D&D General Mike Mearls' blog post about RPG generations

[Aldarc]

I would also note that the Forge classifications were themselves mostly modifications of the classifications that already existed in internet discourse of TTRPGs, particularly on UseNet.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

I would also note that the Forge classifications were themselves mostly modifications of the classifications that already existed in internet discourse of TTRPGs, particularly on UseNet.

Aww, but how can people crap on the Forge for being the worst thing ever, if they have to accept that it actually grew out of the existing tradition and discussion of TTRPGs?

 

[Aldarc]

Aww, but how can people crap on the Forge for being the worst thing ever, if they have to accept that it actually grew out of the existing tradition and discussion of TTRPGs?

 

[TiQuinn]

Every time I read that guy’s stuff now, I’m expecting him to wind it up by saying “Now that I’ve laid out the problem…Here’s the kickstarter for my new game!”

On another note, it’s very weird to talk about generations of games and not give any specific examples. Like someone mentioned upthread, this is a Rorschach test.

 

[AlViking]

I don't really buy into the generational talk, especially since it's primarily centered on D&D versions. But even if I were to lump D&D editions together into generations I'd do it differently.

I'll skip over TSR era because I'm okay with how Mearls grouped those together. I just disagree on what happened after WOTC took over. With 3e they tried to clean up the rules of the game to be more consistent but also to lock down a specific style of play. The goal with 3e was to define everything to say that if you have a brick wall the climb DC is X and under this specific situation this is the correct rule. It was well meaning in the sense that people were always asking why the rules didn't cover how to handle things in enough detail. Then with 4e they went even further down that road, giving you almost board game-like powers with very limited and specific requirements and results.

Then with 5e they went "rulings not rules" and abandoned trying to standardize every table playing the game. Now we had the era of every DM and group making the game their own. It's not so much a focus on house rules, although those are also encouraged and easier to implement, but simply giving the group a fair amount of slack on how to implement the rules. There is no longer a push for one true way of playing the game. Throw in the impact and influence of third party materials to use the same core rules while changing the nature of play*. This of course has it's own issues and pushback from some people because game design will always be a compromise.

So that would be my generational grouping, no better and likely worse than some other groupings. I still don't think my grouping or any other grouping is particularly informative for the broader TTRPG market. If you really wanted to discuss that you'd have to start, I don't know, with the growth of groups like the SCA (Society for Creative Anachronisms) or discuss the Empire of the Petal Throne (also published in 1974) or the Traveller game and the rise of the metaplot. But that would require broader knowledge than what I have. Even then it would just be people trying to put the messy, always changing marketplace of ideas into neat little buckets. It's common to want to organize all sorts of things, not convinced it's particularly useful.

*I think the impact of the OGL mistake is likely exaggerated, in large part by people like Mearls wanting to sell games not associated to D&D. Most people who play the game know nothing about it or consider it water under the bridge. Even if that water was a burning pile of poo.

 

[tetrasodium]

I don't really buy into the generational talk, especially since it's primarily centered on D&D versions. But even if I were to lump D&D editions together into generations I'd do it differently.

I'll skip over TSR era because I'm okay with how Mearls grouped those together. I just disagree on what happened after WOTC took over. With 3e they tried to clean up the rules of the game to be more consistent but also to lock down a specific style of play. The goal with 3e was to define everything to say that if you have a brick wall the climb DC is X and under this specific situation this is the correct rule.

That's a bit backwards and chops off the structure from most of that table. You can see that old table copied into this post where the critical sections of example ability and more importantly who could do it. What it says about climbing are example of climbing a knotted rope while carrying a 75 pound pack & hurriedly climbing a slick brick wall with dc5 &dc30 climb strength checks. Those two have an average human and a high level barbarian listed as who could do it. Those examples were provided an extendable framework that both sides of the gm screen could use for narrative improvisation to bump the DC of a given task up or down.
For a midway point between dc5& dc30 these are the dc15 examples

Spoiler

15 Make a dying friend stable Heal (Wis) A 1st-level cleric

15 Make indifferent people friendly Diplomacy (Cha) A 1st-level paladin

15 Jump 10 feet (with a running start) Jump (Str) A 1st-level fighter

15 Tumble past a foe Tumble (Dex) A low-level monk

15* Get a minor lie past a canny guard Bluff (Cha) A 1st-level rogue

What you are omitting in order to inaccurately toss shade at a functional set of tools is that for any given challenge the gm can say "who should be able to do [his thing] and set a DC that either a relevant PC could do or choose to create an obstacle of some form that the party needs to go around or get creative with collaboratively solving. With 5e they took your misleading bit of criticism and told the GM to make every check so cool that it's exciting when a player with a few levels trivially succeeds yet again on yet another skill check they were almost guaranteed to succeed on them doubled down for a decade telling GM's to raise the stakes and make better adventures/stories even as players got guaranteed success abilities and bigger bonuses to overly condensed do almost everything ", specialist" skills.

Ali am not Oprah and can't be expected to hide a car under every skill check every session to make sure there is joy rising yet again. Nor should the GM be expected to simply because some bean counter decided focusing everything on what any player desires is going to sell more books than actually providing support for the gm running the game their players bought books for

 

[AlViking]

That's a bit backwards and chops off the structure from most of that table. You can see that old table copied into this post where the critical sections of example ability and more importantly who could do it. What it says about climbing are example of climbing a knotted rope while carrying a 75 pound pack & hurriedly climbing a slick brick wall with dc5 &dc30 climb strength checks. Those two have an average human and a high level barbarian listed as who could do it. Those examples were provided an extendable framework that both sides of the gm screen could use for narrative improvisation to bump the DC of a given task up or down.
For a midway point between dc5& dc30 these are the dc15 examples

Spoiler

15 Make a dying friend stable Heal (Wis) A 1st-level cleric

15 Make indifferent people friendly Diplomacy (Cha) A 1st-level paladin

15 Jump 10 feet (with a running start) Jump (Str) A 1st-level fighter

15 Tumble past a foe Tumble (Dex) A low-level monk

15* Get a minor lie past a canny guard Bluff (Cha) A 1st-level rogue

What you are omitting in order to inaccurately toss shade at a functional set of tools is that for any given challenge the gm can say "who should be able to do [his thing] and set a DC that either a relevant PC could do or choose to create an obstacle of some form that the party needs to go around or get creative with collaboratively solving. With 5e they took your misleading bit of criticism and told the GM to make every check so cool that it's exciting when a player with a few levels trivially succeeds yet again on yet another skill check they were almost guaranteed to succeed on them doubled down for a decade telling GM's to raise the stakes and make better adventures/stories even as players got guaranteed success abilities and bigger bonuses to overly condensed do almost everything ", specialist" skills.

Ali am not Oprah and can't be expected to hide a car under every skill check every session to make sure there is joy rising yet again. Nor should the GM be expected to simply because some bean counter decided focusing everything on what any player desires is going to sell more books than actually providing support for the gm running the game their players bought books for

That wall? All that ended up happening that as DM I would have to look up the wall to figure out what to make it out of so that it hit the target DC I wanted in the first place. I get why some people liked it and I think the intent was well intentioned. I also think there will be a never-ending rabbit hole of details that could have specific rules.

 

[bedir than]

I think it's easy to say this, and dismiss such things- but that doesn't mean that it isn't worth the attempt or the discussion.
Examinations like this can be productive, even if you don't agree with them. But to say "it's too complex for you to understand or see the picture of, so don't bother," is IMO unnecessarily dismissive.

Oh, I'm sorry you took it that way.

But I see people suggesting that OSR is ascendent, while ignoring that the most popular among those games would be an extremely failing D&D adjacent project not enough to fuel something like Kobold Press.

The suggestion that there is a generation right now demanding a certain style of play based on a fraction of a fraction shows just how difficult this entire generational exercise is

 

[TwoSix]

Aww, but how can people crap on the Forge for being the worst thing ever, if they have to accept that it actually grew out of the existing tradition and discussion of TTRPGs?

We can't just forgive the Forge for helping to make narrativism a popular design goal, can we?

 

[TiQuinn]

That wall? All that ended up happening that as DM I would have to look up the wall to figure out what to make it out of so that it hit the target DC I wanted in the first place. I get why some people liked it and I think the intent was well intentioned. I also think there will be a never-ending rabbit hole of details that could have specific rules.

Thing I always remembered about our 3e games and the rules was that you could Take 10 or Take 20, and unless the DC was extremely high or you were actively in combat, you'd likely succeed. But that whole take 20 thing kind of meant figuring out DCs felt like a moot point.