LostSoul said:
And that has nothing to do with advertising, production quality, or market share?
Also. But if a 4e came out with the changes suggested, published by WotC, still a majority of gamers will stay in 3e. Or, better, they
would if 3e was still supported - if WotC actually discontinued 3e in favor of a "4e", most likely a good number of people would switch no matter how bad the new edition, because of support alone.
I'm not advocating a wholesale change to D&D. What I'd like to see are options for people who want to tweak this or that, or even overhaul a major part of the system.
I'm all in favor of new options! I've repeated over and over again that the rule you suggest are sensible and will certainly improve the game for a good number of players. What I would not want to see is them as core rules, simply because that's not how most people like to play D&D. I fear that including them as options in the core books would be unfeasible, because the whole system needs to be balanced in a totally different way.
What's more, the fact that some people don't like the way D&D is set up doesn't mean that they (we) are "wrong". Nor does it mean they (we) are "right". It just means that different people have different tastes.
Exactly. Which is why the
core rules should appeal to the majority, and
optional books should be out for the others. I'm not saying that a d20 book with the optional rules AND the balance changes needed for them to work would not sell. I'm saying that it would not sell as well, or even come close to, the usual D&D.
Although I still don't understand why people like having to rationalize away inconsistencies...
People with a strong suspension of disbelief don't need a perfectly coherent system. Hell, if a lot of people can enjoy The Matrix and ignore the glaring plot holes...
edit: One more thing: can you explain to me why those inconsistencies are a Good Thing? (Or is it that you do not see those inconsistencies at all?)
They make the game fun. They don't detract from it. This is not because of the inconsistencies, and not even despite them. It's simply that the fact that some things don't make sense has no impact whatsoever on the enjoyability of the game, and in fact a good number of gamers don't even realize some of the less obvious ones unless they get pointed out (see the example with my friend above).
Additionally, some of the inconsistancies are an integral part of the D&D 'style', such as for example the fact that you can fight normally at 1 HP, or the fact that a blow that would vaporize a commoner is just another wound for a high-level fighter. That's why I said that what you call a fault, I call a feature.