83 replies to this topic

[SkyLion]

I had the same issue with White Wolf btw.  They go and cancel the greatest game ever (Aberrant, duh!) and then proceed to restart the WoD with a whole new system.  i didn't invest a grand into a gigantic shelf of oWoD books just to move on because they felt they needed to sell more books.  Thats the trouble with gaming companies...they DON'T have to kep reinventing the wheel to stay in the publishing business.  They could come up with whole new games and *gasp* creative concepts (or at least reenergize Aberrant WITHOUT a new edition or new system mind you...) to keep making books.  NO need for planned obsolecense of my very expensive friggin collection that I bought from them....gack!

[Valerie]

Well, you DO know that if they make a new Game it will invariably have the same Hypnotic ink and pretty drawings that will sink you in and you will now have 2 Giagiantic collections worth a grand each, right? >_>

[SkyLion]

Nope.  Not gonna happen.

I haven't even read through my current collection all the way yet, it's just that friggen big.

EDIT: Oh you mean a NEW game.  Well i did buy the first Scion book but so far that's it.  Not as compelling as Aberrant to me, far too much of a railroaded metaplot almost utterly dependant on published characters (yet again...sigh) and the nail in the coffin is I havent found any good online games that have started.

On the other hand, Cthulhutech is just fugging awesome and i will be collecting that one in it's entirety as it develops...IF the fraggin printer can ever get enough books out and on the schedule they advertise....a WHOLE notha can o worms that one is...

[Dawn OOC]

Actually, they have to produce more materials to make money, and as your giant shelf proves, they'd milked OWoD pretty hard.  Honestly, I like the NWoD system.  It's a lot cleaner and easier to play, IMO.  Also, they kept promising Gehanna/the end and had to deliver, because I remember fans bitching about that.  That pretty decisively ended OWoD.  NWoD is perpetual.

Aberrant went under because sales tapered off.  It IS a business, and if they aren't making money on something, they can't put more money into developing it.  

[SkyLion]

I get that Dawn, but regardless of how new or shiny th NwOD is I havent yet gotten anywhere close to the story mileage out of the old game yet.  Why should I make my collection obsolete?  Just because they publish Gehenna books and some gamers are too ADD to stick with anything but the current fad doesnt mean that i have to.  My current WW group is still YEARS away from the end of things in story time.  Perhaps decades away in RL time...

It wasn't broke.  No need to fix it...

[SalmonMax]

I kinda hafta agree. NWoD is a LOT tighter of a system than OWoD. I feel the gripe about obsolescence, but lets face it...the Game Police won't arrest you if you play old WoD sometimes, or even Aberrant.

Same with D&D. I'm not torching my 3.5 books, even if I decide 4 is the best thing since sliced gravy. As for 4, I have my doubts, but I have nothing to lose but time, and I think it's worth giving it a try. If I don't like it...cool. If I do, also cool.

Lets not blow all this out of proportion, after all. We're talking about games here, not a cure for AIDS.

[SkyLion]

Im just sayimg...I dont play LARP for example, but if I did I would be PISSED when it switched to the nWoD...

EDIT:  Also nonone keeps me from playing Aberrant, my favorite game but it's telling that I can only do so through an inline community.  Trying to find gamer groups that arent agoggle at "the newest thing" has been impossible for me.  It seems to me at least that every group i have found mindlessly rushes to buy the latest edition instead of sticking with what works.

Also I see no problems with the oWoD system.  Maybe I've been playing it for so long, but the system is tight enough for my tastes.

[Dawn OOC]

Originally Posted By: The_Fool

I get that Dawn, but regardless of how new or shiny th NwOD is I havent yet gotten anywhere close to the story mileage out of the old game yet.  Why should I make my collection obsolete?  Just because they publish Gehenna books and some gamers are too ADD to stick with anything but the current fad doesnt mean that i have to.  My current WW group is still YEARS away from the end of things in story time.  Perhaps decades away in RL time...

It wasn't broke.  No need to fix it...

As Max said, no one is saying "Stop playing OWoD."  In fact, I encourage you to do that if you enjoy it.  But once Gehenna was underway, they couldn't keep making supplements.  They couldn't stop their flagship line, either.  So they had to come up with something else, but they couldn't just replicate it whole cloth.

Look at it this way - you have your old system, which you like.  But there's something else to play too, and have fun with.  Yes, you'll have to invest in more books, but only if you want.  You don't have to plug into NWoD.

And I'd disagree about it not being broken.  The Generation system was a POS, IMO.  It was just the only game in town, so to speak.

Max: Well stated post, btw.

[SkyLion]

Generation was and still is awesome: measuring the potency of blodd by distance from Cain, the Progenitor.

And I DO have to bitch if every friggin local gaming group toes the "party line" and switches to the nWoD books.  that puts me SOL now doesn't it????

[Dawn OOC]

Originally Posted By: The_Fool

Generation was and still is awesome: measuring the potency of blodd by distance from Cain, the Progenitor.

And I DO have to bitch if every friggin local gaming group toes the "party line" and switches to the nWoD books.  that puts me SOL now doesn't it????

You are getting way too upset about this, Sky.  I'll put it simply - if you want OWoD, look around.  There's some old timers out there who feel the same as you - I live with one.  If you can't find an OWoD game because of local players, then at least you can mooch their books when they "make" you play NWoD.  

As a final point, you are not entitled to bitchiness; no one is, and there are choice words for those who believe that they are entitled to anything in a game.  

A certain amount of irritation is expected.  But it's JUST a game - PRETENDY FUN TIME GAMES. Your old books are not invalid.  They still cover the rules you like.  It's not like you have to upgrade a computer or buy a new game system to play the game anymore.  Now, THERE's a money sink.  :p

[jameson (ST)]

Originally Posted By: The_Fool

Generation was and still is awesome: measuring the potency of blood by distance from Cain, the Progenitor.

I'd like to point out that the CONCEPT of Generation may have been cool and great but I think Dawn was referring to the SYSTEM being a total pieces of steaming crap.

[Mr Fox]

I chose not to go with NWoD.  I read some of the Vamp book and didn't like the flavor changes I perceived there.  On top of that, I too have probalby a grand in the oWod books and saw no reason to jump.  So for me... I still play oWoD and no one has convinced me yet that there was a good reason to move to nWoD.  

As for generation... I loved it.  Several of the games I ran or played in were diablarie games and were a ton of fun.  Don't know what the new system replaced that with.  Didn't read far enough int o the new stuff to find out.

[Mr Fox]

Yeah, the system around Generation did leave quite a bit to be desired.  We came up with our own house rules to cover it and it worked well for us and still does.

[Dawn OOC]

Originally Posted By: Dr. Raphael Bradford

Originally Posted By: The_Fool

Generation was and still is awesome: measuring the potency of blood by distance from Cain, the Progenitor.

I'd like to point out that the CONCEPT of Generation may have been cool and great but I think Dawn was referring to the SYSTEM being a total pieces of steaming crap.

Bradford - yes, I was speaking of the system.  IMO, it sucked. If you weren't 8th gen, you could be punked pretty easily, and after my third game with every PC being 8 gen (or the max allowed by the ST), I got the idea that it sucked.  And the only way to better yourself was to commit a henious crime on a fellow Kindred AND be socially screwed in the game.  Blood Potency allows you to rise and fall in power without feeling like you're taking one while bent over the table.

The concept was cool - the system less so.

And I admit - OWoD has a better setting than NWoD, much better.  I was talking pure mechanics.

[SkyLion]

Doing away with the Gen system means that a whole clan of vampires is nerfed in both game terms and story terms: The Assamites.  There are alot of very good and valid IC and OOC reasons for the way Generation works the way it does.  Our group has never had a problem with it and yeah we almost always play 8th gens. No reason not too and its not a problem IMHO.

[Mr Fox]

Yeah, it was always a fun race in the diablarie games between dropping gen and becoming too tasty to live.  Drop too many gens without developing the power to go with it and you become a walking milkshake just begging to be slurped.

[Revenant]

*looks at the name of the thread*

Huh... guess this is officially derailed.

And Fool, switch to decaff.  This is really not that serious.

[SkyLion]

I don't drink coffee Rev but sweet of you to think of me!  And yeah I realize we got a bit derailed but my point still stands.  4th Edition is not an improvement and the only reason it was published was so the money grubbing types could cash in.  NO Im not opposed to developers making money but I am opposed that they go the quickest easiest most uncreative route by creating a new "edition."  They could either  expand the sxisting world or create a new setting but rebboting editions is similar to how Hollywood can only rarely start something new and why we are stuck with sequelitis.

That said there is only 8 hours to go until the Dark Knight goes wide release...if all sequels lived up to it, I wouldn't mind so much...

[Dawn OOC]

Originally Posted By: The_Fool

4th Edition is not an improvement and the only reason it was published was so the money grubbing types could cash in.  NO Im not opposed to developers making money but I am opposed that they go the quickest easiest most uncreative route by creating a new "edition."  They could either  expand the sxisting world or create a new setting.

They could, but there is no guarantee that people would buy into "yet another" setting or more supplements.  Eberon was moderately successful, but not so much that I've ever played it, or heard of more than one person in an Eberon game at any time.  Also, with the exception of a module game, all the games I've played or run has been a home brew, and there is no money in that for the developer.  What really sells are rule books, and third parties had glutted the market with them under the OCL.  

[SalmonMax]

It's also been argued by some...and convincingly, I think...that one of the things that shot 2nd Ed D&D, economically, was the comparatively huge number of competing settings. Towards the end of the run, you had Dragonlance, Forgotten Realms, Dark Sun, Planescape, Mystara, Council of Wyrms, Ravenloft...the list goes on.

You think that's good, but what it did was force TSR to try to maintain a huge number of product lines for which people all too often didn't cross-buy. If you played Dark Sun, you didn't play Planescape, by and large. So all those production costs led to products that in essence competed against each other...driving the core company out of business. The only books EVERYONE needed were the PHB and sometimes the DMG and Monster Manuals. A pretty small catalog compared to all the setting stuff.

It didn't help that TSR wasn't full of the brainiest people in the biz to begin with either.

That said, Wizards is being considerably more prudent in their marketing. They rely on their core line...the Big Three, and then a series of expansion books for races and classes...with just two or three established settings, and really only two they're regularly publishing for. Plenty of books everyone needs, and only a handful that split the base.

4e just adds more products to the "core" line, with minis and dungeon tiles and electronic stuff...

Makes a lot of business sense. I dunno if I'll follow it, but I can't fault the logic.

[Mr Fox]

Good point there about TSR competing against itself.  I think there were other factors going on at the time as well.  After the big religious furor of the 80s it lost a good bit of it's appeal and original base and had a stigma for years.  During the Dark Sun days when TSR was producing more than a half dozen different settings it was having a bit of a resurgence.  That resurgence was pretty short lived though partly because computer games were muscling in on DnD's turf.  In the mid 90's for the first time people could get on  a computer and SEE the fantasy in real time by themselves without the need coordinating with an entire gaming group that could only meet once a week or once a month in some cases.  

I think 3.0 and then 3.5 breathed a little new life into DnD, and whether the latest system is good or not, I hope that 4th ed will do the same.  I'm more concerned that gamers not be a dying breed than I am over whether WotC is making an unfair profit or not.  I'm still reserving judgment on the system itself until I actually try it, but if it brings in some new blood that's great.

[Revenant]

It's not for me.

I'll play 3.5

[Einherjar]

I'm going to be boring and stodgy and say "I've got about 200 quids worth of 2nd Edition AD&D books and I'd rather chew glass than shell out for a later edition."

[Dave ST]

Heh, the only reason I switched over to 3.0/3.5 was because Fighters and other classes became worth a damn, and that took me over  two years of convincing from my table.

4E Just doesn't have 'it' in my opinion.  Whatever 'it' maybe.