OGL:Someone releases as OGC a most revolutionary & awesome game design.You, Wotc...

xechnao · Jun 30, 2009

jmucchiello said:
Xechnao, as someone above mentioned, Mike Mearls is your hypothetical guy. He was hired and help craft 4e. This is exactly what WotC did and would do. So that's the answer. Is there some manner in which Mearls doesn't fit your proposal?

I agree with the example of Mike Mearls. The only difference that I see as of now, is that Mearls was hired before Wotc did what it did with the OGL, aka the GSL.

Now, Wotc may seem to some people that has somehow actively burnt bridges with the OGL. Moreover there are other companies that carry this OGL banner -while as said Wotc does not.

Another thing that comes to mind is that Mearls, as another poster put it, worked on the strengths of the existing system, aka D20. I find it more interesting to think of the case that this new game design is something really innovative or that innovative so that Wotc should have to put some thought and probably a bit of risk to make the step to change the system it has been carrying. I find it interesting because there are pluses and negatives to consider. The negatives I believe are aparent to most people. For the posistives I would say that Wotc in our market or hobby is always risking a bit nonetheless -and this risk would be more important in the scenario of the OP. Moreover, D&D has to change, has to evolve and rather for the better. If it does remain stagnant there is not even a risk to worry about: the line will just have to face commercial death.

thecasualoblivion · Jun 30, 2009

xechnao said:
I agree with the example of Mike Mearls. The only difference that I see as of now, is that Mearls was hired before Wotc did what it did with the OGL, aka the GSL.

Now, Wotc may seem to some people that has somehow actively burnt bridges with the OGL. Moreover there are other companies that carry this OGL banner -while as said Wotc does not.

What does WotC's dumping of the OGL have to do with the OP?

xechnao said:
Another thing that comes to mind is that Mearls, as another poster put it, worked on the strengths of the existing system, aka D20. I find it more interesting to think of the case that this new game design is something really innovative or that innovative so that Wotc should have to put some thought and probably a bit of risk to make the step to change the system it has been carrying. I find it interesting because there are pluses and negatives to consider. The negatives I believe are aparent to most people. For the posistives I would say that Wotc in our market or hobby is always risking a bit nonetheless -and this risk would be more important in the scenario of the OP.

I have no idea what any of this means

xechnao said:
Moreover, D&D has to change, has to evolve and rather for the better. If it does remain stagnant there is even no risk to worry about: the line will just have to face commercial death.

Are you saying that the current path of D&D is bad, has to change and evolve, for the better this time instead of the worse? That D&D in its current state is facing commercial death?

ST · Jul 1, 2009

Leatherhead said:
This thread appears to have been killed by witch-hunts before it really had a chance to get off the ground.

Honestly, I was really just trying to get a handle on the question.

If somebody wants to argue that D&D should be supplanted by some other system, or it shouldn't, or that this or that particular market share would grow the market -- really, any concrete topic or question -- I'm on board.

Okay, let me try another approach. I would guess that an open-content system that became immensely popular would have the potential to become as fragmented as the various 3.x OGL content that came out. Let's assume that doesn't happen, so that it's open yet has a strong product identity.

If it was a particular, strong ruleset that enjoyed strong support, people gave great feedback on how it worked and because it was open source it was expanded with a number of supplements and extra detail, but quality stays high. I guess an analogy would be large Open Source software projects -- anyone can change thing, but there is a trunk line that's managed tightly by the project team. So that's the key product.

I think that Wizards' wouldn't take any action on a corporate level.They wouldn't regard the product as serious competition, as an open source 'continual release' system would mean that there's no need to buy physical product. That's sort of how it works in software -- open source software doesn't really compete for consumer dollars the same way commercial software does.

However, designers who worked there might take notes, see if any particularly useful or effective techniques could be adapted from that OGC game, and either in a future supplement or a future edition, they'd incorporate some of these ideas, but not in an Open Content fashion; they'd likely reverse engineer the ideas represented into their own, proprietary rules.

That's a good faith effort to answer the question, with no snark and no trying to beg the question. =)

MichaelSomething · Jul 1, 2009

xechnao said:
Moreover, D&D has to change, has to evolve and rather for the better. If it does remain stagnant there is not even a risk to worry about: the line will just have to face commercial death.

And that's why WOTC made 4th Edition!

Also...

Did you know that RPG.net Game index contains over 10,000 Games? There are hundreds of different RPG systems ou there all ready. If your looking for innovation, you'll be bound to find it if you're willing to look.

xechnao · Jul 1, 2009

ST said:
That's a good faith effort to answer the question, with no snark and no trying to beg the question. =)

It seems so, yes. Thanks.

So you would choose to reverse engineer. It seems the most reasonable approach, at least as we are used to know and think of how would Wotc operate.

Lets develop on this one step further...

So, at this point it would be interesting to consider how far will Wotc allow herself to go, if a lot of change was necessary to Wotc's system for the genius ways behind the new design to take effect. Would Wotc ever be courageous enough to make the big step, or would it rather shy a bit and choose to maintain loyalty to the legacy of D&D in fear of fan backlash?

It seems that 4e has had some of this courage into it. So it seems Wotc is aware of the necessity to follow this force of courage so to remain in business. The question is how much? Lets say you do not have time for experimentation to balance things out. Development takes a lot of time and you have to choose a path. You either go for a half-baked evolution in your game while remaining loyal to your traditions or you take up your arms and start up the revolution.

You can hire these innovative new game designers to lead your path. Or you can try to maintain your previously held ground while accepting that you will have to comprimise some of it in an effort to try to buy some time so that your fans are more accustomed to the innovative ideas to the point you feel comfortable enough with them to make the change. You are Wotc, you are considered the leader: at least till now. And now you have to decide. So what would you do?

xechnao · Jul 1, 2009

MichaelSomething said:
Did you know that RPG.net Game index contains over 10,000 Games? There are hundreds of different RPG systems ou there all ready. If your looking for innovation, you'll be bound to find it if you're willing to look.

This is out of topic but I do want to address this here. I do not think there is a lot of value there. Most certainly there would exist some hidden gems, unfortunately their light covered by the mere mass of the pile. The matter is that the vast majority of the design of tabletop rpgs are spin offs of the original design of d&d. You have a set of abstract attributes or abilities denoting the pseudo set of the measures of the physics to run the game. Strength, Intelligence etch. You have players choose how to assign values to these and face the target numbers or chances to do things based on their choice.
95% of rpgs are a spin off of this model. And yet there are infinite directions and innovations and optimizations this system can stand because it is so generic. The fact though that 95% of the rpgs follow this kind of system shows that most rpgs are not grown up by some genuinely innovative idea or intellect behind them. The chances that they manage to produce something explosive while trying to follow or mimic an established mindset are pretty slim. This is my impression at least.

Michael Silverbane · Jul 1, 2009

jmucchiello said:
Xechnao, as someone above mentioned, Mike Mearls is your hypothetical guy. He was hired and help craft 4e. This is exactly what WotC did and would do. So that's the answer. Is there some manner in which Mearls doesn't fit your proposal?

Yeah, it seems like this has happened a couple of times, with varying results.

Mike Mearls, with his Iron Heroes game and various supplements. He got hired by Wizards.
Steve Kenson, with Mutants and Masterminds and True 20. He is still with Green Ronin (whether Wizards offered him a job, or not, we do not know).
Pat Kapera (and others) with the Spycraft line of games. Those guys pretty much all moved to Crafty Games (from AEG). Again, we do not know if there was a job offer for any of them from Wizards.

I'm sure that there are other games that are considered revolutionary and awesome by their fans. None have taken over a significant amount of the market share of D&D, regardless of their awesomeitude.

kitsune9 · Jul 1, 2009

xechnao said:
Perhaps I should have made this as a poll.

1. Do nothing
2. Try to take ideas for the current edition if possible
3. Try to design the next edition on (the ideas of) the new revolutionary design
4. Turn the next edition to OGL and develop on that design
5. Hire the person that did this to work on the development of the next edition
6. Something else, explain.

Mr. Piratecat is this possible? I mean, can I transform the thread in a poll?

Likely do nothing. As another poster had stated, it will probably be hailed by critics, but will only sell 100 copies. I've seen some awesome games in terms of boardgames, ccgs, cmgs, rpgs, etc. over the years and the rpg crowd is the only group of people that goes "meh" or yaaaaaaawwwwwnnnn..... :yawn:

Happy Gaming!

xechnao · Jul 1, 2009

kitsune9 said:
I've seen some awesome games in terms of boardgames, ccgs, cmgs, rpgs, etc. over the years and the rpg crowd is the only group of people that goes "meh" or yaaaaaaawwwwwnnnn.....

You have made yourself an interesting observation here. So why do you think that might be?
I am talking about the stance of the rpg crowd obviously

thecasualoblivion · Jul 1, 2009

xechnao said:
You have made yourself an interesting observation here. So why do you think that might be?
I am talking about the stance of the rpg crowd obviously

Pretty much the same. Meh.