On updates for dead-tree games and general disillusionment with 4E.
So the July 2010 update to D&D 4E has just come out. Among other things, it changed around a bunch of powers (such as Magic Missile, the definitive at-will wizard attack, being restored to its previous status as an auto-hit attack in exchange for a reduction in damage) and made tweaks to some of the status effects. There have been a good number of these updates over the past few years, resulting in gamers who have not been with the game for a while having to see what rules got changed, what powers got nerfed, etc.
Wizards apparently expects players to have subscribed to D&D Insider, which has a rules compendium that keeps current on the rules as new updates are made, new changes are made to the rules and new material gets added. There's just one little problem with this business model. It does not account for people like me, who do not have credit cards to buy shit online with, who do not have the luxury of buying a subscription to D&D Insider and thus do not have access to the online rules and are thus stuck with the rules from the books that they bought in order to get into the game and whatever they can download from the ebooks of Dragon and Dungeon. Which makes trying to keep current in regards to this game a goddamn hassle, as more and more rules from my books have to be revised, and I have to keep abreast on the forums and the major site in terms of what new changes are coming.
And quite frankly, it is getting to the point where it is just not worth it for me anymore. Maybe it's the effect of getting older, but all these changes to the game I know and love are starting to grate on me. I could live with the other annoyances of 4E (feat taxes, unimaginative wiki-word style class and monster naming, the necessity of having a "build" for your character, and others), but when I pay good money for a set of gaming books, I expect those books to still be relevant two to five years from now. And with every new update that comes out, I am not getting that impression.
Perhaps it is because of this general disillusionment with the latest version of D&D that I am turning more and more to the games of yesteryear and the retroclones based off them. Games like Mutant Future, Rules Cyclopedia D&D, and Swords and Wizardry are simpler by far than anything Wizards has produced, and easier to house-rule without having to worry about fucking up the game system.
Wizards apparently expects players to have subscribed to D&D Insider, which has a rules compendium that keeps current on the rules as new updates are made, new changes are made to the rules and new material gets added. There's just one little problem with this business model. It does not account for people like me, who do not have credit cards to buy shit online with, who do not have the luxury of buying a subscription to D&D Insider and thus do not have access to the online rules and are thus stuck with the rules from the books that they bought in order to get into the game and whatever they can download from the ebooks of Dragon and Dungeon. Which makes trying to keep current in regards to this game a goddamn hassle, as more and more rules from my books have to be revised, and I have to keep abreast on the forums and the major site in terms of what new changes are coming.
And quite frankly, it is getting to the point where it is just not worth it for me anymore. Maybe it's the effect of getting older, but all these changes to the game I know and love are starting to grate on me. I could live with the other annoyances of 4E (feat taxes, unimaginative wiki-word style class and monster naming, the necessity of having a "build" for your character, and others), but when I pay good money for a set of gaming books, I expect those books to still be relevant two to five years from now. And with every new update that comes out, I am not getting that impression.
Perhaps it is because of this general disillusionment with the latest version of D&D that I am turning more and more to the games of yesteryear and the retroclones based off them. Games like Mutant Future, Rules Cyclopedia D&D, and Swords and Wizardry are simpler by far than anything Wizards has produced, and easier to house-rule without having to worry about fucking up the game system.