What RPG(s) did you stick with an earlier edition?

[Reynard]

Just out of curiosity.

What RPG that had multiple editions did you decide to stick with an earlier edition rather than "upgrade" to the new edition? Why? What about the earlier edition made you decide to stay with it? What about the new edition made you decide not to go with it?

I used to run and play a lot of Champions and Hero System, and even though I bough the 5th Edition big Black Book, I actually decided against adopting it and just stayed with the 4th Edition Big Blue Book (for as long as we continued to play Hero/Champions). Mostly this was because we knew 4E and did not want have to fight to find where the small changes had been made. There wa snothing explicitly bad about 5E -- we just did not bother to adopt the new edition.

What about you? What game did you stay with an older edition rather than adopt a newer edition, and why?

 

[Aldarc]

One of my Austrian gaming groups stuck with 7th Sea 1e instead of switching to 7th Sea 2e. They backed the 2e Kickstarter though for PDFs of the entire catalogue of 1e material.

 

[dragoner]

I have often circled back to Classic Traveller after playing other versions, it's not perfect, though has a certain brevity that is appealing. I mean like instead of complex rules for cover it is simply "-4." Things such as that.

 

[TGryph]

Call of Cthulhu. Really don't like the slightly pulpy feel of the new edition...

 

[Micah Sweet]

I stuck with AEG's last edition of Legend of the Five Rings after they sold the IP. I moved on from official D&D and stuck with the 5.0-derived Level Up instead. I prefer Cyberpunk 2020 over later versions too.

 

[Thomas Shey]

There are only two I can think of.

1. OD&D. This may be a case where I was already in my head moving out of D&D, and didn't see a reason to move over to B/X or AD&D when they weren't going to bring me to any of the things I was wanting that OD&D didn't anyway. Of course this was arguably a short period.

2. The other, for a while, was Hero 6e. I really disliked some of the 6e design decisions when it first arrived. Over time I, well, got over it. But there was a period where technically I was staying with 5e to the degree I was still using Hero.

 

[Xenolith234]

I have often circled back to Classic Traveller after playing other versions, it's not perfect, though has a certain brevity that is appealing. I mean like instead of complex rules for cover it is simply "-4." Things such as that.

As someone who’s only read and run Mongoose Traveller 2e, what makes it lesser in comparison? Just too verbose? I’ve heard several people lately preferring Classic Traveller.

 

[billd91]

There are relatively few examples considering there are lot more games I've dabbled in that have gone through edition changes than I have had time or groups inclined to really play.

Back in the D&D 4e days, one group I was in stuck with 3.5e (after trying 4e). That's the one really concrete example I have.

However, had I been running Traveller actively at the time, I'd have stuck with MegaTraveller instead of Traveller: New Era. And had I been running Pathfinder at the time, I'd have stuck with PF1 rather than moving to PF2. And we didn't have an active campaign at the time, but I think we'd have stuck with Cyberpunk 2020 rather than move on with what followed it.

 

[Warpiglet-7]

It has been in waves…so we did not stick with a 1st edition of anything indefinitely but have skipped stuff along the way.

We played Ad&D 1e through 2000 or so.

Played 3e through 3.5 skipping it and playing 4e very briefly, effectively skipping it too.

We play D&D 2014 now skipping 5.5. I think half actions are usually a no go—-not different enough to justify learning the nuance.

At this point barring radical change will stick with Shadowdark and 5e.

 

[Blue]

BBB for Champions was the greatest, though I wouldn't mind FRed (Fifth Revised). Not a fan of the sixth.

I skipped D&D 4e for quite some time. Tried it out in a couple of one shots, but stayed with 3.5 Even when I eventually joined campaign I kept running 3.5.

Haven't played any D&D 5.5, as they now are calling it. But since I'm also not currently playing or running 5e, I don't know if you can say I stayed. I have some foundational issues with 5.x like the mismatch between how I run vs. designer encounter-per-day expectations to mechanically balance between the classes.