Quote from: BedrockBrendan;735701I never intended to suggest they weren't religious (my mother was extremely religious and my father was too in his own way----but this intensified while living in a highly religious and conservative community). I said they were liberals from Boston...

That's what I thought the mismatch was.

Fortunately, my parents thought the greatest evil was communism, so Papa Gygax was below their radar.

Quote from: Rincewind1;735226Five ounces of cocaine, , ten thousand dollars in gold, D20s, six condoms, two condoms ribbed (for her pleasure), Judas Priest Mixtape, 12 bottles of Jack Daniels, D&D handbooks, two dry - cleaned suits, brass athame, six pairs of nylon stockings, a bound virgin victim...looks like we're set for a weekend in Vegas.

"We can't stop here; this is Stirge Country!"

The D&D brand is, unusually these days, not tied to a particular game world.

You can have GURPS Traveller, because the Galaxy of the Third Imperium is Traveller to so many people. You can have GURPS Bunnies & Burrows, GURPS Vampire the Masquerade, GURPS In Nomine.

GURPS D&D? The closest you can get is GURPS Dungeon Fantasy.

Many 4E fans get irate when people say something like "it's not D&D to me anymore." Wizards must recognize that getting irate with people is not a winning strategy for convincing them to choose your product. Since tons of other fantasy games have similar character types, monsters and magic, there's nothing left to make a product peculiarly D&D except game system.

That 4E changed the system too much is reflected in sales that have left Paizo very happy and Wizards disappointed.

In the past, many RPG publishers did good enough for themselves by selling different games for different settings. That seems to be increasingly a thing of the past, and is probably not good enough for Wizards in any case.

What makes the "core" books a cash cow is that you sell a lot of copies of the same product. Selling supplements specific to Forgotten Realms and whatnot is icing on the cake (and may contribute to more profitable sales of fiction lines).

I think this presents a tricky problem for the Dungeons & Dragons brand. Maybe it will end up being meet to tie it more to a particular game world; then perhaps it will be more feasible to make radical changes to the system. But trying to do that in the reverse order looks like a recipe for disappointment.

Quote from: Phillip;736814I think this presents a tricky problem for the Dungeons & Dragons brand. Maybe it will end up being meet to tie it more to a particular game world; then perhaps it will be more feasible to make radical changes to the system.

That is profoundly unlikely to happen. At this point, that ship has sailed; and thank goodness.  D&D is a wide tent, it encompasses a huge variety of potential settings (fantasy, and even things straining the definition of fantasy into other genres).  

I would argue that if you made any version of D&D that only worked with one setting, or even one genre/theme, you'll fail to make it seem like D&D.  That was a huge part of the problem with 4e, in fact.

Quote from: RPGPundit;737242I would argue that if you made any version of D&D that only worked with one setting, or even one genre/theme, you'll fail to make it seem like D&D.  That was a huge part of the problem with 4e, in fact.

It's not necessarily a matter of working only with one setting.

The World of Greyhawk is an example of something that fits like a glove the old editions that also spawned quite a variety of other official worlds. Likewise, Traveller and RuneQuest officially support much more than only the OTU and Glorantha.

It seems, though, that gamers increasingly expect and desire a package of rules and setting. The tricky problem I alluded to is finding the best course among options for pleasing existing fans' expectations of the D&D brand, or the wider market's expectations of brands generally.

Quote from: RPGPundit;737242That is profoundly unlikely to happen. At this point, that ship has sailed; and thank goodness.  D&D is a wide tent, it encompasses a huge variety of potential settings (fantasy, and even things straining the definition of fantasy into other genres).  

I would argue that if you made any version of D&D that only worked with one setting, or even one genre/theme, you'll fail to make it seem like D&D.  That was a huge part of the problem with 4e, in fact.

Absolutely. Maybe its because i cut my teeth during the setting sprawl of the 90s but I want to be able to use the core D&D to fit my setting.

Quote from: JeremyR;733757It's often used as a joke on MST3K/Rifftrax as well.

I'm not sure it's a good meme to be associated with, being nerds who live in their parents basements.

I miss the days when they thought we were satan worshippers...

Considering a lot of college graduates are living in their parents' basements these days, it doesn't have quite the sting that it used to.

As for the Satanic Panic, it was very much a thing back in the 80s in conservative SW Ohio. Brendan's experience was very much like mine in that my parents bought into the Satanic nature of D&D and threw out all of my stuff. Hell, my mom buys into the "Harry Potter is Satanic" and "Rick Riordan's Demigod books are Satanic" crap, and she was VERY concerned that some of the books my kids are reading are very close to D&D-esque.

My kids have learned to not even bother trying to argue with my mom about SF&F, RPGs, and other games. She's not going to change, so save your breath and ignore what she says.

Quote from: flyerfan1991;737267Considering a lot of college graduates are living in their parents' basements these days, it doesn't have quite the sting that it used to.

As for the Satanic Panic, it was very much a thing back in the 80s in conservative SW Ohio. Brendan's experience was very much like mine in that my parents bought into the Satanic nature of D&D and threw out all of my stuff. Hell, my mom buys into the "Harry Potter is Satanic" and "Rick Riordan's Demigod books are Satanic" crap, and she was VERY concerned that some of the books my kids are reading are very close to D&D-esque.

My kids have learned to not even bother trying to argue with my mom about SF&F, RPGs, and other games. She's not going to change, so save your breath and ignore what she says.

I should probably add that my mom is a incredible and a lovely person, no complaints as a son. I dont want to give the wrong impression here. She just happened to buy into some scary things people told her about D&D and heavy metal.

Quote from: BedrockBrendan;737269I should probably add that my mom is a incredible and a lovely person, no complaints as a son. I dont want to give the wrong impression here. She just happened to buy into some scary things people told her about D&D and heavy metal.

Oh, my mom is the same, but she has a pretty simplistic viewpoint on religion and religious people in authority (read: absolute trust).

It was a thing is rural Northern New York as well, and WalkerP a long ago banned poster, lived in Ontario and had clippings of satanic panic letter exchange in his local paper. He may have posted some of that here at one time or another. So it was not just the states or even the more religious regions.

However, we played with a preacher's son on a regular basis. His mom went through the ADnD books and marked over all the nipples. Moms as a rule seem to have really dirty minds. My wife has similar control issues, but I push back when she gets weird.

It seems to me that people of the boomer generations were as a rule more religious than their offspring- even if they didn't go to church, they at least felt bad about it. It kind of goes with their generational love/hate for authority, imo. As a rule though, the satanic panic was a white trash (my people) thing in my area.

Heh, not gaming related, but do you guys remember when living together with your SO while unmarried was called 'living in sin' or how unmarried pregnancy was seen as the absolute worst fucking thing that could ever happen to anyone ever? They were crazy times. I was shocked when I relocated to Tx in 1990 and they were waaay more laid back about both than "liberal" NY.

DnD was never edgy where I lived; EVER. If you played, you hid it or got ostracized.