Ironically for a post complaining about reading comprehension, but you misrepresented the original post you’re talking about. Even have the classic “quotation marks around a thing that was never said” in the title.

First, and perhaps most obvious, this wasn’t “everyone”. This was one person, and they didn’t get many upvotes. When I recommend a TTRPG, for example, I’m recommending Genesys (like someone else did).

Second, they weren’t saying to homebrew old editions of D&D. They were saying you don’t need to homebrew at all. At most, they said you could reflavour something in 4th edition. Their entire point was that you don’t need to homebrew when you can just find a system that already has what you would have homebrewed in.

Third, they were suggesting this as an alternative to homebrewing specific material into D&D 5e. Pathfinder can provide the experience of “5e with time travel” that you wanted without any modifications. BitD is so different from 5e that it can’t.

You are, however, correct that they did backtrack. I’ll put this down to poorly explaining their argument to start with, as they downplayed the “5e but better” games in their first comment while that was really their entire point.

Personally, I like homebrewing. It’s fun to tinker with the rules and materials. But there’s also an argument to not repeat work someone else has already done.

I first heard it as lawnmower. And either way, it’s more about the structure than about getting every word right. If nobody could put their own spin on existing jokes, we never would have gotten Norm’s version of the moth joke.

I was very careful in having him say “am I right in assuming” instead of “that means” for that part.

I take a system inspired by the video game Wildermyth, where the player gets to decide what happens at 0 HP.

Option 1: You fall unconscious. Your fate is out of your hands.
Option 2: You die, but… You might go out in a blaze of glory, or inspire an ally, but you’re dead for good. At least it’s a good death, which is better than some get.
Option 3: You live, but… You might lose an eye, or a magic item gets destroyed, but you manage to escape. You’re still out of the fight, but you live to see another.