The Really Interesting Hypothetical (RE: 3e/4e/5e)

[innerdude]

So with the all-but-certain conventional wisdom being that Monte Cook is working on 5e, here's the really interesting question that I haven't seen discussed:

If WotC had essentially made 4e what Pathfinder is now, how different would the RPG landscape look?

Would many of the current 4e fans turned their noses up at it and gone back to playing retroclones/Runequest/HERO/anything else? Or would it have "fixed" enough of the problems with 3.x to bring some of them back?

Would it be as revered among 3.x-ers as Pathfinder is, or would it be viewed as "more of the same money-grabbing" by Wizards?

Would it have been seen as a greater success, both in terms of revenue and in the eyes of the fans?

I ask this, because there are clearly a sub-set of RPG players that won't ever look twice at D&D past 1e ever again, assuming they haven't moved on to something else, and aren't looking back. Neither Pathfinder nor 4e has probably captured their business loyalty.

But if Pathfinder was actually 4e, how would the scene heading into 5e look now, and would Paizo have even bothered creating the PFRPG at all?

In some ways, it's academic; there's no point in rehashing history, right? But on another level, I think there may be some interesting points about the evolving tastes/culture of us as gamers.

For example, I know for a fact before the 4e/3.x split, I would have NEVER considered running ANYTHING other than D&D. Now I've already dabbled in Savage Worlds, would love to try Runequest and Ars Magica, have gotten some experience with GURPS, want to try Dresden Files and Mongoose Traveller.......

In an interesting way, are we as gamers overall better off now than if 4e HADN'T been such a radical departure from its roots?

 

[Vascant]

It is hard to compare PF and 4e because PF is an evolution of 3.5e while 4e is a different ladder entirely.

There would of still been some issues such as the GSL which has had its own effect upon some gamers and a lot of publishers. There would also be the issues of how 4e was marketed to gamers, I know for a fact that turned off some people to the point the edition was never read and they just walked away.

I think it goes without saying that a WotC version of PF would of been a much easier pill to swallow then the vastly different direction it ended up going. Let me state I don't play PF but I have at least read it and have never read 4e.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

We still play 3.5Ed primarily- though we're playing someone else's 4Ed campaign right now because the 3.5Ed campaign is on hiatus while the DM gets a break- and in all honesty, few of us see Pathfinder as "The Solution." Personally, like most of the other 3.X RPGs, for everything I like about Pathfinder, I find something else I don't care for.

If I had the time and designer's chops to make it all work together, I'd meld things like Midnight's Heroic Paths, some of Pathfinders' take on classes like the Sorcerer and Witch, True20's/W&W's modular approach to making unique spells, AU/AE's take on classes like the Mage-Blade, Akashik & Oathsworn, racial class levels lesser/greater spells, alternative spell components and Feats from all over, etc. with 3.5Ed's corpus.

But the fact remains: a game that more closely resembled 3.5 or it's offspring would have been easier for many to swallow...and harder for others. To what degree? Unanswerable. I suspect there would have been many who wouldn't buy into such a game, just as surely as I would have. And the fact is, some of those non-purchasers would have been fans of 3.5Ed as-is: in my own group of 10+ gamers, I'm the only one who has bought a 3.X game (and I have several).

 

[Crazy Jerome]

Depends on what that hypothetical 4E was like. For example, if it had kept all the problems with higher level play, and powerful casters, but brought in a lot of the Arcana Evolved stuff/mechanics and went with the 4E take on monsters not being built the same as the characters ... I'd have probably got it and liked it, at least for awhile. Not that I like the dominating casters, but I can work around that if need be. But the sheer frustration of preparing for 3E games was just too much work for me, before 4E was even hinted at.

Barring something like that, I'd be playing MRQ II or Fantasy Hero or Burning Wheel. Those were all strong options (and still are) even with 4E on the table.

The "money grubbing" aspect doesn't personally bother me. I tend to skip editions in games that I like, until a "new" edition has enough new in it to tempt me. So I would hardly get irritated at WotC for "more of the same" in 2008, when I last bought in 2000-2002.

 

[GMforPowergamers]

If WotC had essentially made 4e what Pathfinder is now, how different would the RPG landscape look?

snip

But if Pathfinder was actually 4e, how would the scene heading into 5e look now, and would Paizo have even bothered creating the PFRPG at all?

ok, first part...if 4e looked like pathfinder then most of my group would not be buying it, and some would not even be Rping anymore.

4e was the logical step for us. It was the next evolotion of the game. We had already used ALOT of house rules to try to get around 3e.

In the game I was running when 4e was announced we used Bo9S classes, plus 2 varriants we found on the web of those classes, warlocks, Bards, and palidens. We were useing a Daily second wind (From SW Saga) and made a bunch of spells (IDentfy, and the like) into rituls anyone could do.

Many of my cirrent group had stop playing D&D for other systems by then, or just stoped RPing in general. The number 1-3 complaints:

1) Spellcasters too easy to min max as you get above 5th level
2) skill system to crazy/ social skills too much
3) the 'best' answer was to multi early and multi often...single class sucked. (And that goes back to 2003 when we already had never seen a 12th level anything.)

then there were lots of little things that buged us too.

I know that the best 3e fighter we ever saw was loaded with specilized feats, items, and was a unqie build with 2 prestige classes... and a 4e fighter can do it all out of the box and in some ways btter.


2nd part, I belive Piazo would be out of buiesness now if that were the case. That also means the whole RPG industy would be worse for it. Without an OGL they could not publish, and the GSL was not what they were looking for. I do not belive pathfinder in that enviorment would have been a hit (without the pissed off at wotc rabid fans backing it) and as such today WotC would be stronger, the Hobby would be weaker, and alot of good work would have been lost.

 

[BryonD]

Another angle on it: Pathfinder benefits a lot from "you don't know what you've got until it is gone".

To many people there was a period of frustration that support for a game they liked was being pulled. But, there were also a lot of people who didn't mind moving on from 3E but were simply disappointed that they were not enthused by the new "official".

There was a period of "3E is dead"* and then Paizo rode in on a white horse. Now that heroic moment would have fallen flat if they had not backed it up with quality. So all credit to Paizo where due.

But even if WotC had done a slightly "better" Pathfinder called 4E it would have just been "3.5 is dead. Long live 3.6!" And that would not have had NEARLY the enthusiasm.

WotC NEEDED to evolve. They just could have evolved better. (No disrespect for those who love 4E intended, "better" just means "in a way that attracted a larger overall fan base.")







* - No that doesn't mean they came into anyone's house and stole their books.

 

[amerigoV]

For example, I know for a fact before the 4e/3.x split, I would have NEVER considered running ANYTHING other than D&D. Now I've already dabbled in Savage Worlds, would love to try Runequest and Ars Magica, have gotten some experience with GURPS, want to try Dresden Files and Mongoose Traveller.......

In an interesting way, are we as gamers overall better off now than if 4e HADN'T been such a radical departure from its roots?

I know I am much better off - but that is because I now play Savage Worlds (and just ordered Agents of Oblivion from Reality Blurs - Mmmmm). I am not sure it was the split itself that had anything to do with it - I was at the end of the line with 3.5. I looked at 4e and it just would not work for my groups. Patherfinder - lets see, I can buy a game that is "compatible" and just has a bunch of fiddly bits different than 3.5, or I can play Savage Worlds and convert on the fly - no contest there.

So for me personally, its the best of times regardless of who made 4e.

 

[Hussar]

If WOTC had made PF, then it would have to be backwards compatible. That means it would have to use OGL material. In turn, that means you'd have no digital initiative and no solid cash cow for WOTC.

We'd have seen a continuing of the gradual, slow death that was 3e and right about now we'd be seeing 5e in a vain attempt to try to stem the tide.

 

[MichaelSomething]

If Paizo made their game mostly like 4E, it would turn into yet another Fantasy Heartbreaker.

If WOTC made their game mostly like Pathfinder, the 3.X fans would be happy but there would be some people who wouldn't like it but accept it anyway because it's D&D (and they would keep grumbling about it on forums and such).

 

[Pentius]

It's hard to say what might have happened, but for me, I think it would have been much easier but much less rewarding. I had a hard time with the 3.5-4e shift. I really just didn't want things to change, regardless of what that change was. Hating 4e for it being different led me to look at other systems and really branch out, which led me to have the breadth of experience to look closer at what a game can offer, what I do and don't like about it, rather than just throwing out close-minded insults. It took awhile of trying different stuff, and of trying old stuff again, but it was actually quite formative for me, as a gamer.