-King players enthralled with their own greatness again. I finally got rid of the toxic player in public matter. The rest of the players started either going along with my GM desires, gave me honest feedback. I took some feedback and ignored the others.
No gaming is better than bad gaming.

 

[Vaalingrade]

The loss occurs when the above options (which are highly sought out) are not included in the core books and one has to look further to get such options. The ones who don't want it have an entire edition which suits their playstyle, I'm not worried about them.

But... you just admitted you have the whole other edition to get what you want too. Why should you get priority in the core if your way isn't the majority of players?

I like steampunk, and high magic and martial characters and character options and I didn't get that in core either. But I'm not trying to slap the core out of other people's hands. Yet.

 

[Ovinomancer]

You are missing a few important details regarding how the discussion started and what was being discussed when his Thorin example came up. To be blunt, at no point has it ever been about vetting his character or hashing it out into an acceptable form for my games. Not even the post where I was explaining problems with the character was about hashing out his character. I can see how you'd be mistaken in assuming otherwise given how in 1213 he seems to be lamenting that nobody is making an attempt to hash out a workable character with a hostile player in a thread about how d&d has changed over the decades. If you go back to 1091 you can see that the discussion going on when he quoted it &asked about thorin in 1092 the discussion was about tools that GMs used to be able to rely on to stroke the lizard brain to incentivize cooperation & interest from players.

You would think that simply saying "this is an $specificSetting game" is all a GM would need to say to ensure that there is at least some shred of an attempt at ensuring characters & their backstories fit that particular setting & any mistakes there could be easily corrected with statements along the lines of

Spoiler: these

• " I tend to use dragons more like eberron's dragons & this conflicts."
• "Most of my games take place in eberron, this is kind of an FRism, it's not going to be goblin tribes because they have real problems."
• "There may have been a keep razed by someone during the last war, but it's going to be someone thatmakes narrative sense given the location"
• " It would probably be a good idea to regularly be on the lookout for ways you could proactively say things like "this group of karrnathi bandits seems to have some military ties from what it sounds like, is it possible they were related to the soldiers who seized my ancestral keep?" & "hey bossnpc/patron who hired us, do you have any dealings near my ancestral keep that need attention from folks like us?"

Except that was not the case where simply saying X is the setting is enough. The very idea that a GM might engage in that sort of shaping over a character's backstory was so heretical that there were vows of being a murderhobo who cares nothing for the world. I mentioned earlier that I've seen people bring up thorin & other Tolkein inspired dwarves for my eberron games many times over the years, the reaction is rarely one of mea culpa & a good faith effort to learn about the setting or reshape their initial plans in a way that fits acceptably. Typically the reaction is to dig in & disruptively make efforts to shovel it onto newer more conflict averse players.*

* I've literally seen one of these players jump in after I explained something about the place of giants in eberron's ancient history & the much more recent dwarven arrivals to some other player who was not them with "no that's not right, the dwarves were the first race & then giants came along & got language from them so the giant language uses dwarven runes not the other way around" in a jaw dropping example of how deeply entrenched the mindset of players who demand total control over the worldbuilding they do with their "backstory" often seems to be.

Your pronouns are lost little things, missing any trace of their antecedents. You use "he" three times back to back in that first para, each time referring to a different person (best I can tell). People have names, man!

 

[tetrasodium]

Here I have to agree. I grew up with the much tougher, more adversarial version (1e in the 80s) and in my heart still tend to favor that style of D&D, but I just went with the flow of what everyone else seemed to want when I got back into the game, right? And in all that time, not once have I said to myself, "This sucks--we need more character deaths and sobbing players." No. No, we don't.

I like the dangerous, on-the-edge style of play and will never be sad to participate in it, but I also totally understand why so many other players prefer adventures in which survival is, at least, not unlikely. I even agree with them that it has numerous advantages and in no way reduces our fun. I never would've reached this conclusion, though, had I been unwilling to give others' play style a chance.

I started with ad&d 2e & I don't think that anyone has said that there was not some middle ground between the oldest editions & today when it comes to things like lethality & how much players need magic items vrs character/class based abilities. It's more that the pendulum has swung so far to such an extreme that the lethality is so low that players often don't even consider it a possibility on the table & there is such a low need for magic items that the GM can't really use them as incentives or power shifting at all

 

[AnotherGuy]

But... you just admitted you have the whole other edition to get what you want too.

You mean previous editions? So you relegating people who enjoy a harder core to previous editions?

Why should you get priority in the core if your way isn't the majority of players?

That is an assumption on your part.

I like steampunk, and high magic and martial characters and character options and I didn't get that in core either. But I'm not trying to slap the core out of other people's hands. Yet.

Which version of D&D was steampunk that we suddenly now lost it with 5e?

 

[Thomas Shey]

That is an assumption on your part.

The alternative is to assume WOTC doesn't know their own market and just change things for the hell of it.

 

[LongTimeLurker]

it's gotten waaaaay easier. You used to be able to take pride in having a character hit 3rd or 5th or 10th level. Now, not so much. Also, the language of the game has been dumbed down. I needed to read the 1E DMG with a dictionary next to me and even then, you couldn't find some of the words (dweomer anyone?). Now, well you've read the 5E DMG I'm sure...