Goodman Games

Boo,

I don't know if you can make it to North Texas RPG Con, in June, but we will be running more play test sessions of the DCC RPG.

//H

Joe

I really support this idea. I play in two groups, one switched to 4e and the other stayed with 3.5ed. The 4e group have found the game very repetitive and boring and encounters at medium to high level seem to take a bloomin age. To cut a long story short, we have decided to switch to Pathfinder. This made me sad as I love Aereth as a setting and have every DCC published so far, but I have resolved to buy no more 4e modules as they will remain unused and I don't have time to convert. If you offered web conversions to 3.5ed or Pathfinder, I would definitely stay a customer.

I will however, always buy any Aereth fluff you publish. Roll on the next gazeteer.

Whatever you decide to do, you have my best wishes.

Frank

I'd like to see DCC modules that are compatible with classic D&D (OD&D, 1e, 2e, or BX/BECM). I have no interest at all in 4e and very little interest in 3e. I'm quite interested in a DCC RPG, as long as it sticks reasonably close to classic D&D and is well-supported.

Whaaaa? I started with 3.5, but I've never played without a map and tokens of some kind. Color Spray can't be adjudicated fairly without seeing exactly whom it covers, and what sacrifices must be made to ensure it doesn't hit allies.

I enjoy both 4e and PF, and I run them both. I'm more likely to buy PF adventures, because DMing 4e is a breeze. As far as 1e and retroclones: they were a fad that our group quickly tired of when we realized that players would always be dying, and it was pointless to get attached to or spend effort on a given character.

Playing without a map and minis was pretty common prior to 3e. In my experience, playing without a map and minis tends to speed up the game and put more emphasis on exploration, puzzle-solving, role-playing, and the other non-combat parts of the game. Some groups like this, some don't. It's a matter of preference.

Without a map and minis, spells like Color Spray would be adjudicated by the DM using his best judgment. The DM also might give the player a choice such as, "You can hit two enemies for sure. You think you might be able to get three, but there's a decent chance you'll hit the party's fighter if you go for three. What do you do?"



It's well within the spirit of the old editions for the DM to adjust the rules of the game to fit his group/campaign. If your group finds that 1e is too lethal, the DM can make some adjustments: characters can receive max hit points at 1st level, save-or-die effects like poison can be toned down, raise dead might be available for a reasonable price at the local temple, etc.

I've got a few Goodman products, a few Judges Guild AD&D products, a heckuva lot of AD&D material that I keep as references, a bunch of 3.x Wizards books, and a growing collection of Wizards 4th edition books. I'm most interested in using the 4th edition system because it's easier to get newbies started and I quite enjoy the tactical miniatures aspect of combat. With 1st edition, I had a lot of minis but we rarely used them - never had quite the right ones. Any new product I purchase needs to come with 4th edition in mind. I went back and bought the D20 version of City State of the Invincible Overlord because it's way easier to convert a D20 product for 4th edition than my old 1.0 (well, 6th edition printed) version. There are things I've kept like 1st edition in my campaigns however, because there was no reason for Wizards to screw around with the alignment system or the way the planes are organized. Those things already make sense.

Anyway, I guess my vote is FOR using 4th edition as a base, since Wizards controls so much of the marketplace. They've done a piss-poor job of coming out with adventures and campaign tools for 4th edition, which is why it's so nice to lean on Pathfinder or D20 products for creating the flavor of our own campaign worlds. The new Wizards stuff is perhaps more epic in scale than I want or need for the games I run, and missing a great deal of t he humor and creativity found in the retro systems.

Any more thoughts on this? IMO, systems to support would be the upcoming DCC RPG, The Pathfinder Roleplaying Game, and 4e.

I like the idea of a simple and generic statblock (e.g. the orc example above) becasue that would make each module useful for every edition.

I think if you look behind the screen you'll find that quite a few rpgs share common data (AC and hit points), or at least the conversion is a simple one. I'm thinking about OD&D, AD&D, 2E, 3E, Pathfinder, probably the DCC RPG, C&C, and many others. While 3E and Pathfinder tend to have larger monster statblocks, the other games typically require almost no statblock at all and could function quite well with minimal information. Heck, for most of those games there wouldn't be a need for an extra download at all!

4E is pretty much a different scale than all of the others and would require more and different information than the rest. That makes it more of a pain for conversion and/or information put into a PDF download.

Just my two coppers.

Nothing else to add at the moment. Conceptually I still like the idea supporting multiple systems...but logistically, it's much harder and more resource-intensive than it sounds.

I can imagine. Have to hire more folks at least, and update the online systems to support the increased load.