Quote from: HorusArisen;966625Genuinely curious how others define this magical movement.

A series of publishing projects, each separate but in total comprising a movement. It wasn't the original intent, but the renaissance part compares better to the Harlem Renaissance than the Renaissance Renaissance.
The focus is in recapturing (and or expanding upon) a feel that the author feels represents their old school experience. Rules are roughly based on some version of TSR-era D&D*, except with the author's own spin, and any modern inclusions that the author considers acceptable breaks.

That's about it. Everything else is people trying to see more 'there' there than is really there.

Quote from: DavetheLost;966671Old D&D Good, Other Games Bad. Make all games old D&D.

The OSR seems to miss the non-D&D games that were popular in the early days, and to miss on original designs.

There is a more general OSR movement based more on focusing on all earlier era games. The D&D OSR movement is just D&D-focused because, well, it is comprised of D&D fans. They're not inherently saying other games are bad because they want to use D&D-like rules to play in different genres. They do so because they like D&D.

Quote from: Willie the Duck;966694There is a more general OSR movement based more on focusing on all earlier era games. The D&D OSR movement is just D&D-focused because, well, it is comprised of D&D fans. They're not inherently saying other games are bad because they want to use D&D-like rules to play in different genres. They do so because they like D&D.

Agreed and I find it ironic that critics of the OSR (all caps) don't berate fans of Classic Traveller and Runequest 2e for being more inclusive of D&D in their communities despite those being part of a larger osr (small caps). Imagine that! People have preferences.

I define it as one thing and one thing only: reviving and playing old school games, or continuing playing old school games if you never stopped. Everything else seems to be an attempt to define as new something that has always existed, as plenty of us never stopped playing the old games we already owned. Other than that, I suppose labeling things "OSR" is a marketing tool. And since I don't care about D&D at all, OSR has nothing to do with D&D aside from the fact that it includes people embracing old school D&D and using D&D rules to make new games in the same mode.

Quote from: Dumarest;966726I define it as one thing and one thing only: reviving and playing old school games, or continuing playing old school games if you never stopped. Everything else seems to be an attempt to define as new something that has always existed, as plenty of us never stopped playing the old games we already owned. Other than that, I suppose labeling things "OSR" is a marketing tool. And since I don't care about D&D at all, OSR has nothing to do with D&D aside from the fact that it includes people embracing old school D&D and using D&D rules to make new games in the same mode.

Except for the pesky fact that there a rather large group of folks focused on playing, promoting, and publishing for classic editions of D&D. OSR (all caps) happens to be the label that won out to describe this group. Define it how you like but there still going to be hobbyists doing what I describe above. Along with hobbyist who are interested in all older editions, and hobbyist that only interested in particular edition of a specific RPG, along with hobbyists interested in merging newer mechanics with older mechanis and well just about every damn things inbetween.

Again because of digital technology the barrier to do something about their interests has dramatically lowered. Not just publishing or sharing either but finding fellow hobbyists to game with has been dramatically been made easier. If there is Open Content is involved the barrier it lowered to just the time one willing to devote to their projects. The OSR (all caps) is just one expression of this dynamic. There Pathfinder, the D&D 5e SRD, the D&D 5e DM's Guild, d100 Runequest style RPGs, Fate, Savage World publishing program, and more recently Cepheus for Traveller.

The number of RPGs whose IP is held tightly by their parent corporation or author is shrinking. And the amount of material for RPGs that have open content or a open Publishing program is expanding. That the major story here. The other one is that people are surprised that there is so much love for older editions and older games. That the idea of progress in RPGs in the former of new editions is mostly baloney.

There been a bunch of posts so far in this thread that are variants of

QuoteHow I view the OSR as ....

The thing is you are all right. Back in the day when the only way to distribute things was by buying a print run and convincing distributors to carry your book. When you had to create everything from scratch. When creating the final layout of the book involved days at a paste up table with glue and printed sections from a machine costing thousands. All these factors meant that you had to go in whole hog with an idea to make it worthwhile to pursue. There was considerable time and money invested to pull it off.

Today it a completely different story. Anybody with the drive can get their idea no matter how expansive or small it is into the hands of other people. And not just in the form of badly mimeographed copies, but in a form nearly indistinguishable from something made by a traditional printer. And with stuff like Print on Demand, even in physical bound books.

So the OSR is everything thing people been saying it is in this thread because it is the sum what of people do when pursuing their interest.  And it undiluted material as well. Which as many of you note means there are a lot of crap.  But it also means that the good stuff isn't compromised by consideration of limited shelf space, or limited money. Even limited manpower is somewhat mitigated by the labor savings enabled by digital technology. However stuff like editing, art, and actually writing still consume pretty much the same amount of times as they did back in the day.

Which is why the past decade been a golden age for RPGs in general not just D&D.

Few "OSR" books are any good. Most OSR writers think they are going to get rich by producing books with the D&D label scratched off. This all happened before with the d20 System books that collected dust.

Quote from: Shawn Driscoll;966758Few "OSR" books are any good. Most OSR writers think they are going to get rich by producing books with the D&D label scratched off. This all happened before with the d20 System books that collected dust.

Like who? Nobody I know expected to get rich. One, James Raggi of Lamentation of the Flame Princess, after his first year published planned out a path to make a living. A couple of others like Dyson Logos, Matt Finch, Kevin Crawford, and Dan Proctor make a substantial income from sales. Below that are dozens making enough to make a dent in their monthly bills and the rest are at my level where the income pays for our hobby. Unlike the d20 boom which lasted only 4 years, the OSR is in its tenth year.

Like usual you ignore inconvenient facts.

Define the OSR? Um, gee that's, um, like this.

Quote from: HorusArisen;966630lol I think it's the renaissance part that always gets my back up. I'm liking the look of a couple of things but I struggle with OSR when I already own everything printed for D&D.

The term is a response to the early 2000s attitude in some places on the Internet that new games are necessarily objectively better, usually because reasons, and that the only reason anybody would play those stupid old games is nostalgia.

Almost 15 years later, it looks to me like what has happened is that the internet community has selfselected into subsectors by interest, and people really just don't hang around with people they don't mostly agree with.

I've never been part of any "renaissance," I'm just playing this sillyass game the way I always have.

Quote from: Dumarest;966726I define it as one thing and one thing only: reviving and playing old school games, or continuing playing old school games if you never stopped. Everything else seems to be an attempt to define as new something that has always existed, as plenty of us never stopped playing the old games we already owned.

Pretty much.

Quote from: estar;966738Except for the pesky fact that there a rather large group of folks focused on playing, promoting, and publishing for classic editions of D&D. OSR (all caps) happens to be the label that won out to describe this group. Define it how you like but there still going to be hobbyists doing what I describe above. Along with hobbyist who are interested in all older editions, and hobbyist that only interested in particular edition of a specific RPG, along with hobbyists interested in merging newer mechanics with older mechanis and well just about every damn things inbetween.

Again because of digital technology the barrier to do something about their interests has dramatically lowered. Not just publishing or sharing either but finding fellow hobbyists to game with has been dramatically been made easier. If there is Open Content is involved the barrier it lowered to just the time one willing to devote to their projects. The OSR (all caps) is just one expression of this dynamic. There Pathfinder, the D&D 5e SRD, the D&D 5e DM's Guild, d100 Runequest style RPGs, Fate, Savage World publishing program, and more recently Cepheus for Traveller.

The number of RPGs whose IP is held tightly by their parent corporation or author is shrinking. And the amount of material for RPGs that have open content or a open Publishing program is expanding. That the major story here. The other one is that people are surprised that there is so much love for older editions and older games. That the idea of progress in RPGs in the former of new editions is mostly baloney.

None of which contradicts my definition, so I don't know why you needed three paragraphs to agree with me.

Around here, we agree with each other at the top of our lungs!

Quote from: gronan of simmerya;966794around here, we agree with each other at the top of our lungs!

i agree!

Quote from: Gronan of Simmerya;966794Around here, we agree with each other at the top of our lungs!

Except on the things that make not a whit of difference, in which case we will devote 300 pages to arguments that convince no one to change his position.

Quote from: Voros;966627Indie projects based on the D&D engine. Seems pretty simple to me.

Have to say naming yourself a 'Renaissance' is mighty pretentious and smug. And people shit on Zak and WW for pretension?

I think Voros pretty much has it, but would tweak it slightly:

Indie projects building on TSR era D&D engines (ie 2e and earlier).

I think 3e and later, Wotc etc is a convenient way of dividing what's "old school" and what's newer.