Quote from: estar;624569Well the point of the OSR is to play older edition D&D not something like them.

This is true only for the AD&D Revival segment of the OSR. They are the largest block of the OSR, but certainly not the only voice.  

I love that the OSR has created new, interesting and often better versions of the classic editions. And even more important, the OSR has produced some badass original games as well.

Quote from: Zak S;624590And by that light, I think the OSR is batting about as well as anyone else--including many professionals.

Many of the DIY garage publishers (OSR, storygamers, etc) compete very well against the 2nd tier RPG publishers in terms of quality.

It's worth pointing out when the Monster and Treasure Assortment was vastly more useful in the days before you could randomly generate monster encounters and their associated treasure in an instant using a web page. There are several breeds of supplement which were really useful back in the day but only had that utility because most DMs didn't have home computers.

TSR, that's still a boring question. It gets asked all the time, and people bring it up because TSR is their big reference point. Show me this generation's City State of the Invincible Overlord. Something with so much massive applicability. Keep on the Borderlands has been remade a dozen times. We get it, it is a great basic module. But let it rest already.

Dark Tower.
Thieves' Guild.
That sort of thing.

(Note, they were rare gems in their time, too: most of the 3rd party supplements I have collected from that period are not any better than today's average product... and that's putting it very mildly. A lot of them are worth less than the paper they are printed on. At least a PDF is a victimless crime.)

Quote from: Melan;624676TSR, that's still a boring question. It gets asked all the time, and people bring it up because TSR is their big reference point. Show me this generation's City State of the Invincible Overlord.

If that's the mark, I'll never get near it.

City State is great if what you want is City State (as are Ptolus and Haven, much in the same vein), but I really don't. That niche is filled.

Thracia or Dark Tower? That I can see some current OSR lights making a run at.

Quote from: Melan;624676Show me this generation's City State of the Invincible Overlord.

The problem is that people are imitating past glories literally, and these imitations are being praised, rather than writing original works, originality which CSIO had and the Gygax modules had in their day.

Most of your stuff Melan is not very original: ordinary maps with numbered lists of locations with monsters in them. Im not sure how you have ended up as a spokesman on this subject.

People should be on the lookout for originality, that is how the old days can be matched. Vornheim is original at least even if it has many failings and so is some sort of example to look at, setting a low standard to be improved on.

Next time, I will be asking for your kind permission.

Quote from: Will Graham;624693Im not sure how you have ended up as a spokesman on this subject.

Uh ... it's derived from his avatar, obviously.

I don't think OSR released will ever eclipse TSR releases, for one solid reason--the various OSR camps are not really united and there's a lot of separate threads, branches, etc.

TSR had a very short product list in its first decade.  When AD&D was up and running I think the average was 2-4 modules released every year before the early 80s.  Outside of Judges Guild (the only authorized module maker), which did not have the same marketplace penetration as TSR, most gamers who played D&D would know the TSR output.

However, that's based on a singular market.  Now that D&D has become "open source", for lack of a better term, there are many variants--and no central force.  Dozens of blogs, sites, message boards, and publishers all sort of fracture the audience.  As more people embrace the "long tail", the amount of central attention one items gets is less so.

That's probably also why as TSR expanded, there were less "classics", as they were fracturing their own audiences with different campaign settings.  People have limited budgets, and would then pick and choose their favorites, but there wasn't a major expansion of the pool.  So, less of a shared experience.

I also think part of the problem is that the "classics" are better set in your mind when you are younger and don't have years of experience and sometimes jaded cynicism appear.  They say the "golden age" is "12", and I suspect a person who has been involved with D&D for over 30 years is likely not going to have the same sense of wonder reading a new release than they did back in 1980 reading Tomb of Horrors or Vault of the Drow.  And I can't see many of these OSR releases being aimed at the brand new gamer.

James Raggi is a self-aggrandizing circus clown.  What he meant when he said "The OSR is better than TSR" (and he said it years ago, but hey, Pundit, you've gotta drive forum traffic right?) was "I'm better than TSR" which was his attempt at an annual "The Beatles are bigger than Jesus Christ." moment.  Then later when his star began to fade (again) he hooked up with child rapefic author Geoffery Mckinney and published Carcosa (ooo controversiaaaaaal!) and, once that charge had spent itself, he published the orange turd from beyond (that's what's on the cover, take it up with him) where apparently microscopic silver surfers can actually prevent you from DMing ever again so long as you live if you play his module.  Yes, that's really in there.

So, no, the "R" isn't better than TSR - it never was, never is, and isn't close to it.  It's Raggi getting people looking at him by saying it.  Even if the actual question would merit discussion, there is no B2, G1-3, S1 through S4, WG4, A series, C1 or C2, D1-3, etc. etc. anywhere in the "R".

Quote from: Melan;624676Show me this generation's City State of the Invincible Overlord.

I will be taking a stab at this .. eventually. My problem is that I don't scale much beyond one or two products a year. And for the really big products the work is doesn't grow linearly but rises much higher which I am sure you know from Tegal Manor. Plus for City-State the existence of the CSIO hardback from Necromancer means I put my version at the end of the list.

Quote from: Melan;624676Thieves' Guild.

Now that is something I been working on and it will come out sooner rather than later.

What I am planning over the next two years is releasing a series of follow-ons to the Majestic Wilderlands taking each of the four core classes (Fighter, magic-users, clerics, and thieves) and writing a supplement based on the stuff I ran for 30 years and recently that focuses on that general area. What I plan for the Wilderness and Adventure section is a detailing locales, mini-adventures, and mini-settings that pertain that class.

One of them is the Lost Book of Magic some of which I already previewed on my Blog and within Scourge of the Demon Wolf.

However I think there been a lot of creativity poured into translating D&D into other genres. However there are things like Spear at Dawn, and the upcoming Arrows of Indra that I think expand D&D in the way the best of Judges Guild material did and are every bit as useful.

Quote from: estar;624739I will be taking a stab at this .. eventually.

I too have an idea for something comparable (yet quite different). But that's not going to happen right now.

Quote from: Will Graham;624693The problem is that people are imitating past glories literally, and these imitations are being praised, rather than writing original works, originality which CSIO had and the Gygax modules had in their day.

You do realize that the point of the OSR is to play older editions of D&D not other games? Are you going to criticize the Traveller Mailing List for not talking about anything else other than Traveller. Or the GURPS forum at SJ Game for not talking about anything other than GURPS. Or Lythia.com for not posting anything else other than Harn material?

The problem you are describing is considered a feature by many. In addition you are a aware that as of May of 2012 there has been 700+ products that have been released and targets a older edition of D&D. That of those 700+ products, only 31 are rule system or retro-clones as people like to call them.

Quote from: Will Graham;624693Most of your stuff Melan is not very original: ordinary maps with numbered lists of locations with monsters in them. Im not sure how you have ended up as a spokesman on this subject.

You do realize there is a difference between format and content. Are you going to criticize say Game of Throne for the fact it is printed in a boring single column format on paper bound into a book? Or that it just one more series set is a pseudo medieval setting?

Obviously Game of Thrones managed to rise above similar novels due its content. Melan is respected because he takes older formats and older themes and makes them fresh with interesting ideas, places, and NPCs.

Quote from: Will Graham;624693People should be on the lookout for originality, that is how the old days can be matched. Vornheim is original at least even if it has many failings and so is some sort of example to look at, setting a low standard to be improved on.

Here are your tools to prove us wrong.

Scribus
Abiword
Inkscape or Gimp
Lulu, or RPGNow
Ghostscript
The D20 SRD

The use of these items will allow you to create a product to show the rest of us how it is done. Then at the end of the year, we can compare sales or download figures and see how well it worked out.

There are no gatekeepers to stop you from doing how it ought be done. And if you ask nicely some people may help with areas that you may not have the skills for like art, cartography, or layout.

This illustrates an important point about the OSR, that whatever slice you see is the result of what somebody WANTED to do. The secondmost important feature of the OSR is that it is a do it yourself culture. That what it is a result of those who DO.

Quote from: Benoist;624743I too have an idea for something comparable (yet quite different). But that's not going to happen right now.

Another possibility is what I was going to do before I secured the Judges Guild License. Strip out the JG Content, draw a new map, and release it as part of the vague setting that is behind my Points of Light/hexcrawl stuff.

A link to the rough map draft of Eastgate

It has an appeal because my version is more Harn-like than the original. The gonzo elements have been mostly discarded in various of politics and factional struggles. Although I still have stuff like vampires in the sewers.

Quote from: Spinachcat;624656This is true only for the AD&D Revival segment of the OSR. They are the largest block of the OSR, but certainly not the only voice.

First off B/X D&D, and OD&D both have revival segments of their own. AD&D is not the only older edition to get special treatment.

Second it not a sharp dividing line. The center of the cloud that is the OSR is the older editions of D&D. 700+ products have been release that specifically target those editions. Many more have been released that are near-clone or similar feel.

The further you get away from the older edition the less useful the OSR become in trying to get more sales, more downloads or more views. Eventually if the differences are large enough the person is the same boat as anybody else in trying to promote a new RPG.  

Quote from: Spinachcat;624656I love that the OSR has created new, interesting and often better versions of the classic editions. And even more important, the OSR has produced some badass original games as well.

Most people in the OSR are interested in a wide variety of games. I like GURPS and Harn. Dan Proctor has managed to acquire a bunch of older games in different genres and released new editions based of D&D engine.

Quote from: estar;624747Another possibility is what I was going to do before I secured the Judges Guild License. Strip out the JG Content, draw a new map, and release it as part of the vague setting that is behind my Points of Light/hexcrawl stuff.

A link to the rough map draft of Eastgate

It has an appeal because my version is more Harn-like than the original. The gonzo elements have been mostly discarded in various of politics and factional struggles. Although I still have stuff like vampires in the sewers.

I have no doubt that it would be great to see such a product come to life!

I disagree with the idea bandied about before that "the niche for such products has been filled". We're basically talking about settings, here, and just like I can't have enough variations on the concept of the underworld setting (aka the mega-dungeon), I can't get enough cities, can't get enough baronies and kingdoms and whatnot to play with. I think there's such a potential for this kind of product to be declined in oh-so-many-ways that they've proven in spades, over the last 40 years almost, that you can really do something like this in many, many different ways.

And yeah, that does mean that some of these do suck, only ape what preceded them without really doing anything original in and of themselves, and the like. But if after settings like CSIO, Pavis, Night City and so many others you can still have a Ptolus in the 2000s, I'm confident you can still have original city settings that represent great added value for the actual game table. I have no doubt of that.