Friday, January 21, 2011

Did WotC fart or something?

About the big to-do around the blogs this past week.

Since WotC pulled their pdfs, I'm no longer giving them any of my money.

If I were in the States with easy access to second-hand WotC minis, I'd likely have picked up plenty, but I'm not, so I didn't.  Still not giving any of my money directly to WotC if I had.  And since they're discontinuing the minis line, I won't be giving them any of my money that way in the future.

If I play any of WotC's RPGs (and yes, I did have fun playing Gamma World the other day, thank you very much) friends have bought the rules, not me.

I'm playing D&D, but the version I purchased 26 years ago (plus my own house rules, of course). 

I've always been pretty good about putting together gaming groups, or getting into ones that already existed.

So all the speculation about WotC D&D dying, or Pathfinder taking over as the 800lb. gorilla (not playing that one, either), being good for the hobby, being bad for the hobby, being good for the industry, being bad for the industry, whatever, doesn't really affect me one way or the other.

The only thing keeping me from gaming at the moment are time constraints.  And so I don't waste any time worrying about the 'health' of the industry, or moves by the big corporations in it.  I may have some opinions about what they do, and ideas for what I'd like them to do.  But the goings-on within the industry give me no reason to lose any sleep, or gnash my teeth, or anything like that.

I'm a selfish gamer, but as long as my personal gaming is good, that's all that matters to me.

6 comments:

  1. I'm generally of the same opinion but occasionally I think about the next generation of players. Then I think, man, I'd like to preserve the "old school" way of playing. Then I think "How ridiculous!" and I go back to whatever I was doing. Until a week or month later when the cycle begins again. {shrug} I can't fully explain the reason for this. Maybe it's the fear of death (or at least of old age) transferred. :)

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  2. I think Ze Bulette's comments mirror my own. I don't really care what happens to WOTC, or even D&D, to some extent, but it would be a shame, I think, that future generations would never know it.

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  3. I just got around to picking up my first 4E books and I mostly like what they are doing with Gamma World at this point. That said, I doubt I'd shed a tear if they took a dirt nap tomorrow. Prior to the last month or so I had got along just fine for years without buying anything from WotC.

    My only concern is that they could potentially do something crazy like transitioning everything but a few core books over to DDI. I think I'd rather see D&D go away than become 90% digital content that requires a subscription.

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  4. Man, I nailed the title on this post. Less than a day old, and it's already on the top 5 viewed posts I've made this month.

    As for the next generation, I'm not too worried about them, actually. And we've actually got Mr. Ryan Dancey to thank for that. Because of the OGL and SRDs being out there in perpetuity, our kids will have access to one form of the game or another. It may not legally be able to call itself D&D, but it'll be D&D.

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  5. I lose a lot of sleep with all these upheavals and tribulations in the industry. I fret ceaslessly over who is going to control my gamer fate.

    OK, seriously, I really don't care much. I think the OSR has met all my gaming needs. Even if there wasn't an OSR, WotC tanked and the sun blew up, I'd just make my own stuff anyway. Well, I guess if the sun blows up I wouldn't be much in the mood for gaming, but well, you get the point...

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