Quote from: Natty Bodak;777848Style & Layout: I have no expertise in this area but I know what I like. The text headings take a back seat to the art so it can be hard for me to spot them. In the races section I have a hard time telling where one section ends and another one begins. It looks good as a whole but maybe not the best for reference. Speaking of races, why, in the name of Xiombarg's venomous teat-milk, are the races not in goddam alphabetical order?! WHY?!

Damn, so 4e shall remain the pinnacle of PHB layout? That was the one area that edition did perfectly.

Quote from: Blacky the Blackball;777819Yeah - Simon Burley found that out when he tried to republish Golden Heroes as Squadron UK.



It's also an excellent board game.

Love my Golden Heroes, but there's a "clone" I saw that one may download free called something like Project Spandex which actually may have better layout than the original.

But is the boardgame Fury of Dracula about kung fu-sters fighting Dracula's minions in Hong Kong?

Quote from: danbuter;777920Damn, so 4e shall remain the pinnacle of PHB layout? That was the one area that edition did perfectly.

If referencability is the yardstick then i think so.

Quote from: Natty Bodak;777952If referencability is the yardstick then i think so.

I agree somewhat because the spell layout is pure 2e and I always hated that. The index rocks and the rest makes sense to me though.

Quote from: Natty Bodak;777952If referencability is the yardstick then i think so.

Every edition has to have some bright spot!

Quote from: Blacky the Blackball;777819The FFG versions of Talisman, Dungeon Quest, and Fury of Dracula all have minis.

I dont think any of those though sport GW compatible minis? The Talisman and Dungeonquest minis are smaller Some notably so and based differently. Dont know about the Dracula one. But odds are they are scaled differently too. And none of the ones I saw were iconically Warhammer style. And Dungeonquest was moved to the Runebound setting so no longer Warhammer. FFGs Talisman was also moved out of Warhammer land. Though no idea if it too is Runebound or what. And Dracula is... well. Dracula. But far as I have seen the scale is off and they are visibly not GW style.

Back on topic and speaking of minis.

WOTC/WizKids is really pushing the minis as a seperate game. The whole Attack wing set and the Legends sets.

How much mention. If any, does the PHB even make of miniatures?

Quote from: Matt;777922Love my Golden Heroes, but there's a "clone" I saw that one may download free called something like Project Spandex which actually may have better layout than the original.

It's called Codename: Spandex, actually. I know this because I wrote it!

QuoteBut is the boardgame Fury of Dracula about kung fu-sters fighting Dracula's minions in Hong Kong?

No. It's set in the 19th century Europe of the original novel, and rather effectively I might add. It's one of those asymmetric chasing games in that one player plays Dracula and uses a hidden movement system to travel around the map leaving encounters behind and the other players are the vampire hunters (Mina Barker, Lord Godalming, Van Helping, and Dr Seward) trying to track him down and destroy him before he has been able to spawn enough vampiric minions to win.

Quote from: Matt;777207Just keep seeing posts about 5th edition coming out or being out and how it sucks or rules and how fill-in-the-blank edition sucked or ruled in comparison.

Fill-in-the-blank is the number one edition.

All others are number two, or lower.

Quote from: Omega;778015Back on topic and speaking of minis.

WOTC/WizKids is really pushing the minis as a seperate game. The while Attack wing set and the Legends sets.

How much mention. If any, does the PHB even make of miniatures?

There's no mention of minis in the index. I haven't read the PHB cover to cover, but the only mention I've seen of minis is in the sidebar in the combat chapter (only 9 pages in total) called "Variant: Playing on a Grid". It describes a 4e-esque Chebyshev 1-1-1 movement metric with a call out to more realistic movement metrics options in the forthcoming DMG. Outside of mentioning minis once in this section to indicate their use in marking position on the grid there's nothing more (e.g. no mention of facing, etc).

Quote from: Blacky the Blackball;778026It's called Codename: Spandex, actually. I know this because I wrote it!

Why does no one ever tell me these things?

Quote from: Black Vulmea;778027Fill-in-the-blank is the number one edition.

All others are number two, or lower.

The true hero is the one with the courage to run away.

When I whined that the first 4E PHB didn't contain enough of the race/class options, and that I would have to wait months to see them all, the apologists lectured me on the way publishing *is.*  

I knew they were full of shit and the 5E PHB proves it.  Good job there, WotC.  You finished your player's manual, and put it out in one volume, right on time.

Hope y'all have fun.

I downloaded the free PDF version and looked it over.

Too many damn rules.  It's 100 pages just for the "quickstart player's guide" or whatever they call it.

Original OD&D was 110 half-size pages, and even granting it needed more descriptive material it could still be brought in at 150 digest-size pages.

I agree with Dave Arneson.  "Games nowadays have too many rules."

Quote from: Old Geezer;778147Hope y'all have fun.

I downloaded the free PDF version and looked it over.

Too many damn rules.  It's 100 pages just for the "quickstart player's guide" or whatever they call it.

Original OD&D was 110 half-size pages, and even granting it needed more descriptive material it could still be brought in at 150 digest-size pages.

I agree with Dave Arneson.  "Games nowadays have too many rules."

We already are.

Quote from: Old Geezer;778147Hope y'all have fun.

I downloaded the free PDF version and looked it over.

Too many damn rules.  It's 100 pages just for the "quickstart player's guide" or whatever they call it.

Original OD&D was 110 half-size pages, and even granting it needed more descriptive material it could still be brought in at 150 digest-size pages.

I agree with Dave Arneson.  "Games nowadays have too many rules."

and how many rules are in chainmail?. OD&D referenced those as part of the game.  Also, OD&D didn't really have fluff.  I'd even argue OD&D is more complex with more rules, because it has a different mechanic for attacks, saving throws, etc

but most importantly, which of the two is easier to learn from someone picking up those rules.

don't get me wrong, I really like OD&D, but I think your rationale here is pretty odd

Quote from: Sacrosanct;778163I'd even argue OD&D is more complex with more rules, because it has a different mechanic for attacks, saving throws, etc

Yes, because as everyone knows, games with unified mechanics are much less complex.