D&D 5E Reasons Why My Interest in 5e is Waning

[darjr]

Fewer balls in play does reduce the chance of dropping one. I hadn't realized that this may be part of it.

 

[Hussar]

/snip

Somewhere in the mix I said that what WotC should do now is IGNORE ME completely,

Good advice there.

 

[pemerton]

My read on the ICv2 ranks is, 5E is selling to a much wider audience than 3E/Pathfinder or 4E. I think people like us, the type of people who post on the EnWorld forum, mean a great deal more to Paizo than to WotC.

I think both these suggestions are highly plausible.

Does alienating fans who don't want to buy stuff really do much harm?
Is it somehow better to not produce something and not sell it to both Player A and Player B? Or is it better to make something and sell it to Player A but not Player B?

Your way of framing it seems to ignore what seems to be WotC's aspiration, namely, to continue to sell core books and the odd adventure path to Players C, D, E, etc. I think this is Macnhu's point.

And, as [MENTION=6701829]Trickster Spirit[/MENTION] has mentioned a couple of times now, to keep those "casual" players in the broader D&D loop so that when video games, movies, coffee mugs etc come out they will be customers for them.

The "new shiny" portion of fanbase are also the most likely to move on to the next thing as well.

I don't think there is a lot of evidence for this - depending, I guess, what you mean by '"new shiny" portion of the fanbase'.

If we are talking aboout the wider audience to which 5e seems to be selling, then I think it's the opposite: "casual" players are likely to stick with what they're used to for a long time. Hence the orientation of 5e to make it easy for long-time AD&D players to drift over without getting the sort of mechanical surprise they might from 4e, or even 3E.

 

[Sebkha]

Not to rain on your parade, but if you are doing interesting things for the mechanical benefit, you are not a real thespian.

Exactly, and that's where 5e is particularly good: I'm not a real thespian, but I can pretend to be one in D&D.

 

[The Mirrorball Man]

If it had been selling like hotcakes, they would have kept making more hotcakes.

After a while hotcakes get cold.

 

[CapnZapp]

Sure

And there are people who won't go Pathfinder because of Pathfinder.

It seems clear that no system is going to appeal to everyone and you can find reasonable stones to throw at anything.

So the relevant question is not "will someone find a reason to dislike this?", the relevant question is "How do we get a lot of people to like this for as long as possible?".
I think Paizo has demonstrated that quite well.
Again, by the number that you personally quoted, Pathfinder's 6-year-and-going existence blows away both 3E and 4E. So it is a model of success.
Pretty much everyone who didn't like 3E, doesn't like Pathfinder.
I know a lot of people who very much liked 3E and yet don't like Pathfinder.
It is easy to find people who don't like Pathfinder.
It is hard to find a game with a better template of success in the modern market.
Clearly these two things are not directly related.

And by the same token, it can't be said that PF's huge output is a reason for its success. It may be a big help, it may not. But it can certainly be said that it has not stopped it from being a huge success.


All that aside, I'd find it strange to see APs as a barrier to entry. You buy the ones that you find interesting and ignore the rest (with zero being a completely valid response). Same for all of the Golarion stuff. Just don't buy it.
The actual core game release schedule has been rather modest.

GURPS is, literally, built upon its splat books. To me personally, that is all the better. But I can see how that may turn others away. But if you see the same barrier for Pathfinder then you are not looking at it clearly.

I would love to be able to go Pathfinder precisely because of the great selection of adventures.

It's the utter madness that is running PF as a DM at mid to high levels that make this impossible.

So I'm left with 5E hoping there will be lots of great adventures coming up the next few years...

 

[BryonD]

Sure thing.

That one with the big Xs all over it?

They've not formally announced a second adventure path for 2015 yet but have said they're planning on two a year.

Understood

Optimized for what?

Optimized for number of products to support a game line? Sure.

But what schedule do you go with if you're optimizing for not declining over time? I know if I were promoting big


I don't have Wizards' numbers. The numbers might be the opposite - putting out lots and lots of splatbooks actually does make more sense financially - but if that were the case, why aren't we seeing lots and lots of splatbooks?

Far more likely that lots and lots of splatbooks doesn't make them significantly more money than they figure they can make putting out a few a year.

The conventional wisdom is that they want to promote and maintain the IP.

And I'm not calling for "lots and lots of splatbooks". I'm calling for an increase from the ZERO listed on the schedule you linked.

Rather than boom --> decline --> fallow period between editions --> next boom, I think this time they're pursuing a "slow and steady wins the race" strategy.

Who says it will win the race?
Boom/decline/fallow/Boom is better than whimper/fallow/fallow /whimper

And I'm skeptical that more products would help. But I don't think the goal is to keep D&D #1 long term.

Based on what? What evidence can you present for an RPG staying heavily popular through lack of content?

And yes, WotC has dropped the ball before. That's precisely why I'm so glad they're trying something different this time.

Yeah, And they have already dropped the ball doing it this way (see HotDG reviews, see all the Xs on your link)

"Something different" is a great phrase. But when you talk specifics, does *this* something hold up?

Again, I keep getting replies suggesting I want this flood on content. Start promoting one decent hardback that will come out in the next six months and my argument loses a ton of steam.

 

[BryonD]

Good advice there.

Ah! Its Hussar, taking things out of context. (deja vu)

 

[BryonD]

Your way of framing it seems to ignore what seems to be WotC's aspiration, namely, to continue to sell core books and the odd adventure path to Players C, D, E, etc. I think this is Macnhu's point.

And, as [MENTION=6701829]Trickster Spirit[/MENTION] has mentioned a couple of times now, to keep those "casual" players in the broader D&D loop so that when video games, movies, coffee mugs etc come out they will be customers for them.

I don't think there is a lot of evidence for this - depending, I guess, what you mean by '"new shiny" portion of the fanbase'.

If we are talking aboout the wider audience to which 5e seems to be selling, then I think it's the opposite: "casual" players are likely to stick with what they're used to for a long time. Hence the orientation of 5e to make it easy for long-time AD&D players to drift over without getting the sort of mechanical surprise they might from 4e, or even 3E.

Yes, by new shiny I mean Players C, D, E, etc...

And we are now firmly into relearning the lessons of 4E as far as misreading the fanbase. I was told over and over that 4E would be just fine because throngs of casual players would overwhelm the trivial lack of interest in the unrepresentative ENWorld population. I agree that ENWorld is not representative of the casual base. But the rest is simply wishful thinking. As the "unrepresentative" core goes, the casual base will follow.
I was told I was a clueless elitest H4ter then. I be told similar things now. None of that is true or fair.

The casual part of the market will continue to be just that: casual. If they were readily attached to any one thing they wouldn't jump to 5E in the first place.
They won't leave 5E because of burn-out. They will leave 5E because they are casual and not attached and there are new things to do. If you want to keep the casuals playing 5E then keep the "unrepresentative" core playing 5E.

 

[BryonD]

I would love to be able to go Pathfinder precisely because of the great selection of adventures.

It's the utter madness that is running PF as a DM at mid to high levels that make this impossible.

So I'm left with 5E hoping there will be lots of great adventures coming up the next few years...

Certainly. I get that PF is just not a good game of choice for a lot of people.
That is a separate point.


There are a lot of great options for people to choose from these days. That is a very good thing.