D&D 5E The Next Generation

[ArmoredSaint]

Wow. I don't know where to begin. What a monumentally offensive, self-centered, and hubris-laden original post...

I'm in my early thirties and am just barely old enough to have cut my teeth on 1st edition AD&D, which is by far my favorite edition of the game. I suppose that I qualify as "old guard" by your standards.

They already tried it your way. They already tried to push the "old guard" aside--changed things, rejected long-standing traditions, and gave the finger to nostalgic appeal--in 4th edition and look what happened? The younger generation didn't buy it in great enough numbers to keep it afloat. I don't want to start an edition war, but that point is inarguable--if ignoring the tastes of the older crowd in favor of making the game fresh and new to cater to those of the Pokemon generation had worked out for the brand, we wouldn't be staring down the barrel of a new edition, now would we? Younger gamers have other options available to meet their needs--tabletop RPGs, CCGs, and MMORPGs--and a large number of them won't ever look in D&D's direction no matter how much the game tries to cater to their tastes.

No thanks. The "new guard" were given their chance and they dropped the ball. Fans of the newer fantasy fiction failed to support the brand in sufficient numbers to make aiming the game at their tastes a worthwhile endeavor. In the meantime, the Old School Renaissance happened. What was old is new again.

So, no--we won't go away. You've no right to tell us to do so, and no leg to stand on with the assertion that the new game ought to be aimed exclusively at the younger crowd who failed it the last time they got what they wanted. As others have said, it is bad business practice to deliberately alienate your long-standing loyal customer base in order to woo new customers. It didn't work with New Coke, and QED, it didn't work with D&D either.

May your complaints ever fall upon deaf ears.

 

[Doug McCrae]

After all, you want a game that can do Conan, and Elric, and Frodo, right?

D&D has never done any of those remotely well. The only things it emulates to any degree are the crazy wandering monster and magic-infested world of Vance's Dying Earth, and his 15 page story, Mazirian the Magician, which is basically the only source for the rules of Vancian magic.

The same thing can be said for Conan, for Frodo, for the Gray Mouser, for... whatever else traditional sources you can name for D&D. I know there's all kinds of sources, all kinds of books and what-not that no doubt innumerable people that frequent these forums can toss at me.

All that Appendix N stuff gets talked about too much on ENWorld. Gygax gets quoted too much also. I'm probably more guilty of that than anyone else.

gaming needs to understand that the environment in which it was born is changing, and that it needs to change with it to stay relevant.

That's true, but I think it always has done. For example, early D&D was much akin to a massed battle, where PC life was cheap. From 1e onwards, it has become harder and harder to kill a PC and characters have become more and more mechanically detailed, the reason being that people don't play D&D like a wargame any more.

 

[Nellisir]

Yeah, I was thinking that New Crobizon was a very D&D world, and Perdido St Station almost seemed like an adventure that was novelized. You could certainly easily run that kind of thing in D&D. The thing is, all that is new is old. I mean isn't New Crobizon kind of a reworking of City State of the Invincible Overlord pretty much? You could certainly fit the same style of adventure into either one.

I was thinking Joe Abercrombie's First Law trilogy (& accompanying books), but Perdido St. Station is even better.

There is (once again) a trend towards a "grittier" or more "roguish" bent of fantasy (Lies of Locke Lamora; Name of the Wind; First Law). I think D&D really can deal with that just as well as it can older fantasy. Better, if anything - I suspect there's been a certain homogenization of fantasy tropes that didn't exist in the 60's and early 70's. I'm reading the first Witch World books right now, and really, when was the last time anyone read a "serious" fantasy or sci-fantasy novel that had a character step through from our world? It used to be popular, and now it's cliche.

90% of mimicing a novel is reskinning existing elements; the remaining 10% is actual mechanical changes. I think the bigger problem is DMs don't anticpate how changing from a novel, with its directed viewpoint and fixed narrative, to the interactive and multi-character tabletop RPG changes the feel. You can't have 6 characters -all- be Harry Potter.

I try to be relatively up-to-date on my reading, within the areas that interest me, but I also try to urge other readers (younger or not) to investigate older books that might not be popular at the moment, but are, IMO, worth reading. I finished the Riddle-Master of Hed trilogy a month or two ago, and it's a shame that those books don't get more discussion nowadays.

 

[billd91]

Yeah, it's a pretty egregious thing to say. "Hey, you who have been playing this game for 30 years - well, I'm just past puberty and I've decided you should bugger off and give the game to me! I have, like, a $5 allowance and everything! Your stuff is MINE now!"

Why not find your own game, if my one isn't to your tastes? Why should I be forced to stop playing the game I've supported for 30 years because you want to turn it into something else?

(All this addressed at hypothetical person, of course. Even the OP wasn't that bad!)

This really is a family of questions that needs to be asked more often.

 

[Doug McCrae]

You have to bear in mind that D&D was created by young men - Gygax and Arneson - in their early 30s and mid-20s. It was played by adolescents and teenagers. These were all open-minded people, people without much baggage, without preconceived ideas, ready to try something new just because it seemed cool.

Most of D&D is the way it is because a few young guys in the early 70s thought up some stuff, in a very short space of time, that seemed cool. It's a weird mix of wargame, classic fantasy and 70s pop culture.

D&D was successful for two reasons:
1) It was first to market. This has been borne out by WotC's research.
2) Fantasy was big in the 70s because the world was changing fast, times were hard, and people wanted escapism. No more bright future like in the 60s.

D&D could've had a magic system out of Arthurian myth, or from Stormbringer, and it would still have been a big hit. Most elements of its makeup are totally contingent.

Step forward 40 years. The type of people who play D&D are totally different now. They're old. Those same guys who wanted something new in the 70s don't want anything new in 2012. Their attitudes have calcified. They are set in their ways. They want stuff that reminds them of their youth. They want nostalgia, and they're prepared to pay. If these guys had been around in 1974, in their mid-40s to mid-50s, they'd have *hated* D&D. But they'd be all over Frank Sinatra's comeback, and all that 50s nostalgia like Happy Days.

 

[El Mahdi]

Does D&D really have to try an emulate every new fad that comes along?

What ever happened to just making new RPGs to handle new stuff? If you want to play Harry Potter, then there should be a separate Harry Potter RPG. Why is everyone so desperate to piggyback on the D&D brand?

It did in the '70's and '80's and '90's, I don't know why it would be any different today.

Nonsense. It didn't try to emulate Star Wars, He-man, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, etc.

D&D doesn't really "emulate" anything. While at the same time, it can be "used" to emulate most anything (to varying degrees of success). I understand what you're saying to Kamikaze, but he was making a tongue in cheek comment that I believe meant what I just said. It could emulate each new fad in the 70's, 80's, and 90's...and each new edition "modernizes" to a certain extent. I think it's ability to emulate throughout the different decades is a testament to just how good a rules system D&D is and has been.

So, it' isn't necessarily a matter of people trying to "piggyback" off the D&D brand. It's simply a preference to wanting to use the rules they think are the best, and that they like the most, to play the genres and settings they like the most.

What I don't and apparently never will understand, are gamers that are so bothered by what other people want to do with D&D. D&D is not WhereMyD20's D&D, nor is it anybody elses, unless it's being played at your table. When it comes right down to it, D&D is WotC's D&D. And WotC will always do with the game what they think will get the most people to use it (read as "buy it"). If that means appealing to Harry Potter fans (or any other group of fans), then that's what they're likely to do. And they'd be foolish not to.

So basically and speaking generally, D&D as a brand does need to attempt to cater to each new fad that comes along.

As to "What ever happened to just making new RPGs to handle new stuff?": WotC does do that...they're called new editions. Also, just making new RPG's (or editions) each time, winnows your fan base down into ever more and more small groups...groups that are less and less interested in your new RPG's/Editions.

So, if you don't like the directions D&D takes as it evolves, you're in luck: you have plenty of past editions that I'm sure will grab your fancy. But insisting that D&D never change, never adapt, never do anything but remain the one and only version or form of it one prefers, is simply futile, foolish, and unrealistic.

However, as to those that think 5E should completely ignore tradition and older gamers in favor of only new ideas and new gamers...that's just as futile, foolish, and unrealistic as those who want it to never change.

WotC tried doing that to one extent or another with almost every new edtion, and each time they lost a little more of their fan base (read as "old gamers") as a result...eventually reaching the point where the group of those who didn't play the current edition of D&D, was at least as large or larger than the group that did. I don't believe they are foolish enough to repeat that same mistake so soon. I also believe WotC isn't foolish enough to listen to those on either extreme of this issue.

 

[Fifth Element]

Why not find your own game, if my one isn't to your tastes? Why should I be forced to stop playing the game I've supported for 30 years because you want to turn it into something else?

To be fair, no one can force you to stop playing any game. Even if the newest edition of the game was made specifically to piss you off, you could still play your preferred edition instead. You're rather missing the point - we're talking about the newest edition of the game, not the ones that came before. It seems to me the OP is talking about his "own game" as you say, in suggesting the new game should be directed at him rather than you.

One could easily respond to your question "Why should each new edition of that game continue to cater to you? You already have your D&D, now let me have mine." That's basically what the OP is saying, as I read it. You've had your game and your support for 30 years now, what more do you need?

And I also think you're underestimating the spending power of the "younger generation". If they can afford all these video games they're supposed to be playing, they can surely afford D&D books.

I can't believe we're talking about a younger generation. I've been playing since 1E, but I'm only 36. I'm not old enough to be discussing this!!

 

[the Jester]

Hey, old people....go away.

Wow, I'm torn between:

Dismissive much?
and
Nice troll!

I'm amazed this thread is even still open, to be honest.

 

[El Mahdi]

That's asking for the game rules to allow you to support an entire specific setting.

And what's wrong with that exactly...? Especially as "D&D" has been doing that for decades...both officially and unofficially.


Officially:

• Greyhawk
• Mystara
• Forgotten Realms
• Dragonlance
• Darksun
• Ravenloft
• Planescape
• Gamma World
• Wheel of Time
• Birthright
• D20 Modern (Dark*Matter)
• D20 Future (Star*Drive)
• and the aforementioned Star Wars...

Unofficially:

• just a couple hundred or so third party settings...give or take a hundred

"D&D" in all it's varied editions and permutations, has been and is a very versatile, flexible, and fun system. With room for all. Don't worry, it's actually quite easy in an RPG, to remove somebody elses peanut butter from your chocolate.

 

[Morrus]

To be fair, no one can force you to stop playing any game. Even if the newest edition of the game was made specifically to piss you off, you could still play your preferred edition instead.

That's not really an answer to the issue, is it? "If you don't like it, play something else"? No, I'd rather like it and play it. I don't feel that's an unreasonable position.

You're rather missing the point - we're talking about the newest edition of the game, not the ones that came before. It seems to me the OP is talking about his "own game" as you say, in suggesting the new game should be directed at him rather than you.

In that case, I fully understood the point. I want the new game to be directed at me, not him. Was that not clear?

One could easily respond to your question "Why should each new edition of that game continue to cater to you? You already have your D&D, now let me have mine." That's basically what the OP is saying, as I read it. You've had your game and your support for 30 years now, what more do you need?

One needs to read the rest of my post for the answer to your question. The bit that talks about 4E, consolidation, and Pathfinder.