I was just curious. When you play Pathfinder do you actually call it Pathfinder or do you call it D&D?
So when gathering your friends for a game; do you say "can you make it on Sunday to play Pathfinder?" or do you say "can you make it on Sunday to play D&D?"
I'll start first. My group still calls it D&D.
I think we all say "Pathfinder" in my groups/groups?
I try to avoid the "D&D" term to avoid both the stigma of the "Devil Worshiping Geek" accusations from non-gamers, and the "4th Edition" stigma from gamers.
Some of the "don't say D&D" feeling may be left over from our early days when I/we felt that we had graduated from "D&D" to RuneQuest, DragonQuest, Aftermath, etc. Anything but "D&D" seemed to be the feeling for a while back then, for me, anyway. I had always felt that "D&D" indicated RPG-lite, but have come to realize that it is GMing and Players that make the actual system being played pretty much irrelevant to my enjoyment.
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Well I have been playing DnD since 1979 so i am in the habit of just saying DnD vs Pathfinder but i do try to correct myself when I do. Pathfinder IMO is soooo much better of a game than DnD ever was.
Although I do have very fond memories of the "Good Ole Days" when things were very simple during games and there were not 1,000,000 different rules.
We call it Pathfinder. If anyone asks, I normally say it's a close cousin of D&D. I also play D&D 4e with friends, and that gets called out D&D game.
I'm generally explaining it to non-RPers. Which means it's sometimes described as "It's a storytelling game where we play the parts of adventurers looting dungeons and fighting dragons."
Otherwise it's Pathfinder.
...there is a game already with those initials, Palladium Fantasy Role Playing Game, and they even have a registered trade mark.
1. Good point; and
2. Trademark? Sad.
Our group still calls it D&D for the most part. I don't see it as a disservice to do so, simply because the D&D we refer to is what we have known, love and enjoyed for 20+ years. Which is my understanding of why "Pathfinder" even exists.
DM Blake - Brand names and stuff...
I agree, it is hard to shake an industry-wide term, especially one that has been used universally for decades.
KaeYoss - Pathfinder to roleplayers and whatever to everyone else...
That is how we typically handle it, as to not "disappoint" those expecting a 4E game. Non-roleplayers I usually just tell them I'm playing D&D, it saves a lengthy discussion which basically boils down to me sayin/explaining "Pathfinder is a replacement for what is traditionally called D&D".
Dovaj Viajiir - I try to avoid the "D&D" term to avoid both the stigma of the "Devil Worshiping Geek" accusations from non-gamers, and the "4th Edition" stigma from gamers.
A lot of non-gamers still don't get the concept of pen & paper games, often I find myself giving a dumbed-down explaination of D&D as a "boardgame with a big book of rules", then they just shrug and wander off if they aren't interested, lol.
Either way is fine with me. PATHFINDER RPG is the very best, top-shelf, Dungeons & Dragons game. Because PATHFINDER RPG is backward compatible, I'm very comfortable inviting friends for a game of dungeons & dragons and letting them know we are playing PATHFINDER RPG. Its brilliant design leaves everyone happy, regardless of what you call it.
Conversely, when someone says they're playing 4e, I know they're not playing Dungeons & Dragons in anything but title.
We usually call it the name of the AP we are playing in. Example "When's a good time for the next Kingmaker game."
Now that you mention it, we actually do that more often than not, as well.
Our group calls it d&d unless there's a need to differentiate between 3.5 and pathfinder.
We call it Pathfinder. I mean, our Saturday's are still referred too as "DnD Night", but that's no matter what we're playing, Deadlands, Seven Sea's, World of Darkness, whatever, we do it on DnD night. Now we're playing Pathfinder on DnD night.
For my group we call it Pathfinder. This is mostly because there are a few members of my group that feel sore about "loosing" D&D as a name. I can kind of understand where theyre coming from so I try to make the differential.
If I talk to non-roleplayers about it then I often call it D&D because the name is just synomous with fantasy roleplaying even if its Pathfinder or even Exalted. Everyone has a rough idea of what D&D is and if you say pathfinder some explanation is needed, if you say D&D theres a good chance they'll know what youre talking about.
We call it Pathfinder. I guess it is due to the fact that when I introduced people to it we were still playing 3.5 for we play tested 4E and believed it felt to much like a video game. We expressed it during play testing but who knows if they paid attention to it.
I for one will always call it pathfinder and if someone is confused or don't understand I take the time to explain it to them.
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How odd. I have just realized upon pondering this question that we call it neither. We call it gaming. eg. "Are we gaming tonight?", "We were having a game last Thursday when Dave's elf came across...".
We are all fans of Pathfinder to the point that if we were asked specifically we would call it Pathfinder, an game based on the worlds most popular RPG, Dungeons and Dragons.
With people who aren't in the gaming scene or who are predominantly MMO players, I'll say, "I play a version of D&D called Pathfinder." That scores instant recognition of what I'm talking about and makes them realize what Pathfinder is should they hear/see it mentioned again.
Amongst friends, Pathfinder IS D&D for us. A few months ago one of my players said, "Hey, I want to try my hand at DMing a D&D game, the Pathfinder rules seem a lot easier to manage than 3.5."
As for D&D 4th Edition, we pretty much refer to it specifically as "4th Edition" to avoid confusion.
Our group calls it pathfinder dnd. Dnd for us is the old Rules Compendium (RC). AD&D for us is out 1E/2E hybrid (still my favorite). We play pathfinder dnd when we want lots of magic toys. We play RC or AD&D when we play "don't depend on magic" types of games. I still respect my first DM who had the motto "don't become dependent on your magic items".
Ever since 7th grade back in the early 80's my group (which still games sporadically) has called it "poker" and game night is "poker night".
It started as serious code to avoid geek-scaring girls and has continued tongue in cheek since, most of us have kids who game now too.
In group we call whatever we specifically play by it's proper name: AD&D, 3.5, Call of Cthulu, Gurps, etc and a tendency to play microlite rules more these days for impromptu one nighters.
Tried 4th edition and it didn't do it for me.......
love the paizo modules and adventure paths, as enjoyable to read as to actually play.
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My group says "Are we gaming Sunday?" or "We rolling sixes?". As for pathfinder we call it pathfinder or "3.75" 4th edition left us with an ugly taste in our mouths so we sold all 5 4th edition phb's we bought and bought pathfinder core books.
4th edition Dungeons and Dragons...Its a turd and I suspect it killed Gary Gygax...my opinion.
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I was just curious. When you play Pathfinder do you actually call it Pathfinder or do you call it D&D?
So when gathering your friends for a game; do you say "can you make it on Sunday to play Pathfinder?" or do you say "can you make it on Sunday to play D&D?"
I'll start first. My group still calls it D&D.
Both, depending who i am talking to.
To my gaming group - we call it both.
To other gamers who are not in our gaming group - Pathfinder
To non-gamers - DnD
Pathfinder = D&D (It's faster to say in texts, usually) 4th edition is fourth edition. Played one game, was not D&D, moved on to pathfinder.
CEO
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Every Wednesday for the past seven years, I have run a game at my house. We started off playing 3.5 but switched to Pathfinder when we released the Beta. Yet, I still find myself saying things like, "See you at D&D next Wednesday!" or "Hey, I am going to have to cancel D&D this week." I usually catch myself and am really trying to say "Pathfinder," but it's like the word Kleenex to me. I haven't bought a Kleenex brand tissue for a long time, preferring the Kirkland brand tissues from Costco, but I always ask Vic to pass me a kleenex. And I'll probably keep using D&D, even though I know we are playing Pathfinder.
You now what they say about old dogs and new tricks...
:)
-Lisa
Ever since 7th grade back in the early 80's my group (which still games sporadically) has called it "poker" and game night is "poker night".
It started as serious code to avoid geek-scaring girls and has continued tongue in cheek since, most of us have kids who game now too.
In group we call whatever we specifically play by it's proper name: AD&D, 3.5, Call of Cthulu, Gurps, etc and a tendency to play microlite rules more these days for impromptu one nighters.
Tried 4th edition and it didn't do it for me.......
love the paizo modules and adventure paths, as enjoyable to read as to actually play.
Your group has a much higher intelligence than our group. I sure hope you guys picked up more babes than we do.. er I mean did.
I think my group has always referred to the different editions of D&D (or products like it) as their version name and D&D was just implied IE "we are playing 3.5 tomorrow." or "We are playing Pathfinder tomorrow." or "I'm feeling old school lets play 2nd ed. tomorrow."
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I never started roleplaying with D&D, indeed I only bought into D&D with v3.5, so I never used D&D to refer to the hobby - i.e. I go to "roleplaying", we have "gaming" nights etc.
Because of this I only use D&D to refer to specific games being played or run, in the same way that I would use Shadowrun or Mutants & Masterminds.
If offering a game to players I am specific on the title of the game and the edition (if it has more than one). So I would say D&D3.5, or M&M 2e, or Pathfinder (and when 2nd ed comes out I would add 1e or 2e appropriately).
Once a game is established, unless we are playing multiple editions of the game in the same group, I will usually drop the edition specification, e.g. I will just say "next week we're back to the D&D game".
So I would never call a game using the Pathfinder RPG "D&D", and equally if someone were pitching a game using Pathfinder RPG I would expect them to be explicit and not say D&D.
The only slightly confusing thing with Pathfinder is that the setting and the rules are using the same name, so someone running a game set in the world of Golarion but with the D&D3.5 rules, may say they are playing Pathfinder. If I was invited to such a game, I would likely decline (I don't particularly want to play Pathfinder RPG) but may have played if I had known it was actually using the D&D3.5 rules (even though I am not that bothered about the Golarion setting).
I.e. I am not interested in playing in the Pathfinder setting using the Pathfinder RPG, but I may be persuaded to play in a D&D3.5 game using the Pathfinder setting, or a Pathfinder RPG game using the Eberron setting.
With D&D as the setting names are distinct from the game name, if someone were to say "We're playing Eberron" I would at least know to ask what system they are using (D&D3.5, 4e, or maybe something else). So there is at least less confusion.
I had a thread on this over in the 4E forums but it got locked down. Civility collapsed...
Hopefully this thread will remain civil, though it seems that a minority may not be willing to do that.
We call it REAL D&D AKA Pathfinder. We call 4E a still fun game, but not D&D thematically. MMO in paper form.
This is I guess okay, but definately provicative - apparently my current Eberron campaign is not "real D&D" and an "MMO in paper form", from which I could perhaps infer that my players are getting the same amount and type of enjoyment as they would from just playing a computer game by theirself.
Conversely, when someone says they're playing 4e, I know they're not playing Dungeons & Dragons in anything but title.
Again, not hate, but still provocative. Again I am being told I am not playing "real" D&D. Will I next be accused of BADWRONGFUN? (to use an RPG.net-ism)
"not that 4.0 crap".
And now we get to outright insults... Apparently the current campaign I am running is using a "crap" rule system.
4th edition Dungeons and Dragons...Its a turd and I suspect it killed Gary Gygax...my opinion.
Again with the faeces comparisons, nice! But wait, its also apparently the cause of death of a human being! But hey, that "my opinion" bit makes it all okay.
I try to avoid the "D&D" term to avoid [...] the "4th Edition" stigma from gamers.
Judging from the above quotes, maybe its your fellow Pathfinder RPG players who are creating that stigma!
Well, when we do play Pathfinder, we call it such to differentiate it from our 3.5 game, Aftermath! Game, Morrow Project Game and some of the others we do. It just lets the folks coming to the Table know what mind set, dice and snacks to bring.
PF is becoming the standard Fantasy RPG in the house since I am the only DM / GM for the games now...slowly weeding the 3.X folks into PF. The Evil Plot continues!!
Have Fun out there!!
~ W ~
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RPG Superstar 2009 Top 32, 2010 Top 8
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I call it Pathfinder or D&D depending what I'm doing, plus I was still in a 3.5 game, so it was still called D&D anyway.
as for calling it PFRPG that is wrong, because there is a game already with those initials, Palladium Fantasy Role Playing Game.
and they even have a registered trade mark.
Yeah, but who really plays that?
*ducks*|
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It's interesting that you can say you play dungeons and dragons and people will know what you mean.
Most of the time people give me blank looks, occasionally they say: "Um, I think some people played that at school." or "Hey, I remember that cartoon!"
Usually I don't bother to explain, I just say: "Y'know that game the boys are playing at the start of E.T."
I always thought they included dnd in the film just for the line: "You don't win, it's like life, how do you win at life?"
We play DnD, the pathfindeer veersion. Pathfinder is more DnD than 4e. In fact I ahve never reffered to $e as DnD. ( Sorry for the $e hate but i can't stand it, it's not DnD its a different game)
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To fellow gamers - Pathfinder
To non-gamers, who wouldn't know a d8 from a d10, or even know that anything besides a d6 exists - D&DSo who still get's funny looks or lectures when they say that they still game?
I usually get lectured about once a year.
My wife who in fact plays in one of our two campaigns explains to her coworkers or when short on time that on Tuesday night her husband is "playing poker."
To which she usually gets, "Poker on a work night?"
So to them I'm an alchi- with a gambling addiction instead of a D&D player, apparently it is less socially awkward that way.
I call it D&D, because hey, that's what it is. If it's followed by "what version" I say Pathfinder.
Our group calls it D&D - Pathfinder rules. 4e is called D&D - 4e edition rules and 3.x is called D&D - 3rd edition rules, etc.
We do this because when talking D&D with other people, it is helpful to state which rules up front to avoid confusion about which version of the game and to avoid the usual question that comes up when I say I play D&D, which is "What rules?"
Once we settle into a campaign, we simply call it D&D amongst our selves but if outsiders ask what we are playing, the response is D&D - Pathfinder rules because the person asking may play another version of the game.
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My group says "Are we gaming Sunday?" or "We rolling sixes?". As for pathfinder we call it pathfinder or "3.75" 4th edition left us with an ugly taste in our mouths so we sold all 5 4th edition phb's we bought and bought pathfinder core books.
4th edition Dungeons and Dragons...Its a turd and I suspect it killed Gary Gygax...my opinion.
No... age, disease and other things killed Gygax. Gygax's problems with the company date pretty much back to the collapse of TSR, and quite frankly I'm fairly sure he had no particular problems with 4.0, but no particular love for 3.x either.
BTW I used to hear this about the game Pathfinder replaced.
"3rd Edition. I don't know what to call it because it's not D+D."
Fact is... a lot of folks react badly change when it hits the comfort zone. Classic example; the whole "New Coke" thing. The fact is the change of the label and the identity hit Coke drinkers in thier comfort zone despite the fact that in blind taste tests, most of them actually prefered the taste of the new stuff.
I recently sold all my 2nd ed books (except a few gems) to someone who was about my own age ~30 because he couldn't move past 2nd, 3rd was just junk to him, and who cares about the rest.
I think Penny Arcade (as always) captured it well here:
Penny Arcade: Traditional Values.
I guess I call it Pathfinder. I called 3.5 well... 3.5, I called 3rd 3rd, I called second D&D and later 2nd, and I called 1st ed D&D pretty much until 3rd. Honestly I'm a RPG whore, I LOVE the Hero system and call it my favorite, though my time actually playing the game is less than I've spent playing others. At one time (this year) I had a Savage Worlds, Hero, 4e (D&D, because yes, I still play 4th ed Hero, or Champions to call that one what I call it(even though I don't play supers), lol), and a pathfinder game going... So I tend to refer to whatever game I'm playing/talking about at the moment as it is.
Then again, I also tend to call myself (or whoever is running the game) as a GM, as I have played much D&D (what I now call the collected masses from TSR's rules, through WoTC rules, to Piazio's rules, and all 3PP. Huddled together they all make up what I call D&D), I still have played other systems muchly, so the GM is the name of the Dude (or chick) at the helm.
My buddy who we just got into Pathfinder calls it 3.75, and still uses his 3.5 books, as he says, "so little different, I'm going to use these until they are useless." LOL, but hey, he's digging it.
For the most part I refer to all of it in total as Gaming.
Every Wednesday for the past seven years, I have run a game at my house. We started off playing 3.5 but switched to Pathfinder when we released the Beta. Yet, I still find myself saying things like, "See you at D&D next Wednesday!" or "Hey, I am going to have to cancel D&D this week." I usually catch myself and am really trying to say "Pathfinder," but it's like the word Kleenex to me. I haven't bought a Kleenex brand tissue for a long time, preferring the Kirkland brand tissues from Costco, but I always ask Vic to pass me a kleenex. And I'll probably keep using D&D, even though I know we are playing Pathfinder.
You now what they say about old dogs and new tricks...
:)
-Lisa
+1
I want to say Pathfinder but my thirty eleven brain keeps saying D&D!
I have to say that it's usually "Are we gaming on..." Since my game group doesn't delve into too many games, rpg->pathfinder->d&d is inferred. Since the group is not 4th Ed players, we all know what each other is talking about.
We play DnD, the pathfindeer veersion. Pathfinder is more DnD than 4e. In fact I ahve never reffered to $e as DnD. ( Sorry for the $e hate but i can't stand it, it's not DnD its a different game)
Preach on, my brother!