D&D General It's really weird loving D&D and not loving the current rules.

[schneeland]

Listen. I get it. The world moves on. My GenX butt needs to get out of the way. Intellectually, I understand that. But emotionally, I just want my love for D&D "stuff" to match my love for the D&D game again.

Same here. I really want to like 5e more than I do. It was a breath of fresh air after sitting out 4e and consequently playing 3e for about 15 years, but I quickly soured on it. The tricky thing is: 5e is not a bad game - if it were, it would be much easier to reject. Instead it's "just OK", sometimes bothering me, sometimes bringing nice sparks of nostalgia, but not exciting in any way.
It doesn't get better when considering that while I still have fond memories of older editions (particularly 2e and 3e), I cannot get myself to like those RAW either (the best option for something close to an original edition would probably by Old-School Essentials with the ascending AC option). And modifying 5e doesn't feel like the best idea either, because once you start deviating from the original rules so much that it essentially becomes another game, why not play an entirely different game right away?

 

[Alzrius]

The tricky thing is: 5e is not a bad game - if it were, it would be much easier to reject. Instead it's "just OK", sometimes bothering me, sometimes bringing nice sparks of nostalgia, but not exciting in any way.

For a while now, I've thought of 5E as the bard of the various iterations of D&D; it's a good generalist, but the specialists outshine it in various areas. 3E offers much deeper mechanical complexity, 4E has a greater range of power, 1E is grittier, 2E has better lore and world-building, and BECMI is simpler. If there's a certain aspect of D&D that you particularly enjoy, there's almost certainly an older version of the game that does it better.

 

[Mind of tempest]

Same here. I really want to like 5e more than I do. It was a breath of fresh air after sitting out 4e and consequently playing 3e for about 15 years, but I quickly soured on it. The tricky thing is: 5e is not a bad game - if it were, it would be much easier to reject. Instead it's "just OK", sometimes bothering me, sometimes bringing nice sparks of nostalgia, but not exciting in any way.
It doesn't get better when considering that while I still have fond memories of older editions (particularly 2e and 3e), I cannot get myself to like those RAW either (the best option for something close to an original edition would probably by Old-School Essentials with the ascending AC option). And modifying 5e doesn't feel like the best idea either, because once you start deviating from the original rules so much that it essentially becomes another game, why not play an entirely different game right away?

would the simple answer be that the game you want has never existed? you have to make it as no game offers what you want?

 

[Jack Daniel]

Wait... You still put up fliers? People answer them?

Last I checked, paper, eyeballs, and literacy all still exist.

 

[schneeland]

would the simple answer be that the game you want has never existed? you have to make it as no game offers what you want?

If we are talking about RAW, then yes, that game never existed.
If we look at my gaming history, it did exist - however, only in the ephemeral state created by a bunch of 20 somethings learning, misremembering and forgetting things, carrying over the gaming culture from both AD&D 2 and The Dark Eye, but also not knowing too other systems, and the general state of the world of nerdy middle class people in Germany in the early 2000s. It was a time where we still unironically listened to Blind Guardian and Manowar, drank mead and spent time on rennaissance fairs. And for some reason, D&D 3 really resonated perfectly with that.
Now the problem is that I became less tolerant to mechanical cruft in games over the years - what was merely a small nuisance back then, now bothers me greatly. So something that evokes the same feeling I had with 3e, would need to look different today. I have found other games that I enjoy greatly (e.g. DCC, Forbidden Lands), but as mentioned above: my initial hope that 5e would do the same for me specifically for D&D, which is the game I have probably played most in my life, was not fulfilled by how the edition developed (I did enjoy reading the core 3 books and also Volo - it's just that, contrary to 3e, this time the excitement didn't last).

 

[jmartkdr2]

For myself, it's not really a problem with 5e per se, it's a lack of interesting new content.

Interesting is of course a subjective point - but on several occasions during the 5e period I've not had any character concepts I want to play but haven't yet. This never happened in a prior edition.

I have several for PF2, but none for 5e.

One factor might be that I'm able to play a lot more now thanks to online play, so I'm going through concepts faster - but on the other side, new official classes/options are coming out slower and aren't pushing boundaries much so there's less new stuff to get excited by.

 

[jmartkdr2]

Wait... You still put up fliers? People answer them?

It will only get you the sort of player that goes to game stores -

- but those players are more likely to be open to different games and/or editions, just because they're reminded weekly that 5e isn't the only game in town.

 

[The-Magic-Sword]

I keep forgetting you guys are playing last edition still, Pathfinder 2e has been out for three years now

#ThisIsTongueInCheekDon'tHurtMe

 

[Alzrius]

Last I checked, paper, eyeballs, and literacy all still exist.

"Print is dead." -your avatar

 

[Charlaquin]

Pathfinder 2e has been out for three years now

Man, 2020 really F’ed my perception of time…