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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Ruin Explorer" data-source="post: 8605692" data-attributes="member: 18">I just want to say that this is an extremely well-rendered and convincing alternate history, and I LOVE alternate histories of media stuff, they're surprisingly rare, despite tons of major media/culture things actually hinging on very fragile points (whereas military/conflict stuff tends to be more inevitable and have more inevitable outcomes).I could easily see that scenario playing out. My group, despite being raised on 2E, was pretty much done with it by the late '90s, and if 3E hadn't come along, together with the BG games, I'm pretty sure we'd have dropped D&D and not even really thought about it.And yeah, a D&D-like "Pathfinder" seems very plausible - it would probably be significantly different from 3E/PF1, I suspect maybe more like PF2. Yeah again, the model for Adventure Paths was intensely successful in that period, so that all tracks, and Golarion was spot-on for the kind of edgy flashy faux-realist vibe of the '00s, so could easily have become super-popular (even if it's getting a bit outdated now due to excessive edge - I hear Paizo are reigning that in though).Alternatives I can see:1) If D&D started to die earlier, and White Wolf had a little more basic common sense, the nWoD might never have happened. That's not a critique of the nWoD, which is kind of cool/awesome, but it clearly lead to less success for WW rather than more (I'd argue Revised being so dark/nerfed/downer didn't help either, even with ostensibly horror games). If, instead of going with the nWoD, they just went with a 4E, and pivoted back to the more "colourful" and broadly-appealing take they had with the 2E WoD, maybe even going a bit more mainstream than that, they might have taken the crown, I think. If we can scroll back a little further and stop Revised from happening, and instead they have a 3E that really goes hard for a more mainstream-friendly approach (which 2E essentially had), I think you could almost guarantee it. Especially with no d20 boom. WW zigged when they should have zagged in real history.White Wolf also, in this period - the late 1990s - had some close contact with Capcom, and IIRC, there was nearly a Capcom W:tApocalypse game made (no, not Vampire Hunter/Savior). Had WW been riding a bit higher, maybe that would have actually panned out, and we might even have various different "takes" on the World of Darkness being successful.2) Shadowrun has been mentioned, and I think you have to scroll back to 3E, really, to potentially replace D&D (again assuming D&D self-destructs). If 3E had made the game more accessible/playable, and focused on fun (a thing that 95% of RPGs just did not even consider in the '90s), whilst retaining edgy elements, then it could have taken over. Especially with a few good videogames in, say, the early '00s, if they used a system very close to the tabletop, or were action-y games that didn't need a system, but that really lived in the setting (not like the bizarre Microsoft arena shooter).3) RIFTS - Siembieda would have to have like, decided to sell the whole RIFTS IP to someone sensible, but if that had happened, and we'd have proper "RIFTS 2E", with vastly improved rules but he same insane profusion of sourcebooks (all new, of course), in say, 1996/1997, and then this putative "Sensible RIFTS owner" managed to get some decent videogames made, or maybe just popularized it generally (but I think videogames matter - I strongly suspect BG1/2 factor in how successful 3E was, because they reignited a lot of people's interest in D&D, or introduced people to it), we could easily see a situation where it became the "default" RPG, especially if they pushed alternate worlds for it and so on. God help people if they say, linked up with Final Fantasy for an Ivalice or FFVII world book or something.</blockquote>

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