What people today do not understand is how you were supposed to play the actual PnP game.

The rules were never meant to be set in stone.  The entire premise was their for the DM to add his own creative touch to the framework of the D&D ruleset.  If you had a problem with THAC0.....you changed it.  Duh.  If you wanted to add rules....you added them in.

3rd edition was the beginning of what was termed as munchkinism by the D&D crowd.  You would get your feats, role your dice, and collect your loot and go on to the next room in the dungeon.  They made more rules but in doing so they cut out the actual role of the DM and made it more of a WOW experience before WOW even existed.  Easy to play, easy to win.

The truly great D&D experiences were all done by DMs using their own worlds and their own mythos, and they (and the players) cherry picked whatever rules and regulations were needed to uphold that player created content.

With 3rd and 3th edition, your sole purpose was to acquire mass number of feats to the point where your level 8 character somehow was demi-god powerful.  You can say that the DM is at fault for letting the characters get that powerful....but when you have entire books and rulesets devoted to ultra-powerful characters, what else do you expect.

Everyone had a dual weilding dark elf something...and they never died.

Originally posted by koboldfodder

3rd edition was the beginning of what was termed as munchkinism by the D&D crowd.  You would get your feats, role your dice, and collect your loot and go on to the next room in the dungeon.  They made more rules but in doing so they cut out the actual role of the DM and made it more of a WOW experience before WOW even existed.  Easy to play, easy to win.

i think the munchkinism started with 2nd edition Unearthed Arcana  (1985)

allowed players to be far too powerful

Originally posted by koboldfodder

What people today do not understand is how you were supposed to play the actual PnP game.

The rules were never meant to be set in stone.  The entire premise was their for the DM to add his own creative touch to the framework of the D&D ruleset.  If you had a problem with THAC0.....you changed it.  Duh.  If you wanted to add rules....you added them in.

3rd edition was the beginning of what was termed as munchkinism by the D&D crowd.  You would get your feats, role your dice, and collect your loot and go on to the next room in the dungeon.  They made more rules but in doing so they cut out the actual role of the DM and made it more of a WOW experience before WOW even existed.  Easy to play, easy to win.

The truly great D&D experiences were all done by DMs using their own worlds and their own mythos, and they (and the players) cherry picked whatever rules and regulations were needed to uphold that player created content.

With 3rd and 3th edition, your sole purpose was to acquire mass number of feats to the point where your level 8 character somehow was demi-god powerful.  You can say that the DM is at fault for letting the characters get that powerful....but when you have entire books and rulesets devoted to ultra-powerful characters, what else do you expect.

Everyone had a dual weilding dark elf something...and they never died.

We modified rules, combined worlds, and made it how we liked.  One friend of mine loved Rolemaster rules so he would merge D&D and Rolemaster rules.  It was great fun.

I always thought the 3rd Ed rules were needlessly cumbersome and overly complex without adding depth or value.  We'll see how the 4th ed rule interpretation works out, but it looks good in game play videos.

I have to say I am in disagreement with the anti 4th edition crowd. Yes it was definately designed to be able to be played on the table top using miniatures but that doesnt mean you had to. It just made it very simple to do so. Now what it did do is have more defined roles for the characters, but being a hack and slash game... That's just what the RPGA did to it with their Sunday adventure models. The group i ran was very much a ROLEPLAYING GROUP. we went entire sessions with no combat at all. Skill challenges and complex skill challenge rules were the best of any edition, and the ritual magic (something most GMs ignored existed) w great for bringing uitlity spells into the game.

all in all I really liked it. If you did like miniatures it definately allowed for more strategic play during combat.  I started playing when I was 8 years old I turn 39 this year. 4th I think is actually my favorite edition. Guess it just depends on the group and the GM. that being said I did not like whole weekly encounters I think that made people believe it was a hack and slash only game.

It is most certainly intended for you to use the minatures in 4e.  In 3 - 3.5 it wasn't a requirement, but it was very helpful and easier to do so based on the rules.  2e was designed with the intent not to use the minatures.  1e was a mixed bag depending on what part of the game you were playing and which books included.

That said.  DnD isn't on top any more.  Pathfinder is and is the ONLY reason WotC is dropping 4e into a pit of hell to never be heard from again.

All that said, Neverwinter actuallly looks pretty fun to play as its own thing.  Curious to see how it plays out.

3.5 was a great system. But it was also slow and overly complicated (especially combat)

4 was supposedly attempt of making it simpler. But it was instead influenced by simplified computer games. Probably aimed in making D&D computer game aswell - but that never happened.

I gues they lost half of regular playerbase

And than they dropped the bomb with yet another edition comming ... so the players they didnt lose , they will lose now.

But D&D will never disappear as idea - doesnt mather which ruleset you are playing

Originally posted by Lobotomist

 

But D&D will never disappear as idea - doesnt mather which ruleset you are playing

 

exactly.  IP will never die.  But Pathfinder most certainly captilized on the misstep big time.

Originally posted by jdnyc

Originally posted by Lobotomist

 

But D&D will never disappear as idea - doesnt mather which ruleset you are playing

 

exactly.  IP will never die.  But Pathfinder most certainly captilized on the misstep big time.

Agreed.

Today its like: "Lets play D&D , wait I am bringing my Pathfinder books"

Gah this just makes me want to run 4th edition again! 4ed is by far my favorite edition. I started out with 3.0, played a ton of 3.5 and actively play Pathfinder for the past 2-3 years. Oh and I've dabbled in 2nd as a kid.

The problem I'm having is that my current group are a bunch of 3.5/pathfinder snobs and will never even attempt to try out 4th. So I'm pretty much stuck playing Pathfinder with them, and my 4th edition group dissolved due to life circumstances.

Anyways, if I had a point to make with all of that above (?) it is that I never understood the hate 4th edition recieves. Roleplay does not suffer at all, if anything it is liberated from clunky mechanics. Combat is tactical, and flows rather evenly throughout the levels ( a massive problem with 3.5 and Pathfinder ). And a lot of character builds aren't as pigeon holed into being "optimal". The best part of the edition is that it is so much faster to prep and DM for it. Frees me up to actually develop the story, and encounters instead of number crunching for hours.

Originally posted by VirgoThree

And a lot of character builds aren't as pigeon holed into being "optimal".

This is exactly the problem. In 3.5 you can build whatever you imagine. In 4 you are almost constrained to MMO like classes.

...

But I agree , combat is faster

Originally posted by Fendel84M
How was any version forced on you? I can still play any edition I want, you people are so dramatic. More editions is just more options.

Yup, my local store still uses 2.5 edition, IMO it was the best edition overall.   As a company though, a comapny that needs to make a profit then every so often they need to redo their systems to make that $$$.