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I just started playing D&D about a month ago:

I just graduated from college, and since I didn't have anyone to play 40k against, a bunch of friends of mine got together to play D&D. None of us had played ever before, and we picked up the books and got started. I got chosen as DM. Its been fun! We've been playing online, using Google Docs spreadsheet as our 'client.' I know its really broke, but we don't want to spend $40 each on a client when this works pretty well.

I think you're right that D&D online was set in Eberron.

I've heard 4.0 is doing "as well as expected." I don't know if Hasbro/WotC releases sales numbers, but they keep putting out books for it... Keep in mind that 3.0 came out in a big boom market for RPGs and created a boom of it's own by the very open OGL terms that meant companies could market their own d20 games that essentially required a Player's Handbook for a few key items.

Unfortunately I think a lot of the 3rd part stuff for 3.0/3.5 was shovelware... Books of untested prestige classes, hasty conversions to d20 because it was all they could get companies to stock, etc.

4.0 did change a lot. Conceptually, it really breaks the game with a sort of left-brain/right-brain split. There's dungeon-delving, which is what the rules focus on: combat, treasure, exploring, puzzles. The other half is the 'role playing' and a lot feel that 4.0 dropped the ball here. I disagree: 4.0 really admits that a lot of groups roleplayed very shallowly if at all and takes the point of view of not really catering to them, but you can still do so if you want.

It's not a bad game. Not perfect, and it makes less of a pretense of being a 'universal' RPG than 3.0/3.5 tried to be, but that's not a bad thing. The new class 'philosophy' (and more restrictive licensing) mean that (hopefully) less companies will put out books of dubious quality.

It's not perfect... I think I might tire of almost every class spamming big, flashy powers and the assumed setting dependence on magic items.

KeithGatchalian, I'm a bit surprised at your comments as my group generally found ranged combat to be of limited use and clerics to be very dull to play.

Part of this is just the way things work. RPGs tend to be more 'house rule' dominated than wargames due to being built around a tigher 'group play' concept. Pick-up games really don't work as well so groups are more likely to get caught up in weird interpretations.

Typeline wrote:People just don't like change for the worse.

That's a bit closer to the mark.

Eric

MagickalMemories wrote:

Typeline wrote:People just don't like change for the worse.

That's a bit closer to the mark.

Eric

Keep crying I'm certain it will help.

Balance wrote:KeithGatchalian, I'm a bit surprised at your comments as my group generally found ranged combat to be of limited use and clerics to be very dull to play.

If I may, Clerics owned in 3.5 and are certainly decent in 4.0. I've been playing a Cleric of the Raven Queen from 1st to 7th now using the pre-made quests and I've loved it.

A friend of mine let me look through his 4th edition D&D player's manual, man it's a mess! You can't get through an entire page reading about anything without being referred to some other section of the book, and it's so much different than I remember the last time I played (I believe it was 3rd ed.) that I would probably have to get in a party with a bunch of complete noobs and have somebody explain it as we went along to figure it out. Why does it have to be so complicated? Surely not everybody who plays is an IT worker who is a whiz at juggling reams of numbers. (I suck at math, it makes my head hurt.) Even thinking about it now is giving me a headache. I know 40K is really simplistic in comparison, but surely there is a halfway point somewhere.

warpcrafter wrote:A friend of mine let me look through his 4th edition D&D player's manual, man it's a mess! You can't get through an entire page reading about anything without being referred to some other section of the book, and it's so much different than I remember the last time I played (I believe it was 3rd ed.) that I would probably have to get in a party with a bunch of complete noobs and have somebody explain it as we went along to figure it out. Why does it have to be so complicated? Surely not everybody who plays is an IT worker who is a whiz at juggling reams of numbers. (I suck at math, it makes my head hurt.) Even thinking about it now is giving me a headache. I know 40K is really simplistic in comparison, but surely there is a halfway point somewhere.

Nice troll 7/10

i played in highschool, and have played off and on in college.

been a couple years since i've had a regular game to play in though, since i became tired of running games, and the games i've found run by others have died off after a session or two.

oh....and i started in 3rd edition and a did a bit of 3.5
i've looked at the books for 4th, but they don't really interest me that much.

Havoc13 wrote:
CyberPunk was AWESOMESAUCE!

+1.

I found my niche game when it was released in the late 80s.
Ain't no "resurrect" spell in this game. Stupidity kills. Learn the lesson.

Typeline wrote:

warpcrafter wrote:A friend of mine let me look through his 4th edition D&D player's manual, man it's a mess! You can't get through an entire page reading about anything without being referred to some other section of the book, and it's so much different than I remember the last time I played (I believe it was 3rd ed.) that I would probably have to get in a party with a bunch of complete noobs and have somebody explain it as we went along to figure it out. Why does it have to be so complicated? Surely not everybody who plays is an IT worker who is a whiz at juggling reams of numbers. (I suck at math, it makes my head hurt.) Even thinking about it now is giving me a headache. I know 40K is really simplistic in comparison, but surely there is a halfway point somewhere.

Nice troll 7/10

Stay out of my swamp and I'll let you live...

I've played for 20 years now.... 2nd Ed, AD&D, Skills and Powers, 3.0, and 3.5. We haven't switched to 4th (and Probably never will), mainly because we (collectively) own 1,000's of dollars worth of books, and find nothing wrong with it. Balance problems? Do like it was always intended to be done. Fix it yourself. RPGs are the ultimate D.I.Y. game. Also looked through the 4th ed stuff and found it not 'unplayable' but not enough to justify switching.

D&D will always be my favorite game.

Balance wrote:4.0 did change a lot. Conceptually, it really breaks the game with a sort of left-brain/right-brain split. There's dungeon-delving, which is what the rules focus on: combat, treasure, exploring, puzzles. The other half is the 'role playing' and a lot feel that 4.0 dropped the ball here. I disagree: 4.0 really admits that a lot of groups roleplayed very shallowly if at all and takes the point of view of not really catering to them, but you can still do so if you want.

People like fighting monsters and scoring loot. From what I've seen, 4.0 caters to this quite well, and for that, more power to it. I don't play D&D, as I said earlier in the thread, but myself and two friends have started up a Warhammer Quest campaign, where I'm the pseudo-GM (I control the monsters and flip most of the cards), one friend is the leader (his two characters lead my two and the other friend's two), and the other friend controls the magic and events (ie. he rolls a 1, we have to fight people), and he also plays both the Elves, so we can always blame the Elves when something goes wrong.

The most enjoyment we get out of it is fighting monsters and scoring treasure. We 'roleplay' in a very non-serious style, such as how the Warrior Priest always seems to hurt the Elves when he tried to heal them, so that became part of his character. My Chaos Warrior's name is "Steve". We don't take it seriously, and just enjoy fighting stuff. Nothing wrong with that.

D&D made a good intro to gaming back in the day (About '87 for me) I played it on and off for years until v3.5 came out and I just couldn't be bothered with more books.

Then Black Industries re-released WFRP.

Now that is an awesome ruleset. I genuinely don't believe I've read better RPG rules.

If only GW would employ some of those people...

Resurrect Dragon Magazine! DEATH TO 4th EDITIO... err...wait sorry, for a moment I forgot and was about to post my usual rant from the Gleemax forums re D&D...

achem: Yes, I play D&D, AD&D, 3.0, 3.5, but I'll sell my soul to Slaanesh before I play 4e.


That is all...

Elric of Grans wrote:I have followed DnD in some form or another since AD&D2E and currently play regularly.

The 4E hate is over-done. They simplified it a lot, streamline it a lot, but improved balance considerably (not perfect, but nothing is) and added some really interesting concepts. More importantly, it has opened the game up to a wider audience than ever before, meaning we now have more people to play with, and better business for Wizards. I have never DMed, but I am assured that it is now easier and more fun than ever before.

Improved is a bit a stretch there. 4th pretty much divorced itself from the games legacy, and is a totally different game from its predecesor. Mych like GW, D&D's competition isnt of RPG games, but things that take up free time like playstation and xbox and WoW. And WotC moved in that direction.

But given the lack of attetion span, much like GW's banking on, we'll see how long they stick with it(the newer players) or will wotc have similar problems-annoying older fans, and trying to get younger ones to stay....


I've been playing since '79 and frankly 4e has no desire from me. We're sticking with and playing in 3.5 and having a blast still like we have for the past 2 years. I've been playing it longer than I have 40k.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

MagickalMemories wrote:
I don't like what they're doing to the game. It's all about developing your character as a combat monster, now, and not at all about "character development."

Disregarding 4e since I dont play it and wont comment, one could say that about a couple of editions. But its more about what the DM does for the game adn the players, then the system. We have at least one combat monster in our party, yet all the characters have complete character and style and background that unless we're actually in a fight you'd never know about that.

Recently, I started an AD&D 2nd edition campaign and managed to find 7 other players (with an 8th who's now interested). That system is the BEST in D&D's history, IMO, and was the SOLE basis for my choice of "frigging awesome."

WHile I'm glad you have found players and are playing and having fun, you, frankly, are wrong. Flat out wrong. 2nd ed was a trainwreck that required too many house rules to make right. not even close to the best.

I´ve played since the late 80s and feel that 4th ed is too much restrictive to RP than before. I like wading into fights screaming and waving my sword, quickrolling to hit and to dam rather than start counting squares, opportunity attacks, actions and minor actions that 4th ed is so keen for. But I`m having fun so can´t complain.

M.

warpcrafter wrote:A friend of mine let me look through his 4th edition D&D player's manual, man it's a mess! You can't get through an entire page reading about anything without being referred to some other section of the book, and it's so much different than I remember the last time I played (I believe it was 3rd ed.) that I would probably have to get in a party with a bunch of complete noobs and have somebody explain it as we went along to figure it out. Why does it have to be so complicated? Surely not everybody who plays is an IT worker who is a whiz at juggling reams of numbers. (I suck at math, it makes my head hurt.) Even thinking about it now is giving me a headache. I know 40K is really simplistic in comparison, but surely there is a halfway point somewhere.

Really? Most people wouldn't fault a book for pointiung out links to other sections.

The main 'trick' is to make or buy power cards (or a similar reference sheet). All your math is on them and can be pre-calculated, and during play they an be discarded/turned over to show what has been used. It's a bit fiddly (some find the idea of arts & crafts in D&D to be some horrible thing, but are probably the same people who'd love to see the 'artifacts' like aged-looking maps some GMs like to make.

KeithGatchalian wrote:


4th edition DND has been a colossal flop, with sales dropping off considerably, and the company in its death throes. They changed too much too fast. Tone down clerics, fix melee fighters, make wizards more viable to play and make it easier to plan encounters and you're done.

Ok I'm no fan of 4e, in fact I really dont like it, but really you have no facts to back up that statement. 4e hasnt been a flop, and the company is not in its death throes.

Ive played since 3.0

now a days i tend to be the GM as no one else seems to care for it.

i must say i do not get why people are crying about math and links like that for me and my players the math was always more of a "in case it can't be rp'ed" kinda thing
i only own the 3.0 books and i havn't noticed any imbalance but that might be that my players are good at rp'ing.

i think it is in the 3.0 dungeons master book where it says that the GM is god so why not just take what you like at leave the rest behind, thats what i do.

but i to have heard that the 4th is bad but reading this tread i think i might read them to see what all the fuss is about, though i have heard the art in 4th is great and that alone would be anough for me to buy them.

carmachu wrote:

KeithGatchalian wrote:


4th edition DND has been a colossal flop, with sales dropping off considerably, and the company in its death throes. They changed too much too fast. Tone down clerics, fix melee fighters, make wizards more viable to play and make it easier to plan encounters and you're done.

Ok I'm no fan of 4e, in fact I really dont like it, but really you have no facts to back up that statement. 4e hasnt been a flop, and the company is not in its death throes.

Um, as someone who owned stock in WotC before it was acquired by Hasbro, and having seen their latest filings with SEC... um... maybe not 'death throws' but she sure isn't healthy.

And yes, their sales have been declining. d20 3.0 and 3.5 enjoyed a larger audience due to the relative ease of the D20 licensing system at the time. However, WotC has adopted a heavy handed approach with 4.0 which has resulted in fewer third party developers producing material for it, which serves to shorten its lifespan as a viable IP (something TSR ran into.) This has been further complicated by many old school RPs like myself being either A) Really pissed off about them forcing Paizo to cease publication of Dragon Magazine, or B) irritated by not being able to buy a single DMG,MM, and PH but rather a Time-Life style series of books (at premium prices) as they stretch out classes and rules that used to be issued in a single book into as many as WotC thinks they can convince the players to buy.


I like the power cards thing... "I use the power of Black Lotus to regain three ability uses..."

My only experience is Dark Heresy, a.k.a. "no you don't want to be a psyker unless you like peppering us in your bone fragments and hot marrow".

BrookM wrote:My only experience is Dark Heresy, a.k.a. "no you don't want to be a psyker unless you like peppering us in your bone fragments and hot marrow".

Hmmm.... to explain my view of D&D 4.0e:

Take the DH rulebooks, and split them into 1/3 chunks, and then sell one set of those fragments each year at the same price as the whole book was before.


Though my last pysker in DH was surprisingly long lived, actually... made it five whole sessions before the TPK. But I have noticed they tend to go off like fraggers, don't they?

BaronIveagh wrote:And yes, their sales have been declining. d20 3.0 and 3.5 enjoyed a larger audience due to the relative ease of the D20 licensing system at the time. However, WotC has adopted a heavy handed approach with 4.0 which has resulted in fewer third party developers producing material for it, which serves to shorten its lifespan as a viable IP (something TSR ran into.) This has been further complicated by many old school RPs like myself being either A) Really pissed off about them forcing Paizo to cease publication of Dragon Magazine, or B) irritated by not being able to buy a single DMG,MM, and PH but rather a Time-Life style series of books (at premium prices) as they stretch out classes and rules that used to be issued in a single book into as many as WotC thinks they can convince the players to buy.

Yes, because every other edition of D&D has been 100% complete purely with the books included.

Game companies release books to make money. The core of the game is the same as it's been for several editions: The PHB, the DMG, and a Monster Manual. The group needs at least one of each of these or a suitable alternative. The PHB2, etc. are all add-ons. A few classes got moved into and out of the core books, but that happens every edition. In this case, some (like the Druid and Barbarian) may be a lot more interesting now: The Barbarian has multiple unique 'rages' and the Druid is a bit more than just a Wild-Shape chassis.

BaronIveagh wrote:I like the power cards thing... "I use the power of Black Lotus to regain three ability uses..."

It's not really like that, though. The cards are merely markers an an alternative for the old standby of check-boxes on a character sheet or numbers that get erased and re-written so much the sheet wears through. They made 'spell cards' for previous editions for similar purposes. THe big change is every 4th ed. character has eough limited powers that everyone has cards, not just the spell-casters. Stereotyping it as 'M:tG in an RPG' is inaccurate as it's more like the 'wargear' cards I hear older versions of 40k used. There's no 'deck' and such.

BaronIveagh wrote:

Um, as someone who owned stock in WotC before it was acquired by Hasbro, and having seen their latest filings with SEC... um... maybe not 'death throws' but she sure isn't healthy.

And yes, their sales have been declining. d20 3.0 and 3.5 enjoyed a larger audience due to the relative ease of the D20 licensing system at the time. However, WotC has adopted a heavy handed approach with 4.0 which has resulted in fewer third party developers producing material for it, which serves to shorten its lifespan as a viable IP (something TSR ran into.) This has been further complicated by many old school RPs like myself being either A) Really pissed off about them forcing Paizo to cease publication of Dragon Magazine, or B) irritated by not being able to buy a single DMG,MM, and PH but rather a Time-Life style series of books (at premium prices) as they stretch out classes and rules that used to be issued in a single book into as many as WotC thinks they can convince the players to buy.

I pretty much know about the GSL debacle. And their "everything is core" idea.

However(and granted its according to them) sales of the PHB have been better than the 3.0 one. I'm not exactly sure how your tracking their "declining sales". Its not like GW's charts where you can see unit sales shrinking, unless you have data some of us dont have.

BaronIveagh wrote:

BrookM wrote:My only experience is Dark Heresy, a.k.a. "no you don't want to be a psyker unless you like peppering us in your bone fragments and hot marrow".

Hmmm.... to explain my view of D&D 4.0e:

Take the DH rulebooks, and split them into 1/3 chunks, and then sell one set of those fragments each year at the same price as the whole book was before.


Though my last pysker in DH was surprisingly long lived, actually... made it five whole sessions before the TPK. But I have noticed they tend to go off like fraggers, don't they?

Our games are best summed up in this chart here, which is a realistic representation of most games played:

I Love D&D! Cleric of lolth FTW! i have a Dark elf fetish used to play religiously for about 6 years then was asked to leave the roleplay group because of angry Girlfriends.l now i just look longingly at rule book and monster manual remembering the joys.....*sigh*

D&D is high powered, but lacks detail. The new encounter based powers really take the strategy out of the spellcasting classes. I also don't care for the morale aspect of the hit points- if a goblin hits you with a spear, you will keep that wound for weeks, or until the cleric performs a miracle on you.

That being said, I started on Hackmaster. This variant of the DnD system apparently blended the most hardcore aspects of 1st and 2nd edition while introducing a dash of satirical humor. Your armor fell apart, you couldn't even hope to carry all the treasure out of a dungeon, and your bags of holding were liable to tear if you put sharp objects in them. Overall, your character would have a grim, short life which would hopefully end in a blaze of glory. It was the only game I've ever played that had a last will and testament on the free character sheets. When something came at you in the middle of the night, the fighters and thieves handled it because if you woke the mage or cleric, then they had no spells the next day.

DnD reminds me much more of Streetfighter. It is a very amusing skirmish game. You fight, you loot, you win over the forces of evil again. The sheer power level is heady. I just find the challenge level in settings like that to be too small. The experience of DnD 4e was similar to oh, let's say going from 'Ard boyz back to a friendly escalation league for new players.

Balance wrote:
Yes, because every other edition of D&D has been 100% complete purely with the books included.

Game companies release books to make money. The core of the game is the same as it's been for several editions: The PHB, the DMG, and a Monster Manual. The group needs at least one of each of these or a suitable alternative. The PHB2, etc. are all add-ons. A few classes got moved into and out of the core books, but that happens every edition. In this case, some (like the Druid and Barbarian) may be a lot more interesting now: The Barbarian has multiple unique 'rages' and the Druid is a bit more than just a Wild-Shape chassis.

Ooh... I get a roll on the Witty Reply to Sarcasm table...

No, but previously they have not actually set out to make an incomplete book as a model to force increased sales. Most previous releases at least contained a full set of the basic classes. Bard for some reasons springs to mind as the most glaring example of this. They also tended to include the basic races in the initial release, rather then telling people that they had to wait a volume to play a gnome.

Balance wrote:
It's not really like that, though. The cards are merely markers an an alternative for the old standby of check-boxes on a character sheet or numbers that get erased and re-written so much the sheet wears through. They made 'spell cards' for previous editions for similar purposes. THe big change is every 4th ed. character has eough limited powers that everyone has cards, not just the spell-casters. Stereotyping it as 'M:tG in an RPG' is inaccurate as it's more like the 'wargear' cards I hear older versions of 40k used. There's no 'deck' and such.

True, it would be more accurate to call it World of Dungeons & Dragonscraft. But that's a personal opinion.

carmachu wrote:

I pretty much know about the GSL debacle. And their "everything is core" idea.

However(and granted its according to them) sales of the PHB have been better than the 3.0 one. I'm not exactly sure how your tracking their "declining sales". Its not like GW's charts where you can see unit sales shrinking, unless you have data some of us dont have.

I'd be interested to see a comparison between it's sales and, say, the current Shadowrun or GURPS books, or better, Pathfinder when it comes out. Further, is that overall units sold in a given time frame or current sales of 3.0 vs 4.0? (And yes, I've seen big companies use a metric where they compared sales of a product they no longer sold to one that was on the shelves to make the current one look more popular.)

Hasbro's profits fell 20% overall last year, according to the SEC, and 47% last quarter when compared to the same time a year ago. WotC was one of their less profitable product lines, though they anticipate that additional revenue will be generated by movie tie-ins with GIJoe and Transformers, as well as their cut of the proceeds of each of those films and are forecasting a turn-around for overall corporate profit in the second Quarter.

BrookM wrote:Our games are best summed up in this chart here, which is a realistic representation of most games played:

Oh, my. Our last one was against genestealers. It ended when someone fumbled the demo charge in a spectacular way.

I play a LOT of D&D. 40K and D&D are basically my 2 big games. D&D is my winter game, usually, since you don't have to cart as much through the snow to get together with friends (also people are lazier during winter). 40K is great for summer. Of course, I'd play either anytime, but both are well loved by me.

I run a D&D game once a year (usually 12-15 sessions) and as a point of trivia, my preference is D&D 2nd Edition.

Note: I am trading and selling various OOP D&D Books:
http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/237809.page

Been playing D&D on and off for like 15 years. I'm mostly a DM rather than a player.

My favourite edition was 3.5. Looking forward to the new pathfinder rule book coming out by Paizo. 4th Edition doesn't really appeal to me, I'm not going to bag it out but its just really not what I want D&D to be.

As an overall trend D&D has become very combat focused with each edition. The magic of D&D for me is that even though that is where the rulebooks are heading, as a DM you can do whatever the hell you want. And thats always been the magic of D&D. That some people don't see that is a shame. They seem to think of the rule books Wizards puts out as the only way to play the game.

In the end it can really come down to the players you have, and what kind of DM you have. Our campaigns are usually a mix of story, combat and non combat challenges.

In a couple of months I will wind up this current campaign we have going and start a new one where all the players start off as NPC classes lol. Commoners basically, with farms, shops etc. They want to see how well they would do against some classic D&D monsters as simple folk of the world.