Jay Barnson on Dungeons & Dragons and Computer RPGs

Jay “Rampant Coyote” Barnson has published a brief blog post on D&D-inspired RPGs, itself inspired by this recent Tom’s Hardware article. The Frayed Knights developer seems to have to moved on from Dungeons & Dragons, and actually advocates for tailor-made rulesets in videogames:

The appeal to me in the past was mainly in the form of rules familiarity. I didn’t have to wonder too badly about the relative value of a 16 Strength versus a 17 strength, or a +1 longsword versus a +2 short sword. And I was already prepared to experiment with character and party ideas. If we have a druid and a paladin, can we skip having a cleric in the party? Plus, I could leverage off of that experience to apply known tactics in something like a dragon battle.

Today, however, I’m no longer one of the D&D faithful. While I’ve perused the 4th edition player’s guide when it came out, I only recognize the gist, not the details. And I’ve really not been paying attention to the (D&D Next) development (as Paizo’s already won my group over in spades with Pathfinder, capitalizing quite well on WotC’s missteps).

And it is not as if those rules were in any way sacred or particularly well-suited to computer games. In fact, they were arguably the opposite. While the nasty learning curve of a new rules system is a pain in the butt for developers and players, I’d just as soon see more broad, turn-based, choice-heavy RPGs in the style of the 1996-2003 classics with custom rules systems.