Hey, Birthright is a scrubbed line. Accept it. I believe some had
said they lost money on it. Frankly I find it hard to find anyone outside my
gaming circle locally that even heard of it. Its a clunky rules system that
has some merits, but unless you are willing to sit down and read the rules
all the way through, and take the time to play it, the game is just another
campaign world. You must remember that a gigantic peice of AD&D's market is
of the younger generations. These are people who like the accessability of
the game (You can find it in book stores as opposed to other games that can
only be found in the specialized comic book/hobby stores).
On AOL, we have a lot of the "younger" (9-14) group who play the
games in the chat rooms. Most who I have talked to find their RPGs in those
superstores that sell CDs,Movies,Books, and other things. If you look at the
majority of games on AOL, it is White Wolf, Star Wars, and AD&D. Why? That
is exactly what is in that type of store. When I asked several of them about
the BR game, and those that heard of it complained about the added rules, and
alluded to the fact they liked the simplicity of AD&D.
Now, being in my middle twenties, my group is mostly the same age.
Among them, two of them started with AD&D. The others having started with
Palladium, because their dad had said no to AD&D, but allowed Heroes
Unlimited... Needless to say, they were AD&D prejudice and called it a
prehistoric system... (by this time they were into character points systems
and what not... all of which I think takes the gambling aspect out of the
game). When I it was my turn to GM, I elected to haul out AD&D and forced
them to actualy read it. I also made them read the BR book. Needless to
say, we all enjoyed the game, and it ending in a spectacular war between the
two dominant playes.
Where am I headed with this? Well that is a good question. What I
am saying is the Birthright series has two strikes against it. One is
ignorant word of mouth. Somehow the majority of people who have heard of BR
but not picked up a copy is because they heard it was complicated and a bad
world. Both untrue. And the second is that it has the AD&D stigma attached.
The advanced gamers it needs, and who would enjoy it, avoid it because they
avoid AD&D. These strikes helped to drive it out of the market before it had
a chance to fully achieve its recognition. All I can say is keep playing it.
Spread it to all you meet. Word of mouth can be a poweful thing. If the
right ears, hear the right thing at the right time, then it can be very
effective. Yet, I would not count on that. I would count on one thing. Its
dead. Live with that. Of course, I would like to be proved wrong.