I'm starting to feel unusually blessed. I've never really had trouble finding players willing to try games other than D&D or some other top tier property. At worst they've balked at one particular game, but then been willing tro try some other unusual thing.

But then I read a lot of stories out there in internet land that go like this: "I always wanted to try [game X], but no one wanted to give it a shot," or "No one around here wants to play anything but D&D."

Is this really a consistent, notable phenomenon, or the internet gripe echo chamber at work? If it is a major issue, what's going on and how can it be aleviated? Should it be fixed or should we just make sure we're always ready to settle for running whatever the top 3 games are in our personal style?

Quote from: Vegetable Protein;651129I'm starting to feel unusually blessed. I've never really had trouble finding players willing to try games other than D&D or some other top tier property. At worst they've balked at one particular game, but then been willing tro try some other unusual thing.

But then I read a lot of stories out there in internet land that go like this: "I always wanted to try [game X], but no one wanted to give it a shot," or "No one around here wants to play anything but D&D."

Is this really a consistent, notable phenomenon, or the internet gripe echo chamber at work? If it is a major issue, what's going on and how can it be aleviated? Should it be fixed or should we just make sure we're always ready to settle for running whatever the top 3 games are in our personal style?

Yes, it certainly can be difficult. Some players are only interested in one milieu (Sci-Fi, Fantasy, Cyberpunk, etc.), some only in the system they started with. And when I say only, I do not mean they prefer that - I mean it's the only thing that interests them enough to play. My personal experience is that the proportion of players who fall into one of these categories is high.

I'm personally rather lucky in that my core group, composed of longtime friends, has always been willing to experiment.

Depends on the group. In my current one, the tastes of one particular player carry special weight. Besides that, though, the rest of us may split 50-50 on whether this or that seems fun.

Almost anything is likely to get a chance for 3 sessions or so, but we keep coming back to old-time D&D as the reliable crowd pleaser.

To an extent, it depends (for this bunch) on how much rules-wonkery the GM lays on the players. One guy likes to use Twilight: 2000, but nobody had to learn the details of the rules in order to play.

Quote from: Vegetable Protein;651129I'm starting to feel unusually blessed. I've never really had trouble finding players willing to try games other than D&D or some other top tier property. At worst they've balked at one particular game, but then been willing tro try some other unusual thing.

But then I read a lot of stories out there in internet land that go like this: "I always wanted to try [game X], but no one wanted to give it a shot," or "No one around here wants to play anything but D&D."

Is this really a consistent, notable phenomenon, or the internet gripe echo chamber at work? If it is a major issue, what's going on and how can it be aleviated? Should it be fixed or should we just make sure we're always ready to settle for running whatever the top 3 games are in our personal style?

I think it varies a lot from group to group. I've played with people who were open to any system, but I've also played with people who will only play D&D or Pathfinder. Another poster mentioned that some gamers will stick to a single genre as well. It really boils down to who you are playing with.

One possibly unusual thing with my group is that it's easier to get a "one off" game going with pregenerated characters.

The guys who most balk at learning a new chargen system basically just want to "get on with the game" and develop their personas in actual play. They don't want to sit down before hand even to think of a character sketch and describe it in plain language (which a GM could then translate into whatever game-ese was wanted).

My group is pretty flexible though I know some games they won't or most likely will not enjoy so I avoid them.

When coming time to switch games they have told me run what I want and I have twice even though I knew it would fail. Once was Dc heroes (MEGS version) but I and they had fun just not enough to keep running. Second was a game I hacked the Seventh sea system for called Senseis and Dojos. which was a near future martial arts game which everyone enjoyed but one player who hates Martial arts anything.

I really want to run my game system but the complexity is beyond most my players who wouldn't want to learn enough rules to play but for me it is my version of simulationist fun.

So in truth I am lucky as well.

But I have been with groups who only play one thing or maybe two. usually the old D&D standards.

I agree with everything above, but in my own experience, there's another factor involved, as well, in the online complaints. Let me fill in the blanks:

"I always wanted to try (running) [game X], but no one wanted to give it a shot (as gamemaster),"

or

"No one around here wants to play anything but D&D (when I'm gamemaster, which I've never done, except that one game where they locked me in the closet for being an ass, and played Uno for the next six months instead)."

We have a couple of people (me, and another guy) who have gamemastered a lot, and if we announced we wanted to run Monopoly as a roleplaying game, most of the group would show up at least once. And a couple of people who want to gamemaster, and just aren't very good at it[1], and nobody really bothers when they try to start a game, regardless of what system. And a few in between, where it does depend on the system, and setting.

[1]One guy wanted to run a game set in the Roman Empire, his favorite historical period, using Chivalry & Sorcery. Didn't want us running about with heavy armor and equipment, so he told us were were "the dregs of Roman society." Forgetting that, while he might have studied the period in more detail than any of the rest of us, we were all well read enough to know exactly how dreggy said dregs could get. We immediately dubbed ourselves the Roaming Roman Rape Gang, and at one point used live babies as a stepping stone to climb over a wall (hell, they were *our* babies). Though the guy took a crap in the middle of the mage's bed, then masturbated on top of it, that was a little too much for even us.

Not for my group. If you don't want to experiment, why are you here?

-clash

I gamed with two seperate groups for a few years. One would play anything, but favored Call of Cthulhu or WoD. The other would only play the current version of D&D, and nothing else mattered.

As long as I've been gaming I've been in groups where we switch systems and rotate GMs quite regularly with what we call campaigns lasting maybe 5-10 sessions, sometimes even less. So yeah we don't have any problems getting people to try less established games.  

I suppose the one caveat is that if a game is really obscure, its production values poor or it's just has very unconventional in either subject matter or mechanics it really needs to work first time round. If does not make a good first impression in play it may never get another chance as there is just too little time to play and too many other games to be played. That is tricky because it is precisely the unconventional game that might take a little time to get used to.

I know "X Game Only" groups and some of them are fun. My old "Try Anything" group was awesome, but sadly disbanded. I would love to get them back together or a group like that.

I personally love variety, not just playing RPGs, but boardgames, CCGs, wargames, LARPS, etc and that's why I do as many cons each year as possible. My goal is to be free enough to do a con every month. That would pretty much eliminate my need for a regular group. I also like the concentrated 3 days of gaming instead of 4-6 hours per week.

I miss the campaign concept a bit, but for me, variety is more valuable.

I agree with what most posters have said that it varies per the group. In my experience it has been relatively easy to get people to try things. But if the game in question has been run once and didn't go well. Forget about another chance. Its all or nothing. Which sometimes really sucks. As a new system or what not to you. Trying to teach people something new. Then a couple times in my case having people that don't want to do any kind of reading, or what not to help themselves understand the setting and/or rules. (Oh and by reading I don't mean large portions of books, or even chapters. I mean a couple of paragraphs. Which has always astounded me.)

My group is very open to new games - we switch GM duties regularly and usually have two or three different campaigns, each using a different system, at once. Judging from what I see at conventions and at the shops, my group isn't the norm, though.

Quote from: Ronin;651176In my experience it has been relatively easy to get people to try things. But if the game in question has been run once and didn't go well. Forget about another chance. Its all or nothing. Which sometimes really sucks.

Actually, that's generally my experience as well. I'm not innocent of it either. First time I played Savage Worlds, the GM sucked and I didn't enjoy or understand the game at all. It took a few years before I gave it another chance with a different GM and now it is one of our regular sysstems.

I only GM for old friends and family these days and they will try anything that does not require more than 10-15 minutes of character creation. I have heard from other players in my area that it is hell to get anything other than a Pathfinder game going.