D&D General D&D Editions: Anybody Else Feel Like They Don't Fit In?

So, this may feel like a strange thread, but I hope people will bear with me.

I have been playing and DM'ing "Dungeons & Dragons" since the early-80s, and I am feeling more and more like there is no place in the hobby where I truly "fit" anymore. I grew up with the mechanical simplicity of B/X D&D, starting with the 1980 B/X Boxed sets supplemented by an AD&D Monster Manual. We quickly abandoned "race as class" and cherry-picked rules from the hardcover books (I read them all, and still have my Dungeoneer and Wilderness Survival Guides, but that basic game continued. I had some enduring campaigns as 1st-Edition turned to 2nd, and I kept playing D&D, but I always longed for a better skill system; as the combination of "wing it" and Nonweapon Proficiencies never quite cut it for me.

When 3e dropped, I loved it at first, but the longer I played, the more something became clear to me. Dungeons & Dragons had become more "over-the-top fantastical" than I liked. Cook and Tweet basically had turned the default setting of Dungeons & Dragons into a high-magic Monty Haul campaign. The magic system still grated and the constant embrace of making characters MORE magical was taking it further from the kind of fantasy stories I want to tell.

I grew up on Arthurian legends, The Hobbit, The Lord of the Rings, Fafhrd and the Grey Mouser, Conan, and a bunch of other "Sword & Sorcery" stuff. I didn't want my fantasy game to let me play the medieval equivalent of the X-Men, where every character has magical powers. I've thought about going back to the OSR, but the truth is that I want a game that has more rules guidance than those games offer. I just don't want one where every character can teleport, cast spells, and all of the other high-magic shenanigans that D&D embraces from the get-go.

The 5.24e embrace of this flavor has me turned off more than anything else. But I don't see a home for myself. Part of me wants to go backwards, but OSR type games are usually either too lethal (or grim-dark), too enamored of outdated game mechanics (OSE), or they're overly enamored with tables and whacky subsystems (looking at you DCC). I want there to be more fun combat options, but I don't want a lot of fiddly rules that will slow the game down. I see promise in something like DCC's "Mighty Deeds of Arms," or DMScotty's "Luck Dice" (or Professor DM's "Deathbringer Dice") or whatever you want to call them. I see some fun sub-systems in DC20, but I also see it getting way too fiddly.

Shadowdark speaks to my tastes a little (I love "roll to cast"), but I'd have to houserule some additions and alterations to it to really get the game I want. There's some other heavily house-ruled versions of OSR or "simplified 5e" that work for me, but they aren't there. But while I love the d20 resolution mechanic, I may need to walk away from a D&D that is becoming increasingly fantastical. And I don't know where to go.

Sorry for the wall of text, but is anybody else in this boat?

There are about half a dozen different hobbies and rules sets going under the moniker of D&D, and the only one I feel I fit into is the late 1E/BECMI/pre-WotC 2E era, and even that's iffy. Part of that is that I'm not willing to worship any of the idols set up by the major factions of the hobby.

Forbidden Lands does a fair job of capturing that Conan essence.

JohnSnow said:

Sorry for the wall of text, but is anybody else in this boat?

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Not specifically with your set of preferences and concerns, but in general, yes. I feel out of place with D&D. I like my fantasy weird and fantastical, and I like my RPG rules to be deep and developed for the players and lean and fast for the GM. There really isn't anything in the D&D space that fits all of those things that I have found.

Yes, I don't fit in. I am not a fan of superheros and never have been. In the 1980s I had no interest in the various super hero games, but I was glad they existed for people who do like those kinds of tales.

Since the turn of the millennium it has been difficult for me to scratch that itch.

Yeah. I know what you mean. Not the exact same boat, but a similar one. For me, the OSR was like coming home. I prefer the wing it, lighter is better approach. I'm over-the-moon for Dungeon Crawl Classics RPG. It's easily my favorite D&D-like game. I love B/X and OSE.

You're not alone. You're not going to get exactly what you want from D&D.
If I hadn't turned DMing into a profession, I'd probably be running more DCC; but 5e is where the players are, and it's very moddable/house-rulable.

DCC is VERY Sword and Sorcery- it's only as whacky as you make it. I was sold on DCC's SYSTEM when it was demoed for me years ago at GAMA, but haven't run much of it despite acquiring a collection . I don't love the "Wizards driving vans wearing ripped denim jeans" flavor that a lot of folks push with it- but I do think the system is great.

I've been trying to decide to run either DCC or Shadowdark, I'm pretty sure my tastes land a little closer to DCC's more heroic but still not-superhero characters.

My issue is in part that I love the d20 resolution mechanic. I find it elegant as hell. It's just swingy enough that the story changes based on the outcomes of the die rolls, which is my issue with the more narrative-focused RPG systems: I like the game to surprise me.

Applying the same "d20, roll high" mechanic to skills as well was, IMO, one of the brilliant innovations of 3e. Similarly, Advantage and Disadvantage is a delightful innovation from 5th-Edition. I'm also one of the weirdos that really liked "proficiency dice" during the D&DNext playtest. Overall, there's a lot of things I like from various editions, but there's a default flavor to the game that increasingly turns me off.

It's not that I don't like "whacky fantasy," as I'm all about non-human races and such, but I don't really like low-level characters teleporting across the battlefield and growing to giant size.

And I have a particular loathing of "per-day abilities," but that's a separate rant.

I love OSE for its simplicity. I can houserule anything on the spot easily enough.

Getting rid of all the glut that modern D&D has has been a blessing IMO

During 4E, I felt like I was being kicked to the curb as far as my tastes went. 5E up through Xanathar's has been the D&D that I find myself liking quite a bit, and I'm happy to ignore most of what has come since Tasha's and beyond (I've picked up a few bits, but ignored most). You don't have to keep up if there's a break point in the game where you enjoy it, stick with that. If you feel the need or urge to continue to add to it, make your own based on that content you do like or from other like-minded individuals on DM's Guild or DM's Binder.

Failing that, give some other systems a try. I'm quite fond of the likes of Savage Worlds, Dragonsbane, Old School Essentials (Advanced) and Castles & Crusades for D&D adjacent systems myself.