Sentimentality And D&D Editions OR Happiness Is The Edition That Brings You Joy
- Thread starter Angel Tarragon
- Start date
Charwoman Gene
Adventurer
Okay, so explain how this differs from 2e, aka post-Gary TSRs Fantasy Heartbreaker?
3e, aka Peter Adkison's WotC Fantasy Heartbreaker.
Hell, AD&D aka post-Arneson Fantasy Heartbreaker.
Please keep in mind you have referred to 4e as being a D&D clone.
Keefe the Thief
Hero
"It wouldn´t have been D&D without the name on the cover" always reminds me of a friend of mine i beat playing table tennis: "You wouldn´t have won if you didn´t play so good!"
Well yes. If the situation would have been totally different, everything would have been totally different. Maybe. Because i don´t exist as someone who doesn´t play table tennis well, so the point is moot. And 4e was permeated from design-start to design-finish by people who played, thought and breathed D&D (of course, perhaps not the parts of D&D you thought important).
Perhaps Dr. Frankenstein would have been able to remove D&D surgically from Mike Mearls before he began to design Project Orcus, but otherwise...
Well yes. If the situation would have been totally different, everything would have been totally different. Maybe. Because i don´t exist as someone who doesn´t play table tennis well, so the point is moot. And 4e was permeated from design-start to design-finish by people who played, thought and breathed D&D (of course, perhaps not the parts of D&D you thought important).
Perhaps Dr. Frankenstein would have been able to remove D&D surgically from Mike Mearls before he began to design Project Orcus, but otherwise...
Well duh, it's subjective. I can see a pretty clear path from 2E to 3E - most of the same clunk is there (e.g. spells with a lot of potentially game-world-affecting scope), and the implied setting is pretty much the same. The trail goes cold from 3E to 4E, though, because the game has been replaced mechanically from the ground up, and the implied setting is full of dodgy...stuff....which for me ruin the vibe.
i.e. It's a new game to me, both in form and function, and it's unequivocably not D&D. YMMV, but I'm pretty sure I'm right on this one for all but the wilfully disbelieving. The evidence which matters to me, personally, is that it's the first edition I don't like, so something's changed, in a big way. I also saved versus illusion, and have little respect for the sore thumb design artifacts in the game, nor the cynical contents of the implied setting. That never used to be the case. I don't expect you to agree, but opinions are all we have, here.
To refresh your palate on what D&D stands for, go have a look at Castles & Crusades. Compare it with 4E D&D. An in-print game without the title "D&D" is now more D&D than "D&D", perhaps because it's unsaddled with the need to sell miniatures and splat. Hmmm. (And I'm not implying that C&C is perfect, or even better than 4E for that matter, by that....just that it's on a path "more D&D" than the one 4E D&D seems to be on.)
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vagabundo
Adventurer
My group has only ever played DND, never had an interest in playing other games and has played 1e, 2e, 3e and now 4e. They have no complained that this is not DND, they only want to play DND.
So it seems that many people still feel 4e is DND, so your wrong. For you personally it might not feel like DND but there are too many styles of playing DND, throughout the editions, for you to equivocally say 4e DND is not DND. The fact that a huge section of the DND fan base now plays 4e and believes it is DND means that it is DND. It is not based on what name is printed on the front cover.
IMO 4e is more DND that 3e every was, but of course each person and group can differ in their play styles. I believe 4e caters more for the casual groups.
I understand your hatred of Dragonborn Warlords, but they are now as DND as the bard or monk.
Repeating the same meme repeatedly, in multiple threads, to diminish 4e gets tiring.
Fifth Element
Legend
Wait, it's a completely new game, but it's a D&D clone? If being a D&D clone is a requirement for being a heartbreaker, then 4E is less of a heartbreaker than 1E, 2E or 3E.
Yay, semantics! Okay... here's how it works. We pound the guy who is attempting to make a point via 'clever' tricks. Awesome; I get to earn back all of those stripes I lost in high school debate...
I think his whole point is that, if this game was released with elves, and goblins, and octopoid mentalists, there would be people calling this an OUTRAGE and plow through it as a D&D clone. However, looking past the icons of the setting, you see a game which is far removed system-wise from any earlier editions. Thus both reasons would fit; if this game was released outside of the D&D label it would be considered a D&D Clone for the setting, but because of its 'unique' styling it would also be considered something different and something which is trying to be a giantkiller.
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I don't like the cosmology and the interconnected nature of narrative and system. Having read through the books I find them highly disappointing for a lot of reasons, and though I can see the game fitting certain types (wargaming in the vein of Final Fantasy Tactics would be served well, superheroic games would be served well, I would love to run an 8-bit kingdom game in 4e
) it doesn't have that mouthfeel to me which has defined 'fantasy roleplaying game' over the last... too many years . However, there's so much connection between a specific cosmology... it disappoints. 4e would have made an excellent modular system. D&D in and of itself is very hard to convince individuals into playing in a modular system; you just don't move an average group between time and space. If the whole thing is stripped of story, and served up with modules it would be an amazing thing... but it's D&D, and it won't ever happen.
Slainte,
-Loonook.
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