Not Eating My Words Yet

[I've got 15 minutes to post this...hiatus continues]

Remember when I was complaining that WotC's new Basic D&D wasn't really a game, but rather a sneak peek at the soon-to-be-released PHB? And my astute readers pointed out to me that Mike Mearls had in fact said that the Basic D&D game would be released as an incomplete game pending the release of the PHB? In May, Mearls specifically wrote:

At the launch of the D&D Starter Set, Basic D&D will include the material needed to create characters and advance to 20th level. In August, with the release of the Player’s Handbook, Basic D&D will expand to include the essential monsters, magic items, and DM rules needed to run the game, along with the rules for wilderness, dungeon, and urban adventuring.

[emphasis mine]

SO...admitting I was being deliberately obtuse (but still feeling the whole hype and press regarding Basic D&D was bullshit), I decided to wait and see what the expanded Basic rules would look like.

Still waiting.

The new PHB has been released, expanding on the "sneak peek" and again getting folks fired up. The Basic rules haven't yet been updated, and I didn't see any article talking about delays or pushed back timelines...until I caught this old article from June 30th, which wasn't referenced or linked in the previous articles I had found (instead they linked to the May 27th article with the August statement):

For the D&D basic rules, our initial release will include character creation. It features the human, elf, dwarf, and halfling for races, along with the cleric, fighter, rogue, and wizard classes, all from 1st level to 20th level. As the Monster Manual and Dungeon Master’s Guide near completion, we’ll add to the basic rules with more material to grow it into a complete game. Our goal is to continue to make updates to the basic rules for D&D until the end of the year, at which point it will be feature complete.

[emphasis mine...again]

So contrary to what I wrote previously, I will now be waiting till November or so (the scheduled release of the DMG) to see what the new "basic game" looks like. Which is fine...I've got enough to keep me busy. But, again, it makes me question the motivation for releasing Basic D&D. I mean, other than the snarky reasons I discussed earlier.

By the way, I'll be back in Seattle for a few, short days next week. Probably not enough time to get in any gaming; however, I do plan to entirely avoid purchasing the new PHB while I'm in town. I'm sure I can find something better to put the money towards...like, over-priced beer at the Seahawks preseason game.

; )