D&D 4th Edition and the NEW VERSION stupidity.

My views on the new 4th edition of D&D?

So totally uninterested. I really dislike 3.0, and 3.x's too soon introduction pretty much tore what little interest I had in modern D&D right out the window. 4th's apparent MINIATURES WHERE ROLEPLAYING (maybe) sessions break out isn't to my taste and I like "Braunstein" styled games WAAAY more than that deep immersion RP Indies Forge kind of thing. Heck, I think I quit running a nWoD game because it was too heavy into RP. But 4th is taking it way too far.

From everyone I have talked to in the real world, its overwhelmingly ANTI 4th edition. One gamestore that did very well with 3rd has currently a whopping TWO preorders for fourth. Gamegroups that were D&D are trying out things like Gamma World fer crying out loud!

I'm personally looking into DC Heroes or D6 for my next game till I am ready for the crunch and gloom of Warhammer or Dark Heresy. Even the biggest D&D D20 fanboy I know is against the game.

The whole "now you can rebuy stuff that was already working out fine for you loser" thing isn't helping either. Now all my stuff is mostly useless. Again.

Instead of being able to buy cool new supplements I have to rebuy the core books AND then hope every book I liked would get redone. This is one thing that is probably doing more damage to gaming than people realize. Every new edition fragments the playerbase of a hobby that NEEDS people into smaller and smaller groups, many of whom eventually just leave entirely.

New editions are short term profits that lead to long term losses. And I am really getting sick of it. Warhammer 40K did up 4th edition in Spring 05. Hi grognards.txt.  I love you.   3 years later and its time to buy another damned 50 dollar rulesbook, or a 50-60 dollar starter set? Were people that pissed with the old rules so they needed to tweak it, AGAIN? I still haven't bought the newest version of Paranoia or Runequest since I am perfectly happy with my mid-late 80s rulesbooks for games I want to play but can't really get people for anyhow. So why buy it again?

I am not alone. Money is tight, and if you like or love what is currently there, why in hell would you release a somewhat to completely incompatible edition of a hobby game which is sure to fragment the playerbase and cause hurt feelings for anyone who isn't a consumer whore?

Oh right. There are enough of them out there to make those short term profits I mentioned. Which makes the beancounters happy until profits dry up even faster than they did before.