D&D General No two people ever seem to play D&D the same way, but we can usually find people to play with anyway.

[bloodtide]

Well, I'd point out that any bad feelings or whatever go all the way back to Day One of D&D. You know like how D&D was made by two guys....and one of them just up and vanished. Humm..ever wonder why and what the story was there?

Of course, most people today are not just thin skinned...but skinless. If you even suggest saying anything even slightly negative to them they will take it as the most vile personal assault and go cry in their safe space.

As a frequient poster on "The Other Side" I also see this A LOT: Someone takes the D&D rules and makes a ton of changes to them and makes a very spcific set playstlye. Then they log into a forum and complain that the game is SO broken. And plenty of people will chime in and say "yup I agree 100%".

Then there is the poster like me. I will immediately point out the obvious problem: it's not the game, it's the persons chosen rules changes and play style.

This often will end the conversation as the person will feel personalty attacked as I posted "It's not the rules, it's you".

Not that even if they can accept the problem might be them it helps much any. Just take the classic

Poster: "monks suck(in my game with my changed rules and play style)!

Me: no they don't, just don't make your game all about endless mindless combat and monk characters are fine

Poster:No way, my game is so awesome and is about so many awesome things..but, um, monks still suck!

Me: well, ok then, give me a non combat example of your problem?

Poster: LOGS OFF

 

[Asisreo]

Since this is the internet, we're all subject to many different experiences not just in D&D but even in real life.

Some of us have significant others, some don't. Some of us have jobs, some don't. Some of us are more cognitively divergent than others. That in-and-of itself will seriously change the way the game will be played. And that's okay.

We're a collection of strangers that happens to have a medium in which we can talk yet remain strangers. This forum lets us express some of our thoughts as loud as possible without causing tangible hostility. Some are more willing than others to use that.

But this also gives us a power to truly learn the perspective of others in areas we would never even touch in our lives.

As for why we can't agree on everything, well, that's how life happens. One person's experiences will vary from another and both their attitude towards that experience as well as the way its projected will always be something different.

As long as people remain respectful and rule-bound according to the hosts, then I don't have a problem even with opposing opinions. Nobody changes their mind from one extreme to another over the course of a thread, but sometimes when you give them the time to experience similar things, they may come around to re-evaluate.

 

[payn]

Well, it was a good thread while it lasted.

 

[Oofta]

I think most of our differences are blown way out of proportion. I know some people are "if the DM does X I'll walk away". For that matter, I have a few lines myself. I wouldn't have fun in a murder-hobo game for example. Fortunately there are a lot of people out there and a wide variety of play styles and if you're willing to be a bit flexible you can find a match.

It's kind of like the 80/20 rule: when looking at a solution to a business problem if you can address 80% of the issues it's a good start. I could probably have fun gaming with 80% of the people on this forum. We'd probably run slightly different games but from the outside most people couldn't tell. I might rule on [insert spell or feat here] slightly different but the DM would make the ruling and we'd move on.

 

[Lycurgon]

Rest assured that Internet forums are not representative of the D&D community at large. When WotC were creating 5e and doing all of their surveys on all the D&D Next playtest material, they were surprised to learn that Internet forums were not representative of the D&D player base. Prior to that they had mostly got their feedback from forums but once they realised they weren't a representative source of feed back they stopped relying on them and continued to rely on surveys, which have a much bigger, wider source of feed back.

So keep that in mind when reading them. These forums are not representative and only have a small portion of views. Probably these groups are of people that are more interested in rules and theories (and probably arguing too) than your average player.

 

[jayoungr]

Anyway, I guess the topic I am bringing up for discussion is if the boards and the people who tend to frequent them have a warping effect on viewing the game and game style/approach and its players.

Sometimes I feel like all the people who like D&D are off actually playing it, and the only people who still hang around here having discussions are those who don't like it and want to complain.

(I freely admit that's an exaggeration.)

 

[el-remmen]

Sometimes I feel like all the people who like D&D are off actually playing it, and the only people who still hang around here having discussions are those who don't like it and want to complain.

(I freely admit that's an exaggeration.)

I am a huge Prince fan and way back in the day I was part of Usenet Prince Fan group, which I finally left when I realized it was better called "The Formerly Known as Prince Fans Usenet Group" because so many people who claimed to love his work seemed to do nothing but complain about it.

 

[Umbran]

This is the kind of thing I’ll ague about animatedly on forums - I strongly believe in keeping the PCs’ feelings exclusively under control of the players. But in an actual game, I might grumble internally if told my character “got a bad feeling”, but it wouldn’t actually be a deal-breaker. Maybe if the DM was constantly narrating what my character felt I would eventually quit the game, but most likely it would just be a minor annoyance that was vastly outweighed by how fun the rest of the game is.

This is a place where it is helpful to remember language. "Feeling" can speak of the character's emotional state, or it can indicate a sensation or impression - as in, "You get a feeling you are being watched." "You get a bad feeling," can be the shiver up the spine, or the momentary dropping in the pit of the stomach that is commonly used to indicate wrongness, but not the character's actual emotional state. It would be better if the GM used more descriptive language for the sensation, but them not doing so doesn't mean they are intending to dictate the character's emotional state.

When WotC were creating 5e and doing all of their surveys on all the D&D Next playtest material, they were surprised to learn that Internet forums were not representative of the D&D player base.

Do you have a quote of "Hey, we were surprised to find out..." from someone at WotC? Because otherwise... I doubt they were actually surprised. I mean, we have been noting since back in the 3e era, when occasionally WotC folks where known to read the place, that the boards do not constitute a representative sample of players overall. Anyone who has even a basic understanding of statistics could tell you that.

 

[Ralif Redhammer]

I'd also like to think that a lot of us, while we're willing to workshop and jaw about rulings and interpretations here, in actual play are more easy-going. Maybe not always by much, but I think when we need to move the game forward rather than debating things out, it's a different situation.

We will always have common ground with other players, shared experiences, and be more alike than not. At con and public games, I've only gamed with a few people that had such a radically different takes on gaming that it was like playing with an alien.

All that being said, my twin brother and I have been playing D&D since the same age, frequently in the same campaigns. We were informed by the same books and movies growing up. If any two people were going to have the exact same playing styles, it would be us. But while our playstyles are mostly in sync, we still differ in our approaches as players and DMs.

 

[TheSword]

Woody Guthrie’s Mean Talkin Blues sums me up pretty well...

I'm the meanest man that ever had a brain,
All I scatter is aches and pains.
I'm carbolic acid, and a poison face,
And I stand flat-footed in favor of crime and disgrace.
If I ever done a good deed, I'm sorry of it.

I'm mean in the East, mean in the West,
Mean to the people that I like the best.
I go around a-causin' lot of accidents,
And I push folks down, and I cause train wrecks.
I'm a big disaster, just goin' somewhere's to happen.
I'm an organized famine, studyin' now I can be a little bit meaner.
I'm still a whole lot too good to suit myself, just mean

I ride around on the subway trains,
Laughin' at the tight shoes dealin' you pain.
And I laugh when the car shakes from side to side,
I laugh my loudest when other people cry.
Can't help it, I was born good, I guess,
Just like you or anybody else,
But then I, just turned off mean..

I hate everybody don't think like me,
And I'd rather see you dead than I'd ever see you free.
Rather see you starved to death
Than see you at work,
And I'm readin' all the books I can
To learn how to hurt,
Daily Misery, spread diseases,
Keep you without no vote,
Keep you without no union.

Well, I hurt when I see you gettin' 'long so well,
I'd ten times rather see you in the fires of hell.
I can't stand to fixed, see you there all fixed up in that house so nice,
I'd rather keep you in that rotten hole, with the bugs and the lice,
And the roaches, and the termites,
And the sand fleas, and the tater bugs,
And the grub worms, and the stingarees,
And the tarantulas, and the spiders, childs of the earth,
The ticks and the blow-flies,
These is all of my little angels
That go 'round helpin' me do the best parts of my meanness.

And mosquiters,

Well, I used to be a pretty fair organized feller,
Till I turned a scab and then I turned off yeller,
Fought ev'ry union with teeth and toenail,
And I sprouted a six-inch stinger right in the middle of the tail,
And I growed horns,
And then I cut 'em off, I wanted to fool you.

I hated union every where,
Cause God likes unions
And I hate God!

Well, if I can get the fat to hatin' the lean
That'd tickle me more than anything I've seen,
Then get the colors to fightin' one another,
And friend against friend, and brother, and sister against brother,

That'll be just it.
Everybody's brains a-boilin' in turpentine,
And their teeth fallin' out all up and down the streets,
That'll just suit me fine.
Cause I hate everything that's union,
And I hate everything that's organized,

And I hate everything that's planned,
And I love to hate and I hate to love!

I'm mean,

I'm just mean.