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*Dungeons & Dragons
Will 5e D&D re-claim its campaign settings.
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<blockquote data-quote="Mouseferatu" data-source="post: 6863605" data-attributes="member: 1288"><p>Thing is, it <em>is</em> possible for D&D settings to compete against themselves. That's part of what killed TSR in the 2E era. (Not the only thing that killed them, of course, but it was a factor.)</p><p></p><p>Here's the thing. It requires X resources--money, time, labor, etc.--to produce a D&D book. A D&D book must make Y sales to recoup that investment.</p><p></p><p>Every detail of that book that segments the target market is, potentially, a mark against doing it.</p><p></p><p>Not all D&D gamers are interested in all settings. A FR book is only going to get a percentage of the sales that a "generic" D&D book will get. A Dark Sun book is only going to get a percentage, a Ravenloft book is only going to get a percentage, etc. And the less popular a setting is, the smaller that percentage is.</p><p></p><p>Furthermore, every book in a setting line after the core book has an even smaller percentage. An Eberron or Dark Sun supplement beyond the core book is a fraction of what is already a fraction.</p><p></p><p>When you're pouring resources into supporting multiple lines, you are by definition getting less return than you would get pouring those same resources into generic books, or into one or two of the most popular setting lines.</p><p></p><p>It sucks--I'm a huge fan of multiple settings, and many of them are among the less popular--but it's a simple fact of the business. Hopefully WotC and 5E are doing well enough that they decide they can eventually take a few steps down the road, throwing the fans a bone as it were, but it will <em>never</em> be something they can afford to do with anything approaching older editions' regularity. (That's why the 4E model was "three in and done." No lingering lines to support. And even that may not have worked as well as they hoped; I don't have numbers to know one way or the other.)</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Mouseferatu, post: 6863605, member: 1288"] Thing is, it [I]is[/I] possible for D&D settings to compete against themselves. That's part of what killed TSR in the 2E era. (Not the only thing that killed them, of course, but it was a factor.) Here's the thing. It requires X resources--money, time, labor, etc.--to produce a D&D book. A D&D book must make Y sales to recoup that investment. Every detail of that book that segments the target market is, potentially, a mark against doing it. Not all D&D gamers are interested in all settings. A FR book is only going to get a percentage of the sales that a "generic" D&D book will get. A Dark Sun book is only going to get a percentage, a Ravenloft book is only going to get a percentage, etc. And the less popular a setting is, the smaller that percentage is. Furthermore, every book in a setting line after the core book has an even smaller percentage. An Eberron or Dark Sun supplement beyond the core book is a fraction of what is already a fraction. When you're pouring resources into supporting multiple lines, you are by definition getting less return than you would get pouring those same resources into generic books, or into one or two of the most popular setting lines. It sucks--I'm a huge fan of multiple settings, and many of them are among the less popular--but it's a simple fact of the business. Hopefully WotC and 5E are doing well enough that they decide they can eventually take a few steps down the road, throwing the fans a bone as it were, but it will [I]never[/I] be something they can afford to do with anything approaching older editions' regularity. (That's why the 4E model was "three in and done." No lingering lines to support. And even that may not have worked as well as they hoped; I don't have numbers to know one way or the other.) [/QUOTE]
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Will 5e D&D re-claim its campaign settings.
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