Quote from: cranebump;964296You can also play all that as fluffy bits in most any system. The difference now, I think, is that players expect to be mechanically rewarded for everything their PC is. More crunch wanted, as you say, hence the whole video game comparison.  

That said, I'm not entirely sure about the desire for more crunch from anyone over 50.:-)

I'd say that the majority of players who were/are prominent in 3e and 4e are probably under 50. And yea, there's an expectation from players to be mechanically rewarded. There's a collection of players who still prefer Pathfinder to 5e because it's seemed (to them) to be more complex or, and I've heard this many times over on their boards, a "Big-Boy RPG" whatever the hell that means? Having played a LARGE amount of 3e and 4e and to a lesser extent Pathfinder I feel most of the options released are rather "meh" overall. The distance between options that are practically required to those that are easily overlooked is HUGE. At least in 5e most options have a significant benefit that no one takes because it's so utterly lacking in mechanical benefit.

I don't think the preference for crunch is just for those under 50. A lot of people who returned to D&D with 5e started with Basic and 2e and part of the attraction is the less crunchy rules and character builds. They would tend to be in their 30s/40s. Plus look at the popularity of rules light and storygame systems for those in their 30s and younger. A lot of grognards who are 50+ online seem to prefer crunch heavy systems.

Basically I don't think it breaks down based on age and while the crunch heavy crowd are the most vocal I don't think they're the majority.

Quote from: Voros;964360Basically I don't think it breaks down based on age and while the crunch heavy crowd are the most vocal I don't think they're the majority.

It makes sense that it wouldn't break down by age. Both heavy crunch and low crunch have been well represented almost since the beginning. Traveller--one of the earliest sci-fi games out there and you get to design spaceships down to the displacement-ton, with every choice having a mechanical benefit. Aftermath? Extremely crunchy. 1e AD&D? Kinda split the difference, since the book contained tons of crunch but lots of people only used the parts they wanted. Certainly once GURPS and Champions came out,  people could spend all the time they wanted fine tuning their character build for maximum game benefit.

Good point regarding GURPS and Champions. Crunch heavy systems existed long before 3.5e.

Quote from: Willie the Duck;964313I'm not even sure if it's a reward they are necessarily looking for. I think people just like having options to choose from, metaphorical buttons to push and levers to pull, etc.

That's a reasonable assumption.

Quote from: Voros;964360I don't think the preference for crunch is just for those under 50. A lot of people who returned to D&D with 5e started with Basic and 2e and part of the attraction is the less crunchy rules and character builds. They would tend to be in their 30s/40s. Plus look at the popularity of rules light and storygame systems for those in their 30s and younger. A lot of grognards who are 50+ online seem to prefer crunch heavy systems.

Basically I don't think it breaks down based on age and while the crunch heavy crowd are the most vocal I don't think they're the majority.

No way to know. Your point about storygames being more popular among younger players makes sense, but it feels like an apples-oranges comparison for me, since I'm thinking evels of crunch in similar systems, that is, D&D. I honestly don't even know what "rules medium" is anymore, since my yardstick is based on ease and speed. Using that as my guide, my worst experiences the last decade have been with 3.5, 4E, and 5E, in that order (with 5E having a lot of aspects I actually like). On the subject of options, I'm in the camp of "options at the table" versus "options in chargen and charbuild."  Maybe that's simply me looking at it from the side I prefer, though. I prefer not to be noodling around in the books, so, from here on out, it's less is more. For me, anyway.

Quote from: Voros;964372Good point regarding GURPS and Champions. Crunch heavy systems existed long before 3.5e.

The crunch for GURPS is primarily before you get to the table. D&D 3.x and 4E was both.

Quote from: Willie the Duck;964313I'm not even sure if it's a reward they are necessarily looking for. I think people just like having options to choose from, metaphorical buttons to push and levers to pull, etc.

Widgets and gew-gaws and shinies for everyone! Plaster them all over yourself, beyond rhyme or reason! More means more, so who cares?! You're all stars in my universe!
 -- RPG Katamari Damacy