@deinol As I understand the Forge people, they meant it as a slander against games that were too complex to learn in one session or required "math" (anything more than 1-digit addition), and wouldn't make a lot of money or displace D&D.

But AD&D made a stupendous amount of money, funnelled all of it to Gary instead of Dave until the lawsuit, displaced Basic D&D by about 25-50% until they pretty much killed Basic for AD&D 2E. Remained too hard for Forgeites to learn.
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@E_T_Smith @deinol
> It fascinates me how far some of these go, especially in combination with the bizarre math necessary to derive the secondary attributes. <

I played semi-regularly with several Forgeites in Seattle, math-phobia was *endemic* among them. Hand-holding them thru even middle-complexity systems was like teaching kindergarten.

"Part Four: Business and marketing" is exactly what I said: The idea these wouldn't compete! Well, many did, they're still here & thriving.
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@mdhughes @E_T_Smith

I must admit it had been a long time since I looked at the article, so it distilled into my head as “passionate project with good ideas but a disorganized mess and also some mediocre ideas“.

@deinol “passionate project with good ideas but a disorganized mess and also some mediocre ideas.“

Many FHBs weren't bad from a design perspective, some were even comparable to professional games. I feel the main flaw Edwards was trying highlight in the essay was one of marketing -- independent designers who didn't know any other model of publication but AD&D, so that's what they emulated (at great expense) ... which was a ludicrous thing to do at a time when AD&D was dominant.