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Author Topic: Games That Are Completely Different Games From One Edition To the Next  (Read 4586 times)

RPGPundit

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I was thinking first of Pendragon, where 4e and 5e are based in the same setting, have many of the same rules, but are actually radically different games. One is a fantasy adventure game where you can be a knight, a rogue, a wizard, whatever, set in fantasy-britain; the other is a game where you play Knights, PERIOD, and live through the Arthurian Saga.

But of course there are many games where the "essence" of the game is changed, beyond any question of the rules, from one edition to the other.

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J Arcane

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Games That Are Completely Different Games From One Edition To the Next
« Reply #1 on: October 23, 2009, 12:04:38 PM »
Gamma World.

The core concept has remained more or less the same in all but the most recent edition, but the system has changed drastically from one edition to the other.

DC Heroes 1e vs. 2e and later is also a pretty major paradigm shift.  The developers realized the original scaling had gotten out of hand and completely redid all the benchmarks to line up with the Crisis on Infinite Earths event.  THe whole setting changed, all the heroes got a bit less uberpowered, the system was revised dramatically for the better, but unfortunately, it meant the vast bulk of the sourcebooks became completely obsolete, and the later editions never approached the original's sheer vastness of material.
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RPGObjects_chuck

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« Reply #2 on: October 23, 2009, 12:10:10 PM »
D&D. Twice.

3e bears almost no resemblance to 2e.

4e bears almost no resemblance to 3e.

Claudius

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« Reply #3 on: October 23, 2009, 12:17:30 PM »
Quote from: RPGPundit;340107
I was thinking first of Pendragon, where 4e and 5e are based in the same setting, have many of the same rules, but are actually radically different games.

What?

Quote
One is a fantasy adventure game where you can be a knight, a rogue, a wizard, whatever, set in fantasy-britain; the other is a game where you play Knights, PERIOD, and live through the Arthurian Saga.

Aha, I get it. But I disagree with your assertion, Pendragon if anything is like Call of Cthulhu, the different editions of the game are almost the same. It's true that Pendragon 4th offers more option than 5th, which has a tighter focus, but even in 4th the emphasis is on playing Arthurian characters, specially knights.

I think there are other games with editions that differ much more. For example, Ars Magica, and obviously D&D, most D&D versions are wildly different from each other.
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Machinegun Blue

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« Reply #4 on: October 23, 2009, 12:27:33 PM »
There's the obvious example of Warhammer 2e to 3e.

Gordon Horne

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« Reply #5 on: October 23, 2009, 01:01:02 PM »
Traveller --> MegaTraveller: moderate rule change (codified years worth of errata and extensions), major setting change (one event, civil war, effected everything)

MegaTraveller --> Traveller: The New Era: complete rule change to GDW house system, major setting change

Traveller: TNE --> Marc Miller's Traveller: complete rule change, major setting change

Marc Miller's Traveller --> GURPS(3E): Traveller: complete rule change, major setting change (to original Traveller setting)

GURPS(3E): Traveller --> GURPS(4E): Traveller: major setting change

Mongoose Traveller: Return to more or less original Traveller rules and original Traveller setting.

RPGObjects_chuck

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« Reply #6 on: October 23, 2009, 01:17:41 PM »
Quote from: Gordon Horne;340124
Traveller --> MegaTraveller: moderate rule change (codified years worth of errata and extensions), major setting change (one event, civil war, effected everything)

MegaTraveller --> Traveller: The New Era: complete rule change to GDW house system, major setting change

Traveller: TNE --> Marc Miller's Traveller: complete rule change, major setting change

Marc Miller's Traveller --> GURPS(3E): Traveller: complete rule change, major setting change (to original Traveller setting)

GURPS(3E): Traveller --> GURPS(4E): Traveller: major setting change

Mongoose Traveller: Return to more or less original Traveller rules and original Traveller setting.


This might explain why I could never fucking understand traveler.

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« Reply #7 on: October 23, 2009, 01:19:29 PM »
Quote from: Claudius;340116
Aha, I get it. But I disagree with your assertion, Pendragon if anything is like Call of Cthulhu, the different editions of the game are almost the same. It's true that Pendragon 4th offers more option than 5th, which has a tighter focus, but even in 4th the emphasis is on playing Arthurian characters, specially knights.


Yeah, my understanding is that 4th edition was the odd-man-out in the game line: 1st-3rd had the same tight focus on knights as 5th.
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T. Foster

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« Reply #8 on: October 23, 2009, 01:21:23 PM »
Quote from: RPGObjects_chuck;340127
This might explain why I could never fucking understand traveler.

It gets even more confusing if you include 2300 AD, which was originally sold under the title Traveller:2300 despite having a mostly-different system and completely different setting from any other edition.
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arminius

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« Reply #9 on: October 23, 2009, 01:42:47 PM »
Maybe this discussion should be focused a little more clearly away from mechanical system issues, except where they radically alter the style/focus of play.

E.g. I could cite Blue Planet which I believe had very different systems from 1st edition to the next. Same for Jovian Chronicles (at least if you look at the original Mekton supplement compared to the Silhouette standalone game) and Hong Kong Action Theatre. But, although I don't know those games too well, I think those were all probably faithful translations.

D&D is a game that's undergone much more radical changes. Even if you think they were evolutionary over time, it's obvious that 4e has a completely different tenor from OD&D, 1e core, or BX.

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Games That Are Completely Different Games From One Edition To the Next
« Reply #10 on: October 23, 2009, 03:41:39 PM »
Quote from: Claudius;340116
What?


Aha, I get it. But I disagree with your assertion, Pendragon if anything is like Call of Cthulhu, the different editions of the game are almost the same. It's true that Pendragon 4th offers more option than 5th, which has a tighter focus, but even in 4th the emphasis is on playing Arthurian characters, specially knights.


No, I disagree. I played 2e CoC, 3e CoC, 4e CoC, 5e CoC, 5.5e CoC, 6e CoC, and they're all exactly the fucking same.
Whereas with Pendragon, the rules might be very similar, but the difference in the orientation is extremely pronounced between 4e and 5e.

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Tetsubo

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Games That Are Completely Different Games From One Edition To the Next
« Reply #11 on: October 23, 2009, 04:55:29 PM »
Quote from: RPGObjects_chuck;340114
D&D. Twice.

3e bears almost no resemblance to 2e.

4e bears almost no resemblance to 3e.


Going to have to disagree with that first statement. I see 3E as a direct evolution of 2E. The 2E DNA is very much present in 3E. Heck, I used quite a bit of my old 2E material in 3E 'on the fly'.

4E isn't even in the same phylum.

Jason D

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« Reply #12 on: October 23, 2009, 05:53:55 PM »
The Stormbringer line took a detour through Elric!, and Stormbringer (5th edition) bears little resemblance to Stormbringer 1st - 4th editions.

Silverlion

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« Reply #13 on: October 23, 2009, 06:11:02 PM »
Cartoon Action Hour 1E< Cartoon Action Hour 2E. The 2E edition is a superior Cartoon oriented game, but 1E was a good game, it just wasn't optimal for Cartoon style play.

What about Mutants & Masterminds?  1E to 2E is a paradigm shift--they look the same but some aspects are very very different. (1E was about Ranks, 2E is about number of points) despite the change  they still work MOSTLY similarly.


Do we count games where there is some lineage of material, but the system is wholly different? That is things like Top Secret to Top Secret S/I or Marvel Superheroes (FASERIP) to Marvel Superheroes Adventure Game (Saga)?
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« Reply #14 on: October 23, 2009, 06:11:32 PM »
Mage: The Ascension to Revised: From Doctor Strange battles the MiBs and Cthulhu in Astral Space to... I'm not sure what. Guys in trenchcoats who sometimes read Tarot cards or transform vampires into bananas.