Only the Lonely: Why We Demand Official Product

[prabe]

I'm not convinced that the actual consumers are so focused on nostalgia that they would reject something new just because it's new.

I'm kinda convinced consumers are eating the nostalgia because it's what they're being served. Of course, I tend more toward novelty-seeking, so my POV on this is ... atypical.

 

[oreofox]

Quality. Have you seen the binders on some the books?
Consistency. Did you every look at Rise of Tiamat vs Tomb? The writing and encounters are not consistent.

That's because WotC didn't make Rise of Tiamat. Other than Phandelver, the first WotC made adventure path was Curse of Strahd. HotDQ + RoT were made by Kobold Press. PotA was made by Sasquatch Game Studio. OotA was made by Green Ronin (in collaboration with WotC). Those adventures were published by WotC, but weren't made by them. So, that really just reinforces the Consistency portion of Lowkey's post.

 

[MonkeezOnFire]

I'm not convinced that the actual consumers are so focused on nostalgia that they would reject something new just because it's new.

I would agree in the general sense that the average consumer probably doesn't tunnel vision in on nostalgia. My post was more about rationalizing the viewpoint of the small, but vocal groups on the internet that will inevitably react to any announcement with "If it's not setting X it is worthless to me." A viewpoint that I do not share so I must admit that I am projecting here.

 

[Fenris-77]

You're not projecting, you're pointing out the sadly commonplace.

 

[Haffrung]

Those adventures were published by WotC, but weren't made by them.

They weren't written by WotC, but I'm pretty sure they were edited, laid out, and formatted by the professionals at WotC. There's a lot more that goes into producing a professional-quality RPG book than writing it. And some of us value those elements.

 

[Tyler Do'Urden]

That's because WotC didn't make Rise of Tiamat. Other than Phandelver, the first WotC made adventure path was Curse of Strahd. HotDQ + RoT were made by Kobold Press. PotA was made by Sasquatch Game Studio. OotA was made by Green Ronin (in collaboration with WotC). Those adventures were published by WotC, but weren't made by them. So, that really just reinforces the Consistency portion of Lowkey's post.

Though HotDQ + RoT were primarily written by Wolfgang Baur, longtime TSR/WotC designer and writer, so they weren't exactly going far from home.

(And given everything else I've ever seen by Baur has been fire, I'm not sure what went wrong there. Perhaps he tried to constrain himself to creating something as "5e RAW" as possible, given it was the first adventure path of the new edition... and sticking to the rules isn't really what he does best.)

 

[Salthorae]

For me, my preference for "Official" product has much more to do with potential game balance and "keeping it small" for rules to know/reference/etc.

While I know that WotC isn't 100% on game balance, they are often much more internally balanced that 3PP just because of the level of playtesting that is available to them vs. smaller 3PP.

I also adore the 5e PHB+1 rule that is in AL and use it in my home game. With that there is no reason to go outside of the "official" products for character building.

(And given everything else I've ever seen by Baur has been fire, I'm not sure what went wrong there. Perhaps he tried to constrain himself to creating something as "5e RAW" as possible,

HotDQ + RoT were written before the 5e rules were finished.

 

[Tyler Do'Urden]

HotDQ + RoT were written before the 5e rules were finished.

Well, that probably just made him even more conservative in his approach...

 

[billd91]

I think somewhat related to the idea of "canon" is the idea of a "shared experience". Official material is really the only material you can be sure you have discussion points on with other D&D fans and nerd out over. I can think of several homebrew products I like much more than the current WotC artificer, for example, but I can't really log onto ENWorld and ask for advice about how to best use them in the campaign or for shared play experience. I have to go onto custom Discords for that kind of discussion.

Shared experience is definitely a thing. How many of us older gamers have experienced the Against the Giants/Demon Queen of Spiders adventures? The Slavelords series? Desert of Desolation? Ravenloft (in various editions - I've run it in 3 so far)?

Even though all of our experiences with these adventures will vary because of different DMs, groups, styles - they all have the same foundation. How often can we say that with homebrew? We can't with anything like the same level of familiarity. This helps develop D&D gamer culture in a positive way of stronger shared experiences (compared to the negative way of gatekeeping the community).

 

[Arilyn]

Interesting post with good insights.

I appreciate 3rd party companies a lot. They are often willing to stretch the game in more original directions. A lot of my favourite product comes from 3rd party, and I would never wasn't to stick with just "official" stuff.