D&D 5E Greg Leeds talks about D&D

[fjw70]

So...they aren't getting more money from you then? Is that what's to understand here?

I assumed they wanted repeat customers...but maybe I'm wrong.

Sure they will. I don't need more but I want more. Not necessarily more rules but more monsters and adventures.

 

[Reinhart]

Not you, just the trend of the conversation.

Assuming the core books do drop...how do they make money afterwards, if they don't make books with crunch? I know from me and my group they haven't made a cent since the DMG. If they only make level 1-15 adventures, they never will.

Unless, it's just about keeping the brand active for other, more lucrative projects. Then, I understand.

You pretty much understand then. The classic RPG business model is that the supplements create continued interest and shelf-presence in your game, but the core books are where you make the most profit. So the supplemental materials are essentially used to help drive demand for the main product. RPG supplements are not quite the same as a loss-leader, but it's very similar.

In the past, many RPG companies have suffered instability because they over-estimated the demand for their supplements and thus lost money on some of these products. Most RPG companies don't have that much money to lose so such a mistake can be disastrous. Related to this problem is the idea that ubiquitous supplements can glut the market or jade consumers. Essentially there's a thought that the faster your release schedule the fewer books each given person buys. It's a plausible theory but in reality we still have no evidence. What is certain though is that the more books you release the more likely you're going to make a demand error and lose money on a product. This is pretty much the main reason why Kickstarter is so important to other RPG companies: It fills a critical role for marketing and measuring the demand for a product *before* it's printed.

WotC doesn't have this exact problem because WotC has the best selling RPG brand on the market. Instead what WotC has to deal with is Hasbro shareholders. They're essentially guaranteed a profit, but their RPG's have to compete with Magic and other more profitable Hasbro game brands for funding. When D&D doesn't do as well as Monopoly or Risk: Legacy, the WotC CEO has to justify the funding and may have to start messing with D&D's budget. It's not exactly fair, but Hasbro isn't ever going to let D&D die either. To them it's too potentially valuable in a time when geek is chic, games are going mainstream, and 80's nostalgia rules cinema.

 

[Sword of Spirit]

Crunch bloat also can affect the nature of the new options. If for example, we only a get a few new subclasses, they are going to try to make sure they are either broad, or really cover a D&D base that needs to be covered.

If, on the other hand, we get 3e style hundreds of prestige classes, they won't worry so much about how well a specific option handles the core concept (quality and breadth), and will just put out five different versions of things.

We have a thief subclass. I don't want there to be burglar, cutpurse, criminal, and lock-picker subclass also. It dilutes the concept and forces you to sort through a mess to try to find the best fit for your thiefly concept.

 

[Shasarak]

There is a meme.

Want to make a million dollars in RPGs? It's easy just start with 2million dollars.

Since I am married, then I better start with 4 million just to make sure.

 

[darjr]

Since I am married, then I better start with 4 million just to make sure.

Oh my gosh yes.

 

[Shasarak]

What would be?

That a tabletop roleplaying company can not maximise their profits by producing tabletop roleplaying games.

 

[Mistwell]

OK I guess we're going to do the "Why more options can be bad" discussion again:

First, DMs have no choice in accepting new options for Adventurers League. A PC is either AL legal, or it is not. And then there are groups that are private but do round-table DMing (not that uncommon) such that one DM might be fine with an option but a later DM might not be fine with it and they can't really tell a player that the PC they've been playing in that same game can no longer be that PC.

Second, you never know how a new option will turn out in the long run. DMs are not game design experts. A new option might look fine for their campaign to begin with, but turn out to be terrible in practice after a while. It might interact fine with how things are at the beginning of a campaign, and then interact very poorly with future things that are published or developments in the campaign. And it's a lot harder to take an option back once someone's been using it. The more options there are, the greater the risk of this happening over time.

Third, some of the best arguments against a new option have repeatedly been made by Paizo for their new options. That being, when they release a new option, they feel compelled as game designers to support that new option in further material they are publishing. So even if it is optional, that means it because almost not-optional over time because it gets brought up in future publish materials such as adventures and splat books. The initial optional mechanic gets expanded in a future splat book, the optional ability gets put on a challenge to the party in an adventure, etc.. And the argument Paizo makes for doing this is pretty simple - they want to support what they've previously published and feel fans of those things deserve that support. Which means DMs who don't like that option either don't use that published material (which is decrease options for the DM) or has to remove that material from the new published material (which means a lot more work, and more unintended and unforeseen consequences from removing it).

 

[Jester David]

That a tabletop roleplaying company can not maximise their profits by producing tabletop roleplaying games.

They're not a tabletop roleplaying company. They're a Collective Card Game company that happens to produce a tabletop roleplaying game. There's all of a half-dozen people working on jobs related to TT-RPGs of the 200+ employees. They likely have more lawyers on staff, but I'm not going to call them a law firm.

Also, more content does not always equal more money.
Disney and Marvel studios could probably finance a new Marvel Cinematic Universe superhero movie every month. There's enough IP and characters that they could do so without creator overlap. But that doesn't mean ticket sales would stay the same and that they'd make as much profit as they would by limiting themselves to two movies a year. More than likely there'd be a sharp drop in attendance for their movies and many would barely make a profit.

 

[Shasarak]

They're not a tabletop roleplaying company. They're a Collective Card Game company that happens to produce a tabletop roleplaying game. There's all of a half-dozen people working on jobs related to TT-RPGs of the 200+ employees. They likely have more lawyers on staff, but I'm not going to call them a law firm.

Dont worry about it, Greg says that they outsource all the hard stuff the can not handle in house so no reason they could not be a Law Firm if they wanted it.

Also, more content does not always equal more money.
Disney and Marvel studios could probably finance a new Marvel Cinematic Universe superhero movie every month. There's enough IP and characters that they could do so without creator overlap. But that doesn't mean ticket sales would stay the same and that they'd make as much profit as they would by limiting themselves to two movies a year. More than likely there'd be a sharp drop in attendance for their movies and many would barely make a profit.

Of course I would believe that if they were not releasing all the Movies, TV shows and Spin Offs, Comics and Lunchboxes.

 

[MechaPilot]

OK I guess we're going to do the "Why more options can be bad" discussion again:

First, DMs have no choice in accepting new options for Adventurers League.

A more accurate statement might be that DMs have no control for Adventurers League, because as I understand it DMs have other restrictions on their preferences than simply being forced to accept what is legal, and that if they want to control everything they should DM for a non-AL game.

And then there are groups that are private but do round-table DMing (not that uncommon) such that one DM might be fine with an option but a later DM might not be fine with it and they can't really tell a player that the PC they've been playing in that same game can no longer be that PC.

If that's the case then the approval process should be done by the DMs as a group, and that's a kink that should be worked out as part of agreement to round-robin DM. The agreement can require a majority or unanimity, but some kind of agreement should be reached.

Second, you never know how a new option will turn out in the long run. DMs are not game design experts. A new option might look fine for their campaign to begin with, but turn out to be terrible in practice after a while. It might interact fine with how things are at the beginning of a campaign, and then interact very poorly with future things that are published or developments in the campaign. And it's a lot harder to take an option back once someone's been using it. The more options there are, the greater the risk of this happening over time.

Because the design experts are also not experts? If the experts are actual experts and if there is a proper process for review, then any problems that arise should be limited to being minor in nature. It only becomes an issue if there is no proper review, perhaps because the company is rushing the book to the shelves.

With regard to taking an option back, yes, it is naturally harder to do once someone has chosen it because you then rely on the maturity of that person and the persuasiveness of your reasoning for removing the option. However, the notion that something in the future that is published affects the previously-allowed option in a way detrimental to the campaign assumes that the DM doesn't also assess the future material before integrating it (or that the DM didn't do a thorough job of doing so). As far as developments in a campaign causing a problem, that can happen even with the existing options and is not a reason to not have them available for those who want them.

Third, some of the best arguments against a new option have repeatedly been made by Paizo for their new options. That being, when they release a new option, they feel compelled as game designers to support that new option in further material they are publishing. So even if it is optional, that means it because almost not-optional over time because it gets brought up in future publish materials such as adventures and splat books. The initial optional mechanic gets expanded in a future splat book, the optional ability gets put on a challenge to the party in an adventure, etc.. And the argument Paizo makes for doing this is pretty simple - they want to support what they've previously published and feel fans of those things deserve that support. Which means DMs who don't like that option either don't use that published material (which is decrease options for the DM) or has to remove that material from the new published material (which means a lot more work, and more unintended and unforeseen consequences from removing it).

Sounds like an excuse for shoehorning too much new material into resources that fans of older material want to use. just because you create a duelist class or subclass doesn't mean you have to shove a duelist NPC into an adventure. You can suggest the possibility of changing that NPC into a duelist, but the NPC should work just fine and have the appropriate flavor even if you are not using the dueslist option or the book that it comes in. Paizo's failure to recognize that you don't have to shove new options down people's throats is not a valid excuse for not creating more options, it's a flaw in the execution of their products.