What Game Did You Leave D&D For?

[MechaPilot]

When I stopped playing AD&D 2e, I transitioned from D&D to Palladium's games. It started early on as playing a bit of both, because I loved both the fantasy and the giant mecha genres, and because my DM at the time was interested in trying it. Over time, I essentially "left D&D for" palladium's games. I still maintained my love for fantasy gaming, and Palladium's fantasy rpg helped me scratch that itch for a quite a while. I didn't come back to D&D until partway through the run of 3e (but before 3.5e). I was still playing other games at that time: Vampire, the Battletech rpg, and the Buffy the Vampire Slayer rpg in particular. I got heavily back into D&D with 4e, and remain so with 5e.

 

[billd91]

I believe there's only one real extended period in which I would say I 'left' D&D, but even that was a small step. I stopped buying D&D products in favor of Pathfinder for most of 4e's run and I haven't played 4e since we hung it up about a year after its release. One group I'm in still plays Pathfinder while the other has returned to D&D with 5e. Every other time I 'left' D&D, it was only for the duration of an adventure/story here and there as we mixed Villain and Vigilantes, Star Frontiers, Traveller, Call of Cthulhu, Paranoia, and a variety of other games into our schedules. But we always have kept coming back to D&D in some form.

 

[ccs]

I've never left D&D. I never will.
'80-early '90s we played numerous systems, true. But it was one week one of our our D&D games would run (several of us DMd & it was always decided that evening exactly who was running), the next week we'd play something else.

The closest I'd say I've come is:
'95-Dec of '99. I played a lot of Vampire/WoD & my only D&D occurred at gaming conventions.
Then 2k - fall of 2006. I played almost exclusively miniature wargames of all genres & assorted board games. Once again, D&D was a con only game for me & I was playing only 1e.

Todays gaming is 50% D&D (5e & PF1) & miniature wargaming (mostly WWII) with the occasional something else RPG-wise. But even then, as I'm in two different RPG groups, D&D is being played in one of them.... So it's a lot like where I began.

 

[Aiden_Keller_]

NEVER LEAVE D&D!

ITS GOING TO BE INSCRIBED ON MY TOMBSTONE/URN!

 

[Piratecat]

I <3 D&D - I just finished one ten-year-old 5e campaign, and another one is still going. That said, I fell for GUMSHOE hard about five or six years ago. First it was the space game Ashen Stars, then the super-spy game Night's Black Agents, then I wrote TimeWatch for time travel (and hacked it into a 1930s two-fisted pulp game), and now I've got a fantasy GUMSHOE game named Swords of the Serpentine coming out this year. It's a very different game than D&D -- it models swords & sorcery novels and lets you manipulate politics to change society around you -- but holy crap, am I finding it fun.

 

[DM Howard]

I have been rather disenchanted with 5E lately, it doesn't really give me that excitement that 3.X did, but 3.X isn't the solution either. I thought of trying to GM Hackmaster 5E, but the real-time combat appears to put a LOT of stress on the GM to keep the pacing (even more than usual). I decided to set the familiar aside and jump into Rolemaster Standard System, it might not be the newest version of Rolemaster, but I had some Amazon credit burning a hole in my pocket and I could get the main books within that budget. I've found that I have yearned for deeper, more complex systems as I get older rather than the reverse which seems the norm!

 

[Reynard]

I <3 D&D - I just finished one ten-year-old 5e campaign, and another one is still going. That said, I fell for GUMSHOE hard about five or six years ago. First it was the space game Ashen Stars, then the super-spy game Night's Black Agents, then I wrote TimeWatch for time travel (and hacked it into a 1930s two-fisted pulp game), and now I've got a fantasy GUMSHOE game named Swords of the Serpentine coming out this year. It's a very different game than D&D -- it models swords & sorcery novels and lets you manipulate politics to change society around you -- but holy crap, am I finding it fun.

After owning if for a couple years, I am planning on running my first Timewatch adventure at a game day this spring. I am excited to the leave the fate of the timestream to the League of Ordinary Gentlefolk (nobodies from across time).

 

[Umbran]

Back in the days of yesteryear, my group had been playing 1e for a while....

Then the 'FASERIP" Marvel Superheroes game came out. And we were all comic book fans, so we basically dumped D&D on its keister, and played superheros...

...Then Shadowrun came out. And we dumped the Superheroes....

Since then, while D&D has been in the mix for me, I've not been a one-game kind of person. Pretty much each campaign, I switch rulesets. Last was classic Deadlands. Now is Ashen Stars. Next may be 7th Sea (or something else that does pirates well, because... pirates!)

 

[doctorbadwolf]

I may be taking a break for 5e later this year to dig into some games I've wanted to check out, like Shadow of The Demon Lord, and Dresden Files, and The One Ring (we've played it, but not as much as I'd like).

 

[Flexor the Mighty!]

I have been rather disenchanted with 5E lately, it doesn't really give me that excitement that 3.X did, but 3.X isn't the solution either. I thought of trying to GM Hackmaster 5E, but the real-time combat appears to put a LOT of stress on the GM to keep the pacing (even more than usual). I decided to set the familiar aside and jump into Rolemaster Standard System, it might not be the newest version of Rolemaster, but I had some Amazon credit burning a whole in my pocket and I could get the main books within that budget. I've found that I have yearned for deeper, more complex systems as I get older rather than the reverse which seems the norm!

In theory I love HM5e initiative count system. But in play you need good players to make it flow. I didn't have that.