Over the years... I have had the fortune to play under a good number of people in a massive number of game engines. It is truly amazing honestly how many games are out there and how many go neglected. Honestly, I could go for a long time discussing that which systems are good and for what reason... but that isn't the point today. By the way... almost all have their own merit in one regard or the other, just wanted to say that.
I'll admit that I am a bit of an old guard member... I still enjoy classic AD&D 2nd. It's like your first doctor or first love, you will always remember them fondly. In fact, I still have enough of the books to be able to run a game if I chose to. Will I? Probably not. Why not? I know it well enough, yes... the big black bound books of the players handbook sits next to my well loved players option manuals. I often will still reference ideas from those old tomes. It was the pre-template days and it was good. But why not? Lack of desire from players.
Oh, I can wow those players in my living room for hours on end with stories of past glories and adventures... of people long past and challenges defeated and failures so fun that it can not help but be riveting. Every gamer who has spent time amongst their own kind has done it, its part of our culture! We are storytellers. But the moment those books come out... it's different and would require a good deal of re-education... difficult in the face of they are satisfied with the current engine we are running. If more of the old guard players I used to play with when I was younger were still around, we might still be using 2nd/Player's Options but they have moved on or have become enamored with newer editions.
I have run through the entire swath of 3rd through 3.5 and to it's present incarnation of Pathfinder. If you haven't realized it yet, that is the current engine of choice. It is not my first choice but it has worked well enough that we make do and it is a vehicle for the story. Common footing and all that.
This is not to say that I have not attempted to run other engines... oh no! Not true!
There is my classic favorite of Legend of the Five Rings... prefer the first but even through it's 4th edition... it has been well loved and received. So many players enjoy it and it was the original engine I ran during the youth of my current world. Sadly, the people who really enjoyed asian culture moved on and the newer gamers, not enamored with concepts of samurai culture and honor, moved the game towards the western world. Despite my love of the setting and the engine, it is semi-retired for me, despite attempts to stay current.
There is my love of 7th Sea. Had I still kept all my books for that, I would still be running it to this day. It is a blast but they disappeared with time. Entropy is great sometimes. Its fun and fluid and cinematic. Unfortunately, for all my love of swashbuckling and Errol Flynn movies, not as many love it as much I do. It is great source material.
Ooooh look here, Shadowrun... the old West End Games version of Star Wars, Traveller from so many versions (even the D20 version), Battletech/Mechwarrior (even the playtest for the current rules), the Starfleet Battles RPG (Prime Directive), BESM (1st thru 3rd), Heavy Gear, Amber, oWoD (predominately Mage, Vampire, and Changeling), and Exalted. I've tried to run all of these to various levels and degrees of success. They are all masterful and fun (perhaps not Prime Directive... but it is Starfleet Battles afterall, you have to be a masochist) but ultimately... everyone clamors back for the classic that keeps them coming back...
Dungeons and Dragons.... or more specifically... Pathfinder these days. It seems to give them level of customization with all the books that I provide for them, the safety of rules for nearly everything that can silence an argument... or fuel one, and an easy way to gauge their own abilities against another that they can't get from my more preferred storyteller games. They chafe under some of the poorly written rules but those can fixed.
House rules exist in plenty. How can you run anything for long without coming up with a few dozen? Compared to what my old gaming friends and I did to the D6 Star Wars engine where we rewrote it from the bones up... the changes to pathfinder have been really slim. Why? New gamers join all the time. The books have to be solid base to build from... otherwise they will never know where they stand and grow from. They have to trust the books in their hand are worth the time they put into reading it. The long departed old guard, we had the benefit of only having 8 people who were always together... today, I don't have that. I have 2 old players who know my house rules, 4 that are relatively older and 2 two who are new... and a waiting list of people to join... this isn't counting the people who are on the 'inactive but always welcomed' list. It has to work for all of them
I think it is why ultimately, we stick with Pathfinder... despite calls from some to play Exalted or Mage or Battletech or Legend of the Five Rings... people who would jump at the first sign of me wanting to run those again. Pathfinder and thus, Dungeons and Dragons is the safe rock they all trust. Call it what you want, Pathfinder, D&D, Iron Kingdoms, Warcraft: The RPG/World of Warcraft, Wheel of Time, or just D20... its all compatible... like GURPS for those of us who like slightly less algebra in our games... or don't know GURPS.
Thus, its my game. It is the current vehicle for the world till a better one is found... and I will always look for a better engine to drive the world with... because the current one is imperfect... but hey, it is just an engine... after all, without the story... all the crunch in the world is meaningless.
BTW, I only avoided 4th because it was too much of a change to what I knew. Despite wanting to learn it to see what it could do, it was anathema to my player base and as a GM, never lose your player base... or you might find yourself without players and having to turn to the old cork board at the local gaming ship for a new group. Plus, I am friends with all of them... never good to piss off the very people you go out drinking with, have cook outs with, go see movies, or work with. This is a social hobby after all.
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