D&D General Why Were the Dragon and Dungeon Magazines Discontinued?

[dave2008]

Return on investment juat wasn't there, same as moat magazines.

However, I would say that thw DMsGuild fills the same gap by and large of old magazine content that was sourced from readers.

Actually DnD Beyond fills some of the gap too.

 

[dave2008]

As a lore junkie I have a hard time getting excited for anything that comes out of the DMs Guild, unfortunately. I want to see official lore developments that build up the world of D&D and could be expanded upon in the future, not someone's obscure homebrew.

Counterpoint, there is a a ton (like almost all of it) official lore on the DMsGuild. Lore is, basically, edition neutral. If you want lore on a setting, you can go to the Guild and get the official lore on that setting. If 5e never add any lore to pot, you would still have access to everything you need.

Lore and worldbuilding in particular have largely languished during 5E.

Maybe, but when they do update stuff they get a lot of push back (at least around here). So I could understand why they don't go into the weeds a lot with that. However, they definitely have added to the lore in 5e. The addition of the First World was an interesting add (and to my mind a twist on the 4e Dawn War) and one of the most significant. However, the have also added a ton of lore with the magic settings, the have provided substantial lore about the planescape and spelljamer settings, not to mention quite a lot about Eberron. May not be as much as you want, but there is still a good chunk their.

That being said, I would love the return of Dragon and Dungeon if possible.

 

[Parmandur]

Actually DnD Beyond fills some of the gap too.

For sure, that too!

 

[tomBitonti]

Umm, the history is that the license was pulled from Paizo, then the format was changed to all digital, then content trailed off. The line seems to have died from neglect.

That 4e did not succeed as a full digital platform didn’t help.

I rather enjoyed a monthly fix of reading new adventures in Dungeon. I don’t enjoy digital content the same as printed. And I wasn’t interested in 4e, so I had no interest in the new digital format.

I suspect a part of the reason is that there is an ongoing effort to created a captured ecosystem, similar to the apple app structures. Community content that is not put into the captured, fully monetized ecosystem is not of interest.

TomB

 

[Yaarel]

As a lore junkie I have a hard time getting excited for anything that comes out of the DMs Guild, unfortunately. I want to see official lore developments that build up the world of D&D and could be expanded upon in the future, not someone's obscure homebrew. Lore and worldbuilding in particular have largely languished during 5E.

These "official lore developments" are moreorless the same thing as a DM choosing a setting.

It might be more helpful to achieve this goal by creating a wiki that many authors can contribute to, to expand and elaborate the details of the setting. Decide what the setting is called, and what its concepts are, and make it a collaborative artwork.

Anything that seems to gel, offer it in DMs Guild.

 

[Echohawk]

It is worth noting that the only current official D&D magazine is D&D Adventurer, produced under license. That has a very different business model, essentially being a relatively pricey dice subscription service plus some printed content. That content is mostly a repackaging of the PHB and DMG, which sadly suggests that to be profitable, a modern magazine needs to sell "stuff" rather than quality written content.

 

[QuentinGeorge]

A lot of the joy of "lore", of course doesn't exist now in 5E where settings are no longer living things but static flavours that are often mangled beyond recognition compared to their pre 5E incarnations.

 

[QuentinGeorge]

The main reason magazines are going extinct, especially for niche hobbies, is the thing you're looking at right now. Awesome websites like this offer all the content a magazine could, and more, updated daily, with forums where you can trade ideas in real time with your fellow fans. For free. Hard for a print magazine to compete.

Forums are also going extinct though, that's why all the big websites like WoTC don't run any themselves anymore.

 

[mamba]

That content is mostly a repackaging of the PHB and DMG

why would I need to have a dice subscription (I do not lose them fast enough for that to make sense) and have them send me a few pages of books I already have at a time?

I am surprised that this is the magazine that is left standing… sounds like something you maybe buy until you have a set of dice, and then never again

 

[Echohawk]

why would I need to have a dice subscription (I do not lose them fast enough for that to make sense) and have them send me a few pages of books I already have at a time?

I am surprised that this is the magazine that is left standing… sounds like something you maybe buy until you have a set of dice, and then never again

I mean, it's not technically a dice subscription, it's a magazine subscription which happens to include a "toy" with each issue, and statistically speaking 3/4 of the toys are sets of dice. I detailed what you get with issues #1-20 here.

I can't give you any reason why you might need this. Frankly, I don't think anyone really needs a subscription to D&D Adventurer. I have to imagine that completist collectors (guilty!) are probably the main audience. That and maybe people who intended to subscribe to Disney Cross Stitch (from the same publisher) and misclicked.