Oof

What does this friend say when they are confronted with this information?

Better yet, when's the last time your party was in a large cave room, and you were being attacked by enemies shooting bows from a stone bridge above? I think more dungeons could use 3-dimensional designs like this. Zelda did it for decades, yet I don't see it too much at the table. 2/x

tangentially related, mad props for going the extra mile for hardcover - there are supplements I've flat-out said no to on the grounds that they didn't offer a hardcover option.

I feel the answers to most player and/or player character problems aren't going to be found on a character sheet. New shiny character builds rarely succeed in addressing whatever rut or issue a player or player group had. But I get that making books only for GMs doesn't sell as well

Ad&d and older was far more procedural and did not focus on earning/accumulating special class-specific actions, and definitely was NOT a "so what's your character build?" system.

If anything I'd say dnd 2014's greatest feat is in that it's designed to feel like a video game to appeal to younger folks, but absolutely gets away with it because of how they effectively tricked us into thinking it's any less of a video game-esque design than 4e is.

Optimization or no, the whole system still heavily resonates with vg design. The closest parallel is fighting games like street fighter, where folks pick their main based on their variety of normals and specials they have. PF and modern dnd were both built to appeal to this way of thinking.

this really hits the sonic hyperfixation spot for me

is g rework a thing because old kits don't have decals, or is it that some kits' decals are low quality?

what is g-rework?

Also, as a gamer cursed with having a love for several hobbies, I've found that the game occupied too much of my brainpower when it could be spent on writing new ttrpg material, or painting my gray pile of shame (warhammer)

I reached a point where's it's taking too much effort to get diminishing returns of enjoyment out of the game. And with the past two years' reduced in-universe releases, and those few releases being very gimmicky, the energy required to get excited about buying/building/playing is just gone

I think it's a great analogy but would be difficult to use in conversation since, aside from racism and sexism, there is very little consensus as to what's moldy about ttrpg's. Your moldy is another's fine cheese. Same goes for books; there are middle schoolers who love reading LotR over and over

I'm surprised you don't see the video game-ness in 5e and pf. E.g. The most popular classes and builds always seem determined by 1. How many things they can do in one round, and 2. How many different things they can choose from to do that round. I'd compare it to how ppl pick a street fighter main

Feels more like a video game to me, as if wotc was on a neverending quest to give everyone as many big action buttons to press as possible (same goes for pathfinder)