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I’ve been playing 2nd, BX, and 5th edition of dnd for a while, but it has all been through my brother, who is the master of tomes in my house. Now that he has left for college, I have no books to use. I’m trying to run a campaign with my other siblings, but I’m stuck on what system to start with. I’m either leaning towards Pathfinder (beginner box), or 5e D&D (starter set). Which system is better (pros and cons) and which starter set should I buy? Thanks in advance to anyone who helps out!

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How much crunch do you want?  Are you looking for a system that has a built-in setting or are you going to develop and use your own setting?

Pathfinder is 3.5 with some of the rough edges polished off (and others added, of course).  Their system is tied in closely with their setting.  It assumes PCs have a profession other than adventuring that takes them from place to place and provides income and loot is balanced accordingly.  It has loads of material available in published adventures.  The adventures tie together and provide fairly good continuity and interaction... (Remember that amulet you got from the mad wizard 4 adventures ago?  It interacts with one of the traps in this one to allow you to bypass it completely!)

I have not played 5th edition since the beta but my take on it was that it tried to add back some of the flexibility and crunch that went away in 4th edition.  I always felt like 4th Edition was good but really took a lot of the creativity out of players hands.  That said, it tries to maintain some of the simplicity of 4th edition by making all modifiers an advantage so you kind of lose the flavor of things...  So, are you flanking him or is he off balance or prone or blind?  Meh, it's all advantage so take your +2 and go.  Pathfinder encourages the GM to think more...  Pathfinder wants to allow you to throw a flask of oil and then light it with a flaming arrow.  D&D still has a hard time with allowing players to think outside the box although a good GM can allow and encourage it if he's willing to work at it himself (without a lot of support from the rules).

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Duckman is correct. 

Both Pathfinder and 5th edition are really fun to play. Pathfinder just has a little more number crunching and I'd like to think you have a lot more options in creating a character. However it depends on you as a Dungeon Master, Can you remember all the modifiers for different effects? 

Personally I like pathfinder because of the little bit of number crunching. Then again I play hackmaster and 2nd edition a lot. 

Also before you buy any starter set you should can ebay, theres a good chance someone is offloading a small collection which can jump start you in. 

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5 minutes ago, generalripphook said:

Duckman is correct. 

Both Pathfinder and 5th edition are really fun to play. Pathfinder just has a little more number crunching and I'd like to think you have a lot more options in creating a character. However it depends on you as a Dungeon Master, Can you remember all the modifiers for different effects? 

Personally I like pathfinder because of the little bit of number crunching. Then again I play hackmaster and 2nd edition a lot. 

Also before you buy any starter set you should can ebay, theres a good chance someone is offloading a small collection which can jump start you in. 

What do you mean by a “small collection”

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Pathfinder has been sold via DriveThruRPG for a while now as PDFs.  Check around and see if you can find a copy of the PDFs unless you specifically need a bag full of tome-sized rulebooks.  For myself, I have been very happy to move all my rulebooks to a kindle.  I also do a lot of my development and plotting at the computer and have plenty of screen-space to have multiple PDFs and my notes open at the same time.

 

You can also find a number of the books, as mentioned, on auction sites if you want the hardbacks.

For Pathfinder you'll want the Core Rulebook and the rest is optional.  There are at least 6 more titles available which add options and flavors (advanced classes, advanced options, gear, spells, etc.).  The Beginner's Box does not actually give you all the content from the Core Rulebook and the GameMastery Guide as I recall.

 

Paiso (the original publisher) offers the PDF of the Core Rulebook for $10 while the hardback runs $50+shipping.  You may also be able to catch an offer from HumbleBundle for the books as they have sold Pathfinder in the past.

 

And since we're on the subject of books and PDFs, I will strongly recommend to any GM who has not seen and read it...  Find a copy of Robin's Laws.  This will do more to improve your awareness of the party and hence your game mastering than any other resource I have ever run across.

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27 minutes ago, Duckman said:

Find a copy of Robin's Laws.  This will do more to improve your awareness of the party and hence your game mastering than any other resource I have ever run across.

This, a hundred times.  That PDF is so great!

 

Also a consideration...to date, I don't believe WOTC is providing any PDF's of rulebooks, where as Paizo does.

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4 hours ago, Ultramar Or Bust said:

I’ve been playing 2nd, BX, and 5th edition of dnd for a while, but it has all been through my brother, who is the master of tomes in my house. Now that he has left for college, I have no books to use. I’m trying to run a campaign with my other siblings, but I’m stuck on what system to start with. I’m either leaning towards Pathfinder (beginner box), or 5e D&D (starter set). Which system is better (pros and cons) and which starter set should I buy? Thanks in advance to anyone who helps out!

The main thing between the two is that 5e D&D is relatively new, while pathfinder has been out for a long while. So Pathfinder has much more content already out, while D&D is newer to more people. Neither system is bad, as far as I can tell. I will also note that the Pathfinder company recently released Starfinder, which is a sci-fi variant of Pathfinder, so if looking for a newer RPG, that is also an option. 

On a personal note, I have a bunch of Pathfinder books that I would be happy to sell you for a negligible fraction of their value. I just need the space cleared which they occupy in my home. I'm debating selling them to Powell's Books, at present. I'd rather get them to a person that would use them, and I'm not a fan of Powell's as much these days.

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1 hour ago, paxmiles said:

On a personal note, I have a bunch of Pathfinder books that I would be happy to sell you for a negligible fraction of their value. I just need the space cleared which they occupy in my home. I'm debating selling them to Powell's Books, at present. I'd rather get them to a person that would use them, and I'm not a fan of Powell's as much these days.

If you can PM me with details, that would be great. I’m actually planning on buying the beginners box tonight, but having books later would be awesome. Thanks!

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I'm currently playing pathfinder and it is okay, but it is a builder's game. And due to the fact that there is so much content for it, there is some pretty wild and crazy [big bad swear word]. If you can keep it simple, it is probably a fine game. However, be careful about people finding stuff for it that is completely broken.

I've only played 5th a little, but it is a much more controlled game that I have seen. But I also know they are having trouble with some of the class balance.

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6 hours ago, Duckman said:

LOL!

You gots too much junk, Pax!  (This would be why I bought the PDFs when they went on sale at HumbleBundle :biggrin:.)

I do have too much junk. But regarding PDfs, I've found that players which play pathfinder via PDFs seem to have a very poor grasp of the rules. I understand the desire for less weight and the indexing/search function is certainly convienent, but not knowing the rules is very annoying for the other players...

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The other issue is that humble bundle really undercuts the local businesses. I really think those bundles were a really snotty thing for Paizo to do to the businesses that sell their books. Humble Bundle is basically the legal version of the pirate bay in terms what it does to local business. 

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26 minutes ago, paxmiles said:

The other issue is that humble bundle really undercuts the local businesses. I really think those bundles were a really snotty thing for Paizo to do to the businesses that sell their books. Humble Bundle is basically the legal version of the pirate bay in terms what it does to local business. 

Granted, but if I would not buy the books any other way then Paizo comes out ahead because I bought *something*.  The Core Rulebook is worth having in hardback.  Everything else is a reference book...  I agree that it is easier to sit and page through a hardback but the references rarely rate a page-turning reread.

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Having been starting to DM and played as a player D&D 5th edition. I have to say, i really enjoy D&D 5th edition! I haven't played pathfinder. But the level of story, campaigns to draw from, the new pre-primed minis, and such are EXCELLENT! We've been having a great 5th edition campaign and i've talked the nephews into wanting to join a new campaign where I'll start DM'ing.

 

You'd have to convince me why pathfinder would be better, because 5th edition is very solid!

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23 hours ago, Duckman said:

Granted, but if I would not buy the books any other way then Paizo comes out ahead because I bought *something*.  The Core Rulebook is worth having in hardback.  Everything else is a reference book...  I agree that it is easier to sit and page through a hardback but the references rarely rate a page-turning reread.

Humble bundle purchases are donations to charity. Paizo doesn't recieve money for them, as I understand it. It's a tax write off. Humble bundle definitely takes a cut. 

That said, if you purchase your books for almost nothing and then you tell other people that are looking to buy books that humblebundle is where to go to buy them, then how do the local stores sell the product sitting on their shelves? If they can't move the product, then why should they carry it? And if they don't carry it, why should they support the hobby? And if they don't support it, how long will it last? The humble bundle deal is bad for the hobby, even if their are short term gains for the individual players. Same issue with the Pirate Bay. The legality really doesn't matter, what makes it bad is that the local hobby isn't being supported because it's being undercut by the online sales. 

If people stopped buying 40k in the store, and exclusively bought it online, stores would not have play space for 40k. That's why GW tries to keep their digital content the same price as the physical copies, it's not greed, as greed would have them undercut local businesses, it's that they want the hobby to continue, long term. GW is greedy, no question, but their online prices are as such to promote the local stores, not because they want to stiff the players. 

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Direct profit or tax write-off, Paizo is benefiting because I bought something that I would not have at full price.

While I understand the loss of support for the LGS or the local bookstore, the same problem has been killing the LGS regularly.  For popular gaming titles I can wait until I get a Barnes and Noble discount and then go ask my LGS to offer me the same price on the title and they can't match it so if I go support Barnes and Noble I am not supporting the LGS.  Taking it a step further, publishing is a hideously wasteful medium in this day and age and it allows specific publishers to dictate content in a way that is detrimental to the market.  That's not to say that they don't provide some good services (like editing and proof reading) but at the same time they also refuse good, solid titles because they control the market and they don't want a property in a specific niche at the moment.

This applies to fiction and literature just as much as it applies to roleplaying.  Kevin Simbieda, for example, is in desperate need of an editor, a proof reader and some playtesters, but all the same I am happy that he put out Rifts as it is a great setting that deserved a chance.  Hugh Howey is another good example of someone who had a good product that was not picked up by traditional publishing.

Then you go into the cost of producing a fixed number of copies and storage and shelf-space and you can compare that to the costs of print-on-demand or digital copies and you see why the big publishers and the music industry are in a panic.  The people in control are looking at a market that is no longer willing to support their salaries because they no longer hold a monopoly on distribution and they have no other useful purpose in the business.

 

While this does not bode well for the LGS (at least regarding published material) it honestly is one of the best things to happen to fiction, literature and music as it has provided more people access to more material.  Like the LGS, hobbies like roleplaying and wargaming have got to figure out how to perpetuate themselves in this environment and I think clubs like Ordo are one of the best answers.  To be honest, a LGS is a terrible environment for a lot of people.  They tend to have local cliques and in some (or even many cases) are downright hostile to outsiders, whether being defensive or just abrasive.  I've watched wargaming at the LGS and it doesn't often carry the same spirit that you see at Ordo.  When you watch roleplaying, you have the same kind of dichotomy.  Worse, with a group exercise like roleplaying, the LGS attracts people who cannot find stable groups in private settings.  At least with wargaming you see more Ordo-style gamers who also game at the LGS and set a good example. To be honest, the internet itself is killing a lot of the benefit of the LGS (says the guy who still roleplays with his Seattle group every week from 3000+ miles away).  Another sign of the world changing...

 

I don't have a good answer for you really, Pax, other than to say the world is changing and through self-publishing and kickstarter the life of the LGS or bookstore owner is changed radically (which I suspect you already know and agree with).  I think we both are willing to pay a premium to support those businesses but I am not going to feel guilty about buying something on sale (or from HumbleBundle) when I would not buy it at retail price.  I've already made a decision that Paizo's Ultimate Combat or Ultimate Magic are not worth $45 each (plus tax and space to store them and on and on).  But if they are offered to me (by the legitimate owner of the IP) then I have no qualms about picking them up for less than the price of a cup of coffee.  I also see no harm in telling a teenager where to find a cheap, legal copy of the source books.  I'd rather he get involved and support at least the publisher, if not a LGS, rather than see him leave the hobby because he cannot afford the $500+ buy-in.

 

Your extension to the wargaming hobby here is one I have not quite figured out how to handle for myself.  GW has been very careful how it manages its IP and I understand why but at the same time other companies like Privateer Press have demonstrated that they can write much more legible rules.  I'm not sure I support the idea of $40-$60 for a new codex, especially not one as badly proofed and playtested as some of the GW stuff.  At the same time, they have some incredible artists making really good models and I want to support those guys but I haven't figured out how that should be done in the new world of 3D printing unless it is to develop an infrastructure for 3D printing just like print-on-demand books.  That, of course, leaves GW themselves in exactly the same position as the record label execs and the printing house managers...  They've always made their living by owning the distribution path for the products of their authors and artists and that is simply no longer the most efficient route to market.

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8 hours ago, Duckman said:

I don't have a good answer for you really, Pax, other than to say the world is changing and through self-publishing and kickstarter the life of the LGS or bookstore owner is changed radically (which I suspect you already know and agree with).  I think we both are willing to pay a premium to support those businesses but I am not going to feel guilty about buying something on sale (or from HumbleBundle) when I would not buy it at retail price.  I've already made a decision that Paizo's Ultimate Combat or Ultimate Magic are not worth $45 each (plus tax and space to store them and on and on).  But if they are offered to me (by the legitimate owner of the IP) then I have no qualms about picking them up for less than the price of a cup of coffee.  I also see no harm in telling a teenager where to find a cheap, legal copy of the source books.  I'd rather he get involved and support at least the publisher, if not a LGS, rather than see him leave the hobby because he cannot afford the $500+ buy-in.

 

Your extension to the wargaming hobby here is one I have not quite figured out how to handle for myself.  GW has been very careful how it manages its IP and I understand why but at the same time other companies like Privateer Press have demonstrated that they can write much more legible rules.  I'm not sure I support the idea of $40-$60 for a new codex, especially not one as badly proofed and playtested as some of the GW stuff.  At the same time, they have some incredible artists making really good models and I want to support those guys but I haven't figured out how that should be done in the new world of 3D printing unless it is to develop an infrastructure for 3D printing just like print-on-demand books.  That, of course, leaves GW themselves in exactly the same position as the record label execs and the printing house managers...  They've always made their living by owning the distribution path for the products of their authors and artists and that is simply no longer the most efficient route to market.

I suspect that PP has a higher profit margin that GW. They just put less effort into their product, which sells at similar, if not higher prices that GW products. All the PP stuff is made in china and is very low quality considering they cost the same to the consumer. And PP doesn't produce assembly instructions worth beans. As for rules, PP produces rules that make their produces easier to use in a tournament, but they don't promote casual play very well. GW doesn't compete with PP, they create the market and PP lives in their shadow. If GW were to disappear, PP would die. 

Regarding extremely cheap online digital content, like humble bundle, it is as good for local game stores as the Pirate Bay. Like how napster was for the music industry - that's actually a really good comparison because I would never buy music, but I was using napster back when it was new. Now that napster is gone, I've gone back to not buying music (I own, maybe 4 total music CDs and they were all gifts from others). For me, if the music industry died, that would be fine, possibly even a welcome change. 

Regarding Barnes and Noble. I don't think that's the same thing. For one, barnes and noble is crap and I would be happy to see them die off. So there is that. Additionally, I see waiting for reasonable sales to be the same sort of hurt for local game stores. No the issue is when humble bundle "sells" a hundred Pathfinder PDFs for a dollar. That's what hurts the local game stores. That goes well below the amount they could sell the product and break even. That's what I'm addressing. Buying things on sale, or at reasonable discount, is fine. A game store can compete with that. Even Amazon, usually doesn't undercut the market by so much where the local game store doesn't have the option to compete.

All that said, if GW, or any other company, isn't producing a product, or they make it really hard to acquire a certain product. I do understand seeking less than legal means to acquire a product. Supply and Demand has priority over the legal system in our capitalist society. If they have supply, but don't meet demand, they are at fault for creating the need to acquire things less than legally. 

For example. I wanted to buy the new Tick series. Amazon won't sell me a copy of the new Tick series (you still can't buy a copy). 6 hours after launch, I found the entire series online via google and watched it. I don't feel guilty because Amazon was the ones screwing themselves out of sale. Just like I see no issues streaming episodes of a TV show that was released in another country at an earlier date than in my country. There's no logic there, if they have the product and won't sell it, and there is demand that they won't meet, then it not a fault of the consumer to acquire it via other means. And especially with digital content, it's stupid to try to horde it.

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Anyway, if you don't like your local game store, I fully understand not wanting to support it. There are definitely crappy local game stores out there, ones that should just die off. 

I also think that if you are unwilling to buy into a hobby at full price, buying that hobby is probably an impulse buy anyway, and should be resisted. All of us have far too many hobbies, with children being the most expensive hobby I've seen - nothing quite compares to the cost of the raising children hobby. 

Though in terms of personal hypocracy for this thread, I see nothing wrong with buying used products. Even though used books undercut the new prices and the money doesn't go to the company, I see no issues with buying used books if you want cheaper books. Funny how the mind creates hypocracy like that. 

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You seem to have missed the point of my post, Pax.

This is actually not about whether or not I support my LGS.  It's about *how* I support my LGS.  I look at products and decide if they are worth the price they are marketed at.  Paizo's books at $45 for a hardcover book offering new spells or new combat feats is not something I will buy, period.  I am a good enough GM that I can come up with my own content and my own relatively well-balanced spells if I want to.  As such, I am not going to buy that product, period, and my LGS gets no support.  I am not such a philanthropist that I will go out and donate $45 to my LGS to keep it in business.  On the other hand, when the same product is presented for pennies, I will give it a very different look.

You're trying to draw a distinction between Barnes and Noble and Amazon and the LGS.  You've missed the point.  No matter how reputable or nice the buggy-whip vendor is, they are all but dead because the buggy-whip is no longer the most efficient tool (or even in demand) in our society.  Similarly, print books (and boxed minis and albums from the big music labels) are being replaced by digital content and print-on-demand because those paths to market are so much more efficient and cost effective.  When you remove the choke-hold on the distribution path held by traditional publishers of these products the IP becomes cheaper and more readily available to the consumer.  If you want to identify some *other* benefit that the retailer provides (e.g. tables to play at and a social forum) then look at a way of maintaining that product (e.g. the gaming cafe) and quit trying to save the doomed aspects.

As a retail vendor of certain types of IP, the LGS and the book store are doomed.  Over time that market has no option but to dry up and die.  Whether it is kickstarter eating 70+% of the market for new games by offering direct-to-consumer sales or online digital content, those products are moving away from the traditional retail storefront.  Every person here who purchases kickstarter minis or Jim's castings like his excellent terrain and objective markers is taking money away from the LGS.  And I'm going to praise Jim for bringing an excellent product to market and using a new and more efficient means to do so.  I don't know if he could have done it with traditional publishing but it doesn't matter because of the new technologies available to him.

So the need is not to support the LGS in the specific (although I do where it makes sense), but to identify the things about the LGS that are not being replaced by the digital content revolution.  Space for gaming and social interaction is clearly one of these and is why I hold up Ordo as an ideal means of perpetuating the hobby.  Conventions like GameStorm and Dragonflight also provide a unique experience that is not being replaced.  Online forums and tools are also going a long way toward providing the social environments and digital tables or other tools for gaming though.  These environments provide access to many more people and encourage them to invest in the IP and perpetuate the hobby in a way that the retail storefronts cannot.  I can't roleplay or wargame locally.  I am in central Mexico in a small town and there simply is not a social group participating in that kind of thing here (at least not one known to the folks who frequent the local ex-pat forums, physical or virtual) and there is certainly no LGS for me to support.  I can still participate in those activities through the internet though and so I still invest in RPGs and games, supporting the hobby and the holders of the IP.

That's not hypocrisy, that's identifying what is important to me and supporting it as much as I can without being a foolish wastrel.

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2 hours ago, paxmiles said:

I also think that if you are unwilling to buy into a hobby at full price, buying that hobby is probably an impulse buy anyway, and should be resisted. All of us have far too many hobbies, with children being the most expensive hobby I've seen - nothing quite compares to the cost of the raising children hobby. 

I'm not sure that telling people that unless they are willing to make large expenditures they should reconsider entering the hobby is the best way to support either the hobby or the LGS.  There are a number of ways to actually get into wargaming that don't involve the purchase of a new rulebook and a new army and I don't mean PirateBay either.  Used armies and books and where they are available PDFs are all options to lower the cost and keep the hobby alive.  And as more and more wargames come out through kickstarter or largely online sales those games are going to become the model for the future and they are not, by their very nature, going to support the LGS.

So when confronted with the choice, do you let the hobby die because it does not support the LGS or do you try to bring new blood into the hobby even if it means a new business model and a new venue for gaming?  I think you still have to support the people creating the IP, whether it is rules or models or electronic platforms to play on.  Otherwise you might as well write off the hobby entirely and the LGS is dead anyway.

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