How do you knock Dungeons & Dragons away from its ill-deserved mainstream pedestal?

How do you knock Dungeons & Dragons away from its ill-deserved mainstream pedestal?

It is an inconceivably terrible system, awful for getting new people into the hobby and horrendous for the more experienced ones to play in, an unholy amalgamation of four decades' worth of terrible rules and traditions - yet by means of brand recognition alone, it stands as the only game normies have ever heard of or would ever care to play. An eldritch abomimationfilling the playground all on its own, shouting that it it the only one, all other games buried under its hideous flabby fat bulk.

I want to stop this. I want to bring other, objectively better games to the attention of common man. I want D&D to just fucking die already, like the cancerous old man kept on life support it is.

How would you do this? And what other system would you sell normies in its stead, at least at first?

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I think I finally understand.

They're going through their teenage rebellion phase, and basically just hating on something they find familiar.

It's kind of sad, how they try to rationalize their intense emotions as "objective facts", but in time, they'll either grow up and realize that D&D is nowhere near as bad as they're committed to believing it is, or they'll just end up alienating even the other people who don't like D&D by making such insufferably stupid posts like OP's.

The problem with the "have you tried not playing D&D" is that people use it more often than not when playing a different system wouldn't solve anything.

Few problems discussed on this board can be solved just by switching systems, largely because at the end of the day, the system is actually only a small component to the game that's being run, and that switching systems just leads to a new veneer on the same old problems.

"Try X system" is not always bad advice, but it's not particularly helpful in a thread about problem players, or about story issues, or even alignment arguments, because even in the last case it's just a name (or a different name) for things you'll find in find in almost every other game. Even games "without" alignments still have degrees of morality to them or factions with codes of conduct, and most alignment arguments typically revolve around these two features of alignment.

Does D&D have flaws? Certainly, but most of these are remedied in far less time than it takes to learn a new system, and the idea that you should abandon a system just because something didn't work out is why we find a lot of people hopping through multiple systems hoping that a change of game will solve their problems.

Most of the whole problem with system discussion is that it's actually political in nature. Play X game or play Y game is a tactic to try to garner support for one game or dissuade people from playing another, and is largely dishonest in its lack of transparency. D&D becomes a target not because it's a bad game by any measure, but because it's popularity means people are less inclined to play other games.

As a person who has played his share of everything under the sun and now plays homebrews almost exclusively, I've really gotten tired of people claiming system superiority or inferiority when they're all just talking about the same inferior games just under different disguises.

If only they knew how amazing Duck in the Circle was.

>If only they knew how amazing Duck in the Circle was.
It's your job to teach the D&D players the glory of this system, user.

Oh boy, another blatant bait thread that 3aboos will undoubtedly bump up to 300+ posts while retards on the sidelines wonder why these threads reach bump limit even though non-shitposting threads die out in less than six hours.

I gotta say man, a part of me wishes D&D does fall off the wagon, because falseflagging shitposters like and copypasta like have just gotten so tedious to deal with lately that I'd even prefer talking about F.A.T.A.L. just for some more variety.

I don't play D&D.

Just doing my part. You're welcome.

There's nothing wrong with D&D you incredulous faggot.

Dnd, a game of the imagination, is only as good as its player base. Its not dnd, its not vampire, its not ttrpgs, its us.

>Pic related, average tabletop player.

>How do you knock Dungeons & Dragons away from its mainstream pedestal?
At this point you'd have to change history. Not really any way about it now.

But you can still make your game of choice more visible and have more people willing to play, and both of those are important.
How to do that as members of the community?
Be open to new players, be open to teach them your preferred games, and be patient with them. Be magnanimous.
Don't condescend.
Use those conversation techniques, be that personable, and you shouldn't have much trouble getting people to at least try it out, and have a good time.

...

>How do you knock Dungeons & Dragons away from its ill-deserved mainstream pedestal?
You don't, and you can't. Even if you destroyed all of 5e's books, the rules are available for free online. Even if you stopped 5e's development hard, someone would take the OGL SRD and make a spinoff a la Pathfinder. Even if you erased all traces of 5e from the world, D&D's 40-year history remains.

You would have to literally erase history to do that. It's the equivalent of making a Linux distro the go-to desktop OS: you would have to literally erase Windows from history.

>unable to entertain the notion that my golden calf is flawed, I am forced instead to assume anyone with complaints is a petulant child

Most people who are hardcore 3aboos tend to be manchildren who cannot accept that someone, somewhere, at some point in time, legitimately dislikes their favorite system for good reason and must assume that they're the ones who are wrong in order to protect their fragile little psyches.

It's cognitive dissonance at work.

Instead of shitposting bait threads you could pick whatever system you think is superior and run amazing games in it alongside supporting that games community via creating homebrew content, actively participating in the community, creating a YouTube channel about the game, creating a website discussing the game etc.

By spending the same amount of money on your marketing.

Good luck.

This is a pretty transparent attempt at damage control, OP. It's the kind of thing that makes it a running joke how pathetic you anti-D&D trolls are.

By wanting to play something other than fantasy.

"I want to run a British Secret Agent in 1980's East Germany!"

GURPS can do that. D&D... nope!

We don't have really have all that many "hardcore 3aboos" by your definition here though.
No one claims the game is perfect, only that you're kind of a dumb troll for getting upset by it to the point where you make a thread like this, a thread that's basically "STOP PLAYING D&D FOR FUCKS SAKE LOOK HOW UPSET I AM."

Everyone already knows why you're upset. No need to keep reminding everyone that you can't stand the idea of people playing it.

"I want to play soldiers stuck in the middle of World War III"

Twilight 2000 can do that. D&D... nope

"Let's play gunslingers in the old west!"

GURPS, Deadlands, Aces & Eights etc can do that. D&D... nope!

But all most roleplayers ever care to play is fantasy.

Do you have any fantasy games that do their thing better than D&D does?

Who gives a shit lmao

>Even games "without" alignments still have degrees of morality to them or factions with codes of conduct
No. Apart from D&D and WoD, I've never played a system that makes players choose a faction or alignment at character creation. This is not a normal thing that every system makes you do.

My uncle wrote a module for that once.

Just find players that want to try something different. Or just want a table were some dumb fat fuck isn't yelling, "My axe!" every three fucking seconds.

"I want to play a Lord of the Rings styled adventure"

The One Ring can do that. D&D... nope

Yep.

Most games have expected behavior, and you reeaaaaally don't seem to understand alignment if you're having an issue with someone choosing something that's largely descriptive rather than restrictive.

In general, the people with the biggest issues with things like alignment are the people who understand them least, and their frustrations come from thinking everyone else has to follow their poor misinterpretations, rather than just following what the books actually say.

"I want to play a dramatic and cinematic fantasy campaign focusing more on character relationships than dungeon crawling"

Hillfolk can do that. D&D... nope!

D&D keeps all the stupid people contained in one system, why would you want them to infect other systems?

What system is for smart people then?

As soon as you get the stupid people on a smart system, they will wise up.

My main problem with D&D lately (and I say "main" because I got plenty of problems with that shit) are the classes. They are an unholy amalgamation of four decades' worth of terrible stereotypes that only makes sense to people who are already contaminated by this infectious bullshit.

I honestly don't like being a hater. Usually I'm okay with just not doing whatever I don't like doing and I don't mind people who do the things I don't like. Its their problem, not mine. But D&D has brainwashed 90% of the tabletop players and ripped their imagination out of their brains, since most players are unable to create anything that's different from what everyone else expects them to.

All barbarians are the same.
All rogues are the same.
All paladins are the same.
Everyone is fucking the same. All the fucking time.

I know a disturbing amount of people who have been playing with me for over 10 years and still make the same characters over and over again. They change some details but in concept, every barbarian is the same, every is the same.

Its just really disappointing. That is why I would be fucking glad if D&D just died out.

pic related: every single rogue ever

I run D&D 4 times a week at the store I work at. It is successful and draws people into the hobby because it is simple to learn.

Yes, it certainly has it's flaws. However every system has it's flaws.

How does the game being mainstream or even popular effect you in any way? You sound like some whiny cunt who bought into a system that no one wants to play with you, because they like D&D.

All you really need is fighter, cleric, and mage. That way you can still clearly choose your party role but have plenty of options left for just what kind of a fighter you're going to be.

Thief was a mistake.

This post is solid, concentrated ignorance.

It's basically why most people just ignore you, and continue to make D&D ten times over the most popular and played role playing game.

Yeah, the classes are really bad. As is the level system which makes it so that you can't just get a little bit better at something -- you get an entire package of abilities everytime you get better -- with no room for player creativity apart from where a few, mostly meaningless (because of the d20), skill points are allocated.

If you honestly don't know anything about the game, just scream "Stop playing D&D, it hurts me fee-fees!"

You'll look less ridiculous.

There is only one way to achieve this goal: Play as much of your favorite system with as many people as possible and make it feel as good as possible.

You can't be serious.

Now, this position has always baffled me--what is supposed to be stopping you from doing those in D&D?

The swinginess of the d20 is one of my personal pet peeves with the system. The fact of the matter is that skill points and ability modifiers just don't matter because of the choice in dice.

In an arm wrestling competition between a strength 8 and a strength 18 character the latter is not strongly favored, even though he should be. The outcome of the die roll is almost the only thing that matters.

That's not how arm wresting works in D&D.

That can't be true! It's what everyone always complains about with the system!

Hillfolk, Burning Wheel, GURPS, ORE, Savage Worlds. List goes on.

Fuck, even Dark Ages does fantasy better.

There's no actual rules for friendly competitions like that. You can very easily just rule "The person with higher strength wins, and you only roll for it if they both have equal strength." Call it both contestants "taking 10" if you need to. In general, if you feel like something shouldn't be a roll, don't make it a roll.

Or, you can have fun and embrace the randomness and go ahead and just use rolls to make the arm wrestling more exciting and unpredictable. As weird as it may sound, most people actually tend to prefer the unexpected and exciting when playing games, even if it requires a little more flexibility in the narrative.

It doesn't really matter wether arm wrestling in particular works like that (even though my experience is that that is exactly how people play them regardless of what the rule book says). It's true for every check you make with a d20. Your bonuses are near useless in the system and wether you succeed or fail is instead determined almost solely by the die.

There's literally nothing stopping you from playing either of those in D&D

It's all up to the individual DM. I've played extremely roleplay heavy campaigns in fucking 4e, The one everyone screams about how it's impossible to roleplay in.

D&D hasn't even been about dungeon crawling in decades

Unless you stack dozens of bonuses to high heaven. But then you're called out as being a min-maxing munchkin fag who doesn't know how to roleplay.

"Serious" arm wrestling actually depends more on technique than pure strength. Strength helps, of course, but if that's the only difference than it seems reasonable that there's only that spread.

>It's true for every check you make with a d20.

But it's not. Especially once you get past 5th level (where the D&D math hits a sweet spot up to about level 14), and that's without talking about "not rolling when it's not neccesary" like you think you have to.

D&D at low levels is to introduce players to the characters and to let them not have to rely on their stats and to instead enjoy just watching stuff happen. For "serious" games, that tends to start at 5th level, where your complaints about the dice being too swingy don't really play out.

YOU don't. I don't want to.

Simple.

If you want to run a LotR or Hobbit styled adventure in D&D you'd have to homebrew and outright remove such large parts of the original system to make it work that you're effectively no longer playing D&D. Spellcasting alone would have to be remade from the ground up for the setting to even feel like Middle-Earth, not to mention how you'd have to rebalance absolutely everything to accomodate the lack of spells and magical items.

And if you want to run a roleplay heavy game in D&D you certainly can by simply ignoring the rule book and simply playing pretend. In Hillfolk, that roleplaying is the system.

Thinking about a party role is not the way I roll, but I get what you mean by pointing out those three classes. In the end of the day, all the other D&D classes are just a variation of those three.

> most people just ignore you
Actually I got 4 replies lol that's something

I guess I don't like the level system neither, but it doesn't bother me so much. Something I would put on the second place of my list of things I don't like on D&D are the attributes. They are just fucked up in many ways, I could actually make a second list of just reasons why they suck.

Actually, I can safely say 90% of my tabletop experience has been using D&D. I've been playing it since I was around 10 (can't really remember the exact year though). Just lately I started noticing all the bullshit around it.

Why would you assume I don't know anything about it? That seems a weird assumption, considering I just said I've been playing for at least 10 years lol

>>You'll look less ridiculous.
You (and ) came to an anti-D&D thread and got butthurted because some people shared why they don't like it. THAT is what being ridiculous means.

D&D is geared towards kill-people-break-things dungeon looting at heart. Yes, you can do more with it, but the system doesn't provision for much beyond its wargaming roots.

t. cheats at arm wrestling

"I want to play a game of epic tragedies about knights at the north pole"

Polaris can do that. D&D... nope.

Actually, pure strength winds.

Source:
youtube.com/watch?v=AWvtbmL2rtQ

wins*

Haaaaaaaaaahahahahahahahahaha!

So, play fighters, thieves, rangers, with only NPC spellcasters?

Sounds like Teh Succ.

The system gives you what you need except for the role-playing; you have to provide that yourself.

>Sounds like Teh Succ.
That is because it does. D&D is not a good system for a D&D styled campaign.

I want to suck tremendous amount of cocks.
OP can do that. DnD... not.

I would try posting the same thread on Veeky Forums over and over again for years

>All editions of DnD are 3.5 or Pathfinder

People like me love DnD because you can make it anything you want. The core rules of older editions is perfect for the type of game it's supposed to be; a heavily play driven dungeon crawler. Very few if any skill checks, you only roll a few times per session and combat is meant to be a last resort, not something you do for loot and XP.

You need to at least try to understand D&D before you can make these bait threads that shit all over every single edition of DnD and claim that everyone who plays it is a normie.

That's a good thing. If the outcome of a roll is so heavily modified using mods and dice curves then there is no purpose to rolling. Flat bonuses of +5% or +20% is plenty to have a clear obvious advantage over another character, but d20 is great because it favors the underdog. It actually gives them a chance to come back and succeed.

DnD Can do all of those things and more. The rules are more then flexible enough.

It doesn't, because the picture the numbers paint is clunky, slapstick "heroic fantasy" rocketing up on a column of power inflation and the linear distributions of most rolls leads to ridiculous bungles and luckswings. A simulationist system like GURPS is more effective if you're not afraid of numbers and a narrativist system is more effective if you are; D&D only fills an unhappy medium of gamist nonsense.

>No one claims the game is perfect
Except that people do, which is what causes most of the strife that we see on the board, like that one faggot who goes on about how D&D is the best because it's popular for being popular.

I'm not OP but nice try though.

By now I'm pretty sure most of the people who defend D&D are just trolling.

>DnD Can do all of those things and more. The rules are more then flexible enough.
Maybe after adding houserules and removing everything that makes it D&D, sure you can champ.

>every is the same
>when the latest edition of D&D gives every class a selection of different subclasses to choose from

My, that's a fancy watch.

That's an odd response.

>How do you knock Dungeons & Dragons away from its ill-deserved mainstream pedestal?
Well, Pathfinder pulled it off for a while, so it's clearly possible. You just need to sink a decent amount of capital into advertising.

How do you get people to stop referring to tissues as Kleenex?

Answer: you don't. D&D was the first big RPG, therefore it will always have that brand recognition.

I mean, seriously, can you remember the name of the fourth guy on the moon without googling it? First may not be best, but they definitely are the most known.

>I want a game that can do ANYTHING at once
>Ok, here is one just change a few rules and it works great
>Wow changing the game and making it something else? Pfft what are you talking about? No I want a game that can give me all the rules i need for any conceivable game, setting, or character I am imagining, I don't want to put any work in!

>It is an inconceivably terrible system
No, it's not. It is a mediocre, but completely usable game, that is very easy for new people to pick up because it makes everything gamey, tropey, quick to pick up on and is one of the very few RPGs with an actual advertising budget.
D&D's problem is that it really only does D&D, a special breed of retards fail to recognize that, and then we have threads like this on Veeky Forums.

>just change a few rules and it works great
Getting D&D to do any of the things listed is not a matter of simplye "changing a few rules". You have to effectively rebuild the entire system. You'd actually be better off simply making your own game by then.

Haven't bother checking out the 5th edition to be honest, if that is what you are talking about. But I seriously doubt that giving the option of a few subclasses will solve the issue.

Give me exactly one example game concept and I'll prove you wrong.

D&D is not a generic system, so stop treating it like one, you stupid motherfucker.

>I seriously doubt that giving the option of a few subclasses will solve the issue.
They did it in Pathfinder as well. It didn't do shit.

Haunted mansion horror game.

>I seriously doubt that giving the option of a few subclasses will solve the issue.
You'd be right sir.

For the most part, each sub-class only offers flavortext and a handful of unique abilities but the bulk of your progression is still going to be the same shit no matter what.

Tacticool modern combat.

>I haven't bothered checking out the most recent edition
>but I'm still qualified to talk about whether or not the brand deserves its market share

For everyone of these threads I see, I'll start a new d&d campaign.

Oh look, a 4e player.

Never played 4e, try again.

>I've played extremely roleplay heavy campaigns in fucking 4e, The one everyone screams about how it's impossible to roleplay in

That was always just a meme complaint anyways.

>but I'm still qualified to talk about whether or not the brand deserves its market share
I never really said it doesn't deserve its market share. I'm just saying that new tabletop players deserve a better system that won't cripple their imagination to fit tiny outdated and pointless class templates. Market share is probably about marketing and other shit, at this point in my life I'm quite convinced of the obvious that this sort of shit is not even close to be directly related on how good a game is.

But basically, besides the point that the subclasses are probably just a tiny variation of the standard class (which is also standard as well), even if they are really different it only means that there are more classes. I used to play 3rd edition and have a bunch of different additional rulebooks with new classes, and I gotta be honest with you: more classes doesn't change shit. Basically, the issue that people still need to fit their characters into classes and end up not creating a new and interesting character but just giving a custom name for an instance of that class (which quite often not even the names are creative or decent).

Also, this two gentlemen here seems to agree with me on that one:

You play a team of Investigators. Each of you has six stats; Strength, Dexterity, Constitution, Intelligence, Wisdom, and Bravery. We'll replace Charisma with Bravery for this game because diplomacy and reaction checks aren't much of a thing in a horror game. Roll 3d6 down the line to determine your stats.

All investigations of figuring out what's going on in the mansion are player driven. You tell the DM what you're looking for and doing, and he tells you what happens. Add your stat bonuses to relevant challenges.

Every character has a primal fear, related to their weakest stat besides Bravery. Whichever stat the investigator has that is weak, roll 1d2 to determine your greatest fear.
>Str- Being buried alive, eaten alive
>Dex- Trapped in a room with rising water, falling from a great height
>Con- Wasting away from disease, Having your blood pumped out by a machine
>Int- Eldritch horrors, being mind controlled and hurting a loved one
>Wis- Being isolated from everyone, going insane

Any time you witness something scary, you roll a Saving throw. Add your Bravery modifier +7 and try to roll UNDER that number. if you succeed, nothing bad happens. If you fail, you get a fear point. The exception to this is your greatest fear, in which case you automatically lost a fear point every turn until you roll under your lowest stat + bravery bonus, trapped in that illusion or situation and can break out. Anyone who is helping you to endure that situation allows you to use their (hopefully) higher stat in that category instead.

Keep track of your fear points. If you get 7 or more, you must run from the house. If you get 10 or more (such as being trapped in a nightmare of your fear), you go insane instead and your character becomes a new house hazard.

And there you go, a little game for exploring and trying to solve the mystery for a haunted house. This system encourages you to work with teammates, and gives everyone a weakness. Perfect.

This is the issue. People treating D&D like it's a generic system when it's not, then wondering why D&D is such a shit system ( because they are using it as if it's generic ).
I want to slap people who ask "How do I run Bloodborne/Darksouls/[insert media here] in D&D?" questions.
You're fucking retarded, it doesn't work, it doesn't even fucking fit.
What part of BB makes you think "Yeah Clerics, Fighters, Wizards, Elves, Halflings, Vancian casting, noguns,inflexible action economy combat, HP inflation...perfect for a classless action game with guns,parries,healing based on aggression, lethal, and shines the best at asymmetrical 1v1 combat"

So basically all I'd have to do is make sure my bravery is the lowest stat and I don't have to worry about a primal fear?

Also, if you did have a greatest fear somehow, and your lowest stat is still bravery, would you have to roll under a target of bravery + bravery?

Also, if you experience your greatest fear...you lose fear points every round but at the same time, GAINING fear points is bad?

I mean, give me some clarification here because as it stands, I'd much rather be playing CoC if I wanted to run a campaign about a haunted house filled with existential horror.

And what about classes, spellcasting, and combat? You know, all the things that make the game D&D and clashes horribly with the horror aspect.

I introduced my players to D&D 5e first and then brought them into GURPS.

It's honestly a good introductory system just for it's relative simplicity.

In this case, you'd always generate a fear using the second lowest stat if bravery is your lowest, rolling against that stat + bravery bonus if you're trapped in that illusion or situation. You'd also *gain* fear points instead of losing them, but you already knew that based on the common sense of the game.

This is the kind of thing I'm talking about. You have a basic, functioning ruleset that works perfectly to make a haunted house game that I made in like 5 minutes or less.

Don't include those elements of DnD. That's it. Bam. You have a game. I used DnD's basic rules and made a haunted house horror game in 5 minutes. I proved you wrong.

Anyone can make unbalanced shit up and say "See? The system works for this"
What about races? He only said "haunted mansion horror game". Nothing about that implies that elves and dwarves exist. Are you going to ban non-human races? Are you going to be pedantic and say "Why do you assume they *don't* exist" like a retard and prove my point?
What about classes? What about spellcasting?
Fear is relative, how do you make sense of something like a Paladin having to make a fear saving through against a skeleton when a casual smite would obliterate it?
What about spellcasters.
What about combat? In a horror game you're not supposed to be directly fighting the things. 90% of class features have something to do with combat. Whoops, you just casually made EVERY FUCKING CLASS USELESS WHY THE FUCK ARE YOU STILL PLAYING D&D IF YOU'RE NOT GOING TO BE USING 90% OF THE RULE BOOK and in game are going to be using 90% made up houserules? At that point you're just playing a homebrew system with a few rules you ripped off from D&D.
Based on what you wrote, it seems like you're not using levels at all and every character is going to be level one. If not, then how are you going to deal with HP inflation? Are you just going to make shit up?
>If you get 10 or more (such as being trapped in a nightmare of your fear), you go insane instead and your character becomes a new house hazard.
Oh right you are, HP is entirely worthless. Why the fuck are you still using D&D if the HP rules aren't being used ( or god forbid you ARE like a retard ), the Death rules aren't being used, class rules are worthless, race rules are worthless, you just prescribed the Background so that's worthless as well.
>And there you go, a little game for exploring and trying to solve the mystery for a haunted house.
Yeah, you just made a one post homebrew for a simple horror game, not houserules for D&D.
This is why people hate D&D. The fanbase is fucking retarded.

There's unexpected and then there's bullshit. The twiggy-armed rogue beating Blast Hardcheese the barbarian at arm wrestling is just straight bullshit