D&D General Ray Winninger on 5e’s success, product cadence, the OGL, and more.

[Stormonu]

Really begs the question of what the other < 50% of players were doing. Not using DDB at all? Using it for something other than character creation?

I'm genuinely curious!

I'm somewhat dubious about that percent and where that number supposedly came from. Trying to tie down the actual number of D&D players is no easy task.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

I think it's a failure, personally, for the creators. I think it could be much better if there were better curation and marketing on behalf of the creators. A 'good housekeeping seal of approval' would do wonders to separate the wheat from the chaff, and develop new talents. Right now it's a flat miasmic plain.

The thing is, they did have that seal of approval. The Guild Adepts program wasn't perfect -- it wasn't clear why someone got that seal of approval -- but it did tend to go to very good creators and Guild Adept products tended to be of a very high quality, which cannot be said for a lot of the stuff there.

And then one day, the program just stopped without notice.

I suspect it was run by one person inside WotC and it just stopped when they left.

 

[Reynard]

The thing is, they did have that seal of approval. The Guild Adepts program wasn't perfect -- it wasn't clear why someone got that seal of approval -- but it did tend to go to very good creators and Guild Adept products tended to be of a very high quality, which cannot be said for a lot of the stuff there.

And then one day, the program just stopped without notice.

I suspect it was run by one person inside WotC and it just stopped when they left.

I have still never found a good source for knowing what is worth looking at there. When Dragon+ was running, they used to highlight titles, at least.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

I have still never found a good source for knowing what is worth looking at there. When Dragon+ was running, they used to highlight titles, at least.

The Guild Adepts section is still on the front page. The stuff on there, while older, tends to be good. And, generally, the best-sellers are often pretty good as well.

Otherwise, I would look at how much of a catalog a given creator has and what people say on those.

 

[mearls]

Ray does seem to dispute this issue in the interview, stating "they" (meaning, I suppose, you and the team there at 5e launch) wanted to do a product a month but didn't have the resources for it and only came on this strategy later after the results were so positive. However he also repeatedly mentions he wasn't there at 5e launch and did not develop 5e but just stepped in 7 years after launch. So it seems his impression of what had happened prior to his arrival was incorrect.

Yeah, the "they" is me, Nathan Stewart, and Liz Schuh. We had asked about product frequency as part of the playtest surveys. If we had really wanted monthly releases, we would've just brought on more publishers under contract to do stuff. We had signed on Green Ronin, Kobold Press, and Sasquatch to fill out the release schedule while we finished the core rulebooks. He's probably conflating the two.

 

[Reynard]

The Guild Adepts section is still on the front page. The stuff on there, while older, tends to be good. And, generally, the best-sellers are often pretty good as well.

Otherwise, I would look at how much of a catalog a given creator has and what people say on those.

I am in the market for a lot of small things to fill a big sandbox and it seems like the Guild should be a good place for that sort of thing.

 

[Chaltab]

I am in the market for a lot of small things to fill a big sandbox and it seems like the Guild should be a good place for that sort of thing.

The problem is that that stuff like Adventures tends to sell poorly on DMs Guild. My two Spelljammer books hit Electrum and Silver respectively but none of my adventures have made it to copper. And on top of that there's so much AI content on there now it's hard to trust if what you're buying is actually even written by a person.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

The problem is that that stuff like Adventures tends to sell poorly on DMs Guild. My two Spelljammer books hit Electrum and Silver respectively but none of my adventures have made it to copper. And on top of that there's so much AI content on there now it's hard to trust if what you're buying is actually even written by a person.

DriveThruRPG seems to be better for adventures at the moment, for whatever reason. My copper seller is my adventure (although my bestiary is going to be hitting copper any day now).

 

[dave2008]

I have still never found a good source for knowing what is worth looking at there. When Dragon+ was running, they used to highlight titles, at least.

It would be nice if this was a regular article on DnD Beyond.

 

[darjr]

I recall there is evidence of the plan from early on too. Maybe even before the release. Here in ENWorld. Other quotes etc.