Quote from: RPGPundit;1028126So these are my thoughts:

1. 2e is not considerably worse than 1e, system wise. It's just somewhat less aesthetically appealing, having been made more lukewarm and less edgy.

2. 1e was first. The appeal of going back to the origin is a lot more than any appeal of "going back to an edition that existed at a certain point in time but wasn't first, and was later replaced by another system".

3. People who were around in the 1e era and stuck with 1e when 2e came around are committed. People who were around and switched to 2e already updated once, so there was less rationale for them to stay loyal to 2e when 3e (and later 5e) came along.

I would partially disagree with you to some extent.

1. IMO 2E is considerably worse system wise, it is much more rules heavy and the play of the game bogs down considerably slower than 1E just as 1E crawls compared to OD&D.

2. I think that the difference here is that the people who moved from 1E to 2E were already looking for a game without meaningful choices and for a spoon feed powergamer munchkin never loses paradise, so as even worse games became available these swine for want of a better word gravitated to those games that were more in line with Ron Edwards and his cultists. 3E and ilk owe a lot more to Edwards than to Arneson.

3. The 1E people had found their post old school fix and were stuck with it, there was no place for them to go except to stick to their dead end. The 2E people as I said were looking for a spoon feed powergamer munchkin never loses paradise so they just kept moving to the lowest of the low that they could find. These people are not your market and Arrows of Indra is too good for them. If I were not wedded to OD&D and were a lot younger I would switch.

2nd Edition is my nostalgic and sentimental favorite, which is one of the many reasons I am an official Enemy of Love and Gaming.

Quote from: Crimhthan;1028720I would partially disagree with you to some extent.

1. IMO 2E is considerably worse system wise, it is much more rules heavy and the play of the game bogs down considerably slower than 1E just as 1E crawls compared to OD&D.

2. I think that the difference here is that the people who moved from 1E to 2E were already looking for a game without meaningful choices and for a spoon feed powergamer munchkin never loses paradise, so as even worse games became available these swine for want of a better word gravitated to those games that were more in line with Ron Edwards and his cultists. 3E and ilk owe a lot more to Edwards than to Arneson.

3. The 1E people had found their post old school fix and were stuck with it, there was no place for them to go except to stick to their dead end. The 2E people as I said were looking for a spoon feed powergamer munchkin never loses paradise so they just kept moving to the lowest of the low that they could find. These people are not your market and Arrows of Indra is too good for them. If I were not wedded to OD&D and were a lot younger I would switch.

While I do like 2E to some extent, I am inclined to agree with this sentiment. 2E did up the power levels of PC's compared to OD&D or even 1E for that matter and 3E is pretty much the epitome of New School RPG's that Ron Edwards and his ilk are so famously associated with.

When I run 2E, it's a scaled down version that is more similar to how OD&D or 1E are traditionally played, and oddly enough that is how my Dad played it back in his day. He started in the 1980's, during the heyday of 1E and when he played 2E, the way he played 1E carried over, which I later found out was more in the vein of OD&D or early Basic D&D than the most commonly assumed way to play AD&D 2E. This is because my grandmother (RIP) played OD&D when it came out in the 1970's and that she ran 1E AD&D games for my Dad in a style more reminiscent of OD&D.

I started with 3E when I was thirteen because that was what was available at the time. But even then, my Dad was my first DM and he ran my first campaigns in the old-school sandbox style. Given the mechanics of 3E and the fact he was far more familiar with 1E and early 2E, we had to heavily house-rule 3E to make it enjoyable for us.

I never played 3E rules-as-written until after I graduated high school and joined a Pathfinder game at a local gaming store. Needless to say, I was one of the few who was actually role-playing and not being a power-gaming Munchkin and the experience was not that enjoyable, especially compared to the modified 3E games I played when I was thirteen.

And the less said about 4E D&D, the better.

In a lot of ways, 1991 was the swan song for traditional Old-School RPG's prior to the rise of the OSR movement. That year saw the release of the D&D Rules Cyclopedia, the last direct continuation of OD&D/Basic D&D officially published, as well as the release of Vampire: The Masquerade 1E by White Wolf, which despite its modern setting was very much an Old-School style game that owed heavily to OD&D and the 1981 version of Call of Cthulhu. That being said, all the editions of Vampire that came after 1E and the other White Wolf games were very much New-School, but Mark Rein-Hagen was a lot less involved in those games than he was in the original version of VTM.

Then there's Justin Achilli, an untalented and pretentious hack who in many ways was the proto-Ron Edwards with his smug pretentious approach to gaming. Seriously, when it comes to being the epitome of Swine, it's a tie between Achilli and Edwards in my eyes.

And it was Achilli and his overarching metaplot that caused the once-popular World of Darkness IP to self-destruct and it was that approach that Achilli took which ultimately doomed White Wolf as a viable company.

I love OD&D, even if it is well before my time (I was born in 1993, but I love the old games of the 1970's and 1980's a lot), and I also love the very first edition of Vampire, which owed a lot to OD&D in many ways and those ties are often overlooked and underappreciated.

Crimthan, there is a thread I made over at the RPG Pub that compares 1974's OD&D to 1991's Vampire: The Masquerade and discusses Old-School gaming to a large extent as well. I'll link it below if you're interested in reading it.

https://rpgpub.com/threads/vampire-the-masquerade-playing-in-the-old-school-style.1004/

Quote from: Crimhthan;10287202. I think that the difference here is that the people who moved from 1E to 2E were already looking for a game without meaningful choices and for a spoon feed powergamer munchkin never loses paradise, so as even worse games became available these swine for want of a better word gravitated to those games that were more in line with Ron Edwards and his cultists. 3E and ilk owe a lot more to Edwards than to Arneson.

Ron Edwards, king of the munchkins!

I kinda like your bizarro fantasies, but I don't think you have any idea who Edwards is or why he's bad. It's nothing at all to do with "a game without meaningful choices and a spoon feed powergamer munchkin never loses paradise"

This is so silly I do kinda wonder if you are just an act though, maybe you're really Edwards or Baker 'avin a larf.

Quote from: S'mon;1028730Ron Edwards, king of the munchkins!

I kinda like your bizarro fantasies, but I don't think you have any idea who Edwards is or why he's bad. It's nothing at all to do with "a game without meaningful choices and a spoon feed powergamer munchkin never loses paradise"

This is so silly I do kinda wonder if you are just an act though, maybe you're really Edwards or Baker 'avin a larf.

Ron Edwards started the whole "Story Gamer" movement and was the owner of a shitty website called The Forge.

He is known for being a smug and pretentious asshole who hates fun and looks down on people who play RPG's in the old-school fashioned style. Essentially he's Justin Achilli writ large and not tied to White Wolf in any way.

People like to blame Mark Rein-Hagen for the Swine-like attitude that White Wolf developed in its later years (and the fandom of White Wolf games followed suit and began to epitomize the swine themselves), but all of the pretentiousness and general swinery that White Wolf was guilty of in its later incarnations can be laid solely at Justin Achilli's feet.

Justin Achilli is a massive swine and a talentless dickhead.

Mark Rein-Hagen was very much an old-school gamer who took inspiration from Gygax and Arneson, and he even cited OD&D as a major inspiration in the First Edition Vampire: The Masquerade corebook in addition to the original Call of Cthulhu, as well as the more commonly cited media influences such as Anne Rice and The Lost Boys.

Mark Rein-Hagen in many ways was one of the last pre-OSR game designers who adhered to the Old-School approach. Everyone talks about how Call of Cthulhu inspired VTM, but so did OD&D, despite the fact that the swine at Onyx Path and the new White Wolf like to overlook or downplay the massive influence OD&D had on Vampire in its initial days.

It's a shame that Onyx Path Publishing, the new incarnation of White Wolf, and the greater WoD fandom have become utter swine and follow in Justin Achilli's footsteps as opposed to better game designers like Gary Gygax, Dave Arneson, or even Mark Rein-Hagen.

Quote from: Doc Sammy;1028729When I run 2E, it's a scaled down version that is more similar to how OD&D or 1E are traditionally played, and oddly enough that is how my Dad played it back in his day. He started in the 1980's, during the heyday of 1E and when he played 2E, the way he played 1E carried over, which I later found out was more in the vein of OD&D or early Basic D&D than the most commonly assumed way to play AD&D 2E. This is because my grandmother (RIP) played OD&D when it came out in the 1970's and that she ran 1E AD&D games for my Dad in a style more reminiscent of OD&D.

Pardon my old-ness, but I'm tickled that we actually have multiple generations of role playing gamers now...

Quote from: Ratman_tf;1028732Pardon my old-ness, but I'm tickled that we actually have multiple generations of role playing gamers now...

Hey, I'm glad to carry on the torch.

If I ever decide to have kids, I'll do my best to get them into RPG's as well.

Quote from: Doc Sammy;1028731Ron Edwards started the whole "Story Gamer" movement and was the owner of a shitty website called The Forge.

He is known for being a smug and pretentious asshole who hates fun and looks down on people who play RPG's in the old-school fashioned style. Essentially he's Justin Achilli writ large and not tied to White Wolf in any way.

Edwards is certainly a smug and pretentious asshole, but his whole movement/cult of Narrativist story creation games was a reaction AGAINST White Wolf railroaded games with their pre-written stories.

Quote from: S'mon;1028734Edwards is certainly a smug and pretentious asshole, but his whole movement/cult of Narrativist story creation games was a reaction AGAINST White Wolf railroaded games with their pre-written stories.

And yet they became a mirror of the very same Achilli-esque nightmares they were rebelling against in the first place. Ironic, isn't it?

The OSR was able to buck against Justin Achilli and New-School D&D in the right way, by going back to basics instead of digging the grave deeper.

Mark Rein-Hagen intended for the World of Darkness to be a sandbox, and Justin Achilli turned it into a railroad.

Quote from: Crimhthan;10287203E and ilk owe a lot more to Edwards than to Arneson.

I appreciated your insight, but on this one point above I would say that you weren't accurate. Edwards didn't really have any major influence on 3e at the time of its creation.

His GNS theory had a HUGE influence on 4e, however. Which is why it was the least popular D&D edition ever.

Quote from: RPGPundit;1028895I appreciated your insight, but on this one point above I would say that you weren't accurate. Edwards didn't really have any major influence on 3e at the time of its creation.

His GNS theory had a HUGE influence on 4e, however. Which is why it was the least popular D&D edition ever.

By contrast the old '90s threefold model Edwards ripped off & mutilated - the GDS idea that roleplaying games involve Gamism Drama & Simulation - seems rather reminiscent of 5e's "Three Pillars" of Combat Roleplay & Exploration. It tends to be Combat where gamist competition comes to the fore, social roleplay that foregrounds Drama, and world-simulation shines most in Exploration mode.

Unlike Edwards' horrible GNS, 5e's concept gets it exactly right IMO - most players play and most GMs GM for a mix of the three, and the three pillars are often mutually supporting.

And 5e D&D is incredibly popular, moreso than 3e ever was from what I can tell.

Quote from: S'mon;1028896And 5e D&D is incredibly popular, moreso than 3e ever was from what I can tell.

I'm not sure about that at all.  Not to take anything away from 5e, but 3rd was huge when it first came out.  It was getting people back in who'd lapsed from playing, it was getting new players in, it was getting converts from earlier editions and from other games.  5e's going strong as well, but I'd need to see sales figures to believe it's a bigger phenomenon.

Now, if 5e doesn't break down at high levels like 3e I could believe it will have longer legs, but that's a distinct issue.

Quote from: Dave R;1028897I'm not sure about that at all.  Not to take anything away from 5e, but 3rd was huge when it first came out.  It was getting people back in who'd lapsed from playing, it was getting new players in, it was getting converts from earlier editions and from other games.  5e's going strong as well, but I'd need to see sales figures to believe it's a bigger phenomenon.

Now, if 5e doesn't break down at high levels like 3e I could believe it will have longer legs, but that's a distinct issue.

3e was definitely popular, that's why I made the comparison. But it seemed mostly to be drawing back lapsed gamers and did not have the general cultural penetration of 5e, or of D&D in the early '80s. My impression is 5e is ahead of 3e but behind early-mid '80s 1e+Basic.

5e doesn't crash at mid-high levels (9+) the way 3e does and indeed is playable to 20th, very unlike 3e. Don't know how important that is with new players though.

According to WotC, 5e has outsold 3.0 and 3.5 combined. Chris Perkins said last year was D&D'd biggest year since he arrived at the company during the 3.x era. So yeah, it's bigger.

The much lower barrier to entry is IMO a big factor. Purely an anecdote, but I know a guy whose whole experience with D&D prior to being invited to a 5e game was spending over 2 hours putting a character together who got killed almost immediately. So I think it's less about being playable until level 20 and more about not needing system mastery to play a basic fighter and kick the shit out of monsters. That really should be the litmus test of any fantasy game...if I write "Fighter" at the top of my sheet, I should be a badass.

D&D in the 3.x era was still a gamer's game. Today, it's gone mainstream, pulled up in the same updraft that has seen hobby boardgaming explode in popularity, and then turbo-charged by its prominence in pop culture properties like Big Bang Theory and Stranger Things. It's not just lapsed RPGers who have rejoined the fold with 5E, but 20 and 30 somethings who have never played RPGs before, and kids 10-15 who are playing with their parent and friends and school.

New media has been a game-changer for D&D. A guy with no pen and paper RPG credits to his name just raised over $2 million on a D&D kickstarter on the strength of his Youtube channel. Critical Role has made D&D cool with hipsters. I have people at my office begging to join my lunch hour game. You have to be living under a rock not to have noticed the dramatic increase in the profile of D&D in the last couple years.

The owner of my FLGS - which has been in operation for over 30 years and is the biggest hobby game store in the word - told me he sold 1,200 copies of the 5E PBH last year. That was not only more than he sold of 3.x in its best year, but more than he sold of the 5E books in 2015 and 2016.

The Uncanny Resurrection of Dungeons and Dragons