A different Dungeons and Dragons 4th Edition

Let's say, when 4th edition D&D was being planned, instead of doing the work in house, they decided to let the company that they had been subcontracting Dungeon and Dragon magazines to (Paizo) take lead and do all the work for.
 
Well the obvious answer is that TTL version of 4th edition would essentially be Pathfinder but I don't know enough about the design phase of that game to know if they would have stayed so closely to 3.5 without 4th edition going off in a very different direction.

I have to admit I'd probably have left D&D entirely if this happened - I already felt 3.5 was too crunchy and obsessively focused on character optimisation and Pathfinder presses that even further.
 
Well the obvious answer is that TTL version of 4th edition would essentially be Pathfinder but I don't know enough about the design phase of that game to know if they would have stayed so closely to 3.5 without 4th edition going off in a very different direction.

I have to admit I'd probably have left D&D entirely if this happened - I already felt 3.5 was too crunchy and obsessively focused on character optimisation and Pathfinder presses that even further.

Having studied both, I feel safe in saying that Pathfinder is significantly less twinky than 3.5. Not nearly as much splatbook and prestige class nonsense.
 
of course, every version after 2E was an abomination, so it would still be horrible... :p

I long for the days of 2E. I stopped playing for years when it was still 2E. When I came back it was on 3E, so I bought some of that stuff but didn't really play. Then it was 3.5E, so I bought some of that, but never really played. After that I ignored it completely.

However, a year or so ago, I found Pathfinder and am playing that now. It's far from perfect, but it's pretty good.

Honestly, if someone pushed an RPGA Living City-like campaign for 2E (or even advanced or basic) that was popular enough to find games for, I'd switch in a heartbeat.

To answer the original question, if Paizo does it, then presumably it's Pathfinder or something real close.
 
I'm not well-up on internal policies at Wizards or Paizo, but just going by how dramatic the changes from 2E to 3E, 3.5 to 4th, and 4th to 5th were, I kind of have a hard time believing that Paizo would content itself with changes as minor as those from 3.5 to OTL Pathfinder would be.
 
I long for the days of 2E. I stopped playing for years when it was still 2E.
to be honest, from what I remember about 2E days, it was indeed a glorious game... for the first half of it's life. Lots of new settings, new books, new kits, etc. But the second half of it's life, it just got to be too much... too many settings, too many books, too many variant rules, etc. Considering how TSR declined in that second half, it's not really surprising that WOTC decided to revamp the line. That said, I was really not impressed with 3E; never did look at any of the later stuff...
 
Paizo did Pathfinder precisely because 4E came out as it did. They saw a huge market for a tweaked 3.5 as people didn't like the direction of 4E and capitalized on it.

My opinion is if Paizo were to make 4E, it would look more like OTL 5E.
 
4e would probably not end up being quite so divisive among the fanbase in that case.

I quite agree with what Dave Howery said regarding 2e - it was and is my preference.
 
to be honest, from what I remember about 2E days, it was indeed a glorious game... for the first half of it's life. Lots of new settings, new books, new kits, etc. But the second half of it's life, it just got to be too much... too many settings, too many books, too many variant rules, etc. Considering how TSR declined in that second half, it's not really surprising that WOTC decided to revamp the line. That said, I was really not impressed with 3E; never did look at any of the later stuff...

You're right that they did come out with a lot of books and such (warrior book, monk book, etc), but even those were generally fairly reasonable -- more background and explanation than a million new classes, skills, and such. Compared to the number, and cost, of books that continually flow out for D&D 5E and Pathfinder, they were downright modest.

Among others, I still have (and love) the 2E expansion book on building castles -- it was awesome.
 
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