[WotC's recent insanity] I think I've Figured It Out

[Argyle King]

What would the selling point be to convince someone to use tiles instead of other options?


I'm not naysaying. I'm honestly just curious what the pitch would be, and how I'd be swayed from using what I use now to buying more tiles.

 

[giant.robot]

The "D&D has to compete with them dang vidja games" meme is really amusing to me. D&D has had to compete with video games as long as I've been playing (20 years). If you think today's games are magically more attractive than games when I started playing D&D you're fooling yourself. Dragon Warrior, Final Fantasy, hell even the Gold Box D&D games were engrossing time sinks.

They competed for the same number of leisure hours that kids have today. Days are no longer than they were 20 years ago nor are school days shorter. Mass Effect, Dragon Age, and WoW might have better graphics but the number of available leisure hours are pretty much the same. It's not like kids and adults alike could play both pen and paper games and video games. I didn't afterall spend several hours yesterday playing Torchlight and several today playing Pathfinder.

Comparing 4E to video games is silly anyways, it takes more cues from Magic: The Gathering and other CCGs than video games. The highly structured turn sequences, power sources, keywords, and discrete powers themselves all smack of ideas learned from Magic's development over the past two decades. 3E was largely a refinement of the AD&D rules. AD&D picked up a lot of detritus with the latter supplements like the Player's Options books. 3E folded these rules in and unified the D20 mechanic through the system. It didn't do much to make the system more approachable to new players.

When Arneson And Gygax developed D&D they were coming from miniature wargaming as were a lot of their friends and early D&D players. Today's players are coming from WoW and Magic and have read Harry Potter and watched Lord of the Rings more times than they've read it.

The game itself and hobby in general needs to keep up with the players' expectations or there won't be any new players. Because people today have played video games and CCGs they're not going to accept looking up all of their actions on some table on a player's screen when that should be easily referenced on the character sheet or power card. A game shouldn't make players do busywork.

 

[Shazman]

Wait, what is this "recent insanity", again?

The most recent would be stopping support of a perfectly good offline character builder in favor of an online one that is barley functional, only lets you make a small amount of characters, and holds your characters hostage in WotC's cloud so you have to keep your subscription active to access them. That's bad enough, but when you throw in the massive bugs in the monster builder that were never fixed, severe lack of magazine content in the past months, and yanking legal sales of TSR/WotC pdf's in 2009, they definitely seem to be acting insanely and have caused lots of fans to rail against them and many to completely bail on WotC.

 

[Dice4Hire]

What would the selling point be to convince someone to use tiles instead of other options?


I'm not naysaying. I'm honestly just curious what the pitch would be, and how I'd be swayed from using what I use now to buying more tiles.

Well, do you find them more convenient/useful than whatever else you use?

I do. I like the artwork, I have enough of them to make virtually any setup, plus my art skills leave a lot to be desired.

I also get inspiration to keep my rooms interesting with the throw-down bowl of 2x2 tiles and smaller. My battles have never been so crowded. One thing I hate about most WOTC combat maps is the over-abundance of empty space, which leads to boring combats.

But if this does no convince you or anyone else, have fun with whatever you use.
There are tons of mapping or non-mapping options.

 

[Ulrick]

WotC's recent insanity... hmmm...

Who says WotC's actions have to make sense to any of us? Certainly, a lot of aging gamers are no longer part of WotC's target demographic, but does that really mean WotC is insane?

Somebody else brought up a link about Games Workshop's business practices. GW has bewildered me over the years. I guess one person's business model is another person's insanity.

But then again, I know there's people out their who think we're all crazy for even participating in the gaming hobby. How many times must we justify ourselves to such people before we give up and just play the games we enjoy?

 

[Dice4Hire]

If WOTC does not put up a post in the next two weeks explaining what is going on, then I might consider them to be insane.

 

[taichara]

Oh please, not another one of these again. I suppose it's time to crawl out of my den of lurkerdom and address this tired and tiresome handwringing before disappearing once more into the ether.

I'm not addressing the WotC subject here; on that, I don't really give a damn. It's the other slant of the OP's post that I'm stepping up to.

Do you want to know where the creative members of the younger generation are, OP? That generation that you just tarred with a single solitary brush of having no imagination, no creative drive at all, brainwashed by needing CGI and having no idea what it's like to write, to create something?

They're spread across the Internet, oh yes. I know, because I'm right there with them and feeling old as hell. They're in messageboards and forums, on "journal" sites such as Livejournal, in real-time messenging systems such as AIM and MSN. And do you know what they're doing?

ROLEPLAYING.

They create entire communities filled with world information and play in real time or -- as often -- fill thread after thread with written posts. They create characters off the cuff or, depending on the game being played, fill out character applications that require background, personality, physical descriptions, strengths and weaknesses. Some games are completely original, some based in a published world. Some are both.

Post after post after post. Thread after thread, chatroom after chatroom. They're out there, and they are roleplaying. These youngsters are doing all of this with an enthusiasm and a fervor that I could only dream to see at a table these days.

And do you know why they aren't using the rules you want them to, the system you want them to?

Because they aren't using any system at all. They're just roleplaying.

Why would they want to shackle themselves to a system when there are uncountable freeform games out there that they can join or create? I've spoken to some of my fellow players and they find the idea incomprehensible -- and you know, if I had started in these games like they did, I'd be thinking the same damn thing.

So, yeah, maybe we old-timers are almost all WotC -- or any other game company -- happen to have. Because the younger generation, they don't need a tome of rules to get out there and create kingdoms and spelunk in dungeons and take down the BBEG.

But tarring everyone in a generation because you don't know what they're doing to roleplay, and -- sorry to say -- because, apparently, you Don't Get What Those Younguns Like?

That's pretty damn sad, you know. One more example for my fellow forum players to point at and say "why would we want to join you at the table? on top of limiting with rules, we're obviously not wanted".

Pfeh.

 

[ShinHakkaider]

Oh please, not another one of these again. I suppose it's time to crawl out of my den of lurkerdom and address this tired and tiresome handwringing before disappearing once more into the ether.

I'm not addressing the WotC subject here; on that, I don't really give a damn. It's the other slant of the OP's post that I'm stepping up to.

Do you want to know where the creative members of the younger generation are, OP? That generation that you just tarred with a single solitary brush of having no imagination, no creative drive at all, brainwashed by needing CGI and having no idea what it's like to write, to create something?

They're spread across the Internet, oh yes. I know, because I'm right there with them and feeling old as hell. They're in messageboards and forums, on "journal" sites such as Livejournal, in real-time messenging systems such as AIM and MSN. And do you know what they're doing?

ROLEPLAYING.

They create entire communities filled with world information and play in real time or -- as often -- fill thread after thread with written posts. They create characters off the cuff or, depending on the game being played, fill out character applications that require background, personality, physical descriptions, strengths and weaknesses. Some games are completely original, some based in a published world. Some are both.

Post after post after post. Thread after thread, chatroom after chatroom. They're out there, and they are roleplaying. These youngsters are doing all of this with an enthusiasm and a fervor that I could only dream to see at a table these days.

And do you know why they aren't using the rules you want them to, the system you want them to?

Because they aren't using any system at all. They're just roleplaying.

Why would they want to shackle themselves to a system when there are uncountable freeform games out there that they can join or create? I've spoken to some of my fellow players and they find the idea incomprehensible -- and you know, if I had started in these games like they did, I'd be thinking the same damn thing.

So, yeah, maybe we old-timers are almost all WotC -- or any other game company -- happen to have. Because the younger generation, they don't need a tome of rules to get out there and create kingdoms and spelunk in dungeons and take down the BBEG.

But tarring everyone in a generation because you don't know what they're doing to roleplay, and -- sorry to say -- because, apparently, you Don't Get What Those Younguns Like?

That's pretty damn sad, you know. One more example for my fellow forum players to point at and say "why would we want to join you at the table? on top of limiting with rules, we're obviously not wanted".

Pfeh.

I'm not really seeing a point here other than:

"You use a codified system so you suck"

Aren't you basically doing what you're accusing people of doing?

 

[taichara]

I'm not really seeing a point here other than:

"You use a codified system so you suck"

Aren't you basically doing what you're accusing people of doing?

Hardly.

The OP tarred an entire group with a single brush. I'm telling the OP that the OP is wrong. If I didn't also play at a table, I would hardly be here on ENWorld, now would I?

Good try at putting words in my mouth, though. *tips hat, moves along*

 

[MrMyth]

"I want to build a keep."

"I want to start a guild."

"I want to create a new spell."

"I want to be a Baron."

"I want to be...." whatever your character wants, apart from a dude who kills monsters.

The topic has moved on from this a bit, and I still disagree with some of your points here, but I found it amusing that apparently WotC is, indeed, addressing some of your concerns: This month's Dragon will have an article on Bases and Strongholds.

Now, no idea how well they will pull it off or if this is indeed what you are looking for. Nonetheless, it seemed an entertaining coincidence, and worth taking note of.