I feel like I'm holding a proper D&D product and thinking about how I would build characters with lives, rather than coming up with character concepts and trying to flesh out the details of their history afterward.
I was prepared to dislike 5th ed since I disliked most things about 3.5 and 4th was a completely different game that shouldn't have been called D&D . . .
I agree with @Quartz -- best edition since 1&2. It seems like DMs are free to experiment and I like that you can overcome challenges and earn experience points by roleplaying.
I've recently come across a Feargus Urquhart's interview where he says that tabletop game has lost its way.
"I think for Pathfinder as a whole it's going to be very interesting over the next 12 months to see what happens," the head of Obsidian told Polygon in a recent interview.
"The new version of D&D came out last year and people are thinking about what is ultimately going to happen with D&D," he said. "One of the reasons we actually went with Pathfinder was ... how do you say it? I'll just say it: We were having a hard time figuring out how to move forward with Dungeons and Dragons."
"I love Dungeons and Dragons — this isn't an arrogant thing — but I'm probably one of the people who has one of the most electronic D&D games that they've worked on," he said.
That said, when asked directly if the shift to Pathfinder is permanent, Urquhart says:
"It's hard to say, if you ask my lizard brain, I would say yes," he said. "If you ask my emotional brain, I would say I don't know.
"It's hard to move away from something you love and I love D&D. Pathfinder is an important part of the pen-and-paper role-playing world and I love working with them. They want it to succeed and it's theirs. With D&D it's a little more complicated because they have Hasbro and others involved."
"So, I think that this is the difficulty: D&D is a part of Wizards of the Coast and WotC is a part of Hasbro," he said. "Hasbro is a very big company that, let's say makes a billion dollars off of Monopoly each year, I don't know what the number is, but let's just say.
"I think whenever you have that, when you have this company which has this brand which in some weird way is comparable to this evergreen thing like Monopoly, in that it's a board game and it's sold in certain of the same places, it can be difficult.
"D&D is different, it needs a lot more support, it's community driven, it needs conventions and all of this stuff, and it's not going to make a billion dollars."
"Take Activision, they make games like Call of Duty and Destiny," he said. "They have these big tentpole things, it is very hard to then have another thing that is one one-hundredth of the magnitude of those."
"A part of me would love to see D&D be bought by someone and become what it was before," he said. "Become TSR again. TSR did other games, but D&D was their thing, their main focus.
I've worked for Paizo for over 10 years now. They definitely have their own style, and they're very small and independent compared to WotC (I've also done freelancing for WotC in my career and of course I work here now). So the two companies have incredibly different styles.
If you want to do something with Pathfinder, you can talk to Erik and Lisa and hammer something out. If you want to do something with WotC, it's a huge process. At the same time, WotC has reach and resources that Paizo simply doesn't, despite their success. I can see where Urquhart is coming from. He's not really talking about the systems themselves so much as the experience working with individual companies.
Paizo's shown that a company can focus on one system and do well with it (other companies have too, of course. Numenera is kicking ass all over the place, for instance). I don't think we'll see another TSR-style D&D company that's totally separate from Hasbro, but stranger things have happened.
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I agree with @Quartz -- best edition since 1&2. It seems like DMs are free to experiment and I like that you can overcome challenges and earn experience points by roleplaying.
"I think for Pathfinder as a whole it's going to be very interesting over the next 12 months to see what happens," the head of Obsidian told Polygon in a recent interview.
"The new version of D&D came out last year and people are thinking about what is ultimately going to happen with D&D," he said. "One of the reasons we actually went with Pathfinder was ... how do you say it? I'll just say it: We were having a hard time figuring out how to move forward with Dungeons and Dragons."
"I love Dungeons and Dragons — this isn't an arrogant thing — but I'm probably one of the people who has one of the most electronic D&D games that they've worked on," he said.
That said, when asked directly if the shift to Pathfinder is permanent, Urquhart says:
"It's hard to say, if you ask my lizard brain, I would say yes," he said. "If you ask my emotional brain, I would say I don't know.
"It's hard to move away from something you love and I love D&D. Pathfinder is an important part of the pen-and-paper role-playing world and I love working with them. They want it to succeed and it's theirs. With D&D it's a little more complicated because they have Hasbro and others involved."
"So, I think that this is the difficulty: D&D is a part of Wizards of the Coast and WotC is a part of Hasbro," he said. "Hasbro is a very big company that, let's say makes a billion dollars off of Monopoly each year, I don't know what the number is, but let's just say.
"I think whenever you have that, when you have this company which has this brand which in some weird way is comparable to this evergreen thing like Monopoly, in that it's a board game and it's sold in certain of the same places, it can be difficult.
"D&D is different, it needs a lot more support, it's community driven, it needs conventions and all of this stuff, and it's not going to make a billion dollars."
"Take Activision, they make games like Call of Duty and Destiny," he said. "They have these big tentpole things, it is very hard to then have another thing that is one one-hundredth of the magnitude of those."
"A part of me would love to see D&D be bought by someone and become what it was before," he said. "Become TSR again. TSR did other games, but D&D was their thing, their main focus.
"I think it's different now."
http://www.polygon.com/2015/2/9/8005145/why-one-of-d-ds-biggest-video-game-devs-thinks-that-tabletop-game-has
I've worked for Paizo for over 10 years now. They definitely have their own style, and they're very small and independent compared to WotC (I've also done freelancing for WotC in my career and of course I work here now). So the two companies have incredibly different styles.
If you want to do something with Pathfinder, you can talk to Erik and Lisa and hammer something out. If you want to do something with WotC, it's a huge process. At the same time, WotC has reach and resources that Paizo simply doesn't, despite their success. I can see where Urquhart is coming from. He's not really talking about the systems themselves so much as the experience working with individual companies.
Paizo's shown that a company can focus on one system and do well with it (other companies have too, of course. Numenera is kicking ass all over the place, for instance). I don't think we'll see another TSR-style D&D company that's totally separate from Hasbro, but stranger things have happened.