just be mature about the whole thing. it happens... i had to go through several groups before settling with the one i'm in right now.
just don't burn bridges. you might not fit with their group, but one or two of the others at the table might remember you and give you a call if they decide to GM a game or know of a GM looking for players.
Your best bet for an edition change is a total system change. Break them from the whole d20 idea, and go play some shadowrun for a bit. Run a one shot or two of paranoia. Then come back and say "hey, can I vote for 4e this time?"
Step 1- Finish the campaign. Tell the other players and DM "I am really getting disallusioned with 3.5. I'd enjoy trying 4e at some point after this game." Have your character really push the plot forward, no more dragging feet or doing sidequests. (Side quests you get a vote, and if out voted you have to go). Main point of this step. Don't become a bad/flakey player. You need to become the model player, who is excited about the game. This makes your opinion matter when discussing the next game.
Step 2- Play something totally out of comfort zone for 3 or so sessions. Sell it as a quick break to play with a new system you are curious about.
Step 3- Go back to fantasy rpgs, and offer up 4e. Maybe even say "I want to see how it is, maybe we all like it more. If not, we go back to 3.5, no harm done."
If after playing 4e you love it and the group does not, decide if you want to keep with the group.
Be as upfront as you can. Maybe they can address your concerns with 3.5, but if they can't it's better to tell them than to lie or just stop showing up.
Bad joke alert!
My charisma score is pretty low after all.
Thanks guys, I'm really bad when it comes to talking to people :/
Email is acceptable in extreme situations.
Your best bet for an edition change is a total system change. Break them from the whole d20 idea, and go play some shadowrun for a bit. Run a one shot or two of paranoia. Then come back and say "hey, can I vote for 4e this time?"
Step 1- Finish the campaign. Tell the other players and DM "I am really getting disallusioned with 3.5. I'd enjoy trying 4e at some point after this game." Have your character really push the plot forward, no more dragging feet or doing sidequests. (Side quests you get a vote, and if out voted you have to go). Main point of this step. Don't become a bad/flakey player. You need to become the model player, who is excited about the game. This makes your opinion matter when discussing the next game.
Step 2- Play something totally out of comfort zone for 3 or so sessions. Sell it as a quick break to play with a new system you are curious about.
Step 3- Go back to fantasy rpgs, and offer up 4e. Maybe even say "I want to see how it is, maybe we all like it more. If not, we go back to 3.5, no harm done."
If after playing 4e you love it and the group does not, decide if you want to keep with the group.
+1 to this suggestion - it sounds like a very fair, reasonable, balanced, and cooperative way to handling the situation.
Trying some a couple short campaigns in other systems is a great way to take a break from a system that you are feeling burned out on, without committing anyone to a long campaign in a system they decide they don't like, so trying a one short campaign in a completely different system and setting, followed by another one in 4th Edition before deciding whether to commit to a longer campaign, seems to me like a great idea.
At best, the group may decide they like 4th Edition better.
At worst, the group tried it and decided it wasn't for them, but can at least carry some new ideas and experiences away from the experiement.
That I'm becoming disillusioned with our edition? We play 3.5, and I'm probably the only person who wants to switch to 4.0, mainly because I feel like all I do is take up a place in initiative. How can I let them know I'm thinking of leaving the group and going to the gaming shop the next town over and trying to find a new group?
Let me guess, you're not playing a spellcaster?
Just tell them. Don't whine, don't insist on changing right now. Finish the campaign you're playing but let it be known that afterwards you would really like to try 4e for a while. If no one else wants to do it after you finish what you're doing now, find another group and gracefully bow out, thanking them for the game.
And if you do stick with the current group for the duration, there's no reason why you can't play 4e at the same time with some other folks. Just try not to be one of those people that constantly says "Well, in my other game it works better blah blah blah ..."
Being stuck in a 3.5 group when you want to play 4 sucks. Every little rule gripe that comes up, you will be thinking 'if this was 4e, that wouldn't have happened'. Best to make the change sooner rather than later, or actually do leave and go to that store.
Be an adult about it. Tell them you don't want to play 3.x anymore and ask if they'll try 4E. If they're perfectly happy with 3.x, don't bring them down with you. They deserve to play the game they want to play, just like you.
It's normal that they'll probably be defensive, offended or feel abandoned. Hard feelings happen, but that's life. Just don't escalate the situation. They'll run a couple games without you and things will smooth over. If some of the players decide they want to play both games, don't force them to choose between one or the other.
(I've left and been kicked out of bands for 14 years. Early on, it would have been "You sucked anyway. I'm going to egg your house." With some maturity and experience it's "That sucks man. Know any other drummers?")
Your best bet for an edition change is a total system change. Break them from the whole d20 idea, and go play some shadowrun for a bit.
I say break them from teh whole d20 idea and go play 1E.
Another thought to consider, maybe the best thing for you is to move to a new group and new DM. It might not entirely be the system... it might be the DM that is not paying enough attention to folks getting bored or feeling like they can't contribute. Even if you did move to 4e, having the same DM might be part of the problem. A new DM and group could be what you really need.
I wouldn't beat around the bush, or try other systems, that's passive-aggressive and doesn't solve the problem. Be honest with them, explain that you're not having fun, tell them you'd like to try 4e. If they want to as well, great. If not, best to get it over with and break the news to them that you're going to go try it out with another group.
Another thought to consider, maybe the best thing for you is to move to a new group and new DM. It might not entirely be the system... it might be the DM that is not paying enough attention to folks getting bored or feeling like they can't contribute. Even if you did move to 4e, having the same DM might be part of the problem. A new DM and group could be what you really need.
Oh, by all means, be up-front and tell them what's going on - "guys, I'm getting burned out on 3rd Edition, and I want to try something different... I really, really want to try Fourth Edition Dark Sun, but old-fashioned Basic D&D, or G.U.R.P.S. superheroes, or Tunnels and Trolls, or Vampire: the Masquerade, or F.A.T.A.L., or ANYTHING but yet another game of D20 or 3rd Edition would be a great breath of fresh air! We don't have to commit to years of a new game or anything... just a few one-shots for a change of pace."
If they'd rather play something besides 4th, go for a short campaign of whatever new game they can agree on, and offer to run a short campaign of 4th Edition after that's done, to test the waters on whether they would be willing to run a longer 4E campaign. If the group isn't interested in trying anything new, then move on, but leave on the best terms that you can. Some groups are more flexible than others, and you can't force an entire group to make changes they aren't interested in making.
You could offer to DM. 4E, of course. It might give an 'out' to the current DM if he is looking to play, and the other players wont have much of a choice.
Being stuck in a 3.5 group when you want to play 4 sucks. Every little rule gripe that comes up, you will be thinking 'if this was 4e, that wouldn't have happened'. Best to make the change sooner rather than later, or actually do leave and go to that store.
I have just as many rules issues in 4e as I ever did in 3.x. Instead of looking up grapple every game, now we sift through hundreds of pages of erratta, power cards, and online compendium rules lawyering.
Which stealth rule do you use in 4e?
Which cleric healing rule?
Which version of x power?
4e is not some super-awesome game system where rules issue never happen, to insinuate it is; is assinign at best.
I wouldn't beat around the bush, or try other systems, that's passive-aggressive and doesn't solve the problem.
How is "Hey guys, I'm burnt out on 3rd edition DND. How about if we take a month or so break and play shadowrun for a few sessions?" passive aggressive. You literally state your goals up front. That was the first sentance of step 1.
Then once your players are more comfortable with new systems, you can suggest an alternative they may be more receptive to. Some people have a hard time breaking out of "This is the system I use" and giving a total system shock often triggers harsh feelings towards the system. "What do you mean I use a pile of D6, I like my d20". Then when you bring a second new system in, they don't have the bad memories of "First not 3.5 system and so I hated it" and its a little more familiar, going back to the d20 and fantasy.
Being stuck in a 3.5 group when you want to play 4 sucks. Every little rule gripe that comes up, you will be thinking 'if this was 4e, that wouldn't have happened'. Best to make the change sooner rather than later, or actually do leave and go to that store.
I have just as many rules issues in 4e as I ever did in 3.x. Instead of looking up grapple every game, now we sift through hundreds of pages of erratta, power cards, and online compendium rules lawyering.
Shenanigans.
Not only is in-game rules referencing explicitly discouraged in every edition, no table of characters has that many different options to look up, even if every one of their abilities was hard to ajudicate.
Which stealth rule do you use in 4e?
Yes, stealth is 4th Edition's grapple.
Which cleric healing rule?
Either. They both work fine for individual tables, with fair DMs and reasonable players.
Which version of x power?
Either. The changes to most powers are just clarifications that you don't need as long as you're not at a table full of antagonists. Most powers work mostly the same after their updates.
4e is not some super-awesome game system where rules issue never happen, to insinuate it is; is assinign at best.
Agreed, so I won't insinuate that. But the rules issues are far less extensive, consisting, as I said mostly of clarifications that only unreasonable rules lawyers were picking at anyway. And since there's no longer a massive power gap between different base classes, there's much less need to squeeze the rules for everything they're worth.
You could offer to DM. 4E, of course. It might give an 'out' to the current DM if he is looking to play, and the other players wont have much of a choice.
Being stuck in a 3.5 group when you want to play 4 sucks. Every little rule gripe that comes up, you will be thinking 'if this was 4e, that wouldn't have happened'. Best to make the change sooner rather than later, or actually do leave and go to that store.
I have just as many rules issues in 4e as I ever did in 3.x. Instead of looking up grapple every game, now we sift through hundreds of pages of erratta, power cards, and online compendium rules lawyering.
Which stealth rule do you use in 4e?
Which cleric healing rule?
Which version of x power?
4e is not some super-awesome game system where rules issue never happen, to insinuate it is; is assinign at best.
That kind of goes back to the main point which is that it's not the game you play that makes the biggest difference, it's the people you play with and how you get along that are the biggest factor in the fun. In my PF game we have rules lawyers and it drives me nuts. In my 4e game - I can count on one hand over two years the number of rules arguments we've had. But it's not the game ... it's the people. I could go into detail why that is by describing the people in the two groups and how they're different, but I won't go there.
But it's not the game ... it's the people.
Absolutely.
I have just as many rules issues in 4e as I ever did in 3.x. Instead of looking up grapple every game, now we sift through hundreds of pages of erratta, power cards, and online compendium rules lawyering.
Which stealth rule do you use in 4e?
Which cleric healing rule?
Which version of x power?
4e is not some super-awesome game system where rules issue never happen, to insinuate it is; is assinign at best.
I dont think its that hard. The answer for us is always "The latest published rule". There is only one stealth rule, there is only one version of each power and only one rule for cleric healing.
Very little is left open to interpretation in 4e. Power cards are definitive. Rules Compendium is the only print book we ever crack open during a game.
When an argument comes up (and its never an argument in 4e, its always 'how did XYZ work again?', we look it up or handwave and figure it out later. There are hairy moments still. Last week we had carrion crawlers climbing over us, in a pit, then they fell prone on top of us (or wait, do they fall prone under us, who are also prone?). Basically a crazy altitude/who-occupies-which-square problem. DM figured something out and we moved on.
Your best bet for an edition change is a total system change. Break them from the whole d20 idea, and go play some shadowrun for a bit. Run a one shot or two of paranoia. Then come back and say "hey, can I vote for 4e this time?"
Step 1- Finish the campaign. Tell the other players and DM "I am really getting disallusioned with 3.5. I'd enjoy trying 4e at some point after this game." Have your character really push the plot forward, no more dragging feet or doing sidequests. (Side quests you get a vote, and if out voted you have to go). Main point of this step. Don't become a bad/flakey player. You need to become the model player, who is excited about the game. This makes your opinion matter when discussing the next game.
Step 2- Play something totally out of comfort zone for 3 or so sessions. Sell it as a quick break to play with a new system you are curious about.
Step 3- Go back to fantasy rpgs, and offer up 4e. Maybe even say "I want to see how it is, maybe we all like it more. If not, we go back to 3.5, no harm done."
If after playing 4e you love it and the group does not, decide if you want to keep with the group.
Krusk, sorry I feel like Im picking on you today, this is the second time Ive quoted you to disagree...
I too feel this is passive agressive... He wants to play 4e, playing shadowrun is not 4e, if he wants to play 4e, saying anything different is trying to talk Around the situation instead of to the situation... Not a dictionary definistion but that is the spirit of passive.
I think Kruck suggested a very very very safe option, but at each step you have to convince others to let you do what you want, and after each option you still run the risk of ending up back where you are now... the fact that step 3, the final step, gives everyone the option of going back to 3, and before that forces you to play a game you seem not to be enjoying... I don't know... not what I would do at all...
Here is my suggestion. Talk to the DM, let him know how you feel, and that you would like to try out 4e.
If the DM is willing to try, and says he will talk to the group and if everyone is up for it they will switch (either now, or after this champaign depending where you guys are in the game now) Great! And again depending where you are now, you may be so thankful that you finish up this game, or you might just sit out for a while, because who wants to play a game they don't want to play? Nobody.
If the DM says no, or the group in general says no, thats fine, don't swear or spit, just offer ot DM a 4e one shot, then if they have time for BOTH (remember not to step on your old DMs toes) then you have a game.
If they still say no, off to find a new group!
Just be transparent and upfront, and don't feel bad about how you feel. There is nothing wrong with not likeing 3.5 while they still do, its just not the game for you.
Rather, trying something completely different from D&D first is simply a way to eliminate a few possibilities:
[spoiler Possibilities]
- the possibility that the problem isn't a dislike of 3rd Edition, that it is instead a matter of being burned out on a long-running 3rd Edition campaign that is getting a bit stale (in which case, simply quitting the group to look for a 4th Edition group would be like throwing the baby out with the bathwater; after a few games of something different, a game of "good old 3rd Edition" may appeal to a sense of nostalgia)
- the possibility that the problem isn't a dislike of 3rd Ediition, but instead a problem with a 3rd Edition DM who needs to try run something very different from D&D for a little while (in which case, trying to force a move to 4th Edition D&D would be counter-productive - if the DM is burned out on D&D, having to learn a new version of D&D immediately after grinding an older edition campaign to a close isn't going to improve his enthusiasm much)
- the possibility that the group would pin any awkwardness from trying a new system out on 4th Edition, rather than on the natural awkwardnes of trying anything new (in which case, trying to get them to convert to 4th Edition would be doomed to failure when a frustrated DM says "4th Edition doesn't work for me, it sucks, we're going back to a system I know well and that's final!")
- the possiblity that a group that has never seen anything but D20 / 3rd Edition would reject 4th Edition purely on the grounds that it doesn't look like "a proper RPG" (which seems to be a common enough reaction among 3rd Edition users, in that "it ain't exactly like what I've been playing since 1979, therefor it ain't D&D!"; trying a different system entirely can really provide a new perspective!)
[/spoiler]
Whatever the case, dropping cold from 3rd Edition into 4th Edition in a group whose loyalties are split sharply between the two editions is probably a decision that won't be destined for success. Some distance and perspective will be required first.
Try a different game first, a different game setting, someone else's house, a different DM - hell, try spending a couple weeks hiking or playing football on RPG day instead of role-playing. Whatever it takes to take a breather first, so that everyone can come back and try out 4th Edition D&D with a fresh set of open minds.
In any event, this only applies to a group that hasn't yet tried 4th Edition because they are simply hesitant to commit to anything new without trying it out in a controlled environment with a safe exit.
If instead this group has absolutely made up its mind about 4th Edition and will not under any circumstances try it again (or try it at all), and you've absolutely made up your mind that you don't like 3rd Edition and can't enjoy any further 3rd Edition gaming, then you are the odd-man-out and there isn't any sense in offering compromises, or otherwise trying to do anything but part ways on the best terms possible so that you can find a group that is willing to play your game.
Krusk, sorry I feel like Im picking on you today, this is the second time Ive quoted you to disagree...
I too feel this is passive agressive...
Don't feel sorry. If I'm wrong please tell me. Also, sometimes I'm kind of mean and deserve it. Case in point.
I wouldn't beat around the bush, or try other systems, that's passive-aggressive and doesn't solve the problem.
How is "Hey guys, I'm burnt out on 3rd edition DND. How about if we take a month or so break and play shadowrun for a few sessions?" passive aggressive. You literally state your goals up front. That was the first sentance of step 1.
Then once your players are more comfortable with new systems, you can suggest an alternative they may be more receptive to. Some people have a hard time breaking out of "This is the system I use" and giving a total system shock often triggers harsh feelings towards the system. "What do you mean I use a pile of D6, I like my d20". Then when you bring a second new system in, they don't have the bad memories of "First not 3.5 system and so I hated it" and its a little more familiar, going back to the d20 and fantasy.
My post literally says "Become a model player, and ask the group to switch. Don't do a cold switch or they will hate it. Switch to something drastically different so you can revert to something similar. (Both d20 based games). A model player actually has say in what the next game will be. The complainy, annoying, jerk basically is invited to play the next game because you need a 5th guy. Be the first and ask to switch to 4e.
Your best bet for an edition change is a total system change. Break them from the whole d20 idea, and go play some shadowrun for a bit. Run a one shot or two of paranoia. Then come back and say "hey, can I vote for 4e this time?"
Step 1- Finish the campaign. Tell the other players and DM "I am really getting disallusioned with 3.5. I'd enjoy trying 4e at some point after this game." Have your character really push the plot forward, no more dragging feet or doing sidequests. (Side quests you get a vote, and if out voted you have to go). Main point of this step. Don't become a bad/flakey player. You need to become the model player, who is excited about the game. This makes your opinion matter when discussing the next game.
Step 2- Play something totally out of comfort zone for 3 or so sessions. Sell it as a quick break to play with a new system you are curious about.
Step 3- Go back to fantasy rpgs, and offer up 4e. Maybe even say "I want to see how it is, maybe we all like it more. If not, we go back to 3.5, no harm done."
If after playing 4e you love it and the group does not, decide if you want to keep with the group.
I agree with this. A quick change would allow them to put them at ease to try something new.