Using the power of SCIENCE!

Using the power of SCIENCE! and various statistical probability models, I have developed a grand thesis involving the Dungeons & Dragons player ‘diaspora.’ The first part goes like this: if you principally played a certain edition of D&D, but no longer play D&D at all, you are today playing the following (divided by edition):

4th Edition ▷ 13th Age

3.5 Edition ▷ Pathfinder

2nd Edition ▷ Dungeon World

1st Edition ▷ Any one of dozens of OSR/retroclone games

The rest of the thesis deals with other groups:

If you played 3.0, you are either still playing 3.0 or you are no longer playing roleplaying games. 

If you are a hipster who never previously played D&D, you likely spent ten minutes playing either 4th edition or Pathfinder, and then moved on to OSR/retroclone or Dungeon World.  

If you are a former emo kid who somehow got into roleplaying games, you are still playing 4th edition and currently bitching about the impending 5th edition. 

If you are a registered sex offender, you are doing Pathfinder Society HARD. 

If you are a reformed World of Warcraft player, you are also doing Pathfinder Society (the sample may be skewed, however, as there is almost certainly some overlap with the above). 

If you are an anime geek, you are currently reading 2nd edition, but only because that edition has the best ratio of quality artwork to tits. You are otherwise getting ready to kill yourself (or at least I hope so).

If you are currently in the 5th grade, you are playing Dungeon World (wink wink, Mark Chance )

If you have an irrational hatred of President Obama, you are playing Dungeon World on May 31st and a series of tabletop war-games no one has ever heard of most other days. 

If you voted for Reagan in the 80’s, you are clearly a human monster and probably doing Pathfinder Society between rounds of beating your spouse.

If you think a game about the time when Christians were fed to the lions sounds like an awesome idea, you are me (#HailSatan).

If you are a woman under the age of 25, you are currently checking your phone for messages while you wait for your boyfriend to finish-up his Pathfinder session and wondering where your life went wrong. 

If you are a resident of Innsmouth, Massachusetts, Ia! Ia! Cthulhu ftagn!

If you are Gary Wilson,  you are currently being beaten over the head with a truncheon by Rob Ferguson  as he demands you say what your fucking character is doing already. 

Have you ever heard of this game called Nuclear War? 

If you just came to RPGs from the European board game scene, you are almost certainly bitching about the rules for the game we just played. 

If you are excited about 5th edition, you are not a part of this reality and I banish you back to the plane of existence from which you came, vile time-space wizard!