D&D General Is DnD being mothballed?

[Parmandur]

Cool. I didn't mention Reddit. Please engage with what I'm saying, rather than strawmen.

Their market research is weirdly designed. I just filled out the most recent overall survey and, like the UA feedback surveys, it's difficult to tell them that something is pretty good but needs work, or something's a decent idea but approached wrong.

It's all based on dramatic binaries, which means they're getting back either lavish praise for everything they do (which certainly represents some members of the ENWorld community) or abject hatred of what they do (which likewise represents some others), but nothing in the middle -- which leaves out, I'd argue, nearly the entire user base.

I see no reason to assume that WotC is not actively listening to what customers want...?

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

That to me was where Matt was going, why do you still only have 10 people working on this when it turned into this runaway success

I sometimes feel like the only gamer who works in corporate America.

If it's a runaway success with 10 people working on it, that's what the budget will be based around. It takes an extraordinary figure to be able to get a public corporation to invest money where there's no obvious and immediate need to.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

I see no reason to assume that WotC is not actively listening to what customers want...?

Your views on WotC are extremely clear and consistent, yes.

 

[MarkB]

Honestly, the new Phandelver expansion feels like their tie-in to BG3. It appears to hit a lot of similar themes.

 

[FitzTheRuke]

So, again, I must repeat myself - we don't know what changed what. For any one of those influences, we cannot say what would have happened otherwise.

Maybe Big Bang Theory had a positive influence, and the trajectory might have been slightly worse without it. Maybe it was ineffectual, either way. Maybe, even though it was popular, since BBT relied heavily on negative stereotypes and tropes of geekdom for its humor, it actually made things worse!

We can create plausible narrative for any of these. We have no data supporting them.

I think that I can confidently attest (and I admit, I have no "proof", but I've been in business 30 years in a tough field because my gut on these things is rarely wrong, and all evidence I've ever seen says that my store is pretty 'normal' as these things go - or to put it another way, when my store is not representative of the business as a whole, I'm usually aware of it):

Big Bang Theory absolutely had a positive influence on 4e's sales. Not enough to "save" it, ultimately. IIRC there was a small uptick around that time, though. That must have been true across the board. Every positive appearance in media usually has an effect - but not a big one. To be fair, Critical Role is a MUCH bigger phenomenon (relative to the game, not relative to viewers) than BBT.

That said, not a single one of my 5e "whales" (who buy all the books) watch CR. And CR's D&D books only sell - okay - at my store. It's a much bigger deal to people who hang out online, and therefore very likely buy their stuff online as well. People who still frequent FLGSes can crossover (like myself) between online and F2F-style stuff, but they're predominantly people who at least try to minimize their screen time, or maximize their F2F time, whichever makes more sense.

 

[Morrus]

I thought we all came down on it not being a new edition (some of us under duress)?

I don’t know what that means. My opinion has been fairly constant.

 

[Parmandur]

I sometimes feel like the only gamer who works in corporate America.

If it's a runaway success with 10 people working on it, that's what the budget will be based around. It takes an extraordinary figure to be able to get a public corporation to invest money where there's no obvious and immediate need to.

By thst light, the D&D design team doubled their number of designers between 2018 and 2021, and have doubled it again since then.

 

[Parmandur]

Your views on WotC are extremely clear and consistent, yes.

They are filthy corpos who know what they are doing by and large...?

 

[FitzTheRuke]

They are filthy corpos who know what they are doing by and large...?

(I don't mean my laugh emoji to be laughing AT you, but WITH you... for the record).

 

[UngeheuerLich]

Makes no sense at all.
Having 50 different writers does not help to keep the game stable and balanced. A smaller number of writers can be overseen by one person who is responsible for the game state.