The "I Didn't Comment in Another Thread" Thread

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

...even if it isn't consciously capitalism, I would still be willing to wager it is unconsciously capitalism

I think you are probably right.

 

[MarkB]

Yeah, but once you have your copy of GoblinQuest D20, or whatever, it doesn't really matter if GoblinCorp goes out of business 30 seconds later. You can play GoblinQuest for the rest of time. Even if no one but you and your band of misfit friends loves the game, you have a hobby that makes you happy.

Unless you were looking forward to later supplements that will now never be released, or hoping to expand your player base, or just want to be able to enthuse about it online and get into interesting discussions about the lore and mechanics without everyone else going "Goblin whatnow?"

 

[Wofano Wotanto]

Unless you were looking forward to later supplements that will now never be released, or hoping to expand your player base, or just want to be able to enthuse about it online and get into interesting discussions about the lore and mechanics without everyone else going "Goblin whatnow?"

All good points, and often applicable to hypothetically "live" games as well as those whose publishers have vanished.

 

[billd91]

Yeah, but once you have your copy of GoblinQuest D20, or whatever, it doesn't really matter if GoblinCorp goes out of business 30 seconds later. You can play GoblinQuest for the rest of time. Even if no one but you and your band of misfit friends loves the game, you have a hobby that makes you happy.

Maybe? Yet it sure can be a joy to get a new supplement for GoblinQuest D20 that's well made and has decent production values too. It makes the hobby that makes me happy even better.
Honestly, there may be some people completely satisfied with some product or two that came out years ago and was never expanded or supported with additional material. But I'd bet there are more who would have been willing to buy at least a few more publications had GoblinQuest D20's publisher not given up the ghost.

 

[bmfrosty]

Really good Questing Beast video today on this. The best numbers are near the end, IMO, where they look at what the percentage of games on Kickstarter OSR makes up, along with raw dollar amounts. I came away thinking that OSR games have never been bigger, at least in terms of Kickstarter funding which is one easy-ish to find metric.



And Pathfinder may be a retroclone, but it's not OSR. Although many OSR games are retroclones, and vice versa, they're not the same thing.

The style of play most supported by 3E/PF is different in a number of ways than what the TSR editions of D&D were enabling. Yes, one could always play a game that ignores a given game's strengths vs. weaknesses. (This argument hinges on the presumption that system matters to an extent and if you don't believe in that at all, that's a whole separate argument.) One could modify and tweak 3E to make it into a scary and gritty dungeoncrawler, in the same way one could modify a Cessna to be a land vehicle, but in both cases, it's easier to go with something purpose-built for that purpose from the get-go.

I fully agree that Pathfinder is not OSR. I've run across multiple people who argue that it's OSR because it's a retroclone, and I just saw that video.

I think there are several interesting splits between d&d style games. The first is if there's metagame around character builds. I think everything starting with Players Options in the official D&D lines into 3rd edition and beyond include that and I'd say having that is not OSR. Reduce complexity in fighting rules is OSR. Reducing the number of attributes from 6 starts getting you into this NuOSR thing. Same can be said for removing weapons and just saying fighters do d8, wizards do d4, and everyone else does d6. Traditionally it's all D6 anyway. Some games tie you strongly into a setting and some tie you into a setting style. Another factor is damage scaling. OSR games tend to increase the reliability of a figher doing damage in a round, while modern systems tend to scale that up. There are probably a bunch of other things that I haven't thought of at this point.

 

[Wofano Wotanto]

Not sure what a modern edition of TOON would change, but a nice physical reprint with more art and better layout would be nice. If nothing else the viewing recs could be expanded some, been a fair bit of quality animation in the appropriate vein since the 80s. Still pretty impressed by that big wave of Disney shorts from a few years back. Very different art style that broke with tradition but the writing was very creative and the physical comedy was rock solid.

 

[gorice]

I fully agree that Pathfinder is not OSR. I've run across multiple people who argue that it's OSR because it's a retroclone, and I just saw that video.

I think there are several interesting splits between d&d style games. The first is if there's metagame around character builds. I think everything starting with Players Options in the official D&D lines into 3rd edition and beyond include that and I'd say having that is not OSR. Reduce complexity in fighting rules is OSR. Reducing the number of attributes from 6 starts getting you into this NuOSR thing. Same can be said for removing weapons and just saying fighters do d8, wizards do d4, and everyone else does d6. Traditionally it's all D6 anyway. Some games tie you strongly into a setting and some tie you into a setting style. Another factor is damage scaling. OSR games tend to increase the reliability of a figher doing damage in a round, while modern systems tend to scale that up. There are probably a bunch of other things that I haven't thought of at this point.

If I ever want to really annoy some OSR person (I don't), I'm torn between insisting that Pathfinder is OSR, or that everything after OD&D is not OSR.

"Oh, you're into TSR-style D&D? It's a bit too mainstream for me. They really sold out after 1974, it just wasn't the same."

 

[prabe]

What did you buy? Maybe someone here will spare you the storage space (assuming it's a physical object, that is). One man's trash and all that.

It's on PDF, so it's not taking up any real space, and I wouldn't slag on it here anyway.

 

[bmfrosty]

If I ever want to really annoy some OSR person (I don't), I'm torn between insisting that Pathfinder is OSR, or that everything after OD&D is not OSR.

"Oh, you're into TSR-style D&D? It's a bit too mainstream for me. They really sold out after 1974, it just wasn't the same."

It's all a bunch of judgement calls anyway. Personally it's all about not having the build metagame and reducing fighting complexity. I also like having 6 attributes. I give DCC a pass in that it still has 6, but I still think it would have been better if it had the original 6 and added Luck as a thing out of the 6 core stats.

 

[Gradine]

"Nobody says this"

...you said it. Yourself. With your words (well fingers I guess, maybe you use to voice-to-text, I'm not here to judge). In English. We were all there.