Now is the season of our discontent?

[Warren Okuma]

Personally, I don't understand people who play one single system, whether or not they change from one to another at any point. I question why anyone feels the need to declare that they intend to give up on a system for good; if I feel burned out with D&D, I might play GURPS or a World of Darkness game or Unknown Armies, or use an OGL system like True20 for my D&D-like games, and get back to D&D when I feel the urge to play it again . . .

. . . but to give up on any game so entirely and, frankly, dramatically? I don't see the point.

Absolutely. You just have to find out what your group has fun with what system. For my group, DnD is a great way to blow off steam and kill stress. For other styles of campaign we use different systems. Hard SF Gurps, soft SF depends, gritty fantasy gurps, cinematic games Champions or BESM etc... that's what we found out that's what we like.

So come back to DnD when you want to blow off steam. Just try it out that way and let your group know or whatever.

 

[Lord Mhoram]

Personally, I don't understand people who play one single system, whether or not they change from one to another at any point

. . . but to give up on any game so entirely and, frankly, dramatically? I don't see the point.

To answer that question -

I play the occasional D&D, and usually just solo with the Wife. But I am a one system guy. HERO.

The reasons - The rules fit my preconceptions and playstyle to a T. It is an Universal game so I can play any genre. I love to tinker with rules when I GM, HERO is great for that. I've been playing it for 20+ Years, so I know the game so well, I never even have to think about rules.

That's my reasons.

I still buy and read other RPGS, but in the 22 years since I started playing hero, I would say less thatn 18 months were spent playing something else.

I do like D&D 3.x, so I wander over here and enjoy the discussions. And I am always looking for nifty ideas to steal for my Fantasy HERO game.

 

[Warren Okuma]

To answer that question -

I play the occasional D&D, and usually just solo with the Wife. But I am a one system guy. HERO.

The reasons - The rules fit my preconceptions and playstyle to a T. It is an Universal game so I can play any genre. I love to tinker with rules when I GM, HERO is great for that. I've been playing it for 20+ Years, so I know the game so well, I never even have to think about rules.

That's my reasons.

I still buy and read other RPGS, but in the 22 years since I started playing hero, I would say less thatn 18 months were spent playing something else.

I do like D&D 3.x, so I wander over here and enjoy the discussions. And I am always looking for nifty ideas to steal for my Fantasy HERO game.

Yeah I can see hero being a universal system for you. It's solid. How about starting a new thread with what you borrowed for your Fantasy Hero game? BTW Fantasy Hero 1st or 2nd edition?

 

[Twowolves]

I spent 15 straight years plaing with those one second combat rounds, they work great. Thanks for asking! When my group started playing D&D 3.0 when it first came out, I had to adjust to doing a huge amount of activity each combat round. Even then, you seemed to be doing a great deal of activity in a six second round. I much prefer the one second GURPS combat round. I don't see why people have an issue with it.

Whee! My axe wielding viking warrior gets to spend every other combat round.....

.... readying his axe. *yawn*



Moving 30 feet in six seconds and wailing away with a weapon hardly constitutes a "huge ammount of activity" in my book. Nor in reality, for that matter.


What kills both HERO and GURPS for me is the fact that a +1 isn't a +1. It's either a +11% or a +2% or +nothing, depending on what your base chance was. A +1 when you needed a 10 or less is a huge bonus, that same "+1" nets you much less when you needed a 16 or less.

 

[Lord Mhoram]

Yeah I can see hero being a universal system for you. It's solid. How about starting a new thread with what you borrowed for your Fantasy Hero game? BTW Fantasy Hero 1st or 2nd edition?

3rd actually - Using HERO 5th.

Most of the stuff I borrow are just little bits here and there - someone will mention a monster they used, that will spawn an idea for me to use. Or a spell there, or a scene to use.

 

[Moggthegob]

I like 3.5. It's the game that I have been able to get peopl into easiest. Honestly, I have a fanatically loyal group here consisting of 13 people who want to meet more regularly than I actually have time for.

One of the other guys prefers to run M&M but that's only becus he feels the rules there are a lot more cinematic which is all he really wants and the rules-light dumbed downness is fun for us... for a little. His campaigns are fun little breaks from my d&d campaigns( which while fun have a more serious tone to them). There is room for both, but M&M was difficult simply in terms of availability. We have one gaming store that islocated about 25 mintues away and even then they do not always have everything we want or need. With dnd the odds are pretty good. With anything else, I am not holding my breath.

Anything available free online doesnt work with my players simply because we decided long ago, 1 laptop per gaming group(i.e the dms). Aside from that, we never have problems with the system itself, aside from players who refuse to learn how to build to survive(by having i dunno more than a 9 con with his elven wizard). The rulessuit us and the tacitcal movement is a large boon for the few of us who played 1e ( ah the inches system or even for the other who like axis and allies, Final fantasy tactics or even chess I have heards it referred to. Tactics + Fantasy= good in my book.

 

[RFisher]

What is it about 3.5 that pushed you away?

I try not to think of it in quite those terms. So, let me try to tell you: What I learned from 3e...

• I'd been on a path towards more minimalist systems before 3e appeared. Eventually, it showed me that I had been on the right path...for me.
• That I need to let D&D (any edition) be D&D. While there's certainly some flexibility, D&D shines brightest when I just let it be itself. If I want to create a fantasy world significantly different than the "ambient D&D fantasy world", I'm better off going with Gurps or Risus or almost anything else.
• I prefer fewer (as jdrakeh said it) situation-specific modifiers. (Although I'm still not sure that really captures what I mean.)
• Having different rules for PCs & monsters is OK. In fact, it can be very good design to have different rules for PCs & monsters.
• There are lots of things that don't need any rules at all.
• When evaluating a rule in a game, I have to look past face-value. What are the wider implications of this rule? (This is kind of indirect, since 3e made many changes I would have made to D&D, which seemed to help me appreciate the older rule in a new light.)

 

[Ry]

RFisher, can you drop me a line at ryanstoughton <zagga> hotmail.com? I'm massively interested in any serious uses of Risus.

 

[mhensley]

What pushed me away is the deck-building, combo-finding, power-gaming mentality that D&D 3.x encourages in players. It's no longer about playing a role - it's now all about showing off your l33t haxx0r skilz to pwn those n00b monsters. Bah, I'll be running C&C tonight.

 

[Numion]

What turns people off is the huge options for character creation that can drive lesser men insane...

Or what that leads into: the one-armed hunchback albino dwarf who also 'happens' to be a master of the broadsword, like someone put it.

A group of people finds the class system of D&D restrictive. A much smaller sub-group can actually make use of GURPS' 'realistic' character creation system without ending up with a group of quasimodos.