Quote from: ggroy;513318I've only personally known a few individuals offline who were very vocal about their virulent hatred, concerning a particular person, place, and/or "thing".

The commonality I've notice amongst these particular individuals, was that they truly believed (in their own minds) that the world revolved around themselves, and that everybody else was "conspiring" against them.  Anything or anybody that was a threat to their ego (whether real or perceived), was always a target of their virulent hatred.

Frequently these individuals would create their own enemy "targets", regardless of whether their "targets" are even aware of these individuals' existence.  Essentially it was a form of "unrequited hate".  What was hilarious was when the targets of their virulent hatred, responded with "Who's that?"

hmmm.... that kind of sounds like someone here...  

Quote from: Rincewind1;513296Outta curiosity, who the hell is this guy anyway?

.

He was a freelancer on the last edition of Shadowrun who quit in high dudgeon over the haphazard way they did magic (or something... to be honest I don't really know the details nor care). I think he's a newly minted doctor doing time(metaphorical) in poland(or somewhere...) and he posts some truly vitrolic rants about idiots and morons of all strips in 'the industry'.  He gets bonus credits for actually having worked with some of the idiots he rants about.  

He can, and does, make good points quite often. He also says some truly dumb shit alongside it but he is never wrong.   On the other hand, he does put his money where his mouth is, posting his own versions of fixes for free on his forum.  I don't really like them myself, but full credit for doing it.

I think he might actually be fat and bearded, though I wouldn't testify to that in court.

-helpful spike, being helpful.

Quote from: mhensley;513346hmmm.... that kind of sounds like someone here...  

I see what you did there.

More seriously, Frank has some good ideas (I've been using his suggestions to make BRP a roll-over system and it's been great), and some things I disagree with. I don't think (as Ben says) that the guy is a BNG.

Anyway, I haven't read any AP reports because, frankly, I don't give 2 shits about D&D Next or whatever the fuck they call it. I will care when it's released. The hype around the playtest is hysterical.

Quote from: Spike;513348he is never wrong.

No, that is how he sees himself, that is the image he projects, and that is the reality that the slavish tools on TGD accept.  Frank is wrong and has been proven wrong on multiple occasions, but his sycophants think he's some kind of game designer god and refuse to challenge him.  There are a couple of people over there that will call him on his bullshit--either in terms of gaming or in terms of his politics (which are basically cribbed from socialist.net)--but the rest sort of accept that when Frank says something, he's right because.

Frank is a Marxist both in the economic and cultural sense, which tells you all you need to know about how he perceives reality.  When he's not surrounded by his cronies at TGD, he fares much more poorly in debates, such as when he claimed that orcs were totally racist (on this site) and people unequivocally proved him wrong.  (Shit, his misuse of the term "vaporware" in the original post proves that he's wrong.)

That being said, I have no particular axe to grind with him, and I do enjoy reading TGD from time to time.  I just dislike this "Legend of FrankTrollman" crap and the absolute fawning over him that I see.

As a sidenote, I recently read through a thread where people were claiming that forcing women to have an ultrasound prior to an abortion was raping her.  Thus, you can see the kind of person that TGD attracts and why they gravitate toward Frank's personality--weak, amoral half-men need someone to lead them in their bitter frustrations at a society they are powerless to change.  TGD is Tangency with a few more "fucks" and a little less whining about privilege.

QuoteOn the other hand, he does put his money where his mouth is, posting his own versions of fixes for free on his forum.

The Tomes are shit.  I would rather play Pathfinder than the Tomes.

Quote from: CRKrueger;513293Now the bolded part is what I am interested in, because I was thinking it myself.  I think a lot of people are saying the preview seems old school because the GMs were just winging it.  They were making rulings without really any rules behind them other then the core "roll to hit", "roll to damage".  Any of us could basically do the same thing with any system if we wanted to.

What Frank complained about in the bold part seems great to me, but then I play "Old School" where the game depends on GM rulings and players decide what they want to do based on the game situation and the GM figures out how to do it using the rules. Also, from descriptions of the play at various tables, it looks like there was "game system" used: the basic D20 rolls/combat system and the attribute rolls are plenty of system to for a basic "old school" GM rulings not rules game. However, I realize this isn't nearly enough system for those players who want the rules to clearly define most of options they have to select from in the game.

Kudos to Frank for having the balls for being the first one to call Bullshit on the editionless edition via options talk.

I still am too hopeful that they somehow, magically, can make it work. But my intellect tells me, unless 4e's legacy is utterly negated and neglected, the 5e mission is impossible.

Quote from: Rincewind1;513296Perhaps this is a money problem. The "old schoolers" had grown up, they have about 30 - 50 years now. They have their own money, as they work, and they can spend it on the hobby. The age that 4e was marketted - the 15 - 25 range, are people who are mostly at school & college/university etc. etc. People who are too busy either educating themselves, or usually making it in small jobs, to have money to spend on frivolities such as RPG books.

Yarp.

Back before the economic downturn, jobs were plentiful and young people who didn't really need them had money to spend on whatever they wanted.

Right now, going after the youth market is a tough proposition because a lot of the jobs that kids used to have are being filled by adults desperate enough to need them to make ends meet.

What rpg money there is to be made right now is going to come from the older players making decent salaries, and this crowd won't be buying the same kinds of products as the younger crowd.

Then again, the AFN (Adult Fat Neckbeard... ) business model did not work that great for Games Workshop. Then again, GW probably still earns more on the models then WotC on DnD.

Quote from: Settembrini;513355I still am too hopeful that they somehow, magically, can make it work. But my intellect tells me, unless 4e's legacy is utterly negated and neglected, the 5e mission is impossible.

I am wondering about this myself in regards with 4e. There are stuff from 4e in the current playtest (there are stuff from all editions) but not what makes 4e feel like well 4e.

It could be they are betting on the fact combat in 5e takes way less time than 4e, similar to any older edition D&D, combined with the class options nobody haven't seen yet.

Frank Trollman once claimed that all orcs are racist parodies of blacks based upon a single miniature. His claim was disproven.

That really is the man in a nutshell.

Quote from: Settembrini;513355Kudos to Frank for having the balls for being the first one to call Bullshit on the editionless edition via options talk.

I read the thread over on Frank's Forum. I see how he develops his conclusions from Wizard's public statements. But in the end he is making shit up due to his ignorance of what the rules are actually like. For example his comment on a 15 Dex giving +15 to a roll is not the how that rule works in the playtest. And it is obvious his bias is influencing his conclusion in that he paints everything vague statement in the worst light.

I am thinking the RPG Pundit is right that Wizard should be as public as they can be and jettison the NDAs.

NDA are crucial to the oldest tactic in the PR book - the self - spinning circle of customer interest and customer conflict & controversy. It's SUPER EFFECTIVE when it comes to such things as movies, computer games, books...or well, RPGs .

In other words - the less information you give out, while giving some at least, the more pseudohype can built in discussion of those slivers, giving you free publicity without giving any sort of substance that you may regret later, as you'd have to force yourself to write something that you actually promised to the people, for example.

Frank is a lot like Bill Maher or Ann Coulter in that he has a mix of well thought out analysis and strong arguments mixed with batshit crazy hysterics. I find him entertaining in the same way I do both of them.

Frank is definately a heavy number cruncher and looks for spherical cow rules the way a prospecter with gold fever looks for gold.

That said, he's often right and correctly points out how weak a lot of game designs are.

In this case, clearly he is mis-using the term "vaporware" from its traditional use. He doesn't mean 5e won't be released, he's just pointing out that it probably won't actually play the way WotC is talking about.

And I would bet he's right. To the OP's point - what WotC is showing us so far is nothing more than an illusion and Frank is right to criticize it.

The more I read about the 5e "playtests", the more I realized that they weren't really playtesting anything at all, just playing magical tea party.
DMs playing off the cuff is fine. Simplified rules is fine. No arguments from me there. But at this point, there doesn't appear to be any actual rules there yet - it was all smoke and mirrors.

The end product could look like anything at this point. I think way too many people (especially anti-4e people) are being way too quick to project their own desires onto the blank canvas that WotC has given us about what the new edition will actually be like. Skepticism in this case is the smart move.

Will actual, good rules emerge for 5e? Too early to say. But I really, really wouldn't put much stock in the bombastic promises by the designers or the smoke and mirrors show of the "playtests" they had so far.

Hope is for pussies. Real men grind hope into the ground, then rape it's dead carcass.

Then again, I'm supposedly a nihilist, so I ought to applaud.

Quote from: jgants;513375The more I read about the 5e "playtests", the more I realized that they weren't really playtesting anything at all, just playing magical tea party.

DMs playing off the cuff is fine. Simplified rules is fine. No arguments from me there. But at this point, there doesn't appear to be any actual rules there yet - it was all smoke and mirrors.

What been released to the friends & family playtest has the same scope as the Holmes rulebook, or either one of the Basic sets (Moldvay or Mentzer).