Why I don't like Dungeons & Dragons

[Cluedrew]

OK, maybe it should be the things I don't like about Dungeons & Dragons. On the whole I still have a positive opinion of Dungeons & Dragons, but it has its problems. I have managed to create a list of five flaws that I feel are present in Dungeons & Dragons. These flaws are present in all the editions I have seen but at the same time you may not think they are flaws.

Now in ascending order:

5. Magic
I don't like D&D's magic. It is not a generic magic, spell preparation is not a very common feature of many representations of magic. Yet, it manages to be almost flavourless. Yes there are spell components and spells require gestures and words. But that's it, there is no real explanation, not even the briefest view of how this is supposed to work. No true names, no contact with spirits, just stand over there move your hands and things happen.

4. Levels
Not that growing and strengthening is a problem, but it actually creates a problem that the only way that a character can grow it up. People have actually made "mods" for this, so I don't think I am alone. But if the characters grow up and sometimes I just want to be at a particular power level, or just grow at a rate different from the one given by XP.

3. Non-combat
You can divide D&D into its combat and non-combat portions. And if you sum-up all the non-combat portions of the game it still doesn't measure up to the combat portion. These really need some love and attention. They are often underdeveloped (most boil down to a role). Social mechanics in particular suffer for this.

2. Pacing
This in a way is actually number one, because I just don't have the time for a D&D style combat. A single turn of combat in D&D's takes about as long as the combat in the systems I play now (in my experience). Character creation is also has this problem, but I think you get a better return on that then combat.

1. Wargame//RPG
This is not a problem on its own, but I feel it is the source of 2 & 3, a definite contributing factor to 5 and related to 4. So I think it should be mentioned. Historically D&D grew out of a table-top wargame and I think it held onto that a bit too much. So it is a mix of the two types of games and it if you try to play it for only one of the two, the game suffers for it. Even beyond that I am interested in both, but it often doesn't provide enough of either.

So these the things I don't like about Dungeons & Dragons.

[nrg89]

I don't like that the game is extremely hard to teach to new players, the things you mentioned are definitely stuff I don't like to teach either, but the thing I don't like is feats. If it's supposed to be accessible for new players it's a monumental failure. Right at character creation you scare the bejesus out of your players by presenting them with 30 different choices, some of which will have ramifications for the next ten levels.

Spells get a groan from the DM everytime, especially at higher levels, but feats you just can't avoid; your player will interact with them. And most of them are not very flavorful and they're an early signal for players that D&D can be played as a math problem.

[SimonMoon6]

I agree with most of the comments in the first post. I'll add one more thing I don't like: alignments. It's a strange arbitrary way to suggest a character's personality and it easily enables racist attitudes, since "those guys" are "always evil". And don't forget first edition's "alignment languages". What the heck was the reasoning behind those?

I don't like magic for the stated reasons and also how daunting it can be to a new player. "Okay, you're a wizard. Now pick which spell you want to cast today out of the following list of 58 spells. And make sure to change that choice based on what the particular adventure is". And that makes it seem like spellcasters are the most difficult classes to play, but they're not since if they choose a spell badly one day, they choose something better the next day. Whereas, if a new player wants to be a fighter, unless he's playing 1st edition, he has lots of choices that will have a permanent impact on his character. He might ruin his character with his first level choices and that's terrible! And that's a reason not to like the character creation system whose stated goal is to "reward system mastery" but I see that as "punish newbies".

I hate levels on many, um, levels. I could write an essay (and actually I've started one). Character progression is fine, but radical progression is terrible. Going from wimp to god in only one year of playing is unacceptable to me. Suddenly, the adventures that were challenges for you are adventures you wouldn't waste time on any more because they're so trivially easy.

Non-combat can be really interesting in other games. But with D&D skills tied to character level, things get weird. And don't get me started on Profession or Crafting skills. You can't paint a valuable painting unless you have valuable ingredients (expensive paints and canvas?).

[erikun]

D&D Magic is interesting, and I suspect that it is a love-it-or-hate-it situation. There aren't really any other systems which use something similar. Part of the point is no doubt to make the magic system feel strange and unusual - to feel like some sort of magic, as opposed to just being a skill like climbing but with spitting fire out of your hands. Magic and spells and spell slots always appeared to me to represent the way that Wizards were supposed to operate: using their INT to determine what they would need for the upcoming day.

It's not necessarily a magic system which I prefer, but I can certainly see where it makes sense.

Levels... were always a shorthand for character progression. Classes, too. One of the things that I didn't like about D&D3e is how much it took a relatively simple idea (pick a class, you have these powers, you get these powers after 2000 XP) and turned it into a massively complicated exercise. I've heard of some systems which keep the complexity but streamline it - I believe a version of RuneQuest had you select the skills which a character would "train" during a level, and they gained the skill points upon leveling up - but for the most part, it was a simple and straightforward system which I felt became needlessly complicated in later editions.

On the one hand, having no rules for out of combat situations is nice because it basically forces players to roleplay a bit. If they have an item they want to sell to a merchant and they don't have anything to roll, they're forced to just talk and roleplay it out. Some groups were fine with not discussing much and just wanting to sell it, which is perfectly fine. Some groups wanted to haggle and include plot hooks, which is perfectly fine. In other games with good rules, this wasn't much of a problem either. If you group wanted to ignore the rules and just roleplay, fine. If the group wanted to follow the mechanics, there was a working system there.

I found that including poor rules for non-combat situations tended to mess the entire process up, though. Players wanted to roll their Appraise skill or whatever else to get a discount, because the Diplomacy skill says 15+ makes a NPC friendly and some other page of the book says that friendly NPCs grant a 10% discount, etc. Which is fine, you can still do that and have the good NPC roleplay dialogue (if you want), but there was just so many minor details to remember there and so many attempts at prestige classes to goof around with the system. And, what's worst, is that if a player jumped into a prestige class which specifically allowed for an unusual situation in a non-combat roll, then you can't exactly invalidate the whole thing by ab-libing the scene...

I've actually played enough non-D&D games with terrible combat pacing that I don't really find D&D that unusual. Sure, the combat runs overly long and there are too many fiddly bits, but it is hardly such a monstrosity when I've seen what else is out there.

And I don't like alignment. I feel it is intended as a roleplay tool, and a simple "what would this character do?" guide for people who don't have a good idea of what the character they are running might do. But so much advice has muddled the meaning and so many people attempt to ham-fist characters with it that I'd just prefer to throw the whole thing out. We don't even have a clear definition of a lot of alignments anymore.

[BayardSPSR]

OK, maybe it should be the things I don't like about Dungeons & Dragons.

...

So these the things I don't like about Dungeons & Dragons.

I concur with those points, non-exclusively, with the added note that disliking something doesn't mean other people are wrong to like it. For me, every edition of D&D I've interacted with places player time and effort on things that I'm usually not interested in, and quickly abstracts through the things that I want to linger on. For many people this isn't the case, of course.

[Honest Tiefling]

I get the feeling that many people who actually do like DnD actually have issues with these and try to fix them a lot. I don't think they are bad points at all.

[BayardSPSR]

I get the feeling that many people who actually do like DnD actually have issues with these and try to fix them a lot. I don't think they are bad points at all.

I'd argue that the whole genre of "fantasy heartbreakers" exists because of (mostly) D&D players who want something better for their group/individual preferences/styles.

[2D8HP]

Before I list what I don't like, I will say that despite its problems D&D remains the most fun game I've actually played, and:

You may change it around a a little bit , but for me as long as the game features a Dragon sitting on a pile of treasure, in a Dungeon and you play a Wizard with a magic wand, or a Warrior in armor, wielding a longbow, just like the picture on the box I picked up in 1978, whatever the edition, I want to play that game!

Since they're different D&D's I'll make different lists.

1977 Basic set:
1) I remember at the age of ten that I felt the need to read the 48 page rulebook three times before I felt "I got it" (but since I was under the "recommended age" anyway, I may have well have been too young for it).
2) The game only went to 3rd level, so even though there was a Red Dragon in the monster list (and on the cover illustration), any PC you made with those rules would not be a "Dragonslayer", but would instead be a"slain by Dragon"!
3) In fact, while it could have been fixed by a better DM, and maybe what are in retrospect obvious house rules, in what seemed like "the right way" to play the game, almost none of the PC's would survive First Level.
4) The "In Search of the Unknown" adventure that came with the box, was definitely a "fill in the blanks" module, and couldn't just be an "open and run" adventure, which annoyed me at the time.
5) How feeble magic users were at first level (in retrospect we should have just started classes at different levels, but that seemed like "cheating").

oD&D plus:
1) It just really needed an editor! Very unclearly written, and spread over so many books and magazine articles.
2) Some of the books my DM used were already hard to find in the late 1970's, and I never did get them all!
3) What can I say? No game will ever seem as cool as those long ago games, so it set a standard that I'll never be able to match!

1970's AD&D
1) Except for having rules for higher levels, it really didn't fix what seemed the main "problem" of Basic D&D, i.e.your First Level PC wouldn't probably survive!
2) Unlike Basic, I never could memorize all the rules, they were just too many of them!
I would never be "Advanced" enough.
3) The "sample" Dungeon in the DMG only detailed part of the map (almost the exact same map is in the 5e DMG)!
4) At the time, it bothered me that it wasn't as "realistic" as Runequest or MERP/Rolemaster (I don't care now).
5) While I still prefered to play D&D, early 80's Call of Cthullu, proved to be much easier to GM.

1985's "Unearthed Arcana":
1) After the initial excitement of the "Barbarian" and "Cavalier" classes, I realized what an unbalanced rule changing mess it made of the game, that it was Gygax himself who mangled up his own game so much just made it more bitter.
2) After "UA", I just couldn't find anyone else who still wanted to play D&D for decades. Tables were open for other RPG's, but they were never as much fun.

2e AD&D:
1) I foolishly skipped 2e thinking it would be more of the same as "Unearthed Arcana", also the artwork turned me off ( just say no to helmet horns!).
2) When it was the current edition "back in the day", I couldn't find any tables that still wanted to play D&D!

Post '70's TSR B/X, BECMI, RC, etc:
1) Race as Class.
2) That it was a seperate game.
When these rules came out in the 1980's and 90's, I already had a large collection of 1970's rules, so I never bought any of these rules until this year when I picked up from Half Priced Books 1994's "The Classic Dungeons and Dragons Game Rules and Adventures Book", which except for bringing back the "race as a class rules" (no Elf Thieves), that was changed in 1975's "Greyhawk" supplement, it largely looks to be the same game as mid 1970's D&D.
In looking at it I can't help be regret the existence of my beloved Advanced Dungeons and Dragons, which was a completely different game!

"No royalties for you Arneson! Mine all Mine! Bwahahaha!
Wait, what's that Blume?"

It would have been better had they kept it the '77 "Basic" game with "options", no separate "Advanced" game.
All those years of my only playing the "Advanced" version of D&D now seem silly snd stupid.

3e:
1) That soon after I bought it first 3.5 then 4e come out. For more then a decade Half Priced Books has had on their shelves copies of the 3e PHB that are priced much cheaper than what I paid for it, as no one wants an "obsolete" game. Darn you to heck WotC for rolling out so many "editions"!
2) The oversized mess it became (just say no to infinite "feats" and "prestige classes)! 3) How quickly the characters became unhumanly "epic".
4) Two weapon wielding Rangers, that's not Aragorn!

3.5, Pathfinder, and 4e:
1) Just no.
Too much.
Too soon.
PAY ME BACK FOR BUYING 3e FIRST!

5e:
1) Just like AD&D they're just too many rules for me to memorize (if I only use the free online "Basic" Rules, and only some of the PHB that's less of a problem).
2) While not to the same extent, most of what I didn't like about 3e is still true about 5e. Too many rules, too powerful PC's, too many options.

While I've had "hella" fun playing 5e, it is not the perfect edition of D&D for me, because that edition probably doesn't exist.
My ideal form of D&D would:
1) Be as easy to learn and to create PC's as the 1977 "Basic" D&D rules were.
2) Have as quick flowing combat as 5e has.
3) The ability to make special "snowflake" PC's like 3.x D&D.
4) Feel as intuitive to GM as early 1980's "Call of Cthullu".
5) Have a "Ranger" class as awesome as the1e AD&D Ranger was.
Since "perfect" D&D doesn't exist, the free 5e Basic Rules plus some of the extra rules in the PHB is "close enough for government work", and plenty fun for me.

From the 1977 Holmes "Basic" rules, I miss:
Being able to know all the rules. How enchanting the box illustration looked. How quickly characters could be created.

From the 1974 to 1977 OD&D rules and supplements I miss:
The charm of a creation of "amateurs" (done for love), not "professionals" (done for money). "Guidelines" rather than "rules" (5e kind of brings this back).

From 1e AD&D I miss:
The authorial voice. How completely awesome 1e Rangers were!
That the characters stayed human scale longer (not quickly becoming comic book style superheroes). How "Appendix N" and "Deities and Demigods" inspired my reading.
How gratifying it was when PC's survived a session!

3e, what I miss:
The initial excitement of the diversity of characters that could be created.
That they brought back the Greyhawk setting!

What a like about all WotC D&D's, and Pathfinder:
That more classes are viable and can survive First Level!

[Cluedrew]

I concur with those points, non-exclusively, with the added note that disliking something doesn't mean other people are wrong to like it.

No (or is it yes...), ultimately all of these problems are subjective. I mean I could define a set of criteria by which these are objective flaws, but those criteria would themselves be subjective. Take flaw #1, Wargame//RPG as an example. If one could define platonic role-playing game being part war game would probably keep D&D from reaching that. But at the same time a lot of people enjoy the little bit of wargame thrown in.

On Alignment: A couple of people (or just SimonMoon6) mentioned alignment. Alignment didn't make it on this list because I have seen it done well and in those cases it works quite well. If you are wondering those are the cases where it is a descriptive approximation. It can be miss used, but it is not often enough. Plus I have never had any use alignment as an excuse/straight jacket experiences.

To 2D8HP: That is quite a list.

[2D8HP]

To 2D8HP: That is quite a list.

To Cluedrew,
Yeah I do ramble and go on long tirades!
The most important part was about the game as it was in 1978, just before the AD&D PHB:

oD&D plus:
1) It just really needed an editor! Very unclearly written, and spread over so many books and magazine articles.
2) Some of the books my DM used were already hard to find in the late 1970's, and I never did get them all!
3) What can I say? No game will ever seem as cool as those long ago games, so it set a standard that I'll never be able to match!

And that's just it, D&D should mostly be like oD&D but as well edited, and as clearly written as 5e, with some of the rule changes that 5e has (but not all). All the other editions should not exist!

There should only be three editions.
1) oD&D with the supplements and magazine articles that led to AD&D (you have to start somewhere).
2) The 1977 Basic set (not perfect, but still a treasure).
3) The ideal perfect form of D&D that will probably never exist.

If they publish a 6e within a decade from now, with so many editions poppin' out so soon after each other, I don't care if it's a little better, IT BETTER BE PERFECT!

While I am very much grateful that with 5e, for the first time in decades, I have been finally able to find other people willing to play a game called "Dungeons & Dragons, I pretty much feel that for the most part, over the last decades the changes have been:
TOO MANY!
TOO SOON!
TOO OFTEN!

STOP THE EDITION AVALANCHE!

[Slarg]

3. Non-combat
You can divide D&D into its combat and non-combat portions. And if you sum-up all the non-combat portions of the game it still doesn't measure up to the combat portion. These really need some love and attention. They are often underdeveloped (most boil down to a role). Social mechanics in particular suffer for this.

I'm indifferent on the other four, but I absolutely disagree with this one here. In non-combat, my Great Old One Warlock can use Detect Thoughts along with his class Telepathy to learn pretty much anything he needs to whenever he enters a town, and there's been a time where an innocent man (of that particular crime) was on trial and I cast Tasha's Hideous Laughter(Uncontrollable laughter) right after he said "I did not murder that man!", which resulted in him getting locked up and our rogue went in and busted him out so he would work with us.

Or the times where Telepathy, Detect Thoughts, and Dissonant Whispers(Psychic damage, but not enough to kill someone) to convince a NPC to poison a warlord for us, all while making it seem like it was *his* idea.

And that's just what I've done. I knew an Arcane Trickster who would stab someone (Hell, even a horse) and then put the bloodied weapon into our marks' pocket/belt (which lead to the trial scenario above).

Heck, I've seen a Bard put on what amounts to a Rock concert while a Wizard either used a scroll of Mass Suggestion or a spell to do the same and we caused a week long riot without lifting a finger after that.

There's plenty of non-combat usages for a bunch of the effects you get. You just have to think outside the box for them.

[BayardSPSR]

There's plenty of non-combat usages for a bunch of the effects you get. You just have to think outside the box for them.

I feel like that just illustrates how combat-oriented the game tends to be (edition-dependent).

[2D8HP]

I'm indifferent on the oher four, but I absolutely disagree with this one here. In non-combat, my Great Old One Warlock can....... I knew an Arcane Trickster who....

I admit that in @Slarg's example, it all sounds pretty cool, fun, and groovy but, I'M NOT GOING TO LET REALITY STOP A PERFECTLY GOOD RANT!
I spy three things that are just plain wrong in @Slarg's example.

Imprimis:

non-combat

The only reason D&D got slandered with the tag role-playing games is that Flying Buffalo said that a Tunnels and Trolls product could be used with

other Fantasy Role Playing Games

i.e. D&D.
D&D is, was, and should be about stompn' on and stealin' from monsters.
Do not deviate!

Secundus

Warlock

= a new class and thus badwrong!

Tertius

Arcane Trickster

= also a new class and thus badwrong!

Take heed!
Also new and thus badwrong are:
Dragonborns,
Tieflings, and
Eldrich Knights.

(And I'm keeping an eye on Gnomes, half-elves and half-orcs)!

You have been notified!

[Honest Tiefling]

Well! I don't go about insulting your race/class combo. Your mother was a kender samuari 20 and your father smelled of bat guano!

The breadth of classes is what I love about Pathfinder/3.5. Too often I have found that one class gels with a player and another, very similar one does not. (I for instance, really love the scout, but am a bit meh about the ranger.)

[2D8HP]

I for instance, really love the scout, but am a bit meh about the ranger.

HERESY!

(actually the Scout does look pretty cool)

NO!

(max hit points at first level)

RESIST!

(unlimited multi-classing)

MUST REMAIN STRONG!

The old ways are best.
The old ways are best.......

[Cluedrew]

I'm indifferent on the other four, but I absolutely disagree with [point 4].

[...]

There's plenty of non-combat usages for a bunch of the effects you get. You just have to think outside the box for them.

You know I am making my own role playing game. And I needed a system to calculate the probabilities of different results coming out. I did it in Excel. It can be done, I did it but let me tell you I had to think it had to think outside the box to get it to work.

But Excel is really not meant for that.

And that is really how I feel about it. As BayardSPSR said, the fact you have to think outside the box to get it to do what you want really shows that it is not meant for that. If your best stories of D&D are not combats, you should consider switching systems. Personally I would gladly trade the third way I have to hit someone with a sword (or the forth ability I have to set them on fire) for an ability that reflects... well anything really. The traditional woodworking my character inherited form her parents, the ability to make good clothing, the random ancient language my wizard learned as a student.

Yes, D&D has non-combat. No I'm not saying we should rid it of combat. But for me the balance is way off.

[Vitruviansquid]

I played DnD mostly in the 4th edition, and I hated how absolutely combat-obsessed that game was while I was playing it... up until I played a less combat-obsessed game, and then I wanted the meaty, crunchy combat back.

[Pugwampy]

This game does eat up time but I cannot think of a better way to spend my time .

I very much like the magic . Its unique .

Non combat Roleplaying part makes the game so much more then just a chess game between people .

[BayardSPSR]

Non combat Roleplaying part makes the game so much more then just a chess game between people .

Yeah, it makes it chess where you roleplay between some of the moves sometimes. As opposed to a game of roleplaying where you don't keep stopping to play chess for some reason.

[Cluedrew]

To BayardSPSR: I think I know what your getting at (role-play doesn't stop when combat starts)... and now I can't help but wonder how I could modify how I play chess to represent how my characters would play it.

But here is the thing, the amount of stuff you can say in combat about your character is very small for the amount of time it takes to play it. Further more if the thing I want to say about my character is "I have no idea how to fight" then 4 encounters a day of hiding behind the paladin are going to get boring.

[BayardSPSR]

To BayardSPSR: I think I know what your getting at (role-play doesn't stop when combat starts)... and now I can't help but wonder how I could modify how I play chess to represent how my characters would play it.

Sorry, that was the opposite of what I was trying to say - my intended point was that the combat game you're constantly playing eats up a lot of time that could be spent roleplaying, making in-character decisions, resolving conflicts, increasing tension, etc.

[Anonymouswizard]

I have a weird relationship with D&D. In theory I like it and enjoy it. I'm even enjoying a game of 5e at the moment.

However, I just don't like several things about D&D, especially newer editions:

#1 Spell Slots
My biggest complaint is spell slots. I just have no idea what they represent in-world. They come across as a purely gamist mechanic in order to limit spellcasters, whereas I tend towards simulationist. I'd have much preferred it if 5e had gone with a spell point system, I'm fairly certain that spell slots aren't actually a holy cow (memorised spells I actually like in theory, especially the 5e interpretation).

#2 Levels
Now I try to make my opinion on class and level systems clear. I find that they tend to be inherently limiting and annoying. But my bigger annoyance is with the levels than classes. I, at least in theory, like classes. Funnel characters into certain roles in order to make things easily balanced and characters more varied? Awesome! But what I don't like is levels, where characters get sudden leaps in competence at fixed intervals of XP, instead of growing organically and slowly becoming better at what they do (this is why I like the WH40KRPGs, because your level measures how much you've upgraded your character). It just pulls me out of the zone, as either I get a level every session and advance improbably fast, or I spend a long time at the same level and then suddenly improve in a variety of things. I much prefer looking at my skills at the end/beginning of the session and then checking if I have enough XP to raise them.

#3 Lack of focus on skills
This is a rather weird and very personal one. I just don't like that your character's noncombat skills are always a secondary focus (generally barring thieves/rogues). Most of your character's class abilities are combat focused, and the 5e design team essentially classes noncombat abilities as 'ribbons' instead of true class features (nevermind how powerful they are). Also, when you reach a noncombat situation it seems to be normal to consider spells instead of skills, especially if you have a lot of magic.

#4 Wide Power Curve
D&D tries to fit both 'beginning adventurer with a bit of skill' and 'demigod able to change the environment with a single spell' into one game, and doesn't really succeed at both (although it does better at the first). In 4e, when it focused on 'badass adventurer' this wasn't as much of a concern.

I have a few other nitpicks, but those are minor.

I'd argue that the whole genre of "fantasy heartbreakers" exists because of (mostly) D&D players who want something better for their group/individual preferences/styles.

Totally, I'd be working on mine, but I think The Dark Eye might actually be what I want, so I'm waiting until I can take a peek at the corebook.

[2D8HP]

A lot of the complaints about D&D, I remember people having decades ago.
I lot were "fixed" with 1978's
Runequest ("backgrounds" not classes, skills not levels), but maybe it from being jaded, but for me, while the rules felt more intuitive and "realistic", and easier than all but '77 "Basic" D&D to GM, but when I played it in the 1980's, it just wasn't as fun to be a player, as D&D.

And that's just it, I have never been a player of any game as fun as D&D (early Shadowrun and Traveller came closest). But unless you just use the rules as "suggestions", and totally "wing it", DM'ing complete RAW D&D has always been a chore. Every cool new ability/power a PC has makes it more fun for the player, but is an extra thing for the DM to memorize.

While still a chore, being a "Keeper" of Call of Cthullu was just easier than DM'ing D&D (other RPG's I've GM'd were as much or more of a hassle to GM, my players loved the Top Secret games I "Administered", but I was almost completely ignoring the rules and making everything up. Notice a pattern?).

Can you keep D&D as fun for players, but reduce the burden on DM's?

I've never tried it but Magic World is supposed to have more "gonzo" D&D like magic, but with Call of Cthullu/Runequest style rules, so that may be worth checking out.

Also, has anyone tried Tunnels and Trolls? It came out soon after oD&D, and is supposed to be simpler.

[Cluedrew]

Sorry, that was the opposite of what I was trying to say

... Oops. My view remains as it was my previous post, you can say things about a character (role-play) in combat. As a refinement of what I said earlier I think most of the interesting stuff gets "said" around (just before and after) the beginning and the end of combat. All that stuff in the middle is just a tactics games and repetition.

I have a weird relationship with D&D. In theory I like it and enjoy it. I'm even enjoying a game of 5e at the moment.

In a gene that is so heavily dependant on the people you are playing with the system only cares so much weight. Some of my best role-playing memories are from free-form games where the system brought absolutely nothing to the table. Yes a good system is important*, put probably not as important as the people you are playing with.

*There are some trade-offs you make when you play free-form, it is hard for the outcome of a scene to ever be in question for one.

[BayardSPSR]

... Oops.

No worries; I need to stop assuming that everyone who reads a sentence I write will interpret it in the exact same way I do.

While still a chore, being a "Keeper" of Call of Cthullu was just easier than DM'ing D&D (other RPG's I've GM'd were as much or more of a hassle to GM, my players loved the Top Secret games I "Administered", but I was almost completely ignoring the rules and making everything up. Notice a pattern?).

Can you keep D&D as fun for players, but reduce the burden on DM's?

Having had no exposure to CoC, I'm curious what about it made it better/easier to GM.

[RazorChain]

... Oops. My view remains as it was my previous post, you can say things about a character (role-play) in combat. As a refinement of what I said earlier I think most of the interesting stuff gets "said" around (just before and after) the beginning and the end of combat. All that stuff in the middle is just a tactics games and repetition.

In a gene that is so heavily dependant on the people you are playing with the system only cares so much weight. Some of my best role-playing memories are from free-form games where the system brought absolutely nothing to the table. Yes a good system is important*, put probably not as important as the people you are playing with.

*There are some trade-offs you make when you play free-form, it is hard for the outcome of a scene to ever be in question for one.

I have to agree on that, there is nothing more important to a game than the people you are playing with.

As to Why I don't like D&D is kinda I grew out of it and it just doesn't work for me anymore. I'm not going to bash the system for....most everything. The problem arises if you ask why? If you never ask questions and just play the game then you'll be fine.

But then those questions suddenly pop up after you just brought in 30lbs of gold to pay for your 50lbs full plate, or why did your spell vanish from your head after you cast it? Why do monsters congregate in dungeons and collect treasure? Where did that Owlbear keep his treasure that the DM randomly rolled for on treasure table D? Was it going shopping with all that gold? How does more armor make you harder to hit? And before you start to answer that question by glancing blows etc then if a Giant throws a huge rock at you, how comes it is harder for him to hit you? What do Hit Point in D&D represent? Toughness? Durability? Why do they keep publishing material by Ed Greenwood or his novels? Why don't people scoop out their eyes with a spoon after reading his books and ask almighty Cthulhu to end their suffering? Why alignments?

So it is best not to ask questions.

But I have to agree with 2D8HP that D&D should have been a boardgame with minatures where you just go and raid dungeons.

[Honest Tiefling]

And that's just it, I have never been a player of any game as fun as D&D (early Shadowrun and Traveller came closest). But unless you just use the rules as "suggestions", and totally "wing it", DM'ing complete RAW D&D has always been a chore. Every cool new ability/power a PC has makes it more fun for the player, but is an extra thing for the DM to memorize.

And this is why I actually like it when a player tells me of their build from level 1-20. I don't have to muck about with new classes or archetypes that have recently come out, I can just focus on the proposed builds and what the characters will likely be in front of it.

[2D8HP]

Having had no exposure to CoC, I'm curious what about it made it better/easier to GM.

The rules were simple, and intuitive (you roll percentile dice to see if a listed skill was used successfully). The pre-made adventures were pretty clear, and the setting (Earth in the 1920's, with hidden cults and monsters), was real easy to make up scenerios for (a little "Indiana Jones", and a lot of "monster movie"). Since the only spells the PC's could use were the ones you let them find, that made it easier as well. Since the PC's were just regular 20th Century people, there weren't any special powers rules to memorize, unless you wanted the PC's to get them, and you didn't have to confirm to a "Magic system" for the monsters, and could just make up anything that fit the plot.
The downsides? Well number one, as a GM since you had to mostly conform to 20th century Earth, there just wasn't as much Worldbuilding fun to be had (there was a "Dreamlands" setting, but it was hardly used).
Ultimately though it just wasn't as fun to play, your not exploring a fantastic world or really "leveling up", though my players liked having firearms and dynamite instead of swords and fireball spells.
I actually reused some scenerios (cultist and Elder Gods) in D&D, and that worked well.
But my players prefered the Space Opera scenarios of "Traveller" better still, but what they really liked was playing secret agents in the espionage settings of "Top Secret", which was even easier to make uo adventures for (if you've seen just one James Bond movie, and a few episodes of "Mission Impossible", you've got the genre down), for myself though I found it really boring to GM and I just phoned it in, I hardly bothered to learn the rules, and just had the players roll percentile dice for success like in Call of Cthullu.
Even more popular with the gamers I knew "back in the day", were "Champions" or "Villains and Vigilantes", which had comic book superhero settings, but I had hardly any interest in at all as a player, and none as a GM. Then by the early 1990's all anybody around wanted to play was "Cyberpunk" or "Vampire", and that was the final straw, and I left the hobby for decades, until I discovered that they were other people willing to play D&D again, and while it isn't the D&D I knew, it's been close enough, maybe even better to play albeit worse to DM.

[vasilidor]

In every version i have played it is impossible to improve noncombat abilities/skills separately from combat abilities. Drives me nuts.

[Slipperychicken]

The non-combat and wargame problems arise because D&D (I can only speak for least 3.x and 5th edition) is about fantasy violence. That's why most of the rules are about it, and why it's so rare to go a session without a fight. Also, if you want to emulate some classical myths and other stories D&D is inspired by, the heroes in those tales were often people who tried to solve their problems by fighting. I find the closer you stick to dungeon-crawling small scale fantasy violence, the better D&D works overall. That's just what the games were made for.

Pacing: I agree for 3.x, not for 5e. You could easily take a whole 4-6 hours to a single 7-round fight in 3.x (you'd count yourself lucky to get through it in just an hour), but in 5e I've gotten through pretty long fights in 45 minutes or less.

I agree about the vancian magic. If it's just going to be a generic flavorless thing, I don't see the point of all the complexity. My 5e group has already dumped vancian in favor of an MP system.

Levels: I too want to play games where my character starts with things he can do, but doesn't necessarily get that much better in the game. Also the hit point scaling is horrible and the games do a bad job defining what hit points even are. The way they describe it, it overlaps a bunch of other mechanics like armor class, the to-hit roll, dexterity to armor class, dodging as an action, and so on.

I also hate alignment. There are good reasons why most roleplaying games either don't have a comparable rules construct or else play it down greatly. "Using alignment properly" is more or less code for keeping it as far away from the game session as humanly possible.

And I don't like that D&D does such a poor job of making economics, or at least price tables that don't collapse under the slightest scrutiny. Magic items, spells as services, and buildings are each their own cans of worms.