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<blockquote data-quote="RyanD" data-source="post: 7647749" data-attributes="member: 3312"><p><strong>Many replies!</strong></p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p>The brand team under my leadership from 98-2000 developed a comprehensive plan to bring new players in the hobby. This plan was backed by data we received in consultation with a specialist in child developmental psychology. It had 4 main components.</p><p></p><p>The first was a series of simple games for kids 6-8 years old to introduce them to the idea of RPGs. The only game that was ever produced was the Pokemon Jr. Adventure Game, which has the distinction of being the best-selling TRPG of all time (on release).</p><p></p><p>The second was a series of games for kids 9-12 years old that were to be based on various popular brands. We had a Pokemon game in development (essentially finished) and a Harry Potter RPG in development (partially finished) before terminating this project due to licensing issues.</p><p></p><p>The third was a more traditional boxed introductory product for both D&D and Star Wars. The goal was something that could be sold in mass market toystores, targeted kids 12-14 years of age, and would cost less than $20. The 3rd Edition Intro box was the first of these products, though never got more evolution over time as was intended.</p><p></p><p>The fourth were a series of one and two book RPG series linked to popular licenses like Wheel of Time (which got produced) and Dune (which didn't). The plan was to have a very broad, but shallow net of RPGs that we could use to target selected groups of fans with a tailored offering. None of the expected development was done on these products either.</p><p></p><p>While we left behind a very detailed 10 year plan for the RPG business, those who followed after our team chose not to use that plan.</p><p></p><p>This was in 2000. I would not use this plan now. My plan now would be a series of iOS apps that were interactive and could be used solo as well as in groups. I would never plan on selling these kids physical products but would instead get them into a microtransaction based, repeat purchase model business that would scale with their interest levels and age and eventually lead to a whole ecosystem of RPG products driven via digital technology (not VTT, not MMO).</p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p>It's effectively worth nothing in terms of opportunity to grow the market. Every sale earned at Amazon could be earned instead by Wizards if they chose to do more direct marketing (and probably more than that since they'd be doing much more than Amazon does). Amazon is primarily a convenience reseller of hobby gaming products for those who lack other access or who wish to obtain the discounts offered. While Amazon tries mightily to induce you to buy things other than that which brought you to the site in the first place, I strongly doubt that it works well for lines like RPGs. At best, it may induce someone to notice a niche RPG that they were not otherwise aware of and give it a chance, but I can't see many people being shown D&D as an offer and suddenly deciding to buy it without prior intent.</p><p></p><p>In terms of volume, it's probably 10-20 quality FLGS worth of product.</p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p>DDI is a great way to monetize D&D fans, especially those who don't intend to buy any physical product. I'm certain that Wizards is reasonably pleased with the income, but I'm also reasonably sure its far less than forecast when it was pitched to Hasbro. Not having DDI up and running with the release of 4e and not directly tying 4e to DDI were both strategic mistakes that I'm sure they recognize and would have addressed if at all possible.</p><p></p><p>Paizo's situation is a bit different, since they're not (yet) adding a lot of added value to the books they sell via the subscription process, they're just offering a tremendous amount of convenience and a great community. Still, having that revenue flow direct to the publisher without all the middlemen makes those books vastly more profitable on a per-unit basis than anything Paizo sells through the distribution channels. It's a great system for both buyer and seller and from what I can tell, people really like it. I'm certain Paizo will keep adding bells and whistles so that eventually the value proposition will be very hard to ignore. <img src="data:image/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAIAAAAAAAP///yH5BAEAAAAALAAAAAABAAEAAAIBRAA7" class="smilie smilie--sprite smilie--sprite1" alt=":)" title="Smile :)" loading="lazy" data-shortname=":)" /></p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p>It was already obvious in 1999 that eBay and Craigslist meant that the genie was already out of that bottle. Easy access to 1e and 2e product was going to be a mass-market phenomenon, no matter what Wizards did.</p><p></p><p>I believed then, and believe now, that the only thing uniquely valuable in a go-forward basis to Wizards of the Coast is the Dungeons & Dragons brand. Wizards is the only company that can put that brand on a book and sell it. And if managed correctly, that brand alone should allow Wizards to charge a price premium -- even against people selling the exact same content under a (lesser) brand identity.</p><p></p><p>The game rules aren't valuable. The brand equity is the value, connected to the huge social network of folks who want to tap that equity.</p><p></p><p>Let me give you an example. You could easily make your own cola. You could make it taste exactly like Coke (the "secret recipe" isn't that hard to find, just Google it). You can't sell it in any meaningful commercial volume. The reason isn't the contents inside the can, it's the memories and emotions conjured up by someone drinking something they know as "coke" (which is why the "New Coke" thing failed too - it was too new and didn't trigger those memories and emotions). The ability to use that red & white can and call the product "Coke" or "Coca-Cola" is <strong>all the value in the whole product</strong>.</p><p></p><p>That's what D&D is. And just like New Coke, if you put something in a book and call it D&D, and it doesn't generate those emotions and memories in your target audience, they won't buy it (or at least they won't buy enough of it to hit your sales goals). (Please don't take me as saying 4e is New Coke either -- that's extending this analogy past the point I want to take it.)</p><p></p><p></p><p> (in response to my citation of the number of FLGS left in the North American market).</p><p></p><p>Yes, certainly. I was paid by a client while I ran my consulting business to reach out to as many such stores as could be located. To build the necessary database I compiled information from SIC codes and from on-line yellow pages and by doing state by state searches of business licenses. I added in the retail lists I had been keeping for years for my own businesses, as well as contacts screen scraped from many publisher sites. I think GAMA may have distributed a retailer list after one of the GTS shows (but I honestly don't remember at this point). Then I hired an outsourced firm overseas to call all of the phone numbers we were able to generate and we had our outsourcers ask the people who answered a series of simple questions to see if they were brick & mortar stores and if they sold hobby game products beyond just D&D and Magic. Given the time that has passed since that work was performed (more than 5 years) I'm saying the number is likely 750 FLGS +/- 250.</p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p>It's hard to write for new players. Most people in the industry have never done it. They write for players assumed to know a lot about RPGs (even when they <em>think</em> they're writing for new players.) They also have never written for kids. Wanna see something interesting? Find a kid who hasn't played many games and ask them to "draw a hand of cards". If there's paper and pencil nearby, you'll likely get a funny illustration. We take so much terminology for granted.</p><p></p><p>It's also not career enhancing. For the most part, nobody wins an Orgins award or gets noticed by other publishers for working on intro products. By and large, its the flashy top-end game stuff that builds your industry cred. Most people in the industry, if given the choice, will work on something "fun" rather than an intro box.</p><p></p><p>They usually don't make much money. At best, your intro product is going to have a lower margin than your core books. Especially if you sell it in a box, and sell it at a price that's competitive with the other stuff its on the toy store shelves with - like $9.99 Monopoly. At worst, you might actually lose money on each unit, which means that people who don't understand it are likely to cancel it because viewed in isolation, it's a loser.</p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p>Not gonna go into all that in detail - not constructive. Some quick summary responses: The senior leadership at White Wolf decided to transition to the MMO field partly because of what they observed when they did nWoD. That was long before I came to the company. They looked for the best partner, had many offers, and chose the company they felt was the best cultural fit and had the right tech and vision to do what they wanted to accomplish with the World of Darkness MMO.</p><p></p><p>"Flight to Quality" isn't something publishers do. It's something consumers do. And it's an emergent behavior, not a planned or scripted thing. It just happens because most people are rational, and in a shrinking market, the rational thing is to go where most of the other people are going. Once it starts, it becomes a self-fulfilling prophesy. In Pathfinder's case, it's well past the starting point.</p><p></p><p>You've got a twisted and mistaken idea about the people who make RPGs (D&D, Pathfinder, etc.) if you think they're driven by automatic response to market research and focus groups. By and large they're ad hocing it just like they always have. In fact, I'd bet that by far there's more tension as the market research folks try to convince designers not to do something than there is effort expended trying to get them to do something based on research. It's a hair pulling experience to convince a designer who <strong>knows</strong> they're right about something that the data shows they aren't.</p><p></p><p>By and large these are creative folks (intelligent, creative folks) who are trying their best to make stuff that will sell. They rarely, if ever, make something just because they're told to do it - and even when they do, they usually have enough pride in their work to try and make it awesome. Behind 99.99% of every RPG product you've ever purchased is one or more people who had a burning passion about the product and got it through all stages of approvals and development before it landed on your bookshelf.</p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p>Fair enough - it was done by my marketing department. It's only fair that I take the shot for it. It was in bad taste, I wish it hadn't been done, and if I had the chance to do it over again, I'd have intervened to stop it if I had the chance to do so.</p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p>What? That's easy!</p><p></p><p>The DDI should not be a hypertext version of the rules. That should be free anyway. DDI should be tools to help you manage your game and your characters. It should be editorial content to help you enjoy your game session more. It should be lore and backstory for campaign settings. It should be a library of content not published in books that you can access for a small fee - stuff that's got too small an audience to be worth printing, but that <strong>YOU</strong> might find really helpful (like for example a few dozen more Fey creatures).</p><p></p><p>DDI should also be a community organizing tool that helps you find groups, form groups, and gather groups into larger groups so that folks have a sense of a real-world social network.</p><p></p><p>DDI should also be a place for playtesting and feedback, where the designers can get immediate and real-world input on the work they're doing.</p><p></p><p>And obviously it should be a portal to content: All the content that TSR/Wizards has ever published (and that they have rights to) should be available for a reasonable fee.</p><p></p><p>Why can't I browse a list of monsters (thousands and thousands), select any number I wish, and have a POD version of a Monster Manual custom built to my specifications sent to me (electronically or in print)? Why can't I build my own spell books for my campaign from a list of spells (thousands and thousands) and do the same?</p><p></p><p>Wizards has all the data necessary to enable a whole new way of formatting the game - customized directly for <strong>YOU</strong>, as opposed to generically. DDI could be the portal to that.</p><p></p><p>The material released as Open Game Content is just the tip of the iceberg of value that Wizards controls.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="RyanD, post: 7647749, member: 3312"] [b]Many replies![/b] The brand team under my leadership from 98-2000 developed a comprehensive plan to bring new players in the hobby. This plan was backed by data we received in consultation with a specialist in child developmental psychology. It had 4 main components. The first was a series of simple games for kids 6-8 years old to introduce them to the idea of RPGs. The only game that was ever produced was the Pokemon Jr. Adventure Game, which has the distinction of being the best-selling TRPG of all time (on release). The second was a series of games for kids 9-12 years old that were to be based on various popular brands. We had a Pokemon game in development (essentially finished) and a Harry Potter RPG in development (partially finished) before terminating this project due to licensing issues. The third was a more traditional boxed introductory product for both D&D and Star Wars. The goal was something that could be sold in mass market toystores, targeted kids 12-14 years of age, and would cost less than $20. The 3rd Edition Intro box was the first of these products, though never got more evolution over time as was intended. The fourth were a series of one and two book RPG series linked to popular licenses like Wheel of Time (which got produced) and Dune (which didn't). The plan was to have a very broad, but shallow net of RPGs that we could use to target selected groups of fans with a tailored offering. None of the expected development was done on these products either. While we left behind a very detailed 10 year plan for the RPG business, those who followed after our team chose not to use that plan. This was in 2000. I would not use this plan now. My plan now would be a series of iOS apps that were interactive and could be used solo as well as in groups. I would never plan on selling these kids physical products but would instead get them into a microtransaction based, repeat purchase model business that would scale with their interest levels and age and eventually lead to a whole ecosystem of RPG products driven via digital technology (not VTT, not MMO). It's effectively worth nothing in terms of opportunity to grow the market. Every sale earned at Amazon could be earned instead by Wizards if they chose to do more direct marketing (and probably more than that since they'd be doing much more than Amazon does). Amazon is primarily a convenience reseller of hobby gaming products for those who lack other access or who wish to obtain the discounts offered. While Amazon tries mightily to induce you to buy things other than that which brought you to the site in the first place, I strongly doubt that it works well for lines like RPGs. At best, it may induce someone to notice a niche RPG that they were not otherwise aware of and give it a chance, but I can't see many people being shown D&D as an offer and suddenly deciding to buy it without prior intent. In terms of volume, it's probably 10-20 quality FLGS worth of product. DDI is a great way to monetize D&D fans, especially those who don't intend to buy any physical product. I'm certain that Wizards is reasonably pleased with the income, but I'm also reasonably sure its far less than forecast when it was pitched to Hasbro. Not having DDI up and running with the release of 4e and not directly tying 4e to DDI were both strategic mistakes that I'm sure they recognize and would have addressed if at all possible. Paizo's situation is a bit different, since they're not (yet) adding a lot of added value to the books they sell via the subscription process, they're just offering a tremendous amount of convenience and a great community. Still, having that revenue flow direct to the publisher without all the middlemen makes those books vastly more profitable on a per-unit basis than anything Paizo sells through the distribution channels. It's a great system for both buyer and seller and from what I can tell, people really like it. I'm certain Paizo will keep adding bells and whistles so that eventually the value proposition will be very hard to ignore. :) It was already obvious in 1999 that eBay and Craigslist meant that the genie was already out of that bottle. Easy access to 1e and 2e product was going to be a mass-market phenomenon, no matter what Wizards did. I believed then, and believe now, that the only thing uniquely valuable in a go-forward basis to Wizards of the Coast is the Dungeons & Dragons brand. Wizards is the only company that can put that brand on a book and sell it. And if managed correctly, that brand alone should allow Wizards to charge a price premium -- even against people selling the exact same content under a (lesser) brand identity. The game rules aren't valuable. The brand equity is the value, connected to the huge social network of folks who want to tap that equity. Let me give you an example. You could easily make your own cola. You could make it taste exactly like Coke (the "secret recipe" isn't that hard to find, just Google it). You can't sell it in any meaningful commercial volume. The reason isn't the contents inside the can, it's the memories and emotions conjured up by someone drinking something they know as "coke" (which is why the "New Coke" thing failed too - it was too new and didn't trigger those memories and emotions). The ability to use that red & white can and call the product "Coke" or "Coca-Cola" is [b]all the value in the whole product[/b]. That's what D&D is. And just like New Coke, if you put something in a book and call it D&D, and it doesn't generate those emotions and memories in your target audience, they won't buy it (or at least they won't buy enough of it to hit your sales goals). (Please don't take me as saying 4e is New Coke either -- that's extending this analogy past the point I want to take it.) (in response to my citation of the number of FLGS left in the North American market). Yes, certainly. I was paid by a client while I ran my consulting business to reach out to as many such stores as could be located. To build the necessary database I compiled information from SIC codes and from on-line yellow pages and by doing state by state searches of business licenses. I added in the retail lists I had been keeping for years for my own businesses, as well as contacts screen scraped from many publisher sites. I think GAMA may have distributed a retailer list after one of the GTS shows (but I honestly don't remember at this point). Then I hired an outsourced firm overseas to call all of the phone numbers we were able to generate and we had our outsourcers ask the people who answered a series of simple questions to see if they were brick & mortar stores and if they sold hobby game products beyond just D&D and Magic. Given the time that has passed since that work was performed (more than 5 years) I'm saying the number is likely 750 FLGS +/- 250. It's hard to write for new players. Most people in the industry have never done it. They write for players assumed to know a lot about RPGs (even when they [i]think[/i] they're writing for new players.) They also have never written for kids. Wanna see something interesting? Find a kid who hasn't played many games and ask them to "draw a hand of cards". If there's paper and pencil nearby, you'll likely get a funny illustration. We take so much terminology for granted. It's also not career enhancing. For the most part, nobody wins an Orgins award or gets noticed by other publishers for working on intro products. By and large, its the flashy top-end game stuff that builds your industry cred. Most people in the industry, if given the choice, will work on something "fun" rather than an intro box. They usually don't make much money. At best, your intro product is going to have a lower margin than your core books. Especially if you sell it in a box, and sell it at a price that's competitive with the other stuff its on the toy store shelves with - like $9.99 Monopoly. At worst, you might actually lose money on each unit, which means that people who don't understand it are likely to cancel it because viewed in isolation, it's a loser. Not gonna go into all that in detail - not constructive. Some quick summary responses: The senior leadership at White Wolf decided to transition to the MMO field partly because of what they observed when they did nWoD. That was long before I came to the company. They looked for the best partner, had many offers, and chose the company they felt was the best cultural fit and had the right tech and vision to do what they wanted to accomplish with the World of Darkness MMO. "Flight to Quality" isn't something publishers do. It's something consumers do. And it's an emergent behavior, not a planned or scripted thing. It just happens because most people are rational, and in a shrinking market, the rational thing is to go where most of the other people are going. Once it starts, it becomes a self-fulfilling prophesy. In Pathfinder's case, it's well past the starting point. You've got a twisted and mistaken idea about the people who make RPGs (D&D, Pathfinder, etc.) if you think they're driven by automatic response to market research and focus groups. By and large they're ad hocing it just like they always have. In fact, I'd bet that by far there's more tension as the market research folks try to convince designers not to do something than there is effort expended trying to get them to do something based on research. It's a hair pulling experience to convince a designer who [b]knows[/b] they're right about something that the data shows they aren't. By and large these are creative folks (intelligent, creative folks) who are trying their best to make stuff that will sell. They rarely, if ever, make something just because they're told to do it - and even when they do, they usually have enough pride in their work to try and make it awesome. Behind 99.99% of every RPG product you've ever purchased is one or more people who had a burning passion about the product and got it through all stages of approvals and development before it landed on your bookshelf. Fair enough - it was done by my marketing department. It's only fair that I take the shot for it. It was in bad taste, I wish it hadn't been done, and if I had the chance to do it over again, I'd have intervened to stop it if I had the chance to do so. What? That's easy! The DDI should not be a hypertext version of the rules. That should be free anyway. DDI should be tools to help you manage your game and your characters. It should be editorial content to help you enjoy your game session more. It should be lore and backstory for campaign settings. It should be a library of content not published in books that you can access for a small fee - stuff that's got too small an audience to be worth printing, but that [b]YOU[/b] might find really helpful (like for example a few dozen more Fey creatures). DDI should also be a community organizing tool that helps you find groups, form groups, and gather groups into larger groups so that folks have a sense of a real-world social network. DDI should also be a place for playtesting and feedback, where the designers can get immediate and real-world input on the work they're doing. And obviously it should be a portal to content: All the content that TSR/Wizards has ever published (and that they have rights to) should be available for a reasonable fee. Why can't I browse a list of monsters (thousands and thousands), select any number I wish, and have a POD version of a Monster Manual custom built to my specifications sent to me (electronically or in print)? Why can't I build my own spell books for my campaign from a list of spells (thousands and thousands) and do the same? Wizards has all the data necessary to enable a whole new way of formatting the game - customized directly for [b]YOU[/b], as opposed to generically. DDI could be the portal to that. The material released as Open Game Content is just the tip of the iceberg of value that Wizards controls. [/QUOTE]
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