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

[Thomas Shey]

The fate kickstarter was several years ago & it seems like over that period it's gone from "what is fate" to a system that can be discussed even with people who haven't played it. I believe that others that have been mentioned are more recent but still have reasonable traction allowing discussion & the 5e fork I mentioned earlier is between the pdf going to backers & the pdf going to the printing press next month but seems successful enough given the timeframe

Fate, like Powered by the Apocalypse games and ones running off of Savage Worlds, are so widely populated that it actually requires work if you're involved in the broader outside-of-D&D RPG hobby to have not encountered them at least in the abstract; I don't particularly like two of the three and I still know a middlin' bit about them.

 

[Enevhar Aldarion]

Does it matter? If the game gets 10K backers and everybody gets paid and then gets to do more projects and make a living out of making games, it sounds like a success to me. And that story is happening more than it ever has in the history of the industry. The "1000 true fans" theory has some truth to it.

Sure it matters, if your goal is to be more than just comfortable, and want to turn your passion into a huge business, which you are doing, with all the product you have out. And it is good that what you put out is popular and you did not join the tens of thousands of others from the past 50 years in the RPG graveyard.

And some people must have a different definition of success. If a core rules book, and maybe a supplement or two, are all that are ever put out for a game, then I consider that a failure, If I invest in a set of core rules, I am doing so on the expectation that the supplements will continue, not dry up and disappear.

 

[Morrus]

Sure it matters, if your goal is to be more than just comfortable, and want to turn your passion into a huge business

Not everybody's goal is to run a huge business. It's to run a successful small business. That's certainly my goal.

The industry doesn't need a thousand Hasbros, it needs a thousand local restaurants.

 

[Enevhar Aldarion]

Not everybody's goal is to run a huge business. It's to run a successful small business. That's certainly my goal.

The industry doesn't need a thousand Hasbros, it needs a thousand local restaurants.

Compared to maybe 95% of others out there trying to make a living from RPGs, I bet your company is not small.

And since this topic is about whether D&D helps or hurts, you said it helps. Does that mean without the success of your 5E products, you think you would not have gotten the license for the 2000 AD products? Or were your other d20-based products from before you started the 5E line enough?

 

[MGibster]

Yep, and that's the goal here. Outselling WotC isn't the goal. A healthy industry of employed people is the goal. I've managed to carve out a decent full time living from this industry, and I pay a bunch of other people, and I consider that a success.

I can't really speak for the general health of the game industry as it is (I'm no insider), but I think you've got the right attitude there. If you can make a decent living then you're successful. Most musicians are not going to achieve the level of success Beyonce, Madonna, or Adele have reached but that isn't necessary to be a successful musician. We have a local burger chain here in Arkansas that's doing very well but they're never going to be as big and successful as McDonald's. They're still successful though.

 

[Morrus]

Compared to maybe 95% of others out there trying to make a living from RPGs, I bet your company is not small.

Oh, as small businesses go, it’s pretty darn small!

And since this topic is about whether D&D helps or hurts, you said it helps. Does that mean without the success of your 5E products, you think you would not have gotten the license for the 2000 AD products? Or were your other d20-based products from before you started the 5E line enough?

For that specifically, while I can’t speak for the licensors, I don’t believe that was the case.

 

[tetrasodium]

OK cool. But what about them says 5es success helped them? Do you think?
@Enevhar Aldarion

@tetrasodium

@Thomas Shey

because of the fate kickstarter I ran semi-open fate games at a local flgs for a couple years, more than one full group showed up by surprise to watch us or play & with my regulars got quite a few "wow, you guys always seem to be having so much fun but we can't figure out what the heck you are playing. what is it?" conversations. I haven't run any version of fate there in a few years now & the FLGS still has a fate section on the shelves next to the bitd stuff. I think many of the kickstarters were a success on quite a few levels (sales/ word of mouth/etc). 5e's success made me drawing in fate players easier when I was running any ttrpg & I can show a perfect example of how far that extends.


5e's success has an impact that makes making ttrpgs somewhere between socially acceptable to cool & interesting for "regular joe" nongamers to take a interest in. I started running fate pre-5e at one table at the back of the shop that we sometimes needed to share with unboxing/stocking work the staff was doing & ended it with my choice of an entire room of tables filled well after the flgs started renting the spot next door (formerly a hobby lobby turned printshop turned huge room filled with tables for tcgs ttrpgs boardgames etc). Being in a tourist area I occasionally got drop in folks visiting from other continents with more than one remarking how thy had game shops back home but none of them were setup as a place people can just go to play. There is a fairly regular event called kinky & geeky held at a local dungeon* & it's pretty common to see "oh wow can I join you guys?" when someone mentions "so & so plays/runs a d&d game" comes up during community gatherings.

*or at least there was before covid

 

[MGibster]

And some people must have a different definition of success. If a core rules book, and maybe a supplement or two, are all that are ever put out for a game, then I consider that a failure, If I invest in a set of core rules, I am doing so on the expectation that the supplements will continue, not dry up and disappear.

That's one way to measure success but I don't know if it's the best one. John Wick released Orkworld back in 2000 as a standalone product with no intention of ever publishing another edition or any supplements. Was it successful? I thought it was a pretty decent game and I think Wick made a profit so I'd have to say yes. Is a game successful if it puts out a dozen supplements and the company goes bankrupt? I'd have to say no. But I'm measuring success a bit different from product output alone.

 

[Fanaelialae]

Though Kevin is probably a bad example to use because he's relentless at keeping his costs under control. Being a massively skilled one-man-band helps, as he rarely has to pay for anything but art.

That's the nature of a small business, rather than something corporate. The smaller you are, the less you can afford to have a narrow focus. And if you're the only employee, then you've got to be a one-man-band, short of anything you can afford to contract out.

No offense, but this is like saying Kevin Crawford is a bad example of a successful small game designer because he's too good at what he does. I mean, sure, not everyone can be him. But that doesn't disqualify him, since the smaller your company is the more it arguably behooves you to be like him. Part of running a small gaming business is running a small business. If you just want to design a game, then (assuming success) you have a product, but not an actual business.

 

[Jack Daniel]

I say all this because there seems to be a bizarre need for many in the broader D&D community and particularly on this site to put broad sections of our overall hobby in boxes so they don't have to deal with them cognitively. To render them utterly irrelevant and deny they possess any value not contained within the sacred texts of D&D. It's dismissive, rude, and elitist. It's also entirely unnecessary. You can like what you like without shame. There's no need to tear other parts of the hobby down in order to justify your love for D&D. You can just love D&D. I do. I'm just polyamorous when it comes to RPGs.

That's great and all, but entirely too often there's a strain of discourse among the frustrated "polyamorous" that vocally dumps on the D&D-monogamous. It starts in a perfectly understandable and sympathetic place—"I wish I could find more players willing to try out Brand Y"—but all too often it ends up in a place that looks like this thread's title, only less question and more assertion—"the overwhelming popularity of D&D is bad for the hobby." Usually with the undercurrent of "D&D is eclipsing my favorite pet game of the month having its faddish fifteen minutes (probably Blades in the Dark at present), which would be huge if only it weren't for all these benighted D&D players who don't know any better."

This is often accompanied by frothing resentment at the galling notion of "hacking" D&D to run genres other than heroic high fantasy, quite in spite of the fact that d20 System and OSR games prove it's entirely viable. When you have so many of the hobby's elite "connoisseurs" loudly declaring that D&D is lowest-common-denominator drek and openly yucking the hobby's most popular yum, is it any wonder at all that D&D-fans who are aware of this can also be defensive about it?