D&D 5E Is 5e's Success Actually Bad for Other Games?

[billd91]

I think 5e was the final nail in PF's coffin, but I think the writing was on the wall before 5e came out. There's only so much content you can produce for a crunch heavy game before it starts to get extremely bloated and bend under its own weight. Paizo did an incredible job with it, but I think that even without 5e they would have probably produced the new edition. 5e probably pushed the timetable up, but only a little I think.

I don't think there's any final nail in anybody's coffin. Paizo says PF2 is doing alright and I have no reason to disbelieve them. Even as a PF1 player who returned to D&D with 5e, Paizo is usually pretty candid. Rather, with 5e being such a hit, Paizo is no longer eating WotC's lunch.

I think there was a PF2 in PF1's future for quite a while, even without 5e. It's not that they were totally averse to new rules and editions - they just wanted to put it at a pace that the wouldn't piss off their market like they saw with D&D 3.0 to 3.5 to 4. And putting one out at approximately 10 years, that's totally respectable. It's just an edition that doesn't entirely appeal to me so I haven't bought much for it and finally gave up my charter subscription to the AP line.

 

[Fanaelialae]

I don't think there's any final nail in anybody's coffin. Paizo says PF2 is doing alright and I have no reason to disbelieve them. Even as a PF1 player who returned to D&D with 5e, Paizo is usually pretty candid. Rather, with 5e being such a hit, Paizo is no longer eating WotC's lunch.

I think there was a PF2 in PF1's future for quite a while, even without 5e. It's not that they were totally averse to new rules and editions - they just wanted to put it at a pace that the wouldn't piss off their market like they saw with D&D 3.0 to 3.5 to 4. And putting one out at approximately 10 years, that's totally respectable. It's just an edition that doesn't entirely appeal to me so I haven't bought much for it and finally gave up my charter subscription to the AP line.

I think perhaps there's been a misunderstanding. When I said "nail in coffin" for PF, I meant PF1, not PF2. By which I meant that I believe that PF2 was inevitable. I never meant to imply that PF2 was not doing fine. Rather that PF1 was already on its way out when 5e made it's debut, and that PF2 would have probably still happened even if 5e had somehow been cancelled.

 

[Mercurius]

Paizo seems to be supported by a diehard fan-base. It has probably shrunk since 5E, but there is a core that is very faithful. It also seems to be a core that isn't opposed to edition treadmilling, so while it is hard to support such a crunch-heavy game in an evergreen approach, Paizo probably plans to churn out a new edition every so often. So far they've had:

2009 Pathfinder 1E
2017 Starfinder
2019 Pathfinder 2E

Maybe Starfinder 2E comes out in 2025 or so, and Pathfinder 3E in 2029. Not sure they have 7-8 more years worth of stuff to publish for 2E, so maybe that moves up by a year or two.

 

[darjr]

Pathfinder…..
I think that pathfinder, strangely, is selling as much or has about as many players as it always did, in normal, non boom pathfinder times. By boom I mean during release times or other short bursts of sales. I suspect it’s even close to when it surpassed WotC in sales because I think that was largely a phenomenon of WotC drastically losing sales numbers.

I think this is good, though I do wish competition was greater.

What’s my point? I dunno. Except to say I don’t think there is a CLEAR signal that 5e has helped other games.

Other companies? Yea, absolutely. Look at MCDM and Ghostfire and Kobold Press, and even Monte Cook Games. But their success is due in no small part to their 5e content. (and other factors, yes, obviously, some maybe greater than others).

But other games? I dunno. Anybody have any clear direct evidence?

 

[DEFCON 1]

I don't have "a game." I'm not trying to push players to Savage Worlds, Cthulhu, Traveller, or even Buck Rogers. I don't find it especially noble to play games other than 5e - play what you want. I've run (and am currently running) multiple games of 5e every week, have published for 5e, and purchase a lot of 5e content.
And yes, I remember how hard it was to find a gaming group prior to 5e. For decades I had difficulty finding even 4 consistent players. Now, I could run a game every night of the week. I think the system of 5e has had a definite role in that.
But is it so good that it's hurting other systems? That's the question I was posing. Consider Pathfinder for example. Does 5e scratch enough of the gaming itch that the market no longer needs a Pathfinder like it did in 2009?

If some people are happily playing Pathfinder and Paizo is doing fine with making Pathfinder, then yes... the market needs Pathfinder. And the market is getting Pathfinder... in just as much as it needs to support the people playing it. And the same it true for every other single game out there.

The only reason someone would suggest D&D 5E is "taking away" the market of another game is if that person believed that that other game had some higher level of market-share that it should have, but is not currently getting. But who are they to decide how popular a game is supposed to be? Especially when inevitably the game they feel should be more popular just happens to be the same one they like more.

No one ever says "You know... this thing I think is crap should actually be more popular than it currently is." Instead, it's always the thing they prefer. And which is why I said it was ego-driven, this need for something to be more popular. Because it justifies for that person the reason why they think the thing is great.

 

[PsyzhranV2]

Yeah, but who gives a crap about "rules design"? Is the game fun? Then people will play it.

But that's not really what this whole thread is about. What this thread is really about is EGO. All the people who prefer games other than 5E have their egos bruised because THEIR game that THEY think is superior is not seen in the same light as 5E. THEY think 5E isn't worth all the cache it gets, and it kills them that THEIR choice of game gets nothing.

If they have a hard time getting people to play THEIR game, because everybody else wants to play 5E? Well, maybe, just maybe... THEY don't do a good enough job of showing all their friends why the game THEY like is better than D&D. If THEY could actually get across all the points of favor for their game... maybe more people would play it. But if not... I think they're afraid it says more about THEM as players and cheerleaders than it does WotC.

I mean, I understand why they wish to blame WotC and the D&D game because they are unable to convince people their game of choice is better. And I'm sure it hurts to know that other people just don't see the same "brilliance" that they do. But you know what? Too bad.

Um, no. That's not it at all. Missed the target entirely. And that's a weirdly hostile response you've got going there. I'm not a crazy stan for any of the games I listed; they were just the first games that came to my head for exemplary design in OSR, Neo-Trad, and Storygames respectively.

I can't speak for anybody else in this thread, and I am aware that my personal views may be fringe. I am not the biggest expert on rules design, so while I have issues with D&D 5e's mechanics, don't take my opinion as an authoritative source. But I will say that WotC made too many concessions to the 1e and 2e fans when making 5e, and threw out the best parts of 4e in a panicked attenpt to rehabilitate their image, leaving certain parts of 5e a lot more kludgy and lacking clear design vision than they could have been. But no, that's not the primary reason as to why I don't like 5e; and as a game, I don't hate hate it. I'd be willing to sit down with some friends and play or even attempt to DM if that was what was on the table. But no, time to be completely honest about why I don't like 5e.

The primary reason that I don't like D&D 5e and WotC is because I'm a queer POC anarcho-communist who trusts rainbow capitalist corporations as far as I can throw them. WotC may talk a big game when it comes to diversity and a healthy work environment, but their actual track record leaves much to be desired. I'd rather give my money to small studios that don't have long and storied histories of abusing their workers and exploiting their labour. Or better yet, to small-time solo creators or small teams who pour their heart and soul into their artistic works, through which they give voice to their struggles, their dreams, their identities. A lot of these solo creators are among the working poor or are on disability, and many of them are also queer and/or BIPOC. Some of them are making TTRPGs because it's their artistic passion despite the risk of poverty, while others are already struggling and making TTRPGs as a side gig is how they've chosen to try and make ends meet. Both types of these creators could use my money and my attention far more than WotC does. Some of them do in fact work on third party products for 5e, because that's how the game is; I won't begrudge them for that. But who is the primary beneficiary of their work: the creators themselves, or the brand of D&D that WotC has built?

That is what I mean when I say that D&D and WotC are stifling its competitors in the industry. Indie creators struggling to get by and get noticed is a fact of life in almost every creative sector under a capitalist economy, but it's particularly bad in the TTRPG space. D&D as a rules system is... fine. D&D as a creative work still has many problematic elements that it needs to confront; and I would go so far as to say that the entire subgenre of heroic fantasy that it codified is built on a rotten foundation of White supremacy. But D&D as a brand is the 800 lb gorilla sucking all the air out of the room, exceptionally so even for a market leader in a creative industry. The media it creates and commissions to endorse itself, and the fan culture and loyalty it cultivates, all lead back to it. It is a machine that feeds itself, with the unspoken goal of acquiring more and more of the market share to generate more and more profits and install itself more and more as as a reified institution in the minds of consumers. Such is the way of things for all large corporations under capitalism; I doubt that Winninger's management will radically change things for the better, nor would it be in his interest to.

So that's how it is. I don't like 5e not because I have a list of games I think are inherently better and that 5e is lowest common denominator trash; no, that's not the reason I don't like 5e. I don't like 5e because the world can be split into two categories: those who work, and those who own; and I'd really like to see those who own get taken down a notch. It's not ego, it's politics. It can get personal, but the personal is the political. Always has been, no matter how hard those who own have tried to convince you otherwise.

 

[Parmandur]

Pathfinder…..
I think that pathfinder, strangely, is selling as much or has about as many players as it always did, in normal, non boom pathfinder times. By boom I mean during release times or other short bursts of sales. I suspect it’s even close to when it surpassed WotC in sales because I think that was largely a phenomenon of WotC drastically losing sales numbers.

I think this is good, though I do wish competition was greater.

What’s my point? I dunno. Except to say I don’t think there is a CLEAR signal that 5e has helped other games.

Other companies? Yea, absolutely. Look at MCDM and Ghostfire and Kobold Press, and even Monte Cook Games. But their success is due in no small part to their 5e content. (and other factors, yes, obviously, some maybe greater than others).

But other games? I dunno. Anybody have any clear direct evidence?

Direct evidence would be hard to define, let alone find, but we have at least one publisher in this thread, our kind host Russ who is certainly not beholden to WotC, whose position is that it helps.

 

[Steampunkette]

I mean... yes this is all causality, but it doesn't actually reveal that every event is like a single row of dominoes. History is more like dominoes spread all over a room; knocking over one will set off a bunch of other falling, but that doesn't mean that if you instead started with a different domino, that those other dominoes would never fall eventually.

It's a lot like how different cultures that had nothing in common, and no trade between each other, were able to come up with similar (not the same, but commonalities) innovations. The Mayans made paper out of fig trees, far after the Egyptians made paper with papyrus.

I'm not going to presume that TTRPGs are as inevitable an innovation as papyrus... but it could be, and I think with all the tinkering with wargaming people were having at the time, and the growth in popularity of some fantasy material, that it is possible a different game would have emerged even if Gygax did not exist.

You're definitely right that "Progress" as we imagine it is less of a linear series of reasonable events rather than birdshot flung at a wall covered in various nouns on slips of paper.

But even something as "Inevitable" as papyrus, or paper in general, isn't -actually- inevitable. Tons of cultures around the world never did invent it or anything like it and only came to learn about it when a different culture presented it to them. The ones with writing just wrote on the inside of bark, clay tablets, skinned goats, or stone.

Even if Games Workshop had come up with Fantasy Wargaming on their own without Chainmail and Gygax's influence there's no guarantee it ever would have had Roleplaying as a major component.

And unlike Paper, there's not been any other culture in the world that invented something similar in isolation. Because Wargaming was a niche community.

And the smaller that community is, the less likely for any one person to pop up and offer the same idea as Gygax. Especially since his unique perspective was created by... you guessed it.

A unique life made up of essentially flinging birdshot at a wall covered in nouns written on tiny pieces of paper.

Just layers and layers of chaos.

 

[clearstream]

Hey!

I do not like your college, bard
I do not like you playing guitar
I do not like you in chainmail
I do not like you drunk on ale
I do not like your sorry life
I hope you do not take a wife
I hope you don't decide to breed
Cause that's one thing I do not need

I think that you're a total fool
I hate you and your fancy school
You're wrong about the fighting class
I know we'll kick your Bardic ass
I do not like you in this game of ours
I'd rather you play on planet Mars
And die from lack of oxygen
Than have you breathe the air of other men

Hey!

Doesn't like bards 'cos wanna be one!

Oh yes you do

 

[Urriak Uruk]

You're definitely right that "Progress" as we imagine it is less of a linear series of reasonable events rather than birdshot flung at a wall covered in various nouns on slips of paper.

But even something as "Inevitable" as papyrus, or paper in general, isn't -actually- inevitable. Tons of cultures around the world never did invent it or anything like it and only came to learn about it when a different culture presented it to them. The ones with writing just wrote on the inside of bark, clay tablets, skinned goats, or stone.

Even if Games Workshop had come up with Fantasy Wargaming on their own without Chainmail and Gygax's influence there's no guarantee it ever would have had Roleplaying as a major component.

And unlike Paper, there's not been any other culture in the world that invented something similar in isolation. Because Wargaming was a niche community.

And the smaller that community is, the less likely for any one person to pop up and offer the same idea as Gygax. Especially since his unique perspective was created by... you guessed it.

A unique life made up of essentially flinging birdshot at a wall covered in nouns written on tiny pieces of paper.

Just layers and layers of chaos.

Yeah, we just disagree. There are billions of people on Earth, making billions of choices; inevitably, the same choices will be made again and again. So when people are firing birdshot again and again and again, so eventually somethings are going to reappear, even if entirely accidentally.

So I do think some sort of RPG game would emerge even if Gygax was never born, although I'll admit it might be very very different indeed.

After all, Chainmail was not made in a void; wargaming itself predated D&D, and Gygax ran with the concept from rules made by his friend Jeff Perren. Citing Wikipedia below;

In the late 1960s, fantasy elements were increasingly used in wargames. Linguist M. A. R. Barker began to use wargame-like sessions to develop his creation Tékumel.[7] In 1970, the New England Wargamers Association demonstrated a fantasy wargame called Middle Earth at a convention of the Military Figure Collectors Association.[13] Fantasy writer Greg Stafford created the board wargame White Bear and Red Moon to explore conflicts in his fantasy world Glorantha, though it did not see publication until 1974.[citation needed] A wargame session was held at the University of Minnesota in 1969, with Dave Wesely as the moderator, in which the players represented single characters in a Napoleonic scenario centering on a small town named Braunstein. This did not lead to any further experimentation in the same vein immediately, but the ground had been laid. It actually bore greater resemblance to later LARP games than what would conventionally be thought of as a role-playing game. Wesely would, later in the year, run a second "Braunstein," placing the players in the roles of government officials and revolutionaries in a fictional banana republic.

And roleplaying games (mostly focused on reenactments of history instead of fantasy) itself predate D&D by centuries. But anyway, I don't disagree that without Gygax the gaming landscape would probably look very different, so I'll drop it.