Thoughts on the edition treadmill

[Umbran]

Do you think D&D would work with the CoC model of editions?

"Work" in what sense?

Can a game exist on the shelves for long periods of time with only minor rules-revisions? Yes.

Can a game maintain a large player base (say, a million active players) in that state? Probably not.

 

[Dyir]

Couldn't the fact that our culture seems to expect near-constant change in software and the like also affect the idea that tabletop RPGs should "evolve" over time? Editions are given numbers, but they aren't "sequels" like a video game or a movie: they are like version numbers for software. This even seeped into our lexicon with "3.5" even though versions "3.1" through "3.4" never existed. I've encountered the philosophy that games have gotten "better" with time (that modern games are superior to older ones), despite there is no objective way to measure "better" in this sense. If customers and developers and marketers all think (even subconsciously) that this is so, then editions are inevitable.

 

[ggroy]

To some designers, it's all about improving the game.

I'd wager that to others, part of the motive involves having their own name on the game- I mean, wouldn't you love to see "6th Edition Players Handbook" with your own name at the bottom?

In other words: ego.

 

[Mercurius]

It might help to analyze what went into each D&D edition change...

The split of D&D into AD&D and BD&D was driven by differences between it's creators...

AD&D 2e was driven by a desire to clean up AD&D. Gygax had been ousted by then.

D&D 3e was driven by a desire to make the brand profitable to it's new owners. ...

This doesn't seem quite accurate to me, or rather what you say is true but you emphasize rather universal motives for specific editions. I mean, every edition was motivated by "the desire to make the brand profitable" and "a desire to clean up" the previous edition, at least to some degree.

In that sense, I would argue that each edition was motivated by at least two factors: profit and game evolution. Each edition might have specific, even unique, motives behind it (as you point out with AD&D/BX), but those two are part of every edition, every book really.

I would say this was the real clean up. Very much driven by a desire to make AD&D work as a game even as the game was brought back to its roots...back in the dungeon.

Right. I still see 3E as the most substantial change in D&D's history. I'm not just talking about mechanics, but total impact: 3E ushered in a new era, quite literally "21st century D&D."

The “answer”? Lots of experimentation at the margin, but true edition reboots only when needed and with real value added that reflects both lessons learned and new stuff that actually works. I don’t think any edition has quite got there. Still too much group think, designer preference, and condescension towards the fans, and yes, the problem of “we need money so lets make core books cause they sell the best”. However I do think that the game has in general gotten better, inspite of all this. It has evolved.

I agree. In my opinion 3E took two steps forward but no steps back, whereas 4E took two steps forward again but one step back, which is where all the controversy comes from. An example of this is powers - they provide a high degree of flexibility, modularity, and consistency, but they also are problematic in terms of homogenizing classes (at least initially) and making 4E seem too "video gamey."

Yet despite its flaws, 4E provides a stronger foundation for further game evolution than 3E did. Why? Very simply: DDI. DDI provides a tremendous opportunity to evolve the game because it will always be up-to-date, always include errata, and always remain compatible with the current iteration of the game. This allows immense flexibility and leeway in terms of introducing new ideas, new sub-systems, new Incarnum-esque projects (now whether or not WotC capitalizes on this potential remains to be seen, as its potential lies more in creative rather than financial fruit).

D&D does many things, and because of this, can never be "streamlined" like CoC.

Hmm...maybe you are right. But I think this has more to do with the sheer number of supplements and players that D&D has, as opposed to CoC. How many people have played and currently play D&D? The rumor is 25 million and 1+ million, respectively. CoC? Let's say a hundred thousand and ten thousand. The sheer number of D&D players makes the amount of tinkering that much greater.

The amount of supplements, and the continual creation of new material--whether published or house rules--gives D&D a feeling of continual change and development. People are always coming up with new things; in fact, that is part of the game, the culture of D&D that was encouraged from the beginning.

I do not get what you are saying regarding the focus problem. 4e for example is very focused as some kind of minis game and its tactics.

Right now, but that is 4E and might not be 5E, at least not in the same way. D&D as a whole is not so focused, except on the most basic premise: fantasy adventure with lots of monsters, treasure, exploration, etc.

Furthermore, for most gamers, D&D is the RPG from which everything else is an evening's diversion. A game group might be in the mood for something different and play Call of Cthulhu or Traveler or Reign for a few months, but they will invariably come back to D&D. Sure, there are diehard "indie gamers" that won't touch D&D, but they are a minority. To put it another way, most gamers play only D&D, and of those that don't only play D&D, most of them mainly play D&D.

Why is this relevant? Because when a D&D player plays CoC, it has a sense of impermanence to it; you might play it for a story arc (until you go mad!) and then go back to D&D, even the same campaign you've been playing for years (decades, in some cases). So it is more like a mood piece, something you want to try out and enjoy for what it is, but not fully enter into for an open-ended period of time. The sheer amount of time that people spend on D&D increases the probability that tinkering arises, and it also increases the chance of "edition boredom," the readiness to try something new that is still D&D.

 

[rounser]

Otherwise it will become such a tangled menagirie of who-knows what that it will implode.

I'll go out on a limb here and say that specifically it's splatbooks offering PC ability powerups that kill editions.

BECMI is unbalanced by the weapon mastery optional rules. Weapon masters can flatten encounters that would challenge a party not using the rules.
1E is unbalanced by Unearthed Arcana, because Players Handbook classes are clearly underpowered compared to them.
2E is unbalanced by the Complete series (specifically kits), and nailed by Players Option. Kits started a sort of min/max arms race among players.
3E is unbalanced by prestige classes and weird new classes, power crawled new feats, new weapons etc. unbalanced with the old. Min/max arms race becomes comical.
4E has the suggestion that "everything is core", which given the history of the game is a bit of a scream. Planned obsolescence much?

It relates back to the idea of RPG screentime - a broken player's power gets heaps of screentime, a broken monster very little. Although a TPK is possible with the broken monster or bad situational rule, it's less likely to break the campaign and complicate things to a degree which affects people's willingness to play the edition at all (perhaps with the exception of 3E's grapple and AoO rules).

It also makes creating NPCs much more of a time-consuming headache, if they're to use the same character creation rules as the PCs, putting off DMs.

So, my theory is that if you keep player powers in check by turfing toxic splatbook sludge entirely, or vetting it thoroughly, you can get off the edition treadmill entirely. Easier said than done, because min/maxing is one of the draws of the game, but IMO the best campaigns have this as a side attraction, not the main event.

 

[ProfessorCirno]

Also, note that not everyone sees D&D editions as a treadmill. For no small number of people, 4e is better - completely better in almost every way - over previous editions. For many players it isn't a treadmill, it's a line of improvements. They see x edition as being better then the last one.

Certainly, if and when 5e comes out, we'll see the same thing. People will claim it's terrible and that 4e is True D&D. Others will leap atop 5e and proclaim it the best game they've ever played. And that second group will assuredly not see things as an "edition treadmill" but, just as the 4e crowd did then, they will see it as the newest and best edition of the game.

If someone is a fan of 3e, then the treadmill began at 4e. If they're a fan of 2e, then the treadmill began at 3e. But it curiously never seems to have started at or before the edition the person making the claim loves the most.

 

[ProfessorCirno]

2E is unbalanced by the Complete series (specifically kits), and nailed by Players Option. Kits started a sort of min/max arms race among players.
3E is unbalanced by prestige classes and weird new classes, power crawled new feats, new weapons etc. unbalanced with the old. Min/max arms race becomes comical.
4E has the suggestion that "everything is core", which given the history of the game is a bit of a scream. Planned obsolescence much?

Here I need to step in. 3e and 2e were "unbalanced" right from the start. Certainly things like the Complete Book of Elves didn't help, but from day one in both editions there was no balance. 3e especially, the most unbalanced book for the entire system was the Core Handbook. Wizards, druids, and clerics - three of the if not the three unbalanced classes. Natural Spell, the most unbalanced feat in the game? That's core.

4e's "everything is core" had nothing to do with planned obsolescence. It's the opposite. The reason they stated everything was core was to imply that everything would receive updates and improvements. In 3e you'd have classes like the Wu Jen who never saw any new spells or any new materials outside of the book they appeared in. The idea of Everything Is Core was to stop that from happening.

 

[Stalker0]

The RPG industry has a dirty secret. You don't need multiple editions of any game. You don't even need one.

On the other hand I could go to restaurant and cook my own food....yet I'm perfectly happy to pay someone else to make it for me.

RPGs are not needed for roleplay, they like some many things in our lives are a convenience to facility to activity we want to do.

 

[rounser]

Here I need to step in. 3e and 2e were "unbalanced" right from the start.

I'm talking about perceptions, though. Even if you accept 1E with all it's warts (e.g. even if you decide that theives are outrageously underpowered and the rules supporting them are awkward by default, but that we'll make it work somehow, anyway), even if you do that....

....if you let Unearthed Arcana into your game it can still give you some pause (because now theives are still outrageously underpowered and now paladins are not just a bit overpowered, but really outrageously overpowered). You realise you've crossed the rubicon into a kind of 1.5 edition, and begin thinking about a reset. Which is why quite a few AD&D campaigns refuse to use the UA races and classes.

That's the sort of thing that a critical mass of kits, subraces, classes, feats, bizarre weapons and prestige classes did, too.

(4E may be more balanced but it has no soul or hook for me, effectively throwing the baby out with the bathwater and removing a good deal of the reason why you'd want to play the game at all, but that's other threads...)

4e's "everything is core" had nothing to do with planned obsolescence. It's the opposite. The reason they stated everything was core was to imply that everything would receive updates and improvements. In 3e you'd have classes like the Wu Jen who never saw any new spells or any new materials outside of the book they appeared in. The idea of Everything Is Core was to stop that from happening.

I'm not sure that's relevant to the treadmill, although it's nice that your favourite class doesn't get "forgotten". Predictable unchecked expansion is going to result in predictable entropy, resulting in predictable breaking of the edition in terms of the players' perceptions of the game, resulting in predictable replacing of said edition...which could be called planned obsolescence.

I'd assume that it's also possible to choke an edition under a critical mass of errata and obsolete books, so you can't really escape the entropy of expanding splat that way either. 3.5E and 4E Essentials seem to hint at that.

 

[Hussar]

But, Rounser, your basic premise is flawed.

You're saying that it's splats and the like that cause the churn of editions. I'd argue that that's just the convenient point that people make. Closer to the truth is that the base game often contains serious flaws that need fixing.

2e fixed a lot of things about 1e. If nothing else, 2e actually benefited from an editor making the rule books actually usable at the table. While 1e with UA did suffer from balance issues, that's not why 2e came along. Besides the obvious economic reasons, 2e came along because people actually learned a few things over the decade or so since the release of the 1e DMG and applied that to the new version of the game.

The idea that any single edition just, "gets it right" and should never be changed runs smack dab into the concept that groups should take the rules and make them their own. That the rules at one table and the rules at another table may resemble each other in name only.

Add in a publisher with the ability to take a larger picture view of how many tables are running and you get new editions. Thus 3e included many of the fixes that people had already implemented in some fashion in their 1e or 2e games. And, to be fair, 4e does the same. Not for any specific group perhaps, but, for a group of gamers that the publisher (WOTC in this case) identifies as the most likely to buy more products.