D&D Brand Dilution

[Holy Bovine]

I don't think it is diluted as a brand and for me, ime, D&D has always and only referred to those RPGs produced by TSR & WotC. My fellow gamers have always made clear distinctions between 'D&D' and, say World of Darkness or Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay. D&D hasn't become the generic term for role playing games as far as I can tell. Those (now rare) times we play different games we always call it by its real name.

*sigh* now you've got me missing playing some of our other games like WFRP and Traveller.

 

[Mark]

Well, certainly some brand dilution has occurred for those who would call any sword and sorcery gaming "D&D" but it's interesting that generally for most people "D&D" at least refers to all of the editions published by TSR/WotC. So it seems that since the various editions represent such divergently different games (I doubt anyone would try to claim (O)D&D and 4E are easily compatible), it may just be that they have diluted their own brand in many of their own best customers. I hadn't thought of it that way prior to this thread.

 

[Voadam]

well it depends...If tommorro someone asked me if I wanted to play D&D I would ask "Whitch edtion?" but I know plenty of people who would assume it is the newwest edtion inless otherwise stated...

Yes, but would they say people who were playing an earlier edition of the game were not playing D&D?

Its funny, my brother in law mentioned to my wife recently that his young son was playing D&D. He didn't specify edition. It could conceivably have been 4e, or maybe the blue book 79 basic set rules I know my brother in law kept from when he used to play.

 

[Engilbrand]

My parents just refer to any gaming as D&D.
My ex-girlfriend texted me and asked if I was playing D&D one night. I told her that it was Adventure! She asked what the difference was. I took a picture of each of the character sheets and texted them to her. She laughed.
I use to play in an Underdark game that used the NWoD rules. I considered it D&D. Actually, I kinda consider most fantasy gaming to be D&D, whether I'm using the D&D rules or not.

 

[Marius Delphus]

Personally, I can't even comprehend calling something that isn't D&D or AD&D "D&D." Maybe "kind of like D&D" (T&T, ArsM, or any of several others) or "a derivative of D&D" (PF and HM at least).

 

[Mark]

My parents just refer to any gaming as D&D.

I wonder if the most dilution occurs with nongamers, perhaps?

 

[Theo R Cwithin]

I wonder if the most dilution occurs with nongamers, perhaps?

In my experience, that's exactly right. Among gamers, even if there's some assumption what "D&D" means one someone's part, any confusion seems to get cleared up almost immediately:

gamer: "I play D&D."
other gamer: "Oh really? Which edition?"

Among non-gamers, on the other hand, there's no distinction. In fact, at least in my experience, there's usually just "Dungeons & Dragons", and "D&D" is meaningless to someone who doesn't know any gamers:

gamer: "I play D&D."
non-gamer: "Huh?"
gamer: "Dungeons & Dragons."
non-gamer: "Oh really? Like those guys who play in the park with swords?"

...Which brings up another thing: not only does there seem to be little differentiation between different fantasy TTRPGs among non-gamers, but there's very little differentiation between any fantasy games at all, whether table top rpgs or board games, computer/console games, LARPs, etc. To most of the non-gaming public, it's all just "Dungeons & Dragons". YMMV.

Either that's a very powerful brand, or a very dilute one. Not really sure which, since I know nothing about branding!

 

[fba827]

Well, certainly some brand dilution has occurred for those who would call any sword and sorcery gaming "D&D" but it's interesting that generally for most people "D&D" at least refers to all of the editions published by TSR/WotC. So it seems that since the various editions represent such divergently different games (I doubt anyone would try to claim (O)D&D and 4E are easily compatible), it may just be that they have diluted their own brand in many of their own best customers. I hadn't thought of it that way prior to this thread.

I wouldn't say that to be the case, exactly.

To me, it is similar to something like the Windows operating system (bear with me, I have a point).

There is a version and over time they release newer versions while older ones get phased out through no longer being produced/supported (3.x, 95, 98, xp, me, vista, 7, nt, etc.)

Yes, each version has some problems and things that work well. You have people that are fans of one over the other versions. When people refer to "Windows" they're referring to the operating system as a whole, or a specific version (perhaps the most recent, perhaps the one being used at their house/office, etc as determined by the context of the conversation) But would you say that Microsoft diluted their own brand? Or is it really just different versions of the same thing that's evolved over time (for better or worse)?

If you ask any "non-techy" (like, my parents) it's all "Windows" with no distinction beyond how it might look and what you have to click. They don't know any details to understand that they all work differently or that they wouldn't work together at the same time.

I'd say it's a little brand dilution by virtue of the fact that the word D&D can refer to more than one definition (the particular definition being defined by the context of the conversation). However, in my mind, for the most part I just chuck it up to different (albeit incompatible) versions.

 

[Umbran]

When you hear someone mention "D&D" do they always mean the most recent rules for sale under that name? Do you know people who use the name "D&D" in a more generic fashion?

When someone says "D&D", around me they still mean one of the games actually published under that name. I have not heard anyone refer to it in the generic, meaning any fantasy RPG, or say, "let's play D&D" and whip out a completely different ruleset.

 

[JoeGKushner]

Yeah, ever since I started playing.

They used D&D to indicate that they role played and then if you asked for specifics, they'd go into it.

Most people will try to describe role playing as, "You know, Dungeons and Dragons."

It's been a generic alias for role playing for at least 20 years.