Magazine Survey from WotC

[darkadelphia]

It looks like they're gathering market data about their magazines. I hope those of us disappointed with recent quality of the magazine will give their feedback. I was specific that I would like longer better adventures (like the recent White Field adventure).

http://wizards.com/DnD/Article.aspx?x=dnd/4news/20101130

 

[I'm A Banana]

Reading between the lines a bit, seems like they might be considering slashing the art budget, possibly altering the format, possibly combining the mags, possibly changing the focus of them.

The Print-On-Demand ideas intrigue me, but I am content getting my options in horizontal PDFs.

The bigger concern -- and one I haven't seen in the survey -- is specifically about the quality of the content they do provide. Adventures are great and useful, but most WotC adventures...strings of combat encounters...aren't. Crunchy rules options are fantastic, but it's useless without solid story to support it. Fluff is fun, but it's all just toilet reading unless there's something to take back to my game.

I like Dungeon and Dragon conceptually, but there's not a lot of actual good material in them recently. That's the central problem from where I'm sitting. It's not what they're doing (mostly), it's how they're doing it.

 

[Darkthorne]

I agree w KM. 2 comments was I wanted 2 mags as combining them into one would infer even less content than what is being provided now (why do I want to pay for less product?) And when they asked what versions of D&D I play I listed 4E & Pathfinder. 4E I'm mostly playing now because it's the one time I get to see one group of my friends. One of them tried using the new CB to update her character & it crashed on her. Also didn't have my Alea tools with me which made combat more of a chore. Pathfinder, whether or not belonging to Paizo is still D&D to me.

 

[Zaukrie]

I don't care about two magazines, I care about quantity and quality of articles. Where are the new writers and voices? Where are the interesting articles like we got in the beginning of the on-line magazines? Where are the deity, archfey, demonicon articles? Where is the advice on playing the game (the great articles by Ray, Monte, and others in print and even online)? Just awful quality (and don't get me started on the lack of adventures).

 

[pauljathome]

Interesting. It seems to be a subscriber only survey.

Which implies that they have little or no interest in attracting new customers.

Or, of course, that they're idiots

 

[Festivus]

Combined magazines = not my ideal way to do things. I like having adventures in a separate magazine, but it really doesn't matter I guess... since the adventure isn't much anyhow.

Online or PoD isn't something I want / need, though others could probably use it. I would prefer it remain as a pdf that I can download so I can read it on my van ride (the only time I have to read it). If they do this, I for sure will never resubscribe because that was basically the only reason I was subbing to begin with, and only recently stopped autorenew because of the magazine quality.

 

[AntlerDruid]

I filled out the survey and told them I would NOT want Dungeon & Dragon to be one magazine. I don't DM so I have no interest in Dungeon at all and combining them would cut down the already dwindling Player articles in Dragon.

Me personally, I want more crunch than fluff articles.

I also mentioned the lack of psionic articles though I see they finally have a Psion article now for this month.

I did comment how much I loved BOTH recent Hexblade articles and what great quality they were.

I also asked for more Unearthed Arcana articles as I love alternate rules.

 

[Dice4Hire]

Well, I don't feel like paying to give my opinion.

And they do not seem to value my opinion without paying.

 

[Dragonhelm]

I want comics to come back. They were a staple of Dragon magazine. I looked forward to reading them every issue.

 

[Destil]

Can I somehow hit the button for "HTML format" harder or click someplace on the screen with no button that corresponds to 'YES, PLEASE!'? PDF is fine if you're looking to print something, but putting page breaks in something read on a computer is about the most asinine thing you can do.