D&D 5E Am I no longer WoTC's target audience?

[LuisCarlos17f]

Planescape only needs a planar handbook, and adding Sigil and factions. It is more lore/fluff than crunch. If you want something with plot, then the option can be comics or novels, without crunch at all. Even I dare to say Planescape has got lot of numbers (for the jackopt) to be adapted to a media project. Even it would be in podcast shows as Critical Role, good advertising with low level cost.

And you can bet if there is a Planescape return somebody will ask about the Gate-Towns, the planar dragons, the demiplanes or the para/quasi elementals. You never can please everyone.

 

[hawkeyefan]

It's hard to argue with their current success, and the factors that seem to have contributed to that success. Especially when compared to recent past editions, and the factors that contributed to those failings.

I mean, it seems like the release of Forgotten Realms and Dark Sun campaign books did little to help 4E's success. Why should they expect anything different now? Their books are doing just fine without providing a full on setting Realms book. They're slowly getting to different areas of the setting, and doing it while packaged with adventure paths.

The setting books they've done so far....Ravnica, Ebberon, and now Wildemount....all have a pretty strong reason for existing. Ravnica tapped into the Magic the Gathering fanbase. Wildemount does the same, but with the CR fanbase. Ebberon is the youngest of the "classic" D&D settings and the on with the lease amount of content, while also still having a vibe that is different than the kitchen sink approach used by the Forgotten Realms.

If these books do well, then I expect we'll continue to see setting books. But it's just going to be at a slow pace. They're not going to start cranking out more settings like crazy now. They're going to take a setting and look at what it has to offer to customers, and how wide the appeal will be. They then have to weight that against other settings and products to determine what's the best move at any time.

Part of what they seem to want to do is create an evergreen edition. To do that, they need to keep the slow and steady pace, and hope that the open game license and DMs Guild can help those who are looking for additional material at a faster pace.

 

[Lanefan]

shrug..

Speaking only for myself, I haven't been WotC's target audience since WotC took the game over, which is fine with me in one way and not in another.

It's fine in that I still look over what they put out and now and then buy such bits of it that look halfway useful (mostly adventures), but if I don't buy something I don't at all feel like I'm missing out on anything. I homebrew my settings, but there's still one or two (Mystara and Birthright, I'm looking at you) that if they were ever re-released and-or updated I'd give 'em a long hard look.

It's not fine in that I'd prefer they continue to support older editions (in my case, 1e) by including conversion guides in their adventures - or, put another way, making them fully backwards-compatible. That would bring me - and probably a whole bunch of other players/DMs of past editions - at least partway back under their target-audience umbrella.

 

[Parmandur]

I'd suggest there's a middle ground between 'flooding the market' and the release tempo WotC has employed for 5E.

What is I told you...this is the middle ground?

 

[Parmandur]

Just thought I'd share some images of recent products that show who the target market is these days (my two year old daughter has expressed that the Owl Bear is her favorite thing):

 

[LuisCarlos17f]

And don't forget the Endless Quest gamebooks. When they may be translated I will buy them for my niece. (8y and her PC doesn't want to drink beer in the tavern because it may be poisoned).

 

[Haffrung]

IThere is no lack of 5E material available if you don't arbitrarily restrict yourself to official WotC hardcovers.

For my part anyway, that's not an arbitrary distinction. The overwhelming amount of content on the DM's guild is amateur, and it looks and reads amateur. One of the values WotC (and a handful of other RPG publishers) brings to the table is professional layout, editing, and document design. I'm actually buying WotC 4E books at my FLGS and converting them to 5E. Which is a hassle - and kinda weird. I'm basically waving money in WotC's face, but they're not taking it.

 

[Haffrung]

So what's the point between "starvation" and "saturation"?

Because I have no clue. To say we're "starved" for content is a bit hyperbolic. All of which, of course is just my opinion and carries absolutely no weight whatsoever. Just like everyone else on this forum.

There are RPG companies that design and publish many more books per year than WotC, even though they sell far fewer of each book published. And of course previous editions of D&D saw WotC publish many more books a year as well.

Doesn't it seem odd to you that the biggest RPG publisher by an order of magnitude publishes two books a year, while companies with far fewer resources publish 5 or 8?

 

[3catcircus]

But if they license it out then they lose the option of mining that old intellecutal property in the future. There's not a lot of reason for them to do that. That and I have no clue if other companies would be interested or how you would value it.

It depends. There is no one size fits all licensing agreement. It's easy enough to create T's&C's dictating what the limits are for any licensee or sub- licensee.

That could license to a 3PP to create a 5e treatment of x, y, z products while licensing the same IP to a different 3PP to create 5e treatments of other products. The challenge is to properly adjudicate discrepancies across existing products to prevent propagation of errors...

 

[Xenonnonex]

There are RPG companies that design and publish many more books per year than WotC, even though they sell far fewer of each book published.

If lack of sales continue to outstrip number of books published I am not sure this is a sustainable business model. And will inevitably lead to layoffs. Or closures.

Doesn't it seem odd to you that the biggest RPG publisher by an order of magnitude publishes two books a year, while companies with far fewer resources publish 5 or 8?

This fails to mention the extensive playtesting cycles that Wizards books undergo. Companies with far fewer resources simply do not have the time or resources to spend doing this. So they can publish more books in a similar timeframe.
This also fails to mention the general quality of the books produced by Wizards. Binding issues and bizarre page layouts notwithstanding.
To be able to maintain market visibility companies with far fewer resources need to flood the market in a sense. But this is also not wise.