D&D General The Rubber Band Effect

[Mezuka]

The Rubber Band Effect is the way I've come to understand the pull toward TSR editions. I started in 1980 with Holmes and played every edition since. I saluted the changes that came with 3e and liked a lot of the decisions made with 4e.

After playing 5e for several years I started to feel the rubber band pull of the old TSR editions. In 2021-2022 I reread Basic (Moldvay), AD&D and 2e. I read many OSR games and other simulacrums. I can't play these games anymore. I've changed.

There is an undeniable tension between my memories of the 'good old TSR times' and 5e. I know perfectly well that 'good old times were not that good. We bickered a lot over the rules. The really good memories stem from an AD&D campaign, not DMed by me, which was very interesting as a player. It allowed me to play a character up to level 12.

The other good TSR memories are from an AD&D2e campaign I ran with a stable group for several years. I developed a region of a continent over time and it was my best campaign.

With 3e, 4e I wasn't able to replicate that either as a player or as a DM. It's not the fault of these editions. The player groups were riddled with problems. Despite playing them for several years, I have no good memories of these two editions. I only have good memories of d20 Modern.

With 5e I was able to replicate an old-school-style campaign - start a small build around it. It went very well for two years. It crashed because two players changed over time. Covid and divorce between the two didn't help. I think I'm still traumatized by this event two years after the fact. This too makes me long for the 'good old times.

Even if I know they are mostly 'pink coloured memories' the pull is strong. My way to cope with this is to play solitary (no DM) sessions of Castles & Crusades once in a while.

I have a stable group of players in their mid-40s but D&D is off the table. They don't want to play C&C either. I GM mostly the AGE system with them. At 57 I have nothing to complain about. I GM every other week and I'm a player in between.

Still, the rubber band is pulling. I've come to believe visiting forums and FB groups is nourishing the longing for my TSR days because I read about other players’ experiences. Consequently, I’ve decided to stop visiting them.

Goodbye!

 

[Ovinomancer]

My rubber band has snapped, then. I have zero desire to return to any prior edition. I'm also not interested in OSR except for some of the newer games that are doing their own thing.

 

[Umbran]

I've had reasons to think on this recently, due to some things that were highlighted during the pandemic...

For me, at least, it is pretty clear that the things that made play in my younger years great were not about the rule set we were using. Virtually any moderately sound set of rules would do the trick.

But, back in the day, I had a lot more time for gaming. Games were a weekly occurrance, and 5+ hours at a shot. Today, it is every other week, only two or three ours at a pop, and now a lot of it is online, with the communication restrictions of web conferences laid on top. The depth of play that was the basis for the memories of the past requires more time than is commonly available to me now.

By the way, that includes application of Sturgeon's Law: 90% of everything is crud. But, my memory doesn't preserve the crud well - it holds onto the non-crud much better. With more hours, while the percentage doesn't change, the absolute number of awesome bits I remember is increased. So, I end up comparing many old moments to a few new ones, and the current time thus seems lacking.

So, I am not drawn to a set of old rules. I am drawn to a pattern of play that is difficult to replicate now.

 

[J.Quondam]

I've grown to realize that my "rubber band" isn't really a pull toward TSR editions, or any other particular game. Rather it's just a wish to be a kid again, still new gaming and with time enough to play for hours on end around a table with friends.

 

[el-remmen]

Sometimes it just takes playing with new people.

I am currently having some of the best sessions I've ever had (and I have had some great times in the past with 2E and 3E) running 5E for friends ranging from 40 to 50 years old who are all either new to the game or returning after a very long break (hadn't played since 2E days!). Heck, much like my youth, two of the players have become my really close friends - one of which was recruited for the game by another player and the other was someone I was acquainted with but didn't know well. Now we all hang out even when not gaming (for example, we went to one player's wedding this past weekend!).

I had to be convinced to run this game 2.5 years ago because at the time I was feeling like no new game was going to match the games of the past - but I came to accept that every campaign and group is its own iteration of the game and it only needs to be fun now, not compared to something else. We may not get to play as often (once every 3 to 5 weeks, as opposed to every week in college and every two weeks in the post-college days) but we still do play 5 hour sessions.

Honestly, with the right group the ruleset doesn't matter much.

 

[el-remmen]

I have absolutely no desire to be a kid again. The best D&D I've played has all been post 21 years of age.

 

[Yora]

I first read B/X years after 3rd edition and Pathfinder, and a good time after 5th edition had come out, and that game grabbed me immediately. For some people it might be nostalgia for experiences from the 80s, but it's still a really good game on its own merits.

 

[Greggy C]

Nothing is as good as being 19 years old in 1990, drinking too much cheap beer on Friday night, then playing DnD 1e/2e with your college buddies from Saturday 2pm to Sunday 5am. Thats how we rolled. It was intense D&D, serious stuff, it was DMs world vs Players, it was temple of the elemental evil, tomb of horrors, it was deadly homebrew, it was you make mistakes, you will die. It was glorious. Nothing better than after that final fight, everyone gathered around to watch the constitution % check to see if that character was dead forever. We played for years until level 26.

Doesn't matter what edition comes out now, we will never be 19 again.

 

[Umbran]

I have absolutely no desire to be a kid again. The best D&D I've played has all been post 21 years of age.

Some here may be old enough that 21 is more than half a lifetime ago, and may still qualify as "kid" in terms of life experiences.

 

[GMforPowergamers]

4e is my jam... I would drop everything to play a swordmage or warlord again (heck even just a fighter with cool toys) but I too have that rubber band pull back to 2e. SO I get it.

having said that I wouldn't go back. I wouldn't mind a 4e/2e mashup retroclone though (and I have even played around with making one)

 

[GMforPowergamers]

Some here may be old enough that 21 is more than half a lifetime ago, and may still qualify as "kid" in terms of life experiences.

yeah... I don't want to be 15 again, not even 18... but to be in my early or mid 20s would be amazing.

why wasn't I happy then? Oh right I wanted to be older out on my own and be my own boss... um, I'll gladly take mom bossing me around and simple jobs and freetime... the gas price was nice too (although I complained then "Why is it up to $1.65 per gallon, if it hit $2 there will be riots")

 

[Laurefindel]

My rubberband mostly swings between sci-fi (mostly Star Wars) and fantasy (mostly D&D). After a while DM/playing one, I long for the other and when I switch, I want back on the previous.

 

[payn]

My rubber band hasn't kicked in yet. It's going to be Pathfinder Classic. Most of the TSR era was a pain in the ass trying to even get a game going. I almost gave up on TTRPGs because of it. So, I don't have a particular draw to TSR era. I fault the folks and venues open to me at the time more than the editions.

 

[el-remmen]

Some here may be old enough that 21 is more than half a lifetime ago, and may still qualify as "kid" in terms of life experiences.

Sure. Like me. But 21 is not a kid compared to say 12 or 14, when I was also playing a lot.

 

[Shiroiken]

My rubber band has snapped, then. I have zero desire to return to any prior edition. I'm also not interested in OSR except for some of the newer games that are doing their own thing.

Same. I've gone back and reread a lot of the older stuff, and while I've definitely tried to incorporate the good stuff from them into 5E, I really can't go back. Right now, 5E would be my default "return to" edition.

 

[GMforPowergamers]

just rmemeber someone is playing today that when playing 6e there rubber band will want to pull them to 'classic' 5e after tasha's...

 

[Azzy]

I don't feel this kind of nostalgia pull.

 

[Seramus]

I would be a kid again, if only to right the wrongs of my past. Getting to play D&D and other roleplaying games for 8+ hours again would be a nice fringe benefit, though.

 

[cbwjm]

I'd be keen to go back and play 2e or basic, still my favourite editions, most editions I'd enjoy playing again. As others have said, being able to spend more time playing when younger might be part of the nostalgia I feel for these editions, though having gone over them again fairly recently, I'd still have fun, THAC0 and all.

 

[Minigiant]

Meh. Nostalgia doesn't do it for me.

Even as a kid, I recognized, analyzed, and criticized the stories, mechanics, and goals of the roleplaying, tabletop, and video games I played hard.

I think it has to do with me being a preteen and teen in the 90s and early 00s. The internet was new,raw, growing and wild. So when your young mind went online to say "Hey I kinda think the way X Company does Y is stupid", there was visible displays of agreement and any disagreement tended to need some earnest and good faith to not be ignored/dismissed.

I'm also a racial minority and from Brooklyn so nostaglia is for the same for me.