D&D General Ben Riggs on how to make D&D a $1 billion brand

[Burnside]

We did read it it's why it's kinda funny. Big money is in film, movie, game.


2. Haven't had a great game since 2E or good game since 3E.

Baldur's Gate 3, while only in early access, is already a huge success and is frankly the best officially licensed D&D crpg ever made.

 

[Burnside]

2. I'm trying to think of a story that did have wide cultural appeal recently. Last one I can think of is Harry Potter, and even without Rowling's recent actions that was two decades ago. Are people just too fragmented? Part of the problem is I'm old so I'm not into what the kids are watching, though a lot of it seems to be anime from what I can tell, and Hasbro can't make that unless they move from Pawtucket to Tokyo.

You could make arguments for Walking Dead, Game of Thrones, Avengers movies, Stranger Things, Squid Game, Mandalorian, and, most recently, The Last of Us as widespread "water cooler" stories with broad cultural appeal - the difference is that most of them were missing the kids demo.

 

[Clint_L]

Guys, if you read the actual article, he tells you how that advice translates into a $1bn brand.

I did read the article. His premise is that WotC should focus on growing the number of DMs exponentially and therefore selling more books, which is why all his advice is about how to make the books better.

This is like telling Marvel they should have focused more on comics, back in 2008.

The only way to make a billion dollar brand off books is to diversify.

And his pyramid scheme logic (if there were only 10 DMs but every DM made one more per year, in 20 years there’d be 100 million DMs!) falls apart for the same reason as all pyramid schemes - there’s a limited number of potential marks.

I think some of his advice about making the books better is great, some is dubious, and some is basically what they already do. And I like Ben Riggs. But I don’t think you build a billion dollar brand by trying to exponentially grow the DM pool so you can sell 10X as many books.

 

[Burnside]

I did read the article. His premise is that WotC should focus on growing the number of DMs exponentially and therefore selling more books, which is why all his advice is about how to make the books better.

This is like telling Marvel they should have focused more on comics, back in 2008.

The only way to make a billion dollar brand off books is to diversify.

And his pyramid scheme logic (if there were only 10 DMs but every DM made one more per year, in 20 years there’d be 100 million DMs!) falls apart for the same reason as all pyramid schemes - there’s a limited number of potential marks.

I think some of his advice about making the books better is great, some is dubious, and some is basically what they already do. And I like Ben Riggs. But I don’t think you build a billion dollar brand by trying to exponentially grow the DM pool so you can sell 10X as many books.

Oh, yeah. "Here's how to make this a billion dollar brand" I immediately dismissed as a clickbait title. The article should more accurately be called "Stuff I'd like to see happen with D&D."

 

[Aberzanzorax]

I did read the article. His premise is that WotC should focus on growing the number of DMs exponentially and therefore selling more books, which is why all his advice is about how to make the books better.

Disagree. Agree until you get to "therefore". Therefore growing the player base and as such, the customer base.
The point of the article, IMO, is that the lack of DMs is a bottleneck that stifles growth of the brand. More DMs = more GAMES, not more books sold.
More games = more players = more customers.

 

[Burnside]

Disagree. Agree until you get to "therefore". Therefore growing the player base and as such, the customer base.
The point of the article, IMO, is that the lack of DMs is a bottleneck that stifles growth of the brand. More DMs = more GAMES, not more books sold.
More games = more players = more customers.

More games = more players = more customers I totally buy.

I don't buy you can ever stick "= billion dollars" at the end of that equation, without a bunch of other stuff (movies, video games, tv, etc) that he either doesn't address or dismisses.

In fairness, there's a decent chance than some editor, not Riggs, stuck that headline on this article to sex it up.

 

[Count_Zero]

1. Movie just flopped.

I wouldn't say it's flopped. Going from Box Office Mojo, it's stayed in the Top 10 - the films that have dropped it down in the rankings are either films that are very much for kids (Mario Bros) or horror films that aren't going for the same audience (Renfield - Horror-comedy, The Pope's Exorcist - psychological/supernatural horror). Further, going from the total box office, it modestly surpassed its budget, and is still in theaters, so it has time to make more money.

By comparison, if you're looking for a flop, Babylon was nominated for multiple Academy Awards and had an approximately $80 million dollar budget, but only made $63 million worldwide. So, wait until it's out of theaters maybe before declaring it a flop?

 

[Burnside]

I wouldn't say it's flopped. Going from Box Office Mojo, it's stayed in the Top 10 - the films that have dropped it down in the rankings are either films that are very much for kids (Mario Bros) or horror films that aren't going for the same audience (Renfield - Horror-comedy, The Pope's Exorcist - psychological/supernatural horror). Further, going from the total box office, it modestly surpassed its budget, and is still in theaters, so it has time to make more money.

By comparison, if you're looking for a flop, Babylon was nominated for multiple Academy Awards and had an approximately $80 million dollar budget, but only made $63 million worldwide. So, wait until it's out of theaters maybe before declaring it a flop?

Please no. There are already two threads of this in excruciating detail. I'm sure Zardnaar would love to debate it with you there - you can pick it up on page 53 or whatever:

D&D Movie/TV - D&D Movie Hit or Flop?

 

[bedir than]

Even if Ben's right, his solutions are not the ones that make it a billion dollar brand in the next few years -- which is the plan put forth to shareholders and investors. The Riggs plan would work in a generation, if it worked.

 

[Zardnaar]

I wouldn't say it's flopped. Going from Box Office Mojo, it's stayed in the Top 10 - the films that have dropped it down in the rankings are either films that are very much for kids (Mario Bros) or horror films that aren't going for the same audience (Renfield - Horror-comedy, The Pope's Exorcist - psychological/supernatural horror). Further, going from the total box office, it modestly surpassed its budget, and is still in theaters, so it has time to make more money.

By comparison, if you're looking for a flop, Babylon was nominated for multiple Academy Awards and had an approximately $80 million dollar budget, but only made $63 million worldwide. So, wait until it's out of theaters maybe before declaring it a flop?

Babylon was a flop and its an Oscar Bait type movie.