D&D General Richard Whitters poll on twitter, "Will you be buying the newest edition of D&D?"

[KYRON45]

the image in the first post links to it, just click that & it jumps to twittterx

Does that mean only gamers are responding? If one of the estimated 556 million X users stumbled upon a random poll and answered it wouldn't that skew the results more than a little? I'm seriously asking. I am not one of those users. How do you prove to the poll that you are a gamer, care about games or know what an RPG is?

 

[O-Castitatis-Lilium]

@Parmandur I agree, why would you spend $80-100 on a book with a $50 MSRP...?

Because the 50$ that is in USD is not the same as CAD. To be fair, local game stores have it set at 70 plus taxes as they are made for those stores, but we have book stores that sells these as well here that are not specifically a game store, that would charge somewhere in the range of 90-100 before taxes because they bring them in for people that don't have access to a local game store but they have access to the book store down the street. So yes, my price range for where I live is appropriate. My point still stands.

 

[Aldarc]

Does that mean only gamers are responding? If one of the estimated 556 million X users stumbled upon a random poll and answered it wouldn't that skew the results more than a little? I'm seriously asking. I am not one of those users. How do you prove to the poll that you are a gamer, care about games or know what an RPG is?

In order to take the poll, you are required to take a gamer purity test that keeps non-gamers outside of the gates while pledging allegiance to the D&D brand.

 

[mamba]

Since then it looks like the numbers have changed very little since the initial wave of voting

and I still do not trust those numbers any more than I did yesterday...

So what’s the cutoff for data you would believe about trends in how D&D is being played, purchased, or accessed? 2,000 respondents? 5,000 respondents? 20,000 respondents? Or is it that the data has to come from WotC?

it has to come from what I believe to be 5e players, why would I care what anyone else thinks

 

[mamba]

Why am I going to spend another 80-100 dollars on a single book

why indeed when it is selling for $50... where are you located?

 

[KYRON45]

In order to take the poll, you are required to take a gamer purity test that keeps non-gamers outside of the gates while pledging allegiance to the D&D brand.

That's very clever.
I have no allegiance to WOTC or any other brand. My question is how valid are poll numbers when any one can answer them even if they have no idea what the poll is about?

 

[Umbran]

I think that "If" may be doing a lot of heavy lifting for your argument here, and I would politely request that you don't presume the bold is my intent.

In any communication, there are a minimum of three texts: what the author intended, what is literally on the page (or in the piece, to generalize to non-written communication), and what the audience gets from it.

So, the effect can be there, even if the intent was not. When you talk about who has been here longer, and who is being unfair to whom, the reading shouldn't be that surprising.

 

[tetrasodium]

Does that mean only gamers are responding? If one of the estimated 556 million X users stumbled upon a random poll and answered it wouldn't that skew the results more than a little? I'm seriously asking. I am not one of those users. How do you prove to the poll that you are a gamer, care about games or know what an RPG is?

look at his past titles...
Freelance drawing guy. Previously Art Studio Lead for Dungeons & Dragons, Art Director Larian Studios, and Lead Concept Artist for Magic the Gathering.

Twitter tends to show you stuff from people you follow & posts that the almighty algorithm thinks are relevant to your interests rather than random nonsense. I would expect that a great many of them are people who enjoy the art in one ore more of those three wotc/d&d products?

 

[O-Castitatis-Lilium]

why indeed when it is selling for $50... where are you located?

I already said it in my response to the other person that said the same thing:

Because the 50$ that is in USD is not the same as CAD. To be fair, local game stores have it set at 70 plus taxes as they are made for those stores, but we have book stores that sells these as well here that are not specifically a game store, that would charge somewhere in the range of 90-100 before taxes because they bring them in for people that don't have access to a local game store but they have access to the book store down the street. So yes, my price range for where I live is appropriate. My point still stands.

 

[Aldarc]

My question is how valid are poll numbers when any one can answer them even if they have no idea what the poll is about?

It's just an informal Twitter poll. Don't read anything more into it than that. It has no official weight or bearing. Plus, you don't have to worry about me. I'm not on Twitter, so I can't respond to the poll.

However, my skin crawls when I hear things like being worried about "non-gamers" taking the poll or having to prove yourself as a "gamer." It reminds me all too much of how similar gatekeepery language was used during Gamergate days.

In any communication, there are a minimum of three texts: what the author intended, what is literally on the page (or in the piece, to generalize to non-written communication), and what the audience gets from it.

So, the effect can be there, even if the intent was not. When you talk about who has been here longer, and who is being unfair to whom, the reading shouldn't be that surprising.

I have clarified my intent, so I hope that the message that I sought to convey is clearer to you now. But more than that, I would also hope that you would know better of me from my own posting history here. I personally don't think that such an intent or reading would be consistent with my character.