The state of Post-OSR content

robertsconley said:
Thanks for the shout-out. I hope it is received well. Rewriting and editing my old posts into a single book allowed me to make the whole thing flow a lot better than the original.

It is by far the most popular post on my blog. Despite the first one being up since 2009, it still gets thousands of views per year.
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I need to finish my darn launch page this weekend...we got one rolling out soon too for 3 winter-themed adventures rolled into one. Yours sounds interesting Robert! Looking forward to it.
 
Beoric said:
On the demise of adventure designing in general, The Alexandrian's recent post is withering.
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Heh. Maybe I shouldn't, but I do love a good WotC takedown. I'll check it out.

The version of Lost Mine of Phandelver found in The Shattered Obelisk is largely identical to the original, and it therefore remains a good Tier 1 campaign… mostly. The problem is that the designers have, in fact, made a bunch of minor changes, and, as far as I can tell, every single one of them makes the adventure worse.

Imagine you’re looking at Michelangelo’s David, but somebody has decided it would look better if they spraypainted some random graffiti on it. Fundamentally, it’s still Michelangelo’s David. It’s a masterpiece. But the graffiti seems problematic, right?
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This is gonna be good.

It's not just the pure schadenfreude either. I learn more from a combination of negative and positive examples than just from positive examples; I hope I would be gracious about a takedown of my own writing as well. (I might not agree with all of it, because maybe we have different design goals, but I would probably agree with and learn from at least some of it.)
 
Hemlock said:
The version of Lost Mine of Phandelver found in The Shattered Obelisk is largely identical to the original, and it therefore remains a good Tier 1 campaign… mostly. The problem is that the designers have, in fact, made a bunch of minor changes, and, as far as I can tell, every single one of them makes the adventure worse.

Imagine you’re looking at Michelangelo’s David, but somebody has decided it would look better if they spraypainted some random graffiti on it. Fundamentally, it’s still Michelangelo’s David. It’s a masterpiece. But the graffiti seems problematic, right?
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This is how I feel about the Goodman Games additions to B1.
 
Not numbering your maps is ridiculous.

I'm also not a fan of cartographers who choose to eschew a grid; like scale is a crude impediment to the theatre of the mind or something...
Unfortunately, my much-beloved Planescape is frequently guilty of that particular sin.
 
Looks like WotC is close to hitting rock-bottom. They have totally lost the plot. Time for a "renaissance" to remember what was lost? Each generation must rediscover truth.
 
squeen said:
Looks like WotC is close to hitting rock-bottom. They have totally lost the plot. Time for a "renaissance" to remember what was lost? Each generation must rediscover truth.
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[thinks] I honestly dunno. I've been rereading Crossing the Chasm lately and one thing that strikes me is that in a lot of ways, neo-trad "Critical Role"-type players/DMs and classic/OSR players/GMs are really different markets, and they don't rely on each other for references. A neo-trad DM can make a post (
https://www.reddit.com/r/dndmemes/comments/126204y
) that bashes Arbiter of Worlds while recommending The Lazy Dungeon Master, and all it does to me is make me want to read Arbiter of Worlds more (since I know I disagree with The Lazy Dungeon Master's approach).

Since WotC is basically run by neo-trads, I wouldn't count on a renaissance coming from them. More likely they'll drop classic elements entirely: instead of doing a better job creating keyed dungeons, they may ask themselves, "if we don't need keys, do we even really need maps?" A market won't go unserved forever, so this doesn't mean there won't be a renaissance in another quarter--arguably it's happening already in the ACKS community, which is very big on simulationism--but it may look like fragmentation.

Side note: the ACKS community is also very big on VTT support and has a lot of guys interested in CRPGs and ACKS roguelikes, so... I see a lot of growth potential in the simulationist/ACKS market segment because they're not necessarily bottlenecked by word-of-mouth from existing GMs/Judges.
 
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Hemlock said:
Since WotC is basically run by neo-trads, I wouldn't count on a renaissance coming from them. More likely they'll drop classic elements entirely: instead of doing a better job creating keyed dungeons, they may ask themselves, "if we don't need keys, do we even really need maps?"
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Given that having a map doesn't hurt Trads, and it is essential for Classic/OSR, does it make sense to make products that can't be used by both communities? As someone who converts Trad-heavy modules for my Classic home game from time to time, I really don't think it would be that hard to make products that cater to both.
 
Hemlock said:
A neo-trad DM can make a post ( https://www.reddit.com/r/dndmemes/comments/126204y ) that bashes Arbiter of Worlds while recommending The Lazy Dungeon Master, and all it does to me is make me want to read Arbiter of Worlds more (since I know I disagree with The Lazy Dungeon Master's approach).
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Oh yikes. I wish you hadn't sent me down that rabbit hole.

Milo, eh?... 😬

yeah, no

fuckit, ACKS is still very cool. hatetheartistnottheart hatetheartistnottheart hatethe...
 
Cancel culture was/is the Salem Witch Trials of the past decade. Youth seizing power via social media. Targets were both the living and dead. Total poison to society.
 
Beoric said:
Given that having a map doesn't hurt Trads, and it is essential for Classic/OSR, does it make sense to make products that can't be used by both communities? As someone who converts Trad-heavy modules for my Classic home game from time to time, I really don't think it would be that hard to make products that cater to both.
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It would be difficult for me to respond to this in detail without saying negative things about a certain game company, which I'm trying to stop doing, so: you're right. It is very possible once you decide to do it.
 
The1True said:
Oh yikes. I wish you hadn't sent me down that rabbit hole.

Milo, eh?... 😬
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Not even Milo, not really. Reading between the lines, Alex Macris (the ACKS guy) appears to have nothing good to say about Milo. Here's a quote:

I was hired in April 2017 by the investors creating MILO Inc. to manage the business operations of the start-up they were building. The investors hired me because I had previously run a $20M business division for Defy Media and they were aware of my libertarian leanings; however, I had not had any prior dealings with them nor have I had any since. While I was given the title CEO, it would be more accurate to describe me as CFO, as I did not have operational or editorial control. The stated objective of the business was for Milo to become a mainstream "right-wing Bill Maher," with the same sort of libertarian comedic-political commentary that Maher popularized with "Politically Incorrect."

This effort was, obviously, unsuccessful.

Despite many allegations to the contrary, I was never an investor or financier of Milo or MILO Inc, nor was I ever involved in any way in organizing, funding, or running his "Dangerous --------" tour. I was an employee under contract with MILO Inc. for 12 months, from April 2017 to April 2018. During that period, the company published the books "Dangerous" and "Fatwah," and attempted (but failed) to run a Free Speech Week with the Berkeley College Republicans.

Over the course of my tenure, Milo and I had many sharp disagreements about many issues that resulted in acrimony. I resigned at the end of my employment contract, waiving my severance pay and returning my equity. I remain under non-disclosure agreements so I can not and will not comment further.
 
Beoric said:
Apropos of nothing, it is more than a year since we last saw Prince here.
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This discussion is definitely inviting the hammer. It's been pretty civilized so far though... But yeah, maybe back to our regularly scheduled dnd...

squeen said:
Cancel culture was/is the Salem Witch Trials of the past decade. Youth seizing power via social media. Targets were both the living and dead. Total poison to society.
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dammit Squeen!
No but seriously, you're not going to get me on this. Some truly shitty people got what they deserved at the beginning of this, but yes, like every marginalized group who has been picked on for centuries but finally gained the upper hand, these people have turned into the monsters they purport to despise.

Wait, we're still talking about students and gamers right? 😬

Aaaaaanyhoo. Assumedly, culture will (over)correct sooner or later. As I've said before, I'm just glad my favourite game is still relevant and not a dusty old relic from the 70's like you and I.
 
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