Too many supplements a cause for burnout?

[Alnag]

Based on my single experience I don't think so. I am not buying most of the supplements and my players are strictly limited to core rules only. Despite that I have gone through at least two burn out episodes in my gaming history. I think the true reason (in my case) was not being in touch with players having fun. Not enough of feedback. The ivory tower of DMing. Not playing enough (means as a player) just DMing all the time. And overall exhaustion.

 

[Zendragon]

I'm wondering whether other DMs and players are getting burned out because there's so many new Rulebooks, supplements, variant classes, feats, and so on. Personally, it seems like some of my players seem to be into all these variations much more than roleplaying, and there's been many times where obvious facts about the fantasy world they are playing in seem to slip their minds, because they are all agog about some exciting new variant to their character's class recently published in some new third party work.

Is the marketplace actually driving the joy out of roleplaying?

When new stuff does come out, if the player is interested I try to work in a game encounter with it first. If it plays well then I can introduce it into the campaign. SOme of the things I have allowed were Weapons of Legacy, but I had something similar to that already, Spell Compendium, and some other items from other d20 games. I did banish pact magic, truename magic and enhancement runes. You just have to talk to the players and see if they really eant to use it, or are more interested in just seeing how it plays. In one campaign we did a one shot module with other characters. How these characters did affected the party when they arrived at the same place.

I don't think the market place is driving out the enjoyment. It like Baskin Robbins 31 flavors. You din't have to try every flavor and you shouldn't have to introduce every book that comes out into a campaign.

 

[w_earle_wheeler]

There are many supplemental rules for 3.5e, but I feel like they're entirely optional.

The Monster Manual is the only monster book I use. I use the Unearthed Arcana, PH 2, DMG 2, but I use them behind the scenes. Even without using the race or class books, this makes my games pretty robust -- also, cutting down on options streamlines things.

I made a character the other night, referencing all the splatbooks I had, and it took four hours. Yikes.

If another pre-4e revision needs to be made, I would say that it needs to be made in form of collecting and correcting materials from the splatbooks released so far (along the lines of the Spell Compendium and the Magic Item Compendium), while leaving the core rulebooks the same.

A prestige class compendium, a feat compendium, a skill compendium, a base class compendium. Then WotC should release all of their sequel books. Taking this road could extend the life of 3.5 at least another 4 years.

 

[teitan]

I did experience burn out because of all the supplements personally. I got to the point that if it didn't say Forgotten Realms on the cover or I didn't own it, fuggitaboutit and I still got toasted. Players constantly bugging me about prestige classes etc. and when THEY got Savage Species they constantly insisted that they be allowed to play Vampires or Mind Flayers because it was "part of the rules". I barred more than I included such as no Level Adjustment races (changed that to a more +1 LA). I didn't mind incorporating information but prestige classes and feats were a different story altogether.

I still haven't really gotten over than burn out. My new game starts on Monday and I am dreading it like you would not believe. Running Sunless Citadel though and going core rules only for the time being to keep the stress off. I want to make it a RttTOEE campaign but when I dled a conversion for it that was almost as long as the module I choked. Anybody know of one that just lists the changes rather than restatting the characters in total and reprinting unnecessary information?

 

[Zimri]

If another pre-4e revision needs to be made, I would say that it needs to be made in form of collecting and correcting materials from the splatbooks released so far (along the lines of the Spell Compendium and the Magic Item Compendium), while leaving the core rulebooks the same.

A prestige class compendium, a feat compendium, a skill compendium, a base class compendium. Then WotC should release all of their sequel books. Taking this road could extend the life of 3.5 at least another 4 years.

YA know I was laying in bed thinking just the same thing last night. Perhaps yearly they should release compendiums for each of the following

1) base classes and the new rules they need (manuevers, etcetera)
2) Prestige classes
3) skills and feats with new and updated uses
4) anything else I am missing

Could probably lump a couple of those together. Make it bare bones (no fluff about organizations and stuff)

Like a WOTC Yearbook

If class acts is continued that should be done too.

People who want the rules NOW can still buy the full books when they are released but for those people that can wait and don't want the fluff or to spend as much as all the individual books can still get a benefit.

 

[Alnag]

You know, I think true healing of burnout would be the pretty, shiny cool 4e. That would cure you like nothing else. At least I was drooling reading through Star Wars Saga previews few weeks ago and it gives me true determination to play it. Although till than I had no intention of playing Star Wars at all.

On the other hand I understand people who heavily invested to their 3,5e books and don't have intention to switch. For me using just Core, DMG II, UA, FRCS and Draconomicon I feel pretty free to follow if the offer is cool.

 

[shilsen]

Since I agree with most of the previous posters about the fact that the existence of many supplements can't ever hurt my game, let me just point out:

...there's been many times where obvious facts about the fantasy world they are playing in seem to slip their minds, because they are all agog about some exciting new variant to their character's class recently published in some new third party work.

Is the marketplace actually driving the joy out of roleplaying?

If they are all agog about something, then presumably there's no lack of joy where they're concerned. It sounds rather as if they're just more interested about something you're not, so your ... well, joy is taking a hit.

 

[Mortellan]

As a DM I've began to neglect newer products while my players continue to buy them and implement them. I am burn out on trying to learn a hundred new PrC and a thousand new spells and feats. When a new one of any of these pops up, it bogs the game down severely. I tend to stick to the core 3 books myself as I get more gaming done that way.

 

[Alnag]

Now reading the other posts I think, that amount of gaming material might be a reason for burn-out but not a direct one. I think the need to integrate more and more crunch from the books into the game increase overall level of stress which has negative effect on the game experience. Bad game experience than leads to burn-out.

I was always very sceptical to the spitting of prestige classes, feats, spells and magic items in such speed and quantity. Although these concepts are great, I like them more elaborated and with more fluff each. That way they would suite mine (and probably yours) intentions better. But the burn-out problem is still a secondary effect I believe.

 

[taliesin15]

I think the main thing is the sheer amount of information out there--buying these supplements is not an issue as I'm never going to buy something I can't look at in some form or another, and as a result, I rarely buy any kind of supplement these days, since they mostly stink--the burnout factor has more to do with the sheer amount of work I have to do as a DM trying to figure out how to integrate material that is rather alien to my milieu. What makes it worse is most of the suggestions are for feats or class variations that seem rather flippant and vapid--really a waste of time, and I don't see the attraction. But that's really a secondary issue to the one of how to integrate supplemental materials from a Swords and Sorcery milieu that is roughly based on late medieval tropes, when the campaign I'm running is in real world times more than a thousand years earlier (early Iron Age).

And this isn't even getting into the whole issue of a religious system that is decidedly pantheistic and pagan, where there are no churches, temples, or what most people consider "organized religion," other than being organized enough to show up at a site on Beltaine where all the deities are hailed through song, dance, and ritual...in fact, I'm kind of glad I'm not depending on the gaming industry for works to flesh this out IMC, depending on academic works instead. The contemporary gaming industry, if the current supplements and publications are to judge, would generally make a dog's dinner of such things.