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

[pemerton]

After the initial boom that comes with an new edition, they become less hot items and sell less.

Yes. That doesn't necessarily mean they don't produce a steady stream of income.

Ryan Dancey said, back around the launch of 3E, that the biggest revenue stream is from sales of core books, especially PHBs. Is there any reason to think that has changed?

Not making stuff is not very profitable either. You pay employees to generate no revenues.

But what reason is there to think that they are generating no revenue? A new D&D boardgame was just released. Presumably that will generate revenue. They have just released a free PDF which is, from a marketing point of view, a teaser for a new book. Presumably that book will generate revenue.

Yup, and it seems Paizo is very rational.

I would guess that Paizo sets a lower expectation for return on investment than Hasbro.

I would also guess that Paizo doesn't have as many alternative options for places to invest its capital as does WotC/Hasbro.

It is possible that D&D is, in fact, incapable of generating sufficient return on investment to satisfy Hasbro, in which case we should expect the size of the WotC D&D division to reduce over time. But even if it reduces to zero, that wouldn't show that WotC were economically irrational in not producing more supplements. It would just show what many have long suspected, that there is not much money in the RPG business! And it would confirm the scepticism of those who think there is little money in licensing the D&D brand.

 

[pemerton]

I have never heard of a business that stops generating stuff because it could cost them.

I have. It's called winding up. Or, if you have multiple activities in your enterprise, you change your activities.

The university I work for used to offer what was called a PDLP - a Postgraduate Diploma in Legal Practice. An Associate Professor (salary plus on-costs roughly $150,000 in today's money) was appointed to run the program.

After a few years the program was cancelled, because the income generated by students was less than the cost of running the program. There was still demand for this sort of qualification - you can't practice law in Australia without some version of this qualification - but other, non-university providers could supply that demand at a cheaper rate.

My university, and law faculty, still exist. The associate professor in question is still on staff. But efforts have been deployed elsewhere, to other sorts of activities that will generate the revenue to pay our salaries and other costs.

So what do they expect will happen?

As best I can tell, they expect that the core books will continue to sell, that the adventures they are publishing will sell, and that licence revenues will continue to be generated. Thereby paying the salaries and associated costs of Mearls and colleagues.

 

[Trickster Spirit]

So what do they expect will happen? I have never heard of a business that stops generating stuff because it could cost them. In the world of business you have to spend money to make money.

Did Wizards become some newbie company all of a sudden?

But the whole point is that they don't have to spend ANY money to profit off licensed uses of the brand. WizKids assumes all the costs of making the D&D boardgames and pays WotC for the privilege of using the D&D IP. n-Space and Digital Extremes will produce Sword Coast Legends on their own dime and pay Wizards a pre-negoiated cut of the profits. Universal will spend millions on a D&D movie and you can be damn sure Hasbro will get a cut of the gross, not to mention making an additional mint off all the action figures / Nerf weapons / t-shirts / whatever that always follow in the wake of blockbusters.

How is that not a more attractive proposition to a WotC executive than putting out more expensive books that'll sell fewer and fewer copies each time they put one out?

 

[Kramodlog]

'Hobby games' includes CCG, which are monsterous money-makers compared to TTRPGs.

Yup, and RPG are also mentioned.

Also: direct quotes but no links, yourself?

The quote was from the ICv2 article I linked to you earlier.

Wow. That's a lot less than I'd've thought.
Then again, we're a greying market, maybe brick & mortar FLGS sales were much higher, in total.

Maybe it is a lot. I just think expectations can be high without information. Someone I knew once said D&D must sell a million books a year.

 

[Kramodlog]

Yes. That doesn't necessarily mean they don't produce a steady stream of income.

Ryan Dancey said, back around the launch of 3E, that the biggest revenue stream is from sales of core books, especially PHBs. Is there any reason to think that has changed?

The edition isn't supported like it use to be. That is the change.

But what reason is there to think that they are generating no revenue?

It is an exageration, of course. A response to your obvious comment about cost not having to be higher then revenues. It is a sort of "duh" that I was writing to you.

I would also guess that Paizo doesn't have as many alternative options for places to invest its capital as does WotC/Hasbro.

And yet Paizo has cards, a video game, novels, minis... And a robust RPG line!

 

[Sailor Moon]

But the whole point is that they don't have to spend ANY money to profit off licensed uses of the brand. WizKids assumes all the costs of making the D&D boardgames and pays WotC for the privilege of using the D&D IP. n-Space and Digital Extremes will produce Sword Coast Legends on their own dime and pay Wizards a pre-negoiated cut of the profits. Universal will spend millions on a D&D movie and you can be damn sure Hasbro will get a cut of the gross, not to mention making an additional mint off all the action figures / Nerf weapons / t-shirts / whatever that always follow in the wake of blockbusters.

How is that not a more attractive proposition to a WotC executive than putting out more expensive books that'll sell fewer and fewer copies each time they put one out?

So selling a few boardgames is going to keep the business going?

The problem with this is, if they focus more on the brand than on the game then people will abandon the line and go elsewhere which could cause popularity with another brand.

D&D is sacred to a lot of people and they would leave in waves than see their beloved game get put on the back burner more and more until it's an after thought.

They are trying to make the brand more valuable than it really is and I'm afraid they aren't going to get the results they are looking for and then blame the brand. All the while, we are getting a crap release schedule while they test out their newest hair brained theory.

 

[BryonD]

Every edition was a new edition, so every edition but the current one was a failure?

To the best of my understanding, that is what Hussar has stated multiple times. I don't agree, but I figured you two might want to be at least not saying the exact opposite things. shrug

I think the bottom line is that, in stark contrast to the furor and strife of the preceding 6 years, 5e will probably represent a period of relative stability in D&Ds history.

Come to think of it, that might be a first.

Time will tell. And then you will be explaining to me, again, why it not going the way you predicted doesn't count.

 

[BryonD]

Yes. That doesn't necessarily mean they don't produce a steady stream of income.

Ryan Dancey said, back around the launch of 3E, that the biggest revenue stream is from sales of core books, especially PHBs. Is there any reason to think that has changed?

I completely agree with this.

But that doesn't offer anything to the "brand value" side of the conversation, and it seems to undercut the no 6th edition EVAR theory.

 

[Tony Vargas]

So selling a few boardgames is going to keep the business going?

No selling CCGs will.

But, they could just be a fad, they've only been around 20 years or so.

D&D is sacred to a lot of people and they would leave in waves than see their beloved game get put on the back burner more and more until it's an after thought.

I think that's exactly why the release is so measured this time around. Releasing very little, and none of it too new, controversial, or unfamiliar, can leave everyone who has their own zealous vision of The Sacred One True D&D, hoping that WotC will eventually see it their way, and avoid giving them ammunition for any sort of anti-5e crusade.

They are trying to make the brand more valuable than it really is and I'm afraid they aren't going to get the results they are looking for and then blame the brand.

That already happened. this is them trying not to make the same mistake again, right away.

 

[Tony Vargas]

And then you will be explaining to me, again, why it not going the way you predicted doesn't count.

Nah, I admit when I'm wrong. For instance, when I was defending the poor beleaguered 3.x fighter, I pointed out, quite sure of myself at the time, that it would be impossible to balance the game on anything but a knife's edge without eliminating limited-use abilities like spells, completely, and any balanced game just "wouldn't be D&D."
4e came out, and I had to admit I had been wrong.

But, I still think the 3.x fighter was as elegant a class design as D&D has ever managed.