Sadly, no one near me is doing free RPG day. Ah well.

Here's my game store corkboard classified ad: Will play your crappy RPG game that nobody else will. $10/hour + benefits.

This isn't me clinging to my old way of doing things. This is me remembering sessions in which we didn't even use maps, but had a FAR better time than the ones in which we did use minis. I happened to use minis a lot, and not just in D&D. I sometimes used them for Villains & Vigilantes, Champions, GURPS, MERP, Boot Hill, Star Trek, and even, sometimes, for all the Palladium games. . . But they were never necessary, and they were only used in an abstract sense.

Not so with new D&D. It plays more like a tactical game, with less emphasis on the ROLE playing, and more on the ROLL playing. In fact, it reminds me of Car Wars in many ways. It sucks the individuality out of the game. The player characters remind me more of the ones from that old Basic D&D set, or the Dungeon! Board Game.

I'm glad you're loving it, Massawyrm, but to me the new D&D feels less like an "evolution" and more like an intentional devolution with a HEAVY emphasis on marketing accessories, minis, and hardcover books filled with some of the worst art to come from D&D in its entire history.

Oh yes. I went there. The artwork in the new 4th edition looks like comic book art, or even manga, rather than the awesome paintings of previous editions. Yes, there were some comic booky drawings in all editions, but there were also beautiful paintings. No more will we see these, apparently. Now, they want D&D to look as much like World of Warcraft as possible, without outright ripping off the art style. It sucks.

Anyway, back to the point: I don't MIND using miniatures, but I do mind when the rules are changed to focus on them. That transforms the game from a true RPG into a tactical miniatures skirmish game, and if I wanted that, I'd play Car Wars, Blood Bowl (still have my old set), Warhammer, Battletech, or Star Trek.

With D&D I want the rules to consider ROLE playing first. I want the players to have the flexibility to play what's in their mind, not what they're limited to by the rules which were streamlined to make miniatures combat more efficient.

D&D 4th Edition is made for DMs who don't want to do any work, or have limited imaginations. I'm very disappointed by it.

Frankly, I'm thinking of going back to good old 1st Edition Advanced Dungeons & Dragons... But I sold all my books. I guess if I want to play, I'll stay with the 3rd edition, for now, or maybe switch back to playing Palladium Fantasy.

Wizards killed D&D by buying out TSR and turning it from a game company into a different beast. Now it's all about how to get people to buy more supplements and cards and miniatures. I'm surprised they don't make a new kind of dice and patent them so only they can profit from them. But then, what did we expect from the company that invented crack cards?

One of the things that annoyed me about 3rd edition is that WOTC said that they weren't going to oversaturate the market with product. Well, they lied through their teeth. And they're already planning on oversaturating the market with 4th edition (nothing like having a Player's Handbook 2 already announced). Granted, it's what TSR did to kill themselves in 2nd Edition, but I think Wizards are a bunch of morons for going that route. You publish your core rulebooks, a couple settings, and deliver adventures for us to buy on a monthly basis. Period. Supplemental material should come through a PRINT Dragon Magazine. It worked perfectly fine for 1st Edition, it would work fine for 4th Edition as well. But no. They're going to keep publishing hardbound timelines $30 that are available online. And why? Because they think bleeding gamers is the only way to profit.

Here's the biggest problem: how many classic adventures can you name that came out from 2nd Edition onwards that gamers would immediately recognize? Classic Adventures is what builds nostalgia, not the game itself. A new generation of gamers may play 4E, but unless there are some classic adventures made, they won't come back for 6E (or try to get their kids involved). And that's why they should focus on adventures, not rulebook supplements.

Core Rulebooks released in Hardcover.

Campaign Settings released in Hardcover as well (and no "player's guide to the Realms" either. One hardcover).

NO OTHER HARDCOVER RULEBOOKS *EXCEPT* future Monster Manuals. Which you will not need to purchase if you subscribe to:

DND Insider. It's a combo of Dragon and Dungeon magazines, and all new rules, races, classes, etc., are printed here. New monsters as well, but they'll be collected every year-and-a-halfish into a hardcover (as previously mentioned). If you don't want to subscribe, you can purchase articles/short adventures for a buck or two. Columns like Sage Advice would always be free.

Adventures, adventures, adventures. Softcover (no hardcovers; that's just stupid) adventures on a monthly basis. Sync with the Dungeon mini-adventures (like they did with Keep on the Shadowfell).

Softcover Settings books are ok, but should always be optional and should NEVER introduce a new class/race/monster/etc without previously appearing in Dragon article. In other words, it would deliver flavor and NPCs and little else.

And of course, dice and tiles and miniatures.

I believe that this would be the most successful model. I believe it would be profitable, and that a lot of gamers would appreciate the fact that Wizards is cutting out the BS and worrying about making the adventure the central part of the D&D experience.

I think it should be the reverse. I think the Dragon/Dungeon stuff should be considered ongoing supplements to the core (and in some ways DND Insider will be that). And I think the inevitable hardcovers should be variations that only get embraced if the whole party is willing to embrace it.

Your only defense-- Your only argument-- Is "spoken like someone who hasn't played it." as if I don't know what I'm talking about. I'm sorry, dude, but the materials printed by Wizards is pretty clear, and VERY dumbed-down, so I'm quite sure I understand EXACTLY what I'm talking about.

TSR was indeed having troubled, but Wizards didn't "save" them. Wizards bought the name and property, and promptly CHANGED the games to reflect their own business ethics and ideals. What Wizards has made since taking over has NOT been Dungeons & Dragons. Not in spirit. Not in practice. So yes, they bloody well DID kill D&D, and replaced it with a cyclical marketing setup that compels players and DMs to buy as many extra supplements, minis, and books as possible to get the "full" game experience.

But hey, don't take my word for it. Just look at Wizards' forums. People are PISSED OFF about D&D 4th Edition.

They didn't just change the mechanics. They changed the ideals. They mashed a few different game worlds together to get this new one. They turned halflings into kender. They got rid of half-orcs and brought in what are essentially Dragonlance draconians. They turned elves into faeries. They demoted gnomes to an optional race. They cast of full-fledged, customizable character classes for templates that are broken, and very narrow in their customization. They killed multiclassing. They killed the alignment system.

No, man. D&D is dead. THIS game is not D&D. It's a whole new game that resembles a pen & paper version of an MMORPG. It doesn't have the staples of D&D. It doesn't have the open-ended mechanics of D&D. The only way it resembles D&D is that they kept the names of the basic attributes. In almost EVER OTHER WAY this game is a departure from traditional D&D rules and setting.

Why did they even call it Dungeons & Dragons? It's clear that what they meant to do here was to combine Chainmail, WoW, and Magic: The Gathering to get a whole new game.

I'll re-read the books. But from my first reading, all I see is a lot of total rewrites of the rules and reinventing the wheel, and very little of the D&D game that I played since the late 1970s.

Hell, the characters I played in my favorite campaign wouldn't even be POSSIBLE in this current version.

Oh, yeah. And Mezzanine is right. There are a ton of us Mac owners out here, and Wizards alienating us isn't helping their cause. If I want to use their PC crap, I'll have to boot into Windows on my MacBook... And at this point I don't think it's worth it.

People are NOT happy with this new D&D in-name-only.

I may give it a chance in actual gameplay, but so far, it just seems so dumbed-down that it's not worth the bother.

And yes, I'm being a complete and utter smartass. Well, about the 1st vs 4th thing, not about getting along.