*Cue Prince telling me why that doesn't count*
Prediction of your opponent doesn't work rhetorically if you predict you are going to lose DP.
Initial Quote (note open question):
What I want to know is why 2e modules were so fucking horrible (excl. B. Cordell). Railroadery? Yes. Boring? Yes. There was also something about 2e Reinassance Faire D&D that made it all feel like a theme park. Lamps with continual light. Magic item shops. Effects explained in terms of crunch and magic spells. It didn't feel shall we say...fantastical?
Expansion with example to underly reasoning. Note use of the phrase "for me." indicating personal opinion.
Grimdark is one side of the coin, like LOW fantasy, but it doesn't work with High fantasy with a capitol H either which is the other side, with magic item shoppes in the middle. In high fantasy everything is mythic and powerful and mysterious and the problem with streets lit by continual light and magic item shoppes is that it takes something wonderful, magic, and turns it into something mundane and everyday. I would accept it if you include it into some sort of super-magic hyper-civilization where it would only make sense but there's something about having a magic item shoppe in an otherwise mundane medieval village that takes away from the quality of the adventure from me. What if instead of shoppes they were vending machines that you could just put your gemstones in and they would dispense magic+1 swords? I'm cool with visiting some dwarves or wizards and getting yourself a mythril platemail forged if you kill the Dragon that destroyed their old city but there's something about the banality of buying magic items that strips them of wonder.
Expansion/Refinement of initial statement, noting point well made.
Totally (and also Ebberon I think, which I didn't hate, though Goodman's Morningstar was a better take on the same concept). But can you see how having a situation where A) magic is commonplace in a really boring way where you and your opponents use the same magic system B) that magic system is so familiar and predictable it is used for common household applications and C) monsters are so commonplace cities have standardized countermeasures against them D) adventurers are not pioneers and renegades but all part of a mercantile guild with rules etc. etc. etc. leads to a game that has less magic and mystery in it? I bring up magic item shoppes and continual light streets because it is an emblematic example of a way of treating the supernatural as commonplace and mundane in a campaign setting. There's no reason you can't compensate for this in other areas, as you have pointed out.
Request for elaboration after unqualified claim.
The two are distinct. One means its all curiosities (i.e. distinct). The other affects gameplay (i.e. lost technology). One works better then the other, as the default. You can say both versions work but you gotta show how.
Clarification.
The original complaint was, specifically, that 2e adventures sucked and one of those reasons was that in said modules magic was often treated as a commodity akin to modern technology, bleached of wonder. You clearly don't disagree.
Oh sorry I couldn't see any example of any of your empty claims in this but I've gathered them all together so it should be easy for you to showcase where I messed up.
In a supremely ironic twist, you have shifted your own goalposts away from your initial point of
'No it is you that hath shifted." I pointed out you went from literal definition to historical context in one post.
You've shifted your goalposts so much that you went from loving 2e to hating it over the course of this discussion! I doubt you'd ever admit what you've done though... You'll just find some new attack vector against me, probably by pointing out how something I wrote a month ago doesn't match up with something I wrote today and so therefore I'm a troll.
It doesn't take nearly as much effort as that. I love 2e. I pointed out I love it, I love Dark Sun. I said
many of the adventures sucked DP. You'd know that if you read. I'll quote it again I don't mind.
What I want to know is why 2e modules were so fucking horrible (excl. B. Cordell). Railroadery? Yes. Boring? Yes. There was also something about 2e Reinassance Faire D&D that made it all feel like a theme park. Lamps with continual light. Magic item shops. Effects explained in terms of crunch and magic spells. It didn't feel shall we say...fantastical?
See. I even reprimanded
@squeen for bashing Dark Sun (playfully, have your own opinion, I don't care).
Do you even know what the initial point of this thread was?
Psssst. DP. The term is satire, riffing off your post. There's people here that love 2e and people that don't. They are discussing why and why not.
Yeah, I'm the one guy who shifted the goalposts. /sarcasm
Well shucks. An entirely baseless claim. Your move darling. Feel free to point to anything I have gathered. I've compiled it nice and easy.
Where's your proof of that statement? How do you know that the common availability/banality of magic is the problem? Did you poll every single person who didn't buy into 2e? Did you talk to a old TSR staff and ask "hey, why did 2e do so poorly?"
Again, you just don't have reading comprehension. I was correct in pointing out the initial point was other then you presented it to be.
What title do you want? I am considering Village Idiot but Lightning Rod of Controversy might be more fitting.
