The New Edition

(Note: I originally planned to do this as one post, but I have decided to break it up into a series of posts leading up to my impression of 5th ed)
Today is the day that the D&D Next playtest comes out.  Despite every fiber in my body protesting this, I am excited. Why do I have such reservations? Because being let down by D&D has been a trend in my life. It's like Jagermeister. On the one hand, Jagermeister is brought out only when it is party time, so it's good and brings out good memories. Unfortunately, it's appearance can also often be traced back to when the party went seriously downhill and you had to spend the night emptying the contents of your stomach. That's what a new edition of D&D is like. You yell out in an intoxicated cheer every time it's brought out and end it feeling sorry for yourself on the bathroom floor. Sad.

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My first disappointment with D&D actually came before I even played a game.  I remember being just crazy excited about the D&D cartoon. Yeah, almost all of the magic weapon powers sucked and the episodes were mind numbingly bad, but that ranger bow rocked! (the shield was also pretty cool, but who wanted to be that whiny guy?)  It's almost exclusively the reason I bothered learning how to shoot a bow. Throw in some confusing pre-adolescent feelings about the chick with the invisibility cloak and the acrobat that made a staff... become longer... and I was there every Saturday morning.

WTF D&D?!?

Unfortunately, there was never any closure. The kids, transported to this magical dimension and tormented by Vengar and Tiamat, never found their way home. THERE WAS NO FINAL EPISODE!  It was planned. They just decided to not make it! For a while the script of the final episode was floating around the internet. There was no internet back then, though. Just one Saturday you woke up, D&D is not in the rotation, and you were left feeling confused. There is a guy starting a Kickstarter project to do the final episode. I'm not a fan of his animation style, but I suppose half a loaf is better than the dark empty hole in my childhood.



Honestly, this cartoon is kind of what's lacking for Wizards of the Coast. I don't know if I would have bought that Red Box set if I hadn't already been intrigued by the cartoon. Getting it to fly in this day and age would be tough. Cartoons were allowed to be more violent back then and even by the standards of the 80's it was singled out as being too violent.  A way to get kids into the game that doesn't dumb down the game is sorely needed.  Just make sure it has an ending!

Sigh.  Even if it means including a stupid  unicorn in the party...