A little “meh” on D&D for the moment

I haven’t been blogging much recently, which is in part because I’ve been spending a lot of my time on Chaos & Alchemy (currently working on setting up a Kickstarter to run in the next month or so). My audience here on Online Dungeon Master is interested in D&D, not necessarily my new game company, so I try not to inundate you all with content about the game. However, I will note that I’ve opened a call for artists to do color illustrations for the cards – let me know if you’re interested!

Another reason that I haven’t been blogging much is that I’m not as passionate about D&D right now. Again, that’s in part because my gaming passion is elsewhere, and for a while I thought that was all there was to it.

Drow again?

As I reflect more, though, I realize that there are two other things that are keeping my D&D passion in check. The first is that I’m really not digging D&D Encounters this season. I’m still running the game every week, but it’s not grabbing me. I’m kind of sick of the drow, frankly, and knowing that there’s still MORE drow to come in the next season has me feeling a little depressed. Drow are evil and all, I get it. Can we move on now?

I’ve still been creating maps of the encounters, so I’ve included the Week 5 and Week 7 maps below (I was out of town for week 4 and 6, and week 6 didn’t use a map anyway). Enjoy!

Drow Library Map – Gridded

Drow Library Map – No grid

Underdark Antechamber Map – Gridded

Underdark Antechamber Map – No Grid

The impact of D&D Next

The other thing that has me feeling down is D&D Next. It’s not that I don’t like the system – I’m sure it’s going to end up being really cool. But I currently play 4e, and with all of the community’s attention being on Next, I find it hard to get psyched up about 4e.

The obvious solution to this problem is “Play D&D Next!” And I will, eventually. But I ran the first open playtest, and I think that might have been a mistake for me. I appreciated the quickness of combat, but I was really bored with the Caves of Chaos. Also, the limited pre-generated characters didn’t seem exciting.

Now, had I waited for the second batch of stuff that came out just before GenCon before jumping into the playtest, I think I would have been much happier. The new fighter looks like a lot more fun, and having character creation rules is a very big deal. But by the time that packet came out, I was already getting to the point of ignoring D&D Next. I read the second packet, but I didn’t feel inspired to play it. Again, that’s partly because my time was on Chaos & Alchemy, but it’s also partly because my groups didn’t have that much fun with the first playtest packet, and I didn’t feel passionate about getting them to try the second.

What’s next?

So where do I go from here? Well, for the immediate future I’m going to be busy with Chaos & Alchemy. But I’d like to get back to running a regular D&D game. My online family campaign for Madness at Gardmore Abbey has been on hold for many months, but I’ve got it all prepped and ready to go in MapTool; that’s the most likely place to resume. I’d also like to get back to trying D&D Next; I haven’t even looked at the latest playtest packet yet, and that’s a shame.

But I’m not in any hurry to do that stuff. I have other hobbies occupying my free time right now, and I’m okay with that. D&D will wax in my interest again, but it’s in a waning phase right now. And that’s okay.

-Michael the OnlineDM

OnlineDM1 on Twitter

5 thoughts on “A little “meh” on D&D for the moment

  1. I can understand the feeling. I left WotC a while back. The Drow are becoming a little like an over user monster in a horror film. With so much other material out there I do not understand why they keep coming back to this old horse. As far as the kickstarter goes I hope you are aware of the building pressure behind the dam that is the UK. On Oct 31st they are now included in the game. Who knows what will be unleashed on the site when it goes live.

  2. I agree with you; these interests wax and wane. I myself get bored with D&D, so I go play other games. I went through a boardgame phase a few months ago, now I’m back to RPGs, and playing 4e, but will probably try something new out soon. Perhaps I’ll try 13th Age, which is getting great reviews.

    Just enjoy it one game at a time. I’m sure you’ll come back to D&D when you’re ready, just like I know I will too.

  3. Just found out about your website and wanted to thank you! After being away from D&D for the last year or so I’m back to DMing and using Skype + MapTool for the first time. Really helpful stuff here 🙂

    I guess interest comes and goes in waves. This is probably my third spell of being really into D&D 4E since it came out. The first D&D Next playtest really did nothing for me and I still couldn’t try the new ones. I’m really excited about 13th Age too, but until then I’m happy to run 4E again. No Encounters in my country, so Drow are still pretty fresh for me, my latest acquisition was the book on Menzoberranzan and there’s some awesome stuff I’ll definitely use in my games, even though a Drow-only campaign doesn’t appeal to me.

    • I’m glad to hear that you’re embracing the online approach to scratch your gaming itch!

      I’m sure I’ll be back to playing more D&D eventually; a little break now and then isn’t a bad thing.

      -Michael the OnlineDM

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