D&D 5E I think the era of 4th edition Dungeons and Dragons had it right. (not talking about the rules).

[pemerton]

for many 'predatory' is a perfect description for 4e.

An easy example would be the direction WotC purposefully took with the PHB:
One had to purchase 2 PHBs as opposed to the usual 1 offered by other editions to get the general content required for a player and DM to utilise the combination of races and classes one preferred. Add to that the DDI subscription which appeared like a necessary tool for players and DMs alike

I don't understand how DDI appeared like a "necessary tool". It was not needed to build PCs, nor to build creatures.

And my group was also able to start a 4e game using only the PHB. We didn't have to purchase 2 PHBs to utilise the combination of races and classes we preferred.

I'm not sure what the threshold is for "predatory" selling of content - but if we suppose that M:tG is something that crosses the threshold, I don't see how 4e is meant to be an instance of it.

If 4E was WotC trying to sell as much content as they could produce to a core, limited audience, and 5E is them trying to sell a core product to as large an audience as possible, I think the more predatory approach is the first. My choice of word may not be the best for everyone, and I don't think it was a purely predatory approach...as you say, no one should be compelled to buy anything.

But given the massive amount of material produced, the subscription based service for DDI, and the practice of new content rendering old content moot (which is something I really dislike in games), it certainly seemed like WotC at that time felt they needed to wring as much money out of the folks they had hooked in order to succeed. "How do we get these X amount of people to keep spending?"

For the sake of clarity - by your criteria Pathfinder would also be predatory in it's market model, wouldn't it, because it is also about selling a large amount of material to a given audience. (I don't really like the word "hooked" - I don't think RPGing is addictive in any relevant sense.)

I'm also not sure what you eman by "new content rendering old content moot". The errata was all free, so I assume that's not what you mean. Are you talking about some of the instances of feat overlap with Essentials? I would say that's a pretty small component of the overall 4e content produced.

I agree that 4e and 5e have obviously different business models. And 5e's clearly seems to be superior from the commercial point of view, and also from the point of view of many D&D players. But I don't think "predation" is the right way to characterise the differences between them.

 

[PMárk]

@pemerton: so, your baseline is: don't like the current state of D&D? Go and play something else. I'll humor you and say, largely I already did that! However, I like 5e, i liked the settings, i liked the novels. D&D had many things i loved. So IMO it is perfectly okay to discuss and yes, even complain about how those things disappeared, because no other companies would do FR novels, or Ravenloft books. Yes, I think, voicing my opinion about the current state of the game is a valid approach, especially since they said themselves that they're following the various communities, so there's a slight chance they'll listen. I also think politely discussing various ideas netween people and approaches is a productive thing. If you see your environment is changing and you don't like the change, I suspect, for a time you'd try to mitigate it. If it's hopeless and most of the neighbors like the changes, then, yes, you'd move, but I hope at this point we aren't there already.

Believe my, if I wouldn't see any change, or things even got worse from my viewpoint, I'll abandon D&D and won't look back for a long time, just as i did during the 4e era. And that's how WotC loses dedicated fans.

 

[knasser]

This is a really long thread and a lot of it seems to be taken up with arguments over business practices and online tools So I apologise if this one has been listed, but one thing I thought was done very well in 4e was variations on the monsters. You could open the Monster Manual at Goblin and see half a dozen different variations all there and ready to use covering a variety of different challenge ratings too. Ditto for most other monsters. It was both great as a GM in a hurry and also broke people out of that weird (to me) situation where at Level 1-2 it's Goblins, level 5-8 it's hill giants, etc. As if these species and individuals had no variations and humans were the only thing that could progress in ability. And the minions system streamlined it nicely too. In 5e from what I've seen so far (not yet run it, am planning to), you run out of "grunts" rapidly at mid to high level. It's wall to wall special monsters. With 4th you could have a fully-detailed Hill Giant for the PCs to fight when they were lower level and then when they were mid to high level you could use the simplified Minion versions which was a good way of streamlining things whilst still being able to have the same monsters in the game which made it more realistic. ("Hey, you notice how we never see goblins, anymore?")

I'd like to see monster entries in 5e have more of a selection across different challenge ratings for the same creature. You get a smattering of it (Hobgoblin captain, et al), but it's greatly reduced. All of this also applies for templates. I loved to be able to slap a Vampire or Lich template on something.

 

[hawkeyefan]

I don't understand how DDI appeared like a "necessary tool". It was not needed to build PCs, nor to build creatures.

And my group was also able to start a 4e game using only the PHB. We didn't have to purchase 2 PHBs to utilise the combination of races and classes we preferred.

I'm not sure what the threshold is for "predatory" selling of content - but if we suppose that M:tG is something that crosses the threshold, I don't see how 4e is meant to be an instance of it.

For the sake of clarity - by your criteria Pathfinder would also be predatory in it's market model, wouldn't it, because it is also about selling a large amount of material to a given audience. (I don't really like the word "hooked" - I don't think RPGing is addictive in any relevant sense.)

I'm also not sure what you eman by "new content rendering old content moot". The errata was all free, so I assume that's not what you mean. Are you talking about some of the instances of feat overlap with Essentials? I would say that's a pretty small component of the overall 4e content produced.

I agree that 4e and 5e have obviously different business models. And 5e's clearly seems to be superior from the commercial point of view, and also from the point of view of many D&D players. But I don't think "predation" is the right way to characterise the differences between them.

Yes, I think Pathfinder falls into the same category. Again, predatory was just the word I used, and maybe you would prefer another choice of word, and I can understand that. Certainly no one is feeding on their customers. Just as you mentioned that games are not actually addictive, but "hooked" is a word that kind of fits.

I'm not saying that there is necessarily anything wrong with that model, and predatory certainly has a negative connotation. But that's because I don't personally like that approach. I don't want to have to keep buying products in order to "keep up". And while I am certainly under no obligation to continue buying material under those circumstances, many folks will do so. I mentioned earlier that my Pathfinder players were constantly surprising me with new feats and class options that I had no idea about, because I didn't want to buy every single splatbook that came out.

As for my comments about new material that renders old content moot, I was talking about the essentials series, as well as the bloat creating clearly superior choices for classes and such. At this point, I was long gone from 4E, but that was the impression I got from folks who were still playing, and from thumbing through the material here and there. I think I remember a class...the Warden, maybe?....that was like a super archer, and when I saw it in like the PHB4 or something, I remembered thinking "wow, who would play a ranger when this class is so clearly better?"

So that vibe that I got, along with the combination of endless splat, heavy release schedule, the subscription based magazines and options...I just saw it that way. I saw it as them realizing their consumer base had grown as much as it would, so they had to try and milk that demo for as much as they could. I definitely look at Pathfinder along the same lines. I think they've taken that model and applied it in as positive a way as possible...their subscriptions for the monthly AP release and monthly setting release seem to have their appeal...but the constant splat books and so forth were frustrating. It seems like that is slowing, and they're going to change up a bit with Starfinder, and I hope it works for them.

I think both of these examples display the inherent flaws with that approach.

 

[Corpsetaker]

I don't want to have to keep buying products in order to "keep up".

You never did with any edition. I think the problem is just in your head so it doesn't really exist. You have never ever needed anything outside of the core three to play and/or DM.

This is why I don't believe a good bit of these arguments.

 

[Parmandur]

You never did with any edition. I think the problem is just in your head so it doesn't really exist. You have never ever needed anything outside of the core three to play and/or DM.

This is why I don't believe a good bit of these arguments.

We are talking about D&D, the whole shebang is just in our heads. Dismissing other peoples experience as "not existing" is absurd, as my head exists, as does the mind of [MENTION=6785785]hawkeyefan[/MENTION] or any other person. Indeed, what we are discussing is precisely what is in our heads, as the collective psychology of the fan base is what determines what will work or not for a given company marketing a given product.



Your experience differs, but your experience is also subjective: WotC can only appeal to subjective individuals, but like any other business, they can choose to appeal to a broader or narrower set of interests. They have provided an OGL and the DMsGuild to provide for the more narrow subjective groups of headspaces, while they focus on the broader set of headspaces: they cannot create objectively superior product because they have no objective measure, just intersubjective guesswork: guesswork backed by years of high level study that they have turned into mathematical formulas, unlike your purely subjective viewpoint. Does your viewpoint "not exist" just because it is only in your head? Of course not, your individual tastes and likes matter as a person, game on baby! But, that is not what WotC is using for their business.

 

[hawkeyefan]

You never did with any edition. I think the problem is just in your head so it doesn't really exist. You have never ever needed anything outside of the core three to play and/or DM.

This is why I don't believe a good bit of these arguments.

If you've never ever needed anything outside of the core three to play D&D, then what exactly is this thread about?

I've already explained what I meant. When playing Pathfinder, my players would randomly pick up books (or just find options on the PFSRD) that I was unfamiliar with, and that would affect my game. They'd have feats or class options that I had no idea about. I would then feel like I had to keep up with all the books in order to understand what options my players may bring to the table. Because if one of them spent money on a book, the last thing I'd want to do is tell them they can't use it. But ultimately, it was too much for me to be able to keep track of even if I had the books. So 5E has proven to be a great approach for me.

Now...you may not have experienced this. If not, that's great. But I'm telling you this happened. Many other folks in this thread have expressed similar concerns, and provided their explanations about it. So you saying you don't believe that means that you're calling me a liar. Which is pretty lousy, I'd say.

So how about you pretend to be able to see things from someone else's point of view, and try to imagine that what I said is not some kind of lie that I've concocted in order to win an internet discussion, and then once you've done that, see if you can also imagine why someone who felt that way might appreciate a slow release schedule more.

 

[jayoungr]

I know I've said this before, but there are 32-page modules officially published by WOTC. They're called Adventurer's League adventures, and although they run alongside the large hardback adventures, they are separate and individual stories. Several of them can also be strung together into mini-campaigns.

We used to have a thread for discussing them and making recommendations; I'll have to re-post it when I get a few moments.

 

[Corpsetaker]

We are talking about D&D, the whole shebang is just in our heads. Dismissing other peoples experience as "not existing" is absurd, as my head exists, as does the mind of @hawkeyefan or any other person. Indeed, what we are discussing is precisely what is in our heads, as the collective psychology of the fan base is what determines what will work or not for a given company marketing a given product.



Your experience differs, but your experience is also subjective: WotC can only appeal to subjective individuals, but like any other business, they can choose to appeal to a broader or narrower set of interests. They have provided an OGL and the DMsGuild to provide for the more narrow subjective groups of headspaces, while they focus on the broader set of headspaces: they cannot create objectively superior product because they have no objective measure, just intersubjective guesswork: guesswork backed by years of high level study that they have turned into mathematical formulas, unlike your purely subjective viewpoint. Does your viewpoint "not exist" just because it is only in your head? Of course not, your individual tastes and likes matter as a person, game on baby! But, that is not what WotC is using for their business.

It is absurd because Hawkeye's assumptions are incorrect. You don't have to "keep up" with anything because the game doesn't require anything outside the core 3 to play the game. I am talking about D&D as well. I've been playing the game since 1st edition so I do know what is required and what isn't. He's claimed a problem that doesn't actually exist so yes it is all in his head.

 

[Corpsetaker]

So how about you pretend to be able to see things from someone else's point of view, and try to imagine that what I said is not some kind of lie that I've concocted in order to win an internet discussion.

Nobody is claiming it's a lie. I am claiming you are just flat out wrong which is a fact.