The OSR is Dying?? Real proof!

People keep claiming that the OSR is dead or dying. But what do the hard solid numbers tell us about the state of OSR? I give you the solid facts, and then explain what I think is up.
Stats from this blog: seedofworlds.blogspot.com/202...
#dnd #ttrpg #osr
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[@_Sinduss]

Anyone claiming the osr to be dead does not actually believe it they just want it to be true.

[@RPGPundit]

That's mostly true. Most of the time, the people making the claim are really just people who want to kill the OSR. And as my video points out, they're failing miserably.

[@bobreaper2142]

Your right

[@roygoodman1077]

I believe that most people who the OSR is dead or dying say so maliciously. And are hoping to kill it off by making others believe the lie. Well, shit that's exactly what Pundit said....disregard.

[@jacobmarkley6943]

I think it is the same kind of people who want to destroy hobbies. With OSR being an idea instead of a single game, it makes it hard for them to destroy it like they did with D&D

[@occultdetective]

Love that cover art for Baptism, Pundit.

[@RPGPundit]

Thanks! Spread the word!

[@juddgoswick2024]

Is the OSR "dead" again? Must be summer! This cycles around like news stories about how dangerous the scare of the month is to you and your family.

[@Doodle1776]

My current go-to of Castles and Crusades isn't considered an OSR game by the OSR purists because they use the current d20 system instead of THACO. Yet they are a growing company too.

[@RPGPundit]

There are very few "OSR purists". Most OSR games today do not use ThAC0 or attack matrixes, they use bonus to hit vs AC (often ascending, but sometimes descending). That said, Castles & Crusades has some elements of 3e mechanics that are not typical of the OSR. I'd still say they count, at worst, as extremely OSR-adjacent.

[@neimanhao5541]

Can the DM pick up and run Keep on the Borderland as written using C&C without having to do conversion prep work ahead of time? The mark of an OSR product is that you are 10 sessions into the published adventure as the DM and you still don't know what ruleset it was written for and nothing was wonky enough to make you scratch your head and figure that piece of information out.

[@Doodle1776]

@@neimanhao5541 I run the 5e conversion for it but yes, simply replace the creature with C&C creatures. Nothing in the module doesn't have a C&C equivalent monster. Zombies, goblins, kobolds, orcs, ogres, bugbears, and hobgoblins all have C&C versions to swap out with.

[@neimanhao5541]

@@Doodle1776 That sounds like page flipping and work. It also sounds like I need the C&C monster manual. If I'm running an OSR game then the stat line is what the stat line is in the module, even if it is a Swords and Wizardry module and the characters are OSE characters. OSE and S&W are theoretically incompatible, in the same way B/X and AD&D 2E are incompatible, but in practice they are actually compatible. OSR is that engine which will happily run on gas, diesel, a bottle of vodka, or the waste oil from the local fast food fryer.

[@Doodle1776]

@@neimanhao5541 C&C modules add the monsters to the room, the same as AD&D did. But they use ascending and not descending AC for C&C. They also have creatures that have different abilities or power levels than older games, though closely aligned. The lazy-mans way would be to just run it with adjusted AC to be ascending.

[@Darkwintre]

Cadfael the reason Lion and Dragon interests me

[@Iulian111]

The Old School Revival part of the hobby is kinda dying as in stagnating. There are more than enough slight variations of BX and AD&D out there that making anything besides a reprinting/slightly tweaked new edition is just pointless. A premium reprint like the one done for Adventurer Conqueror King 2e is probably the only endeavor that's financially justifiable for already existing retroclones. For the Old School Renaissance part of the hobby it is exactly as you said. There's a boom of new systems that have a niche to complement the (usually, but not only) BX inspired ruleset: your Medieval Authentic series, Miseries and Misfortunes, Dolmenwood, Hyperborea, Weird Frontiers DCC, Stars/Cities Without Number and more. Just in the previous sentence there are OSR systems tailored for historical fantasy (medieval and pre revolutionary France), folk fantasy & horror, sword and sorcery with some weird science fantasy, weird fantasy western, hard SF and cyberpunk. And the best part is that one can take bits and pieces from one or the other and create their own chimera of a system if they wish to.

[@RPGPundit]

That is precisely the killer-app of the OSR.

[@Darkwintre]

Basic fantasy. BECMI, lion and dragon, white box, cairn, Shadowdark, old school essentials, morkborg all games I picked up the last wotc item I picked up was acquisitions incorporated and only because it was in a game store up the town. The rest bought online.

[@RPGPundit]

Spread the word, share the video!

[@Will_GM_for_Food]

Even the WotC RPG designers who are somewhat competent are wholly committed to producing products that appeal to the smallest possible fringe audience.

[@Will_GM_for_Food]

I think the most likely future for 5e is it still remains popular, but the GMs who want to run it will just use their old books, plus whatever third-party supplements they want to use. I predict an abject failure for whatever WotC decides to call 5.5.

[@RPGPundit]

Well, let's hope!

[@bobreaper2142]

You might be right I think the same but the core group of wotc crap will get the new edition just because it's new

[@Will_GM_for_Food]

@@bobreaper2142 Maybe, but is that core group large enough to save WotC?

[@bobreaper2142]

No I don't believe they will save it

[@user-wm1ql5rz9w]

here in my country WOTC dont set any official D&D product since 2022/2023 and even MTG now won't have more translations but a lot of different products and specially OSR rpgs are getting more attention and having official translations such as knave, OSE and DCC

[@RPGPundit]

Brasil?

[@user-wm1ql5rz9w]

@@RPGPundit yes

[@1979fsa]

I'm curious if you and meatball talk to each other only in english or also in spanish/castellano. Greetings from neighbour 🇧🇷 !

[@RPGPundit]

Only in English. Meatball doesn't speak Spanish.

[@farspeakerdm90]

Hmmm? I would take Baptism of Fire and put out books going west from Poland all the way to Ireland.

[@roygoodman1077]

Glad to see you got your book. I hope you're enjoying it as much as I am.

[@RPGPundit]

I really am!

[@gedece]

I do some conversions and run OSR through World of Dungeons, a free PBTA without moves based game with very few rules. It's an offspring of Dungeon world, written as if had been written in 1970's

[@bhorrthunderhoof4925]

Glad to hear that Baptism of Fire is compatible with the Lioen and the Dragon, an outstanding game in itself. Look forwar to get my copy of Baptism of Fire soon, very soon. A nifty GM can use anything with his favorite system be it a published one or a homebrew one. But publications need to have minimal quality - a quality that currently WoTC products don't achieve. I am very sad that WotC does nothing, at least to my knowledge, but really nothing to celebrate the anniversary of DnD. This also tells you a lot. Well lets drink tea and smoke a good pipe and wait what will happen over summer.

[@Seafire-gy2hs]

Love the "Baptism of Fire" book, bought one as soon as it was out. Good job!

[@RPGPundit]

Thank you! Spread the word!

[@neimanhao5541]

I'd hazard a guess that 5E stuff funds less consistently than OSR because WotC D&D has always been about "character builds". A CCG company selling products that are rarely conceptual and generally mechanical. The half-demon half-werewolf quarter-vampire pureblood angel summoner of heaven with a one level dip into the atheist, cultist, luddite, and the artificer class was basically 3E thing. Character building is inherently absurd and EVERYONE knows it, and therefore content being "official" becomes VERY important to fig leaf the absurdity. Players need a central authority to bless their behavior, and DMs can at least somewhat put their foot down and pretend to create a boundary by saying "official products only". The players are still being absurd, and the DM is still letting the players be out of control, but they can both tell themselves they are not by bowing to the altar of official products. TSR D&D, especially with random stats, % chance to learn spells, and now the push for random class benefits, make a game where classes are more concepts of how the character fits into the world and less "My deck/charactersheet is going to nova for 99999 damage infinite times this round because I completed my build and the DM didn't notice and break my combo". An OSR product likely funds because the player knows that it is about a cool conceptual idea and not about what broken jank they can dig up, and the DM doesn't feel the need to reflexively put their foot down to a concept. Rulings not rules to express a cool concept isn't going to nova for three trillion damage because a comma placement in a sentence because that ISN'T THE CONCEPT of a peasant hedge wizard class.

[@UnsureImperative]

If Scott Garibay said it, it must be true.

[@RPGPundit]

LOL, that statement is almost the opposite of true.

[@UnsureImperative]

@@RPGPundit :)

[@VelliMak]

Perhaps these people define the ’death’ of a hobby differently: when, after years and years of grassroot level work they’ve done, that no one outside their relatively small community has ever heard of, it finally starts attracting money and people and becomes the next big thing, they don’t feel at home and don’t recognise it their own anymore, therefore considering it ’dead’. Happened many times in the history of hobbies 😂

[@RPGPundit]

Good point. Spread the word, share the video!

[@user-yl9pc5dz7c]

So what projects are you counting as “OSR?”

[@RPGPundit]

What the people who compiled the statistics were counting was the clone products, the 2nd and 3rd wave OSR stuff, and supplements and modules for either.

[@benitopulatso6637]

I'm much more optimistic that a dozen OSR variations can thrive than a dozen 5e variations.

[@RPGPundit]

Well, as I pointed out recently in an earlier video, the OSR is in fact doing better than ever, growing for every year of the last 5 years, and is currently doing better at successful kickstarters than 5e stuff.

[@UncleDwalin]

Hey Pundit! Are there plans for an updated printing of BoF that includes the final edits you did to capitalisation and such? I'm not exactly rich so I want to make sure I buy the best version possible! Already got the PDF ofc. Think I own 80% or so of your products on PDF, but recently started acquiring physical copies. So far I've got L&D and Cults of Chaos (and Wilderness encounters 'cause I love that stuff). Long comment, I know. Hope you're doing well and looking forward to seeing what's next!

[@RPGPundit]

I can't really say, as that will be up to the Publisher. And it will depend on how complicated it is to do on DTRPG.

[@tabletopgamingwithwolfphototec]

You really should write a book about the history of the OSR.

[@RPGPundit]

Yes, but that would take time away from me writing more RPG material!

[@WonkoSane-jf4qm]

So, if you want to keep playing first or second edition because you have a shelf of books and don't want to spend money, cool? I personally was happy to leave THAC0 behind? Trying to explain how a shield ADDS to A/C so you SUBTRACT it from your A/C and the +1 BONUS is also SUBTRACTED from A/C and watching a newbs head go boing also was a happy thing to let go, but, again, if that's for you, cool? However, I am happy to move forward with the hobby. Now, as for D&D and WoTC and their products, yeah, I'm happy to look for third party products like Kobold Press. Midgard is a GREAT world and their modules are AWESOME!

[@sageofsorceryproductions2576]

EVERY bit of evidence that WotC is failing is like a sweet melody to my ears. You reap what you sow, and the have sowed a toxic field and crappy produce.

[@RPGPundit]

Spread the word, share the video!

[@Owl_of_Omens]

I have almost completely switched over to Shadowdark, I've pulled other old school stuff and applied it to that rule system.

[@RPGPundit]

Well, hope you check out my products. Mechanically they have quite a lot in common with Shadowdark.

[@neimanhao5541]

OSR is TSR D&D. Which is to say: It is OSR if I can run Keep on the Borderlands with minimal handwaving with your rules or I can run your adventure with B/X, BECMI, AD&D 1E or AD&D 2E. Just like you can run Keep on the Borderlands with minimal handwaving using B/X, BECMI, AD&D 1E or AD&D 2E. OSR just means a cottage industry of essentially cross compatible rules and content. As soon as someone attempts to stake off a little walled garden in an attempt to assert control through incompatibility with everything else then it isn't OSR. It is like WW2 table top wargaming vs Games Workshop table top wargaming. One is a highly controlling manipulation machine and the other is a massive cottage industry of rulesets and models where you can find just the right size models and right rules with which to express a historical or pseudo-historical battle with and share the experience with your friends. One is healthy for the human condition, and the other honestly probably isn't. RPGPundit clearly has political disagreements and opinions, but his products are OSR. Zero attempt to stake off a walled garden and attempt to exert control. Nothing but: check out my cool rules to run Keep on the Borderlands with a stronger bent of medievalism, or take your BECMI characters on the Silk Road.

[@RPGPundit]

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[@Darkwintre]

No it’s not.

[@solomani5959]

My players don’t like OSR/original d&d (tried AD&D, BECMI, ose, ose advanced, DCC, C&C and ose). However I steak copiously from OSR and follow the principles of OSR play. It’s not dead.

[@RPGPundit]

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[@tabletopgamingwithwolfphototec]

The only way the OSR would die , is if it fails to expand out of just cloning old D&D editions ( TSR era ).

[@RPGPundit]

But it expanded out of that about 12 years ago, and keeps doing so more and more.

[@andrewjackson673]

its easier for me to get players to add elements of d6 fantasy to osric than it is to get them to use d6 fantasy for anything other than an episodic comic book conan romp

[@fuseblower8128]

Meeple reserves judgement :)

[@presswolf]

Love the game keep up the good work. consider a 16-17c Polish Lithuania RPG

[@RPGPundit]

Thank you. Spread the word!

[@Subcomandante73]

It would be nice if people stopped trying to attach OSR to their particular brand of politics.

[@RPGPundit]

Sure would

[@Darkwintre]

They are? Not seen anything worth bothering about!

[@chicksandwich]

One can only buy BX so many times

[@RPGPundit]

Good thing that the OSR hasn't been about that for about 12 years now.

[@ronosborne6855]

I have tried 5e before. I neither hated nor loved it. I did think it had its good points. If they 5e were become available cheaply once the new edition comes, I would consider adding it to my table. I'm just not interested in it relative to its cost.

[@RPGPundit]

You're way better off checking out the OSR.

[@ronosborne6855]

@@RPGPundit Yeah, I already have tons of OSR stuff that I am anxious to run and play. I'm just not as anti-5e as some OSR players seem to be.

[@calvanoni5443]

Were we ever Alive? Liche's Rule! 💀

[@RPGPundit]

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[@kuality1416]

Let me summarize why Dungeons and Dragons isnt selling. The last book to introduce a new subclass was Armorer in Tasha's Cauldron of Everything released in 2020. Wotc isnt making enough new content to keep people buying the books and they arent putting enough new content to justify people not looking up the info on a website instead of buying the book.

[@RPGPundit]

That is far from the sole, or main reason it isn't selling. WotC's adventure books had done well in 5e until the last three years or so, when they went Full Woke and broke away from the traditional structures of adventure play (i.e. replacing dungeon crawling with "being a hot mess at the magic prom", or overland quests with "going to whimsical magical carnival", or epic battles with "going on an Eat-Pray-Love romp of eating contests at tourist night-markets").

[@kuality1416]

@@RPGPundit I see. I did buy two campaign books on sale recently one from 2016 and the other from 2022 and the one from 2022 I would say is almost unplayable.

[@HugoGlz56]

I don't think anything has a chance to be more sucessfull than 5e since this eddition was the biggest. I still think that OSR is capped to the amount of people being converted into TTRPG players by 5e, i still haven't seen any sign of the OSR, Pathfinder or anyone else of converting people who have never played DnD into players.

[@RPGPundit]

I'll agree that because the OSR is an indie publishing movement, it's unlikely to produce a great many totally-new gamers. But it's also clear that the OSR has actually been growing steadily for the last 5 years, which means gamers may not be made by OSR, but they sure do join it when they find it.

[@HugoGlz56]

@@RPGPundit Yes, I agree that the OSR is a healthy and growing sector of the TTRPG market. Furthermore it is likely to grow in the short term. However I don't think a weak steward for D&D is good long term for the TTRPG hobby since its the main engine of growth.

[@neimanhao5541]

@@HugoGlz56 Maybe. You have things like Dark Souls that got popular in part because people rediscovered that well designed games that are actually hard are more rewarding than cool looking games that hold your hand and tell you that you are amazing even though you could often literally just put the controller down for like 15-30 seconds and just watch the boss fight and then pick it back up and spam buttons and be a "winner". Or you have Game of Thrones that so casually blasted holes clean through plot armor that it was gripping to see the motivations and ambitions of characters knowing you had no idea if they would happen or not. In theory you could have a Critical Role using OSR come along and blow people's mind. It isn't unprecedented for well thought out 'hardcore' versions of the popular thing everyone is bored of to be explosively popular. Edit: Critical Role themselves theoretically might even do it if they feel like their viewership is dropping and their own rules products don't catch on, and people are tired of 5E and the 5E re-tread doesn't move the needle. Pathfinder wasn't a great watching experience because it was too complicated, 5E was easier to watch. OSR is even easier to watch, is "the original", rulings over rules works with and not against actors acting, and when the ratings go down the common move is to try and raise the stakes by raising the body count. The elevator pitch of Critical Role season that is basically Game of Thrones but not season 8, with blood, bodies, betrayal, and snuffed character arcs, every week is shocking, every actor gets to act out shock, grief, anger, hate, fear like never before. That is REALLY easy to understand as a pitch and is literally something that is known to work in entertainment. Could be as simple as Critical Role: Dragonlance using TSR rules.

[@bAtACt1X]

Well I like the OSR very much since a view years (and was not easy to convince)... but 1. I don`t understand your problems. It is obvious that it is doing more than well. 2 It`s completly nuts to mix those topics this with politics! iIn several kinds of ways

[@RPGPundit]

Well, the fact is, as I said in the video, there's a constant noise from people who don't actually like the OSR claiming that the OSR is failing, dying or dead. As for point 2, the people making these claims are almost always parts of politically-focused gaming subcultures, who usually identify as either hard-left or hard-right.

[@WayneBraack]

They can take my OSR from my cold dead hands. I hate 5e. Nandy pamby childish fantasyland.

[@RPGPundit]

Spread the word, share the video!

[@steambub]

I have a collection of GURPS books, both physical and digital. And GURPS is in no way going to overthrow D&D or even the OSR. GURPS is too closed to grow organically unlike OGL D&D or the no masters of OSR.

[@RPGPundit]

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[@monarchprime3611]

Dungeons & Dragons 5th Edition drop in popularity is because of the OGL debacle. that was a big wake-up call for both players and companies that have supported and defended 5th Edition regardless of the drop on quality. I don't think there is anyone saying OSR is dead. there will always be an audience for tabletop roleplaying games whether it be Dungeons & Dragons, Pathfinder, Call of Cthulhu, BESM, Savage Worlds, Powered by the Apocalypse, Fate, GURPS, Cyberpunk, Mutants & Masterminds or the OSR. it is a good time to be in the hobby. try not to shit too much on one system to prop up OSR. it draws attention to the other via the Streisand Effect. it's not a good look, it makes you look threatened and that's why you seem to be lashing out in self defense. on a side note: bought a copy of Baptism of Fire can't wait for the book to arrive and skim through it's contents. looking forward to viewing more of your content.

[@RPGPundit]

Thank you very much!

[@autisticallyaccurate]

24:01 You're sounding a bit distracted, perhaps I have watched so much of you lately during livestreams where you're much more focused in your eloquence. You might be multitasking.

[@RPGPundit]

Well, I had a very busy day (yesterday, when I filmed it) and I was trying to get the video done because I knew I'd be out all day.

[@shinigamiauthor]

Just like "gamers are dead" Okay bud. It was a decade ago. Cope. Seeth. Sneed.

[@RPGPundit]

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[@camzimmeman97]

Woke OSR? Libertarian OSR? what the fuck are you talking about dude? Why make this thing about politics and economics? Also, your point is moot cause there is no "OSR dead" narrative.

[@RPGPundit]

If you think there isn't you've been hiding under a bushel. The woke crowd have declared the OSR "dead" at least three times (remember "Swordream"?). Jeffro of the BroSR recently claimed the OSR was dying.

[@realce666]

It might be more about the aging OSR player base.

[@eclark1406]

👍 thumbs up for Shit Lord! Please do not turn into Joe Biden

[@RPGPundit]

I'm trying to avoid it.

[@BobMcDowell]

Congratulations on your success. But you should be able to break away from D&D by now. THAC0 was dumb back then and is dumb now, for example.

[@RPGPundit]

The vast majority of OSR games do not use ThAC0. Mine do not. If all your experience of OSR products dates back to pre-2013, you probably need to take another look. You can start with one of my early videos, entitled "The OSR is Cutting Edge" (and that one is from six years ago, the OSR has become even more innovative and impressive since then). kzbin.info/www/bejne/gKDWZYdurdhnaNEsi=ipxD0Z8sOp1fI46E