D&D 4E Is liking 4E biased by how many books you own?

[crazy_cat]

50'ish WOTC 3.x hardbacks here. Plus lots of WOTC adventures, plus quite a lot of OGL and D20 stuff from Mongoose, Malhavoc, Paizo, Goodman Games, Necromancer, and others. My gaming bookshelf also holds material for SW D20, WFRP v1 and v2, Hackmaster, C&C, Call of Cthulhu (D20 and BRP), Basic D&D, AD&D 1e, D&D Darksun 2e, D20 Modern & Future, Stargate, Serenity, Space 1889, and Traveller.

Looking forward to 4e - although I'll probably just go for the core 3 books initially and then make a buying decision about future products based on what I see.

I expect to still be playing 3.5 for quite a while once 4e releases as others in my gaming group aren't planning to upgrade. Then again, we also play Traveller, CoC and other games from time to time so I expect the 3.5/4 change over will just add another option to our list of played games rather than being the cause of any seismic shift in our gaming habits.

 

[Treebore]

I own over 400 3.x D&D and d20 books.

I'm anti-4E.

Ditto, but I am not anti 4E anymore. I have come to accept that it won't be my system of choice, but I will buy some of it, so I can play if I find a group I would like to join, but mostly to steal rules and ideas from.

I'll likely buy any module. Plus, when they rerelease all the miniatures for 4E, I might actually get into that this time around. Only "might", though. I really hate "random" collectibles. I'll likely be happy with what Reaper is doing and won't bother with the WOTC stuff. Still, I have to admit its a possibility.

I'll likely still buy a lot of stuff put out by Paizo, Necromancer, Goodman, and Green Ronin too.

 

[Robert Ranting]

I own nine 3.x D&D books published by WotC, seventeen d20/OGL compatible books, two issues of Dragon magazine, and the first volume of Pathfinder. It is worth noting that most of the WotC books were either bought second-hand or given to me as gifts by my players, while I spent my own money on d20/OGL stuff. Most of the time, if I need a 3.5 book, I know someone who would be willing to lend it to me for a couple weeks so I can use it for my game.

I am ambivalent about 4e. The general statements made about streamlining and balancing the mechanics and making the game easier to DM seems like a great idea, but thus far, we haven't really been given much information on what these new mechanics are going to look like. What we have gotten are a lot of fluff teases, which don't interest me. I'm an obsessive homebrew DM, and no matter what the world of "D&D 4E" looks like, I'm probably just going to toss it in favor of whatever crazy idea I come up with for a given campaign. The only thing I care about is if the core mechanics are sound, and if I can understand them well enough to produce my own semi-compatible content for my own use.

Robert "Preferred Arcana Evolved to 3.5 Anyway" Ranting

 

[Monkey Boy]

Put me down as Anti 4E.

I have 35 3.5 harcovers and 30 Dungeon magazines. That should last a while.

Even though I am anti I will still pick it up. What a hypocrite right? I'm interested in seeing what its like. The flavour they are leaking now isn't necessarily indicative of the finished product. A PHB is not that much money. Its still DnD, something I have a 20 year commitment to. If it's not for me I'll stick to 3.5.

If I was a FR fan though I would be fuming.

 

[cougent]

I have 60+ WotC books and over 200 issues of Dragon, rounded out with another 2 dozen or so other things.

My initial reaction was negative towards 4E, but with time and the snippets of information being released I have become a firm fence sitter.

My issue is not the amount of money I have in 3/3.5 stuff, but rather as others have pointed out that my game is more like 3.75 with many house rules to fix perceived problems. Even with the small amount of information out on 4E, I already see that I would be playing 4.1 or 4.25 as there are already things I just do not like and would not run in my game. There are other elements that I do like and would run RAW, but do I want to leave an already working modded house ruled system just to get a new system that would have to be immediately modded and house ruled to be what I want? That is my dilemma, not the cost of new books.

 

[hazel monday]

I gots 10 WOTC hardcovers, and a 2 foot high stack of Paizo mags and modules.
i'll get 4E if it looks like an improvement and if my players want it.

 

[grimslade]

I was trying to tally up all my D&D books and became slightly dizzy.
Basic D&D 3 box sets (basic, expert and master) & 6 mods
AD&D 12 hardcovers (including 2 Fiend Folios?) 17 modules & WoG box set
2E 4 Hardcovers and 15?!? splats plus a whole mess of box sets I am not going that ar into a
crawlspace to find out exact numbers
3.XE 27 hardcovers and 11 splats I habe toned down my nuying in the last few years.

I refuse to calculate the investment I have in D&D. I did notice that I owned more Scarred Lands stuff than I had remembered and less Necromancer than I would like to have.

Oh and I am excited by the possibilities of 4E, but I was stoked about 2E too. I bought alot of 2E but rarely played. We will see come May.

Also, I owned every campaign setting for 2E except Planescape. Just weird.

 

[Gwathlas]

I don't buy books regularly. Since 3E came out, I bought 4 core 3E rulebooks and that was it until 3.5. In 3.5, I bought 4 core rulebooks, 5 "Complete books", a couple environment books. All told, in the 7 years of 3.X, I have spent way more money on simple internet access than D&D.

So, with that in mind, I have to say that I am THRILLED with the news about 4E. I plan on buying the 3 Core #1s, plus another PHB for my wife and maybe one or two more PHBs for poorer members of my group so we can get going on the edition. I also currently plan on buying the continuing core books, but will have to see what they contain. NO WAY is psionics making it into my swords & sorcery.

I get the impression that a lot of 4E naysayers have a huge library of 3E books. It seems ironic that the people who are the biggest RPG spenders are also the worst foot-draggers. So, chime in. What are your spending habits and how do they intersect with a new edition? Do you feel that your spending and like/dislike are related?

I have all the 3.5 FR campaign books all the core books including MM I - IV and a lot of the peripherals and I can say honestly that is not a factor in my decision not to buy any further wotc/hasbro products. I was put off by the changes themselves. By the starwars wow anime influences. If I wanted to play starwars or wow I"d buy those products.

Additionally their claims that the unneeded and for me uncalled for changes to FR are for the good of D&D, the FR and the FR fans rings hollow. There was no consideration given or being given to the core customer base.In fact as they dumb down D&D they may be hoping to change their customer base to the many who could not understand D&D or were not interested in a FRPG.

So if I had liked the changes I would still be a customer of wotc and would be happy to buy new editions of D&D and FR.

 

[Psion]

What's anti-4e?

I'll probably pick up the core books and play with friends who play.

I probably will not run it or adopt it for my game nor encourage my players (who have yet to fully port over to 3.5) to do so.

And I have many 3.5 books. I skipped many setting specific books, minis, corridors, and the like, but I own most core titles, which comes out to at least one title per month for some time.

That said, my WotC buying slacked off lately because the books have been getting worse and worse AFIACT. The authors of the books I truly disdain are the same authors who seem to be key designers of 4e.

Couple this with the short playtest period and the ditching of many elements that I consider key identifying elements of D&D, and you get a formula for an edition I have little faith in.

 

[Wombat]

Let's see...

I own about 30 3.whatever books, plus a host of pdfs.

Then again, I am no longer playing 3.whatever, haven't for about a year.

And I am not really looking forward to 4e, not in any negative sense ("I hate the very concept!"), but rather than in an utterly ambivalent sense ("This affects my gaming ... how?).

Hope that gives some answer...