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

[WinningerR]

Failure? Nah.

The DM's Guild could certainly be managed a LOT better. Better for customers/fans, better for the creators, better for the community, and even better for WotC. It's a far from ideal set up in several ways beyond the 50% cut.

But if you are a fan who wants to get started in game design, get your work exposed to a large audience, and make some beer money . . . the guild is a great way to go, even with the 50% cut. Oh, and of course, if you want to include D&D IP in your work. The guild is the only place you can publish your "Guide to Greyhawk" or what-have-you.

Now, if you are seriously wanting to build a career as a game designer, starting with products on the DM's Guild is an okay way to go, but eventually you will want to move away from that platform.

Amen to all of that. It’s also important to keep that 50% in perspective. Publishers typically give up 60% of MSRP on books sold through retail (online or B&M). That’s why WotC is now putting so much effort into selling printed D&D books direct-to-consumers via DDB; they want to claw back some of that 60% wholesale discount. Also, the DMsG doesn’t charge you an additional licensing fee to use WotC’s IP. On a property like Forgotten Realms, licensing fees would probably run another 10-15%. In other words, if Keith Baker was publishing his Eberron books and selling them through Amazon, etc, he’d keep much less than 50% of the sale price.

That said, there is certainly room to lower that 50% and we were looking at that when I left. One obstacle is that DMs Guild is operated by Roll20/DTRPG, so they need their cut (which is often 35% on DTRPG’s other sites) too.

 

[Shardstone]

It wasn't. It was people in their 30s to early 40s. That's how old GenXers and Xennials were 11 years ago.

Winneger is saying that when he came in, specifically women, and a lot of high school girls, were lifting the results. No where does he indicate that it was people specifically in their 30s and 40s. 11 years ago, people in their 20s and teens and 30s came in to lift the game. That's millenials primarily, and now Gen Z after us, with Xennials being with that.

 

[Shardstone]

Are we talking today growth, or early 5e growth?

I was under the assumption we were talking early 5e growth.

I'm not sure why it matters; demographics for 5E have never indicated that older players outweighed younger players, neither now nor 11 years ago.

 

[Shardstone]

We can cut to the chase and ask the source though: @WinningerR and @mearls

 

[John Lloyd1]

I don't know why I did not think of that. They have an official FB feed so it probably has stuff they are promoting at least.

There is also the DriveThruRPG newletter that features DMs Guild products.

 

[Reynard]

Winneger is saying that when he came in, specifically women, and a lot of high school girls, were lifting the results. No where does he indicate that it was people specifically in their 30s and 40s. 11 years ago, people in their 20s and teens and 30s came in to lift the game. That's millenials primarily, and now Gen Z after us, with Xennials being with that.

I'm not sure why it matters; demographics for 5E have never indicated that older players outweighed younger players, neither now nor 11 years ago.

We can cut to the chase and ask the source though: @WinningerR and @mearls

I don't know why you are being so aggressive about it. I posited a theory is all, based on the sattement that it was women and not "youth" that increased the number initially.

Also, are you privy to the D&D demographics through history? Do you know the cohorts over time?

 

[Shardstone]

I don't know why you are being so aggressive about it. I posited a theory is all, based on the sattement that it was women and not "youth" that increased the number initially.

Also, are you privy to the D&D demographics through history? Do you know the cohorts over time?

Didn't mean to come off as aggressive, apologies. But you didn't phrase your post as a theory, you phrased it as a fact.

 

[Reynard]

Didn't mean to come off as aggressive, apologies. But you didn't phrase your post as a theory, you phrased it as a fact.

This was my theory.

I would have guessed it was an age thing, too.

Since we know a lot of GenXers and Xellenials returned with 5E, and they were old enough to have families by then, I wonder if it is possible that wives and girlfriends came with some of the lapsed gamers. I know from personal experience that during the "dark years" when WoW ate a lot of tabletop D&D groups, women were easily half of those players. So I wonder if folks coming back to the table were joined by the same women playing WoW etc with them?

Everything after was trying to clarify what cohort I was talking about. We know that it was returning players that gave 5E its initial boost, not new players. The new players came in afterwards, driven by CR and other streaming shows, and Stranger Things (which was a GenX nostalgia show, remember).

 

[SlyFlourish]

Amen to all of that. It’s also important to keep that 50% in perspective. Publishers typically give up 60% of MSRP on books sold through retail (online or B&M). That’s why WotC is now putting so much effort into selling printed D&D books direct-to-consumers via DDB; they want to claw back some of that 60% wholesale discount. Also, the DMsG doesn’t charge you an additional licensing fee to use WotC’s IP. On a property like Forgotten Realms, licensing fees would probably run another 10-15%. In other words, if Keith Baker was publishing his Eberron books and selling them through Amazon, etc, he’d keep much less than 50% of the sale price.

That said, there is certainly room to lower that 50% and we were looking at that when I left. One obstacle is that DMs Guild is operated by Roll20/DTRPG, so they need their cut (which is often 35% on DTRPG’s other sites) too.

The big issue is that, while Amazon takes 40%, I can sell the book elsewhere. The exclusivity and the fee together make publishing to the DMs Guild nearly untenable for a high quality product. Not being able to crowdfund it alone is a huge detriment.

I get it, if you’re using WOtC IP, this is really the only way to go. But there’s a ceiling on the quality of a product you can reasonably publish to the DMs Guild and it’s why you don’t see other small publishers there.

I know you know all this. I appreciate your response!!

 

[SlyFlourish]

That was great fun. Thanks for listening everyone.

It was a really great interview. Thank you!