Tuesday, May 27, 2014

Wizards of the Coast Raises the Bar.


Wizards of the Coast has just upped the ante on everybody. They're giving away the new version of Basic D&D for 5e for free. This PDF is designed to be a modern corollary for the seminal D&D Rules Cyclopedia that so many people view as the greatest version of the game. 

That's right, they're so confident that you're going to love the new D&D that they're giving it away for free.  Oh, and and they're going to keep giving you PDF updates that will make the Basic D&D game compatible with the major events.



16 comments:

  1. Uh, WOW. Did NOT see that coming.

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    1. I don't know that anybody did. It's really quite amazing!

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  2. The OSR has taught the Wizards of the Coast how to do it right.

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    1. That may be true. They had already released free versions of the game through their SRDs during 2000 - which Pathfinder has copied - but releasing something like this is much closer to what Swords and Wizardry did. That's pretty cool.

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  3. This is awesome news! Of course, anyone who's halfway interested and downloads the Basic Set, and gets hooked, will have to move on to the PHB, etc. Brilliant marketing on their part.

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    1. I totally agree. It's a really smart move that holds the potential to make this version of the game something really special!

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  4. Ok, now I'll give it the time of day.

    Worth it for free.

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    1. :)

      My wife told me that if I hadn't already been interested in the new system that this would have gotten me to try it out. I'm a cheap bastard. :P

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    2. I'll be honest, my interest is still purely academic curiosity. I want to see it and read it so I can understand what people are talking about in a conversation on the subject. That and to maintain my, 'I've read/played/run practically every game ever made', reputation. ;)

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    3. I wish I could grok as many systems as you've been able to absorb. Some just don't jive with my delicate sensibilities. ;P

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    4. Just 'cause I've 'played'em all', doesn't mean I love'em all.

      At the same, I tend attribute my love of multiple systems to my feeling that no game is perfect for everything. That and I never became super enamored by the way D&D does...pretty much anything. ;)

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    5. I can dig that. It's similar to how I don't like the Storyteller system - sometimes games just don't work for you.

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  5. I’m of three minds about this:

    1. Great!

    2. Of course. To those of us who know about all the great free RPGs (even ones not derived from the d20 SRD), it almost seems like they have to do this. Almost.

    3. I’m reserving judgement until I see it. It sounds good, but let’s see what they actually deliver.

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    1. Hey Robert, have you played any of the playtest iterations? The reason I'm asking is because they brought me back into gaming after 15 years or so. I left shortly after 3rd edition came out, and never gave it a second thought with 4th. But this edition, if they stay relatively true to the last playtest documents, is a really good system.

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    2. Yes, I was in the playtest. Like pretty much every D&D variant I’ve tried, I still prefer B/X.

      I’ll be judging 5e mostly by this criterion: If I were a new to RPGs today, would this help get me into the hobby or turn me away.

      Because I already have lots of games I like and lots more that I’d like to try. But, as much as I try to expose as many people as possible to my hobby, I can only reach a tiny fraction of what the D&D brand can. And I hate thinking that there’s a kid like me out there who would get as much from this hobby as I have, but who would never find it.

      And I’m not convinced Wizards has yet put out a product that meets that criterion. (Except for the actual B/X books that they thankfully are selling as PDFs at last.)

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    3. It hard to say at this point if they have or haven't. We don't actually have any of the new edition's final products so we can't judge them. That said, none of the stuff from Third or Fourth would meet your criteria.

      I wonder if any of it from Fifth will?

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