memories of new editions

[Spell]

from the 4th edition thread.

The irony is not lost on me at all. This must be what it was like for a firmly-entrenched 2E community when the 3E rumors were a-flyin'.

i know it means nothing, because i'm talking about a couple of dozen players, but i remember that when the questionnaire for "what you want to see in the third edition?" started to circulate, every player i knew in my hometown (Bari, in Italy) was terribly excited. i haven't seen so much debating ever in my life, for no other subject or reason.
everyone wanted to write lengthy letters to TSR to describe their house rules and, invariably, those of us that knew english very well (me included) had to translate everything.

it was a very exciting time, i have to say. the future of RPG games really looked bright, despite the crisis of TSR, despite those annoying kids (and adults!) with their blooming trading cards, despite the raising costs of publishing.

do you have any memory you'd like to share tied to that time, or, for that matter, to any new edition announcement?


to conclude my story:

the 3rd edition came out and for a year or so i was quite satisfied. i didn't like some elements of the game (the books were extremely dry to read, compared to the 2nd edition core books), i hated some other things (back to the dungeon??!?!? i *DESPISE* dungeon delving!!!! and what about the number of feats coming out with every book or dragon issue, more and more powerful?).

what did it for me was the Epic handbook. i'm sorry for andy collins, but it was, for the largest part, the most unimaginative book i've ever read. i stopped buying WotC books since then and i've only bought one or two full price d20 books from then. i did buy lots of necromancers, troll's games and FFG book, but they were priced 2 pounds each.

just two days ago, i looked back into my AD&D 2nd edition manuals. the system was in need of some modification, it was utterly illogical, and it was surpassed by dozends of today's engines. but, to me, it is still a great read. it must be david cook's writing. i couldn't stop imagining campaign situations, adventures, and so on.
so i decided to buy the pdfs of those books, and to fix the system myself. partly i will implement some changes seen in 3rd edition (or, in fact, in the masque of the red death boxed set and in the player's option books). i will then have a system that will allow me to run all those old adventures and settings that i have with no conversion work. a system that will follow the direction _I_ decide. the feel that _I_ like. no need to please joe gamer. i'm the boss!

i know, it will take a lot of time, but... well, i'd rather do it this way, than spending a fortune on game books only to use a couple of rules, or to make them sit on my shelves.

moreover, if i want modernity and coolness, i already have GURPS...

 

[Man in the Funny Hat]

i know it means nothing, because i'm talking about a couple of dozen players, but i remember that when the questionnaire for "what you want to see in the third edition?" started to circulate, every player i knew in my hometown (Bari, in Italy) was terribly excited. i haven't seen so much debating ever in my life, for no other subject or reason.
everyone wanted to write lengthy letters to TSR to describe their house rules and, invariably, those of us that knew english very well (me included) had to translate everything.

it was a very exciting time, i have to say. the future of RPG games really looked bright, despite the crisis of TSR, despite those annoying kids (and adults!) with their blooming trading cards, despite the raising costs of publishing.

do you have any memory you'd like to share tied to that time, or, for that matter, to any new edition announcement?

Just that when WotC bought TSR, TSR had been quite literally dead for several months. Only after WoTC bought it did they begin work on a 3rd Edition - and that went quite unheralded in online circles until it was actually announced in 1999. The 3E questionairre you refer to was actually circulated at a 1996 GenCon seminar about whether there should BE a 3rd Edition - in other words the questionairre surfaced BEFORE TSR actually went under and no serious work was proceeding upon 3E until well AFTER WotC came along. I still keep a copy of the questionaire on my website.

When 3E was announced I was quite skeptical. After all, I was around when 2nd Edition was announced and I was ultimately VERY disappointed at how surprisingly little had really been changed in 2E. Heck, I was around just slighly before there was actually an *A*D&D (the new collection of rules that would later be known as 1st Edition). Not until several months after Eric Noah started the legendary "Unofficial 3E Site" and we were finally getting enough superficial information about the new version did I start to actually look forward to it with eagerness rather than optimistic dread.

the 3rd edition came out and for a year or so i was quite satisfied. i didn't like some elements of the game (the books were extremely dry to read, compared to the 2nd edition core books), i hated some other things (back to the dungeon??!?!? i *DESPISE* dungeon delving!!!! and what about the number of feats coming out with every book or dragon issue, more and more powerful?).
...
just two days ago, i looked back into my AD&D 2nd edition manuals. the system was in need of some modification, it was utterly illogical, and it was surpassed by dozends of today's engines. but, to me, it is still a great read. it must be david cook's writing. i couldn't stop imagining campaign situations, adventures, and so on.
so i decided to buy the pdfs of those books, and to fix the system myself
...
i know, it will take a lot of time, but... well, i'd rather do it this way, than spending a fortune on game books only to use a couple of rules, or to make them sit on my shelves.

I, on the other hand, still remain satisfied with 3E because as fortune would have it the changes they actually made coincided with changes that I personally had wanted and long advocated for with but little exception (and I could overlook that), but that I had repeatedly found simply too Herculean a task to ever handle by myself. There were a few disappointments that surfaced afterward that really could not have been anticipated but those, too, are things I can continue to overlook. Should Eric's new 4E rumors prove to have merit I find that I will once again remain skeptical until I actually have DETAILS on the changes to make an informed judgement as to its merit and worthiness of actual anticipation.

 

[Philotomy Jurament]

just two days ago, i looked back into my AD&D 2nd edition manuals. the system was in need of some modification, it was utterly illogical, and it was surpassed by dozends of today's engines. but, to me, it is still a great read. it must be david cook's writing. i couldn't stop imagining campaign situations, adventures, and so on.
so i decided to buy the pdfs of those books, and to fix the system myself. partly i will implement some changes seen in 3rd edition (or, in fact, in the masque of the red death boxed set and in the player's option books). i will then have a system that will allow me to run all those old adventures and settings that i have with no conversion work. a system that will follow the direction _I_ decide. the feel that _I_ like. no need to please joe gamer. i'm the boss!

Sounds cool to me. What are you planning on changing?

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

I was playing 2E online (via Java chatroom) when 3E hit. Everyone I played with were a bunch of 1E-era old fogies and we all took a look at the new rules and said "you know, that DOES make more sense" and after the conversion process, never looked back.

In contrast, I remember picking up 2E after or during college (I forget when I noticed it, since I hadn't played 1E in a number of years), said "yeah, I guess they would need a new version," read through it and thought "well, they still kind of need a new version." It didn't engender any particular urgency to go find someone to play with, even though it did feel like an incremental improvement.

 

[Philotomy Jurament]

When 2E hit, most people switched, but I was kind of disappointed with it, and I ended up playing more RoleMaster and MERP, among other systems. Eventually I started a new group with some RPG newbies, and I chose Classic D&D (the Mentzer BECMI boxed sets) for that. I basically skipped 2E, although I have all the core books (sheepish grin). (Incidentally, that BECMI campaign was one of the most fun and successful campaigns I ever ran in any edition.)

When 3E hit, I decided to give it a look. I liked a lot of what I saw. I remember thinking there was a lot of RM influence in 3E, and also some things were more like Classic D&D than like AD&D (length of a round, the way movement was handled, etc). I liked it enough to get on board.

I still like 3E, but I've jumped back off. C&C is my system of choice, these days, because it combines the elements and approaches I like best, and it's EXCEPTIONALLY tweak-able. I'll look at 4E, when it arrives, but I'm pessimistic, given the direction 3E has gone. We'll see.

 

[RFisher]

When 2e was on its way, I was excited. When it came out, I was excited. A years or two later, I wasn't playing it much anymore.

When 3e was on its way, I was excited. When it came out, I was excited. A few years later, I wasn't playing it much anymore.

Strangely enough, I don't think I was ever actively playing a system except D&D through a revision.

 

[Glyfair]

The system changes and my reaction, to the best of my memory.

When I started AD&D wasn't complete. I started with BD&D (and picked up OD&D, but never played it). Once the PHB was released I picked it up. I salivated for the DMG. I vaguely remember people saying they were looking forward to it. Remember, it took about 2 years from the MM release to the DMG release. After that, the complaints about waiting a month between the 3.0 Core Books seemed impatient to me.

I gradually worked into a gaming crowd centered on a college commuter lounge, and later a gaming store started by the key members of that group. I played many games and realized I was very dissatisfied with the AD&D experience. So, I drifted away, only playing in 2 AD&D campaigns in the last 5 years or so before 2nd Edition.

When 2nd Edition was announced I looked forward to them changing the things I hated about AD&D (and most of the gaming crowd I hung out with did as well). I bought the books and realized they changed none of it. To this day, I'm not sure if I ever played any 2nd Edition, although I did buy some books for use in other RPGs. I completely missed the Player's Option stuff.

Don't get me wrong. Some things I really liked about 2nd Edition (Priest Spheres, for example). However, the things they didn't fix were still glaring and weren't touched (demi-human level limits being a big sticking point).

I drifted out of roleplaying for a couple of years, and started drifting back the year before 3E was announced. I played in a Fantasy Hero game, and ran a variant Melanda campaign that switched to Hero Wars (when it was released). I picked up some 2E books (notably, the Birthright campaign),

I watched 3Es announcement and Eric's site and became excited about the game. Everything I hoped 2E would change was changed in 3E. Both campaigns switched to 3E games when they were released.

When 3.5 was announced, I wasn't really interested. We discussed and discussed, and decided to switch over once it was released. Many of the changes were nice, many weren't worth the trouble they caused.

So, in a nutshell:

Change to AD&D: Excited.
Change to AD&D Second Edition: Excited as it happened, crushingly disappointed when released.
Change to 3E: Very excited as it happened, and after it was released.
Change to 3.5: Not excited when it happened. Not excited after it was released.
Rumors of 4E: Have decided it will be skipped, unless it is as big an advance as 3E was over 2E.

 

[ThirdWizard]

Oooh, I was a hater! Not roll initiative every round? Insanity! AC that goes up? That's just crazy! I picked apart everything. Forget the fact that my 2E game was so heavily modified that my Players didn't even bother reading the PH to learn the rules. Those were good times. I was definately not happy to see 3E coming. I loved my Combat & Tactics. It's still sitting on my bookshelf in view, staring down at me, begging me to use its unwieldy critical hit tables again. For some reason my Players balk at the very notion and would probably stuff dice down my throat if I did that. Ah well.

Oh, but I got better. Not to worry.

 

[Wik]

Well, I don't think we even had the internet when 3e came out, and if we did, I wasn't using it. I knew about wotc taking charge of TSR, at least loosely, but I had heard nothing about 3e. In fact, when I saw the hardcover PHB, with the Dungeons and Dragons logo ("Hey, the logo doesn't say "advanced"), I assumed they were releasing a prettied-up version of OD&D.

There was also a box of fast-play rules that came with a few introductory things... that interested me more, because it was cheaper, and I thought it could be useful.

I was running occasional Dark Sun games when a friend of mine brought over this new, hardcover PHB and told me "It's a new edition!".

"why does there need to be a new edition?"

"well, they fixed a bunch of things. No more THAC0. Saves are easier to do. Skills are more important."

Those were the three selling points for me - I hated THAC0 because it was hard for some of my players to calculate, I used ability checks to replace saves simply because I hated having to reference a table everytime someone had to resist poison, and we only used skills as a way to rough out a character's background.

We made up a character (I had a human sorcerer I tongue-in-cheekly named "Damian") and ran him through the fast-play adventures. My DM made a cleric as my companion, and we burned through those adventures. The big problem was, we were unsure of the new rules (this was no new edition... this was a NEW GAME), so we were a bit confused as to what "turning damage" was - man, those zombies were BLASTED.

I bought a PHB a week later, and I loved it. I remember I just started getting on the internet at the time, and my big beefs with 3e consisted of:

1) The Druid no longer had his special progression - I liked having to fight to achieve each level, and the class lost that flavour.
2) Half-elves mechanically sucked, whereas before, they were a pretty cool race to play.
3) It was harder to be a druid loremaster than a wizard loremaster (That one irked me for a long time, until I finally understood the concept of what a prestige class really is).
4) PCs leveled a lot faster ("I get 75 XP for each goblin I kill? What is this, COMMUNISM!?")

They were minor points, and I became a converted 3e fanboy in no time. Hell, it was around this tim ethat I started frequenting online D&D sites, in the hopes of converting my dark sun stuff into 3e (who hasn't done that!?).

When I look back on earlier editions, I do find a good read, and I know I love the artwork (at least, the setting implied by artwork) of 2e a lot more than 3e; whereas 2e has knights and a definate medieval feel, 3e is much more 'anime' and I'm not too fond of that.

But, really, I love 3e. When people start talking about 4e.... I get rather nervous. I've spent too much money to update now.

 

[Nyaricus]

I started playing D&D in '99, at eleven years old, on the cusp of a new addition. Put my 1st level LG Dwarven Fighter through a few dungeon delves, killed a fang dragon or two while at my cabin and was generally entranced by it all - the fantasy, the fury the feeling of raw power. It was awe-inspiring.

Then, in 2000, we smartened up and bought the real game