When is D&D not D&D?

[IanArgent]

One of the starwars designer geeks was quick to point out stuff doesn't matter in starwars, the indication being it won't matter in 4e much either... powers will replace magic items so you won't be finding +1 swords and such... not D&D to me!

And that would eb one of the ways that SWSE differs from 4ed, I'm sure. I suspect many of the numbers in SWSE are 1 step "higher" on the scale than the equivalent #'s will be in 4ed, so that there is room for "stuff" bonuses, "spell" bonuses, etc.

I also suspect the scale will be <+1, +2, +5, +10>, rather than <+2, +4, +8, +16> because it fits better into a D20 system, but that's just me

 

[Doug McCrae]

And above all, the kitchen sink has to be thrown in, the serial-numbers-filed-off amalgam of the best, and often the worst, that fantasy has produced to date; jotuns and trolls living down the lane from titans and centaurs, with kirin and hopping vampires their neighbors in the next celestial county; not Conan OR Gandalf OR Hercules OR Cloud Strife, but the four of them teaming up to kick ass and chew bubblegum, possibly with Batman's help. Crashed spaceships give our heroes rayguns with which to shoot balrogs (er, balORS), dinosaurs live on lost plateaus overlooking quaint medievalesque villages, worg-riding goblins fight Stygians, and the Argonauts compete with the Knights of the Round Table for the Holy Grail - until the PCs show up and steal it away from both because they need it to kill Cthulhu.

This paragraph is awesome.

 

[see]

A slightly different approach: For each of the following, if WotC licensed it and released it under the D&D name, would it still be D&D?

1) Palladium Fantasy Role-Playing Game
2) GURPS & GURPS Banestorm
3) Storyteller engine, in the Forgotten Realms setting
4) Storyteller engine, in the Dark Sun setting
5) Mage: the Awakening
6) Classic Traveller rules, Spelljammer setting
7) Classic Traveller, including setting.
8) Hero 5th Edition, no setting included.
9) The WEG d6 Star Wars, including Star Wars setting.
10) Over the Edge.

 

[Remathilis]

I'm simple: Playing D&D means the bulk of the books on the table have "Dungeons and Dragons" on the cover. There are polyhedral dice, some character sheets, and a bunch of friends drinking soda, quoting Mony Python, and having a blast going on adventures that exist only in their heads.

Needless to say, I'm not sure the DDI will qualify for most of the latter...

 

[WayneLigon]

A slightly different approach: For each of the following, if WotC licensed it and released it under the D&D name, would it still be D&D?

9) The WEG d6 Star Wars, including Star Wars setting.

That one would be a bit of a stretch.

I've used the Storyteller engine to run a D&D-esque low magic world, calling some of the Tremere Diciplines 'The Faire Arte' or 'Alchemy' and the various spells from it as 'The Darke Arte'. Some of the Werewolf rites and Gangrel diciplines became 'Druidic magic' and the Ventrue diciplines were The Unspeakable Artes - they burned you for using mind control magic. There were rapiers and silk ruffles and court intrigue, there were duels and swinging from ropes and treasure hunts in the ruined sewers of The Fallen City, doging rat men and The Church alike. I'd slap the face of anyone who said it 'wasn't D&D'.

 

[JDJblatherings]

I think you're going to see what we consider to be 'hit points' modified to some degree in 4E. I don't think we'll go even as far as the condition track in SAGA but I'm thinking there will be some other feature tied to hit points. I look for them to exit around about 6E.

and such an exit would most certainly make it Not-D&D.

 

[Ranger REG]

I actually will be a little disappointed if the condition track doesn't make it to 4ed.

Meh. Just because it may not be a part of the 4e standard core rules, doesn't mean you can replace the existing system with HP + ConTrack system.

I hope that WotC still retains the philosophy of "Tools, Not Rules."

 

[IanArgent]

Meh. Just because it may not be a part of the 4e standard core rules, doesn't mean you can replace the existing system with HP + ConTrack system.

I hope that WotC still retains the philosophy of "Tools, Not Rules."

The condition track by itself isn't all that exciting - it's the feats and talents that play with it that make it that much more interesting. Druther have something that could be taken out than have to cram in something that the system doesn't have. IMO it's a lot easier to trim a system down than to add stuff onto it - one of the failings of 3.5 is the stuff that got layered onto it

 

[Ranger REG]

The condition track by itself isn't all that exciting - it's the feats and talents that play with it that make it that much more interesting. Druther have something that could be taken out than have to cram in something that the system doesn't have. IMO it's a lot easier to trim a system down than to add stuff onto it - one of the failings of 3.5 is the stuff that got layered onto it

I hope you're not referring to Unearthed Arcana.

 

[Hussar]

You assume they care about any opinions other then their own.

Ok, why would you assume they don't? We know they do market research and a fair bit of it (unlike pretty much any company in our hobby), so, they actually spend money learning about other people's opinions.

Why do you assume that they are so stupid that they would piddle money away on market research and then ignore it in favour of whatever they think is cool? When did WOTC get taken over by TSR?