So, Wizards said they're not making any more major announcements at GenCon. And they've said that D&D4 is at least another year off.

I'm thinking about buying back into the current edition of D&D, even though I still have some problems with it (mostly: the skills system, and the way they balanced spells in 3.5 - and I am absolutely unpersuadable about this so don't waste our fucking time), because (a) I found a way I think I can make it work for my tastes (basically, run it BtB, but way stripped down, cutting out a lot of options even within the core books) and (b) because I want to run something ordinary folks can buy at a local non-specialty store. Which pretty much restricts me to D&D, WoD/Exalted stuff, and maybe GURPS, and if you think I'm down on 3.14159 from my occasional rants, don't get me started on those other two, which fire me up the way some of you get fired up about the Forge.

But so help me Crom, if they come out with D&D4 after I sink 60 bucks into the new corebooks, and work into developing my own stuff for them, I'll...bitch and whine about it on the internet!

So, any inside information, send it my way by PM, otherwise just offer me bland reassurance that my purchase will be OK (or not!) in this thread.

I've got too many worlds and dungeons inside me that have waited too long to see the light of day! I need a god damned system! That ordinary people can get access too! Fuck this exclusive hobbyist shit!

(Bonus points if you could guess what I want my next words in this rant to be, but won't say because of the character of the rpgsite.)

why buy anything?  just use the SRD.  or use mongoose runequest, also free online.  

Well, I don't need to tell a regular of the Necro Games boards that according to some people the announcement will be made at (the time of) GenCon.

Said people certainly act that way, i.e. have all but stopped publishing 3.5 stuff. And not just said people. One hears the sound of collective breath-holding.

I wouldn't buy a thing right now, but then you're hardcore, Cali, so you'll do it anyway.

Me, I'll start buying 3.x material by the pound... in about a year from now, on ebay.

Unless people other than those alluded to above have different info? (Info, not opinions, Pundy.)

I would always go "by the book" (as far as rules-use) in any case. And if your'e that tentative about buying the books, just use the SRD.

Here's the deal: If I suddenly disappear and start doing RPGA* stuff every week, and I "can't tell you what it is, because I have a non-disclosure agreement", I'll drop enough hints here that people will be able to figure that out.


That is not the case today, and I feel like I'm kinda connected in with the RPGA zeitgeist lately.






* Where do you think WOTC playtesters come from? :cool:

I don't own any D&D books.  I just have eTools and d20srd.org.  I get all my D&D needs from there.

Works great for me.

Quote from: J ArcaneI don't own any D&D books.  I just have eTools and d20srd.org.  I get all my D&D needs from there.

Works great for me.

Another tool I use extensively is the Javascript character generator. I use it for PCs, NPCs, encounters, etc.

http://www.pathguy.com/cg35.htm

Quote from: Pierce InverarityWell, I don't need to tell a regular of the Necro Games boards that according to some people the announcement will be made at (the time of) GenCon.

Said people certainly act that way, i.e. have all but stopped publishing 3.5 stuff. And not just said people. One hears the sound of collective breath-holding.

I wouldn't buy a thing right now, but then you're hardcore, Cali, so you'll do it anyway.

Me, I'll start buying 3.x material by the pound... in about a year from now, on ebay.

Unless people other than those alluded to above have different info? (Info, not opinions, Pundy.)

DUDE; its not a fucking opinion.  WoTC made a formal announcement that from now on all major releases and announcements are going to be done at the D&D Experience con, NOT Gencon; and at that con this year they made it clear that they were not releasing 4e for at least two years.

So yes, ok, I'll grant that your random hearsay by some nutcases on a minor-league company's boards is pretty striking information, but I think that my ACTUAL FUCKING ANNOUNCEMENT BY WIZARDS OF THE COAST sort of trumps that a little...

RPGPundit

As for you, Calithena, someday, sometime, there will be a 4th edition of D&D.  It will at a MINIMUM not be till 2009; probably not till sometime long after that.

So you'd have plenty of time to enjoy your D&D books before having to make any changes to them.

RPGPundit

What happened to your plans for Revised M&M?  That's free online, and thus easily available... :confused:

Anyhow, if you want actual 3.5 books (as opposed to relying on the SRD) but don't want to pay the full price, you could consider the 'pocket books' of the core rules published by Mongoose.  I used the 'Pocket Player's Guide' last time I ran 3.5.  It was actually far more convenient to carry around.

The Mongoose books also have the advantage of not including any of that annoying 'dungeon punk' art.

Definitely do not bother with the 3.5 DMG (unless you can get it really cheap).  That thing's a complete waste of money!  

Oh yeah, you might want to look at the 3.5 Unearthed Arcana.  It includes rules for simplifying skills (one version essentially introduces a C&C system, the other uses something like True20's system), so that might minimize your irritation in that department.

Quote from: RPGPunditSo yes, ok, I'll grant that your random hearsay by some nutcases on a minor-league company's boards is pretty striking information, but I think that my ACTUAL FUCKING ANNOUNCEMENT BY WIZARDS OF THE COAST sort of trumps that a little...

Companies lie. Frequently. Especially about stuff like this. Steve Jackson Games, for example, had been on record numerous times as saying that GURPS 4e wasn't in development, wouldn't be coming soon, and was many years down the road. Almost none of this was true, of course -- the point is that companies will (and do) lie without compunction when it serves them best to do so. Now, WotC might be the sole exception to this truth of business, though I sincerely doubt it.

Clark Peterson, who Pierce is talking about, is much more connected than I am, and he does think the announcement is coming. But this may be wishful thinking on his part (a new version now would probably benefit Necro's business model).

But, Pundit's facts are the ones I'm aware of, and they suggest that yes, we're at least a year and a half out.

And Maw, who evidently is on the playtester grapevine, isn't seeing a fin in the water.

So far, so good.

(Revised M&M is still on the agenda; it's what comes up next that I'm looking at now!)

Look at the release schedule - theres LOADS of shit coming out this year, and a few major releases (need more compendiums) in the pipe for next.

EVEN if it came out next year - so what?  There is literally a metric FUCKTON of books out there you haven't explored, FR and Eberron settings that are detailed and could easily give you a DECADE or more of solid gaming.  

If 4th ed comes out, like most new games, it will take a while for people to work out the bugs, determine the pros and cons, and for a few solid releases to come out.  All that while,  theres still loads of D&D 3.5 goodness out there, that aint goin anywhere.

Jump in with no qualms, and see how you like it.  Don't worry about 4th ed - I have a feeling a lot of people are going to stick with 3.5 for a while anyway, and 4th ed will be different enough that the two are almost seperate games.

If I do this at all, I will do it with the understanding that I will play whatever system WotC comes out with and calls D&D, spending as much money as it takes to buy in, over and over for the rest of my life, or at least until such a time as some other game company can get some superior game system into the public imagination and ordinary book/toy stores with a roughly similar level of saturation to that which D&D3 enjoys. Or at least that enjoyed by WoD, GURPS, Tunnels & Trolls, and a few others at their highest points.

This is about getting out of the specialty games market and getting into the consumer mass market. This is about playing what other people play just because they play it. This is about getting out of the whole game design mentality and getting into the making up fantastic shit for as broad an audience as possible mentality. Which is frankly what I'm better at anyway. I know a lot about game design but I don't care enough about it to make and stick to the choices that make for a good system.

And it's really important to me to play no-hassle pickup games with people I don't know. There are some startup hassles with 3e (skills, feats, spells, equipment all need standard packages for quickstart), but there's a social hassle with other games I'm not sure I'm willing to put up with any more.

I was puzzled why you were bothering to do this, Calithena, if you already have a group willing to play the games that you want to play.  Then I read this:

Quote from: Calithena... This is about getting out of the specialty games market and getting into the consumer mass market. This is about playing what other people play just because they play it. This is about getting out of the whole game design mentality and getting into the making up fantastic shit for as broad an audience as possible mentality.  ...

And it's really important to me to play no-hassle pickup games with people I don't know...

So are you trying to get into the RPG 'industry' or something?  Or is it just that, for whatever reason, you want to play lots of pickup games in the future, and D&D is the best route to do that?
:confused:

Quote from: AkrasiaSo are you trying to get into the RPG 'industry' or something?  Or is it just that, for whatever reason, you want to play lots of pickup games in the future, and D&D is the best route to do that?
:confused:

I can't speak for Calithena, but I'm moving towards this sort of thing too.  I have a lot of games that I really enjoy, but pretty much never get to play or run outside of conventions due to not being able to find gamers.  On the other hand, I'll always be able to find D&D players, and to a lesser extent I think this would be true for a few other games as well (Star Wars, WoD, etc).  I'm never going to completely abandon other games and will play and run them when the opportunity arises, but I'm not going to spend as much time and effort trying to do so when I can get into D&D for much less trouble.

Honestly, I can have fun playing or running anything when it comes right down to it.  And D&D has enough possibilities to keep my interested for a very long time.