I can't help but wonder--how many AD&D 1e players ARE there out there?

[grodog]

I've joined a game group that is doing Age of Worms, but I find myself more often getting familiar with 3.5 by on-line gaming in Neverwinter Nights.

AoW has some serious Greyhawk goodness in it, it's a great campaign

I will confess it was hard to un-learn the way I think about AC, THAC0, & the like, and adopt the incredible flexibility of races/classes/alignments now.

That's because the paradigm of 3.x differs from Basic/etc., AD&D, or 2nd edition (which have nuanced differences among themselves as well, of course), but that's really a topic for another thread.

Does anyone else have some decent sales/demographic/etc. info to estimate the size of the AD&D-buying audience?

 

[diaglo]

The answer is always 42.

quoted for troof

 

[Ghendar]

I know of no 1st AD&D or Basic D&D groups here in Connecticut, but I'm looking.

 

[tx7321]

As a recent convert from 3E to C&C, I'm starting to look harder at AD&D1 (I've been reading many of the old threads at DF about AD&D and how its played). I'm going to attempt to get my group of 7 to make the switch from C&C to AD&D1 (which is basically the same except no SIEGE and the use of tables). I'll probably end up at D&D by Spring 07 at this rate. I wonder what impact 4E will have on the OOP market. Will it boost interest, lower it, or will it stay the same? :\

Oh, my estimate of people playing AD&D1 world wide is 100,000. Thats based on the number of books floating around and the size of the US population and Western Europe, Canada etc. Only 1 in 50 post however. Infact, not all 3E players actively post online (perhaps the same ratio exists for AD&D1...dunno).

 

[ghul]

As a recent convert from 3E to C&C, I'm starting to look harder at AD&D1 (I've been reading many of the old threads at DF about AD&D and how its played). I'm going to attempt to get my group of 7 to make the switch from C&C to AD&D1 (which is basically the same except no SIEGE and the use of tables). I'll probably end up at D&D by Spring 07 at this rate. I wonder what impact 4E will have on the OOP market. Will it boost interest, lower it, or will it stay the same? :\ .

Or you can do what I've done: blend the two together. I run a C&C AD&D 1e hybrid. They're lovely together, like Brad and Angelina. No, I didn't just say that...

--Ghul

 

[dcas]

Goes well with my theory that AD&D is masculine and C&C is, well, not.

 

[Son_of_Thunder]

I'm one.

I play 1e and 2e. My 1e game is Dragonlance and 2e game is Greyhawk.

 

[silver_wizard]

I wonder what impact 4E will have on the OOP market. Will it boost interest, lower it, or will it stay the same?

It seems to me that people who prefer OOP now will continue to do so in the future. I don't think that 4E will move any closer to the philosophy of pre-3E so as to satisfy them. In fact I am quite pessimistic about it, but that is the subject of another thread.
With regard to 3E now: Unless a new edition is clearly and objectively superior to 3E in every way (which, we all know, is impossible because of the variety of factors people take into account when they choose a system), there will be many people (many more than those who did not make the switch to 3E) who will refuse to follow. The OGL guarantees a practically endless supply of gaming products for 3E; so, 3E will never be trully OOP. That, of course, is detrimental to any new edition.

So, to (finally!) answer the question, the OOP market will not change as a result of the advent of 4E (just my $0.02).

Incidentally, am I right in believing that the OGL cannot be revoked?

 

[Goldmoon]

I play 1E whenever I get the chance although I havent seen a game run in maybe 10 years or so.

 

[Akrasia]

... Incidentally, am I right in believing that the OGL cannot be revoked?

Yes, you're right.

Of course 4e may not be OGL, but that will not affect 3e and 3.5.