Which D&D edition do you *really* prefer?

[juboke]

AD&D 1e

 

[Desdichado]

Drowbane: Such as?

Opinions will of course vary, but among my favorite third party settings include the Iron Kingdoms, Dark Legacy, Midnight, Freeport, and the semi-official Rokugan. Late in the 3.5 era we get Golarion, which was later updated to Pathfinder.

Eberron was from that same era, and Dragonstar, and Urban Arcana, and Sovereign Stone (which, granted, is more interesting to me because of its alternate classes than for the setting itself) and I've got a long list of settings that I quite like. If you go just a little further afield and include stuff like Lizard's Mars or Iron Lords of Jupiter, then you've got even more options.

Keep in mind, I'm a dyed in the wool, ever-lovin', dedicated homebrewer. I don't really play in anyone else's setting very much. Heck, I even modify Star Wars significantly when I run it, so I can make it do what I want it to.

That said, almost all of those settings were ones that considered good enough to buy, keep, and borrow from liberally.

 

[Desdichado]

I love PoLand. Not specifically the Nentir Vale or any of the published details. But the whole heroes-in-a-wilderness-of-horror theme? Heck yeah! I pretty much based my homebrew on it.

I really don't have anything whatsoever to do with 4e, but I really like that. That was the best innovation to 4e, IMO. I didn't care for the rules direction at all.

Considering that I never actually answered the question, and yet here I am chatting in the thread... I should probably log my official response.

Houseruled 3.5, or better yet, d20 Modern + d20 Past. Level caps a la E6, or at least greatly slowed advancement with no expectation of getting out of the mid-levels, houserules to greatly limit magic and introduce a more "supernatural horror" vibe instead of high fantasy feel. I'd ignore vast swaths of the rules as completely irrelevent to my game, handwave DCs, ACs and other stats as needed to generate opponents on the fly without actually having statblocks, and otherwise play fairly fast and loose. This system really only works well with a group of fairly laid-back, roleplaying and swashbuckling oriented players; rules-lawyers or powergamers would no doubt break this paradigm wide open. But... since I don't really enjoy playing with rules-lawyers and powergamers anyway, that's not a loss I'm too concerned about.

 

[innerdude]

I'd ignore vast swaths of the rules as completely irrelevent to my game, handwave DCs, ACs and other stats as needed to generate opponents on the fly without actually having statblocks, and otherwise play fairly fast and loose.

That's EXACTLY what I was doing with Pathfinder, with so-so success, until I discovered Fantasy Craft. After Pathfinder hit level 7, it became very hard to play that way.

Seriously, Hobo, check out Fantasy Craft. It's "crunchy," but if you're used to 3.x not overly so, and you could literally rip out a third of the optional rules and the system would be none the worse for the wear.

And the way it handles enemy generation using a table / template system is freaking GENIUS, and would fit exactly in to the type of fighting style you're talking about.

 

[Sunsword]

D&D Next's rules and AD&D 2E's settings.

 

[S'mon]

I don't really have a single go-to edition; I am comfy with 4e D&D for long-term play - with the right players I find it the best edition for umpteen sessions of play. Part of that is the slow pace!

For running chatroom games on Dragonsfoot, either 1e AD&D or its clone OSRIC.
For Old School death round every corner, Labyrinth Lord.
For Old School-ish sandbox tabletop with newbie players and some modern sensibilities, Pathfinder Beginner Box.

Those are the 4 I'm currently GMing. Also playing in Labyrinth Lord and Pathfinder campaigns; full-rules Pathfinder seems a great game to play, but like 3e D&D I'm not sure I'd want to GM it.

 

[DragonLancer]

My preferred option is Pathfinder.

 

[Jupp]

I am still drawn to 2e in a way that I would not mind to play a campaign in it again. We do play C&C at the moment so it is enough of a fix to have the same kind of feeling like in 2e though. But I have some kind of high hopes for 5e to bring me back home to the old dragon.

 

[Moon_Goddess]

Definitely, my campaign setting is very very influenced by points of light. Even more so in it's upcoming 5e conversion

 

[GreyICE]

If I'm going for a tactical, rules-heavy game, 4E, 100%.

For a rules-light game, FATE, Savage Worlds, that sort of thing.