D&D 4E How is the 4e announcement affecting your game groups?

[Bluenose]

My group has three people who couldn't care less what we play, as long as they ave fun doing it - though they have different ideas about what things are fun. They are all willing to buy at least a PHB and give the game a try, though if they don't like it then we might well end up playing some of the other games we've got.

We have one player who is reluctant to change because he's mean with money. If the SRD was available online then he'd use that rather than spend money - the only reason he has a PHB is because we gave him one for Xmas one year.

We have one player who loves FR, and is actually looking forward to the changes to the setting. Since he also DMs our FR games if we play in FR then we'll play 4th Edition.

One player wants to play 4th edition as soon as possible. She really likes the SWSE edition rules, and most of the things that have appeared in the previews. Since she DMs games in a homebrew setting, she isn't worried at all about the flavour changes.

I also DM games in the same homebrew setting. I want to see the rules in action before making a final decision on switching permanently, but I'm hopeful about many aspects of them.

 

[Steely Dan]

Some of these look like good options for the D&D 3+ edition minicampaigns we will be using between the end of our regular campaigns and the publication of 4e. I may try them out as well.

Right on, I hope they work out as well for you as they have for us.

 

[Robert Ranting]

4e has made interacting with my gaming group a chore. Most of the people I know either don't seem to care at all, exhibit a knee-jerk negative reaction to having to spend money on new books, or else are so uncharacteristically taciturn and evasive that I can only assume that the lucky [censored]s have signed an NDA and are playtesting it. Of the twenty or more people I count among my face-to-face gaming groups, no one seems to want to talk about 4e. There's nothing like broaching a topic of conversation only to be met with grumblings, blank stares, and attempts to change the subject to make you feel like you've committed some terrible social faux pas.

It has gotten so bad that I even tried to open up a dialogue with a person who I haven't had friendly relations with in almost a year, just because I had seen him posting some enthusiastic things about 4e in one of the forums we both visit. Due to personal issues, this went downhill fast, and I'm back to having no one to discuss 4e with.

And honestly, I'm not even pro- or anti-4e myself. I genuinely think that D20 needs to evolve and change in order to continue, but I have my doubts about WotC's direction and certain members of their staff have tastes in gaming (whether in RP, storytelling, mechanics, or metagame theory) which don't jive with what I want out of my play experience.

Until the rules are out for everyone to see and use, I feel like 4e is the proverbial large animal in the room which no one wants to talk about, and yet it seems impossible for anyone not to be aware of...

Meanwhile, my 3.5 and AE games continue apace...

Robert "At Least There Is The Internet" Ranting

 

[Sammael]

You know, this is a trend I've noticed myself. Mostly, people simply don't want to talk about 4E - either they are annoyed by it, or ambivalent. I am practically the only person I know who's constantly keeping up with the 4E updates, even though I dislike most of its non-rule elements (and I positively loathe The New Realms).

WotC won't be getting much money from my circle of gamers - I will continue purchasing the minis (but I'd really like them to up the currently mediocre paint quality to the level of GoL and Angelfire), and I'll buy the 4E core books (heavily discounted from Amazon or my FLGS), but I've sworn off buying 4E FR. The rest of my friends have shown exactly zero interest in buying anything 4E, and a few have stopped buying miniatures as well.