Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="Morrick" data-source="post: 4117872" data-attributes="member: 30931">4.0 VS 3.5 the battle begins or is it all in our head?As a player from way back when D&D was actually a roleplaying game I find this sudden Hatfields and McCoy mentality very odd. It's sort of a divide and conquer mentality. Very unproductive. For those 4E minded players that seem to feel that 3.5 supporters are the anti-christs of the RPG community. I think you need to step back and look at 4.0 as it relates to 3.5 as it relates to 3.0 and so on. 4.0 is essentially a boardgame with roleplaying elements and that's ok. 3.5 is a close second. You can still however play 3.5 without a battle mat. I know I have played without one on several occasions. 3.5 is more complicated because it tries to be faithful to that Rping tradition that was the bedrock since D&Ds inception in the 70s.  The phenominon of the "MIN/MAXER" or power gamer was something rarely tolerated back in the day of 1E and 2E. They were referred to as Monty Hall players among other things. 3.5 has gotten watered down like Everquest did in the MMO community don't blame it on the players or third party publishers blame it on WotC and their shortterm fast return business strategy. With the capturing of the name brand so to speak by WoTC and the restructuring of the game with 3E followed by 3.5E. WotC gradually took D&D out of the Rping realm and into the land of Magic the Gathering. 4E was inevitable based on their development strategy. If you have played Magic or any of its contemporaries it's all about Min/Maxing in terms of game play. There is certainly a market for that type of game. So there is a market for 4E. D&D however wasn't started with players or designers with that kind of mentality. It was designed to use your imagination, to work as a team, and to be a part of a story. The living worlds were a perfect example of that tradition still being considered on some level. So really out of this metamorphisis came two separate but valid gamestyles with two separate and valid types of players.Most 3.5 enthusiasts don't have an issue with 4E. They have an issue with WotC. They have an issue with a Microsoft of the roleplaying community, which D&D under WotC has become, saying, "We are going to change the system, We are going to change the software AND we are not going to support the old system and software.(Microsoft at least supports there old software)  If you don't like it, oh well, too bad." They have an issue with being forced to change there style of play because some upstart who probably never even considered D&D as a serious game 10 years ago has decided they are going to tell them that they really don't care about them. If WotC want to create a boardgame called 4E and if I decide to go out and shell more money on a new gaming system I have no problem with that. It's when you tell me I have no other choice if you want to play D&D and particularly(and this is really the fly in the ointment) if I want to play organized D&D. If the governing board of competitive chess owned a license on the game and walked into a national tournament and told the players that next year they would be playing checkers and if they don't like it go home and play with your frends I doubt seriously anyone would be happy.So before you start throwing mud at Paizo or ignorantly marginalizing 3.5 enthusiats you need to take a look at the BIG picture and stop arguing apples and oranges. Paizo is filling a void. They are not as diverse as Hasbro, WotC parent company. They can ill afford to make any marketing mistakes. If they invested all there resources in a product that tanks because the market bully is trying to coral the consumer then they loose there shirts and Hasbro says ooops our 3rd quarter earnings in that sector are a bit low hmmmm. They are playing smart and in so doing they are giving the consumer what he/she deserves; a choice. <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f631.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":o" title="Eek!    :o"  data-smilie="9"data-shortname=":o" /></blockquote>

Verification