Yeah, but who gives a crap about "rules design"? Is the game fun? Then people will play it.
But that's not really what this whole thread is about. What this thread is really about is EGO. All the people who prefer games other than 5E have their egos bruised because THEIR game that THEY think is superior is not seen in the same light as 5E. THEY think 5E isn't worth all the cache it gets, and it kills them that THEIR choice of game gets nothing.
If they have a hard time getting people to play THEIR game, because everybody else wants to play 5E? Well, maybe, just maybe... THEY don't do a good enough job of showing all their friends why the game THEY like is better than D&D. If THEY could actually get across all the points of favor for their game... maybe more people would play it. But if not... I think they're afraid it says more about THEM as players and cheerleaders than it does WotC.
I mean, I understand why they wish to blame WotC and the D&D game because they are unable to convince people their game of choice is better. And I'm sure it hurts to know that other people just don't see the same "brilliance" that they do. But you know what? Too bad.
Um, no. That's not it at all. Missed the target entirely. And that's a weirdly hostile response you've got going there. I'm not a crazy stan for any of the games I listed; they were just the first games that came to my head for exemplary design in OSR, Neo-Trad, and Storygames respectively.
I can't speak for anybody else in this thread, and I am aware that my personal views may be fringe. I am not the biggest expert on rules design, so while I have issues with D&D 5e's mechanics, don't take my opinion as an authoritative source. But I will say that WotC made too many concessions to the 1e and 2e fans when making 5e, and threw out the best parts of 4e in a panicked attenpt to rehabilitate their image, leaving certain parts of 5e a lot more kludgy and lacking clear design vision than they could have been. But no, that's not the primary reason as to why I don't like 5e; and as a game, I don't
hate hate it. I'd be willing to sit down with some friends and play or even attempt to DM if that was what was on the table. But no, time to be completely honest about why I don't like 5e.
The primary reason that I don't like D&D 5e and WotC is because I'm a queer POC anarcho-communist who trusts rainbow capitalist corporations as far as I can throw them. WotC may talk a big game when it comes to diversity and a healthy work environment, but their actual track record leaves much to be desired. I'd rather give my money to small studios that don't have long and storied histories of abusing their workers and exploiting their labour. Or better yet, to small-time solo creators or small teams who pour their heart and soul into their artistic works, through which they give voice to their struggles, their dreams, their identities. A lot of these solo creators are among the working poor or are on disability, and many of them are also queer and/or BIPOC. Some of them are making TTRPGs because it's their artistic passion despite the risk of poverty, while others are already struggling and making TTRPGs as a side gig is how they've chosen to try and make ends meet. Both types of these creators could use my money and my attention far more than WotC does. Some of them do in fact work on third party products for 5e, because that's how the game is; I won't begrudge them for that. But who is the primary beneficiary of their work: the creators themselves, or the brand of D&D that WotC has built?
That is what I mean when I say that D&D and WotC are stifling its competitors in the industry. Indie creators struggling to get by and get noticed is a fact of life in almost every creative sector under a capitalist economy, but it's particularly bad in the TTRPG space. D&D as a rules system is... fine. D&D as a creative work still has many problematic elements that it needs to confront; and I would go so far as to say that the entire subgenre of heroic fantasy that it codified is built on a rotten foundation of White supremacy. But D&D as a brand is the 800 lb gorilla sucking all the air out of the room, exceptionally so even for a market leader in a creative industry. The media it creates and commissions to endorse itself, and the fan culture and loyalty it cultivates, all lead back to it. It is a machine that feeds itself, with the unspoken goal of acquiring more and more of the market share to generate more and more profits and install itself more and more as as a reified institution in the minds of consumers. Such is the way of things for all large corporations under capitalism; I doubt that Winninger's management will radically change things for the better, nor would it be in his interest to.
So that's how it is. I don't like 5e not because I have a list of games I think are inherently better and that 5e is lowest common denominator trash; no, that's not the reason I don't like 5e. I don't like 5e because the world can be split into two categories: those who work, and those who own; and I'd really like to see those who own get taken down a notch. It's not ego, it's politics. It can get personal, but the personal is the political. Always has been, no matter how hard those who own have tried to convince you otherwise.