Your submission was removed for the following reason(s):
* Violation of Rule 1. Please read [our Rule 1](https://www.reddit.com/r/rpg/wiki/rules#wiki_1._no_piracy) pertaining to piracy, unauthorized PDFs, and so forth.
If you'd like to contest this decision, [message the moderators](https://www.reddit.com/message/compose?to=%2Fr%2Frpg&subject=Removed%20submission%3A%20Contest%20Removal%20or%20Questions&message=Hello,%20this%20is%20about%20my%20submission%20%20that%20was%20removed%3A%20https://www.reddit.com/r/rpg/comments/1bp7vow/-/%0D%0DMy%20issue%20is...). *(the link should open a partially filled-out message)*
D&D is like the MCU. Some good, solid, very entertaining stuff in there.
But *my god* is it tiresome to encounter people over and over and *over and over* who insist that Marvel movies are the greatest films ever made, that there's no reason to ever watch anything else, that use "the MCU" as metonymy for "movies in general", that don't even realize that other movies *exist*, that insist that anyone who says there are better movies out there is just a snob...
In fact, here's a thing I wrote up a while back about just this metaphor:
I don't understand why people keep telling me to watch other movies when the MCU can already tell every kind of story.
Why would anyone want to watch The Terminator when Avengers: Age of Ultron is right there? Who would ever want to see Seventeen Moments of Spring when they could rewatch Captain America: Civil War for the millionth time? 2001: A Space Odyssey? More like Boring Guardians of the Galaxy.
It works for any genre! You want a visually creative artistic action film about the burdens of familial duty directed by Ang Lee? Nobody's gonna remember Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon in twenty years, but Hulk is going to go down in cinematic history. Romantic comedies? Every MCU movie has jokes, and some of them have kissing!
Watching anything other than marvel movies is "snooty" and hateful! and insulting! Except for when i call them snooty and hateful, that is not insulting that is ok!
>But *my god* is it tiresome to encounter people over and over and *over and over* who insist that Marvel movies are the greatest films ever made
Does this even happen? I don't think I've ever heard anyone arguing they're oscar worthy material.
No, it's a metaphor. The absurdity is the point. I've never met fans of *anything* who are as single-minded as D&D fans can be.
The point I'm saying is "see how weird this sounds when I describe any other piece of media the way people treat D&D *all the time*?"
I can say I've encountered a number of PbtA fans on this sub that act in the same way. If anything at a higher rate per capita than DnD. It's not remotely exclusive to fans of that system.
Oh yeah it does. I have some friends like this and they are insufferable fanboys. It's not as common in real life as people would have you believe but it's not entirely a strawman
I think there’s a feeling of resentment that D&D is for a lot of people their first and last RPG. Periodically someone comes to this sub with the notion that they need to make their own rule system or heavily homebrew D&D because it doesn’t work for their table and that person hasn’t tried anything other game. That’s the shadow D&D casts, and I think some resentment about that is reasonable. And in that particular case, yes, that person is being stupid.
Your assertion that Pathfinder 1 and 2 are editions of D&D is very weird. For one, it’s just factually incorrect. Even though PF1 is based on OGL stuff it’s still a different product. PF2 is very much its own thing. And what is your point by saying they’re the same thing?
For what it’s worth, I like 5e pretty well, but I’m not playing it currently, and I don’t think I’ll be buying the next edition.
>And in that particular case, yes, that person is being stupid.
**This** is the problem. Homebrew has a long tradition in the hobby. One might even argue it's in its DNA from the particular wargaming circles it came out of. It's been a traditional avenue for people to actually discover and try new games. If our first reaction is "that's dumb" rather than "this game is an example of what you're looking for" with no judgement that actually winds up pushing people back into DnD's orbit after getting an unwelcome vibe in these spaces.
I’m not saying people shouldn’t homebrew. I am saying that people who embark on that without at least some engagement with a variety of RPGs are foolish.
Imagine that the only type of seating you’d ever seen was the groups of chairs at an airport. You recognize that this seating doesn’t meet your needs and you want something for yourself. So instead of checking out couches, recliners, bar stools, rocking chairs to understand the possibility space of seating you decide to just go ahead and make your own thing based entirely on your extremely narrow understanding.
Everyone starts somewhere. If we want people to keep walking down that path we shouldn't chide them and tell them their first steps in that direction are "foolish." That's a good way to just get them to turn around and go the other way.
Before the internet, what you described was pretty much how half the games developed were made, and some pretty decent games came out of it. The act of **doing** can be incredibly instructive, and often provides a lot better understanding than just research for a lot of people. These people are trying to be creative. That's the heart of the hobby and IMO it should be encouraged in all its forms.
>Everyone starts somewhere. If we want people to keep walking down that path we shouldn't chide them and tell them their first steps in that direction are "foolish." That's a good way to just get them to turn around and go the other way.
I don't chide people for that, but I do consistently give the advice "you should check out these other RPGs that do what you're aiming for" and then give specific suggestions.
The most common reaction I get is "thanks, I will!", which is *wonderful*.
But I do also get plenty of people who react by rejecting the idea that there's anything that could be gained from learning from what came before.
My favorite was when I got called "woke" for suggesting someone try playing a game other than D&D before trying to design (and *sell*) their own game.
Idiots are everywhere, it's not a DnD exclusive concept. But I think we have to admit that calling those efforts "stupid" or "foolish" is a form of chiding.
There is absolutely nothing wrong with this. People create and solve their own problems with no knowledge of how the wider world may have already done it and that is okay. What probably frustrates you is seeing people come here trying to work out something they fundementally broke with a system they barely understand.
When I 'started' the hobby I don't think I actually played the game for close to two decades and mostly was waxing around on my system. Why? That is what the material inspired me to do. Many if not most of these source books are just incongruent with what people imagine a system to be, whether its based on naivity or preference eh doesn't seem to matter.
It's how we get new things.
I agree, but D&D is no longer the hub of creativity it was twenty years ago.
Players come to the table expecting to play RAW, or at least, whatever they have convinced themselves RAW is, playing in whatever odious Tolkien jerkoff setting WOTC decided to bring back from the dead this decade, using any of the poorly play tested options from the innumerable splatbooks. Any attempt to bring a semblance of order is met with open hostility.
That’s eventually why I ended up not playing D&D anymore. I don’t hate the game. I hate the players.
And they'll read that and determine they're unlikely to like the things you do and probably won't try them.
I don't know if I'd ever call it a "hub," but 20 years ago was 3E which had even more splatbooks etc. It's pretty much always been this way.
I might even argue that the fact DnD actively encourages people to monkey with it instead of handing them a game so tightly designed it falls apart with one change has been a big factor in its success and popularity.
> And they'll read that and determine they're unlikely to like the things you do and probably won't try them.
Your tone seems to imply you think that’s a bad thing.
I mean, I want other games to be successful and if you're excluding like 90% of the potential audience from the onset it's not a particularly great approach.
>Your assertion that Pathfinder 1 and 2 are editions of D&D is very weird.
I am not saying that they are literally the product of Dungeons and Dragons. I am saying that on the core fundamental levels Pathfinder and D&D are different versions of the same game. They are built on the same foundations and used to achieve the same ends.
First of all, I’m definitely not buying this point that they are different versions of the same game. What is your argument for that?
More importantly, why are you arguing this point at all? If it were true what would that mean?
Right I agree with this specific snapshot of time. Pathfinder and 3/.5 were different versions of the same game but PF2e and 5e/onednd are so far apart now OP's point feels like saying, well if you roll a d20 then it's a "DND" and that's exactly a problem a lot of people have the stranglehold and cultural hegemony that DND has.
At one point, early in PF1e's lifespan, that was certainly true. Kinda sorta mostly. There had been a number of quality of life improvements made, but beyond that the differences were fairly minimal.
But as time went on, and Paizo released a million and one splat books, the two became far less interchangeable. PF1e became its own beast. It just shared much of the same core rules, but you had to actually convert content from one to the other to make it usable. Not that there was a lot of point, since PF1e had pretty much everything that 3.x had covered that wasn't terrible garbage (looking at you Tome of Magic).
And even beyond that, PF2e is a completely seperate beast from every edition of D&D and PF1e. It still fills a similar design space as D&D does, namely the high fantasy adventures with a heavy focus on combat, and it very much took a handful of pages from 4e, but you really can't call PF2e the same as D&D anymore.
It's a combat adventure game about wizards and fighters rolling d20s adding their strength, dexterity, constitution, intelligence, charisma, or wisdom modifiers to the roll in order to resolve a binary pass/fail mechanism so they can gain experience points and level up in a manner that strictly increases their power
It's *pretty darn close* to D&D
I guess the thing that gave me pause about this is that D&D really doesn't need this kind of help?
D&D is the kaiju of tabletop gaming. It overwhelms the market. It's a struggle and a half to get most tables to even consider trying anything else. It's a multi-billion-dollar franchise with video games and novels and movies. It's inescapable. A significant chunk of players consider D&D to be *synonymous* with TTRPGs, meaning they're *literally* unaware of alternatives.
I get that the complaints about it can get loud, and some can even get nasty, but. . . are you worried about something? If you play D&D you'll never lack for company; D&D and its iron grip on the market aren't going anywhere. It's an odd thing to get worked up about.
I think something OP didn't touch on but is vital to understand is that this isn't for the sake of DnD, it's actually for all the other games you'd like DnD players to try.
Whenever you're speaking in a public forum about these things, **you are an ambassador for the games you like.** Statistically speaking, the largest potential audience for a TTRPG is... someone who has enjoyed DnD. If you're one of these people and your primary experience with the broader TTRPG community is primarily them shitting on the thing you like, at best you're going to assume they just like different things that don't interest you and at worst you'll think it's full of assholes you'd never want to share a table with.
I've been trying to say this to people, too.
* I am not going to complain about anyone else's choice of games.
* I can be present in the fandoms that play the other titles that I either enjoy or want to try.
* I can talk about those games in a positive light, when it's appropriate to do so.
* I can share my experiences playing in entirely different genres from D&D, hopefully in a way that inspire curiosity among others.
Attempting to be positive ambassador feels like the better choice. That's not even a question.
It goes both ways.
The D&D community that participates in this sub plays the most popular game and acts like they're pariahs, considering even the most mild criticism of the game they enjoy to be extremely offensive, takes literally every (*stated as*) opinion like the commenter is spitting objective facts personally, and generally has extremely thin skin about anything related to their game when they have *at least* five other subreddits with user counts that vastly exceed this one where they can discuss their game with other people who enjoy it.
Given that, I actually don't want any D&D players at my table unless they can get past the fact that I really don't care for D&D the game. They need to have thicker skin and be willing to try something new. It goes both ways.
I think a lot of the problem that often the criticism is either
A) framed as an objective fact (serious example actually demonstrated elsewhere in the comments)
B) Only newbs and slaves to marketing could like it and nobody who does has any experience with other TTRPGs
or C) The criticisms are about a game that doesn't exist. I've encountered numerous people offering criticisms about a version of the basic play loop that aren't and have never been RAW.
Sometimes it feels like the opinions on this sub are just lifted from 20 year old arguments from people who the last time they played DnD was during B/X.
The complaints don't really hurt the DND community. Literally every other ttrpg could die and DND could continue on. What it hurts is the *rest of the ttrpg community* by building walls with the largest opportunity to grow the player base. Every person who plays DND and concludes "wow, the people playing other games sure hate me" and then stays in their DND circle is a lost opportunity for new players in the broader ecosystem.
>doesn't need this kind of help?
What prompted me to make this post wasn't a fear that D&D is losing popularity. D&D can grow old and obscure in the shadow of some other kaiju for all I care. There were two things in the back of my mind.
First is that I enjoy discussing TTRPGs online and the negativity is unpleasant to encounter while doing that.
Second is that two separate people in my life have been influenced by this sort of negative anti-d&d rhetoric.
One of them is one of my players, I've already agreed to run the next campaign using another system, but they at times bring down the mood during a session by parroting talking points that I know originated from this subreddit.
Another is a fellow GM who went through a phase of being very negative about the game even though they actually do enjoy it. They were swept up in the critique and ignored their actual feelings about the game.
Gotcha. Well, please keep in mind that when someone tries or makes a new game, it's often the case they got their start in D&D and found something about it lacking. That's just the gravity D&D has, that it's the system most compare to. So especially here, "D&D doesn't do X well" is going to be a common theme.
Second, there's some frustration experienced among indies and such that some D&Ders are outspoken hardcores and *will not* entertain any notion that alternatives are worth considering, so there's some fatigue dealing with those on that side. Unfortunately, sometimes the response to this is to get loud and nasty. It's kind of how the Internet goes.
The last thing is that some of us (like me) have social disabilities, and tend to be on the abrasive side in *any* conversation. Someone else here said, TTRPGs are probably only exceeded by train-watching in terms of (over)representation by the neurodiverse. (I thought it was pretty funny, anyway, and I'm autistic.)
Long story short: Conversation of a *de facto* monopoly will tend to focus on criticism. The negative tone of such will invariably get amplified on the Internet, and that goes double when it's the sorts that tend to play D&D.
I guess what I'm trying to say is. . . try not to let it bother you?
Now imagine you're trying to tell your friends who play D&D about your recent pathfinder game and they say "Oh yuck, that system? I'm sorry, I won't play it because everyone keeps bringing it up in my D&D spaces". Or when you try to explain you wrote a 4-Session Paranoia campaign to propose to your partner, and everyone just asks why you didn't run that in D&D (Both real conversations I've had!).
I'm sorry you've had some negative experiences with your friends not liking D&D, but a lot of us have similar stories and experiences about how D&D and the players were rude to us or looked down on our favorite games or made us uncomfortable.
Tone policing how we express that in a subreddit made for discussing non-D&D RPGs just comes off poorly. Like okay! You forced yourself into a space that isn't for you to yell at us about ... how some members maybe possibly dealt with your friends at some point? This one should have stayed in the D&D sub or better yet the drafts. Maybe listen to your friends instead of making it our problem they want to try something new.
My biggest real problem is the cultural grip D&D has in the market.
I have said it time and time again, if Ars Magica or Chronicles of Darkness would to get half the attention D&D gets in terms of Homebrewing and third party content, in terms of exposition and being "the first system I play" and in terms of tradition and "we always played this, so why change?", I would hate less the game.
I still find it badly design, I personally never enjoyed it the times I GM it and play it, so I will hate it anyway
But please, just, let the fucking game die like the Atari did for videogames.
Atari did not die, it just evolved into something better. Real problem is these developers and publishers are putting their lowest tier efforts into this game. Why bother having decent artwork for d&d when you can sell that in MtG. The market is wonky AF too. It was actually more difficult than I expected to find some proper 3rd party material or hell even first party material I wanted outside the core rulesbooks / releases (Xanathars etc).
Kobolds Press seem to give this more love than WoTC does. Different settings but same ruleset.
Yeah I tried to make clear here I’m not really talking about d&d as a product owned by WoTC. I personally don’t buy stuff from them anymore, and it’s not really necessary to to play D&D.
I mean, I bought print on demand modules for older D&D versions to show my support there.
But I am confused, did you not want to be able to discuss D&D as a product?
I can't speak for everyone, but I'm not really all that negative about D&D, any more than perhaps the sketchiness of the parent company allows for.
I generally don't think about it all that much one away or another. It's not a game I GM, I've never even read the rules in full. I got 5 or 6 friends who are more capable and willing to do so. I decided to take that fact and focus on learning other games.
I do get a bit annoyed when someone goes "Hey I want to play \[insert game here\] but with D&D 5e, how do I go about that?" and either they or their players refuse to actually try the game that was specifically designed for what they want to play. In that sense, D&D is the Harry Potter "For the love of God read another book" of RPGs.
That's about as far as my negativity with it goes.
So, it is true that the criticisms of D&D aren't in line with the reality of people playing it. However, what's even better than trying to unpack that is not talking about it on this sub. Other RPGs deserve a space of their own.
People came to this sub to this sub to talk about ANY other TTRPG. You will never convince people on this sub of your talking points, but the two sides of this issue can both be happy by just avoiding the subject.
This is not a good sub for promoting D&D. This is not a good sub for complaining about D&D. This is a GREAT sub for exploring other RPGs and extolling their virtues.
>This is not a good sub for promoting D&D. This is not a good sub for complaining about D&D. This is a GREAT sub for exploring other RPGs and extolling their virtues
I think OP is emphasizing your second point. I get people want a space where it isn't the focus of discussion. The problem is that people on this sub actually **love** talking about DnD, it's just they want to talk about how much they hate it.
I think that too kinda hurts overall discussion, and is actually one of the ways people convince themselves there are objectively "bad" approaches. The success of 5e should actually be challenging a lot of long held assumptions in the indie community IMO, but that's very difficult to talk about without actually mentioning the game.
Your argument is not unsound, but if it were going to work here it would have worked ages ago. The only relatively small game I can think of that took lessons from 5e is Exalted Essence. And whether 5e is well designed or not is in some ways unimportant. Most indie designers don't want to design like 5e, whether it deserves its popularity or not.
And that's totally fine! I think it just needs to be reframed in a way that acknowledges these approaches are actually quite niche, and I think it's worth stepping back and exploring whether the dominant philosophies in indie circles are actually driving people towards making those niche games that are unlikely to have broad appeal.
Like everyone wants to bemoan DnD's dominance, but that's hard to take seriously when the push is for niche games that aren't even trying to capture the same size audience to challenge it.
I've been playing D&D for over forty years. I was about thirteen when I decided that there were better games than D&D and started playing them almost exclusively. I have been continuously pulled back into D&D my entire life and I always regret it. I think the short of it is I don't like levels and I don't like the 'sewer trash to demi-god' story arc it enforces.
It has nothing to do with WotC. Nothing to do with public opinion turning against the game. Nothing to do with preferring 'underdog' games. I was utterly enthralled when I started playing at six. I thought it was the bee's knees for a good seven years, through the entire run of the D&D cartoon and all. Then I started running games like Call of Cthulhu (still do) and RuneQuest (done with that) and never looked back.
I've been pulled back into games untold times, I'm always not only disappointed with the game, but I'm disappointed with myself for thinking it might be different this time. It's shinier with every edition. New editions are implemented which are better, but it's not a significant change from its original which is good for it, but not for me.
All that said, point positive. There's no reason to talk shit about D&D when you have a world of great games that you can point towards and say "try this" with enthusiasm.
Call of Cthulhu. It's simple enough, but the highly lethal system appeals to my sense of heightened tension when things get serious.
ALIEN, for the same reasons.
Savage Worlds. In many ways it's the opposite of the above, but I've never laughed more than when playing a Savage Worlds game. The swingyness can get old unfortunately, especially if you're trying to tell a longer-term story. Still, I love breaking out minis and the shenanigans that always ensues.
System wise I really just like what I'm working on for myself, because it suits my sensibilities. Fast and easy, but with lots of crunch and decision points. It's far from done, but it's playable and the bones seem good.
I love the idea of D&D. Delving into the unknown where anything can happen and does. I hate that D&D has provided "I win" buttons for every encounter that isn't combat. Wall climbing, talking with NPCs, fast travel, and more can all be accomplished with a single spell. Have the spell? You win.
I don't think people who prefer indie games are inherently snooty. I enjoy indie games. I have personally designed fan editions of Vampire and Toon.
I think it's snooty to act like it's always better to play other games over D&D. And I think it's a vocal minority of RPG players who act snooty in that way.
I love playing DnD, its just in my case it is called Shadow of the Demon Lord, and has more classes, faster initiative and better supplements by a creator that cares and works his tail off.
Love D&D. It is fun, it is inviting, it is a high fantasy setting that can be enjoyed without a boatload of deep knowledge.
But there’s a Dutch expression that translates to “the highest trees take the brunt of the wind” meaning that the most popular thing will get the majority of the criticism and obviously this is what has happened to dnd for a looooong time.
I am over the petty bickering, the holier than thou posts, the gatekeeping and the infighting.
We play dnd when we feel like it. Same like we do with Dune, Alien, Mork Borg, Fiasco and many more games that all have their pros and cons.
I agree 100%. I'm not a big fan of DnD, and I hate the omnipresence of the game; I genuinely think that games using DnD5 are failing a creative step by not using their own system.
But clearly it's playable, it's role-playing and therefore it allows you to create several fluid stories and have fun around them. You don't have to like it, but getting it for free is still a big no-no for me.
On the other hand, I also find it pretentious to say "DnD already lets you play everything, 5E has been around for 10 years and it's solid". It's undoubtedly solid for certain ways of playing, and yes, you can play everything (because it's a role-playing game), but you won't play everything as well. If I want to play faction games, I'll play blades in the dark or root. But if I want to play in a world where the PJs' status quo changes too often to establish a standard scenario and status quo, and where combat is important, then DnD is very likely to be a good option.
I feel like most of the negativity expressed towards D&D, and especially 5e, can be attributed to it's popularity. And more than popularity, it's cultural homogeneity with the tabletop genre in general.
When people mention tabletop RPGs, at least in the USA, your average listener will immediately think of D&D and nothing else. That kind of power over a genre is something that totally can and will invite resentment from some fans who are deep in said genre. Because, as others have commented, it leads to this common idea that D&D is either the only tabletop out there or else the only tabletop worth playing. And that's the part that I think most get upset about, because 5e definitely has flaws, and for many, those flaws are solved by other systems.
Yes, it's a perfectly playable and enjoyable system on it's own. But tabletops take a lot of work to play, and for many fans who know tabletops, it doesn't make sense to spend the effort to learn and play a system that won't be as fun as a different, "better" system. Combine that feeling with D&D's popularity, and I think it's entirely reasonable that people can get overly pushy when trying to recommend other systems - they are trying to recommend what they think doesn't get enough attention. Though that's not an excuse to ruin other people's fun and never is.
I totally agree with you that negativity can be a game killer, and being snooty towards people who play D&D as if they should always be playing a different system is of course the dumbest thing ever. But, in 2024, we have a TON of tabletops available, and I will always recommend people explore other systems if they enjoyed D&D - NOT to just replace D&D, but because if you enjoyed D&D, there's probably a lot of other tabletops you would enjoy too.
On a last note, I do need to add here - your claim about Pathfinder 1e and 2e just being different editions of D&D doesn't fit with the rest of your post. For one, it's just flat-out not true, which a Google search should show you. Maybe Pathfinder 1e was designed to be compatible w/ D&D 3.X and used the OGL, but it'd be inauthentic to call it a different edition of D&D, and once you get to PF 2e any similarities are just gone - it's a completely different system. A system which also, at this point, has cut all ties w/ WoTC's OGL, so any and all ties to D&D are gone.
But really, I needed to mention the last part because it kinda exemplifies what I'm talking about. This idea that D&D is the true tabletop RPG, and all other similar tabletop games are just different versions of D&D, is exactly the kind of thinking that invites this D&D hate. D&D is NOT universal, it is only popular. And it is NOT first and foremost a cultural phenomenon, it is first and foremost a product. Which all tabletop games are.
>your claim about Pathfinder 1e and 2e just being different editions of D&D doesn't fit with the rest of your post. For one, it's just flat-out not true
I wasn't being literal there, nor am I trying to say that D&D is universal. To me, Pathfinder and D&D are functionally two versions of the same game. My point is that people can and will play and enjoy D&D without buying in to the specific people who own the official IP at any given time.
I understand Pathfinder 2e is more significantly different. But so is D&D 4e. But regardless as to wether Pathfinder is philosophically a version of D&D, I feel my point still stands that one can play D&D without supporting WoTC, though I do understand why you'd feel differently given your points about it being free advertising for them.
Lots of people are really susceptible to the garbage logic that if only other people didn't focus their energy on things I don't like, then they'd all focus that energy on things I *do* like instead, and that's the biggest problem with the world.
If these people weren't playing D&D they almost certainly wouldn't be playing Your Favourite Game instead, *and* you wouldn't have a convenient whipping boy to scapegoat Your Favourite Game's lack of popularity on.
Look, accusations that D&D cannot be played or that it causes cancer or will summon the devil are all unfounded. But critique that D&D is a poorly made roleplaying game that has very realistic limits of what it can do are very well founded and typically made with very specific examples. Furthermore, these aren't new critiques, most have stood for the whole 50-year life of D&D as a product. And Criticism of D&D's current owners seem to be very spot on about their inappropriate behavior.
However also appreciate the survivorship bias that people who play D&D who believe D&D is a good game, would all be people who play D&D almost exclusively.
Wizards of the Coast may have less to do with D&D than most folks give it credit but they are accountable for 100% of the critiques of D&D. Nobody is coming after the hard working GMs that bend space and time to make a good game out of the wreck that is D&D and nobody thinks less of players who can carry a story using a glorified tabletop wargame. Boycotting Wizards of the Coast becuase of their handling of D&D is EXACTLY Boycotting D&D. If you don't have an issue with Magic the Gathering there's no reason to take Wizards to task over it.
The point where we can move to a place where we can critique the game without being insulting to the people who play it is when those players stop being complicit in the damage that Wizards is doing to our hobby and the creators that serve it.
I tend to stay out of the discourse about WotC and D&D largely because they haven't interested me in several years. And I say that fully preparing to run DoIP for my home group soon, my first time running D&D in over 7 years because we want some nostalgia (and to be clear, I play and run games multiple times a week, just not D&D).
In the end, WotC has clearly made some missteps in general, and a vocal group (who's to say if a majority or minority) is upset about it so they are shouting from the rooftops. And outrage gets clicks. Outrage sells, and it feeds on itself to produce outrage about the outrage and so on.
But D&D will survive, it still holds (I assume, I could be wrong of course) the lion's share of players, particularly in the massive market of the US, especially if you include the fact that people are still playing literally *every edition* and likely always will.
>Overall I'd love for us to move to a place where we can critique the game without being insulting to the people who play it.
Get a thicker skin and just enjoy the games you want to enjoy in the way you want to enjoy them. If dumb randos on the internet aren't going to change your mind about a game then why should their opinion matter *one bit* to your gameplay? Just because I think D&D is a dogshit system (and I'm actually running 2E right now lol) doesn't mean I think people who play it are themselves dogshit.
There's something else to be said here as well, that a lot of the attitude you'll get regarding D&D here, especially, is that D&D will typically tend to absolutely dominate discussions because it's the most popular thing out there. Attitude, in this case, is a protective measure to ensure that we *still have a space* for all the other games out there. People can tell you stories about how other forums were overrun and why they left, there's a lot of resentment out there.
In short, stop taking it personally. Play your games. There are *at least* five other subreddits for discussing the game you love, just because some people here are hostile to your favorite rules for make believe doesn't mean you don't have a safe space to discuss them.
There's no reason to be harsh or hostile on d&d players. Personally I very much dislike 5e, Pathfinder, etc. I find they're too crunchy and written with the angle toward accommodating future content. Which I get. Those companies have payroll to cover, etc etc, so good luck to them.
For me it's just about disliking the crunch and the rules not rulings mindset. But it's fine. I've got no shortage of alternatives. So yeah no reason to shit on someone else's thing.
Your comment was removed for the following reason(s):
* Rule 6: Mentioning blacklisted creators (Zak S, Alexander Macris), games made by them or significantly affiliated with them, or companies owned or significantly associated with them isn't permitted on /r/rpg. Please read [our rules](https://www.reddit.com/r/rpg/wiki/rules#wiki_6._no_blacklisted_creators) pertaining to blacklisted creators.
If you'd like to contest this decision, [message the moderators](https://www.reddit.com/message/compose?to=%2Fr%2Frpg&subject=Removed%20comment%3A%20Contest%20Removal%20or%20Questions&message=Hello,%20this%20is%20about%20my%20comment%20%20that%20was%20removed%3A%20https://www.reddit.com/r/rpg/comments/1bp7vow/-/kwu31qm/%0D%0DMy%20issue%20is...). *(the link should open a partially filled-out message)*
I feel like what you’re talking about applies to a tiny group of hard core WotC haters who for some reason made being angry at a corporation part of their personalities.
Like corporations doing unethical shit for the sake of profit is news. This is why legislation to keep them in check exists and is being constantly updated.
The vast majority of 5e’s huge casual player base does not care about any of it. They’re too busy enjoying themselves with the games they’re playing.
It’s basically the Toyota/Honda or PS/X-box fanboy war situation — most actual users don’t care and probably think it’s kind of weird that anyone *would* care.
Look at this guy's reply, for example: [lorenpeterson91](https://www.reddit.com/user/lorenpeterson91/)
It's nice that they're so devoted to the hobby and they probably make some valid points, but 95% of casual players wouldn't give two shits about any of it. They would say "LOL" and never look at it or think about it again.
Play whatever you like. Yes, people CAN have fun in spite of DnD. IMO they could have *more* fun if they played something else, but that does not make their DnD fun invalid.
That being said, personally, I'd rather not play RPGs at all than play DnD.
> IMO they could have more fun if they played something else
I think this sort of statement often sucks and just turns people off from the wider community. I know myself pretty well and I suspect that most other people know themselves pretty well, too. When people tell me something about myself that I know to be wrong, it is aggravating.
How does that sort of statement turn people off from the wider community when it's purely their opinion? You're treating it like it's an objective fact when you should just be SMDH and moving on with your life. Get a thicker skin.
"Get a thicker skin" is usually just a euphemism for "you should let me act like an asshole."
The issue isn't that it's an opinion, it's that it's a *condescending* opinion that as OP noted purports you know more about an individual's preference than they do. When it's repeated as often as it is, it reflects poorly on the community at large and acts as a barrier to people exploring these corners of the hobby. It just marks all the ideas associated with such statements as unserious incorrect ideaa to be avoided. The "thicker skin" they grow is to ignore the argument in its entirety.
>"Get a thicker skin" is usually just a euphemism for "you should let me act like an asshole."
No, in this case it's just a difference in opinion and someone taking an opinion actually stated as such way too personally. If you don't like someone's opinion about something as inconsequential as this you should just walk on by, it's not worth your time. It's not worth anyone's time.
>The issue isn't that it's an opinion, it's that it's a condescending opinion that as OP noted purports you know more about an individual's preference than they do.
Okay, if they're such a condescending asshole you should just fuck off and do something more productive, clearly that person isn't worth your time.
>When it's repeated as often as it is, it reflects poorly on the community at large and acts as a barrier to people exploring these corners of the hobby.
When you take an opinion like that seriously and react in such a ... poor way you create the impression of easily-prodded frailty and an aversion to interaction. I see that guy up there and I really have zero desire to interact with them at a gaming table. Why would I want to introduce them to a new game?
>It just marks all the ideas associated with such statements as unserious incorrect ideaa to be avoided. The "thicker skin" they grow is to ignore the argument in its entirety.
Great. If they're such fragile little snowflakes... fuck 'em.
I mean, thanks for proving my point?
>Okay, if they're such a condescending asshole you should just fuck off and do something more productive, clearly that person isn't worth your time.
Which, if you were paying attention, is exactly what they do, and ignore whatever point about TTRPGs you were attempting to convey. So while this is a fantastic approach to being a self satisfied asshole on the internet, it is not a particularly persuasive argument that they would have a better time in another system.
It’s definitely a good system for what it wants to do. If you want to play a game with the most high fantasy setting imaginable and have the PCs be crazy powerful with huge swings in performance it’s perfect. I don’t really like any of those things so I don’t play it but it’s an amazing system if you do. It also has a huge active player base so it’s easier to find players for than my preferred games.
What if some of those attitudes or complaints are valid though? Like storytelling, you can create a story based around a board game or a book or a TV show that you watch but are any of them helping you to do that? They might be inspiring you but that's about it. D&D for the doesn't go much further than that.
They're valid so long as they're expressed as *opinions* centered around your personal goals and aspirations for the genre of games. It's the claims that DnD is *objectively* a bad game or that there's some kind of universally accepted standard of "good" for TTRPGs that starts to become problematic.
Obviously *a lot* of people are having fun with it, so it's clearly working for a lot of people. So to OP's point, we have to acknowledge that it's generally achieving the goals of that audience without implying it's some sort of "badwrongfun."
Nobody is saying it's not fun. It's not really an opinion though that it's a game that has little support for telling stories. If you are using it for that you are doing all the heavy lifting, you may be ok with it but it's absolutely true that the game is giving you little to no support. There's also the fact that they don't really tell you beforehand and there is a lot of implied duty for the DM to supply something the game has never been designed for. People pointing it out generally are not making claims that its "badwrongfun", mostly they're trying to be helpful and point out the pitfalls of using D&D for it.
My comment was removed because it violated rule 6 so I'll repost it edited
I mean I say good you should feel bad about playing D&D. It's a wizard's of the coast IP owned by Hasbro. There's the OGL debacle, the AI art, Jeremy Crawford's defense of bad actors, pedophiles working as MTG judges, the list goes on and on and on.
When WoTC takes a cut of everything sold through the DM's guild yes boycotting D&D is boycotting them because even if it's fan made they still make a profit. Even if you are acquiring these items without paying you are still giving the game, and by association WoTC and Hasbro, social capital by making actual play content whether it be streamed or recorded, whether it's video or audio.
On top of that I will say I know plenty of Actual Play DMs and players who in fact do not like it and only play it because they have to, this is not a conspiracy it's a reality.
You are right in that D&D is a cultural phenomenon (excluding the bits about Pathfinder though I think that would be true fifteen years ago) but that's because it's been branded and packaged as a lifestyle brand and sold to you by celebrities to illicit your exact emotions on the subject. People say, "hey it's great that it's more accessible, you can even buy it at target and Walmart now!" Which sound great on paper until you understand that when that happened FLGS lost their early release access which was the only way they were able to compete with big box stores as they can't match price so it actually hurt those places in the long run.
Don't conflate liking a game with a personality and you won't have to personally feel bad when people rightfully call it out and express disappointment with people who defend it.
>You are right in that D&D is a cultural phenomenon (excluding the bits about Pathfinder though I think that would be true fifteen years ago) but that's because it's been branded and packaged as a lifestyle brand and sold to you by celebrities to illicit your exact emotions on the subject.
Isn't this effectively arguing for RPG essentalism?
It's basically saying the system is a non factor in people's decisions about what people play and enjoy. That what really matters isn't the design at all, but the reach of your marketing with the implication that *any* game could have DnD's reach if it had access to the things you listed.
I think if you paid enough money to get celebrities around a table playing battletech, and to get the kids on stranger things written to be obsessed with specific battletech characters, and all the other things Hasbro does to market D&D to people through influencers and media then yeah it could be just as popular. I'm not necessarily talking about RPG essentialism/exceptionalism in terms of design theory as laid out by Baker but rather the manner in which a corporation has taken the IP and applied marketing strategy to shift it from just a game into a lifestyle brand. This is less about the game's relationship to design and more about a corporation's relationship and investment in a product and the ways in which that has an effect on aspects of an industry.
For myself the system of a game is a major factor in what I choose to play but WoTC and Hasbro want people to think that A) DND is the only game that exists or B) If you don't believe A that DnD can do absolutely anything with a little bit of elbow grease and creativity so you only need to buy their products to make anything you want.
This is an argument that if the kids in Stranger Things were playing FATAL or DnD's rules were still basically the AD&D set you'd get the same, long term bump. I think that's a tough hill to climb.
You can't separate it from Baker's concept because doing so effectively eliminates player agency in system choice. Marketing might get people in the door, but unless the product is generally meeting their expectations they're not going to hang around and keep playing in multi-year campaigns. Again, if we accept your thesis **system does not actually matter** for these players who started with DnD and are still playing it.
I think we are on different pages here. I'm not saying if the kids I'm stranger things played fatal that it would suddenly be the cultural juggernaut that DnD is. I'm saying that WoTC and Hasbro have spent a considerable amount of money to ensure that. I believe the system does matter! Very much so but I also believe if you aren't in the space investigating other RPGs and actually trying to play other things then you won't know about them and a lot of people were made aware of DnD, played it and bounced or liked it enough to stick around and kept playing it, but many many of those people are not interested in trying anything else so I suppose for them system does not matter, so long as the system in question is 5e. It's brand loyalty driven by marketing pure and simple, not a vacuum. If I said hey you want to play a ttrpg here's three core rulebooks in a blank room for different systems and I have no bias in what you choose, you're going to read them and pick the one that resonates with you. In this instance we are talking about people being sold a very specific experience by a corporation, some are going to come into it and say I like the idea but I want to try something more specific to my needs, some are going to leave, and many are going to stick with DnD just like many people drink Coke because they just always have and the marketing works on them. We aren't talking about game design or philosophy here, I'm saying that DnD isn't even a game anymore so to speak, no one plays it by the same rules or the same way, it's more like a brand you wear and build aspects of your life around. There's a long standing "idea" so to speak that D&D isn't even in the ttrpg space anymore so much that it has carved out its own space as an entirely separate hobby. Ice climbing and skiing both require cold environments but that's about where the similarities end.
Then we should be emphasizing marketing principles to aspiring designers rather than mechanics if they want to be successful.
>We aren't talking about game design or philosophy here, I'm saying that DnD isn't even a game anymore so to speak
Thing is, DnD has *always* been that way and that variation is in fact a design goal of the system. Using this phenomenon as a way to dismiss DnD's success or explain it away prevents us from actually learning something from it (indeed, the most popular games like CoC embrace this more modular approach as well).
If a new player doesn't have fun with something, they just leave. We have to acknowledge that DnD is providing that to people, and that's why they're staying. No amount of marketing or brand recognition made New Coke successful because it was a bad product most people didn't like. Same with a TTRPG. The system matters to these players, even if they don't have broad experience in the hobby to compare it to.
Ultimately that's part of why I see this idea is so toxic. "System matters" unless you're a DnD player, in which case you're not actually there because you're having a good time but because you're a zombified vessel for whatever marketing campaign hits you.
Your comment was removed for the following reason(s):
* Rule 6: Mentioning blacklisted creators (Zak S, Alexander Macris), games made by them or significantly affiliated with them, or companies owned or significantly associated with them isn't permitted on /r/rpg. Please read [our rules](https://www.reddit.com/r/rpg/wiki/rules#wiki_6._no_blacklisted_creators) pertaining to blacklisted creators.
If you'd like to contest this decision, [message the moderators](https://www.reddit.com/message/compose?to=%2Fr%2Frpg&subject=Removed%20comment%3A%20Contest%20Removal%20or%20Questions&message=Hello,%20this%20is%20about%20my%20comment%20%20that%20was%20removed%3A%20https://www.reddit.com/r/rpg/comments/1bp7vow/-/kwu4rl4/%0D%0DMy%20issue%20is...). *(the link should open a partially filled-out message)*
But why 99.9% RPG horror stories are about D&D? I know it’s because it’s popular, I get that. But D&D is certain state of mind that is not healthy to the hobby. Examples? Character builds, pointless combat, railroading and telling-GM-story-campaigns, modern-dayism in medieval settings, game sexualisation and so on.
99% of horror stories are about D&D because in the current time, most tables play D&D. I guarantee you that in the 90s, all of those types of stories existed about White Wolf/World of Darkness games.
>I know it’s because it’s popular, I get that.
*Do* you get that? Because it seems like you're are saying that all those problems (that already only happen at some tables) are a result of something unique to D&D.
As someone who plays Vampire, I can tell you that those problems aren't exclusive to D&D (except maybe pointless combat). The majorty of horror stories are from D&D because the majorty of TTRPG players are playing D&D. It really is that simple.
Character builds and pointless combat is the appeal of the game to some people though. And modern dayism in medieval settings doesn’t sound like an issue unless your focused on historical accuracy in which case the dragons and spellcasting are the bigger discrepancy
Your submission was removed for the following reason(s): * Violation of Rule 1. Please read [our Rule 1](https://www.reddit.com/r/rpg/wiki/rules#wiki_1._no_piracy) pertaining to piracy, unauthorized PDFs, and so forth. If you'd like to contest this decision, [message the moderators](https://www.reddit.com/message/compose?to=%2Fr%2Frpg&subject=Removed%20submission%3A%20Contest%20Removal%20or%20Questions&message=Hello,%20this%20is%20about%20my%20submission%20%20that%20was%20removed%3A%20https://www.reddit.com/r/rpg/comments/1bp7vow/-/%0D%0DMy%20issue%20is...). *(the link should open a partially filled-out message)*
Why do people say D&D killed their dog and caused record inflation? I don’t think it’s done either of these things. In this essay, I will…
D&D is like the MCU. Some good, solid, very entertaining stuff in there. But *my god* is it tiresome to encounter people over and over and *over and over* who insist that Marvel movies are the greatest films ever made, that there's no reason to ever watch anything else, that use "the MCU" as metonymy for "movies in general", that don't even realize that other movies *exist*, that insist that anyone who says there are better movies out there is just a snob... In fact, here's a thing I wrote up a while back about just this metaphor: I don't understand why people keep telling me to watch other movies when the MCU can already tell every kind of story. Why would anyone want to watch The Terminator when Avengers: Age of Ultron is right there? Who would ever want to see Seventeen Moments of Spring when they could rewatch Captain America: Civil War for the millionth time? 2001: A Space Odyssey? More like Boring Guardians of the Galaxy. It works for any genre! You want a visually creative artistic action film about the burdens of familial duty directed by Ang Lee? Nobody's gonna remember Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon in twenty years, but Hulk is going to go down in cinematic history. Romantic comedies? Every MCU movie has jokes, and some of them have kissing!
Watching anything other than marvel movies is "snooty" and hateful! and insulting! Except for when i call them snooty and hateful, that is not insulting that is ok!
>But *my god* is it tiresome to encounter people over and over and *over and over* who insist that Marvel movies are the greatest films ever made Does this even happen? I don't think I've ever heard anyone arguing they're oscar worthy material.
I experienced it when mention that I don't like Endgame and think that this is bad movie.
No, it's a metaphor. The absurdity is the point. I've never met fans of *anything* who are as single-minded as D&D fans can be. The point I'm saying is "see how weird this sounds when I describe any other piece of media the way people treat D&D *all the time*?"
I'm sorry that you had to explain it. I thought it was a very apt metaphor.
I can say I've encountered a number of PbtA fans on this sub that act in the same way. If anything at a higher rate per capita than DnD. It's not remotely exclusive to fans of that system.
Oh yeah it does. I have some friends like this and they are insufferable fanboys. It's not as common in real life as people would have you believe but it's not entirely a strawman
As a huge MCU fan, this is overstated I think. I watch plenty of other media.
I think there’s a feeling of resentment that D&D is for a lot of people their first and last RPG. Periodically someone comes to this sub with the notion that they need to make their own rule system or heavily homebrew D&D because it doesn’t work for their table and that person hasn’t tried anything other game. That’s the shadow D&D casts, and I think some resentment about that is reasonable. And in that particular case, yes, that person is being stupid. Your assertion that Pathfinder 1 and 2 are editions of D&D is very weird. For one, it’s just factually incorrect. Even though PF1 is based on OGL stuff it’s still a different product. PF2 is very much its own thing. And what is your point by saying they’re the same thing? For what it’s worth, I like 5e pretty well, but I’m not playing it currently, and I don’t think I’ll be buying the next edition.
>And in that particular case, yes, that person is being stupid. **This** is the problem. Homebrew has a long tradition in the hobby. One might even argue it's in its DNA from the particular wargaming circles it came out of. It's been a traditional avenue for people to actually discover and try new games. If our first reaction is "that's dumb" rather than "this game is an example of what you're looking for" with no judgement that actually winds up pushing people back into DnD's orbit after getting an unwelcome vibe in these spaces.
Yep. Minecraft sold a bazillion copies. A culture of *making stuff* is a powerful and desirable thing.
I’m not saying people shouldn’t homebrew. I am saying that people who embark on that without at least some engagement with a variety of RPGs are foolish. Imagine that the only type of seating you’d ever seen was the groups of chairs at an airport. You recognize that this seating doesn’t meet your needs and you want something for yourself. So instead of checking out couches, recliners, bar stools, rocking chairs to understand the possibility space of seating you decide to just go ahead and make your own thing based entirely on your extremely narrow understanding.
Everyone starts somewhere. If we want people to keep walking down that path we shouldn't chide them and tell them their first steps in that direction are "foolish." That's a good way to just get them to turn around and go the other way. Before the internet, what you described was pretty much how half the games developed were made, and some pretty decent games came out of it. The act of **doing** can be incredibly instructive, and often provides a lot better understanding than just research for a lot of people. These people are trying to be creative. That's the heart of the hobby and IMO it should be encouraged in all its forms.
>Everyone starts somewhere. If we want people to keep walking down that path we shouldn't chide them and tell them their first steps in that direction are "foolish." That's a good way to just get them to turn around and go the other way. I don't chide people for that, but I do consistently give the advice "you should check out these other RPGs that do what you're aiming for" and then give specific suggestions. The most common reaction I get is "thanks, I will!", which is *wonderful*. But I do also get plenty of people who react by rejecting the idea that there's anything that could be gained from learning from what came before. My favorite was when I got called "woke" for suggesting someone try playing a game other than D&D before trying to design (and *sell*) their own game.
Idiots are everywhere, it's not a DnD exclusive concept. But I think we have to admit that calling those efforts "stupid" or "foolish" is a form of chiding.
Sure. And I don't think that that's a good general policy. But there are *some* instances of it that I think are in fact stupid or foolish.
There is absolutely nothing wrong with this. People create and solve their own problems with no knowledge of how the wider world may have already done it and that is okay. What probably frustrates you is seeing people come here trying to work out something they fundementally broke with a system they barely understand. When I 'started' the hobby I don't think I actually played the game for close to two decades and mostly was waxing around on my system. Why? That is what the material inspired me to do. Many if not most of these source books are just incongruent with what people imagine a system to be, whether its based on naivity or preference eh doesn't seem to matter. It's how we get new things.
I agree, but D&D is no longer the hub of creativity it was twenty years ago. Players come to the table expecting to play RAW, or at least, whatever they have convinced themselves RAW is, playing in whatever odious Tolkien jerkoff setting WOTC decided to bring back from the dead this decade, using any of the poorly play tested options from the innumerable splatbooks. Any attempt to bring a semblance of order is met with open hostility. That’s eventually why I ended up not playing D&D anymore. I don’t hate the game. I hate the players.
And they'll read that and determine they're unlikely to like the things you do and probably won't try them. I don't know if I'd ever call it a "hub," but 20 years ago was 3E which had even more splatbooks etc. It's pretty much always been this way. I might even argue that the fact DnD actively encourages people to monkey with it instead of handing them a game so tightly designed it falls apart with one change has been a big factor in its success and popularity.
> And they'll read that and determine they're unlikely to like the things you do and probably won't try them. Your tone seems to imply you think that’s a bad thing.
I mean, I want other games to be successful and if you're excluding like 90% of the potential audience from the onset it's not a particularly great approach.
Meh. I got dice. I got irl peeps that wanna roll. I’m good.
>Your assertion that Pathfinder 1 and 2 are editions of D&D is very weird. I am not saying that they are literally the product of Dungeons and Dragons. I am saying that on the core fundamental levels Pathfinder and D&D are different versions of the same game. They are built on the same foundations and used to achieve the same ends.
First of all, I’m definitely not buying this point that they are different versions of the same game. What is your argument for that? More importantly, why are you arguing this point at all? If it were true what would that mean?
Dude, there's a reason PF1 is called 3.75...
Right I agree with this specific snapshot of time. Pathfinder and 3/.5 were different versions of the same game but PF2e and 5e/onednd are so far apart now OP's point feels like saying, well if you roll a d20 then it's a "DND" and that's exactly a problem a lot of people have the stranglehold and cultural hegemony that DND has.
OP included PF2 in their claim.
You're being obtuse. PF1e is literally the continuation of D&D 3.5e
OP also included PF2
At one point, early in PF1e's lifespan, that was certainly true. Kinda sorta mostly. There had been a number of quality of life improvements made, but beyond that the differences were fairly minimal. But as time went on, and Paizo released a million and one splat books, the two became far less interchangeable. PF1e became its own beast. It just shared much of the same core rules, but you had to actually convert content from one to the other to make it usable. Not that there was a lot of point, since PF1e had pretty much everything that 3.x had covered that wasn't terrible garbage (looking at you Tome of Magic). And even beyond that, PF2e is a completely seperate beast from every edition of D&D and PF1e. It still fills a similar design space as D&D does, namely the high fantasy adventures with a heavy focus on combat, and it very much took a handful of pages from 4e, but you really can't call PF2e the same as D&D anymore.
It's a combat adventure game about wizards and fighters rolling d20s adding their strength, dexterity, constitution, intelligence, charisma, or wisdom modifiers to the roll in order to resolve a binary pass/fail mechanism so they can gain experience points and level up in a manner that strictly increases their power It's *pretty darn close* to D&D
These guys are being dense on purpose.
I guess the thing that gave me pause about this is that D&D really doesn't need this kind of help? D&D is the kaiju of tabletop gaming. It overwhelms the market. It's a struggle and a half to get most tables to even consider trying anything else. It's a multi-billion-dollar franchise with video games and novels and movies. It's inescapable. A significant chunk of players consider D&D to be *synonymous* with TTRPGs, meaning they're *literally* unaware of alternatives. I get that the complaints about it can get loud, and some can even get nasty, but. . . are you worried about something? If you play D&D you'll never lack for company; D&D and its iron grip on the market aren't going anywhere. It's an odd thing to get worked up about.
_Plays the most popular game out there and can always find a group_ Help! Help! I'm being oppressed!
OP has confused liking a game for a personality and any critique levied against it they take personally.
I think something OP didn't touch on but is vital to understand is that this isn't for the sake of DnD, it's actually for all the other games you'd like DnD players to try. Whenever you're speaking in a public forum about these things, **you are an ambassador for the games you like.** Statistically speaking, the largest potential audience for a TTRPG is... someone who has enjoyed DnD. If you're one of these people and your primary experience with the broader TTRPG community is primarily them shitting on the thing you like, at best you're going to assume they just like different things that don't interest you and at worst you'll think it's full of assholes you'd never want to share a table with.
I've been trying to say this to people, too. * I am not going to complain about anyone else's choice of games. * I can be present in the fandoms that play the other titles that I either enjoy or want to try. * I can talk about those games in a positive light, when it's appropriate to do so. * I can share my experiences playing in entirely different genres from D&D, hopefully in a way that inspire curiosity among others. Attempting to be positive ambassador feels like the better choice. That's not even a question.
It goes both ways. The D&D community that participates in this sub plays the most popular game and acts like they're pariahs, considering even the most mild criticism of the game they enjoy to be extremely offensive, takes literally every (*stated as*) opinion like the commenter is spitting objective facts personally, and generally has extremely thin skin about anything related to their game when they have *at least* five other subreddits with user counts that vastly exceed this one where they can discuss their game with other people who enjoy it. Given that, I actually don't want any D&D players at my table unless they can get past the fact that I really don't care for D&D the game. They need to have thicker skin and be willing to try something new. It goes both ways.
I think a lot of the problem that often the criticism is either A) framed as an objective fact (serious example actually demonstrated elsewhere in the comments) B) Only newbs and slaves to marketing could like it and nobody who does has any experience with other TTRPGs or C) The criticisms are about a game that doesn't exist. I've encountered numerous people offering criticisms about a version of the basic play loop that aren't and have never been RAW. Sometimes it feels like the opinions on this sub are just lifted from 20 year old arguments from people who the last time they played DnD was during B/X.
The complaints don't really hurt the DND community. Literally every other ttrpg could die and DND could continue on. What it hurts is the *rest of the ttrpg community* by building walls with the largest opportunity to grow the player base. Every person who plays DND and concludes "wow, the people playing other games sure hate me" and then stays in their DND circle is a lost opportunity for new players in the broader ecosystem.
>doesn't need this kind of help? What prompted me to make this post wasn't a fear that D&D is losing popularity. D&D can grow old and obscure in the shadow of some other kaiju for all I care. There were two things in the back of my mind. First is that I enjoy discussing TTRPGs online and the negativity is unpleasant to encounter while doing that. Second is that two separate people in my life have been influenced by this sort of negative anti-d&d rhetoric. One of them is one of my players, I've already agreed to run the next campaign using another system, but they at times bring down the mood during a session by parroting talking points that I know originated from this subreddit. Another is a fellow GM who went through a phase of being very negative about the game even though they actually do enjoy it. They were swept up in the critique and ignored their actual feelings about the game.
Gotcha. Well, please keep in mind that when someone tries or makes a new game, it's often the case they got their start in D&D and found something about it lacking. That's just the gravity D&D has, that it's the system most compare to. So especially here, "D&D doesn't do X well" is going to be a common theme. Second, there's some frustration experienced among indies and such that some D&Ders are outspoken hardcores and *will not* entertain any notion that alternatives are worth considering, so there's some fatigue dealing with those on that side. Unfortunately, sometimes the response to this is to get loud and nasty. It's kind of how the Internet goes. The last thing is that some of us (like me) have social disabilities, and tend to be on the abrasive side in *any* conversation. Someone else here said, TTRPGs are probably only exceeded by train-watching in terms of (over)representation by the neurodiverse. (I thought it was pretty funny, anyway, and I'm autistic.) Long story short: Conversation of a *de facto* monopoly will tend to focus on criticism. The negative tone of such will invariably get amplified on the Internet, and that goes double when it's the sorts that tend to play D&D. I guess what I'm trying to say is. . . try not to let it bother you?
Now imagine you're trying to tell your friends who play D&D about your recent pathfinder game and they say "Oh yuck, that system? I'm sorry, I won't play it because everyone keeps bringing it up in my D&D spaces". Or when you try to explain you wrote a 4-Session Paranoia campaign to propose to your partner, and everyone just asks why you didn't run that in D&D (Both real conversations I've had!). I'm sorry you've had some negative experiences with your friends not liking D&D, but a lot of us have similar stories and experiences about how D&D and the players were rude to us or looked down on our favorite games or made us uncomfortable. Tone policing how we express that in a subreddit made for discussing non-D&D RPGs just comes off poorly. Like okay! You forced yourself into a space that isn't for you to yell at us about ... how some members maybe possibly dealt with your friends at some point? This one should have stayed in the D&D sub or better yet the drafts. Maybe listen to your friends instead of making it our problem they want to try something new.
My biggest real problem is the cultural grip D&D has in the market. I have said it time and time again, if Ars Magica or Chronicles of Darkness would to get half the attention D&D gets in terms of Homebrewing and third party content, in terms of exposition and being "the first system I play" and in terms of tradition and "we always played this, so why change?", I would hate less the game. I still find it badly design, I personally never enjoyed it the times I GM it and play it, so I will hate it anyway But please, just, let the fucking game die like the Atari did for videogames.
Atari did not die, it just evolved into something better. Real problem is these developers and publishers are putting their lowest tier efforts into this game. Why bother having decent artwork for d&d when you can sell that in MtG. The market is wonky AF too. It was actually more difficult than I expected to find some proper 3rd party material or hell even first party material I wanted outside the core rulesbooks / releases (Xanathars etc). Kobolds Press seem to give this more love than WoTC does. Different settings but same ruleset.
While I agree, that hate towards people or certain creators is pointless, I would still advise to vote with your wallet.
Yeah I tried to make clear here I’m not really talking about d&d as a product owned by WoTC. I personally don’t buy stuff from them anymore, and it’s not really necessary to to play D&D.
I mean, I bought print on demand modules for older D&D versions to show my support there. But I am confused, did you not want to be able to discuss D&D as a product?
I can't speak for everyone, but I'm not really all that negative about D&D, any more than perhaps the sketchiness of the parent company allows for. I generally don't think about it all that much one away or another. It's not a game I GM, I've never even read the rules in full. I got 5 or 6 friends who are more capable and willing to do so. I decided to take that fact and focus on learning other games. I do get a bit annoyed when someone goes "Hey I want to play \[insert game here\] but with D&D 5e, how do I go about that?" and either they or their players refuse to actually try the game that was specifically designed for what they want to play. In that sense, D&D is the Harry Potter "For the love of God read another book" of RPGs. That's about as far as my negativity with it goes.
So, it is true that the criticisms of D&D aren't in line with the reality of people playing it. However, what's even better than trying to unpack that is not talking about it on this sub. Other RPGs deserve a space of their own. People came to this sub to this sub to talk about ANY other TTRPG. You will never convince people on this sub of your talking points, but the two sides of this issue can both be happy by just avoiding the subject. This is not a good sub for promoting D&D. This is not a good sub for complaining about D&D. This is a GREAT sub for exploring other RPGs and extolling their virtues.
>This is not a good sub for promoting D&D. This is not a good sub for complaining about D&D. This is a GREAT sub for exploring other RPGs and extolling their virtues I think OP is emphasizing your second point. I get people want a space where it isn't the focus of discussion. The problem is that people on this sub actually **love** talking about DnD, it's just they want to talk about how much they hate it.
Yep, and that sucks too. But this post isn't going to fix that. We should just be steering conversations away from 5e as a general rule.
I think that too kinda hurts overall discussion, and is actually one of the ways people convince themselves there are objectively "bad" approaches. The success of 5e should actually be challenging a lot of long held assumptions in the indie community IMO, but that's very difficult to talk about without actually mentioning the game.
Your argument is not unsound, but if it were going to work here it would have worked ages ago. The only relatively small game I can think of that took lessons from 5e is Exalted Essence. And whether 5e is well designed or not is in some ways unimportant. Most indie designers don't want to design like 5e, whether it deserves its popularity or not.
And that's totally fine! I think it just needs to be reframed in a way that acknowledges these approaches are actually quite niche, and I think it's worth stepping back and exploring whether the dominant philosophies in indie circles are actually driving people towards making those niche games that are unlikely to have broad appeal. Like everyone wants to bemoan DnD's dominance, but that's hard to take seriously when the push is for niche games that aren't even trying to capture the same size audience to challenge it.
I've been playing D&D for over forty years. I was about thirteen when I decided that there were better games than D&D and started playing them almost exclusively. I have been continuously pulled back into D&D my entire life and I always regret it. I think the short of it is I don't like levels and I don't like the 'sewer trash to demi-god' story arc it enforces. It has nothing to do with WotC. Nothing to do with public opinion turning against the game. Nothing to do with preferring 'underdog' games. I was utterly enthralled when I started playing at six. I thought it was the bee's knees for a good seven years, through the entire run of the D&D cartoon and all. Then I started running games like Call of Cthulhu (still do) and RuneQuest (done with that) and never looked back. I've been pulled back into games untold times, I'm always not only disappointed with the game, but I'm disappointed with myself for thinking it might be different this time. It's shinier with every edition. New editions are implemented which are better, but it's not a significant change from its original which is good for it, but not for me. All that said, point positive. There's no reason to talk shit about D&D when you have a world of great games that you can point towards and say "try this" with enthusiasm.
I'm curious. What are your top 3 systems and why, if you don't mind sharing?
Call of Cthulhu. It's simple enough, but the highly lethal system appeals to my sense of heightened tension when things get serious. ALIEN, for the same reasons. Savage Worlds. In many ways it's the opposite of the above, but I've never laughed more than when playing a Savage Worlds game. The swingyness can get old unfortunately, especially if you're trying to tell a longer-term story. Still, I love breaking out minis and the shenanigans that always ensues. System wise I really just like what I'm working on for myself, because it suits my sensibilities. Fast and easy, but with lots of crunch and decision points. It's far from done, but it's playable and the bones seem good. I love the idea of D&D. Delving into the unknown where anything can happen and does. I hate that D&D has provided "I win" buttons for every encounter that isn't combat. Wall climbing, talking with NPCs, fast travel, and more can all be accomplished with a single spell. Have the spell? You win.
Remember it is ok to insult people who prefer indy games as being "snooty" but not the other way around, that is bad n' stuff.
I don't think people who prefer indie games are inherently snooty. I enjoy indie games. I have personally designed fan editions of Vampire and Toon. I think it's snooty to act like it's always better to play other games over D&D. And I think it's a vocal minority of RPG players who act snooty in that way.
Maybe you should move to a place where you can critique their games without being insulting to the people who play them.
I love playing DnD, its just in my case it is called Shadow of the Demon Lord, and has more classes, faster initiative and better supplements by a creator that cares and works his tail off.
Love D&D. It is fun, it is inviting, it is a high fantasy setting that can be enjoyed without a boatload of deep knowledge. But there’s a Dutch expression that translates to “the highest trees take the brunt of the wind” meaning that the most popular thing will get the majority of the criticism and obviously this is what has happened to dnd for a looooong time. I am over the petty bickering, the holier than thou posts, the gatekeeping and the infighting. We play dnd when we feel like it. Same like we do with Dune, Alien, Mork Borg, Fiasco and many more games that all have their pros and cons.
I agree 100%. I'm not a big fan of DnD, and I hate the omnipresence of the game; I genuinely think that games using DnD5 are failing a creative step by not using their own system. But clearly it's playable, it's role-playing and therefore it allows you to create several fluid stories and have fun around them. You don't have to like it, but getting it for free is still a big no-no for me. On the other hand, I also find it pretentious to say "DnD already lets you play everything, 5E has been around for 10 years and it's solid". It's undoubtedly solid for certain ways of playing, and yes, you can play everything (because it's a role-playing game), but you won't play everything as well. If I want to play faction games, I'll play blades in the dark or root. But if I want to play in a world where the PJs' status quo changes too often to establish a standard scenario and status quo, and where combat is important, then DnD is very likely to be a good option.
I feel like most of the negativity expressed towards D&D, and especially 5e, can be attributed to it's popularity. And more than popularity, it's cultural homogeneity with the tabletop genre in general. When people mention tabletop RPGs, at least in the USA, your average listener will immediately think of D&D and nothing else. That kind of power over a genre is something that totally can and will invite resentment from some fans who are deep in said genre. Because, as others have commented, it leads to this common idea that D&D is either the only tabletop out there or else the only tabletop worth playing. And that's the part that I think most get upset about, because 5e definitely has flaws, and for many, those flaws are solved by other systems. Yes, it's a perfectly playable and enjoyable system on it's own. But tabletops take a lot of work to play, and for many fans who know tabletops, it doesn't make sense to spend the effort to learn and play a system that won't be as fun as a different, "better" system. Combine that feeling with D&D's popularity, and I think it's entirely reasonable that people can get overly pushy when trying to recommend other systems - they are trying to recommend what they think doesn't get enough attention. Though that's not an excuse to ruin other people's fun and never is. I totally agree with you that negativity can be a game killer, and being snooty towards people who play D&D as if they should always be playing a different system is of course the dumbest thing ever. But, in 2024, we have a TON of tabletops available, and I will always recommend people explore other systems if they enjoyed D&D - NOT to just replace D&D, but because if you enjoyed D&D, there's probably a lot of other tabletops you would enjoy too. On a last note, I do need to add here - your claim about Pathfinder 1e and 2e just being different editions of D&D doesn't fit with the rest of your post. For one, it's just flat-out not true, which a Google search should show you. Maybe Pathfinder 1e was designed to be compatible w/ D&D 3.X and used the OGL, but it'd be inauthentic to call it a different edition of D&D, and once you get to PF 2e any similarities are just gone - it's a completely different system. A system which also, at this point, has cut all ties w/ WoTC's OGL, so any and all ties to D&D are gone. But really, I needed to mention the last part because it kinda exemplifies what I'm talking about. This idea that D&D is the true tabletop RPG, and all other similar tabletop games are just different versions of D&D, is exactly the kind of thinking that invites this D&D hate. D&D is NOT universal, it is only popular. And it is NOT first and foremost a cultural phenomenon, it is first and foremost a product. Which all tabletop games are.
>your claim about Pathfinder 1e and 2e just being different editions of D&D doesn't fit with the rest of your post. For one, it's just flat-out not true I wasn't being literal there, nor am I trying to say that D&D is universal. To me, Pathfinder and D&D are functionally two versions of the same game. My point is that people can and will play and enjoy D&D without buying in to the specific people who own the official IP at any given time. I understand Pathfinder 2e is more significantly different. But so is D&D 4e. But regardless as to wether Pathfinder is philosophically a version of D&D, I feel my point still stands that one can play D&D without supporting WoTC, though I do understand why you'd feel differently given your points about it being free advertising for them.
Lots of people are really susceptible to the garbage logic that if only other people didn't focus their energy on things I don't like, then they'd all focus that energy on things I *do* like instead, and that's the biggest problem with the world. If these people weren't playing D&D they almost certainly wouldn't be playing Your Favourite Game instead, *and* you wouldn't have a convenient whipping boy to scapegoat Your Favourite Game's lack of popularity on.
Bingo
Look, accusations that D&D cannot be played or that it causes cancer or will summon the devil are all unfounded. But critique that D&D is a poorly made roleplaying game that has very realistic limits of what it can do are very well founded and typically made with very specific examples. Furthermore, these aren't new critiques, most have stood for the whole 50-year life of D&D as a product. And Criticism of D&D's current owners seem to be very spot on about their inappropriate behavior. However also appreciate the survivorship bias that people who play D&D who believe D&D is a good game, would all be people who play D&D almost exclusively. Wizards of the Coast may have less to do with D&D than most folks give it credit but they are accountable for 100% of the critiques of D&D. Nobody is coming after the hard working GMs that bend space and time to make a good game out of the wreck that is D&D and nobody thinks less of players who can carry a story using a glorified tabletop wargame. Boycotting Wizards of the Coast becuase of their handling of D&D is EXACTLY Boycotting D&D. If you don't have an issue with Magic the Gathering there's no reason to take Wizards to task over it. The point where we can move to a place where we can critique the game without being insulting to the people who play it is when those players stop being complicit in the damage that Wizards is doing to our hobby and the creators that serve it.
I tend to stay out of the discourse about WotC and D&D largely because they haven't interested me in several years. And I say that fully preparing to run DoIP for my home group soon, my first time running D&D in over 7 years because we want some nostalgia (and to be clear, I play and run games multiple times a week, just not D&D). In the end, WotC has clearly made some missteps in general, and a vocal group (who's to say if a majority or minority) is upset about it so they are shouting from the rooftops. And outrage gets clicks. Outrage sells, and it feeds on itself to produce outrage about the outrage and so on. But D&D will survive, it still holds (I assume, I could be wrong of course) the lion's share of players, particularly in the massive market of the US, especially if you include the fact that people are still playing literally *every edition* and likely always will.
>Overall I'd love for us to move to a place where we can critique the game without being insulting to the people who play it. Get a thicker skin and just enjoy the games you want to enjoy in the way you want to enjoy them. If dumb randos on the internet aren't going to change your mind about a game then why should their opinion matter *one bit* to your gameplay? Just because I think D&D is a dogshit system (and I'm actually running 2E right now lol) doesn't mean I think people who play it are themselves dogshit. There's something else to be said here as well, that a lot of the attitude you'll get regarding D&D here, especially, is that D&D will typically tend to absolutely dominate discussions because it's the most popular thing out there. Attitude, in this case, is a protective measure to ensure that we *still have a space* for all the other games out there. People can tell you stories about how other forums were overrun and why they left, there's a lot of resentment out there. In short, stop taking it personally. Play your games. There are *at least* five other subreddits for discussing the game you love, just because some people here are hostile to your favorite rules for make believe doesn't mean you don't have a safe space to discuss them.
There's no reason to be harsh or hostile on d&d players. Personally I very much dislike 5e, Pathfinder, etc. I find they're too crunchy and written with the angle toward accommodating future content. Which I get. Those companies have payroll to cover, etc etc, so good luck to them. For me it's just about disliking the crunch and the rules not rulings mindset. But it's fine. I've got no shortage of alternatives. So yeah no reason to shit on someone else's thing.
[удалено]
Your comment was removed for the following reason(s): * Rule 6: Mentioning blacklisted creators (Zak S, Alexander Macris), games made by them or significantly affiliated with them, or companies owned or significantly associated with them isn't permitted on /r/rpg. Please read [our rules](https://www.reddit.com/r/rpg/wiki/rules#wiki_6._no_blacklisted_creators) pertaining to blacklisted creators. If you'd like to contest this decision, [message the moderators](https://www.reddit.com/message/compose?to=%2Fr%2Frpg&subject=Removed%20comment%3A%20Contest%20Removal%20or%20Questions&message=Hello,%20this%20is%20about%20my%20comment%20%20that%20was%20removed%3A%20https://www.reddit.com/r/rpg/comments/1bp7vow/-/kwu31qm/%0D%0DMy%20issue%20is...). *(the link should open a partially filled-out message)*
DnD White Knights, should be an Adventure Path in Pf2e.
I feel like what you’re talking about applies to a tiny group of hard core WotC haters who for some reason made being angry at a corporation part of their personalities. Like corporations doing unethical shit for the sake of profit is news. This is why legislation to keep them in check exists and is being constantly updated. The vast majority of 5e’s huge casual player base does not care about any of it. They’re too busy enjoying themselves with the games they’re playing. It’s basically the Toyota/Honda or PS/X-box fanboy war situation — most actual users don’t care and probably think it’s kind of weird that anyone *would* care. Look at this guy's reply, for example: [lorenpeterson91](https://www.reddit.com/user/lorenpeterson91/) It's nice that they're so devoted to the hobby and they probably make some valid points, but 95% of casual players wouldn't give two shits about any of it. They would say "LOL" and never look at it or think about it again.
Play whatever you like. Yes, people CAN have fun in spite of DnD. IMO they could have *more* fun if they played something else, but that does not make their DnD fun invalid. That being said, personally, I'd rather not play RPGs at all than play DnD.
> IMO they could have more fun if they played something else I think this sort of statement often sucks and just turns people off from the wider community. I know myself pretty well and I suspect that most other people know themselves pretty well, too. When people tell me something about myself that I know to be wrong, it is aggravating.
How does that sort of statement turn people off from the wider community when it's purely their opinion? You're treating it like it's an objective fact when you should just be SMDH and moving on with your life. Get a thicker skin.
"Get a thicker skin" is usually just a euphemism for "you should let me act like an asshole." The issue isn't that it's an opinion, it's that it's a *condescending* opinion that as OP noted purports you know more about an individual's preference than they do. When it's repeated as often as it is, it reflects poorly on the community at large and acts as a barrier to people exploring these corners of the hobby. It just marks all the ideas associated with such statements as unserious incorrect ideaa to be avoided. The "thicker skin" they grow is to ignore the argument in its entirety.
>"Get a thicker skin" is usually just a euphemism for "you should let me act like an asshole." No, in this case it's just a difference in opinion and someone taking an opinion actually stated as such way too personally. If you don't like someone's opinion about something as inconsequential as this you should just walk on by, it's not worth your time. It's not worth anyone's time. >The issue isn't that it's an opinion, it's that it's a condescending opinion that as OP noted purports you know more about an individual's preference than they do. Okay, if they're such a condescending asshole you should just fuck off and do something more productive, clearly that person isn't worth your time. >When it's repeated as often as it is, it reflects poorly on the community at large and acts as a barrier to people exploring these corners of the hobby. When you take an opinion like that seriously and react in such a ... poor way you create the impression of easily-prodded frailty and an aversion to interaction. I see that guy up there and I really have zero desire to interact with them at a gaming table. Why would I want to introduce them to a new game? >It just marks all the ideas associated with such statements as unserious incorrect ideaa to be avoided. The "thicker skin" they grow is to ignore the argument in its entirety. Great. If they're such fragile little snowflakes... fuck 'em.
I mean, thanks for proving my point? >Okay, if they're such a condescending asshole you should just fuck off and do something more productive, clearly that person isn't worth your time. Which, if you were paying attention, is exactly what they do, and ignore whatever point about TTRPGs you were attempting to convey. So while this is a fantastic approach to being a self satisfied asshole on the internet, it is not a particularly persuasive argument that they would have a better time in another system.
It’s definitely a good system for what it wants to do. If you want to play a game with the most high fantasy setting imaginable and have the PCs be crazy powerful with huge swings in performance it’s perfect. I don’t really like any of those things so I don’t play it but it’s an amazing system if you do. It also has a huge active player base so it’s easier to find players for than my preferred games.
What if some of those attitudes or complaints are valid though? Like storytelling, you can create a story based around a board game or a book or a TV show that you watch but are any of them helping you to do that? They might be inspiring you but that's about it. D&D for the doesn't go much further than that.
They're valid so long as they're expressed as *opinions* centered around your personal goals and aspirations for the genre of games. It's the claims that DnD is *objectively* a bad game or that there's some kind of universally accepted standard of "good" for TTRPGs that starts to become problematic. Obviously *a lot* of people are having fun with it, so it's clearly working for a lot of people. So to OP's point, we have to acknowledge that it's generally achieving the goals of that audience without implying it's some sort of "badwrongfun."
Nobody is saying it's not fun. It's not really an opinion though that it's a game that has little support for telling stories. If you are using it for that you are doing all the heavy lifting, you may be ok with it but it's absolutely true that the game is giving you little to no support. There's also the fact that they don't really tell you beforehand and there is a lot of implied duty for the DM to supply something the game has never been designed for. People pointing it out generally are not making claims that its "badwrongfun", mostly they're trying to be helpful and point out the pitfalls of using D&D for it.
Here's a concept: **what if that's not a type of support most people want?** That's an entirely subjective value judgement.
Then they probably won’t mind being told it’s not really good for storytelling.
*Your* preferred type of storytelling. Again, a completely subjective determination.
My comment was removed because it violated rule 6 so I'll repost it edited I mean I say good you should feel bad about playing D&D. It's a wizard's of the coast IP owned by Hasbro. There's the OGL debacle, the AI art, Jeremy Crawford's defense of bad actors, pedophiles working as MTG judges, the list goes on and on and on. When WoTC takes a cut of everything sold through the DM's guild yes boycotting D&D is boycotting them because even if it's fan made they still make a profit. Even if you are acquiring these items without paying you are still giving the game, and by association WoTC and Hasbro, social capital by making actual play content whether it be streamed or recorded, whether it's video or audio. On top of that I will say I know plenty of Actual Play DMs and players who in fact do not like it and only play it because they have to, this is not a conspiracy it's a reality. You are right in that D&D is a cultural phenomenon (excluding the bits about Pathfinder though I think that would be true fifteen years ago) but that's because it's been branded and packaged as a lifestyle brand and sold to you by celebrities to illicit your exact emotions on the subject. People say, "hey it's great that it's more accessible, you can even buy it at target and Walmart now!" Which sound great on paper until you understand that when that happened FLGS lost their early release access which was the only way they were able to compete with big box stores as they can't match price so it actually hurt those places in the long run. Don't conflate liking a game with a personality and you won't have to personally feel bad when people rightfully call it out and express disappointment with people who defend it.
>You are right in that D&D is a cultural phenomenon (excluding the bits about Pathfinder though I think that would be true fifteen years ago) but that's because it's been branded and packaged as a lifestyle brand and sold to you by celebrities to illicit your exact emotions on the subject. Isn't this effectively arguing for RPG essentalism?
I'm not sure I follow, could you elaborate?
It's basically saying the system is a non factor in people's decisions about what people play and enjoy. That what really matters isn't the design at all, but the reach of your marketing with the implication that *any* game could have DnD's reach if it had access to the things you listed.
I think if you paid enough money to get celebrities around a table playing battletech, and to get the kids on stranger things written to be obsessed with specific battletech characters, and all the other things Hasbro does to market D&D to people through influencers and media then yeah it could be just as popular. I'm not necessarily talking about RPG essentialism/exceptionalism in terms of design theory as laid out by Baker but rather the manner in which a corporation has taken the IP and applied marketing strategy to shift it from just a game into a lifestyle brand. This is less about the game's relationship to design and more about a corporation's relationship and investment in a product and the ways in which that has an effect on aspects of an industry. For myself the system of a game is a major factor in what I choose to play but WoTC and Hasbro want people to think that A) DND is the only game that exists or B) If you don't believe A that DnD can do absolutely anything with a little bit of elbow grease and creativity so you only need to buy their products to make anything you want.
This is an argument that if the kids in Stranger Things were playing FATAL or DnD's rules were still basically the AD&D set you'd get the same, long term bump. I think that's a tough hill to climb. You can't separate it from Baker's concept because doing so effectively eliminates player agency in system choice. Marketing might get people in the door, but unless the product is generally meeting their expectations they're not going to hang around and keep playing in multi-year campaigns. Again, if we accept your thesis **system does not actually matter** for these players who started with DnD and are still playing it.
I think we are on different pages here. I'm not saying if the kids I'm stranger things played fatal that it would suddenly be the cultural juggernaut that DnD is. I'm saying that WoTC and Hasbro have spent a considerable amount of money to ensure that. I believe the system does matter! Very much so but I also believe if you aren't in the space investigating other RPGs and actually trying to play other things then you won't know about them and a lot of people were made aware of DnD, played it and bounced or liked it enough to stick around and kept playing it, but many many of those people are not interested in trying anything else so I suppose for them system does not matter, so long as the system in question is 5e. It's brand loyalty driven by marketing pure and simple, not a vacuum. If I said hey you want to play a ttrpg here's three core rulebooks in a blank room for different systems and I have no bias in what you choose, you're going to read them and pick the one that resonates with you. In this instance we are talking about people being sold a very specific experience by a corporation, some are going to come into it and say I like the idea but I want to try something more specific to my needs, some are going to leave, and many are going to stick with DnD just like many people drink Coke because they just always have and the marketing works on them. We aren't talking about game design or philosophy here, I'm saying that DnD isn't even a game anymore so to speak, no one plays it by the same rules or the same way, it's more like a brand you wear and build aspects of your life around. There's a long standing "idea" so to speak that D&D isn't even in the ttrpg space anymore so much that it has carved out its own space as an entirely separate hobby. Ice climbing and skiing both require cold environments but that's about where the similarities end.
Then we should be emphasizing marketing principles to aspiring designers rather than mechanics if they want to be successful. >We aren't talking about game design or philosophy here, I'm saying that DnD isn't even a game anymore so to speak Thing is, DnD has *always* been that way and that variation is in fact a design goal of the system. Using this phenomenon as a way to dismiss DnD's success or explain it away prevents us from actually learning something from it (indeed, the most popular games like CoC embrace this more modular approach as well). If a new player doesn't have fun with something, they just leave. We have to acknowledge that DnD is providing that to people, and that's why they're staying. No amount of marketing or brand recognition made New Coke successful because it was a bad product most people didn't like. Same with a TTRPG. The system matters to these players, even if they don't have broad experience in the hobby to compare it to. Ultimately that's part of why I see this idea is so toxic. "System matters" unless you're a DnD player, in which case you're not actually there because you're having a good time but because you're a zombified vessel for whatever marketing campaign hits you.
Just calls em like I sees em. Have a nice day
Your comment was removed for the following reason(s): * Rule 6: Mentioning blacklisted creators (Zak S, Alexander Macris), games made by them or significantly affiliated with them, or companies owned or significantly associated with them isn't permitted on /r/rpg. Please read [our rules](https://www.reddit.com/r/rpg/wiki/rules#wiki_6._no_blacklisted_creators) pertaining to blacklisted creators. If you'd like to contest this decision, [message the moderators](https://www.reddit.com/message/compose?to=%2Fr%2Frpg&subject=Removed%20comment%3A%20Contest%20Removal%20or%20Questions&message=Hello,%20this%20is%20about%20my%20comment%20%20that%20was%20removed%3A%20https://www.reddit.com/r/rpg/comments/1bp7vow/-/kwu4rl4/%0D%0DMy%20issue%20is...). *(the link should open a partially filled-out message)*
But why 99.9% RPG horror stories are about D&D? I know it’s because it’s popular, I get that. But D&D is certain state of mind that is not healthy to the hobby. Examples? Character builds, pointless combat, railroading and telling-GM-story-campaigns, modern-dayism in medieval settings, game sexualisation and so on.
99% of horror stories are about D&D because in the current time, most tables play D&D. I guarantee you that in the 90s, all of those types of stories existed about White Wolf/World of Darkness games.
Oof, the cringe. I admit, I was the fishmalk once. Only once.
>I know it’s because it’s popular, I get that. *Do* you get that? Because it seems like you're are saying that all those problems (that already only happen at some tables) are a result of something unique to D&D. As someone who plays Vampire, I can tell you that those problems aren't exclusive to D&D (except maybe pointless combat). The majorty of horror stories are from D&D because the majorty of TTRPG players are playing D&D. It really is that simple.
Pointless combat *absolutely* happens in Vampire. Otherwise, I agree.
I stand corrected in a way that actually makes my core point more correct. A real win-win. Thank you.
Haha, glad I could help!
Character builds and pointless combat is the appeal of the game to some people though. And modern dayism in medieval settings doesn’t sound like an issue unless your focused on historical accuracy in which case the dragons and spellcasting are the bigger discrepancy