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

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

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Inertia.

A general observation of RPG players shows that how they approach change is generally a binomial split. They either embrace it, or they fight it with all their being.

A new game may be the greatest game in the world, but if you don't find anyone to play it with, it isn't going to sell to many people beyond the "It is new so I will buy it" crowd.

mudbunny said:

Inertia.

A general observation of RPG players shows that how they approach change is generally a binomial split. They either embrace it, or they fight it with all their being.

A new game may be the greatest game in the world, but if you don't find anyone to play it with, it isn't going to sell to many people beyond the "It is new so I will buy it" crowd.

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What I do not get is this split. It is not like that you have to choose to bother yourself with only one game. People could be into more than one game so this problem would not be so big.

Possible reasons I see this has not been happening:

-learning curve: rpgs tend to be complicated or needlessly complicated and people have so much mind space and free time to invest. Learning and running an rpg becomes a matter of elective choice.

-economic reasons: in the above environment, people heavily invest in an rpg line and so they would rather see this line thrive above all else.

Conclusion: I think these are faults of the industry, not of the gamers themselves for whatever difference this might make.

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.

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Arguably this isn't so. By the time Mearls was hired, WotC had already completely stopped supporting the OGL and had stopped updating the SRD. Most OGL publishers didn't expect any more OGL support from Wizards going forward from before Mearls hire date. If you disagree, fork the thread. But I don't think you'll find a lot of disagreement among people who followed the OGL at the time.

Now, Wotc may seem to some people that has somehow actively burnt bridges with the OGL.

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May? Seem? They definitely have distanced themselves from the OGL.

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.

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Why can't something REALLY innovated derive from an existing RPG rules-base? Part of my real problem with the premise of this thread is the concept of "an innovation so important WotC can't ignore it." There's no such thing.

Those innovations have come and gone many times and for the most part D&D has acquired some of them (skills, feats/proficiencies, point buy systems (2.5e and the whole 3e magic system), action points, etc.) and others it has ignored (narrativist player control, exploding dice, etc) or integrated on the periphery (deck-building = character builds, collectible components = the mini game, board gaming = delves, etc. These things exist but are not inside the game books. They serve to enlarge "This is D&D" without redefining D&D.)

So when next big thing comes down the pike, I'm sure D&D will "overtly adopt it", "examine and then abandon it", or "create a sub-genre of the game where the innovation is front and center without changing the normal tabletop environment."

This is how D&D has always dealt with new ideas and always will. This is, essentially, how all businesses deal with external ideas - add them to the product, promote the product as not needing the new shiny, or creating a new product for independently of the original product giving product A without the new shiny and product B with the new shiny.

xechnao said:

The matter is that the vast majority of the design of tabletop rpgs are spin offs of the original design of d&d...

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.

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If the RPG industry was based on creativity alone - if the market worked that way, then more gaming companies might create new games/new paradigms, but in the real world that is not the case.

One could argue that any RPG game, even if completely unlike D&D is a D&D spinoff. D&D was the first; the game that created the industry. D&D, no matter who owns it, as long as its a viable company will always be the example measured off of for RPGs.

Most indie developers have daytime jobs to live on, and work on their games as a labor of love and perhaps building that "most awesome new game". While some games can take off from such a start, in this business you need a market to survive.

I don't see these spin-off versions of D&D, as "not backed by true intellect and innovation" as you put, but pragmatists that need at least a trickle income to make any headway as a 3pp. That means accessing the same D&D market that is the largest chunk. By creating a completely different game you are lessening your odds of acquiring fans from the D&D casual gaming market. You have to look somewhat like D&D or you might never build a market.

These 10,000 (and growing) "spin-offs", many of them are innovative, yet still practical as a D&D group can easily switch to the new game, due to similarity in rulessets.

If a small RPG developer can gain some foothold, build their own solid market, based on D&D at start-up, now they might have the resources to introduce a completely different game that might mean something. If they tried this a start-up they would most likely not survive.

Your "impression", if thoughtless, seems lacking in business acumen.

Perhaps I'm reading you wrong.

GP

xechnao said:

What I do not get is this split. It is not like that you have to choose to bother yourself with only one game. People could be into more than one game so this problem would not be so big.

Possible reasons I see this has not been happening:

-learning curve: rpgs tend to be complicated or needlessly complicated and people have so much mind space and free time to invest. Learning and running an rpg becomes a matter of elective choice.

-economic reasons: in the above environment, people heavily invest in an rpg line and so they would rather see this line thrive above all else.

Conclusion: I think these are faults of the industry, not of the gamers themselves for whatever difference this might make.

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The big reason for the split Mudbunny describes is consensus. This is a social hobby, and everybody at the table has to agree to play the same game. Variety and innovation are great, but worth nothing if everybody at the table can't agree on what they should play.

The industry has nothing to do with this phenomenon.

D&D has always had the advantage. People know it. People accept it. When you can't agree on what to play, most anybody will play D&D.

The next big game doesn't have to convert just you. It needs to convert all your friends as well.

jmucchiello said:

Arguably this isn't so. By the time Mearls was hired, WotC had already completely stopped supporting the OGL and had stopped updating the SRD. Most OGL publishers didn't expect any more OGL support from Wizards going forward from before Mearls hire date. If you disagree, fork the thread. But I don't think you'll find a lot of disagreement among people who followed the OGL at the time.

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You may be right. When did they announce they wont support the OGL in 4e and go for a new license? Before or after Mearls was hired? I am not sure.

jmucchiello said:

This is how D&D has always dealt with new ideas and always will. This is, essentially, how all businesses deal with external ideas - add them to the product, promote the product as not needing the new shiny, or creating a new product for independently of the original product giving product A without the new shiny and product B with the new shiny.

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But there have been many instances that something new makes an existing market turn and change direction so abruptly that the industrial powers or the producers have to pay more attention than they usually are.

xechnao said:

What I do not get is this split. It is not like that you have to choose to bother yourself with only one game. People could be into more than one game so this problem would not be so big.

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Actually, unless you are a peson with a lot of free time, the older you get, the more responsibilities you acquire (spouse, kids, job, house, etc) and the less free time you have. Thus, you pretty much have to limit yourself to one or two main games, and then some short, really simple ones for one-offs. As thecasualoblivion said, you have to convert the whole group. So it is not just the proper alignment of time and desire for one person, but the whole group that has to align. If one person has sick kids and a spouse, they aren't going to have time to learn the new system, no matter how easy it is.

-learning curve: rpgs tend to be complicated or needlessly complicated and people have so much mind space and free time to invest. Learning and running an rpg becomes a matter of elective choice.

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The days of needlessly complex RPGs are passed. Simplicity and ease-of-learning is the name of the game.

-economic reasons: in the above environment, people heavily invest in an rpg line and so they would rather see this line thrive above all else.

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I think you are attributing the wrong reasons here. It is nto a desire to see game A thrive above game B. It is a matter of "I know game A, so I will buy/play game A."

Conclusion: I think these are faults of the industry, not of the gamers themselves for whatever difference this might make.

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These aren't faults, they are simple facts of human nature. Most people like to stay with what they are comfortable with.

gamerprinter said:

Your "impression", if thoughtless, seems lacking in business acumen.

Perhaps I'm reading you wrong.

GP

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No, I agree with what you are saying. The fact though is, that in this thread we start from the premise that something new, somehow comes up. It is not a matter of the discussion if this new idea will come from an indie designer or the chances that it will come from an indie designer or how it may come from an indie designer. Perhaps 10,000 efforts on game design by various designers are not statistically enough -or are just enough- to produce something trully exciting in a given moment of the rpg hobby. After all it is not much there in the way of game design as it is in the way of setting design or in mixing both at the same time, which somehow reduces the list drastically.

mudbunny said:

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Sorry but there is some contradiction here. You name up as a reason, the fact that as people grow up have less time and then you say that rpgs get simpler. It seems like you want to disagree with what I am saying but in essence you do agree. This is my impression. Which is further enhanced by the reality itself. The library of 3.x is no way simpler than OD&D or BD&D or what have you.

Moreover, it should not be a matter of aging market. The hobby should attract new and young gamers too. And in fact D&D tries to do so. So, trying to stretch the reason of an aging population to balance it out against my description of rpg complexity -which in practice comes to the same thing- for disagreeing on my note that the established industry model is responsibile for the effect we are talking about does not seem very successful.
On a side note, I have never seen people that play board games behave like this. It is not like people are different. The tabletop rpg model is different.

xechnao said:

Sorry but there is some contradiction here. You name up as a reason, the fact that as people grow up have less time and then you say that rpgs get simpler. It seems like you want to disagree with what I am saying but in essence you do agree. This is my impression.

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There is no contradiction here. You are looking at the complex/simple game and free time/no free time as being on the same 2D axis, when they are not. They are orthogonal to each other. The fact that games are getting simpler as has very little impact on whether people feel that they have enough time to learn it the system. Not to mention that there are a whole host of other reasons that impact whether people want to try a new system, such as:

• Do the other players want to change games;
• Do the other players have the time to learn a new system;
• Do the players want to learn a new system;
• Are the books readily available;
• is there support readily available;