D&D 5E State of D&D

[Hussar]

It's been 18 years since Wizards bought TSR. We're not quite yet at the point where D&D's been owned by Wizards for longer than it was owned by TSR (that'll be in 2020), but we're close. I think we can stop referring to Wizards as "the new cooks".

I think his point is that with 5e, WotC has changed the "menu" for D&D because they are no longer offering everything under the sun, but, rather a specialised menu that appeals to the broadest spectrum of people. Because 5e is no longer catering to the niche of the niche, they are somehow failing as a company. The fact that the "niche of a niche" buyer is so minuscule that trying to stay in business by catering to that crowd is no longer a viable strategy doesn't seem to have any impact on that opinion.

I mean, good grief, what is anyone else doing? Why are we not seeing doom and gloom predictions about Paizo for not providing us with material outside of Golarian? Why hasn't Kobold Press folded since the majority of its products are focused on the Midgard setting? Vampire has been using a single setting for going on 30 years now, why hasn't it died? Rifts? Battletech? Star Wars?!?

We do not need generic source books. It would be nice to have them, but, they are not necessary for the hobby. Virtually no one does generic sourcebooks any more. Everyone designs for a specific setting. Yet, for some bizarre reason, when WotC does it, it's a "failure". It utterly baffles me.

THREE times now WotC has tried the TSR model of spray and pray. THREE times. And it has failed every single time. Three editions in ten years. The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results. Why on earth would they try a fourth time when every single time previously it has failed to pay off?

 

[seebs]

Well, anyone that didn't give up their bit of free time to run one game once in a six month period of time. All those that did give up their time have those modules. So, no, they are not consigned to the trash heap forever. Simply not available to you.

If no one can get a given module now, it's been trashed.

And I think you're sorta handwaving a bit on the "a bit of their time". Not everyone has the same limits or options for social interactions.

Then run an online game. Again, it's a tiny time commitment for access to fifteen or so modules.

The time commitment is not, for me, the issue.

So, because one of your friends had a bad experience with D&D, you'll never even consider giving it a try? Really?

Uh, no, that's not even a tiny bit like anything I said. I have been playing D&D for 30+ years, "giving it a try" is not a component of this discussion. My observation is that "getting new DMs running things in stores" strikes me as an awful idea, because inexperienced DMs can produce horrible experiences for players. That's worse for the game than having that game not be there.

Say what? It's not like you need these modules to run D&D. How in the world do you go from "These modules are only available to those who commit to running one public game" to an insult? How entitled do you think you are to these? In what world do you have any "right" to have these available to you?

Uh, you're reacting to things that are far enough from what I thought I said that I genuinely can't comprehend this.

I, like most of the people I know who play D&D, have zero interest in public play with random strangers. None at all. But we are consumers of D&D products. If someone says "these products, which would be useful to you for your game, should not be made available to you or anyone like you, because you are not playing the game in a way that the company should devote resources to supporting", that seems like suggesting that we're not wanted in the D&D community by the people saying that.

It makes sense to me for Wizards to encourage public play; it doesn't make as much sense to me that they would do this by devoting resources to producing content that is only available for people doing public play, and not available to the people who are playing at home with friends.

Let's keep this straight shall we? These are MODULES. They are not needed to play D&D in any way, shape or form. They are 100% optional material that is completely not needed to play.

Sure. So are all the adventure path books. If it's a good idea for these to be restricted, shouldn't all the books other than the core three be restricted only to AL DMs?

Taking this as a personal insult that WotC is insisting that they are available only to those who want to give up their time to help the hobby by supporting the LGS and are more or less a reward for those who give up their time has exactly ZERO to do with you. You want nothing to do with AL? Fine and dandy. That's not a problem. But, that choice means that you don't get access to these modules. That's YOUR choice.

In a strange parallel universe where it is physically impossible for Wizards to also make the modules available to other players, then yes, that's entirely my choice and they have no control over it.

In the universe I live in, though, they also have the choice of making those modules available to other people if they want to. And if they don't, that's their choice.

Again, say what? I have a pretty good feeling that you have no idea what makes the hobby work.

You're obviously right. I've only been playing for thirty years, I've probably only bought about 95% of the D&D material ever produced by TSR or Wizards, and obviously my belief that allowing people to make their own decisions about how and where to play was part of the appeal of the hobby was completely mistaken; everything should be focused exclusively on public play, with that being the primary focus of all future development. How silly of me not to notice.

 

[KahlessNestor]

I think you're mistaken in how much real effort WOTC is putting into AL. It's a marketing strategy run mostly bare bones by volunteers. If you think Paizo is doing such a great job, buy their stuff and convert it. WOTC made a conscious choice to support brick and mortar stores with their public play. Paizo doesn't.

 

[Jester David]

Uh, no, that's not even a tiny bit like anything I said. I have been playing D&D for 30+ years, "giving it a try" is not a component of this discussion. My observation is that "getting new DMs running things in stores" strikes me as an awful idea, because inexperienced DMs can produce horrible experiences for players. That's worse for the game than having that game not be there.

If bad/new DMns is a problem and deal breaker, maybe someone with 30+ years of gaming experience should step up and show the newcomers how is done.

You're obviously right. I've only been playing for thirty years, I've probably only bought about 95% of the D&D material ever produced by TSR or Wizards, and obviously my belief that allowing people to make their own decisions about how and where to play was part of the appeal of the hobby was completely mistaken; everything should be focused exclusively on public play, with that being the primary focus of all future development. How silly of me not to notice.

Do you have the 4e D&D Encounters exclusive adventures? Do you have all the 3e Living Greyhawk or 2e Living City adventures? Xen'Drick Expeditions? Mark of Heroes?

Because the modern equivalent of that content is what we're discussing.
If game store and convention exclusive organised play adventures didn't bother you for the last twenty years, why is it an issue now?

 

[Staffan]

Do you have the 4e D&D Encounters exclusive adventures? Do you have all the 3e Living Greyhawk or 2e Living City adventures? Xen'Drick Expeditions? Mark of Heroes?

Because the modern equivalent of that content is what we're discussing.
If game store and convention exclusive organised play adventures didn't bother you for the last twenty years, why is it an issue now?

I'm not Seebs, but in the Days of Old there were other sources for short adventures. TSR/Wizards published quite a few, and in addition you had Dungeon. Now the only Wizards-based source is AL, which requires a whole different kind of investment, and isn't available everywhere.

 

[seebs]

If bad/new DMns is a problem and deal breaker, maybe someone with 30+ years of gaming experience should step up and show the newcomers how is done.

This is a complete non-sequitur.

The claim made was that it's a good idea to have adventures exclusive to public games, because it will get "new DMs running games in stores" and that this is good for the game.

I'm just pointing out that, no, it's not good for the game.

I am also getting sort of sick of people telling me that I have some kind of obligation to go do public social interactions with strangers after I've repeatedly made it clear that I hate doing that. This is supposed to be a game. You know, for fun. Suggesting that people ought to do something they will hate doing as part of it seems counterproductive.

Do you have the 4e D&D Encounters exclusive adventures? Do you have all the 3e Living Greyhawk or 2e Living City adventures? Xen'Drick Expeditions? Mark of Heroes?

Because the modern equivalent of that content is what we're discussing.
If game store and convention exclusive organised play adventures didn't bother you for the last twenty years, why is it an issue now?

Good question, and honestly it mostly isn't. I'm not arguing that, without this changing, D&D is ruined forever. I'm really happy with D&D. But!

For most of the time I've been playing D&D, there has been plenty of content, or perhaps a bit too much content even. Now there's less. And when people say "I wish there were more published content I could use", telling them "well, if you weren't having badwrongfun playing only with your friends in places you want to be, you could have this extra content" doesn't address their concern at all.

If there's plenty of stuff being produced, I don't much care whether some of it is for things I'm not doing. But when there's a shortage of stuff, I care a bit more about the scarce resources being allocated to things that are not relevant to me, and I got annoyed by seeing people present these non-answers as "rebuttals".

This happens everywhere that people are passionate about stuff. It's like the people who get mad whenever anyone mentions that the current Mac product line doesn't suit their uses as well as it used to (say, because of the lack of built-in Ethernet ports in laptops). There's always some people who offer explanations of other things that might work and get angry and a little insulting or pushy when people say that those things don't work for them as well as the other thing which Apple used to do. Or how, when the PS3 came out and had no rumble controllers, anyone saying they missed that feature got yelled at and insulted.

It's not a good thing! It is not beneficial to the community to tell people they're wrong to not want the thing, or to want the thing under different terms. It's not making Wizards look better or making people happier with D&D; it's just making people feel dismissed and insulted.

 

[KahlessNestor]

I'm not Seebs, but in the Days of Old there were other sources for short adventures. TSR/Wizards published quite a few, and in addition you had Dungeon. Now the only Wizards-based source is AL, which requires a whole different kind of investment, and isn't available everywhere.

If you want short adventure content, EN5ider magazine puts out one every month for cheap, and that gets you access to the back catalog as well.

/shameless plug [emoji4]

 

[Umbran]

I have a pretty good feeling that you have no idea what makes the hobby work.

And I have a pretty good feeling that you've been around long enough to know that you're not supposed to make it personal. But you did it anyway.

Please stop doing it. Now. Thanks.

You're obviously right. I've only been playing for thirty years, I've probably only bought about 95% of the D&D material ever produced by TSR or Wizards, and obviously my belief that allowing people to make their own decisions about how and where to play was part of the appeal of the hobby was completely mistaken; everything should be focused exclusively on public play, with that being the primary focus of all future development. How silly of me not to notice.

Now, we see the dynamic of making it personal play out. Seebs, here, fell into the trap. The personal comment has made him snarky (snark will not convince anyone who doesn't already agree with you) , and try to build up some seeming authority, as if his personal experience as a foundation for an appeal to his personal authority was going to be rhetorically sound. This has become less about the topic than it is about their egos.

Once this has happened, real discourse on the subject between these two people is pretty much done. So, the two you you probably want to consider your conversation done. Whatever you do, do not continue in this head-butting, argumentative vein, or you'll have to be removed from the discussion entirely.

 

[NaturalZero]

I just want SOME splatbooks with a crunch focus.

I don't need a "sea of content" or "bloat." I don't need or want a Pathfinder release schedule or a 4e release schedule or a 3.5 release schedule. We have a trickle of adventure books with an even tinier trickle of new crunch contained therein. At this point, i would kill for a single PHB type release per year (and an MM wouldn't hurt either).

People keep acting like it's all or nothing with releases. It's either a man dying of thirst in the desert or a man drowning in a flood with no intermediate amount of water in between. I'd settle for a canteen, ATM.

 

[spectacle]

What I want is to be able to get self contained modules on the scale of LMoP that are good for 3-5 sessions and that I can slide into my current campaign. Neither the massive adventure paths nor the AL stuff fits my need.