I took a break from the RPG hobby in my late 20’s and early 30’s. About 10 years. When I got back into it, 4E was new and shiny. I looked at it and just wasn’t interested. Six page character sheets, daily powers, “character builds” that took an hour to do with help from software, healing surges? Not D&D to me.

I decided that I would play 1E AD&D and that’s mostly what I played for a couple of years. I’d occasionally dip my toe in to something here and there but AD&D was my thing.

I remember all the 4E edition warriors talking about how much better the game was and how much “sense” it made.

Some observations:

When WoTC went to 4E, Pathfinder emerged and became a serious challenger to the D&D brand. In short, a lot of 3E players like the game they were already playing and had no interest in switching or they went back after trying 4E.

Now that 5E is the dominant game in the hobby; How many blogs, actual play streams and podcasts are focused on 4E? Not many.

The old school blogs, actual play and podcasts are still here, and still growing in number and quality. Old school products continue to improve in quality and (perhaps unfortunately) quantity. Pathfinder is struggling a little. 5E has revitalized the brand though it may just be a cultural moment and D&D is benefiting from it.

4E is pretty much dead as a game.

Just because a game is the current thing that the D&D copyright holder is putting out, doesn’t make it good. Marketing, gaming culture and the network effect have a big impact on how many copies of a game get sold at the beginning of its product cycle. If you don’t make a game that the fans want to play over the long term then that game is going to drop off and die. WotC learned that lesson and in addition to making a much better game with 5E (still not my favorite) they have done a very effective job of marketing the game and supporting the people who play it.