It came up in one of the Story Hour With Aunt Lisa podcasts - and dates back to the days when the 700 Club would have entire episodes dedicated to the evils of D&D. (I always like the Dead Alewives take on that... then came the Summoner take on the Dead Alewives take on that....)



(Required link to .)

The midwest being prime stompin' grounds for Walmarts and reactionary Christians, both. (Me, I was introduced to role playing games by a Catholic priest... he played a cleric.)

I think that silly stigma is finely wearing off - mostly because the folks spouting it were being mocked in turn. (Thanks Dead Alewives - you managed to mock both the game and the folks demonizing it at the same time! (And the gamers loved it. ))

I do not think that I have heard any new rumblings about the devil tainted nature of D&D in about twenty years - but Walmart has shown no sign of dropping that policy.

The Auld Grump

I actually was in Catholic seminary for a year back in the 90s. So, I was fully planning on becoming a Catholic priest. I didn't continue for various reasons, but I was always paranoid that my playing D&D would come up and I'd be accused of being into witchcraft or devil-worship or the like. I'm still a fairly conservative Catholic and still play D&D. I occasionally still run into someone who still maintains that "devil-worship" view of the game, but mostly I'm surprised that I DON'T run into that more.

In fact, I had 4 folks who are doing missionary work for a Catholic religious order on a Native American reservation in far northern ND (it's one of the poorest counties in the nation, sadly) stay overnight at my place just after New Years. One of them was a sister (most call them all nuns, but there's a subtle difference--nuns are cloistered, while sisters work in the world) and they all saw all my gaming stuff on the shelves in my gaming room. I was fully expecting at least 1 of them to make some comment about it being evil or something, but no one had an issue with it. One of them even joked that they could join me in playing if they were staying more than just 1 night. And another even mentioned that he used to play, but was just too busy nowadays to keep up with gaming.

That's awesome that your mom even played in your games.

It probably has helped the issue that we've had a couple of hugely successful book and movie series (Harry Potter and the Lord of the Rings) that have really penetrated mainstream society. That, and game playing in general has become more commonplace. I suspect much of the "demonizing" of D&D just stems from a fear of the unknown, or that which is considered "fringe" in our society.

My parents never played - but my girlfriend first got involved in fantasy gaming at a very young age because her mum played HeroQuest with her.

The Auld Grump

Well, I'm running a 5e campaign and its running very smoothly. The players are almost 4th level now. Play is good, and quite varied. Everything runs on paper and pencil just fine. I notice that there is a huge amount of control in character design as well.

The relatively slow progression in character (attack) bonuses and defenses makes it far easier to run for a DM. In 4e challenges were hyper sensitive to player level. Pathfinder similar but not as bad.

There aren't many micro rules (FEATs) clogging up the system or a lot of micro effects to track in combat. Both Pathfinder and 4e became unwieldy for me to run by 7th to 9th level.

Right now if I was inclined to create my own campaign setting with character rule changes, I'd start with 5e. (I'd love to run Iron Kingdoms. That means, guns, steam, goblins, trollkin along with new gods.)

I'll have a better idea about how the game scales when my players pass 8th level. The only issue I anticipate is player decision paralysis. Most characters will have many more capabilities by then. On the other hand, 5e seems to have a few 'notable' character abilities, which once you have them, are pretty much it. I'm curious to know if the players will become bored with the characters. I won't know that till they hit the 12th level or so.

Finally started a 5th edition game (running through the Lost Mines of Phandelver)! I'm playing with my two boys and they each invited a friend to play. Surprisingly, it was an easy sell to get their friends to join in. I think my older son was nervous about asking anyone to play Dungeons and Dragons, but he finally asked one of his neighborhood friends and he didn't hesitate in saying sure.

We only had about an hour and a half to play, and part of that time was them assembling lego minis to represent their characters, and at least a half hour was spent with them just being silly at the table before I could even start things up. At least they are all on the same page with regards to how (not very) serious to take the game. We haven't really settled into *role* playing yet, but things will get more fluid as the mechanics of the game aren't so foreign to them.

I really hope they stick with it. I'm not a great DM by any stretch, but I'll try to keep them amused.

Well, that isn't good - sales of 5e at BaM! have pretty much leveled, and are selling slower than 4e at this point in its run.

Mostly... It just looks like there isn't a lot for folks to get at this point.

The opposite of the problem that they created with 4e.

Last month the Pathfinder Core outsold the D&D Player's Handbook. Which would be great, but it didn't sell that well - just better than 5e.

On the other hand, a lot of folks asking about the Pathfinder Giantslayer AP - and most of them way too young to have played Against the Giants... maybe they just have a lot of the WotC prepainted minis from the release a few years ago?

The Auld Grump

*EDIT* Weird thought - could some of the folks asking about Giantslayer be planning on using it with 5e?

I know that one of the selling points for 5e is that it is supposed to be able to run stuff for 3.X.... And Giantslayer sounds pretty old school.

It could just be that folks are still in a "wait and see" mode regarding 5e. How well you can get a feel for a new system until there is more than just the PHB, DMG and MM out for it, after all?

Personally, I think the problem is two-fold. First off, WotC did a LOT of damage with D&D4e. They drove away their core players, and a lot of people are looking at 5e from a "once bitten, twice shy" point of view - it's a hard sell to get them to come back after the way they were treated with 4e. On the other side, I still haven't heard any of their plans on continuing 5e. Are they going for a more generic "build your world" style system with lots of generic splatbooks (in this case, 4+ a year), a "setting with tweaks" setup like I'd like to see, focus on their brilliant IPs for the various settings?

There's really nothing to get excited about with 5e yet - it's a good, fun system, but where's the Time of Troubles? The Undermountain or Castle Ravenloft? Heck, where's the list of Poisons and Diseases that was so lackluster in the DMG (seriously, those were the parts in the book I was most looking forward to seeing how they handled, and we barely got anything)? Without something more to pull players in, they'll see a core set of three books, think 'that's nice,' and grab one of the cheaper one-book systems that they can do the same stuff with (heck, you have Fate, Mutants and Masterminds, Savage Worlds, and a couple others just in the generic RPG categories, with a huge array of setting specific games - Iron Kingdoms, Star Wars, Warhammer, Warhammer 40, Malifaux, and some others vying for that design space).

I think once they announce what they're going to do with the book line, sales will pick up again. As it is, there's really not enough indication that they're even going to continue the line to really jump into it (unless, of course, you're a D&D fan and want a big name alternative to Pathfinder - and don't want a retro RPG like Dungeon Crawl Classics, one of the D&D Rereleases, or Swords and Sorcery).

The only thing we have been promised so far is two modules a year.
Plus the associated MMO and mini tie ins.

And a board game announcement.

So there will probably be more books but it looks like very few of them per year.

My observations about 5th are that it just doesn't grab people. The younger folks are trying it and going back to 3rd/Pathfinder or 4th, while many of the veteran folks are becoming nostalgic for Basic. After giving 5th a test drive, I found nothing terrible about the system but nothing enticing either. I really can't bash 5th. I also can't support it. Meh

I think there are a few things that make 5e worth looking at. There are a number of archetypes that 5e makes work - and work well - that have historically been problematic at best. However, without something more to grab peoples attention, I really don't see the system going anywhere.

And I don't mean the adventure paths that we've been shown and promised already. While they're nice to support the system with, they're not enough to bring the system to the forefront. While the overabundance of splatbooks was ultimately problematic for previous editions, Pathfinder shows that a more sedate release schedule, as well as 3rd party support, is still an excellent way to support the line.

Besides, they have the infrastructure in place to really make a big event out of a solid release schedule - imagine one year dedicated to, say, a Dark Sun AP, Setting Trilogy (Player's Guide, Adventures Guide, and Monster Manual), Miniatures set (from their WizKids connection or their more limited edition line - or both). That would be something people could get excited about, and could really give the system the boost it needs.

But, they really need to announce something before people just chuck it off for a more flexible or more established system.

Well, Amazon lists 5e as outselling Pathfinder, so it could be a local phenomenon.

More than one locale, but local.

The Auld Grump

I'm not debating the quality of the campaign released. I've read a bit of it, and it does sound like it's quite fun - but it lacks the epic punch that the Time of Troubles did, or the sheer majesty of Undermountain or Castle Ravenloft (though, granted, we're not likely to see something akin to those direct from WotC).

So, let me ask you - what have you seen from Wizard's release schedule that's really gotten you excited, wanting to run D&D versus something else? I just want to see something announced.