Your Anger Will Do Nothing

AI Art by @nightcafestudio

At this point, if you complain about being put over a barrel by price increases on books from games by billion-dollar Wall Street toy companies and other predatory corporations, your complaints are worthless; they will never be heard, and going on social media to complain will get you nowhere.

Years of price gouging by miniature wargaming companies and card game companies have never made prices go down. Sitting on Twitter complaining about the prices of collectors market RPG books will have the same result.

I get the feeling many of those complaining just want to complain. They will never leave the game. Complaining is the last thing they must hold on to and the last sinew binding the frayed community together.

You can choose other games.

But, let's be honest, many just won't.

The desire to be part of an angry community is greater than the fun they have for the game. This is one of the "signs of the apocalypse" for any hobby or community, where more fun is had complaining than enjoying the game. And people will buy the next book, never use it, just to have the "right" to be angry and still be seen as having a "valid" opinion. I have seen this happen with many games; these are the doldrums, the waiting period before the "next huge fad" comes along, and the old hobby is forgotten.

This happened in the waning days of 2E and 3E, when the games were dying off, and people were abandoning ship for card games. You had people that liked to complain more than play and would take any mistreatment by the company as a reason to continue the abusive relationship.

You only have a short time in this world.

Even less can be spent on a hobby.

Why waste it?

Stop complaining; just play.

And if you are unhappy, leave and find something new.

And say, "The old game is dead to me."

I did, and I could not be happier. You have to, or you will just keep getting sucked back into the lure of the hate posters, angry people, and never-ending arguments. The curse of the garbage hot take.

The imaginary fear of "not finding a group or game" is perpetuated by those who cling to the deck chairs and, worse, by those who never play. Platforms like Roll20 and others lock you into a system due to the availability of choice and feature development. Then again, many games don't need all these 'ease of use' tools built into VTTs, and the game should be designed better and not need all this special coding, modules, and extra work.

If I wanted to play any game, even games decades out of print, I could quickly find a community, put something together, announce it, and have a game. There are communities on Facebook for games I have never heard of, and if I announced a game there, one could be set up for the following weekend quickly. I could do this on any platform; even Tabletop Simulator is fine.

With people that love the game and community. Those smaller communities are often better crowds of faithful fans. I would find a new group of incredible people to hang out with in a snap.

It takes a little more effort but would be well worth it.

Or invest in a 5E clone or alternative. Tales of the Valiant, Level Up, Low Fantasy Gaming, Shadowdark, and many alternatives are out there, and the communities would be thrilled to have you. If you like the 5E framework, you don't have to go that far and will be familiar with all the rules. Plenty of OSR games would love to have you, too; C&C, OSE, Knave, and many others are outstanding games with active communities. There are free games too. Pathfinder is doing incredibly well. Outside of that, Cypher System is an excellent game with a great community.

I just don't buy the anger about the book prices anymore.

Yes, you bought books from a lousy company; you can be mad about them lying to you. That is the price of dealing with Wall Street; you will get screwed. There is no other end than that.

But you have choices.

And some companies care about you and want your business.