D&D 5E Monte Cook Leaves WotC - No Longer working on D&D Next [updated]

ForeverSlayer · Apr 28, 2012

thecasualoblivion said:
Who is to say that discarding 4E and its fans entirely and going back to 3.5E isn't equally suicidal? 4E is over, and 5E is coming, but it doesn't mean that 4E needs to be purged so that things can go back to how they should be, and that isn't what 5E is advertising.

Who says they are going back to 3rd edition? Pathfinder has that covered so it would be suicide if Wizards even tried that. 4th edition has gotten a reaction that has never been seen before in D&D. While they won't be going back to 3rd edition I bet you they would go back to more of a 3rd edition type game than they would a 4th. Not saying that as a fact but as a personal opinion.

The odds are stacked against 4th edition and in the world of speculators and capitalism that is a big no no.

talok55 · Apr 28, 2012

Yeah. If WotC made 5E very similar to 4E it would be like Coca-Cola replacing Coke with New Coke again. Both companies aren't that stupid. They already know the market will not support a 4E like D&D, so they can't saturate 5E with 4E mechanics. That doesn't mean that there won't be a some 4E mechanics in core 5E or that there won't be modules to play a very 4E like 5E game. It also doesn't mean that it will be a tweaked 3.5, but they have to do something to appeal to the 3.5/Pathfinder crowd, because that appears to be the biggest RPG market. 3.5 phbs still end up occasionally having sales higher than 4E books. That pretty much says it all. I know a lot of you love 4E, but that doesn't mean that it was a huge success. If it was, 5E wouldn't even be a topic for discussion right now. The evidence for this is everywhere. The former brand manage for 4E elaborated on some of the reasons why. He said they planned on it lasting for 8-10 years. It's not like it was planned to last 5 years before the next edition. You don't fix what isn't broken, especially if doing so requires a huge, risky investment.

Maxboy · Apr 28, 2012

talok55 said:
Yeah. If WotC made 5E very similar to 4E it would be like Coca-Cola replacing Coke with New Coke again. Both companies aren't that stupid. They already know the market will not support a 4E like D&D, so they can't saturate 5E with 4E mechanics. That doesn't mean that there won't be a some 4E mechanics in core 5E or that there won't be modules to play a very 4E like 5E game. It also doesn't mean that it will be a tweaked 3.5, but they have to do something to appeal to the 3.5/Pathfinder crowd, because that appears to be the biggest RPG market. 3.5 phbs still end up occasionally having sales higher than 4E books. That pretty much says it all. I know a lot of you love 4E, but that doesn't mean that it was a huge success. If it was, 5E wouldn't even be a topic for discussion right now. The evidence for this is everywhere. The former brand manage for 4E elaborated on some of the reasons why. He said they planned on it lasting for 8-10 years. It's not like it was planned to last 5 years before the next edition. You don't fix what isn't broken, especially if doing so requires a huge, risky investment.

All i see is people making this a 3e vs 4e.... there are more editions of D&D than just those two and i would love all of them considered, in how this new edition is shaped

jsaving · Apr 28, 2012

Hussar said:
Hey, you all could be right. You very well might be. But to base your entire position on something that is utterly unprovable is just so bizarre.

My 4e group feels your pain, not wanting to remotely believe 4e could be a subpar marketplace performer unless someone can somehow sneak into WotC and give you the numbers only they have to prove it. All we can do is point you toward people like The Rouse who do know those numbers, surveys like the several that have been posted on ENWorld over the last year or so that show Pathfinder surpassing D&D at FLGSs, and the early plug-pulling on 4e by WotC to lay out a logical case that the sales numbers are likely considerably worse than you and (some) others believe them to be.

But I would dispute your statement that those who do accept this case are "dancing" on 4th edition's "grave". I for one think 4e is a solid system, enjoy playing it with my 4e group, and don't see that it has necessarily gotten a fair shake from some portions of the gaming community. And I deeply regret that the RPG market has gotten so fragmented over the last few years. It split my own gaming group in two, and not a day goes by that I don't wish 4e had been the uniting edition that 5e now seeks to be. I don't know myself whether a new edition that combines the best of 3e and 4e can pull it back together. But I have to hope that it can.

carmachu · Apr 28, 2012

Redbadge said:
Also @Shemeska and @jsaving 

I'm certain that WotC (and Hasbro) is disappointed that they've lost market share.
However, I'll link my thoughts on the subject (my EnWorld posts on the success of 4e, oldest to newest; I don't think it'll take too long to read):

The problem I see with some of your thougts is the lack of information- like your thought that you heard that 4e had larger print run then 3.0 and they sold out of them....

But, the two most profitable times in D&D history was 3.0 and a time and the early 80's. If, by your information that 4e had a bigger run and sold out, shouldnt 4e then have beaten 3.0 then? But from all information it hasnt.

Nemesis Destiny · Apr 28, 2012

jsaving said:
But I would dispute your statement that those who do accept this case are "dancing" on 4th edition's "grave".

Haha, are you new here? Did you read the threads on ENWorld about the announcement of 5e? It was chock full of grave-dancing. And I still see it, here and there, to this day. This is not something I expect will stop any time soon either. Those folks were the ones more butthurt by the 3.x --> 4e edition change and its associated marketing blunders, and they won't be happy until WotC is no longer producing D&D, or the company does some massive backpedalling.

Incidentally, I've seen the '4e is New Coke' thing come up a couple of times and I wanted to point out that New Coke failed due to marketing almost exclusively, and had very little to do with how it tasted. In fact, in blind taste-tests, it outperformed the regular product. Maybe the comparison is more apt than we realize.

Wikipedia said:
The results of the taste tests were strong – the sweeter mixture overwhelmingly beat both regular Coke and Pepsi. Then tasters were asked if they would buy and drink it if it were Coca-Cola. Most said yes, they would, although it would take some getting used to. A small minority, about 10–12%, felt angry and alienated at the very thought, saying that they might stop drinking Coke altogether. Their presence in focus groups tended to skew results in a more negative direction as they exerted indirect peer pressure on other participants.

My point being that if 4e were not called "D&D 4e" nobody would have a problem with it. Heck, it could even have been called D&D, but marketed like Battlesystem, and it still would have done fine. But people fear change, and they fear things that are new. And yes, some just didn't like it, and that's fine. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Coke#cite_note-Prendergast355-4

Redbadge · Apr 28, 2012

Ironically, there would have been no 4th edition in the first place if so many people weren't dissatisfied with 3.x, and 3.x sales hadn't begun to decrease so substantially. In fact, it took a heavily house ruled (but very good version) of 3.x (Pathfinder), coupled with the huge amount of goodwill that WotC *did not* engender (GSL, etc.) to revive (or maintain) that version in the first place (market-wise, obviously people could still have played 3e if they choose even if it wasn't represented in the market).

Also to say that 4e is the red-headed step-child edition of D&D is not only grossly inaccurate, it's also not constructive at all. Besides, Jerry Holkins and Mike Krahulik alone gave enough awareness and overwhelming positive enthusiasm to 4th edition Dungeons and Dragons to make the edition extremely well received amongst nerd culture on the whole. Unfortunately, the overwhelming enthusiasm for 4th edition does not entirely extend to niche, D&D-specific sites such as EnWorld (and even amongst these areas, you can find many people who loved 4e. They do not appear to be a minority even here).

talok55 · Apr 28, 2012

Well 4E's "marketing" (if you can call it that) sure didn't help it's prospects. It should come as no surprise that if you insult the people you are trying to sell to, many of them won't buy what you are selling eve if it is a good product.The closest thing it had to a taste test was playtesting. We do know that they largely ignored playtest feedback (Mike Mearls admitted as much). What we don't know is how much of that feedback was positive, and how much was negative. For all we know their "taste test" data could have told them that a lot of people wouldn't like or accept the system and they ignored it.

jsaving · Apr 28, 2012

Nemesis Destiny said:
Incidentally, I've seen the '4e is New Coke' thing come up a couple of times and I wanted to point out that New Coke failed due to marketing almost exclusively, and had very little to do with how it tasted. In fact, in blind taste-tests, it outperformed the regular product. Maybe the comparison is more apt than we realize.

Some people think that if 4e isn't selling well then it must be a bad system. Too many others think that if 4e is a good system then it must be selling well. But I think the truth is exactly what Nemesis Destiny said -- the sales numbers for 4e, no matter what they are, don't tell us much about whether 4e is "better" or "worse" than 3e/Pathfinder or any other edition for that matter.

Redbadge · Apr 28, 2012

carmachu said:
The problem I see with some of your thougts is the lack of information- like your thought that you heard that 4e had larger print run then 3.0 and they sold out of them....

But, the two most profitable times in D&D history was 3.0 and a time and the early 80's. If, by your information that 4e had a bigger run and sold out, shouldnt 4e then have beaten 3.0 then? But from all information it hasnt.

Here's a bit of information for you; I'll find some my other old research later, including some Greg Leads quotes about the success of 4e!!. (NBA Playoffs are on). And you are definitely right about the 80s; IIRC, D&D had 13 print runs during that era.

mearls
May 30 2008, 19:46:07 UTC

Print run size:

3.0 < 3.5 < 4e

From his blog, you may have to expand some of the comments to find it:
mearls: Thank You, Thank You, Thank You!

Edit: For number of printings (at the time), see Leeds quote, question 7:
http://www.enworld.org/forum/news/254134-exclusive-interview-wizards-coast-president-greg-leeds.html

D&D 5E Monte Cook Leaves WotC - No Longer working on D&D Next [updated]

ForeverSlayer

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jsaving

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talok55

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