When did WotC D&D "Jump the Shark"?

[kaomera]

Is there any denying that WotC D&D is in shambles, or borderline shambles?

Yes. I think that's an entirely subjective assertion, and while you're certainly entitled to feel that way, I would deny that it is actually true for most people playing D&D right now.

 

[Ourph]

Is there any denying that WotC D&D is in shambles, or borderline shambles?

I think HoS is pretty awesome and the latest offerings from the online magazines are seriously tempting me to resubscribe, so I have a hard time saying at this moment that WotC is in shambles. Two months ago? Sure. But it looks like they are now moving in the right direction.

 

[Keefe the Thief]

Is there any denying that WotC D&D is in shambles, or borderline shambles? The DDI debacle, the cancellation of numerous products, the shoddy quality of Heroes of Shadow (from what I've heard), the lack of communication about the present state of affairs and the future, the lingering wound of the PDFiasco, and so on.

But I'm wondering is this: at what point did things really begin to go down hill? OK, I'm going to pre-empt the predictable snarky comments like "When 4E was announced" or "When the core rulebooks came out." Kinda funny, but leave it be.

So what do you think? When did WotC D&D jump the shark? Has it jumped the shark at all, in your view? While we're at it, is there any turning the ship around or is a new edition in the near future inevitable? What say you?

My feeling is that it jumped the shark with Essentials. The quality of the rule books had been strong, especially from PHB 2 onward, but with recent excellent works like the Dark Sun books, the Planes books, etc. But the whole gesture of Essentials seemed...desperate, and also seemed to stall 4E perhaps permanently. But, most of all, it wasn't a movement forward - it was a re-packaging of old material with very little innovation. A few bright spots but more than the actual material itself, it seemed to derail the line, so to speak.

I would couple that with the online version of Character Builder, which if I remember correctly was around the same time. WotC taking away the offline versions of Character Builder and Monster Builder was a travesty - and yet another bad PR move in a long line of bad PR moves.

In other words, the Fall of 2010 was the Fall of WotC D&D.

note: I am specifically saying "WotC D&D" to differentiate it from the game of 4E itself, which I think is still a very good game and evolving in a positive direction. But the whole presentation, publication, and "carrying" of the game--the line, if you will--is what I'm talking about.

The fall of D&D ended when it hit Absurdistan with terminal velocity while riding your post like a horse.

ENworld has been, for me and IMHO, the place where ridiculous assertions like this are amassing like a singularity of haha/hoho. All games have good times and bad times, great and terrible products, good and bad decisions, and yet they don't jump the shark - because ENworld reserves all the sharks in the sea for D&D jumping until the year 2444.

And you know what the sad thing is? I really would like to adress specific points in your post, but they are all so, well...
... is it time for 5e?
... Essentials a sign of desperation?
... Eseentials just a repackaging?
... 4e vs. 4eE / Wotc 4e vs. Blah 4e?
Sorry, these points have jumped the shark.

And Mercurius: if you have to preemtively admonish people NOT to snark at your post, doesn't that mean something is not right?

 

[Chronosome]

Discussing whether or not something has "jumped the shark" is silly. Some people currently dig D&D and some people don't, for various reasons. You don't discuss if something has "jumped"; you discuss when it did, after it did. I'd leave it to the nerd-historians (snarkyologists?) of tomorrow.

 

[ggroy]

From an historical perspective, when did 3.5E D&D jump the shark?

 

[malraux]

For WotC to have jumped the shark, they would have had to do something crazy, like convert the whole system to the DnD Adventure system (ie the boardgame rules), drops the ddi and books, etc. That would be the level of changes to be jumping the shark.

 

[malraux]

From an historical perspective, when did 3.5E D&D jump the shark?

I dunno that 3.5 ever did jump the shark. Jumping the shark implies a radical change, not necessarily a constant change in quality or direction. Contemporaneously, the only real jumping the shark event that I can think of is the final episode of BSG; which technically doesn't count as it was the final episode.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

Frankly I think the issue to a large extent is certain people wanted the game to go in a different direction than it has lately. Don't confuse "this is not to my taste" with "this is bad". HoS is NOT a poor quality product. One or two bits apparently offend the overly mechanically inclined mindset of some posters. Gosh, a Vampire has 2 surges, OH NOZ!!!! The whole book is crap! The game is foundering! WotC is crumbling to dust! Sigh.

Obviously they've had cutbacks and at some level they were told that in hard times you're going to have to bring up your ROI (or somesuch thing). Clearly they're trying to do more with less. They have Encounters, they have new online tools, more board games, etc. All with at best no new resources. So yeah, Dragon and Dungeon got pared back an bit and then they decided to rethink the production process there to align with where they're going, etc.

The problem with comparing to the 3.x days is the industry was in both a happy time of peak RPG interest, the economy was relatively good, the industry hadn't really started to feel the most significant impacts of the digital revolution, etc. 4e exists in a doubtful time of change. Anyone with a lick of talent, the resources of WotC, and any common sense did well 8-10 years ago. Today you have some very excellent people over at WotC busting ass to make any headway at all in a much tougher environment and doing pretty well.

The product is awesome. It is FAR from jumping the shark. When they start pumping out a dozen worthless broken supplements detailing stuff nobody cares about? Then they'll be in the shark jumping phase.

 

[Dice4Hire]

The whole "jumped the shark" thing is ridiculous in any context.

That said, WOTC seems to be in a lot of trouble from my point of view.

Sure, I can play for a long time with what I have now, but, hey, I would like to buy more stuff from them.

But what in the world am I gonna buy?

Essentials? --> the '10' product series, which was an outright lie as HoS is essentials
No, it does not add anything to my game.

HoS itself? --? And probably Heroes of the Feywild, too.
I do not play darker stuff, and do not play essentials which stakes this product.

Adventures?
What adventures? Madness is coming out and looks like it might be good. But one a
year is pathetic.

Campaign Setting?
Neverwinter might be nice, especially if they do themes. But will it be essentials?
Probably.

DDI?
I've said my piece on this before, the only thing that would get me on DDI was super
strong Dungeon content, and it is not there. Nothing else is interesting to me.


So, yes, D&D is in big trouble from my point of view. If you do not agree, more power to you, but it does not change my view of D&D.

 

[Droogie128]

I just think they've come to a point where they've released all of the sacred cows, and they're figuring out which direction to go next.

4e has shown that it can flex and bend a lot without breaking, and I feel they may be out to test the threshold some more.

I've got mixed emotions on HoS, though. In terms of quality. I think the Blackguard is a thing of beauty, but the Shade and Vampire are a giant step backwards (racial penalty, and a dual primary-stat class that doesn't even have a choice in the matter). I definitely hope this part is not the new direction.

Overall, I remain cautiously optimistic. They seem interested in communication finally, or at least they pretend to me. They also finally looked towards the CharOp boards for opinions.

*edit*

Just to Dice4Hire above me, HoS is not purely essentials. There's a lot of stuff in there that is equally useful for non essentials products. It's actually a pretty good mix.