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Because I've seen a LOT of ragging on D&D from others in this forum. So I'm curious, is this a common thing? Because at my local GW, the manager runs his own D&D-esque campaign for his friends, the sub manager does too, and I personally really enjoy D&D and other TTRPG games.

It's just an easy target if you're making arguments from a position of rules focused design - and this forum is very rules obsessed I believe.

D&D is in many ways very poorly balanced, but in the right group that doesnt really matter as it's all about how the DM leads the story, and the rules are just one tool in doing that. I think a lot of people coming from a war gaming perspective really struggle to be ok with that though.

 Stux wrote:
It's just an easy target if you're making arguments from a position of rules focused design - and this forum is very rules obsessed I believe.

D&D is in many ways very poorly balanced, but in the right group that doesnt really matter as it's all about how the DM leads the story, and the rules are just one tool in doing that. I think a lot of people coming from a war gaming perspective really struggle to be ok with that though.

3rd edition had awful balance.

But ESPECIALLY relative to 40k, 5E and especially 4E had and have great balance.

Considering how much user input is required to make a decent game of 40k they should love D&D.

I've definitely been rapidly losing interest in 40K (don't really play it anymore). I actually only started trying out D&D this year, and I've been thoroughly unimpressed.

So, I'm not really sure how to answer. I think I'd categorize them both in a similar vein; massively successful and mediocre (almost as a result). I've taken part in two D&D groups (both with decent GMs) and I don't think I'd get involved in another one. It's an exceptionally strict/boring version of a role-playing game.

If I were to enjoy D&D I think I'd end up doing what I do with 40K and massively house-ruling it, etc.

 Elbows wrote:
I've definitely been rapidly losing interest in 40K (don't really play it anymore). I actually only started trying out D&D this year, and I've been thoroughly unimpressed.

So, I'm not really sure how to answer. I think I'd categorize them both in a similar vein; massively successful and mediocre (almost as a result). I've taken part in two D&D groups (both with decent GMs) and I don't think I'd get involved in another one. It's an exceptionally strict/boring version of a role-playing game.

If I were to enjoy D&D I think I'd end up doing what I do with 40K and massively house-ruling it, etc.

That's pretty fair. Mind if ask what you voted on the poll?

But I've got zero issues with someone saying "Not a fan of D&D-doesn't scratch my itch," like you did. I'll agree that D&D's main power is that it's so damn big, so it's easier to find a group for that than it is Mutants and Masterminds, or GURPS, or Shadowrun, or any number of other RPGs. But it's a good way to get introduced to TTRPGs, I think, even if other systems do their job better than D&D does.

I grew up on DnD, and transitioned into TT wargames, etc.

DnD, like 40k, and almost all GW games, requires an agreement between players about what the game will be like, not to abuse broken elements, etc. Its a negotiation, but one that has an ultimate arbiter (the DM). If you don't like the setting, or the choices of characters, or the power level of the campaign, then you don't play, or it ends up miserable for all parties.

Sound familiar?

*puts on big plastic hipster glasses*

I prefer Pathfinder, Numenera, and Shadowrun.

I hate dungeon crawling so I really dislike DND but we had great fun playing GURPS in many different settings. I actually really liked those days.

I like tabletop RPGs. I dislike D&D specifically because 5e isn't a complete or working tabletop RPG, it's a bland half-assed intro experience nobody seems to want to move beyond into more interesting things. I disliked 3e because while it worked really well it was impossible to get anyone to read enough of to actually use it, and I disliked 4e because it was an overly-abstracted handwavey combat-centric MMO pretending to be an RPG.

If 5e was an intro product and there was an "advanced 5e" game where bonuses/damage didn't scale linearly by level independent of class and where classes didn't shove players into one-dimensional boxes where you have one thing you do every turn, or if 4e had packaged itself as a wargame instead of an RPG, or if 3e had a sensible and easy-to-use tutorial path to make it easier to teach to new people, I'd be happy with D&D, but as-is they're trying to take single-purpose games and sell them as general-purpose RPGs anyone can do anything with, and everyone seems to be lapping it up and refusing to do anything other than D&D in the sphere of tabletop RPGs.

Come to think of it, I dislike D&D for a lot of the same reasons I dislike 40k.

3/5.
Waiting to roll dice, 2 people think their dumb af sidestory is funny and you realize you'd rather not dedicate a day of the week to that. Did have some fun leveling you and char building took too much of a backseat to the 2 drunken larpers.

*takes off big plaster hipster glasses, puts on excessive mascara*

Oh I also like Old World of Darkness.

@OP:

Geez, you are comparing orange with apples here. D&D is a RPG in which the players and the DM play with one another and NOT against another like in a wargame.

I was a DM in a 3rd Ravenloft campaign for ten years and have only fond memories of the time.

Just don't take classes as a player with only D4 HD and you should be fine.

I fell out of love with actual D&D due to the heavy reliance on classes and tropes. Ttrpgs in general are fun for me. A good dm and players can make any edition palatable, but so far more house rules or an open ended rule set are better than sticking to official books.

 Strg Alt wrote:
@OP:

Geez, you are comparing orange with apples here. D&D is a RPG in which the players and the DM play with one another and NOT against another like in a wargame.

I was a DM in a 3rd Ravenloft campaign for ten years and have only fond memories of the time.

Just don't take classes as a player with only D4 HD and you should be fine.

I’m not comparing them.

 JNAProductions wrote:

 Elbows wrote:
I've definitely been rapidly losing interest in 40K (don't really play it anymore). I actually only started trying out D&D this year, and I've been thoroughly unimpressed.

So, I'm not really sure how to answer. I think I'd categorize them both in a similar vein; massively successful and mediocre (almost as a result). I've taken part in two D&D groups (both with decent GMs) and I don't think I'd get involved in another one. It's an exceptionally strict/boring version of a role-playing game.

If I were to enjoy D&D I think I'd end up doing what I do with 40K and massively house-ruling it, etc.

That's pretty fair. Mind if ask what you voted on the poll?

But I've got zero issues with someone saying "Not a fan of D&D-doesn't scratch my itch," like you did. I'll agree that D&D's main power is that it's so damn big, so it's easier to find a group for that than it is Mutants and Masterminds, or GURPS, or Shadowrun, or any number of other RPGs. But it's a good way to get introduced to TTRPGs, I think, even if other systems do their job better than D&D does.

I actually didn't vote.

I think my issues with D&D is that it is an actual "table top" RPG. I enjoy much more free-form, flowing games which are more theater-of-the-mind kind of things. Give me a notepad, a handful of dice and let's cooperatively make a story. I hate strict rules in an RPG, seems to defeat the purpose for me. Hell, I could play a role-playing game with no dice or stats, just an evolving improvised story based solely on the GM's discretion, etc. D&D comes across as a tabletop wargame with combos/unlocks/etc. It feels very little like a true RPG to me.

I basically dropped d&d when I got into RT/2nd. RT had enuff RPG elements in it & had guns/artillery/not fantasy.

the only d&d I played was AD&D 2nd, while fun was lacking in the areas where 40k shined. the miniatures were another reason. whereas you would play w 1 mini for d&d, fielding an entire squad with an HQ/dope model was much more appealing to me. Surprisingly, my Mom was more than happy for me to stop playing D&D(weird 80's satanic panic whatever)& start 40k.

i can't really answer the poll because I mostly play a mash-up of 3.5 and pathfinder, but ive liked a version of D&D and played it a fair bit. no issue there. if anything i probably shoulda stayed there because it's worked out with me a lot better.

 Eldarain wrote:
Considering how much user input is required to make a decent game of 40k they should love D&D.

Sure. But then again, they fill roughly the same niche. No need to play both.

40K probably is the GW equivalent to WotC's D&D, while games like Kill Team Arena or Warhammer Underworlds are more closely aimed at a MtG-style game-player (with added miniatures).

As a(n ex) 40k player, I enjoy D&D and enjoyed 40k for vastly different reasons that can't really be conflated, given how different the games are. My playing of either never impacted my enjoyment of the other at all.

I play a number of RPGs, but have no interest in D&D anymore.

D&D was my first gaming experience, played at scout camp with a single d6, a golf pencil, and character sheets written on a torn up McDonald's bag. D&D and 40k have been my longest running games by far. I wrote a published a few D&D modules with Necromancer Games back in the third party explosion around 3e/3.5e. I don't have a current game and haven't even played the current rules, but I can say that I have a ton of affection for the game regardless.

My issue with DnD is it gives your "friends" a proxy for their poor social skills. eg, my character is an ass hat so I am juuuuuust acting out their ass hattery.

My issue with 40K is it gives your "friends" a rule set for their poor social skills. eg, the rule says I can F you so I'm going to F you.

 redux wrote:
My issue with DnD is it gives your "friends" a proxy for their poor social skills. eg, my character is an ass hat so I am juuuuuust acting out their ass hattery.

My issue with 40K is it gives your "friends" a rule set for their poor social skills. eg, the rule says I can F you so I'm going to F you.

You should get better friends.

I highly prefer table top rpgs over 40k. But I greatly dislike DnD itself for a number of reasons I have talked about in other places on DakkaDakka. DnD is pretty comparable to 40k in that they are both big name heavy hitters in their field but both, mechanically, pretty handily fail to do the things they are supposed to do well. Both are super entrenched in old mechanics from decades ago and refuse to grow up with later editions to newer and better design philosophies. At least in the rpg market there are so many options and getting your friends to play is as easy as saying "I want to run a game of X. Whos in?"

With games like 40k, it's heaps of time and money just to get the first game going.

D&D is fun enough but it is quite limited in its scope. It intended for very specific type of play and trying to do anything else is fighting against the system. But then again in any RPG a good GM matters massively more than a good system.

Bdrone wrote:
i can't really answer the poll because I mostly play a mash-up of 3.5 and pathfinder, .

??
Pathfinder (well, 1st edition PF) is just 'official' house rules for 3.5. It is D&D except in ways that matter to copyright lawyers.

*shrugs* then i guess i like D&D 3.5 then. but thats not even what people think of as much when they think of D&D now, as 5E is a thing, and pathfinder just went to 2e not long ago.

Long time D&D player here, ultimately to like D&D you have to have a good group of people whom understand at the end of the day the rules are just suggestions, plays in a manner so everyone can have fun And that doesn't appeal to everyone here. D&D isn't a wargame, and well, we're here to dicusss a wargame, differant strokes for differant folks. go on a D&D forum and you're apt to encounter plenty of people who have the mind set of "I love the world of 40k, but the table top war game isn't of much intreast"

No one really "likes" DnD. It's the 40k of PnP RPGs.A game that's "fun" but has incredibly lackluster rules, that's so massive and has so much support that it's easier to bare with the rough system and play it then try to play something with better rules but a tenth of the playerbase.

BrianDavion wrote:
Long time D&D player here, ultimately to like D&D you have to have a good group of people whom understand at the end of the day the rules are just suggestions, plays in a manner so everyone can have fun And that doesn't appeal to everyone here. D&D isn't a wargame, and well, we're here to dicusss a wargame, differant strokes for differant folks. go on a D&D forum and you're apt to encounter plenty of people who have the mind set of "I love the world of 40k, but the table top war game isn't of much intreast"

Yeah, but I don't see many people on GitP crapping on 40k.