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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Reynard" data-source="post: 8868142" data-attributes="member: 467">By "Changing Game" in this thread, i mean the evolution of play through the life of a campaign driven largely by the PCs gaining levels.I started D&D (and RPGs) with the Mentzer Red Box in 1985. Shortly after, we got the Expert set with Isle of Dread, and a while after that the Companion Set. We bought a Dragon Magazine here and there when we could find one, but generally speaking this is all we had. So, during my most formative D&D years, the idea of the Changing Game was baked into my experience and was undiluted by tons of other materials, including published adventures. To me, D&D was homebrewing everything and rising through the ranks from dungeon delver, to trailblazing explorer, to ruler of one's own domain. That's just how the game was meant to be played.Before I go on: I know this isn't the way everyone, or even most people, experienced D&D. I think it was more common for folks to go from the Basic rules to AD&D (1E or 2E depending on when D&D was discovered). And while AD&D included gaining followers and building fortresses, it did not include much in its core about domain rulership or warfare. those rules in the Companion Set (reproduced in the Rules Cyclopedia) were unique to that "edition" of D&D. So I am NOT engaging in badwrongfun for anyone who says the game is "meant to be played" differently than I do.Anyway -- I still want the game to be played like this, and I think you can do it with any edition. not least because those Domain and Warfare rules in the old Companions set are perfectly viable for any version of D&D or even other games. They are stand alone modules which work with any game that uses language similar enough to D&D to figure out how to make PCs interact with the system.I think the Changing Game is the solution for the woes of high level D&D that so many people experience. 5-8 encounters between rests becomes an albatross after a certain level, and single encounters between rests become rocket tag. But if PCs have things that are important that they care about beyond their own personal power, a new purpose appears that can drive drama and tension and fun without just looking for different set dressing for the same old fisticuffs. And not that high level domain rulers don't need to occasionally go punch a dragon or demigod in the jaw. All the great epic heroes come out of retirement for one last battle, after all.I don't think there's any chance of it happening, but 1D&D could do worse than explicitly discussing the Changing Game and providing tools for developing through dungeons then wilderness then domain management and finally immortality. It shouldn't be to the exclusion of just continuing adventuring, but it is a lot easier to ignore certain rules than it is to make up new rules.So, what do you think about the Changing Game? Did you play that way? Do you? If not, why not? If so, what tools do you use to support it?</blockquote>

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