Dungeons and Dragons Exploring a New Edition

[ErhnamDJ]

Originally Posted by David Johansen

I can't imagine why anyone would want to run a game where armor makes you harder to hit instead of absorbing damage :D

You have it backwards, see. Armor just completely stops all damage. A dragon can stomp on you, but if he hits your studded leather armor, you haven't been hurt at all!

So what armor class represents is how difficult is it to bypass armor. Armor does absorb damage, just an ∞ amount. :)

[Fred Brackin]

Originally Posted by David Johansen

a $100 boxed set with 100 unpainted vinyl recasts (cf Reaper Bones) of the Other World Miniatures line* and some simple, thick cardboard terrain. I'd go with a couple towers, four wall sections, a gate, a small ship, some dungeon tiles, a couple cottages, and an inn with a detailed tavern map inside.

.

WOTC's flirtation with minis didn't show much understanding of minis for RPG use. A buddy of mine spent thousands probably on the rubber minis from China that showed up after the start of 3e.

There were good aspects. The durability and lack of care neded was marvelous. You could just toss them into boxes and skate them across the gaming table without worrying about anything.

The problem was very likely the way it seemed to be aimed at collectors rather than users. Nothing but random assortments of crap trying to get you to keep going until you found some "rares".

It did not seem to matter that the rares were things you'd probably never use. You also got tons of duplicates of figures you'd never use while ending u short on things you needed frequently. We never had enough wolves or even wolf-like figures be they Wargs or Winter Wolves or whatever.

There was a definite overabundance of Drow though.

A personal gripe is that in that horde of figures (like 10-15 cubic feet or more in their storage boxes) these wasn't a single Northern Barbarian. Not one. How rare a character concept is this?

[Mylon]

I rather liked the D&D minis line. People would go through those boxes of random assortments looking for the mini that had better stats than other minis and pawn the rest. Buy all of those commons for some cheap figures that don't need any special care... Since I didn't care about the cards they came with they worked great for me.

I'm not so sure why I'm so fascinated with D&D 5e myself. I've already become a total fanboy of Savage Worlds and I don't plan on running anything else.

[MadWombat]

Originally Posted by Fred Brackin

WOTC's flirtation with minis didn't show much understanding of minis for RPG use. A buddy of mine spent thousands probably on the rubber minis from China that showed up after the start of 3e.

There were good aspects. The durability and lack of care neded was marvelous. You could just toss them into boxes and skate them across the gaming table without worrying about anything.

The problem was very likely the way it seemed to be aimed at collectors rather than users. Nothing but random assortments of crap trying to get you to keep going until you found some "rares".

It did not seem to matter that the rares were things you'd probably never use. You also got tons of duplicates of figures you'd never use while ending u short on things you needed frequently. We never had enough wolves or even wolf-like figures be they Wargs or Winter Wolves or whatever.

There was a definite overabundance of Drow though.

A personal gripe is that in that horde of figures (like 10-15 cubic feet or more in their storage boxes) these wasn't a single Northern Barbarian. Not one. How rare a character concept is this?

Our experience was that the people playing the mini game were the bigger market than the purely RPG folks (although many were "dual-use" folks. Thus the random boosters and rarity schemes worked just fine. Many RPG customers bought them as singles, so they could get what they wanted, perhaps buying boosters when the set first came out to get an assortment for use and trade.

As long as the mini game was a going concern they stuck with that format, but when the game tanked, they tried but ultimately failed in getting a marketing model that would reach RPG players and still be profitable (changes in materials cost didn't help either).

I am watching the Pathfinder Mini offerings to see how they deal with these issues, especially seeing how there is no accompanying minis game.

[Collective_Restraint]

Originally Posted by ak_aramis

There are literally dozens of such games on the market; LL isn't even the best of the bunch, at least not for those looking for compatibility. Not that it's bad; it's just not the most compatible.

Swords and Wizardry is closer to OD&D than LL is to any edition.
Osric is 99% AD&D1E (the other 1% they didn't translate)
Myth and Magic is 2E
Dark Dungeons is essentially Cyclopedia D&D
Dungeon Crawl Classics and Hackmaster 4E are both AD&D-ish with lots of add-on crunch.
Castles and Crusades is a "Use the AD&D monsters and adventures as is but with a different set of rules but the same classes"...
While Forward to Adventure doesn't bother with the same classes, but is the same approach.
Lamentations of the Flame Princess is AD&D with a few fixes and tweaks for "weird fantasy"...

5E will have o do a lot if its' going to get any of their adherents back.

Which is a proof that it seems WotC should be able to make money by releasing all their old catalog since other companies are making money out of their old rulesets. This blog post is very interesting. Don't mind the rambling in it, just keep in mind the key points of it.

[Polydamas]

They probably don't have clear electronic rights to most of the catalogue before the 2000s. Figuring out who has the rights, tracking them down, and negotiating a new contract would cost time and money. Then scanning and OCRing and processing and proofreading the OCR would take time and money. Then there are all the products which don't work in digital form (big maps, all those 2e boxed sets).

I can't be sure, because I don't know what kind of contract TSR's authors signed, but I suspect that the legal situation is complicated, and that most of their back catalogue is dusty copies in a store room, not PDF files ready to upload to an online store for a few minutes of work each.

[Fred Brackin]

Originally Posted by Polydamas

that most of their back catalogue is dusty copies in a store room, not PDF files ready to upload to an online store for a few minutes of work each.

I remember at one point there were 5.5 in floppies involved. :)

[ak_aramis]

Originally Posted by Fred Brackin

I remember at one point there were 5.5 in floppies involved. :)

Those would be custom jobs, then...
Floppy sizes were 8", 5.25" and 3.5"
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Floppy_disk

But still, most of the file formats from back then can be printed to post-script. And the post-script files converted to PDF.

Palladium books does so, and was using less expensive software.

Most of the TSR back catalogue was pretty clear - they aren't doing them in PDF because of fears of online piracy, not worries over the rights. Or so they claimed when they pulled the 2E and BX/BECMI/Cyclopedia/GAZ stuff with the launch of 4E.

Then again, their printer leaked the print-files for 4E a week before lauch... including the crop and alignment marks.

[roguebfl]

Originally Posted by ak_aramis

But still, most of the file formats from back then can be printed to post-script. And the post-script files converted to PDF.

Actually that's assuming a big step. Most data formats would need to be processed before it can be printed to post-script, and there is no garrent they still have software that can open the data format and do that processing.

Palladium can do so because they happen to still have that software.

[ak_aramis]

Originally Posted by roguebfl

Actually that's assuming a big step. Most data formats would need to be processed before it can be printed to post-script, and there is no garrent they still have software that can open the data format and do that processing.

Wrong. You just need the relevant PS driver for the software. Ok, that's not always going to be available, but there are PS drivers for even such old OS's as CPM...

Originally Posted by roguebfl

Palladium can do so because they happen to still have that software.

Indeed - they still use the same program!

It's not like 1980's era floppy disks are unavailable, and it's not like the hardware to run them can't be emulated adequately.

And it's not like Deep7's issue of not being able to find the files on the HD due to a fire.