This is Huge: D&D 5.0 Goes OGL

Wow, check this out:

http://media.wizards.com/2016/downloads/SRD-OGL_V1.1.pdf

Yes, D&D 5 just went OGL. Amazing stuff, brave, and they deserve a huge round of applause for this (if all the OGL necessities are in place, I haven't read everything yet). They also have this site:

http://www.dmsguild.com/

...a place where fan-produced Forgotten Realms content can be sold and published. Very nice, and this I didn't expect. Kudos for the openness and publishing model for this locked-up setting (I understand why they want to keep this setting closer to them and have approval of products), and this is cool. Kudos again.

My feelings about D&D 5 have just went up very much. I liked the system, but I always had that question of a locked-up D&D 4 type game, or some variant of a closed-up license, but this is an amazing turn of events.

Thank you Wizards. You deserve a huge round of applause and accolades for bringing the OGL back to D&D. It's the year 2000 all over again, and we are about to see some amazing stuff from third party publishers.

Well played, and you guys rock.

UPDATE: Here is a site describing what you can and can't do, and where certain materials should be published. It is pretty nice of them to provide a marketplace and lay things out so clearly:

http://dnd.wizards.com/articles/features/systems-reference-document-srd

Mail Room: Blue Rose PDFs (Original True20 Game)

Today the Blue Rose Kickstarter PDFs came as a part of the backer rewards. Now, these are the original game's PDF files, the new game is going to use the system created for Green Ronin's Fantasy Age game.

Now, the original game is powered by Green Ronin's True20 Adventure Roleplaying, and it feels like an odd match to me. I had this instant reaction where a d20-based game is a poor choice for a narrative and storytelling style game focused on romance. The d20 nowadays is synonymous with D&D and Pathfinder style dungeon crawls, and even having a system remotely related to that play style just feels wrong for me with a game based on drama, soap opera style conflicts, and romance.

I pick up the d20 and I am thinking THAC0, CMB, DC, and armor class. For anything else but dungeon-crawling hack-and-slash, I can't do it. The d20 feels like a poisoned die for anything else, and when you use it in a game the question at the table feels like, "Why aren't we playing D&D with that?"

It is pop culture, and it is roleplaying dogma. The only game I saw that came close to breaking the D&D death-grip on the d20 was FGU's Aftermath, and that was a roll-under system.

So my gut reaction is d20 is a bad choice for dramatic roleplaying, just because of its stigma of being a dungeon crawling game. Add to this the d20-ish repertoire of skills and feats in the game, and you get a romantic roleplaying exchange like this:

Prince Charming: I pick the lock to Cinderella's room!
Referee: Okay, what is the level of your Disable Device skill?
Charming: 10, what is the DC on that?
Referee: 20, before you do that, give me a DC 15 Notice check.
Charming: Passed!
Referee: Okay, a tower guard is sneaking up behind you, and you notice his shadow creep across the wall.
Charming: Okay, remember I have Improved Uncanny Dodge, and I can't be flanked....

My desire to be romantic has just left the room, along with the target market for a game like this. Yes, there are gamer geek girls out there and I love their geeky pride, but really? And don't get me wrong, there are a good many male players out there too that enjoy the roleplaying and dramatic side of things too, so there is equal sides to this market. If you are going to go into this much d20 voodoo and rules fiddly-ness, you have lost me as someone who cares more about story and drama than character builds. If I want this type of game, honestly, I will play Pathfinder.

But the Fantasy Age system feels like a better fit. Characters are simple and self-contained and level up with focused choices. There isn't much in the way of rules-lingo to learn. You are not sitting at the table chanting arcane abbreviations, reciting rules like tax form instructions, and the sound of playing the game isn't something that would scare off a casual observer.

The dice rolls are simple. For the most part, they are add your ability score and a +2 for a focus, referee sets the target number, and that's it. You could sit someone at the table, hand them a character sheet, and have them roll the dice without having to understand attacks of opportunity, flanking, advantage, or any other concept. Sit there and roll the dice plus that number, and tell me if you beat this number. Let me know if you roll doubles, because that is when something good happens.

Conceptually, it is simple, and simple is great if you are trying to focus the game on something else but the rules. That line is so important, "something else but the rules." If you want your game to be focused on drama or horror or any other concept, you cannot create rules so complicated that playing the game and understanding the rules takes away all of the time from what you wanted to focus on in the first place. People only have so much "CPU power" to pay attention to a live event, and if you are requiring them to recite rules and modifiers and feat lists, you are taking the game's focus and putting it squarely on the rules.

Simple Fits Nicely

Fantasy Age gets it, and I feel it would be a great fit. The core rules for Fantasy Age and its sister game Dragon Age are only something like 12 pages long. The rest of the game is under a hundred pages, and you don't need to understand all of it to play. Yes, it is a great game for new players, but it is also a game that gets out of the way and lets you focus on the feeling and situation, rather than the rules.

Complexity is one of the huge problems we have in roleplaying today. Many games create gigantic temples to themselves out of rules complexity, and they become these monolithic and all-encompassing juggernauts that are designed to consume 100% of your mental acuity to play them. You don't have time to think about anything else or play anything else, because this one super-sized rules system is all you can handle. This was the game design and business model introduced with D&D 3, and it is a legacy of system design and support to this day with its descendants and other games as well.

Compare that to a simple game such as Fantasy Age, and I will throw in Basic Fantasy on the simple side of things as well. These are simple games. You can play them without needing to own a library, and memorize a shelf full of books in your head to understand them. You can use a simple set of rules to simulate a great many things, because you have the mental free time at the table to relax and focus on the story, not the rules. You can focus the game on a single activity, romance or reacting-to-the-referee dungeoning, and you can still have enough "me time" and mental freedom to have fun and be yourself.

I am looking forward to the finished Blue Rose game next year, and I hope the designers stick with the spirit I see in Fantasy Age, and keep the game simple and focused on the theme. It has been an interesting day in the mail room, and I am looking forward to some interesting gaming next August.

Is it really a whole other year away? Wow. We may just have to play this version and let you know how things go, The world and lore look fun, so there is a lot of other stuff in these PDFs to enjoy and soak in until the game is released, so I am still happy with the Kickstarter project and my support. More on this soon.

Escalating Hit Points and Damage

D&D 5 made an effort to reduce the range of to-hit modifiers in the game, from +20 at maximum level down to a +6. Now, this can be affected by other modifiers such as ability scores and magic items, but the range is down from D&D 3 and Pathfinder era modifiers that are in the +30 range down to a more reasonable and d20 range friendly +10-ish level, or about half-ish.

"Bounded accuracy" is why, the design team wanted to get the modifiers to dice rolls under control and back within a meaningful amount. Some players feel the difference between low and high level characters is too tight and it creates a feeling that to-hit progression has been taken out of the game, with level only really contributing a 4 point difference between level 1 and level 20.

It does eliminate a key difference between low and high-level characters. Players like to feel empowered, and they like the feeling their epic ranger can deal death left and right at will, hitting impossible shots. But, the whiff factor feels pretty static throughout the game. Yes, this does create the 'will I hit?' tension, but some feel that expertise and skill of higher-level characters has been reduced drastically.

This is a math discussion, so I forgive you if your eyes glaze over. But it does setup discussion for today's subject, escalating hit points and damage.

Damage Output at Level X

Now, hit points and damage output? Unchanged in the scheme of things, and D&D remains a game about the high-level haves and the low-level have-nots. Yes, a low-level character can hit and damage a high-level character, but it doesn't matter because of hit-points. The next turn, the high-level character can sneeze and obliterate the low-level character in one blow, so being able to hit matters less. Only in the game-breaking tactic of massed attacks do low-level character have a chance, and this applies to everyone in the game.

While the designers have addressed the die-roll ranges, not much was done about the ever-escalating power curve of hit points and damage output. In a sense, the only difference between high and low level characters is damage output, and that has been the design ever since D&D 3 came out. In AD&D 2nd Edition, higher level characters could do more damage, but not to the videogame-like extent of D&D 3 characters and that design.

In basic D&D, if a level 20 fighter "hit" you with a longsword, it was still one attack at 1d8 damage plus ability score modifiers. He could hit auto-you all day with one attack a turn, but that damage per turn was still on a flat curve. With D&D 3, multi-attacks and a whole host of feat-based damage modifiers were introduced, which slowed up play with fistfuls of d20s being rolled for melee attacks, and damage output soared and continued to rise with almost every edition released.

But still, overall with most all editions of D&D and also Pathfinder, escalating hit points and damage output tends to turn the game into a combat simulator heavily focused on numbers. There may be some winks and nods towards non-combat skills and problem-solving, but the game lives and breaths on its combat system, and most modules focus on 'good fights' and 'balanced encounters' with a combat focus. It feels at times the D&D based games want to be videogames and MMOs with that heavy focus on combat and escalating numbers.

Who cares about problem solving when your character has 200 hit points and that dagger does a d4 damage? Do you know my damage-per-turn rating? It's awesome.

Yes, a great referee can mitigate this with varied challenges, but when we played the D&D games, we always had one player at the table who focused on character builds and combat, and this infected many other players with the optimization bug and focusing on combat rather than roleplaying and problem solving. The game is focused along these lines so it feels like you are unfairly punishing the min-maxers by putting skill and roleplaying challenges in front of them.

The Game Becomes Combat?

If you compare D&D with a flatter power curve system, such as Savage Worlds, Legend, or even GURPS you notice a couple things. Non-combat skills in those games feel equally important as combat skills. D&D has always had this feeling of a Superman syndrome at higher levels, especially the later versions past 2nd Edition AD&D. Who cares about problem solving when you have this much raw combat power?

Yes, you can make players 'lose' a mission and feel bad they didn't rescue the princess, but in a way, it really doesn't affect them.

There is a danger in making every player Superman. The game becomes about bashing bigger and bigger things, and the little things don't matter anymore. You lose a sense of scale. Combat becomes the only important challenge. A good referee can make the game be about other things, but still, the 500 hit die gorilla in the room is still combat. It's so big, the players are so powerful, and the system is tuned around making characters combat gods that the primary way of viewing a class is by its combat potential.

The first version of rogues in Pathfinder were 'skill monkeys' and 'couldn't contribute meaningfully to combat?' We got balanced and high-damage output rogues in Unchained?

Two questions:

1. Why do non-combat skills suck?
2. Why are we playing a tabletop MMO?

I have this feeling it is not a problem with the adventures, but the entire endless escalating hit point and damage output system of games like D&D past the basic set, and also Pathfinder.

Basic Fantasy vs. Modern Games

I use Basic Fantasy here because it is the most 3.5-like old-school game we have, and it's free so you can check it out for comparison. In my version of Basic Fantasy, an ancient red dragon with 13 hit dice has about an average of 59 hit points. In Pathfinder, it has 362 hit points. In D&D 5, it has 546 hit points. In D&D 4, it has 1,390 hit points.

What the hell, game designers?

Rolling ten to twenty times the dice for damage isn't fun, it's pointless. In Basic Fantasy, my 1d8+2 successful longsword hit to that 60 hit-point beast means something. In all the other modern fantasy games, it means very little or nothing.

The new games make up for it by putting a videogame-like power curve in place. Multi-attacks. Huge fixed bonuses. Powers that scale with level. D&D 5 tries to keep the to-hit static while scaling damage up. D&D 4 puts a 50% chance in place relative to level and scales damage. Pathfinder goes the multi-attack and fixed bonus route. It all scales with level.

Basic Fantasy is based off the old way of doing things. Your to-hit gets better as you level. You can do your damage easier. Your "damage output" increases because you are hitting more often. That's it.

Modern games put in an artificial power curve that scales both damage outputs and monster hit points based as you level. When you take that out and go back to the simple way of doing things, nothing much changes. That dragon is still dangerous. You are doing less damage, but it is meaningful damage.

It feels like the current design de-jour mantra is to go back to the original rules and make things feel like the older games. Well, there are games out there that are exactly like the way things were, and they are still different. The videogame-inspired power curve is still in place in all the modern designs.

Power Curves vs. Problem Solving

I feel the bigger issue is when the power curve becomes the game. Roleplaying problems, social challenges, and non-combat skill checks typically aren't included on the power curve. When you do put these on the curve, the result become nonsensical, like the DC 50 locked door.

I tried to run Pathfinder this way with DarkgarX. I promised him "non-combat skills will matter in this campaign" but still, he had that feeling that some module or situation was going to screw him over because he didn't make the best choices to satisfy the power curve.

With Basic Fantasy, you level how you level, your to-hit goes up, and you don't have to satisfy the demands of the artificial power curve based on your character design decisions. Your character levels up. You get a new hit die, maybe some spells, and you get a little better. That ancient red dragon still has 59 hit points, so even a 1d6+1 damage magic missile matters. It is closer to a flat system than any of the games which came afterwards.

There is still a power curve in Basic Fantasy, yes, but the original dice, in both the d20 for to-hits and polyhedral dice for damage, still matter. It is funny how a game with such a simple damage and to-hit model maintains the heroic feeling without all those extra added power curve rules. There was a simplicity and genius in the Basic D&D rules that was lost somewhere.

More importantly in Basic Fantasy, the focus is taken off combat and power escalation and put back onto problem solving. Combat still matters, but other things do too. Room descriptions. Puzzles. Figuring out how to take that chest of 500 gold pieces without a fight. Talking your way out of an encounter. Avoiding fights. Disarming traps. Stuff back at town.

Combat is not the best answer in old-school games. It is in many times, a last resort.

Sounds like real life, huh?

Find the Games You Like

It feels like the power curves designed into today's games are taken from videogames and slot machines where constant feedback, player empowerment, and 'combat as the answer' are the design goals.

Sometimes, yes, I want to play a game like that on the tabletop, and that's fine. I would rather play a videogame that does all the work for me though, such as Diablo 3, so there is that too. But if you don't realize the design decisions behind games, you play them because you feel you should, and not because they fit your preferred way of playing. This entire argument is really about education, and becoming more aware of how games are designed, and using that criteria to find games that better fit how you like to play.

If you like the power curve, great, but understanding a game and how its curve works will better let you select one you like. If you don't like the power curve, you need to know how to look for them and judge for yourself how the game works and if that fits your expectations.

If you never knew about the power curve and the design decisions behind games, that is a problem. Game designers aren't perfect, and they make silly mistakes. They also follow trends and design decisions sometimes without questioning them that lead the entire industry down a path it never realized it was following, such as chasing the power curve design model.

Realizing this and understanding game design makes you a better-informed consumer.

Pen-and-Paper Videogaming

Somehow, this all started when we were talking about XP charts.

When you have a unified XP chart, you are saying, "all class' power levels are roughly equivalent!" A level 5 thief should be as powerful as a level 5 fighter or level 5 mage.

Back in the original D&D, the designers knew about the power imbalance of mages and fighters (2,500 and 2,000 xp base), and put them above clerics and thieves (1,500 and 1,200 xp base). The charts were never a linear scale, just because a mage needed 2,500 xp for level two did not mean they advanced twice as slow as a thief all the way up, the difference between thieves and mages was never really more than a level or so of lag behind for the mage (a 14th level thief and a 12th level mage had around the same total xp).

Still, there was a difference.

In 3rd edition, we got the unified XP chart for all classes (and the CR system), and every class advanced at the same rate. Not surprisingly, those pesky power level differences came up, and this triggered an endless balance and rebalance cycle for all editions of the game since. You even see this in Pathfinder Unchained, where they redo three of the classes to make them compare better with the entire set of classes in the game.

"Mages are still the most powerful class in the game!"
"Rogues are weak."
"Why class X why you get all that plus a better to-hit with class Y?"

You hear a lot of this because naturally, a player expects a level five class X should be an equal and balanced choice with a level five class Y. You end up having to do the power and math shuffle on every class, again and again, like D&D 4th Edition's endless and painful errata and changes to classes and items.

If there was a problem with relative power level balance in the old "per class" XP chart system the issue could be easily addressed by just adjusting the charts. Mages still too powerful? Push them out by a thousand points here or there. So a level 9 thief is equivalent in raw power level to a what, a level 6 mage? Okay, that's where the charts should go.

We don't need to balance the class, we just adjust the charts.

The CR System Solution

Power levels were 'evened out' because of the CR system, really, and also to simplify things to avoid having a lot of charts. But note that in old school D&D, you did not all need to be the same level to adventure together, and conceivably, that level 6 mage in a party full of level 9 characters could and will contribute. This "the party needs to be within one level of each other, two max" sort of thing feels like it comes from MMOs and computer games, where it is important to balance things with math to make sure "everyone has a good time."

In the original D&D game, how did you determine CR? Here's how you did it:

"Last time our party of level one characters fought an ogre we got out butts kicked. Let's not do that."

You learned the game. There weren't thousands of creatures so you could weigh difficulty for them all relative to classes and powers. You failed, failed some more, died a lot, and then discovered what worked. You got lucky, and knew how far you could push your luck given what level you were and who was in the party. You had to think.

Try-fail-adjust-learn-succeed? That sounds like what you do in any game when you learn it.

The problem I have with CR encounter balancing is it assumes the dungeon master is a computer that balances content to entertain the players. The DM is there to "entertain" people like a DVD player, put in the disc, do the math, balance the game, and run the script. Press play.

Saying, "nobody likes getting killed," in D&D is like saying "nobody likes losing in Monopoly," and coming up with rules so one loses. Or even behind on money or properties every turn because every player needs to feel relative balance with each other. Yes, Monopoly is a competitive game, and D&D is cooperative, but if you take the learning curve out you take out the part of the game where becoming an experienced player is knowing what a monster does what and how you can fight them at what power level.

Pen-and-Paper as Videogames

Somehow I feel this is part of the progression of D&D towards an entirely story-based game instead of a board game. CR does what? Balances encounters so you can get through them all as a party so you can complete a story at the end of the night. Without CR, you run around the ogre's room in the center of the dungeon defeating rats and spiders while looting what you can, and maybe you never fight the ogre - and you decided if you 'won' based on survival. If there was a goal, it had nothing to do with 'story award xp bonuses' or a series of balanced encounters leading up towards it. If you got the chalice, you got it, and you earned the king's trust - xp and balancing had nothing to do with it.

Then again, the king's trust is a very nice thing to have, and you don't need to put an xp reward on that either.

Healing surges, regenerating resources, encounter powers, and anything that resets the party's power is another step towards a story based game (and also an admission of the inability to balance a resource depletion game, like the classic D&D model of play). You have to "reset" the party for the next "encounter" because you can't balance things in the overall scheme, when really, what resources the player have and want to spend should be up to them. It feels fake, like an MMO where health and mana regenerate before you get to the next room, and the entire game is designed to be low-risk entertainment rather than a challenge of how to spend limited resources dwindling all the time.

Don't get me started on this "go back to town" sort of "one encounter per day" cliche either, That comes from videogames and it assumes the world never changes between visits to the dungeon. The pen-and-paper game as videogame mentality breeds this unrealistic way of thinking.

Less is More is Fun

Sometimes we like games to be smaller in focus with a limited set of content, such as Pathfinder Basic Set, where we can get the feeling of how monster X relates to class Y and power Z. Part of why we love Labyrinth Lord and Basic Fantasy are because these rules are complete, done, and what's in the game is what is it. You can learn them. You know a level X thief is about as powerful as a level Y mage. You know how to defeat an owlbear, and how much power and resources that will take.

When you have thousands never-ending of monsters, feats, spells, classes, and powers, you never get a feeling of system mastery. You are always being hit with a new something, reacting, and never knowing how your power relates to the others before it is replaced and you move onto the next one. In Basic D&D, the fireball is what it is, and it is a unique AoE spell that fits a unique role. We don't have or need seventy variations of the spell. It is a unique puzzle piece to be pulled out when you need a...fireball.

And it becomes a unique resource we can spend, that does not recharge between fights.

That "how many resources it will take" is key. This is what the original D&D was about in the macro for the entire play session, not the micro between encounters. You should be able to run out of resources and 'fail' to achieve your goal, due to luck, normal use, or carelessness. You should decide if you will come back another day, if that is possible, and the next time the dungeon should change (tougher, better defenses, less loot, the chalice is lost, or they clear out) when the party gets back.

Know Your Game

There is a distinct game design here when you realize what is going on, and how every piece works together. Imposing systems like CR and auto-regen resources on what was a limited-resource game throws everything out of whack, and D&D becomes a totally different game. We are seeing a shift from resource management to story based gaming, while still thinking we are managing resources.

If you want a videogame style RPG, that is cool. Know what these look like. If you want a resource-based RPG, know what those look like. If you want to make a pen-and-paper game play more like a videogame, it is helpful to know what you need to do to get that result. If your love is resource-based play, know what rules enhance that experience and play that way.

We live in a time where every publisher tries to make every game appeal to everybody, and it all blurs together. The influence of MMOs and computer games in pen-and-paper gaming is strong, you see a lot of these videogame-inspired concepts in today's games, and they often conflict with how the original game was designed.

D&D 5: A Cultural Icon?

From yesterday:

Why one of D&D's biggest video game devs thinks that tabletop game has lost its way

I read this, and it is an interesting read. My first thought, of course he wants to push Pathfinder, he's making a game with Paizo. That's not a surprise. But he is connected to the D&D community, the creators there, and he has a long history with the brand.

He wonders if D&D can survive in such a big corporate structure. Now, Disney is also pretty huge, but they also own other huge things and they are good at running big things, like Marvel, Pixar, the Muppets, and now Star Wars. Big companies can run big things. But can they run small things? Or do these small things need to become big?

He wonders if D&D will never be as big as an evergreen and always profitable Monopoly, and thinks if the game was run by a smaller, TSR-like entity things would be better. Part of me wonders if this isn't some frustration over the electronic gaming for the brand (which has always been locked up in one way of another), but I do feel there is a genuine feeling of concern here.

Monopoly is a different game than D&D. It's more a collection of ideas under a common theme. You can argue it is more marketing and a pop-culture phenomenon than it is a game. It's like Pokemon in a way, Pokemon can be a lot of things, and it is a product that can be turned into a million different products since it is a strong brand with identifiable pop-culture icons. Same thing with Monopoly, the Monopoly guy, the car, the board, the look, the colors, the way it's played, the shoe, chance cards, and the dog. All those pieces can be reshuffled and remixed into a billion Monopoly products.

Forever.

Now D&D.

What is it? If you strike out all the things that are not in the public domain or SRD (and thus in Pathfinder), it is the unique collection of sort-of copyrightable product identity. Beholders. Mind flayers. Owlbears. Drow. And basically anything unique to the game that can't appear anywhere else, such as the game worlds and other trademarked pieces. I don't feel those are a unique and identifiable set of cultural icons, they are just funny-shaped monsters and a couple worlds that once dominated the NYT fiction charts.

I don't feel the 'product identity' pieces of D&D will ever achieve cultural icon status. Pathfinder didn't need them, and it is hard to get excited about a monster you are supposed to hate. A beholder is no Pikachu. D&D's problem is that the 'cultural icons' are the player characters, each one is player created, unique, and it is hard to market an icon that every player creates a unique instance of. If you were playing Elminster or Ash Ketchum, fine, but D&D for every player is a unique player character.

And these player characters exist in every roleplaying game, Pathfinder, GURPS, Legend, Traveller, and so on.

D&D is not every fantasy adventure. It tries to be because it is so generic and malleable, but the same experience exists in a million other games. It exists in World of Warcraft. It exists in Game of Thrones. Assassins Creed. Any dungeon crawling game on Steam. Any Final Fantasy. You can get that D&D experience anywhere, because fantasy roleplaying is not defined by having a beholder and drows or any other piece of product identity attacking the player characters.

Those are just monsters, and they can be any monster in any world, because it doesn't matter anymore. People don't care that the creature in the next room is an 'official' D&D brand displacer beast. Again, Pathfinder proved you can create a whole new mythos to replace D&D's and people will accept it and be excited by it. They are just monsters, they are infinitely replaceable by a new shape with a scowl, fangs and horns.

The worlds are something else. Those are fiction. Those are stories. To me, they feel like a complete mess since 4th Edition, and their futures are unclear, except as being legacy supported settings with little real future support. They need a reboot badly. They need their timelines wiped out. They need a creative team to recreate them for this generation. Like Batman, they need to become cultural properties of their own, and reset from time to time to keep them relevant and fresh.

The worlds and unique NPC characters are likely the best path out of this quandary, but those exist often as a force hostile to player characters. Nobody wants powerful GM-NPCs competing with their player characters. Nobody wants railroad-like modules that force a story on a party.

Roleplaying and D&D is like a box of art supplies. You create what you want to create with it, and one crayon is as replacable than the next. It doesn't matter to your picture if your red crayon came from a box of non-Crayola brand colors. It's a crayon. You roleplay. In a fantasy world. With a set of rules. Specifics do not matter. It's a hobby.

To some, it matters that they are all Crayola crayons. Fine, if that is how you want to color your picture, it's cool. If you want to play D&D and your group enjoys the experience, very cool and more power to you. It is a good game and enjoy it. But for the huge population of players enjoying fantasy gaming and roleplaying, it is a larger community with many diverse options where everything can be played and enjoyed. As a company trying to make something in this environment "big" like Monopoly "big", I don't see how you do it since everything is so replaceable and individual-player creator-focused.

Maybe D&D has lost its way, or maybe it is still relevant and on the path, but in another way. It inspired a million other games and worlds, and on this fertile ground a garden of options and opportunities grew. As a large cultural phenomenon I can get excited about, like a Star Wars?

No. I don't feel it.

As an interesting set of rules that gives me a new option to play with others? I can handle that, along with all the other games I enjoy. "Monopoly big" really doesn't matter to me.

I Wanna Hold Your Hand - NOT!

NOTE: Leave trapdoor open at night. Watch your step, lava may be present.

One thing I love about Minecraft is all the experimentation that goes on. You are free to just try things to your heart's content, come up with silly plans, and experiment. The game does not hold your hand, tell you 'this is the way to do it,' or lead you through the discovery process. Things are left open intentionally for you to try different theories and contraptions, and the game's designers purposefully build in new functionality to enhance those possibilities.

Watch out, here comes the Spider-Proof wall!

Now contrast this with a traditional pen-and-paper RPG, and especially something like Pathfinder or D&D4. It's amazing to see the shift in focus, now, these games focus on character builds, balancing everything, and telling you what to do. By the time the designers and forums get done with the new expansions and character classes, there is little room left to experiment, it really has all been done for you, any fun combo balanced and planned out, and all the options thought of already. There is probably a little fun in multi-classing, but really, any of the D&D style games typically either break or have the fun balanced out of them by the time the next edition rolls around.

Right now, the trapdoor goes to a cage where we can deal with intruders mercilessly.

In addition, the focus of pen-and-paper games often breaks down to a mindless pursuit of levels, character power, and loot. They really are nothing more than Facebook games where the whole goal is to increase your "numbers" and "get your friends to play!" Yes, there is that thing with the story and what a good gamemaster brings to the table, but that is the exception more often than not. Pen-and-paper games fall into the trap of making character power the ultimate goal, when in reality, there is nothing fun about character power than having bigger numbers, and being able to end combats quicker. In Minecraft, yes there is loot and character power, but it is capped at a point, and it is definitely not the endgame focus. How you play and what you build determine success; not, do you have diamond this and that. Those are still tools, not auto-win weapons and gear.

THEORY: Lower-level entrances should have some security!

Where is the creativity? Where is the experimentation? Where is the game that celebrates what you create, instead of the modules or books you buy? These are things other people create, and yes, they want to make money and sell you lots of stuff too, but all those modules and stories and expansions drain the life out of your creations, how could you ever write or create something better than the paid stuff? Player-created content takes a back seat to official re-tellings of The Tomb of Horrors or Pathfinder's adventure paths. At times, it feels like there is no creating anything; modern pen-and-paper games feel like they are there to just serve up the next official module release to you, and there is always another book to buy to make things more 'fun' next time. You imagination, and your shelves, sag under the weight of everything you need to buy to start having fun.

Of course I'll never need to defend against a castle siege, but it's so COOL!

Minecraft celebrates the simple, it's basic building blocks plus some rules, and it leaves the rest to you. The basics of the game haven't really changed, it's still the same simple building game with a few parts and many possibilities it started as. Big game companies, and this includes pen-and-paper as well as video game, just don't understand the 'simple is better' concept. I'm sure if a big PnP or video game company designed Minecraft, we'd have the following expansions to buy before we could start playing with others online, and having fun:

• Minecraft: Pets
• Minecraft: Seasons
• Minecraft: Ultimate Magic Power
• Minecraft: Heroes of the Netherworld
• Minecraft: Hollywood Style Stuff

...and so on until my wallet is drained and my mind hurts. Also, the official Minecraft: Adventure Pack 1 through 25+ would be the better maps to play on, nobody could really build maps that compare to the official releases, right? The game just wouldn't come with those awesome tools or random worlds that everyone loves.

I leave you with this, a dark picture of the end of the main shaft down all those stairs. Now, what lies beyond this? How would you build the stairs? Would you dig down, or off to the side and look for a cave to explore? The game's focus is on 'what will you do next?' It's not, 'Where do the game designers want me to go?' That is the difference, and frankly, it's where the vaunted benefits of pen-and-paper games fail in comparison to simple games such as Minecraft and other building-block games. When the creativity, experimentation, and fun is designed out of the game, you have little left. Simple, open, and games that let you build are infinitely better than games where you run a system until max_level and everything ends.

End of the line...? You decide.

The Post D&D World

I remember when everything used to be talked about in the terms of "Dungeons and Dragons." Final Fantasy? Oh, that's a roleplaying game on the Nintendo, kinda like D&D. Traveller? That's kinda like D&D in space. Everquest? That's an online Dungeons and Dragons type fantasy game on the computer.

Today, you ask what a RPG is to your average game playing demographic member, and you'll probably get answers like: World of Wacraft, Skyrim, or Mass Effect. Many World of Warcraft players have never even touched or opened a pen-and-paper RPG, ever. To them, the definition of 'fantasy roleplaying' is World of Warcraft - that is the world they grew up in, and that is what they know.

Interesting times, and if I can crib from the greats, I will. Steve Job's Post-PC World comes to mind, and I shall toy around with the term, Post-D&D World. Pen and paper games have not kept up, and 4th Ed made it worse by trying to be like MMOs, from the world to the powers, and especially the progression, you can't compete with MMOs. It's like trying to compete with Apple with the same product and a different OS, sure, if you are a fan of the OS it's great, but most people, average consumer types, will buy the iPad or iPhone and call it a day. Yes, there will be a day that changes, and yes, this is flameworthy, but at the time of this writing, it's the truth for everyone that's tried to compete based on the mantra 'competing with Apple.'

Post-D&D reflects people's perceptions of what fantasy is nowadays. It's not Elminster running around a dungeon with fireball and magic missile anymore, nor are thieves perceived to be the people who are only good for climbing walls and picking locks. Fantasy is more broad nowadays, more ingrained into popular culture. Orcs can be seen as heroic, noble characters; these aren't Tolkien's mindless brood with 1 Hit Die anymore. Elves just aren't happy tree creatures or knock-offs of the residents of Rivendell, they are living breathing spirits of the elements, such as night, magic, or fire. Our view of fantasy has evolved beyond Tolkien-isms, and the Tolkien movies are taking back the things D&D borrowed from them in the first place. I am sure when you say the word Elf, people will say, "Oh, like the Lord of the Rings Elves?" rather than, "Oh, like D&D's Elves?"

D&D4 tried to strike out on its own, culture-wise, and that was cool. The new world construction, the races being a part of things, and the entire vibe was interesting. The rules, a step forward compared to D&D3, but too MMO and heavy for a pen-and-paper game. Now it seems we are back to the Tolkien-borrowed standards, and somehow, I think that's a step backwards. I feel you can't go back to the future here, D&D needs to make its own lore and strike out as something new. Yes, D&D needs to change from its Tolkien-borrowed roots, and let Middle Earth be Middle Earth.

There are a bunch of thoughts here, trying to define what happens after the market has moved on, after technology has replaced you, and that thing that was once cool is searching for a new identity. You can't grow without changing, and you can't change without looking at what you are. The world has moved on, and it's up to D&D and Wizards to prove 'why should I care about D&D?' Yeah, it's a big task, and I enjoy the game, so I hope they can answer that. A big part of the problem with D&D is D&D itself, refusing to move on from the Magic the Gathering styled complicated rules of 3E that are too heavy for new and casual players to grasp.

Lots to think about, and a Post-D&D World is an interesting term to use when thinking about the question, "What is fantasy nowadays?" You can't think along the lines of , "Oh, let's start with D&D." Things have moved on, and your thinking must too.

"Change comes when you want it."

A very wise friend of mine said that to me, and it is one to think about. For many people, this should be followed up by, "Why change?" If you are happy with what you have, fine, don't rock the boat, change would be bad for you. If you are unhappy, then the question of "why change?" is already answered, and you must.

The entire EQNext experience changed me. Sometimes, when you see something new and different, you want that instead of what you have. For MMOs, the same-old static worlds and terrain of EQ2 and World of Warcraft have gotten stale, and yes, I would like to see something new and different for a change. It does not mean EQNext is going to be better, and I think that is where people get defensive and confused. EQNext has to prove itself, and it deserves a fair chance. If you are happy in your current MMO, fine, don't rock the boat, and change would be bad for you. Others may be unhappy with what you are happy with, and that is fine too, I accept that, and you know, it is life. Who knows, the old games may be more comfortable for some, and even me, I don't know, but I am excited by the future and all its possibilities.

Same thing with Pathfinder, D&D4, D&D3.5, and to some extent D&D Next. All of these celebrate the past, and it is a fun, wonderful past, mind you - I enjoy all of these games. Something on the edge of my conscious says, there is something better out there, something wonderful and fantastic with new worlds never seen before. There comes a time when I don't want to live in the past, I want to explore the possibilities of new games, so I head out and try new things. I design too, game design is my hobby, and I enjoy it to no end. However, the twentieth time through Keep on the Borderlands and the Tomb of Horrors gets the same after a while, and yes, there are the Pathfinder adventure paths, but those are still in the same D&D Normal worlds where you know what to expect.

Part of me wants to head out into the unknown, and experience worlds never seen before. It's part of the original spirit behind SBRPG1.0, to cut players and groups loose with a full set of world creation tools, and let them come up with the world. This spirit is back in EQNext, where players shape the world, players create it, and the shared "live" experience is more important than the written module. It's part of why the game calls to me, and why we are recreating SBRPG in a new and exciting form. To adventure in games where magic does not work the way you are used to, you can never expect what's down that deep hole, and the dangers lurking out there you have no idea what they are capable of - that is a truly dangerous and exciting world, and ones people love playing in.

There will come a time when the pen-and-paper world wants change, something new, something cool. It's a natural cycle and renewal and rebirth. It only comes, however, to those who want it.

Wise words indeed.

SOE Live: Day 1

Planetside 2 sure is the 800 lb. gorilla in the room, this convention is about 50% Planetside interest, with players from all over the world attending. By the time the keynote had rolled around to EQ1 and EQ2, we lost a good portion to the room to the PS2 tournaments and lack of interest. It is a strange shift I bet for those used to coming to the SOE conventions and having the MMO crowds be the focus of attention. Clearly, this year seems to be about Sony's mega-hit sci-fi shooter, and it feels like it is dominating the show.

EQ1 and EQ2 seem to be on longer-term support, with the focus being on recycling older content for the current high-level player base. We had a shocking moment where the air went out of the room when the EQ2 director said basically 'every player will be able to have a fully-geared level 85 character in the next expansion' - for free. No applause, and more of a stunned reaction it felt like. MMO players love their characters and cherish the investment of time put into them, so giving everybody a pocket high-level twink does a couple things: it introduces a population of low-skill players to high-level content, it devalues leveling a character the old fashioned way (since traditional character will not be raid equipped when they hit 85), and it puts a focus on new content only. Of all of those, people seem concerned about traditional leveling, and the mid-level zones may become wastelands without people to level through them.

Regarding EQ1, they introduced a dynamic mission-builder that auto-tunes a special zone to your party size and character level. This is only for the new expansion zones, and how much it auto-tunes is still undetermined. I doubt you could level from 1 to MAXLEVEL on auto-tuned content, this is still unclear. A lot of stuff comes into consideration, the needed level and gear to play these, level and challenge appropriate rewards, solo-ing, and a bunch of other stuff. It does seem, like EQ2, that most of the new content seems to be focused around maintaining the current high-level crowd than encouraging new and mid-level players to get up there and enjoy it. I wonder why a pocket-85 wasn't introduced in EQ1 when it was in EQ2.

Okay, let's consider pen-and-paper games. One thing Sony gets right is developing a game and supporting it. EQ1 is going on 15 years old, which in pen-and-paper years, comes out to a RPG like 45 years old. D&D has had this annoying history of throwing everything away, especially true in 3rd Ed, and EQ1 proves you can support a game as long as there is interest in it. Monopoly has been around a lot longer, and D&D culd be the same 'evergreen' game. If you have new ideas, build a new world with a new game.

Building a glorious persistent with lore and history is something Pathfinder gets right, and D&D fails at. D&D's rebooted 4th Ed. worlds were bitter pills to swallow and not well received (maybe Dark Sun was best out of all of them), and the 'roll your own' was a welcome change, but it seems we left Grayhawk and Faerun behind, or wallowing in unpopular changes. SOE and Everquest get this right, with a lore, current story lines, and history stretching as far back as the game itself. With pen-and-paper games, it's typical we reboot the worlds every time we get a new version, or alter them so badly they are unrecognizable or too heavy.

A fun thing said by the EQ2 director was 'we polled players and asked them, what parts of the game are annoying or not fun?' Man, I wish more pen-and-paper game designers asked that question. D&D Next has a great opportunity here to make things better, though I fear the gut reaction away from 4E may force the game back into the 2E/3E cave. Pathfinder fares even worse, because to hold the mantle of the spiritual successor to 3.5E, they have to adopt some of its worst rules, such as the skill system and complicated character stats. Innovation? Most pen-and-paper games fall way short here, and the things we saw today with some of the next-gen MMO games should put them to shame.

Really. MMOs are the enemy pen-and-paper game designers, since they play for the same crowd and attention. You tried to ape them with 4E with mixed results, and now the safe course is to hold onto 3E or go back to the tried-and-true class roles and rules (which I fear with D&DN). Where is our innovation? Where is the pen-and-paper game community's answer to Planetside 2? (Don't say Magic: The Gathering, although you could make a case there - more on this later.) Where is the long-term support for older games? Why do we need to throw so much away? Where are the new rules systems with exciting features, or will we be stuck with 3E derivatives for the next 10 years? Where is our long-term world support, with continuing stories?

Pen-and-paper companies throw to much away, and it's sad to say that MMO companies actually have better plans for support and retention. Product development too, you'd think with all that MMO companies have working against them, because PnP companies don't have to code game engines, make 3d models, build tons of content - that innovation would actually be on the PnP game side. It's not. We are stuck trying to repeat the success D&D had during it's golden years, and I am not sure if that can ever be replicated again. Computer game companies actually seem to be more innovative and willing to take risks, which is shocking, to say the least.

Maybe we are stuck to selling to the same crowd of D&D fans, it is shocking to see a ton of Planetside 2 fans here at SOE Live - but these fans are the new blood, important people to get into your world if you want your fantasy titles to thrive and survive. SOE has another game called Dragon's Prophet that looks geared towards new players as well, new rules, new goals, action-oriented combat - just cool new stuff. D&D doesn't have those new fans, it seems we are just selling the same thing to a dwindling group of players. Where are the PnP games that pull people in? Again, computer game companies are the ones attracting new players. PnP game companies need to figure out how to do that before they shrink to niche markets of older-and-older players.

Of course, you need to update your premiere franchise every-so-often, and tomorrow we get to see EQ Next. Will they innovate? Can they pull back the dwindling fantasy MMO interest with something exciting and fun? Can EQNext compete with Planetside 2? From the hardcore innovation and support I saw here, I am wondering if the pen-and-paper vs. MMO fight isn't just a one-sided affair. The most troubling part about all this is most of PnP's wounds are self-inflicted, and could be at least stemmed with proper support of existing editions and worlds, creating new games for new worlds, and marketing everything better.

There is a lot to think about, not all of it good news for PnP games; but really, I believe we need to change the PnP game for PnP RPGs to not only survive, but thrive.

D&D Classics: Every Edition on Sale!

Very good news from Wizards and the great guys at Drive Thru RPG. It seems like every edition of D&D is now for sale via PDF up at the www.dndclassics.com store. Not all the core rulebooks are up yet, but there are sections for Basic/Expert, 1E, 2E, 3E, and yes, even 4E - and some of the releases are old, out of print rulebooks. This is a great thing, and brings Wizards back up to the times in our tablet and smartphone world. The prices are great too, plus regular sales, very cool.

This is a positive step, and one that is very welcome. Credit where credit is due, thank you Wizards and the team out there for making this happen.

I shall repeat the call for some of the classics as PDFs as well; such as Star Frontiers, Top Secret, Gangbusters, Gamma World, and all the old TSR greats. You are doing an incredible job with the store guys, keep it up, and they deserve our support. Get out there and play these as well, they deserve to be seen again by new players and new faces!

Design Room: Eberron

Welcome back to another edition of Design Room, not really a review of a number of gaming books, but more of an in-depth look into the game design aspects around a series of books and the implications on game play. For reviews, I shall steer you to other sources, like Amazon, we are interested primarily here in game design, theory, and impact on referees and players. Today we look at one of the biggies in a retrospective, D&D's Eberron game world.

It is important to note that Eberron is still the setting of games like D&D Online, but it doesn't seem to be getting any D&D Next love as of yet. It had a number of 4E supplements, which we will get into, but the fate and status of the world is very much up in the air right now. It is not a good thing, Wizards has far too many worlds to support for the company's focus, and it leads to none of them being supported all that well. Let's start with the D&D 3E Eberron Campaign Setting as the starting point for our delve into the world of Eberron. Mind you, this is not a complete review, nor can we cover everything, we will be hitting some high-level stuff, and reflecting upon the world and game design implications and consequences of these choices.

3E Origins

Eberron started out as a contest-winner in the D&D3 days of a 'create a new D&D game world' contest Wizards put on in the waning days of D&D3. Why they did this is strange, they already had a number of incredibly well designed game worlds, including Faerun, Greyhawk, Dark Sun, and the shelved worlds of Mystara and Birthright. One thing you need to remember was this was the heady days of the beginnings of a number of modern MMOs, and the bug one at the time was World of Warcraft. Perhaps Eberron was the first step to making D&D relevant to that crowd, a fantasy world with steampunk elements with an over-the-top look sounds a lot like...World of Warcraft to me. If true, this makes Eberron the first D&D4 product released, a change in tone from what came before, and also a clear statement of change in the direction of the product.

Eberron is very much one of those worlds that never really had a place. Faerun was the home of the big-money fiction, and Greyhawk was the official setting of D&D3. This seems to harken back to the old TSR's habit of creating too many game worlds to support, and D&D3 always had this multiple-personality complex where the main books were heavily Greyhawk-centric, and the other worlds were' oh yeah, them too' add-ons. Eberron seemed the least-liked child, but it was definitely the most unique and cool. A smart choice would have been to keep all the Greyhawk stuff out of the main three books, and support all worlds equally. You shall see this 'what world do we support?' question come up later, so keep this in mind.

3E Theme: Factions and Kingdoms

The MMO elements are clearly here, a number of strongly rethought races with motivations and a unique flavor, a ton of internal orders and organizations which fight and shift alliances, and a number of pseudo-governments that serve as the backdrop to the larger conflicts. It is important to note that point, the governments of Eberron are backdrops, thematically, they aren't as important to the world as the major players, the Dragonmark Houses being the largest and best defined, followed by all the local factions unique to each kingdom. Again, this is like your typical MMO, and again World of Warcraft. While major nations can fight and even the players can take part, for the most part, the big stories are with the organizations that control the world, and most of these reside between and even above the governments. The kingdoms are 'zones' and the interesting action happens across them.

There is a balance between governments and power groups in the campaign guide which is interesting. The government is given one section, and all the power groups their own following. This is done for every major area of the world. This tells you two things. The first is that unlike other game worlds, the big players are the power groups - they are clearly given more weight than the governments. While a power group may be itself the government, this is not supposed to be a forever thing, different groups can get the upper hand and control the government. It is a fluid and dynamic situation that is clearly different than any previously published D&D game world. The second is that this is a game about these groups and all the plots between them, again, the governments are supposed to take a back seat to the games these groups play.

Again, you can find a mirror in World of Warcraft, with groups like the Cenarion Circle, Order of the Silver Hand, the Guardians of Hyjal, Hellscream's Orcs, and all the other classic WoW factions. Orgrimmar is a kingdom, yes, and it has a government and background all its own - but who controls it on any given day can shift and change depending on what is currently going on between all the background groups that are fighting over it, playing politics, and running plots. Eberron is the same way, and it is important to understand. Friends characters make in one kingdom may or may not be there when they come back, and their political situation may have changed dramatically as well depending on the current stature of things.

Contrast this with other D&D game worlds, where nothing much changes. In Faerun we get the stereotyped belief of, 'Oh I can always go to kingdom X and contact NPC Y for help, they are always good, and enshrined here by the fiction.' In Greyhawk, the same can be said, although it is typically, 'Oh, Kingdom X is lawful good, that is a safe place and they can help.' In Eberron, nothing is guaranteed, and if the players want change, they will need to get out there and do the leg work to support the factions on their side. Note this point, this is clearly the #1 most important thing about Eberron and why it is different than any other world that came before - or after.

World Design In 3E: The Wow Factor

Another clear point of differentiation between Eberron and any other world is the 'WOW' factor. Throughout the original 3E Eberron book, a series of incredible art pieces lays out the world. Cities aren't boring concentric castles surrounded by urban sprawl and squalor; they are grand matte paintings of towers built on top of spires of rock, floating castles, cities built in alien ruins, and a whole imaginative smattering of out-there ideas.

It is perfectly normal in Eberron to have cities built in underwater domes, in the middle of volcanoes, built on the underside of floating mountains in the sky, on crawling robots made out of stone, floating on rivrs of magical ley lines, warping in and out of reality, or anything else you can imagine. Similarly, temples, ruins, fortresses, and any other adventure locale can be just as way out there and cool, and in fact - it is expected. We can go as far as placing monsters and magic items under the cool umbrella as well - these need to be unique, fun, different, and engaging. If it is not cool and unexpected - it is not normal. This is major point #2 about the world, note this.

One of the cardinal rules of Eberron goes like this, "If it is in D&D - it has a place in Eberron." Note that for some things in D&D, like the Drow, they get pushed to the side in this world, they are clearly not as important as they are in either Faerun or Greyhawk. This brings in a lot of material, for good and bad. On the bad side, it is a very chaotic world, with a lot of stuff going on at once, and a lot for the DM to grasp. The 3E Eberron book does a lot to sort this out, and attempts to give everything its own spot so you don't have too much going on at once.

The good part is that this opens up the door for unlimited creativity for the DM. "In D&D" covers a lot of ground, any book Wizards put out, anything from other D&D game worlds, D&D Modern and Future stuff, anything from third-party publishers - anything. You can literally beg, borrow, and steal any idea out there and put it in your game world. This is not only allowed, it is encouraged. Eberron is uniquely situated to be the "game world to end all game worlds" and is written to be that way.

3E: Magic in the World

The magic in Eberron is uniquely designed. Low-level magic is so common it is ubiquitous, everyone has it, and magic is a part of everyone's daily life. A farmer could have a magical self-powered cart to haul hay, magical robots to tend crops, a magical hot-water tap, and all sort of other pseudo-conveniences taken from the modern world, fiction, or any other source the DM can imagine. High-level magic is ultra-rare, even more so than other D&D worlds. You simply don't have a thousand wizards living in the world that can cast the wish spell willy-nilly. You don't have high-level interventionist NPC spell-casters shaping the world with magic. High-level magic has been pushed back, is rare as Hades, and is a special thing again. Resurrections don't happen every day, bucko.

This is another interesting point, and a fun design element. The factions of the world are left duking it out with lower-level spells, casters, and powers. They can't simply scry or cast their way to victory, they have to put boots on the ground to get what they want. This is a good thing, and it keeps the world interesting. See that group of enemy soldiers? They may have a low-level caster or two with them, but they were sent here by that faction that does not get along with you, and they really want to recover that high-level magic artifact before you do. Oh yes, shades of Indiana Jones are back, and they are groups in the world that want those items of power more than you do, and are willing to use force to get them. Cue the music, we need to get in and out fast, Indy.

Having high-level magic reduced also makes high-level PCs more powerful and special, and they are now major players in the world rather than 'one in a million high level NPCs.' This also puts PCs at a distinct disadvantage, once you think about it. All these lesser powered factions will start to notice high-level characters in the world, and the pressure on them will increase. Having a high-level PC allied with an opposing faction may cause another faction to try to eliminate the high-level PC just to keep the balance, so the world gets a 'self correcting' power-balance that is a very interesting place for PCs to operate in.

All of a sudden, it isn't wise to flaunt your power, you never know who might be jealous of you, and there just may be someone else out there who really doesn't like you all that much for who you are. Come to think of it, maybe the reason this world has limit of high-level magics is because it tends to kill of ff and weed out high-level threats ll its own through the groups and politics of the land. An element of danger for high-level PCs just because of who they are? Unthinkable in every other D&D game world. Major point #3 here, note this.

4E: Things Change

Along comes a new edition of D&D, and things change. Picking up the Eberron Campaign Guide, you will notice one thing right off: where did all my cool art go? Gone are all the cool pictures of floating castles, amazing contraptions, and cities perched on the top of rocky spires and alien ruins. There are a couple, but a disturbing trend happens in the book of normal art of castles surrounded bu urban sprawl and squalor.

Where are the cool illustrations of the dragonmarks, especially the large ones? Those took up a huge portion of the book in 3E, and they are now gone. Where is the cool Heavy Metal style Mobius art in the chapter starts? You know, those pieces that gave a tone and flavor to the world, almost like a mature comic book? Gone again. A lot of art was removed here, so much so it changes your perception of the world.

Point #2, the coolness of the world, has been severely reduced.

This hurts, and yes, some of the original art is maintained, but a lot of the important pieces are lost. In the beginning of the Campaign Guide, we get Sharn, a floating city, and a pretty typical castle on a lake. Most of the rest of the art is the typical 4E 'character battle' art, and not really world-specific. Sharn seems like the only cool place here, and the 'open door' to creating fun adventure sites and cities seems to have closed some. This is a great example between the 3E and 4E books of how art can totally change the perception of a game world, and really needs to be recognized and studied.

4E Eberron Factions

Even the iconic sections of the area governments and factions have been muddled, done away for and replaced by random adventure seeds, monster stat blocks, mini-adventures, and plot hooks. Another huge step back, and the individual sections for each kingdom just seem like articles in Dungeon rather than something that lays out tense political conflicts. There doesn't seem to be a coherent world anymore, and even though some of the same factions are mentioned, there is no focus, and each area just seems like a single adventure to burn through.

If you have both books, compare the worldbook sections. Sure, the 4E maps are pretty, but the 3E books seems a lot tighter on focus of the lands, factions, government, places, and interesting sites. We get huge stat-blocks for monsters, and mini-adventures. The factions are either gone, or moved into the adventures. We don't get the feeling that these places are really fought over anymore, or that anything can change, nor are NPCs that important anymore. The 4E 'War on Powerful NPCs' continues here, with a majority of Eberron's big players missing or sidelined. With no powerful NPCs, and a lessening of the important of factions, something is lost.

Could it be, point #1, the focus on factions, is gone?

The 4E Campaign Guide is a huge step back. Room had to be made in the Eberron Player's Guide for all those lists of rote 4E powers, and the referee's book has devolved into a copy-and-paste section of DC History checks that take up way too much space. If all you know about Eberron comes from the 4E Guides, you don't know Eberron. Seek out the original Eberron Campaign Setting book and prepare to be blown away.

The 4E Rules in Eberron

Granted, I like 4E's rules a lot better for Eberron-style action roleplaying, as they are more cinematic; but then again, something major has been lost here. Once thing you notice is that the art in the 3E Eberron book to a point looks like the art in the 4E books, in fact, most all of the 4E books. It is like Wizards decided to transplant the cool from Eberron and place that into every D&D world - yeah, it is all like that now.

I like this tone, but as for putting it in every D&D world? It didn't make much sense in dramatic-novel Faerun, and it surly doesn't fit all too well in old-school Greyhawk. They took Eberron's coolness, turned it into a whitewash, and painted it all over everything they could to make everything seem just as cool. It didn't happen, nor was it correct in many cases. For Nerrath, yes, it worked, and it worked well - but realizing where this cool came from is just as important, and how it can mess things up is another thing.

Faerun is more of a LARP-y, dramatic, almost romance-novel world full of dramatic action. Geryhawk is the original gangster of old-school death-trap dungeons, dour and deadly in its outlook and survivability. Dark Sun is even the way it is, different, Mad-Max, post-apocalyptic, and cool. They each bring a unique 'cool' to themselves, but they are not the over-the-top Eberron 'cool' - nor should they be. They each are special, they each deserve their own tone, and they are not the same as Eberron. To do so is to not respect their special culture and flavor of the worlds. You can't transplant a new 'cool' onto a world without a reboot, nor can you make a world something it is not.

4E Magic in Eberron

Magic too, has been changed to the 1 to 30 D&D4 run, where everyone lives in this MMO-style progression path. Gone is the unique low-level/high-level magic disparity, and the world loses yet another interesting and cool aspect. In the old world, level 6 to 8 characters were the movers and shakers. In the new, it seems like we are back to the lets-get-to-30 grind, and we lose that have and have-not fight in the original world.

Remember, in 4E you start plane-hopping at level 10, and the original world goes away for the Feywild, Elemental Chaos, and all the other theme parks of the 4E cosmos. In Eberron, the focus is solely on the world - it is the center of the universe, and the place to play in all the way up to max level. All of a sudden, Eberron is just for the first 10 levels of play, and we quickly move in a whole new group of worlds into the mix. This water-down syndrome affects all the 4E worlds, including Faerun and Dark Sun - both of which should not have a Shadowfell and Feywild, but they do, since that is what 4E is, and the game loses something without them. For a world to be the central focus, we need to stay in it.

With the loss of magic and clear focus on the world, point #3 seems to be gone too.

What are we left with? Something that is definitely 4E, with some of the action-adventure cool, but none of the original fun stuff that made the 3E world so special and cool. Note that some of these things were tied to the original implementation of the 3E rules (like magic level), others were because 4E tried to adopt the Eberron coolness (Faerun, didn't work), and the others I cant explain (the loss of factions and the focus of the world). Part of this can possibly never transfer correctly, like the magic-level, due to the change in rules.

The loss of focus on the world's unique faction setup is the most puzzling here. It seems like they used the same model for all of the D&D4 campaign books, the DC History checks, the turning every area into a mini-adventure Dungeon magazine article, and general same-ness of the treatment of each worldbook for 4E. It didn't work for Eberron, and a lot was lost. Another thing was a lot of material just didn't convert in all too well, and some of the most interesting parts were ignored, like the dargonmarks - losing the higher-level art for them was huge.

The connection to old-school World of Warcraft is weakened too, while the D&D4 1-30 MMO track is here, the original world inspired by the fantasy-steampunk inspiration seems missing, and all the cool movers and shakers have been replaced by mini-adventures. Remember, the focus of a 4E world is away from ppowerful NPCs, so the 'powerful factions and NPCs control the world' theme of the original Eberron can't happen in 4E - the focus is supposed to be on the adventurers, Points of Light, and the whole 'alone in the world' adventure theme. This is one of the fundamental differences here, 4E's focus is incompatible with 3E Eberron's focus.

Where Art Thou, Eberron?

Part of me thinks they put out too many campaign books for 4E, and maybe they should have just stuck with Eberron as the only and official 4E world. Granted, they needed to keep what was cool and not cut so much art, but then again, it is probably a limitation of book size and format than purposefully limiting content; or they just didn't understand what the 'cool' was here and thought it was just like any other game world, medieval and static.

They would have also had to consider Eberron's magic-balance as well, and wrote 4E around that balance. It is an interesting problem, the design of a generic rules system for all D&Ds seems to have gutted the world of its unique mechanics and flavor, even though Eberron was designed under the generic 3E system. Part of the world depended on those items and rules in 3E worked, and in fact, the "anything in D&D" rule is part of that. Eberron is a redefinition of the 3E world in a new and interesting way, a new way to look at things. If all of a sudden, we lay 4E on top of that, we lose what we were looking at in the first place, and the world just becomes another implementation of the 4E ruleset. We are not looking at anything differently here, this is the same 4E, just with different kingdoms and peoples.

You also potentially have a situation where players coming into Eberron having played 3E understand the world and what is cool, and players introduced to it via 4E are sitting there wondering what the fuss is about. Why is this any cooler than Nerrath or Faerun, it's all 4E action-adventure, right? Well, people that understand the original source material know, but the new players have a different perspective on the world. Combine that with the loss of focus on the world's factions and unique magic setup, and Eberron becomes another 4E world with nothing really special about it other than two new classes, some magic items, and a map.

Eberron is cool, and the 4E version is a nice piece of work - but it is not the same world. From a design perspective, there is a lot to learn here about world design, reboots, rules systems transplants, and a whole bunch of other stuff just waiting to be explored. There are two different design goals here, one for 3E to present a new and exciting world, and another for 4E to transplant the rules and theme of the new game into the existing world. Like Faerun, the transplant is not 100% successful - but for different reasons. Examining why this happened tells you a lot about the subjects we study here on the blog, game design, world design, and what makes something interesting and fun.

Watering Down the Bad Guys

It's days like this that make me miss AD&D 2nd Edition and their total ban on anything demonic or related to the planes of the Abyss or Hades. I will get to my thoughts in a minute, but let's get some background first.

George was doing a read through of the Pathfinder Campaign Setting World Guide, and he did a 'state of the world' report to me, just for fun. Demons figure prominently in the world, and when I came to think of it, demons figure prominently in most Pathfinder adventure paths too. Demons here are the 'big bad' and it seems I just can't get away from them in the setting or published materials. Cheliax, the Worldwound, and a bunch of the enemeies in the Adventure Paths are all demonic figures, and I had a feeling that I misses the days where demons were special, extremely rare, and extremely secretive entities that were more manipulators than the en-masse-enemy-de-jour. I mean, this is Paizo's choice, and I accept it, but I like my infernal forces to be special, one-of-a-kind enemies, such as a demon who lives at the bottom of a dungeon and manipulates goings-on there indirectly.

Switch over to D&D4, and the initial situation is a little better, especially if you limit the game to the basic books. In the 4E Dungeon Master's Guide, we have rules to build custom monsters, and we used these to build 20th level human mercenaries, 16th level plant monsters, and all sorts of other non-demonic bad guys. Just playing with the basic book, you could run an entire campaign without playing the demon card, and just have enemies based on whatever you want. We ran a campaign like this for the longest time, with various bad guys popping up, and with demons playing a lesser role in the background - but still as threats.

Old habits die hard, and it does get worse in Heroes of the Elemental Chaos, a supplement on the demonic side of the 4E World. Here, the planes of hell are laid out in detail, with an uncharacteristic description of demonic planes and their populations of billions of demons laid out. Nothing kills a game like creating hopeless places like this and expecting DMs not to be overwhelmed by the sheer size of what was just dumped on their carefully created campaigns. Yes, DM Fiat applies, you don't have to use it, but this is the official world, and demons have just been promoted to a major role in the ecosystem of the world and its monsters.

I do wish for a world where demons were special again, rare, and existing as the manipulators in the background, not troops on the battlefield. I guess it's a natural progression of demons as the bad guys, you seen it with the Drow as well. In the beginning, the Drow were wicked creatures of the underdark, sadistic evil elves, very rare and special when met. Then the drow became the enemy-de-jour, and you seen them everywhere, armies were on the surface world, and they appeared frequently in modules and on magazine covers. We then had the drow-as-antihero phase, and then today's drow as everyhero phase - they are part of the normal race mix. They have to invent creatures to replace the sadistic evil drow on old-days, like the githanki or something. Demons and their tiefling pop-PC-choices are following the same path, and sooner or later, you'll see something branded as 'worse than demons' appear, like the demons of the demons.

Back to the main point, demons are really prevalent in modern-day gaming, almost too prevalent. I miss the freedom to define the campaign's big-bad as anything you want it to be (aka 4E original 3 books OR Pathfinder minus Golarion), and not have later supplements redefine the world. It is enough to just have dragons and their humanoid servants be the campaign's enemy, or evil mages and their armies, and just leave it at that. There is a point where you need to step back and say, "We need to support referee's and their choices on what's important, and be sure the game company is not dictating a favored enemy or play style."

By making demons the big-bad, it tends to water down everything else in comparison. It feels like Dark Elves in Golarion are window dressing, humanoids are servants of demons, undead are second-fiddle players to demons, and dragons are not really important at all to the world and its history. 4E is a little better with the balance of importance of enemies and their factions, but we do tend to slide towards 'Orcus being the big-bad' at times, and it trends towards gods vs. demons in the end-game. All factions should threaten the world equally, undead lords in Pathfinder should be able to trash the demon's plans, the dark elves could rise and assassinate a demon prince, and even a dragon could get into the fray and kick serious tail. The world should be dangerous, and all enemy factions should be a threat.

Yes, what's in your campaign is your choice, but it is hard to get away from some of these things if you are playing the official releases. Those releases create a 'shared world' for all the players, and control their expectations. If all of a sudden, you see a game with custom enemies and the game doesn't support it, you may run into players that would see that as derivative or off-the-beaten-track. My preference is for freedom and custom enemies, special and rare when they need to be, and respected and celebrated as unique and powerful foes.

DNDClassics and the OGR

Victory, of a sorts.

Wizards and DriveThrueRPG have launched a new PDF store, dndclassics.com. This doesn't look to be a one-time thing, as they will be having rolling releases every so often. Check the press release for more info. The prices are great, only $5 for a D&D rulebook, and there are sales, which shows an active effort to maintain and drive interest in the store. Wizards deserves kudos for supporting one of the largest PDF distributors, DriveThruRPG, that is great to see them working with the third-party community, and noted and appreciated.

Overall, very nice, and thank you again Wizards for supporting players in the iPad and Android era. This is long overdue, and wonderful to see. I call out the good moves when I see them, and this is a great one, just like the re-release of the D&D 3.5 hardcovers. Hats off to you guys again for doing a great thing.

A couple issues come up because of this. Firstly, I hope D&D Next follows a similar release model with a PDF version being available on Day 0. I know Wizards needs to support its retailers, but that can always be done in other ways, like physical-only copies of modules, special box sets, and other deals. Give me a reason to drop by the game store and I will, but core rules products need to be available in PDF to strengthen the brand.

Another issue that I have read on various OGR forums is that old-school retro-clones are dead, such as Basic Fantasy and Labyrinth Lord. With the release of the original rulebooks in PDF form, why play the retro-clones? Some are saying, the battle is won but the war is lost. I will agree with the elephant in the room, and say yes, the OGR is dead - at least how we knew it before.

These sort of things happen in the computer world all along, people flock to an alternative operating system because of some compatibility or workflow improvement, and then the big guys (Apple and Microsoft) copy it in their own way, and all of a sudden, everybody has this capability and there is no reason to stay with the old system. Same thing here, the original rules were out-of-print and locked away for the longest time, and the only way people could enjoy them were through the retro-clones. Now, Wizards releases the old material via PDF, and the reason to stick with the old systems is gone - right?

Not entirely. Remember, the old copies of D&D are still locked up behind a great copyright wall, third party producers still can't support 'old D&D' directly, say a module is compatible with it, or produce any material for it. If you support the OGL market, you have plenty of reasons to stick with Labyrinth Lord and other old-school clones. If Wizards starts tweaking licensing for the old books to support third-party publishers, things will really start to get interesting.

Let's call the new OGR the OGR2.0, and eliminate any notion of playing this because the old games are not available. What are our strongest reasons to play? As noted, the freedom for third-party publishers to publish and express themselves is important, and one of the great things that came out of the D&D3.0 era. Our new OGR2.0 should absorb the best qualities of why people should support it, and stick to those fundamental rights of game players. We may come to a time where the SRD and OGL is moved aside for more free and configurable licensing system such as the Creative Commons, and the electronic rights to play these games is protected and encouraged by third party developers. We live in the digital, portable world nowadays - what sense it it to play games that have such onerous electronic licensing restrictions?

In a way, D&D Classics is a great thing to happen, because it will force everybody to 'up their game.' Being the only source of old-school gaming isn't good enough anymore, quality has to improve, communicating 'the message' has to improve, and the core concept of freedom and third-party support needs to be spoken loud and clear. While I love the old games, in a way, they are not good enough to support the 'evergreen ecosystem' we desire in the digital age.

A revolution does need to happen, and while I love my copies of D&D, and Wizards, please get around to releasing Top Secret, Gangbusters, Star Frontiers and the other greats - the OGR needs to retool, rebuild, and recreate games built around freedom, quality, and openness. It is possible a new open-source 'operating system' needs to be created, and released for third party teams to support, sort of like 'The Android OS of Roleplaying'. While Android can be put of some crap hardware, it can be put on the best hardware as well, and it continues to grow daily.

The challenge both Wizards and the OGR community needs to think about is the 'Android problem,' and how to get revenue off a system such as that. You need an open-source gaming system, with hooks back home. Google does it electronically, by linking the OS to its search and advertising revenues. It could be as easy as making the D&D Next license free and open to use, but requiring every player to go through a free-to-use portal for rules downloads, character sheets, games, and the like. Free-to-play and freemium is the model to support, so subscription fees need to go away. The 'next RPG' should be as easy to play as creating an account, using the online character creator, picking a rules module, bringing up one of your character sheets, and playing. Once they are in the door, then charge for expansions and options.

You see, a fundamental shift is happening, a change in the market, and the new RPG market is waiting out there to be captured and owned. We are in a time of change, the old OGR needs to change, and someone needs to step up and own this opportunity. The new way of playing RPGs is out there and carried around in people's pockets and backpacks every day, and while PDFs address one piece of the puzzle, who is going to fill in the rest with that 'new way to play?'