D&D 5E Is 5e's Success Actually Bad for Other Games?

[Thomas Shey]

I disagree. I think you need to actually show some sort of causality, we certainly cannot assume it.

I think its sufficiently self evident that we're coming from too different a place to continue this.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

I think its sufficiently self evident that we're coming from too different a place to continue this.

Fair enough. None of us have enough information to actually conclude the discussion.

 

[Thomas Shey]

Fair enough. None of us have enough information to actually conclude the discussion.

And that's absolutely true.

 

[MichaelSomething]

I think its sufficiently self evident that we're coming from too different a place to continue this.

Are those places so different that you both can't be a part of D&D??

 

[Aldarc]

What drew me back to Dungeons and Dragons with 4e was that it had an evocative setting that grounded players in the center of its conflicts, had this visceral energy, and mechanics with strong themes and helped you feel your character's mentality. That it's mechanics had teeth. That as a GM I did not need to focus on pacing nearly as much.

When I say it (5e) lacked what was great about 4e I mean exactly that. That it lacks the spirit of the game. It's heart. It's tension. While definitely different games Pathfinder Second Edition and Exalted Third Edition are the only games that come close (to its spirit) in my estimation. It definitely has stuff from 4e, just not the right stuff to enable the sort of play I came to expect from 4e.

I think that this is what I fundamentally loved about 4e. The game and its setting had a well-developed sense of its own dramatic conflict. Its Points of Light and Chaoskampf themes permeated everything from level 1 to 30. It was part of your class. It was part of your race. It was in the monsters. It was in the setting. So many monsters had a place or role in that conflict. It felt like you could pick up a monster and just knew how to use it, not only mechanically (roles and stat blocks) but also conceptually (its place in the setting conflict). Power sources provide a sense of quasi-political identity in that conflict. If you are a Divine class, that says something about your character's likely stance on the Dawn War. Likewise if you play a Primal class. As you say, there was so much mechanical and conceptual teeth to 4e.

 

[MerricB]

I'll try to find some numbers for you, but I don't exactly keep a running bibliography on everything I learn. I simply recall one of the designers saying that AL makes up a fairly small percentage of players, in spite of being exponentially bigger than any past dnd organized play system in total numbers. They were using that to illustrate how much the playerbase has grown, IIRC.

I look at the sales of DDAL adventures. They are low (though higher than many others on the DMs Guild).

 

[Fanaelialae]

I think what would help indie/smaller games more than anything, would be a website that helps gamers looking for other gamers interested in certain games find each other.

Granted, we have a lot of those. I think ENWorld has a forum for gamers looking for groups, as does Roll20, etc. However, the problem is that indie games tend to have relatively small audiences to begin with. By spreading them out over dozens of different LFGs, you're either forcing them to post on dozens of sites (which, let's face it, nobody wants to do), or you're spreading them too thin among those sites, such that they'll be lucky to ever find each other.

What I'm thinking would be like the Facebook of LFG (in terms of popularity - practically no one uses MySpace anymore, and G+ died out). Of course, that's easier said than done. You'd need a robust site, and you'd probably need a significant amount of advertising to get it the traction it needs. Which is, again, easier said than done, especially since this site is unlikely to draw FB-like advertising revenue.

I think it's what the indie community could really use right now though. It's easier than ever to find a game, but because they're diffused among various sites, for an indie gamer it still isn't easy.

And to be clear, no, I'm not willing to implement it. But it's something I've been thinking about the past few days, largely as a result of this thread. I believe that the gamers are out there, at least in the majority of cases. It's just unreasonably challenging for them to find each other. That's something that the right technology with the proper traction could definitely help with.

 

[theCourier]

Discords usually help for that kind of stuff. Depends on how active the community for the game is, of course. Not exactly what you're suggesting, but I feel like it also helps since you can specifically join the chat for a game you want to play (and there are some Discords that advertise multiple game systems). But of course, the caveat is you'd need to actually find said Discord in the first place.

 

[MGibster]

he best way to get people into the SCA is to have regular practices open to the public at public parks that see a decent amount of family traffic. Hell, the local shire makes sure that shire practice happens where teenagers getting off the bus home from high school can see them, because you're never going to grow a hobby like SCA without getting kids interested in it.

According to the SCA's own census report from 2010, roughly 65% of the respondents first learned about the SCA through a variation of friend, family member, or significant other. Only 4% of the respondents said they first heard of the SCA through a chance encounter with an event or a demo. D&D is probably a bit different in that many people have heard of it just through cultural osmosis, but I would suspect that the vast majority of players are brought into the fold by friends, family members, or significant others rather than coming across an event by happenstance..

People see other people having fun, and want to join.

In the case of the SCA, I think it's more that people are having fun, and want their friends to join in. I think that's the case with most RPGs as well though I don't have any data to back that up.

 

[Thomas Shey]

Are those places so different that you both can't be a part of D&D??

I'm not really part of the D&D community, but for entirely different reasons.

(Ironically, D&D4e was closest to what I wanted but just a little too--much. I was back for a while during the 3e days before it showed its warts too thorough.)