So the Mercer effect is pretty common, but what about the MMO effect. Most campaigns will last years (or at least the goal is to last at least a year if not longer.). For example my current campaign has gone from level 3 to level 6 in six months averaging a level every two months. (The game is every week, but there have been some canceled game sessions and some new players and a switch to 2024 contributing to the time between levels.)
So my question is how much of an impact does MMOs have if you have come from an MMO to D&D? Most MMOs can be finished in 1-2 months by most people and even less time by those who focus exclusively on it.
According to Google A.I the upper time to beat Boulders Gate 3 is 100 hours. My game sessions are 4 hours. So Balders Gate would take about 25 game sessions to completely finish. Back to my game where it's only been 3 levels during that sametime. (And I started at level 3).
So if you have come from an MMO does an actual D&D game seem too slow? Or does it not matter.
Or do people prefer faster games these days instead of the Critical Role style of 2.5-3+ years in one game regardless of whether or not you are more use to MMOs?
MMOs don't have any influence, as the market of MMOs is actually quite niche, so the overlap between that and D&D might not be as big. And i don't think there is much from MMOs that translates to D&D.
As for Single Player RPGs, like BG3 or even Skyrim, that can have a much bigger influence, especially in the freedom of what you can do as a player. But this needs to be discussed at a session 0, that D&D is not a video game. Players can't do crazy stuff without having consequences, and you can't just reload if you screw up. But also, players need to be reminded that unlike a video game, in D&D they can do things that are not pre-scripted. They can leave the boundaries, can attempt things that wouldn't work in a video game.
Never played BG3, but other similar games didn't make me feel like the game was slow at all. It being very different media made it seem very different in experience. My experience, for what it's worth.
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Admittedly I level up players a lot faster than you (I tend to run prewritten adventures and take a year to a year and a half to finish) but the only impact of computer games I've felt was one guy who joined one of my groups and had such a computer game mindset he kept asking to smash furniture to look for loot
BG3 is relatively close to the rules but it won't teach you how to roleplay, it is still a video game world. Solesta I played in Early Access, I will go back to that at some point, seemed a bit better for the rules than BG3 but again, not something that shows you how D&D is played, still a bit closer in some respects since it starts with the party telling stories in a tavern... but yea, still far away. Obviously BG3 is still the better video game compared to Solesta.
I think BG3's bigger influence was how people expected the rules of DnD to work vs. what they actually were (see all of the content creator DMs talking about it). As for the media changing how people approach the game, I don't think it's that big of an influence. When you're sitting around a table with a bunch of people, the pace is just slower by its nature and I doubt whether someone's played MMOs or Single Player RPGs (I've played plenty of both, myself) does anything to their perception of it.
Personally, I have not experienced any problems with players who enter the game through other media - in fact, the only people I have ever really seen complain about this are gatekeeping grognards looking for thin excuses to attack newer players.
For the past fifty years, people have been bringing their own baggage to the D&D table; their own expectations of what the game is. Someone who got deep into Howard is going to have a different perspective than someone who has not even read Tolkien. Someone who is a theater nerd and loves the acting side is going to have a different perspective than someone who only enjoys the war gaming side.
MMOs, computer games, actual play videos? They all might color player perspectives… but they do not color player perspectives any more or less than the myriad other elements that make up a player’s vision of “what should a fantasy roleplaying game be…?” And, of course, many of these things have themselves been around for decades - clearly they are not that big of a problem if the game has continued to thrive for multiple editions even with these factors.
I remember when bg3 first hit, there were people shocked that the level cap was 12, when so many computer games have like 50 or 80 or 200 “levels.” And I have noticed a bit of confusion from the games where bg3 isn’t exactly RAW, and that’s been tripping up even experienced players who sometimes think they must have been doing it wrong on the tabletop. Though I guess that’s not really the question, it’s really the only impact I’ve noticed.
But I don’t think it’s really set crazy expectations for how tabletop should work. Larian is an incredibly good DM, but there’s still something missing. They do a very good job of giving you the illusion of choice, but unlike a real D&D campaign, you can’t just decide to say screw it and hop on the next boat to the moonshae islands. Or make a bad roll in the underdark, get lost, and end up in neverwinter. It’s the nature of a video game that there’s some rails on it that don’t exist in tabletop.
Admittedly I level up players a lot faster than you (I tend to run prewritten adventures and take a year to a year and a half to finish) but the only impact of computer games I've felt was one guy who joined one of my groups and had such a computer game mindset he kept asking to smash furniture to look for loot
Yeah, part of that was from switching to 2024 and letting players get use to the new abilities. People still keep forgetting about weapon masteries. Other issues were several games where only half the party showed up and the next session where only the other half of the party showed up. But Bing in Exandria it is somewhat styled in that flow.
Honestly, in most video games your kills per hour are massively higher than in any tabletop RPG, for the simple reason that the game is automating so much stuff that normally would involve die rolling. In BG3 you can reasonably do the tutorial, search through the ruins of the Nautiloid, find Shadowheart, Gale, and Astarion, clear the first dungeon, and fight the goblins at the gate of the Emerald Enclave, all within four hours. I don't think I've ever seen a tabletop manage that kind of pace.
Though compared to games like Diablo, BG3 is still very low kill count.
Most MMOs can be finished in 1-2 months by most people and even less time by those who focus exclusively on it.
Uh... how do you define "finished?" MMOs are perpetual content that really only "finish" when the money stops rolling in. The oldest ones (including MUDs) have had campaigns going for decades.
So if you have come from an MMO does an actual D&D game seem too slow? Or does it not matter.
The length of any game does not matter, what matters is whether the players get what they're expecting to get out of it and whether it's paced well. I've seen one-shots that were more engaging and emotionally fulfilling than campaigns that have lasted months or years.
I think the bigger impact MMOs like WoW in particular have on how people play DnD is the trend toward lots of players making builds instead of characters. We didn’t used to make Class + Race × 20 plan for our characters before the first session even started. We made made characters and then figured out what they were going to do next based on whatever happened before then and if they survived. Now I even hear of people that plan for their PC to get specific magic items at certain levels and give lists of requests to their DMs.
I think the bigger impact MMOs like WoW in particular have on how people play DnD is the trend toward lots of players making builds instead of characters. We didn’t used to make Class + Race × 20 plan for our characters before the first session even started. We made made characters and then figured out what they were going to do next based on whatever happened before then and if they survived. Now I even hear of people that plan for their PC to get specific magic items at certain levels and give lists of requests to their DMs.
oh yeah, this is a big point, but it happens everywhere. META chasing, for some reason, to be "competitive"... competing with whom? your party? your DM? This is such a silly thing to do. And to note, i like to see what builds can be made myself, but chasing some META is just plain brainrot.
I think the bigger impact MMOs like WoW in particular have on how people play DnD is the trend toward lots of players making builds instead of characters. We didn’t used to make Class + Race × 20 plan for our characters before the first session even started. We made made characters and then figured out what they were going to do next based on whatever happened before then and if they survived. Now I even hear of people that plan for their PC to get specific magic items at certain levels and give lists of requests to their DMs.
You might not have, but I know people who have been planning out and optimizing characters since the very beginning of the game. Players have been looking through the items list and making requests since the beginning of the game.
Nothing has fundamentally changed in the past fifty years regarding players - what has changed is access to different perspectives. When people were just playing on their own in their own, insular friend group, their only real experience was with those people. Now, with D&D being more socially acceptable to discuss publicly and the internet giving people access to uncounted glimpses at different tables’ perspectives, we can see the myriad different ways folks play the game in a way that was hidden before.
Everything you are talking about is ancient as the game itself; the only thing that has changed is your exposure to those long-existing play styles.
I think the bigger impact MMOs like WoW in particular have on how people play DnD is the trend toward lots of players making builds instead of characters.
There is no "instead"; that's Stormwind Fallacy. And players who don't care about their characters beyond being a pile of mechanics and stats existed long before MMOs did.
As for players who feel entitled to shopping lists of specific magic items, MMOs didn't create that problem either - 3e and 4e did, with rigid WBL. 5e already solved that.
Now I even hear of people that plan for their PC to get specific magic items at certain levels and give lists of requests to their DMs.
There's nothing wrong with that. Adventurers in a magic world know about magic items. They know certain things are going to exist or have the capacity to exist. Maybe you can fault the specificity of the request "I want a very rare giants belt" versus "I am looking for an item that will make me physically stronger", but all in they're basically the same thing. Ultimately the DM controls the world and its up to them if they provide.
The Mercer Effect I've always thought as an unfair term because the fact is it's happened far before Matt and it'll happen far after Critical Role is dead. Conan influenced how people perceived Barbarians. LoTR changed how people perceived rangers, dwarves and wizards. Arthurian Legend for people and how they see knights and the concepts of honor. It's also irony that I see some responses in this thread about how MMOs had little influence, but Mearls flat out said MMOs were an influence in 4th and Mearls helped design 5th so take that how you will. Media influences everything and what a lot of people fail to really take into account is that as you age up into a hobby, people are always aging in and some are flat out aging out. That changes how that hobby is seen, played and developed. The team that developed the 2024 rules also flat out said that the way they saw the rules played in BG3 helped visualize a lot of things and it did contribute to some rule changes.
So if the teams that are developing the game are doing so with inspiration from video games, it's a natural link that the people playing TTRPG are also doing so with inspiration from those same sources. To answer the question in the topic title, why would the expectations be unrealistic? I've had MAJOR encounters end with another party of adventurers coming in and "stealing the kill". Why? Adventuring isn't something that only your party does. It's not a regular thing at my table but when it does happen it shows the world is expansive and other things are happening around the PCs that they aren't in control of. Sound effects, voices, ambient lighting, figures etc can all be done to varying degrees depending on your budget. Milestone experience is a 5th edition rule implemented prior to Mercer so honestly the argument about speed of leveling should be attributed to the game system and not the people who are simply utilizing the rules. Milestone leveling is a concept that has existed in RPGs in general since the 80s and probably before that.
The point of all of this is there is no single point you can point to and honestly it's not negative. It's natural progression and evolution.
I think the bigger impact MMOs like WoW in particular have on how people play DnD is the trend toward lots of players making builds instead of characters. We didn’t used to make Class + Race × 20 plan for our characters before the first session even started. We made made characters and then figured out what they were going to do next based on whatever happened before then and if they survived. Now I even hear of people that plan for their PC to get specific magic items at certain levels and give lists of requests to their DMs.
I also have to disagree here. In 1 and 2e we didn’t make builds because there were no builds to make. You chose your race class and you were done. No multiclassing (as we understand it today) no asi, no feats. But it n 3e it was all but required to build out a few levels to make sure you hit your prerequisites and took all the right feat taxes. And let’s not forget pun-pun. Planning ahead is nothing new.
I think the bigger impact MMOs like WoW in particular have on how people play DnD is the trend toward lots of players making builds instead of characters. We didn’t used to make Class + Race × 20 plan for our characters before the first session even started. We made made characters and then figured out what they were going to do next based on whatever happened before then and if they survived. Now I even hear of people that plan for their PC to get specific magic items at certain levels and give lists of requests to their DMs.
I also have to disagree here. In 1 and 2e we didn’t make builds because there were no builds to make. You chose your race class and you were done. No multiclassing (as we understand it today) no asi, no feats.
There was less to do in AD&D due to its design choices, but people were figuring out if they could/wanted to multiclass (and level caps meant you kind of had to to keep up with humans). The 1e Bard alone requires some serious planning of your dual-classing.
I also have to disagree here. In 1 and 2e we didn’t make builds because there were no builds to make.
In 1e that was mostly true outside of dual-classing shenanigans, but by AD&D era, with kits and specialization, looking multiple levels ahead was definitely a thing.
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So the Mercer effect is pretty common, but what about the MMO effect. Most campaigns will last years (or at least the goal is to last at least a year if not longer.). For example my current campaign has gone from level 3 to level 6 in six months averaging a level every two months. (The game is every week, but there have been some canceled game sessions and some new players and a switch to 2024 contributing to the time between levels.)
So my question is how much of an impact does MMOs have if you have come from an MMO to D&D? Most MMOs can be finished in 1-2 months by most people and even less time by those who focus exclusively on it.
According to Google A.I the upper time to beat Boulders Gate 3 is 100 hours. My game sessions are 4 hours. So Balders Gate would take about 25 game sessions to completely finish. Back to my game where it's only been 3 levels during that sametime. (And I started at level 3).
So if you have come from an MMO does an actual D&D game seem too slow? Or does it not matter.
Or do people prefer faster games these days instead of the Critical Role style of 2.5-3+ years in one game regardless of whether or not you are more use to MMOs?
MMOs don't have any influence, as the market of MMOs is actually quite niche, so the overlap between that and D&D might not be as big. And i don't think there is much from MMOs that translates to D&D.
As for Single Player RPGs, like BG3 or even Skyrim, that can have a much bigger influence, especially in the freedom of what you can do as a player. But this needs to be discussed at a session 0, that D&D is not a video game. Players can't do crazy stuff without having consequences, and you can't just reload if you screw up. But also, players need to be reminded that unlike a video game, in D&D they can do things that are not pre-scripted. They can leave the boundaries, can attempt things that wouldn't work in a video game.
Never played BG3, but other similar games didn't make me feel like the game was slow at all. It being very different media made it seem very different in experience. My experience, for what it's worth.
If you're not willing or able to to discuss in good faith, then don't be surprised if I don't respond, there are better things in life for me to do than humour you. This signature is that response.
Admittedly I level up players a lot faster than you (I tend to run prewritten adventures and take a year to a year and a half to finish) but the only impact of computer games I've felt was one guy who joined one of my groups and had such a computer game mindset he kept asking to smash furniture to look for loot
BG3 is relatively close to the rules but it won't teach you how to roleplay, it is still a video game world. Solesta I played in Early Access, I will go back to that at some point, seemed a bit better for the rules than BG3 but again, not something that shows you how D&D is played, still a bit closer in some respects since it starts with the party telling stories in a tavern... but yea, still far away. Obviously BG3 is still the better video game compared to Solesta.
I think BG3's bigger influence was how people expected the rules of DnD to work vs. what they actually were (see all of the content creator DMs talking about it). As for the media changing how people approach the game, I don't think it's that big of an influence. When you're sitting around a table with a bunch of people, the pace is just slower by its nature and I doubt whether someone's played MMOs or Single Player RPGs (I've played plenty of both, myself) does anything to their perception of it.
Personally, I have not experienced any problems with players who enter the game through other media - in fact, the only people I have ever really seen complain about this are gatekeeping grognards looking for thin excuses to attack newer players.
For the past fifty years, people have been bringing their own baggage to the D&D table; their own expectations of what the game is. Someone who got deep into Howard is going to have a different perspective than someone who has not even read Tolkien. Someone who is a theater nerd and loves the acting side is going to have a different perspective than someone who only enjoys the war gaming side.
MMOs, computer games, actual play videos? They all might color player perspectives… but they do not color player perspectives any more or less than the myriad other elements that make up a player’s vision of “what should a fantasy roleplaying game be…?” And, of course, many of these things have themselves been around for decades - clearly they are not that big of a problem if the game has continued to thrive for multiple editions even with these factors.
I remember when bg3 first hit, there were people shocked that the level cap was 12, when so many computer games have like 50 or 80 or 200 “levels.” And I have noticed a bit of confusion from the games where bg3 isn’t exactly RAW, and that’s been tripping up even experienced players who sometimes think they must have been doing it wrong on the tabletop. Though I guess that’s not really the question, it’s really the only impact I’ve noticed.
But I don’t think it’s really set crazy expectations for how tabletop should work. Larian is an incredibly good DM, but there’s still something missing. They do a very good job of giving you the illusion of choice, but unlike a real D&D campaign, you can’t just decide to say screw it and hop on the next boat to the moonshae islands. Or make a bad roll in the underdark, get lost, and end up in neverwinter. It’s the nature of a video game that there’s some rails on it that don’t exist in tabletop.
Yeah, part of that was from switching to 2024 and letting players get use to the new abilities. People still keep forgetting about weapon masteries. Other issues were several games where only half the party showed up and the next session where only the other half of the party showed up. But Bing in Exandria it is somewhat styled in that flow.
sadly altho i started with bg3 at beta i never enjoyed it. unfortunately in my mind too linear with the story.
Honestly, in most video games your kills per hour are massively higher than in any tabletop RPG, for the simple reason that the game is automating so much stuff that normally would involve die rolling. In BG3 you can reasonably do the tutorial, search through the ruins of the Nautiloid, find Shadowheart, Gale, and Astarion, clear the first dungeon, and fight the goblins at the gate of the Emerald Enclave, all within four hours. I don't think I've ever seen a tabletop manage that kind of pace.
Though compared to games like Diablo, BG3 is still very low kill count.
Uh... how do you define "finished?" MMOs are perpetual content that really only "finish" when the money stops rolling in. The oldest ones (including MUDs) have had campaigns going for decades.
The length of any game does not matter, what matters is whether the players get what they're expecting to get out of it and whether it's paced well. I've seen one-shots that were more engaging and emotionally fulfilling than campaigns that have lasted months or years.
I think the bigger impact MMOs like WoW in particular have on how people play DnD is the trend toward lots of players making builds instead of characters. We didn’t used to make Class + Race × 20 plan for our characters before the first session even started. We made made characters and then figured out what they were going to do next based on whatever happened before then and if they survived. Now I even hear of people that plan for their PC to get specific magic items at certain levels and give lists of requests to their DMs.
oh yeah, this is a big point, but it happens everywhere. META chasing, for some reason, to be "competitive"... competing with whom? your party? your DM? This is such a silly thing to do. And to note, i like to see what builds can be made myself, but chasing some META is just plain brainrot.
You might not have, but I know people who have been planning out and optimizing characters since the very beginning of the game. Players have been looking through the items list and making requests since the beginning of the game.
Nothing has fundamentally changed in the past fifty years regarding players - what has changed is access to different perspectives. When people were just playing on their own in their own, insular friend group, their only real experience was with those people. Now, with D&D being more socially acceptable to discuss publicly and the internet giving people access to uncounted glimpses at different tables’ perspectives, we can see the myriad different ways folks play the game in a way that was hidden before.
Everything you are talking about is ancient as the game itself; the only thing that has changed is your exposure to those long-existing play styles.
There is no "instead"; that's Stormwind Fallacy. And players who don't care about their characters beyond being a pile of mechanics and stats existed long before MMOs did.
As for players who feel entitled to shopping lists of specific magic items, MMOs didn't create that problem either - 3e and 4e did, with rigid WBL. 5e already solved that.
There's nothing wrong with that. Adventurers in a magic world know about magic items. They know certain things are going to exist or have the capacity to exist. Maybe you can fault the specificity of the request "I want a very rare giants belt" versus "I am looking for an item that will make me physically stronger", but all in they're basically the same thing. Ultimately the DM controls the world and its up to them if they provide.
The Mercer Effect I've always thought as an unfair term because the fact is it's happened far before Matt and it'll happen far after Critical Role is dead. Conan influenced how people perceived Barbarians. LoTR changed how people perceived rangers, dwarves and wizards. Arthurian Legend for people and how they see knights and the concepts of honor. It's also irony that I see some responses in this thread about how MMOs had little influence, but Mearls flat out said MMOs were an influence in 4th and Mearls helped design 5th so take that how you will. Media influences everything and what a lot of people fail to really take into account is that as you age up into a hobby, people are always aging in and some are flat out aging out. That changes how that hobby is seen, played and developed. The team that developed the 2024 rules also flat out said that the way they saw the rules played in BG3 helped visualize a lot of things and it did contribute to some rule changes.
So if the teams that are developing the game are doing so with inspiration from video games, it's a natural link that the people playing TTRPG are also doing so with inspiration from those same sources. To answer the question in the topic title, why would the expectations be unrealistic? I've had MAJOR encounters end with another party of adventurers coming in and "stealing the kill". Why? Adventuring isn't something that only your party does. It's not a regular thing at my table but when it does happen it shows the world is expansive and other things are happening around the PCs that they aren't in control of. Sound effects, voices, ambient lighting, figures etc can all be done to varying degrees depending on your budget. Milestone experience is a 5th edition rule implemented prior to Mercer so honestly the argument about speed of leveling should be attributed to the game system and not the people who are simply utilizing the rules. Milestone leveling is a concept that has existed in RPGs in general since the 80s and probably before that.
The point of all of this is there is no single point you can point to and honestly it's not negative. It's natural progression and evolution.
I also have to disagree here. In 1 and 2e we didn’t make builds because there were no builds to make. You chose your race class and you were done. No multiclassing (as we understand it today) no asi, no feats.
But it n 3e it was all but required to build out a few levels to make sure you hit your prerequisites and took all the right feat taxes. And let’s not forget pun-pun. Planning ahead is nothing new.
There was less to do in AD&D due to its design choices, but people were figuring out if they could/wanted to multiclass (and level caps meant you kind of had to to keep up with humans). The 1e Bard alone requires some serious planning of your dual-classing.
In 1e that was mostly true outside of dual-classing shenanigans, but by AD&D era, with kits and specialization, looking multiple levels ahead was definitely a thing.