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The unlikely resurgence of Dungeons and Dragons

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Re: The unlikely resurgence of Dungeons and Dragons

#141

Post by kriro »

smaili wrote: post #50
trynewideas wrote: post #5

Is it unlikely? Board games were already growing fast. Even CCGs were growing fast, not only through video games but still as physical games too. People want to sit down and get offline and spend time with each other, _and_ people who used to do that want to get online and hang out with each other. All the RPG market needed was one publisher with good production values and broad distribution to discard a big chunk of…

Speaking of CCG's, any collectors who happen to be coders? I haven't met too many at the local shops I stop by so I always figured collecting cards wasn't very popular amongst engineers.

I'm a very avid boardgamer (>100 games stored in a dedicated room) but CCGs never really interested me. I played some MTG way back but it was always very obvious that those games are a money sink. I like LCGs a lot more because you know what you get and can plan. For CCGs I always ended up buying a deck to play instead of "collecting". I tried again with Star Wars Destiny and enjoy the game a lot but I just can't bring myself to buy lots of booster displays just to get the stuff I want. My rational brain simply refuses to do it. I can buy a great board game for less than a booster display or I can buy a cool but expensive game for less than two booster displays (Gloomhaven).

And I can get the feel of a CCG from any of the great LCGs if I want that (Netrunner, L5R etc.). I get that in a CCG you get more carddrops and boom the entire meta shifts etc. but it's the corner of board/card gaming that interests me least by a wide margin.

Re: The unlikely resurgence of Dungeons and Dragons

#142

Post by tehwalrus »

shemnon42 wrote: post #38
dragonwriter wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> All the RPG market needed was one publisher with good production values and broad distribution to . Wizards was happy to oblige... I think you can make a very good case that D&D 4e in 2008 was where they decided to “discard a big chunk of its worst, thorniest rules”, and that the big innovation in 5e, released in 2014, was less about discarding thorny rules and more about reconnecting the streamlined rules with the…

4e wasn't “discard[ing] a big chunk of its worst, thorniest rules”, it was a re-write to sell splat books and accessories, to try and turn it into pen and paper World of Warcraft, and make it a miniature focused expensive game. It failed. It was D&D in name only and an abomination to those who really cared about it. 5e was the streamlining and modularization that was needed so you could play it like it was 2e, or 3e/…

I learned 4e first (modulo a one-shot 3rd ed game a long time before). I think it has excellent potential as a system that allows you to tell stories, even if the actual game mechanics are a bit too simple for most AD&D-heads. Check out the Critical Hit podcast by Major Spoilers, to see where a very effective DM can turn even 4e into a compelling story.

(I now play 5e whenever I run a game, because I can get people to actually play it with me.)

Re: The unlikely resurgence of Dungeons and Dragons

#143

Post by SubiculumCode »

PhasmaFelis wrote: post #70
dragonwriter wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> FWIW: Pathfinder didn't win because it didn't have the name. The game itself is fine. But there can be only one D&D, and once WotC managed to figure out that the edition upgrade mill was a death trap and released a streamlined 5e, there wasn't much niche left for Pathfinder to fill. 5e was the second D&D edition released after Pathfinder, so I'm not really sure what “edition upgrade mill” you are talking about. > (…

Pathfinder's entire market was "people who didn't like 4E and wanted to keep playing [/selling OGL supplements for] for 3.5," and on that basis they were one of the only games to come close to matching D&D's success. (They may actually have outside D&D for a few years; it's hard to be sure because WotC doesn't release those numbers.) It was only 4E's divisiveness that let them find a niche, and they started slipping…

Pathfinder does have a pretty large following. They also have a new Pathfinder 2.0 coming soon.

Re: The unlikely resurgence of Dungeons and Dragons

#144

Post by gambiting »

tomc1985 wrote: post #66

What a shame that all this attention goes to D&D. There are so many other good tabletop games with exquisite worldbuilding, languishing for attention... Vampire: The Masquerade, RIFTS (my personal fav)

I mean, in a casual discussion I'd frequently say that I "play D&D all the time" even though I have never in my life played Dungeons and Dragons - we usually play derivatives of DnD and other roleplaying games. But DnD is something that most people at least recognize so for me it became a generic term for roleplaying game, just like hoover became a generic term for a vacuum cleaner.

Re: The unlikely resurgence of Dungeons and Dragons

#145

Post by quadcore »

I just realised what was really magical to me with pen&paper rpgs. My uncle used to have this funny / ridiculous trick of his, with a deck of cards where he would secretly see the bottom card of the deck while finishing shuffling it and then ask you: "red or black?". You'd say "red", then if the bottom card was red, he would say "then we take the red", or if the card was black he would say "then remains the black". Basically whatever you would say would lead to the bottom card and you'd supposedly be amazed when he'd show it to you.

In a rpg, it's like "you're in the forest, what you do?", "well I walk east". "ok you found a tower". Whatever you do, you'd find that tower haha. It's like whatever you say have fun consequences but with thousands more options than my uncle's trick.

Re: The unlikely resurgence of Dungeons and Dragons

#146

Post by SubiculumCode »

The saddest thing about having board games is not having anyone come over to play them.

In particular for me at the moment, I have Battles of Westeros https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/67492/battles-westeros

that many feel is one of the best tactical board games out there: https://boardgamegeek.com/thread/979785/battles-westeros-imm...

and yet I've played it twice in five years. ;(

Re: The unlikely resurgence of Dungeons and Dragons

#147

Post by uberswe »

meekins wrote: post #133
rb666 wrote: post #115

Ironically, the best way to actually play D&D is...online, using Fantasy Grounds software. This saves on an incredible amount of time and micromanagement, creating time for actual RP and gameplay. Highly recommended, plus you can actually include your non-local friends.

Roll20 is awesome as well

Whenever I hear Roll20 I just think of this post https://www.reddit.com/r/DnD/comments/9iwarj/after_5_years_o...

Re: The unlikely resurgence of Dungeons and Dragons

#148

Post by wingerlang »

crooked-v wrote: post #139
c22 wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I used to have several blind friends who were very successful in text based MUDs. It's possible finding one with an active userbase is getting harder and harder.

These days, the number of non-pay MUDs with an average of 100+ people on them at a time can be counted on two hands.

How about paid ones?

Re: The unlikely resurgence of Dungeons and Dragons

#149

Post by RugnirViking »

justinjlynn wrote: post #117
tuesdayrain wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That sounds like a good thing to me. It would be unfortunate if going blind was more common

The more common a disability becomes, the less of a disadvantage it becomes - with some lag, of course - the world does tend accommodate for the (visible) average.

It is still undoubtably useful, even if thanks to technology we can manage without.
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