DND popularity has never been as high as it is these days. It is also probably one of the longest TTRPGs to have ever existed and stayed alive. What I was thinking about today is will DND ever be surpassed by another TTRPG? It is hard to imagine, but every empire will eventually fall. Right now the competition doesn't even come close to being as well known and played as DND, but can you ever imagine it happening?
I mean, for a while there, Pathfinder seemed to be doing way better than 3.5/4e, so I can see it happening. That time frame was largely due to a disconnect between what the players wanted and what was given to them (quantity of books, focus of books, rules ideas, etc.). The current edition has been pretty adamant about customer satisfaction, so I don't see anything taking it over for a good long time, as long as no one at WotC makes just a really horrible decision or five.
It will happen sooner or later. That's the nature of things. It'll be delayed by the use of editions to keep updating and keeping the game fresh, but one day D&D will die.
I imagine that we'll see a drop soon as the people who found it because of lockdowns etc but find that they don't have the time start giving up. However, it will still ve popular for a while yet.
I imagine AI will be the killer. When consumer-accessible AI can perform all of the functions of a DM (specifically the ability to improvise comes to mind), I think D&D, at least in its current form, will be doomed. It's just too expensive, complex to use and produces too simple results to compete. If you can hide all the complicated parts behind a computer program, you can simultaneously make it both easy to use and get all of that depth that just isn't feasible with dice, pens and paper.
People will play how they do currently do out of nostalgia or reluctance to use technology, but we'll pass on and the game will be something people have heard about rather than actually play that much.
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D&D wasn't doing well at all in the mid-'90s. WotC pretty much saved it when buying the IP from TSR. If it gets mismanaged it can fail, just like anything else. That's a lot less likely nowadays, with company size comes a certain stability, but the real advantage D&D has is that it's the typical gateway RPG: we can discuss the quality of the ruleset all day long (and do that quite often right here on these forums) but it's undeniably simple enough for totally new players and it has the brand exposure no other tabletop roleplaying game has. If 90% of new players pass through your doors it's no big deal if a lot of them move on to other systems at some point; that's still a guaranteed revenue stream and ensures that brand recognition will pretty much always eclipse that of others. This isn't a case of being easier to get on top than staying on top, being in the position they are is a massive advantage compared to any 'competition'. And being backed by Hasbro means even more (and massively so) access to financial means and feet in the door with ancillary businesses (movie rights, video games and the like).
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No king rules forever; D&D will eventually be supplanted by something; even World of Warcraft can't hold the king MMO crown forever. It might well take a confluence of factors; but all it really takes is WotC to bugger something up bad enough for something else to take its place. See the afore-mentioned 4E vs Pathfinder battle. Regardless; based upon size alone, it'll probably be a matter of D&D losing the crown as much as or more so something else taking it.
There are different possibilities that lead to D&D not being an iconic brand someday, but you question about when D&D is no longer the top TTRPG brand is a specific question.
Concerning the statement that "D&D has probably been ... " D&D is the Godfather of all the TTRPGs. It came from the TT Wargame genre where players adopted the persona of a single character and then set off to do battle with evil in the world.
I don't know what comparison you would make to determine which is the dominant brand and I don't know what the relative numbers of players or sales or whatever turns out to be, but I anticipate D&D is by far in the lead. I have only one friend that "Games" that has talked about another RPG system, and it was Rokugon. He also plays (played) the game Mordheim, but I don't believe this is an RPG. Except for these fora, I have never heard of the other systems. However, I have a dozen friends that have played D&D.
When something begins to happen, it will have to begin with a decline in interest in D&D. The first indicator that this is real trouble for WotC is if other TTRPGs are not experiencing the same decline. If the "tide goes out" and something new comes along, it will cause the interest in all the TTRPGs to decline together, and may well hit the others first because players of the others are probably out there looking for that next great thing while most D&D players are just using it as a social excuse one a week/month. So a new VR version or an AI version is unlikely to unseat D&D as the top dog because all the current iteration of TTRPGs will decline against that. But, an AI or a VR version that isn't D&D sounds like a video game and so it only reduces interest in other forms of entertainment.
D&D could only fall from its supremacy if WotC shoots itself in the foot, from my perspective. WotC is quite capable of doing that but so far they have avoided going too far. My two worries are that they will become overly determined to make their card game, Magic the Gathering, a component of the D&D magic system -or- that they allow the Woke crowd to tell them what they can't do and what they must do to stay in their good graces. Those are the kind of things that could knock them out of their supremacy.
D&D is enjoying a golden age. It will end and it is unlikely to come back once it does. There are other industries enjoying large profits because of D&D. They are selling specialty dice crafted in new and innovative shapes and materials. They are selling minis like they never have in the past, with one company providing the "design your own mini at a premium" service. There are dice towers and trays specifically themed for D&D. There are dice bags, dice jails, DM screens, play mats, mugs, T-shirts, and I bet even some LARP gear being sold because of the popularity of D&D. Of course the Internet is a component of this. But I don't imagine the hobby will see such a success again.
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While it is inevitable that all things must one day come to an end, I have to disagree with the argument of "see, look! Pathfinder almost became king once" argument. Yes, Pathfinder was more popular in certain circles than 4e--but it has never in the running to replace D&D as the king. Why? Even today, Pathfinder is still really only known by those already familiar with the tabletop RPG world. But once you start getting outside of the core group of RPG players, knowledge of Pathfinder's existence plummets.
Even at its least popular (and, frankly, I think 4e gets a bad rap--it did a lot of things better than 5e does), D&D is still a cultural phenomenon with wide-reaching knowledge of its existence. Even before Stranger Things, the Big Bang Theory, and COVID started to make D&D more mainstream, most people would know what D&D is, even if only as "that nerdy thing people play with dice?" Pathfinder never reached the level where you could survey random folks on the street and they would be able to immediately recognize what the game was.
Which means D&D always remained the most common entry point into tabletop gaming, and, though some of the more dedicated tabletop gamers might move from D&D to pathfinder, the vast majority of folks are more casual players who are adverse to learning new rulesets, so they stick with D&D.
Perhaps one day that will change, but with 48 years or so of inertia under its belt, it is going to take a long, long time for D&D to sufficiently fade that someone else overtakes it.
I dunno about all this "empires must fall" rhetoric. I kinda think of D&D like the brand Wilson is to sporting gear. It'll be a lot of peoples "first glove" for TTRPG. For better or worse (there being so many more accessible TTRPG that would be arguable better TTRPG entry points) I don't see D&D being replaced, but I also didn't see the surge in popularity either. I get the "wait till AI". I'm aware of the line of thought in AI development that postulates what that an AI dungeon master would be significant benchmark for AI development, but that's not necessarily a win or even a want for TTRPGs. People still play chess. Sure one could see some massive AI driven west marches campaigns, but a big part of the TTRPG is doing the thinking and getting to know and engage with people's imagination. I'm not sure where AI is on the social emotional learning side of things, but from what I've seen from AI generated fiction and art, it's still got a lot to learn.
I'd honestly prefer a different ecosystem for TTRPG, WotC is basically Marvel to Hasbro's Disney in this space and much like Marvel movies are great but also suck is a truism to film, I wish TTRPGs could start with games like Magical Kittens or even Unkindness and the rest of the micro RPG book (the article link actually includes the game, it's cool and fun and shows how little you really need to have an awesome TTRPG experience). It's ironic because the D&D brand says it wants to see and find more things to do with D&D and I frankly don't think that's going to happen unless you had more people start from a position that doesn't begin with Dungeon and Dragons as the definition of TTRPG.
I think, even if D&D ultimately gets overtaken by another game, at least in terms of "copies sold" and "active community", D&D will still remain the generic term for all of TTRPGs in pop culture and among the general public. Sort of like how, in the 90's, every videogame system was just "A Nintendo" for anyone who didn't actually pay attention to that kind of thing. Even if Vampire: The Masquerade comes out with a new edition that sweeps the TTRPG world off its feet, the average person will still recognize "Dungeons and Dragons" as just the generic term for TTRPGs... if you and your friends are trying to explain what you're doing rolling all those dice and speaking in weird voices to Grandma, you'll just have to say, "It's like Dungeons and Dragons, but everyone is Vampires."
It will happen sooner or later. That's the nature of things. It'll be delayed by the use of editions to keep updating and keeping the game fresh, but one day D&D will die.
I imagine that we'll see a drop soon as the people who found it because of lockdowns etc but find that they don't have the time start giving up. However, it will still ve popular for a while yet.
I imagine AI will be the killer. When consumer-accessible AI can perform all of the functions of a DM (specifically the ability to improvise comes to mind), I think D&D, at least in its current form, will be doomed. It's just too expensive, complex to use and produces too simple results to compete. If you can hide all the complicated parts behind a computer program, you can simultaneously make it both easy to use and get all of that depth that just isn't feasible with dice, pens and paper.
People will play how they do currently do out of nostalgia or reluctance to use technology, but we'll pass on and the game will be something people have heard about rather than actually play that much.
Umm, they call those video games and they’ve been around for a while. My love of baulders gate 1 and 2 did not stop me from wanting to play in person with friends. BG3, fun so far in early access, also doesn’t make me want to sit home.
People like to be around other people. People like to hang out with friends and do things. That will never change and is a big part of the draw of D&D. I’m not trying to say it will last forever, but computers aren’t going to be what kills it.
And as hobbies go, D&D is fairly cheap, if you look at the cost of books compared to the hours of play you get from them, way less expensive than an Xbox or even going to a movie.
I don't think that games like Baldur's Gate accomplish quite what Linklite was talking about with AI. I believe what they're talking about has more to do with the absolute freedom that D&D allows... if there's a decorative chandelier in a videogame, unless it's designed as a triggerable trap it's just set dressing, whereas a DM who maybe didn't plan to have the chandlier they mentioned early as set dressing can decide that, if a player cuts it loose, the chandelier can drop on enemies and then the DM can improvise how much and what type of damage it deals to opponents, or if it can potentially trap an opponent in place. If you're having a conversation with an NPC in a modern videogame the NPC will only say what they've been programmed to say, whereas a DM can react to specific phrases and information. If an AI can replicate that level of improvisation then perhaps that could become preferable to traditional D&D, but for now videogames just don't truly replicate the feel of a TTRPG.
It will happen sooner or later. That's the nature of things. It'll be delayed by the use of editions to keep updating and keeping the game fresh, but one day D&D will die.
I imagine that we'll see a drop soon as the people who found it because of lockdowns etc but find that they don't have the time start giving up. However, it will still ve popular for a while yet.
I imagine AI will be the killer. When consumer-accessible AI can perform all of the functions of a DM (specifically the ability to improvise comes to mind), I think D&D, at least in its current form, will be doomed. It's just too expensive, complex to use and produces too simple results to compete. If you can hide all the complicated parts behind a computer program, you can simultaneously make it both easy to use and get all of that depth that just isn't feasible with dice, pens and paper.
People will play how they do currently do out of nostalgia or reluctance to use technology, but we'll pass on and the game will be something people have heard about rather than actually play that much.
Umm, they call those video games and they’ve been around for a while. My love of baulders gate 1 and 2 did not stop me from wanting to play in person with friends. BG3, fun so far in early access, also doesn’t make me want to sit home.
People like to be around other people. People like to hang out with friends and do things. That will never change and is a big part of the draw of D&D. I’m not trying to say it will last forever, but computers aren’t going to be what kills it.
And as hobbies go, D&D is fairly cheap, if you look at the cost of books compared to the hours of play you get from them, way less expensive than an Xbox or even going to a movie.
Xbox is dirt cheap, much cheaper than films on a per hour basis. Films are pretty expensive on a per hour basis.
Anyway, the main thing holding AI back is imagination and the ability to improvise. Right now, if you want to do something, someone has to program the computer to tell it what it needs to do to account for it. Try to do something that the the programmer hasn't accounted for? Too bad. We're getting there slowly, the physics engines are allowing more and more freedom and game design is allowing more choice, but there are still severe limitations. You can't persuade the bandits in Skyrim to form an army to combat Alduin, for example. You can in Dragon if Icespire Peak.
This allows D&D a niche, a place in the market. It can offer something that computers can't. Freedom to do whatever you want (so long as your DM is fine with it). Computer games have much over TTRPGs. Their graphics are much more immersive. They're cheaper - unless you're really keeping things cheap, doing theatre of mind. They take much less preparation. They're easier to use, while simultaneously offering more complex systems. They take much less storage space.
The one thing holding them back from knocking TTRPGs into the nostalgia territory is the AI. Current AI isn't actually intelligent at all, and can't cope with novel developments - which is a vital component of D&D. Once it is intelligent (which is still decades away, IMO), TTRPGs will be an exercise in nostalgia. Once that happens, D&D will either fade or morph into something that wouldn't resemble modern D&D very much at all.
I'm not sure why you would think using computer technology to play a game would mean that you couldn't wouldn't be in the same room. Heck, the reverse isn't even true - you are using at this very moment a website designed to help you to play physical games while not even necessarily being in the same country.
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Right now DnD 5E has taken a pretty unassailable position, it is lightweight rules wise which means it is the perfect platform for Online streams. Something the designers have admitted is driving design decisions moving forward. Jeremy Crawford stated in an interview for MMM that the shorter session times of streamers, combined with the fact that the average player are now grabbing 90 mins -2.5 hours when they can as opposed to playing 8 hour long marathons, means that game design has shifted to a lightweight slimline game that can be played quickly and easily without getting bogged down in rules or mechanics.
This, as with so much media now days is the way that most people devour there entertainment. DnD has a position of strength in terms of 5th edition exposure and ease of introduction to the system. The focus of the game has become the Roleplay Pillar as opposed to a deep tactical combat experiance, there is still plenty of scope for DM's and groups to add more complexity into the game, but, the core vanilla version of 5th edition is not that style of game, and I think that is a good thing. I have been playing TTRPG's for 30 years, of varying levels of detail and complication, I only got into DnD 9 years ago because of 5th edition. Before then myself and my friends sneered at DnD as a very 1 dimensional hack and slash game.
In the 90's DnD almost lost out to a competitor. White WOlfs world of darkness was very very close to becoming the top TTRPG game. It is a very very different system and style of game. I don't see anything right now out there that is competing anywhere near to the same level so I really do see DnD keeping it's top spot fr a long time to come.
Now is DnD the best game system? In my opinion no, it isn't even my fav fantasy system. I really dislike the D20 target number mechanic, I dislike the fact that at even medium levels most parties have an "expert" at all the various areas of the game delivering a regular roll of 20+ for things like Investigation, Perception, Stealth, Deception etc.
But I have continued to DM the game for 8 years, why? Firstly because it is a great TTRPG intro, I also like it's lightweightness, compared to the other well known fantasy based TTTRPG, Pathfinder, I much prefer 5th Ed for telling stories in a world with dragons etc. The other fantasy system I have always loved, Warhammer fantasy roleplay suffers from a lack of support and attention unlike DnD. DnD being lightweight works. My favoured gaming systems are things like 7th seas with it's roll and keep mechanics, or legend of the 5 rings, which as a bespoke setting is just amazing. But in recent years DnD has trumped everything else largely because of this site.
I can run remote games (which I have been doing pre covid) of DnD far easier then almost any other system. So it is a far better system for me to run as a storyteller. In person I still love getting out my books and running games of L5R, Mage, Call of Cthulu and my absolute fav game, Paranoia. But most of my players now days lives are better suited to them jumping online and playing remotely.
So unless someone creates a way to play other systems as easily as DnD remotely (and I know roll 20 etc have modules for other systems but they are rarely as well supported as DnD is) then I really don't see DnD losing its spot as no 1.
Define "toppled" and "surpassed". In a way it has already happened, D&D has had to reinvent itself (about five times by now) just to stay alive, so to speak. And in the late 90s and early 2000s you had White Wold and their World of Darkness that was in some ways meant to be more "mature". Vampire the Masquerade back then was HUGE, you had a VtM wrestler, a TV-series and computer games. So not unlike D&D's recent success with Critical Role and the Legend of Vox Machina (although I can't imagine Hornswoggle being reimagined as a Scnlan type character...).
Also, in Europe (and probably other parts of the world) there are domestic "generic fantasy games" that often compete quite nicely with D&D. That said, the popularity of D&D will always wax and wane and I think that as long as there are peopl eplaying pen and paper RPGs you will have people playing D&D.
Video games haven't eradicated boardgames - which actually can and have been programmed so you don't absolutely need to play against other people - so I don't worry about an AI revolution (which isn't exactly imminent either) ending TTRPGs. The social element, the human component, is very much an invaluable part of the experience. And I mean, if you DM a campaign or two you'll be acutely aware you can't plan for every eventuality. Players will continue to surprise you, forcing you to improvise and think on your feet. That kind of AI is still true sci-fi on the same level as widescale space colonisation. I don't doubt they're both going to happen at some point, but it's not going to be soon.
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I don't see it happening until there is a new generation that is co-opted by something equally as captivating. 5e brought a lot of new people into the fold, and that cultural inertia is going to keep it going for a long time.
I do think that eventually we will have the capability for a 'DM' to basically generate a virtual world for their friends to play in, whether it's a video game or AR or VR or whatever - basically like the current virtual tabletops but actual immersive, procedurally generated 3D worlds. If someone else does that and keeps the core concept of collaborative storytelling with friends with one of those friends controlling every aspect of the world, I could see that appealing more to a new generation. But when we speculate about the future we are wrong a lot more often than right, so what do I know?
I think we are decades away from AI ever being able to emulate an incompetent DM, and may never see an AI that can emulate a good DM.
Narrative storytelling is hard for an AI to accomplish - you can feed it every book ever written and it might be able to recreate general themes, but it is going to have a hard time with setting a tone.
D&D is even harder than that. Not only do you have to tell a narrative, you have to react to what the characters do AND what the players do. For an AI to be successful, it would have to create a compelling narrative, adjust the narrative instantly based on any number of infinite choices characters make, and be able to read the emotions of the players at the table and adjust the story based on players’ real world emotions and reactions.
Many human DMs are incapable of checking all those boxes. I don’t see an AI ever satisfying all these elements, particularly not the third.
So to clear up the AI reference here, this comes down to a an informal benchmark setting of getting AI past let's call it traditional game theory problem solving models, a notion that got distilled by a researcher quipping to their adviser, "so we shouldn't really be teaching AI Chess or even Go, or even fiction writing if we want to advance the technology, but teach it dungeons and dragons."
The problem is what would an AI give players to do? AI is designed to do the thinking for the human and present the human not with options but the best answer. It's possible an AI could write a module, they can already write fiction and I've heard of some meh attempts at AI generated dungeons, but given what AI are largely trained to do, it's going to be a railroading. Some folks may want to do that, just like some people like reading transcripts of great chess matches. But I think at the end of the day folks who want to play D&D. want to do the thinking for themselves.
I mean, could you imagine the player agency push back?
DND popularity has never been as high as it is these days. It is also probably one of the longest TTRPGs to have ever existed and stayed alive. What I was thinking about today is will DND ever be surpassed by another TTRPG? It is hard to imagine, but every empire will eventually fall. Right now the competition doesn't even come close to being as well known and played as DND, but can you ever imagine it happening?
1 shot dungeon master
I mean, for a while there, Pathfinder seemed to be doing way better than 3.5/4e, so I can see it happening. That time frame was largely due to a disconnect between what the players wanted and what was given to them (quantity of books, focus of books, rules ideas, etc.). The current edition has been pretty adamant about customer satisfaction, so I don't see anything taking it over for a good long time, as long as no one at WotC makes just a really horrible decision or five.
It will happen sooner or later. That's the nature of things. It'll be delayed by the use of editions to keep updating and keeping the game fresh, but one day D&D will die.
I imagine that we'll see a drop soon as the people who found it because of lockdowns etc but find that they don't have the time start giving up. However, it will still ve popular for a while yet.
I imagine AI will be the killer. When consumer-accessible AI can perform all of the functions of a DM (specifically the ability to improvise comes to mind), I think D&D, at least in its current form, will be doomed. It's just too expensive, complex to use and produces too simple results to compete. If you can hide all the complicated parts behind a computer program, you can simultaneously make it both easy to use and get all of that depth that just isn't feasible with dice, pens and paper.
People will play how they do currently do out of nostalgia or reluctance to use technology, but we'll pass on and the game will be something people have heard about rather than actually play that much.
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.
D&D wasn't doing well at all in the mid-'90s. WotC pretty much saved it when buying the IP from TSR. If it gets mismanaged it can fail, just like anything else. That's a lot less likely nowadays, with company size comes a certain stability, but the real advantage D&D has is that it's the typical gateway RPG: we can discuss the quality of the ruleset all day long (and do that quite often right here on these forums) but it's undeniably simple enough for totally new players and it has the brand exposure no other tabletop roleplaying game has. If 90% of new players pass through your doors it's no big deal if a lot of them move on to other systems at some point; that's still a guaranteed revenue stream and ensures that brand recognition will pretty much always eclipse that of others. This isn't a case of being easier to get on top than staying on top, being in the position they are is a massive advantage compared to any 'competition'. And being backed by Hasbro means even more (and massively so) access to financial means and feet in the door with ancillary businesses (movie rights, video games and the like).
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No king rules forever; D&D will eventually be supplanted by something; even World of Warcraft can't hold the king MMO crown forever. It might well take a confluence of factors; but all it really takes is WotC to bugger something up bad enough for something else to take its place. See the afore-mentioned 4E vs Pathfinder battle. Regardless; based upon size alone, it'll probably be a matter of D&D losing the crown as much as or more so something else taking it.
There are different possibilities that lead to D&D not being an iconic brand someday, but you question about when D&D is no longer the top TTRPG brand is a specific question.
Concerning the statement that "D&D has probably been ... " D&D is the Godfather of all the TTRPGs. It came from the TT Wargame genre where players adopted the persona of a single character and then set off to do battle with evil in the world.
I don't know what comparison you would make to determine which is the dominant brand and I don't know what the relative numbers of players or sales or whatever turns out to be, but I anticipate D&D is by far in the lead. I have only one friend that "Games" that has talked about another RPG system, and it was Rokugon. He also plays (played) the game Mordheim, but I don't believe this is an RPG. Except for these fora, I have never heard of the other systems. However, I have a dozen friends that have played D&D.
When something begins to happen, it will have to begin with a decline in interest in D&D. The first indicator that this is real trouble for WotC is if other TTRPGs are not experiencing the same decline. If the "tide goes out" and something new comes along, it will cause the interest in all the TTRPGs to decline together, and may well hit the others first because players of the others are probably out there looking for that next great thing while most D&D players are just using it as a social excuse one a week/month. So a new VR version or an AI version is unlikely to unseat D&D as the top dog because all the current iteration of TTRPGs will decline against that. But, an AI or a VR version that isn't D&D sounds like a video game and so it only reduces interest in other forms of entertainment.
D&D could only fall from its supremacy if WotC shoots itself in the foot, from my perspective. WotC is quite capable of doing that but so far they have avoided going too far. My two worries are that they will become overly determined to make their card game, Magic the Gathering, a component of the D&D magic system -or- that they allow the Woke crowd to tell them what they can't do and what they must do to stay in their good graces. Those are the kind of things that could knock them out of their supremacy.
D&D is enjoying a golden age. It will end and it is unlikely to come back once it does. There are other industries enjoying large profits because of D&D. They are selling specialty dice crafted in new and innovative shapes and materials. They are selling minis like they never have in the past, with one company providing the "design your own mini at a premium" service. There are dice towers and trays specifically themed for D&D. There are dice bags, dice jails, DM screens, play mats, mugs, T-shirts, and I bet even some LARP gear being sold because of the popularity of D&D. Of course the Internet is a component of this. But I don't imagine the hobby will see such a success again.
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While it is inevitable that all things must one day come to an end, I have to disagree with the argument of "see, look! Pathfinder almost became king once" argument. Yes, Pathfinder was more popular in certain circles than 4e--but it has never in the running to replace D&D as the king. Why? Even today, Pathfinder is still really only known by those already familiar with the tabletop RPG world. But once you start getting outside of the core group of RPG players, knowledge of Pathfinder's existence plummets.
Even at its least popular (and, frankly, I think 4e gets a bad rap--it did a lot of things better than 5e does), D&D is still a cultural phenomenon with wide-reaching knowledge of its existence. Even before Stranger Things, the Big Bang Theory, and COVID started to make D&D more mainstream, most people would know what D&D is, even if only as "that nerdy thing people play with dice?" Pathfinder never reached the level where you could survey random folks on the street and they would be able to immediately recognize what the game was.
Which means D&D always remained the most common entry point into tabletop gaming, and, though some of the more dedicated tabletop gamers might move from D&D to pathfinder, the vast majority of folks are more casual players who are adverse to learning new rulesets, so they stick with D&D.
Perhaps one day that will change, but with 48 years or so of inertia under its belt, it is going to take a long, long time for D&D to sufficiently fade that someone else overtakes it.
D&D is a pretty big fish in a pretty small pond. It'll be hard to knock over.
I dunno about all this "empires must fall" rhetoric. I kinda think of D&D like the brand Wilson is to sporting gear. It'll be a lot of peoples "first glove" for TTRPG. For better or worse (there being so many more accessible TTRPG that would be arguable better TTRPG entry points) I don't see D&D being replaced, but I also didn't see the surge in popularity either. I get the "wait till AI". I'm aware of the line of thought in AI development that postulates what that an AI dungeon master would be significant benchmark for AI development, but that's not necessarily a win or even a want for TTRPGs. People still play chess. Sure one could see some massive AI driven west marches campaigns, but a big part of the TTRPG is doing the thinking and getting to know and engage with people's imagination. I'm not sure where AI is on the social emotional learning side of things, but from what I've seen from AI generated fiction and art, it's still got a lot to learn.
I'd honestly prefer a different ecosystem for TTRPG, WotC is basically Marvel to Hasbro's Disney in this space and much like Marvel movies are great but also suck is a truism to film, I wish TTRPGs could start with games like Magical Kittens or even Unkindness and the rest of the micro RPG book (the article link actually includes the game, it's cool and fun and shows how little you really need to have an awesome TTRPG experience). It's ironic because the D&D brand says it wants to see and find more things to do with D&D and I frankly don't think that's going to happen unless you had more people start from a position that doesn't begin with Dungeon and Dragons as the definition of TTRPG.
Jander Sunstar is the thinking person's Drizzt, fight me.
I think, even if D&D ultimately gets overtaken by another game, at least in terms of "copies sold" and "active community", D&D will still remain the generic term for all of TTRPGs in pop culture and among the general public. Sort of like how, in the 90's, every videogame system was just "A Nintendo" for anyone who didn't actually pay attention to that kind of thing. Even if Vampire: The Masquerade comes out with a new edition that sweeps the TTRPG world off its feet, the average person will still recognize "Dungeons and Dragons" as just the generic term for TTRPGs... if you and your friends are trying to explain what you're doing rolling all those dice and speaking in weird voices to Grandma, you'll just have to say, "It's like Dungeons and Dragons, but everyone is Vampires."
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Umm, they call those video games and they’ve been around for a while. My love of baulders gate 1 and 2 did not stop me from wanting to play in person with friends. BG3, fun so far in early access, also doesn’t make me want to sit home.
People like to be around other people. People like to hang out with friends and do things. That will never change and is a big part of the draw of D&D. I’m not trying to say it will last forever, but computers aren’t going to be what kills it.
And as hobbies go, D&D is fairly cheap, if you look at the cost of books compared to the hours of play you get from them, way less expensive than an Xbox or even going to a movie.
Sure, but I have a strong imagination. Do I think it will ever happen? Not in my lifetime, if ever.
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I don't think that games like Baldur's Gate accomplish quite what Linklite was talking about with AI. I believe what they're talking about has more to do with the absolute freedom that D&D allows... if there's a decorative chandelier in a videogame, unless it's designed as a triggerable trap it's just set dressing, whereas a DM who maybe didn't plan to have the chandlier they mentioned early as set dressing can decide that, if a player cuts it loose, the chandelier can drop on enemies and then the DM can improvise how much and what type of damage it deals to opponents, or if it can potentially trap an opponent in place. If you're having a conversation with an NPC in a modern videogame the NPC will only say what they've been programmed to say, whereas a DM can react to specific phrases and information. If an AI can replicate that level of improvisation then perhaps that could become preferable to traditional D&D, but for now videogames just don't truly replicate the feel of a TTRPG.
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Xbox is dirt cheap, much cheaper than films on a per hour basis. Films are pretty expensive on a per hour basis.
Anyway, the main thing holding AI back is imagination and the ability to improvise. Right now, if you want to do something, someone has to program the computer to tell it what it needs to do to account for it. Try to do something that the the programmer hasn't accounted for? Too bad. We're getting there slowly, the physics engines are allowing more and more freedom and game design is allowing more choice, but there are still severe limitations. You can't persuade the bandits in Skyrim to form an army to combat Alduin, for example. You can in Dragon if Icespire Peak.
This allows D&D a niche, a place in the market. It can offer something that computers can't. Freedom to do whatever you want (so long as your DM is fine with it). Computer games have much over TTRPGs. Their graphics are much more immersive. They're cheaper - unless you're really keeping things cheap, doing theatre of mind. They take much less preparation. They're easier to use, while simultaneously offering more complex systems. They take much less storage space.
The one thing holding them back from knocking TTRPGs into the nostalgia territory is the AI. Current AI isn't actually intelligent at all, and can't cope with novel developments - which is a vital component of D&D. Once it is intelligent (which is still decades away, IMO), TTRPGs will be an exercise in nostalgia. Once that happens, D&D will either fade or morph into something that wouldn't resemble modern D&D very much at all.
I'm not sure why you would think using computer technology to play a game would mean that you couldn't wouldn't be in the same room. Heck, the reverse isn't even true - you are using at this very moment a website designed to help you to play physical games while not even necessarily being in the same country.
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.
Right now DnD 5E has taken a pretty unassailable position, it is lightweight rules wise which means it is the perfect platform for Online streams. Something the designers have admitted is driving design decisions moving forward. Jeremy Crawford stated in an interview for MMM that the shorter session times of streamers, combined with the fact that the average player are now grabbing 90 mins -2.5 hours when they can as opposed to playing 8 hour long marathons, means that game design has shifted to a lightweight slimline game that can be played quickly and easily without getting bogged down in rules or mechanics.
This, as with so much media now days is the way that most people devour there entertainment. DnD has a position of strength in terms of 5th edition exposure and ease of introduction to the system. The focus of the game has become the Roleplay Pillar as opposed to a deep tactical combat experiance, there is still plenty of scope for DM's and groups to add more complexity into the game, but, the core vanilla version of 5th edition is not that style of game, and I think that is a good thing. I have been playing TTRPG's for 30 years, of varying levels of detail and complication, I only got into DnD 9 years ago because of 5th edition. Before then myself and my friends sneered at DnD as a very 1 dimensional hack and slash game.
In the 90's DnD almost lost out to a competitor. White WOlfs world of darkness was very very close to becoming the top TTRPG game. It is a very very different system and style of game. I don't see anything right now out there that is competing anywhere near to the same level so I really do see DnD keeping it's top spot fr a long time to come.
Now is DnD the best game system? In my opinion no, it isn't even my fav fantasy system. I really dislike the D20 target number mechanic, I dislike the fact that at even medium levels most parties have an "expert" at all the various areas of the game delivering a regular roll of 20+ for things like Investigation, Perception, Stealth, Deception etc.
But I have continued to DM the game for 8 years, why? Firstly because it is a great TTRPG intro, I also like it's lightweightness, compared to the other well known fantasy based TTTRPG, Pathfinder, I much prefer 5th Ed for telling stories in a world with dragons etc. The other fantasy system I have always loved, Warhammer fantasy roleplay suffers from a lack of support and attention unlike DnD. DnD being lightweight works. My favoured gaming systems are things like 7th seas with it's roll and keep mechanics, or legend of the 5 rings, which as a bespoke setting is just amazing. But in recent years DnD has trumped everything else largely because of this site.
I can run remote games (which I have been doing pre covid) of DnD far easier then almost any other system. So it is a far better system for me to run as a storyteller. In person I still love getting out my books and running games of L5R, Mage, Call of Cthulu and my absolute fav game, Paranoia. But most of my players now days lives are better suited to them jumping online and playing remotely.
So unless someone creates a way to play other systems as easily as DnD remotely (and I know roll 20 etc have modules for other systems but they are rarely as well supported as DnD is) then I really don't see DnD losing its spot as no 1.
Define "toppled" and "surpassed". In a way it has already happened, D&D has had to reinvent itself (about five times by now) just to stay alive, so to speak. And in the late 90s and early 2000s you had White Wold and their World of Darkness that was in some ways meant to be more "mature". Vampire the Masquerade back then was HUGE, you had a VtM wrestler, a TV-series and computer games. So not unlike D&D's recent success with Critical Role and the Legend of Vox Machina (although I can't imagine Hornswoggle being reimagined as a Scnlan type character...).
Also, in Europe (and probably other parts of the world) there are domestic "generic fantasy games" that often compete quite nicely with D&D. That said, the popularity of D&D will always wax and wane and I think that as long as there are peopl eplaying pen and paper RPGs you will have people playing D&D.
Video games haven't eradicated boardgames - which actually can and have been programmed so you don't absolutely need to play against other people - so I don't worry about an AI revolution (which isn't exactly imminent either) ending TTRPGs. The social element, the human component, is very much an invaluable part of the experience. And I mean, if you DM a campaign or two you'll be acutely aware you can't plan for every eventuality. Players will continue to surprise you, forcing you to improvise and think on your feet. That kind of AI is still true sci-fi on the same level as widescale space colonisation. I don't doubt they're both going to happen at some point, but it's not going to be soon.
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I don't see it happening until there is a new generation that is co-opted by something equally as captivating. 5e brought a lot of new people into the fold, and that cultural inertia is going to keep it going for a long time.
I do think that eventually we will have the capability for a 'DM' to basically generate a virtual world for their friends to play in, whether it's a video game or AR or VR or whatever - basically like the current virtual tabletops but actual immersive, procedurally generated 3D worlds. If someone else does that and keeps the core concept of collaborative storytelling with friends with one of those friends controlling every aspect of the world, I could see that appealing more to a new generation. But when we speculate about the future we are wrong a lot more often than right, so what do I know?
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(Artificer) Swordmage | Glasswright | (Barbarian) Path of the Savage Embrace
(Bard) College of Dance | (Fighter) Warlord | Cannoneer
(Monk) Way of the Elements | (Ranger) Blade Dancer
(Rogue) DaggerMaster | Inquisitor | (Sorcerer) Riftwalker | Spellfist
(Warlock) The Swarm
I think we are decades away from AI ever being able to emulate an incompetent DM, and may never see an AI that can emulate a good DM.
Narrative storytelling is hard for an AI to accomplish - you can feed it every book ever written and it might be able to recreate general themes, but it is going to have a hard time with setting a tone.
D&D is even harder than that. Not only do you have to tell a narrative, you have to react to what the characters do AND what the players do. For an AI to be successful, it would have to create a compelling narrative, adjust the narrative instantly based on any number of infinite choices characters make, and be able to read the emotions of the players at the table and adjust the story based on players’ real world emotions and reactions.
Many human DMs are incapable of checking all those boxes. I don’t see an AI ever satisfying all these elements, particularly not the third.
So to clear up the AI reference here, this comes down to a an informal benchmark setting of getting AI past let's call it traditional game theory problem solving models, a notion that got distilled by a researcher quipping to their adviser, "so we shouldn't really be teaching AI Chess or even Go, or even fiction writing if we want to advance the technology, but teach it dungeons and dragons."
The problem is what would an AI give players to do? AI is designed to do the thinking for the human and present the human not with options but the best answer. It's possible an AI could write a module, they can already write fiction and I've heard of some meh attempts at AI generated dungeons, but given what AI are largely trained to do, it's going to be a railroading. Some folks may want to do that, just like some people like reading transcripts of great chess matches. But I think at the end of the day folks who want to play D&D. want to do the thinking for themselves.
I mean, could you imagine the player agency push back?
Jander Sunstar is the thinking person's Drizzt, fight me.