innerdude
Legend
Which is why I just don't see the point of 5e, at least in terms of it being a product that I would want to buy. I hardly need more D&Ds when I have one that already does what I want, and when--frankly--I'm not really a fan of most of the D&Disms that have suffused so many versions of the game over the years. I really only value a D&D that is sufficiently flexible that I can use it to play something that little resembles that classic playstyle associated with D&D. And making D&D more closely resemble other games--many of which I already own as well--also does little for me personally .. (snip) .. I don't value the idea of playing D&D for its own sake. I value the idea of playing the game I like, and I don't particularly care what it calls itself.
Near the end of the 3.x era, hints of dissatisfaction with the system creeped in to my mind. The D&D-isms were mild irritants, but it was what our group played, so I just rolled with it.
When the 4e era kicked off, our group quickly knew that it was a non-starter. We simply weren't going to move ahead with 4e, period, which then begged the question--what were we actually going to play? Stick with 3e? Wait for Pathfinder? Try something totally different?
I think an unintended, unforeseen consequence of 4e was that when adoption of 4e didn't "catch" for much of the RPG crowd, many of us as players and GMs had a unique situation on our hands--we had to DECIDE what we were going to play going forward. This wasn't really new; we could have ditched D&D for numerous alternatives over the years, but it had been easy to just "graduate" with each successive D&D edition. Now the sudden decision brought to the forefront just how much choice we had.
When you're "looking around" for other dance partners, so to speak, you tend to do a total evaluation of EVERYTHING that's brought you to that point. For me, that led to a much deeper analysis of what I REALLY wanted from the RPGs that I was playing, and I more fully realized just how much the "D&D-isms" weren't taking my (increasingly limited) RPG time in a direction I really wanted to go.
So far, 5e's main selling point seems to be little more than, "Hey look, it's a new D&D!" when frankly, I haven't particularly liked the "D&D" in D&D for a while now.